A little to the south of Mount Hopelesssoure good pastoral tracts have lately been discovered and occupied. The northern extremity of this mountain region is bounded by a level desert. A salt crust is found at Intervals on the surface of the sand, and a few pieces of what appear to be drift timber are lying about. This desert is about 300 feet above the level of the sea. The river Broughton may bo considered the southern boundary of this barren mountain region. It rises on the declivities of Mount Bryan, and appears to be of considerable size daring the rainy season. In the dry season its upper course consists of extensive reaches of water connected by a atrongly-running atream, Into which several chains of pond. discharge their water during the rains. Lower down the Broughton winds through some broken hills of an open but barren description, and hero the water is lost in the sands; only water-bolee are found at intervals. Still farther down the channel, though very wide and deep, is quite dry. After the rains however the waters come down to Spencer Gulf.
South of the Broughton a few high hills are found, as the Razorback (2900 feet above the sea) and the Lagoon Hill (2260 feet), but they soon sink much lower. The country between these bills and the shores of Spencer Gulf presents open grassy downs, which are well adapted for sheep, and abundantly watered by ponds. With this part is connected Yorke Peninsula, which separates Spencer Gulf from the Gulf of St. Vincent. This peninsula is about 100 miles long, with an average width of 15 miles. Its surface is level, rising gently towards the interior ; the soil is a light sandy loam, and generally wooded in a park-like manner, except towards the eastern shores, where the woods are thick and have underwood.
The beat portion of the colony is the country lying on the east of the Gulf of St. Vincent. The interior of this tract is hilly. The hills run in • series, of distinct ridges called ranges, from Mount Bryan range In the north, to Wakefield range, which spreads over the penin sula, between the Gulf of St. Vincent and Encounter Bay. The intervening space is occupied by the Belvidere, Barossa, and Mount Lofty ranges. Mount Lofty, which is about 12 miles E. from the city of Adelaide, rises to the height of 1200 feet. The several ranges are mostly well wooded with large timber-trees. Along the shores of the gulf are low sand-downs, on which only bushes grow. Between these downs and the hills is an undulating country, which contains a great portion of land capable of cultivation.
In this part the town of Adelaide, the capital of the colony, is situated. [ADELarea.) It is built on the southern border of the Tomes, a river which rises in the hills about 6 miles E. from the town. It can be called a river only in the rainy season, when the banks are full, and it runs with great velocity. In the dry season it consists of a number of expansions like small lakes, which are very deep and of considerable length, but rarely more than 30 or 40 feet wide. These pools arc connected with each other by shallow places, in which the water is hardly a foot wide and an inch deep. At these places scarcely a current is perceptible in the dry season. The Torrens in that season does not reach the sea, but is lost in what is called the Iteed-bed, a swampy flat depression overgrown with reeds, which is separated from the shores by the sandy downs. When the river is full the surplus water finds its way to the sea by running from the Reed-bed to the Creek, which is an inlet branching oft' from the Gulf of St. Vincent about 12 miles N.W. from Adelaide. It runs about
4 mile. eastward and then 12 miles southward, terminating not far from the Reed-bed. Though there is a bank at the entrance of the creek, with only 14 or 15 feet of water over it, vessels of 500 tons burden can rail up to Port Adelaide, which is only four miles from the town, and has a good landing-place and wharfs. As the water in the wells of Adelaide is brackish, that of the Torrens River is used for all purposes, and is oven transported to Port Adelaide for the con sumption of the people there, and for the vessels. Besides the Torrens, the rivers Wakefield and Gassier, and the united streams of the Gilbert and Light, fall into the Gulf of St. Vincent north of Adelaide, as do on the south the Onkaparinga, Curricalinga, Yankalilla, and several other streams, most of which are partly dried up during summer.
The Murray is the largest river in Australia, and its remotest tributaries rise in the Australian Alps, not far from the eastern shores of the continent. (AurrraaLta.) It enters South Australia near 34° S. and flows west for about 80 miles, when it suddenly turns to the south, and runs In that direction to the sea, before entering which it expands into • large lake called Lake Victoria, or Lako Alexandrine. Ma navigable river, which within the province has a uniform width of about 300 yards, and a minimum depth of 12 feet, runs in a level bottom about 4 miles wide, inclosed by grounds from 20 to 40 feet higher. Between the winding course of the etream and the base of the higher grounds, on both sides, are flats of greater or loss extent, overgrown with reeds. The soil is of the richest kind, being fofmed by an accumulation of vegetable matter, and as black as ebony ; but as the destruction of the reeds requires much labour, little has been done to hriug it under cultivation. Lake Victoria is about 30 miles long and 15 miles across in the widest part. It has a depth of from 36 to above 160 feet, and is united to Encounter Bay by three shallow chanuels, the shortest of which is four miles long. From the southern side of Lake Victoria branches off a narrow chanud, which after two miles gradually expands into another lake of smaller dimensions, called Lake Albert. This lake is separated from the sea by a sandy neck of land and the Coorong. The whole course of the Murray, from the junction of the Darling, some miles east of the province line, to the Goolwa, which connects Lake Victoria with Encounter Bay, is about 350 miles. In August, September, and October, 1853, an experimental voyage up the river Murray was accomplished by Captain Cadell, with a steamer, the Lady Augusta, which had been specially constructed with a view to this service. Sir Henry Young, the governor of South Australia, accompanied the party; and the steamer reached Swan Hill, about 800 miles from the mouth of the river. The navigation of the Murray for such a distance Into the interior, and the circumstance of its being available for about six mouths in the year, are of great importance to the prosperity of South Australia. Large quantities of wool can now be sent down the river from remote inland districts, and facilities of communication are afforded between the provinces of New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia.