finest
rivers yet discovered in Australia, and from the richness of the
country through which it flows, must one day become of great commercial
importance. The country around is remarkable for the excellence and
beauty of its timber; the cedar ranking first among its vegetable
productions. Large sums have been given in London for some logs of
cedar from this district, for the most expensive kind of cabinet-work,
in which it often surpasses the best specimens of mahogany.
The
Clarence is obstructed by a bar, yet surpasses all other Australian
rivers in the breadth and volume of its waters; its reaches, too, being
longer and wider than those of any other river on the coast. As a
grazing district, the country through which it flows is of a high
order, being, in addition to its fertility, for the most part level;
and even the mountains do not attain any great elevation, except at the
sources of the streams. A great number of squatters have stations at
the Clarence River. The communication between the table land along the
main range and the navigable estuary is easy, and wool drays can
descend with facility from Beardy Plains, the table land opposite the
sources of the river, to that part of the river where vessels take in
cargo for Sydney.
The Richmond is
another river of the Clarence district, entering the Pacific to the
southward of Lennox Head. The general character of the country on this
river presents slightly wooded grassy forest of the greatest fertility.
There are few rivers in Australia in which so much good available land
exists unbroken by densely wooded ranges and ravines. The low flats
near the mouth of the river are covered with mangrove scrubs, tea tree,
and the swamp oak, but the alluvial land higher up is diversified with
brush, abounding in cedar and pine, clumps of bangola palms, reedy
swamps, small rich plains, and lightly wooded forest flats of great
richness.
The Brisbane.—This
river falls into Moreton Bay, previous to the termination of its course
receiving the waters of the Logan, Tweed, and Scott. The Logan rises on
Mount Lindsay, in the Clarence River district, and flows through the
county
