to measure its girth. This is often the case with fallen trees. On our return, I measured two Stringy-barks, near the houses at the Hampshire Hills, that had been felled for splitting into rails, each 180 feet long. Near to these, is a tree that has been felled, which is so large that it could not be cut into lengths for splitting, and a shed has been erected against it; the tree serving for the back!
7th. I accompanied J. Milligan in a visit to an open plain, previously unexplored, which we had seen from an eminence, and taken the bearing of, by the compass. We set out early and reached the place about noon. It was covered with long grass and tall fern, to which we set fire. As evening drew on, we made "a break-wind" of boughs, and thatched it with fern, &c, of which we also prepared a bed. Toward night, rain fell, but not so as to extinguish our tire, though it stopped the burning of the grass and fern. We were amused with the note of a little bird, in the wood near which we had formed our shelter, that in a shrill whistle, seemed to involve the words, "Who are you? who are you? Are you wet? are you?"—In passing through a woody hollow, we saw many of the tree-ferns, with the upper portion of the trunk split, and one half turned back. This had evidently been done by the Aborigines, to obtain the heart for food, but how the process was effected, I could not discover; it must certainly have required considerable skill. Many small branches of the bushes were broken and left hanging: by this means these people had marked their way through the untracked thicket.
8th. The morning being wet, we concluded to return to the Hampshire Hills, and having to pass over the burnt ground on which the charred stems of the fern were standing, we were blackened by them in a high degree; but afterwards, on coming among wet scrub, we were as effectually washed. We then passed 4½ hours in traversing a dreary Myrtle-forest, making frequent use of the compass, and sometimes losing sight of each other, by the intervention of tree-ferns. We were much impeded by roots of trees projecting above the grassless surface of the earth, and by fallen and decaying timber. In crossing some of the latter,
