We had heard much of the famous Blue Mountains during our progress from West Australia to New South Wales and were anxious to visit them. In the early days they formed an impenetrable barrier between Sydney and the rich country beyond. Many vain and unsuccessful attempts were made to cross these labyrinthine ranges. Each successive line of heights is so like another, its eucalyptus-covered shoulders with the deep, blind gorges between, for long baffled and defied all attempts at exploration. The first of these efforts was undertaken as early as 1793–4 by three naval officers; but it was not till 1813, in the time of Governor Macquarie, that some settlers interested in stock-breeding won their way through. For a time, like all their predecessors, they got entangled in the bewildering network of gorges that make travelling here so difficult, but at last, chancing upon a dividing spur that ran westward, they pursued its ridge till, arriving at the summit, they saw below them a fairly open valley with a running stream and good pasture.

Governor Macquarie at once followed up the important discovery by sending out another expedition, which led to the discovery of a river flowing westward, the “Macquarie River,” and subsequently opened up the country beyond. A road was constructed across the mountain in 1815. Early inland exploration in Australia forms an interesting and often tragic chapter in the history of the continent. Its story has been told in detail in Favenc’s “Australian Exploration.”

We got up very early in the morning. How delightful it was to throw open the shutters on to the green trees and lawns of the garden with the busy blue waters of the harbour below, the big ships lading and unlading their cargo on to tenders, the little local steamers bustling to and fro, looking as if there was not room for them all. Breakfast, including a very agreeable kind of marmalade jelly, made of sweet oranges, was brought to us at seven o’clock, and we started shortly afterwards. It was a still morning with a threat of rain, and heavy, drifting clouds. The water round the little wooden landing-stage of Kirribilli Point is so clear that small shoals of fish can be seen distinctly swimming about the piles, and we watched for some time a little speckled thing that looked like a mouse in shape.

We passed out of the suburbs of Sydney, through the outlying red wooden houses, with corrugated iron roofs, surrounded by greenery and standing in cleared spaces. Then came green fields, sometimes with the dead trees or their stumps still remaining. We noticed numerous orange trees before we left the populated district. The hour was still very early; we slept peacefully for the greater part of the journey. Unless the faculty of sleeping in a train is cultivated, there is no enjoyment for the Australian traveller, for he must always journey scores of miles to get anywhere, and the country, generally speaking, varies little in character. On this occasion we awoke to find ourselves in a sort of Swiss scenery, with range on range of blue hills. This endless vista of gum-covered hill after gum-covered hill made it easy to see why for years the Blue Mountains were the despair of pioneers, who, surmounting one range, found another in front of them exactly the same. The view was only varied by red escarpments in places. The stopping-places, as we slowly mounted higher, were entirely conventional. We might have been looking out on a suburb of London—Sydenham, for instance, as far as the aspect of the neat suburban houses was concerned. The illusion was deepened by the appearance of “Springfield Ladies’ College,” very trim and sedate among its neighbours, only the gardens bore camellia bushes for roses.

Leura, on the other hand, gives the illusion of a Swiss village, with its background of high dark hills, large flourishing hotels, and rows of fir trees. Our destination was Katoomba. These hill settlements are on the way to becoming thriving towns. A large and excellent hotel already dominated the one main street of shops. The Blue Mountains are a popular week-end, or holiday resort for Sydney, whose residents can easily attain the pure mountain air, after the steamy heat which is said to be the normal condition of the city in summer. Katoomba could only boast of one modest street, but it supported two chemists’ shops, and a furnishing company, conducted by a man of unsurpassed initiative and a sense of the dramatic. One would not have supposed that there was scope for such a faculty in the furnishing trade. But in his shop window was represented not mere specimens of his wares, not merely pillow-slips and dining-tables to tempt the hardy pioneer from the backwoods, but that hardy pioneer himself. The whole shop front had been converted into a scene representing a sumptuously furnished hotel bedroom, in which a young man, a wax figure, had retired for the night. His clothes were thrown carelessly about the room, his boots and socks kicked off by the bedside, his gun leant in one corner, the contents of his small tin trunk were neatly arranged on the dressing-table. A small table, on which were a pack of cards and an empty champagne bottle, bore testimony to his gay bachelor habits, but before he went to bed his last thought had been otherwise, for open upon the writing-table was a letter written in a large bold hand to his “Dearest Henriette,” lamenting his loneliness, and asking when the happy day would come on which they should set up house together. The whole scene was so realistic that the youth of Katoomba could not linger long unmoved in contemplation of it.

We lunched at the large hotel of the little settlement, its verandah overlooking a fine vista of misty hills that must have been superb on a sunny day, but the rain clouds hung heavily over them, diffusing an exquisitely soft light under the low grey sky. After lunch we started on the top of a coach drawn by five horses to see some of the falls for which the neighbourhood is famous. It took skilled driving over the rough tracks that did duty for roads. We bumped up and down steep ascents and descents, swung round impossible corners with glimpses between the trees of range on range of misty blue mountains stretching away illimitable, mysterious, aloof, with no sign of life on their soft gum-clad slopes.

Occasionally the coach stopped, and we got down, while the guide who accompanied us pointed out some famous views or some especially beautiful fir-clad gully, with a little trickle of water falling from the rocks and tinkling away unseen. There seemed to be no birds or animals. The guide said that the foxes were killing off the small native animals in these gorges, and that of the koala bears, which were once numerous, there were very few left. A price is given for foxes’ skins in the hope of exterminating them. We were told in Melbourne that they fetched 10s. On one of these occasions we heard a curious noise, something like the gobbling of a turkey, made by a large brown bird, which the guide affirmed to be a lyre bird.

The Katoomba Falls, which we visited last, were on a much more imposing scale. The water comes down from a great height in a succession of falls. As a matter of fact an extra supply of water was turned on for the benefit of ourselves and some other visitors, so that altogether our impression of Katoomba was that of a very sophisticated spot. The excellent hotel and the soft sweet air, even in winter, though it is 3000 feet above sea level, would certainly make it an ideal place for rest, with an endless variety of delightful walks, which would reveal in their season all kinds of plants, animals, and insects, as well as the magnificent mountain views. It was dark when we started on the return journey, which seemed so interminable that we marvelled at the hardihood of the people who actually live at such places as Katoomba and go into Sydney for business, for such we were told there are. The lights of Sydney and a very belated dinner were more than welcome.

It is difficult in a new country to think in large enough terms—to realise, for instance, that New South Wales is more than two and a half times as large as the whole British Isles. In this vast expanse of country the climate varies greatly, from that of Mount Kosciusko in the south, where ski-ing and other Alpine sports are carried on in the winter, to the warm and humid districts of the north. There is thus a correspondingly great variety of products; from wheat, barley, and maize to sugar-canes and tobacco, cotton, and olives; from strawberries to that much over-rated tropical fruit, the mango.

The state of New South Wales may be roughly divided, geographically, into three areas. A coastal district; plateaux or tablelands, of which the Blue Mountains form part; and the western or inland plains. Agricultural and pastoral production varies according to the character of these different areas.

Dairying is making rapid progress in the coastal districts of the north; the tablelands afford admirable conditions for mixed farming, in which the raising of sheep and cattle is combined with the growth of cereals; the western slopes are the centre of the wheat industry; while the vast area of level grass land in the far west give pasturage to 40,000,000 merino sheep.

For the chief contributing factor to the pastoral wealth of Australia has been wool. By far the greater part is exported, for though local woollen mills have been started they do not absorb much more than 1¼% of the whole clip. It was the introduction of the merino sheep from South Africa, through the agency of a Captain MacArthur in 1797, that laid the foundation of the Australian wool trade, for the merino unites the faculty of producing the finest wool with the capacity of seeking its food over the most extended areas, and of resisting drought.

New South Wales is now the most important wool producing state in Australia, and exported in 1912 44·4% of the total export of wool from the continent. The Commonwealth Returns for 1911 show that Australia exported 44% of the total value of all wool imported into the United Kingdom alone, in round numbers more than fourteen million pounds’ worth, as compared with seven millions from New Zealand, and two from Cape Colony.

By far the most important product after wool is wheat. In 1911–12 a little over 65% of the whole area under cultivation was devoted to wheat. At present less than 2% of the land in the state is under cultivation, though over 92% is occupied. “In the past New South Wales has filled a most important place as the premier wool-producing country in the world. But during later years the production of wheat and other cereals has been steadily increasing.... The land is the great source of wealth, and we cannot continue to let the great part of such wealth lie idle.... Australia, and more particularly New South Wales, may confidently accept “mixed farming” as the solution of the land problem.”

The days of enormous runs, at all events on land suitable for agriculture, are numbered ... the big run, having served its turn, is fated to undergo subdivision and closer settlement.18 Under the Closer Settlement Act large areas of good land have been repurchased by the Government and disposed of at from 25s. to £5 an acre. The terms are very easy; a small deposit has to be made, and the remainder is paid off over a term of years. Many large private estates are being periodically cut up, and under the Closer Settlement Promotion Act three or more persons having agreed with the owners of land as to price and area, may apply to the Crown to purchase the lands.19 The system of “Shares Farming” is being worked with great success in New South Wales at present. The landowner supplies the land, the tenant the labour, the produce of the combination is equally divided. By this means the farm labourer without capital soon acquires land of his own.20

Among the many charms of Sydney and its neighbourhood are the flat sandy beaches that have made surf bathing popular. Our host had planned a delightful expedition by motor and motor-launch that was to culminate in a real Australian picnic in the bush with “billy” tea and damper, showing us on the way Manly Beach. The morning was drizzling and heavy, but Australian weather at its worst always has lucid intervals, and soon after our early start the rain had cleared off. Our way led through the extensive suburbs of Mosman, past many arms of the harbour, like lovely inland lakes with wooded banks, down to a narrow point called the Spit, from which a ferry crosses to the eastern side. Here we met many other motor-cars, all converging on the same point, and after crossing on the ferry and climbing a steep hill, we had left Sydney and its harbour behind, and presently began to have glimpses of the Pacific. The drive was one of endless charm and novelty: sometimes we passed what looked like a rushy inland lake, sometimes we were close to the shore. Several miles of the coast land here have been bequeathed to the Salvation Army, which has erected various buildings on this beautiful site. At one point a sandy bar separated a reach of still water from the great sunlit breakers beyond, and within it hundreds of black swans were swimming.

There were numerous week-end cottages among the gum trees. The road ended under a steep hill, its hedges covered with a sweet-scented yellow flower. We had reached our destination of Pittwater, an arm of Broken Bay, so named by Captain Cook. It looks like a great lake, the low hilly shores covered with trees down to the water’s edge. Our motor-boat was waiting at the end of a little jetty. The tide was low, and in the mud alongside were myriads of little crabs that disappeared with astonishing rapidity, scuttling into their holes. It was a pretty little voyage across this smooth arm of the sea, in which big yellowish-green jelly-fish floated beside us. At the landing on the opposite side of the creek the shore was fringed with small oysters.

In the bush spring flowers were already beginning to appear. Ferns and cotton palms grew among the gums, a yellow clematis was coming into flower, and the lovely pink starlike Queensland rose, that is not really a rose, but a kind of boronia. We lunched at one of the picnic places provided by the forethought of a paternal government, with a place to boil the billy all ready, and a wooden shelter with rough benches and table. There is always plenty of dry wood in Australia; a soft-water tank was part of the equipment, and the billy was soon boiling; so we had our billy tea and damper, a kind of unleavened bread that is very agreeable, and it was great fun, though the pioneer effect of it was rather diminished by such accessories as hock and salmon sandwiches. Then we gathered a bunch of the lovely unfamiliar flowers and started on our return journey, which was varied by our running along Manly Beach, crowded with Sunday pleasure-seekers even in these early spring days.

Sydney is so split up and scattered over its hills that it takes some time for a stranger to realise its extent. All these Australian towns are so extraordinarily well-to-do; there is never anything like our working-class suburbs. “Where do the poor people live?” we used to ask. The obvious answer being that there are no poor.

For us Sydney will always mean Kirribilli Point, and the old house, whose owner called it by the pretty native name of Wyreepi—“Come and stay”—a name eloquent of the unfailing kindness and hospitality within its portals—an old house shuttered and barred against the depredations of the early lawless convict settlers who had helped to build it. The name evokes a mental picture of its red gables and chocolate-coloured walls, with the gravel paths to match; its hedge of grey, closely clipped salt bush, its sloping lawns and tall trees, its beds of sweet peas and stocks, sweetest of spring flowers, the coral-tree its bare boughs hanging with scarlet flowers; and in front the grass sloping to the water’s edge, and the endless panorama of the harbour.

Those who have unlimited time at their disposal can choose between taking ship at Sydney and coasting up to Brisbane in preference to the very long and exhausting railway journey of about thirty hours; though by so doing they would miss the magnificent scenery of the Hawkesbury River, and the smiling suburban country-side that the train passes through after leaving Sydney, with the red iron-roofed houses scattered among the gum trees. The Hawkesbury River runs into the northern extremity of Broken Bay, bordered here by a national reserve of great beauty called Kuring-gai-Chase. Formerly trains from Sydney were met on the shores of the river by a steamer, which took passengers across to the other side to continue their journey; a delightful experience on a fine day, for every traveller on its shores must long to make a closer acquaintance with this noble and mighty river. Now, however, it is spanned by a bridge, which crosses to Long Island, where it resembles an Italian lake. Along the shore the water showed through a fringe of coral-trees. Farther north the country grew more tropical; we noticed a tiny house flanked on either side by two tall brugmancias in flower. And the undergrowth of the bush became more varied. We saw for the first time a curious kind of white bulrush, growing like the “black boys” of Western Australia. They looked just like very tall church candles, their black spikes forming the wick. The bush is always the same, that is, it is always a forest of gums; but it has nevertheless an individual character from the undergrowth in the different states and latitudes.

We stopped for some time at Newcastle, an inferno of smoking chimneys and coal-dust. The coal deposits of New South Wales are its most important source of mineral wealth, and her coalfields are greater in area, and produce a better quality of coal than those of any other state; it is hoped for that reason that New South Wales may become the principal centre of manufacture in the continent. Coal was first discovered in 1797 in the coalfield south of Sydney, and soon after coal was found in the cliffs at Newcastle, which has become an important centre of export.

After leaving Newcastle the line turns westward from the coast and crosses the fertile Hunter River valley, where the soil is so rich that it yields as many as eight crops in one year, averaging between three and four tons to the acre. We stopped for dinner at what we supposed to be in the dark a small wayside station called Singleton. It is actually a town of considerable importance, with a population of 10,000, and the neighbourhood is famous for its breed of horses. We dined in the characteristic wooden, iron-roofed hall. An immense advertisement of the local hairdresser at one end inquired, “Is your hair ringbarked?” A selection of the population, boys in front and men behind, a serious, rough-looking group, watched us at our meal with silent and rapt attention from the open doorway.

Soon after passing Singleton the line ascends steeply, crosses the Liverpool Range and runs through the Liverpool Plains, where some of the best wheat is grown. We awoke next morning to find ourselves passing through forest, and changed trains at Wallangarra, the border station where the gauge changes from four feet eight and a half inches to three feet six, so that all passengers and luggage must be transferred.