140 PHILLIP 1788 each other, and no scrub, except where the soil was poor. April. It was this sort of country that charmed the eyes of Captain Cook and his friends when, '^ properly accoutred for the expedition/' they made their little /'excursions into the country at Botany Bay — finding in one direction the ^^^^^^ face of the country finely diversified by wood and lawn/' and in another " some of the finest meadows in the world. Phillip was so pleased with the undulating landscape before him, with its wild flowers and birds of brilliant plumage flitting through the trees, that he found ordinary English unequal to the expression of his feelings, and therefore gave it the name of Belle Vue — probably in recollection of some pleasant landscape in the old world. But the river was not discovered ; it had taken the party five days to make thirty miles, and there was yet no sign of Mj^ back it. The provisions they had taken with them would not last long enough to enable them to make any further attempt on that occasion to reach the mountains, and Phillip suffered so much from a pain in the side — brought on by sleeping for several nights on damp ground at Broken Bay — ^that he was obliged to return ; but he did so with the intention of re- newing the attempt in a few days. The good country they had seen, and the prospect of discovering a large river, "made everyone, notwithstanding the fatigue, desirous of being of the party"; and they were not a little encouraged Natives to make another attempt by the traces of the natives which they had seen. Phillip says he " was surprised to find tem- porary huts made by the natives far inland, where they must depend solely on animals for food." He did not know then what their resources were, but took it for granted that when they left the sea-coast wild animals were their only source of supply. His conjectures as to their habits at this time are not a little amusing. He could not understand how they could live at any distance from the coast, unless wild animals were very plentiful and easily caught ; being under the im- pression that fish was their principal means of subsistence. Digitized by Google
