A few years after one of the highest authorities
then in the colony had deemed the western interior, beyond a certain
limit, unfitted for human habitation; and expressed his opinion that the
monotonous flats over which he vainly looked for any rise, extended
almost to the sea coast--snow-clad mountains, feeding innumerable
streams, were discovered to the south of his track.
The successful and arduous expedition led by the young native-born
explorer, had the twofold effect of exposing Oxley's fallacies, and
teaching a lesson of caution to future explorers not to indulge hastily
in general condemnation. This lesson, however, has not been heeded; the
history of Australian exploration being a history of conclusions drawn
one year, to be falsified the next. Hume's journey to Port Phillip at
once added to the British-Colonial Empire millions of acres of arable land
watered by never-failing rivers, with a climate calculated to foster the
growth of almost any species of fruit or grain.
It is a pity that in concluding the review of an expedition, fraught with
so much benefit to the colony, and carried out with so much courage,
hardihood, and facility of resource, that it cannot also be said, and
marked with the same cheerful spirit that pervaded those of Oxley's, but
unfortunately, the evil feeling of jealously that would arise from the
presence of two leaders, showed plainly throughout in petty and
undignified squabbles, which, in after days, led to paper warfare between
the two explorers.
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