mand a ready sale, the supply being much under the de mand ; but in other parts of the colony, the propinquity of a productive soil renders garden produce both abundant and cheap. The whaling ships that frequent Port Stephens obtain vegetables and other articles of refresh ment at extremely moderate prices ; and at Maitland, New castle, Raymond Terrace, Wollonging, the capital of Ilawarra, and other growing townships in these agricul tural districts, the inhabitants are far less severely taxed for the comforts of the table than those of Sydney. The swampy grounds near Botany furnish a large portion of the vegetables consumed in Sydney, and land adapted for the purpose is not reckoned excessively dear at 100Z. per acre. The continuous moisture in such situ ations, whilst the surrounding country may be parched and burnt up, renders them extremely valuable and produc tive, even in the driest season. This fortuitous circum stance points out clearly the good effects that would ensue from a more systematic and economical management of water than has heretofore been dreamt of by the colonists, who seemed to have forgotten that a climate like that of Catalonia demands similar processes to those followed by its inhabitants for fertilizing the soil. A trip to Paramatta, in one of the four steamers which ply regularly up and down between that place and Sydney, is a very favourite Sunday recreation. The distance is sixteen miles. To the west of Sydney, as to the east, the inlet presents a beautiful and broad expanse with islands of sandstone, rising like fortresses out of the water. For the first few miles the shores are serrated by low and rocky headlands, covered with a brown and dwarfish vegetation, of banksias, casuarinee, and ragged