ding from its base to the sea, and having a length
of more than fifty miles in a north and south direction, I have also
named the Province of Victoria, trusting that her Majesty will not object
to bestow her name upon one of the finest provinces in this her new,
vast, and almost unknown empire; and which, protected in its very birth
and infancy by her fostering hand, will doubtless ere long attain to no
mean destiny among the nations of the earth.

The other range is thrown off in a westerly direction from the Darling
Range; it is about forty miles in length from north to south, of a bare,
sterile, and barren nature, and terminates seaward in Mount Perron and
Mount Lesueur; to this range I have given the name of Gairdner's Range:
it forms a very important feature in the geography of this part of
Australia.

DISTRICTS OF BABBAGE AND VICTORIA.

Three extensive districts of good country were also found in the course
of this expedition, the Province of Victoria, before alluded to, the
district of Babbage, and another adjacent to Perth, to which I have not
affixed a name.

The district of Babbage is situated on and near the river Gascoyne, which
stream discharges itself in the central part of the main that fronts
Shark Bay, and may indeed almost be recorded as the central point of the
western coast of Australia; thus at once occupying the most commanding
position in Shark Bay and one of the most interesting points on that
coast; it is moreover the key to a very fine district which is the only
one in that vast inlet that appears well adapted to the purposes of
colonization.

COAST OF SHARK BAY.

Immediately to the south of the southern mouth of this river commences a
line of shoals which at low-water are nearly dry, extending to a distance
of from two to four miles from the coast and running with scarcely any
intermission round the bay: except at high-water it is therefore
impossible to approach the greater part of the coast, even in the
smallest boat, unless by tracking it over those flats, which proceeding
is not unattended with danger, for, if it comes on to blow at all hard,
owing to the shoalness of the water, the whole of them becomes a mass of
broken billows. I feel convinced it was owing to this circumstance that
the navigators who had previously visited this bay left so large a
portion of its coast unexplored.

The shoals in the vicinity of the mouth of this river, as well as those
in the river itself, have