Fairfax, the nearest and most
commanding point. About one mile and a half from the beach, we crossed
the dry bed of a stream, trending South by East about twenty yards wide,
with banks from twenty to thirty feet high, composed of reddish earth and
sand, having considerable portions of ironstone in it. A few small
tea-trees of the colonists grew in the sand that formed the dry bed of
the stream. Our course continued afterwards uninterrupted, over a
gradually rising plain, of a sandy scrubby nature, until reaching the
foot of Mount Fairfax, when we crossed another small watercourse,
trending South by West where, for the first time, we noticed a solitary
stunted casuarina. Mount Fairfax is the southern and most elevated part
of an isolated block, forming Moresby's Flat-topped Range. It rests on a
reddish, sandy, sloping plain, on which were occasionally noticed
fragments of quartz and ironstone, which latter formation is the
character of Mount Fairfax, and apparently of the neighbouring heights.
Having completed our observations, which place Mount Fairfax 582 feet
above the level of the sea, we continued our journey to the south-east,
in the direction of Wizard Peak. Two miles, over a scrubby sandy plain,
brought us again to the Chapman or Greenough. Here, for the first time,
there was an appearance of fertility; but only in the valley of the
river, which was about a quarter of a mile wide.

With the exception of a few brackish pools, the bed, as where we before
crossed it, was dry, and formed of white sand, growing in which was a
small crooked kind of drooping gum, besides a species of wattle and
tea-tree. Its course was about South by West and appeared to come from
the valleys, formed by the ranges in the rear of Mount Fairfax, and north
of Wizard Peak. Continuing our journey, we proceeded over an undulating
plain, on the higher parts of which a reddish sand and ironstone gravel
universally prevailed; in the lower parts, and near the watercourses, the
soil approached a light mould, and produced the warran, so much sought
after by the natives. In all this district the vegetation was of the
worst description--the trees, which grew only in the valleys, were small
kinds of banksia, wattles, and drooping gums--not large enough to furnish
building materials.

ASCEND WIZARD PEAK.

In the course of the afternoon we reached the summit of that remarkable
and almost solitary pyramidal hill, Wizard Peak,* which we found composed