Stephenson returned early with two of the mounted police. To his most important question, “ What water
was to be found lower down in the river, the reply was, ‘ Plenty, and a flood coming down from the Turôn
mountains.’ The two policemen said that they had travelled twenty miles with it on the day previous, and
that it would still take some time to arrive near our camp................In the afternoon, two of the men taking
a walk up the river, reported on their return, that the flood poured in upon them when in the river-bed so
suddenly, that they narrowly escaped it. Still the bed of the Macquarie before our camp continued so dry
and silent, that I could scarcely believe the flood coming to be real, and so near to us, who had been put to
so many shifts for the want of water. Towards evening I stationed a man with a gun a little way up the
river, with orders to fire on the flood’s appearance, that I might have time to run and witness what
I so much wished to see, as well from curiosity as from urgent need. The shades of evening came,
however, but no flood, and the man on the look-out returned to the camp. Some hours later, and
after the moon had risen, a murmuring sound, like that of a distant waterfall, mingled with occasional
cracks, as of breaking timber, drew our attention, and I hastened to the river-bauk. By very slow decrees
the sound grew louder, and at length so audible as to draw various persons besides from the camp to the
river-side. Still no flood appeared, although its approach was indicated by the occasional rending of trees
with a loud noise. Such a phænomenon in a most serene moonlight night was new to us all. At length
the rushing sound of waters, and loud cracking of timber, announced that the flood was in the next bend.
It rushed into our sight, glittering in the moonbeams, a moving cataract, tossing before it ancient trees,
and snapping them against its banks. It was preceded by a point of meandering water, picking its way,
like a thing of life, through the deepest parts of the dark, dry and shady bed, of what thus again became a
flowing driver. By my party, situated as we were at that time, beating about the country, and impeded in
our journey solely by the almost total absence of water,—suffering éxcessively from thirst and extreme
heat,—I am convinced the scene never can be forgotten. Here came at once abundance, the produce of
storms in the far-off mountains that overlooked our homes............. The river gradually filled up the
channel nearly bank-high, while the living cataract travelled onward much slower than I had expected to
see it ; so slowly, indeed, that more than an hour after its first arrival the sweet music of the head of the
flood was distinctly audible, as the murmur of waters and diapason crash of logs travelled slowly'through
the tortuous windings............. The next morning the river had risen to within six feet of the top of its
banks, and poured its turbid waters along in fulness and strength, but no longer with noise. All night
that hody of water had been in motion downwards, and seemed to me enough to deluge the whole
country.” . :
So little has as yet been ascertained respecting the climatology of western, north-western and northern
Australia, that i t is not known whether they also are subject to these tremendous, visitations ; but as we
have reason to believe that the intertropical parts of the country are favoured with a more constant supply
of rain as well as a lower degree of temperature, it is most probable that they do hot there qcmir. :
Independently of the vast accession of birds attracted by the great supply of food, as mentioned above,
there are many species which make regular migrations, visiting the southern parts of the continent and Van
Diemen’s Land during the months of summer, for the purpose of breeding and rearing their progeny, and
which retire again northwards on thé approach of winter, following in fact the same law which governs the
migrations of the species inhabiting similar latitudes of the Old World. There are also periods when some
species of birds appear to entirely forsake the part of the country in which they have been accustomed to
dwell, and to betake themselves to some distant locality, where they remain for five or ten years, or even
for a longer period, and whence they as suddenly disappear as they had arrived. Some remarkable
instances of this kind came under my own observation. The beautiful little warbling Grass Parrakeet
(Melopsïttacus undulatus), which, prior to 1838, was so rare in the southern parts of Australia that only
a single example had been sent to Europe, arrived in that year in such countless multitudes on the
Liverpool plains, that I could have procured any number of specimens, and more than once their delicate
bodies formed an excellent article of food for myself and party. The Nymphicus Novoe-Hollandioe forms
another case in point, and the Harlequin Bronze-winged Pigeon (Peristera Aistrionica) a third ; this
latter bird occurred in such numbers on the plains near the Namoi in 1839, that eight fell to a single
discharge of my gun ; both the settlers and natives assured me that they had suddenly arrived, and that they
had never before been seen in that part of the country. The aborigines who were with me, and of whom I
must speak in the highest praise, for the readiness with which they rendered me their assistance, affirmed,
upon learning the nature of my pursuits, that they had come to meet me. The Tribonyx ventralis may be
cited as another Species whose movements are influenced by the same law; This bird visited the colony of
Swan River in 1833, and that of South Australia in 1840, in such countless myriads, that whole fields of
corn were trodden down and destroyed in a single night ; and even the streets and gardens of Adelaide
were, according to .Captain Sturt, alive with them.
If we compare the ornithology of Australia with that of any other country in similar latitudes and of
the same extent, we shall find that it fully equals, if it does not exceed them all, in the number of species it
comprises; and those parts of the country that, are still unexplored doubtless contain many yet to be added
to the list of its Fauna.
In the course of the present work it will be found that I have given a wide range of habitat to
some of the species, and that I have at the same time pointed out slight variations, not amounting to a
specific difference, in individuals from different localities. This difference I am unable to account for»
I do not believe the birds to be distinct species, but am1 inclined to regard them as varieties or races of
the same species, modified by the character of the situations they frequent. I may mention some curious
instances in point : the Artamus sordidus is a migratory bird in Van Diemen’s Land, and is partially
stationary in New South Wales, yet all the examples procured in th e former country are the largest
and most vigorous, which we should naturally attribute to the excess of food afforded by its more humid
climate y but- precisely the reversé of this occurs with regard to the Graucalus parmrostris, which is also a
migratory bird in Van Diemen’s Land, and examples of which, killed in that island, are much more feeble
and diminutive than the Graucali obtained in New South Wales. The Halcyon sanctus, again, whose
distribution is universal in Australia, variés somewhat in size , in every colony, still not sufficiently so as to
afford any tangible specific characters.
Upon taking a general view of the Australian ornithology, we find no species of Vulture, only one
typical Eagle, and indeed a remarkable deficiency in the number of the species of its birds of prey, with
the exception of the nocturnal Owls, among which the members-of the restricted genus S trix are more
numerous than in any other part of the world ; a circumstance which is probably attributable to the great
abundance of small nocturnal quadrupeds.