precedings there had
not been one. Since the establishment of the colony they have
happened upon an average, about once in three years.

The principal cause of them is the contiguity of this river to
the Blue Mountains. The Grose and Warraganbia rivers, from which
two sources it derives its principal supply, issue direct from
these mountains; and the Nepean river, the other principal branch
of it, runs along the base of them for fifty or sixty miles; and
receives in its progress, from the innumerable mountain torrents
connected with it, the whole of the rain which these mountains
collect in that great extent. That this is the principal cause of
these calamitous inundations has been fully proved; for shortly
after the plantation of this colony, the Hawkesbury overflowed
its banks, (which are in general about thirty feet in height), in
the midst of harvest, when not a single drop of rain had fallen
on the Port Jackson side of the mountains. Another great cause of
the inundations, which take place in this and the other rivers in
the colony, is the small fall that is in them, and the consequent
slowness of their currents. The current in the Hawkesbury, even
when the tide is in full ebb, does not exceed two miles an hour.
The water, therefore, which during the rains, rushes in torrents
from the mountains cannot escape with sufficient rapidity; and
from its immense accumulation, soon overtops the banks of the
river, and covers the whole of the low country.

LIVERPOOL.

The town of Liverpool is situated on the banks of Geoge's
river, at the distance of eighteen miles from Sydney. It was
founded by Governor Macquarie, and is now of about six years
standing. Its population may amount to about two hundred souls,
and is composed of a small detachment of military, of
cultivators, and a few artificers, traders, publicans, and
labourers.

The public buildings are a church (not yet I believe
completed) a school house and stores for the reception and issue
of provisions to such of the settlers in the adjacent districts
as are victualled at the expense of the government. These
buildings, however, as might naturally be expected from the very
recent establishment of this town, are but little superior in
their appearance to the rude dwellings of its inhabitants.

The river is about half the size of the Hawkesbury, and is
navigable for boats of twenty tons burden as high up as the town.
It empties itself into Botany Bay, which is