With a seaboard of over 2500 miles, it is well favoured with ports on the Pacific side. Moreton Bay receives the Brisbane river, on whose banks Brisbane, the capital, stands. Maryborough port is on the Mary, which flows into Wide Bay; Bundaberg, on the Burnett; Gladstone, on Port Curtis; Rockhampton, up the Fitzroy (Keppel Bay); Mackay, on the Pioneer; Bowen, on Port Denison; Townsville, on Cleveland Bay. Cairns and Port Douglas are near Trinity Bay; Cardwell is on Rockingham Bay; Cooktown, on the Endeavour; Thursday Island port, near Cape York; and Normanton, near the Gulf of Carpentaria. The new gulf port is at Point Parker. The quiet Inner Passage, between the shore and the Great Barrier Reef, 1200 miles long, favours the north-eastern Queensland ports. Ipswich, Toowoomba, Oxley, Been-leigh, Maryborough, and Mackay are farming centres; Warwick, Roma, Clermont, Blackall, Aramac, Hughenden, and Mitchell are pastoral ones. Gympie, Charters Towers, Ravenswood, and Palmerville are gold-mining towns; while Stanthorpe and Herberton have tin mines. Townships are laid out by Government as occasion requires. There are fifteen large districts, viz., Moreton, Darling Downs, Wide Bay, Burnett, Maranoa, Warrego, and South Gregory, southward; Port Curtis, Leichhardt, South Kennedy, Mitchell, and North Gregory, central; North Kennedy, Burke, and Cook, northward. Cape York Peninsula is the northern limit. A few persons were sent to the Brisbane in 1826; but the Moreton Bay district of New South Wales was thrown open to colonization in 1842. It was named “Queensland” on its separation from the mother colony in 1859. A natural but unfounded prejudice against its supposed warmer position retarded its progress, or confined its few inhabitants to pastoral pursuits. The discovery of abundant -wealth in minerals and sugar-lands, with the growing conviction of its singular salubrity, greatly advanced the immigration prospects of the colony. A broad plateau, of from 2000 to 5000 feet in height, extends from north to south, at from 20 to 100 miles from the coast, forming the Main Range. This region is the seat of mining, and will be of agriculture. The Coast Range is less elevated. A plateau goes westward from the Great Dividing Range, throwing most of its waters northward to the gulf. The Main Range sends numerous but short streams to the Pacific, and a few long ones south-westward, lost in earth or shallow lakes, unless feeding the river Darling. Going northward, the leading rivers, in order, are the Logan, Brisbane, Mary, Burnett, Fitzroy, Burdekin, Herbert, Johnstone, and Endeavour. The Fitzroy receives the Mackenzie and Dawson; the Burdekin is supplied by the Cape, Belyando, and Suttor. The chief gulf streams are the Mitchell, Flinders, Leichhardt, and Albert. The great dry western plains have the Barcoo, Diamantina, Georgina, Warrego, Maranoa, and Condamine. There are few lakes. A succession of elevated and nearly treeless downs of remarkable fertility contrasts with the heavily timbered country favoured by the rains. Cape York Peninsula is an epitome of Queensland. There is good land alternating with bad. The hills are rich in gold, silver, copper, tin, and coal. The forests are valuable, and the scrub is dense. Flats near the mouths of the many streams are admirable for sugar-cane and rice, while rising slopes suit coffee trees. West of the range dividing the gulf waters from the Pacific is a sandy grassless region where the only vegetation is a poisonous pea. Suddenly the traveller passes from this desert to the glorious downs around Hughenden, a garden-land beside the Flinders. Farther north-west is the charming Leichhardt river district, and the marvellous mineral Cloncurry highland. Southward of that again is the country of the Diamantina and Georgina, with little rain, but having vast tracts of good black soil threaded by slight ridges of barren sandstone. Droughts are there followed by floods from thunder showers. The south-western portion is inferior to all, having heavy sand-rises between the grassy belts. Still the pastoral settlers are taking up areas there. AU that dry warm west is remarkably healthy for man and beast. The productive and better-watered part between the Main Range and the Pacific has the principal population.

Climate.— The coast-lands, with an annual rainfall of from 40 to 130 inches, are favoured by the south-east trade-winds and the summer north-west monsoons. During 1882 there fell at Johnstone river, 17° S., nearly 160 inches on one hundred and ninety-seven days. Northern Queensland, up to the ranges, is well watered. Central and southern districts are not so aided by the monsoons. The highlands have on their eastern side from 30 to 70 inches, but on their western only from 15 to 30. The gulf region has from 30 to 60. The southern hills have far less rain than the northern ones. The arid western area depends on occasional thunderstorms, though nature provides a grass that long resists the drought. The low south-west basin, trending to the depressed lake region of South Australia, has repeatedly seasons of intense dryness. In temperature, Brisbane has a mean of 69° —between 34° and 105°. The hilly districts, even in the tropics, have slight frosts in winter, but a high barometer in the dry warm weather. North Queensland has less heat than its latitude would seem to threaten. Tropical ports show a lower summer thermometer than may sometimes be seen in Sydney, Adelaide, and Melbourne. The western heat is stimulating in its dryness and electrical condition. The oppression on the northern coast is felt during the rainy season, though the showers cool the air. The prevalence of south-east winds off the sea mitigates the trials of summer. The dreaded “hot wind,” brought southward by the usual course from central Australian deserts, descends upon the southern colonies, avoiding Queensland. Still the ordinary western breeze, passing over so great an expanse of land, while positively cold on winter nights, is sufficiently hot during the summer.

In a recent year the colonial registrar-general gave the death-rate of Brisbane municipality at 13 in the thousand, Toowoomba 17, and Rockhampton 15. In the tropics it was 12 at Charters Towers and Cooktown, 15 at Townsville, but 29 at Mackay, where the sickly Polynesians abound. The prevalent diseases are rather from disordered liver and bowels than lungs and throat. Low fevers, seldom fatal, continue for a time in all newly opened-up country throughout Australia, as in America. Female mortality, even in the tropical ports, is considerably less than that of males. Infants, as a rule, thrive better in the colony, according to numbers, than in England. Cooktown, in lat. 16° S., is regarded by some as the sanatorium of the future. Queensland can give invalids any climate they may desire—moist and equable, dry and exhilarating, warm days and cool nights, soft coast airs for bronchial affections, and more bracing ones for other consumptives.

Geology.— Queensland is geologically connected with New South Wales and Victoria by the great chain of hills continued through the eastern portion of Australia, from Cape York to Bass’s Strait. That immense range consists largely of Palaeozoic formations with igneous rocks. The granites, porphyries, and basalts have greatly tilted and metamorphosed the sedimentary deposits of Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Oolitic ages. The width of this elevated and mineral part of the colony varies from 50 to 400 miles. Ancient formations, however, rise in the broad western plains, and everywhere indicate metallic treasures. Nearer the eastern coast granite and porphyritic rocks appear in greater force than in the Dividing Range, and the voyager rarely loses sight of them all the way from Moreton Bay to Cape York. They add much to the attractiveness of the scenery, especially in Whitsunday Passage. The old sedimentary strata consist of sandstones, limestones, conglomerates, and slates of various kinds. The Carboniferous beds are of great extent, occupying thousands of square miles (perhaps as many as 100,000), on the highlands, and on both sides of the Main Chain. It is in north and central Queensland that the mineral is found of the true Palaeozoic character, bearing the distinctive floral features of the English and New South Wales Newcastle formation. The Jurassic and Liassic rocks of the southern hilly districts are rich in cannel coal. The Wollumbilla beds are similar to the Upper Wiannamatta ones of New South Wales. The Mesozoic or Secondary formations prevail largely to the westward. Ammonites, belemnites, and ichthyosauri declare the same condition of things as once existed in the English midlands. The Cretaceous and Oolitic series on the western plains occupy nearly a third of Queensland, and their grassy surface is being rapidly covered with flocks of sheep. A descent below thé ocean level produced the Tertiary beds. The so-called “desert sandstone” may have once covered nearly the whole of the colony, though suffering great denudation afterwards, to the decided satisfaction of settlers. It still stretches over much of the extensive plateau and both slopes. In some places it is hundreds of feet thick. The favourite Downs have got free from this arid incubus. Tertiary freshwater beds, not marine ones, are seen towards the coast. The volcanic element is very distinguishable, and is a source of the large area of fertile soil. Throughout the ranges, and over many of the downs, basalts and lavas abound. Though no eruptive cone appears, there are hundreds of well-defined extinct craters, some being 4000 feet above sea-level, surrounded by sheets of lava and masses of volcanic ashes. The Great Barrier Reef, following the line of the north-east coast for 1200 miles, preserves the memory of an ancient shore; the coral animalculae built on the gradually sinking cliffs. The reefs approach the coast-line within five miles northward and one hundred southward, having an area of 30,000 square miles, and protecting eastern Queensland from the violence of Pacific storms. A narrow deep trough in the sea-bottom extends from Moreton Bay to Fiji. Within 100 miles of Cape Moreton the water is 16,000 feet in depth. While the alluvial gold and tin-workings are among the Tertiary and post-Tertiary formations, the veins and lodes of gold, silver, copper, tin, and other metals are in the solid granite, or in the ancient sedimentary rocks, particularly in association with dioritic and other igneous intrusions. Greenstone has there some of the richest of copper lodes. The celebrated tin mines of Tinaroo are in granite mountains 3000 feet high, where Englishmen work without discomfort within the tropics. Some of the tropical coal-fields are also at a considerable elevation, though nowhere arc they situated in an insalubrious locality. The more southern coal seams are in districts as healthful as they are beautiful. The Queensland fossils greatly resemble those of other parts of the world. Those, however, of the more recent Tertiary times indicate the presence of animals akin to existing marsupials, though some of the kangaroo order stood a dozen feet in height, and had the bulk of a hippopotamus. The diprotodon, 16 feet in length, may have pulled down branches or young trees for its support. The rise of land would have diminished water-supply in the interior, and caused the gradual disappearance of the gigantic marsu-

ρials. A monster bird, like the New Zealand moa, twice as large as the existing emu, once strode over Queensland plains. An ichthyosaurus, computed nearly thirty feet in length, was found on the surface of the Flinders river downs. The Secondary fossils have less resemblance than those of Western Australia to the European species. Near the Condamine a fossil monitor twenty feet long was unearthed. The northern coal-fields display the Glos-sopteris f Sigillaria, and Lepidodendrωι. The northern beds exhibit the mesozoic Thinnfeldia odontopterodes, Alethopteris australis, and Podozomites distans. Some existing Queensland fish, as the ceratodus, are allied to those of the Carboniferous age in Great Britain.

Minerals.— Gold is found in alluvial deposits and in quartz veins. The most important of the former were near the northern Palmer river, but auriferous quartz now almost monopolizes the digger’s attention. The recognized gold workings are over 7000 square miles. While there were 3454 Europeans, early in 1883, engaged in quartz mining, only 280 were on alluvial ground; in the same year 2046 Chinese worked alluvial claims. Charters Towers in the north and Gympie in the south are the chief gold centres; but Mount Morgan, south of Rockhampton, is the richest mine yet discovered. The gold export realized £1,498,433 in 1875, but only £829,655 in 1882. The decrease is owing to the greater dependence of the miners on blasting rock.

Gold is often found mixed with silver, copper, or lead. One lode had to the ton 75 to 120 ounces of silver and from ⅜ oz. to 4⅜ oz. of gold. Silver ore is being worked to great advantage now near Ravenswood, Star river, and Sellheim river. Copper has been long so low-priced in England that its extraction in the colony, with high-rated labour, has been seriously checked. The cupriferous area is very large there. Mount Perry, Peak Downs, Herberton, and Cloncurry are the leading copper sites. The “Australian” mine of Cloncurry, 200 miles south of the gulf, is very rich. In one place a lode, 80 to 120 feet wide, showed 30 per cent, of bismuth and 40 of copper to the ton. Tin streams were first opened at Stanthorpe, near the southern border. Tin lodes of astonishing richness exist in the Wild river district about 19° S. lat. There are single claims of tin stream, or on tin lodes, besides tin land leases, at Tate river, Wild river, and other localities. The Tinaroo yield in the five years has been £383,350. Called the Cornwall of Australia, this tin district shows gold, silver, copper, and antimony. The tin export of the colony during 1883 was £298,845. Iron ores abound, but with no present prospect of being utilized. Bismuth, graphite, antimony, nickel, cinnabar, and other metals are known. Precious stones are gathered from gold and tin workings. Building stones are plentiful in variety, and good in quality. Granite, porphyry, basalt, sandstone, and marbles are wrought. The coal is, after all, the most important and useful of the minerals. Already steamers, foundries, and railways are being supplied from Queensland pits. Several beds are known near Moreton Bay. About Ipswich and Darling Downs the coal is clean to the touch. Some specimens cake, others do not. All are good for gas and steam purposes. The Darling Downs beds are in an ancient lake, and are valuable for fuel and oil. On 100 lb of that coal being burnt, 529 lb of water were evaporated to 505 from Newcastle coal, leaving 16 lb of ash to 7 for the other. That cannel is of Lias age. Much rests under the Eolian sandstone and basalt of the west. The Burrurn mineral, between Maryborough and Bundaberg, is true coal, yielding, at the first opening, 3000 tons a month. One seam would give 5,000,000 tons. The Dawson, Bowen, and Mackenzie river basins, of vast extent, are Palaeozoic, as in the Drummond range, and westward over the main chain. Coal is found in the York peninsula. On the coal of Queensland the distinguished Australian geologist, the Rev. J. Tenison Woods, expresses himself thus :—“The fact that the coal formations cover so vast an extent of the territory, and so many valuable coal-fields having been discovered, makes me confident in predicting that its resources in coal are enormous, are equal, if not superior, to any other colony, and will raise her shores to be in the end the grand coal emporium of the southern hemisphere.”

Agriculture.— Until the fast few years little cultivation was to be seen, and only 180,000 acres yet receive such attention. Labour was supposed to pay better in other employments. Still there can be grown in Queensland corn of all varieties, hay, English vege tables, sweet potatoes, melons, cassava, cocoa, indigo, arrowroot, ginger, colfee, rice, tobacco, cotton, spices, cinchona, cocoa-nut, bread-fruit, and sugar-cane, with the fruits of England, India, and China. Lucerne is much grown for stud stock, where winter food is needed. Bananas, oranges, grapes, pine-apples, mangoes, guavas, tamarinds, and dates thrive well. Coffee is being extensively produced. Many Ceylon planters have recently settled in the colony. Cotton pods, tended mostly in Moreton district, are now a paying crop. The mulberry success is paving the way for silk culture. The Roma grapes and oranges are much esteemed. Bananas grow on any coast-lauds. Arrowroot and tobacco are profitable. Sweet potatoes are extensively used. Rice will be a crop of the future. Farmers in the southern hills raise corn and English fruits. Dairy farming belongs more to a cooler latitude. Wheat can be successfully produced, when labour is cheaper, over an area of 60,000 square miles. Stanthorpe wheat gave 67 lb to the bushel. Maize is a more certain crop. But sugar-cane is now the Queensland farmer’s chief resource. From the southern border up to Cape York, if near the coast, it can be raised. All round Moreton Bay, and in the Maryborough and Bundaberg neighbourhood, it does well; but in the more northern parts, as at the Mackay, Cairns, Burdekin, Johnstone, and Herbert fields, the yield is greater, and the plant comes earlier to maturity. In the Mackay sugar district, dûring 1884, there were 22,000 acres in cane. Coast Queensland has not only warmth, and rich alluvial or scrub soil, but abundance of rain when growth requires it, with fine weather at cane ripening for manufacturing sugar. Some planters have their own appliances for the extraction of juice and the manufacture of sugar, but the small farmers combine to have machinery in their district, or else dispose of cane or juice for cash to the neighbouring sugar-maker. Polynesians or Kanakas have been used for the sugar-house, though Europeans do all the work of growth and manufacture in South Queensland. Chinese merchants are establishing cane grounds, worked by their own countrymen; and Germans and Scandinavians have extensively embarked in this industry.

Pastoral farming is still the leading industry of the colony, and is rapidly extending overall districts. An occasional check to its prosperity comes by drought in the dry western interior. But a few good seasons, in that healthy wilderness, enable the sheepmaster to recoup himself,—especially as, in the remoter parts, he has a securer tenure and a very small rental. In “settled districts,” and within 30 miles of the coast, a “run” is subject to resumption by the state, at six months’ notice, should any part be required to be cut up for farms. In the more distant “unsettled district” a lease of twenty-one years is fairly secure. The rent advances every seven years of the term from about half a farthing to a penny an acre. In the dry parts, where grass is insufficient, cattle and sheep thrive well on the salt bush and other shrubs. The only really unavailable pastoral region is that portion of the north-western slope of the Main Range already referred to. The spear-grass sometimes sends its barbed tufts into the flesh of sheep. Wild dogs, floods, and droughts have to be encountered, though the animals to be tended are unaffected by ailments plaguing flocks and herds in Britain. The western plains, dry but fertile, are best for sheep; the hillsand moist coast-lands for cattle and horses. The merino sheep yields excellent wool on tropical pastures, contrary to former expectations. The sheep had increased from 3,000,000 to 12,000,000 between 1860 and 1883; and cattle, from 430,000 to 4,320,000. To meet future droughts, subterranean streams have been found by artesian wells in the most arid wastes, and the storage of water after floods will furnish a supply in dry weather.

Flora.— The Queensland flora comprehends most of the forms peculiar to Australia, with the addition of about five hundred species belonging to the Indian and Malayan regions. The eastern portion of New Holland may have a vegetation of a somewhat different type from that of the western, but both have older representatives than those found in the central zone from the gulf to the Southern Ocean. The palms in the north-east of Queensland include the Cycas and the screw or Pandanus. The pines take an important position in the colony,—as the Moreton Bay pine (Araucaria CunninghamU), the Burnett bunya bunya (Araucaria Bidwelli), the kauri or dundathu (Dammara robusta), and the she pine (Podocarpus data). The Callitris or cypress family like poor soil. The cedar forests are buried in scrub towards the mouths of eastern rivers. Coast-lands are crowded with trees, though brigalow-scrub, with the silver-leaved tops, prevails far inland. There are trees...