been seen near
its mouth, convicts were sent up to open mines, and, these proving
successful, the town of Newcastle rapidly formed. In 1800 Governor
Hunter returned to England on business, intending to come out again; but
he was appointed to the command of a war-ship, and Lieutenant King was
sent out to take his place.

CHAPTER III.

THE DISCOVERIES OF BASS AND FLINDERS.

#1.# No community has ever been more completely isolated than the first
inhabitants of Sydney. They were three thousand miles away from the
nearest white men; before them lay a great ocean, visited only at rare
intervals, and, for the greater part, unexplored; behind them was an
unknown continent, a vast, untrodden waste, in which they formed but a
speck. They were almost completely shut out from intercourse with the
civilised world, and few of them could have any hope of returning to
their native land. This made the colony all the more suitable as a place
of punishment; for people shrank with horror at the idea of being
banished to what seemed like a tomb for living men and women. But, for
all that, it was not desirable that Australia should remain always as
unknown and unexplored as it then was; and, seven years after the first
settlement was made, two men arrived who were determined not to suffer
it so to remain.

When Governor Hunter came in 1795, he brought with him, on board his
ship the _Reliance_, a young surgeon, George Bass, and a midshipman
called Matthew Flinders. They were young men of the most admirable
character, modest and amiable, filled with a generous and manly
affection for one another, and fired by a lofty enthusiasm which
rejoiced in the wide field for discovery and fame that spread all around
them. Within a month after their arrival they purchased a small boat
about eight feet in length, which they christened the _Tom Thumb_. Its
crew consisted of themselves and a boy to assist--truly a poor equipment
with which to face a great and stormy ocean like the Pacific. They
sailed out, and after tossing for some time like a toy on the huge
waves, they succeeded in entering Botany Bay, which they thoroughly
explored, making a chart of its shores and rivers. On their return,
Governor Hunter was so highly pleased with their work, that, shortly
after, he gave them a holiday, which they spent in making a longer
expedition to the south. It was said that a very large river fell into
the sea south of Botany Bay, and they went out