John H. W. Pettit letters to his family in England, illustrated with sketches by the writer, 1852-1868 - Page 40
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the the principal part of the day to get through - it is of course very Woody but little was brushwood - which I am told was destroyed about 3 Yrs ago. About that time, the Weather for a long period had been very dry, that - no rain - every thing was parched up, Now one unusually hot day - which every one who was here at the time told me was an awful terrific day - the air so suffocating that people could hardly breathe - every thing being so parched [indecipherable] fired the country in many parts which fire lasted for Weeks, wasting all before it - almost all the trees of young size that are standing are torched, blacked and burnt to a great height up -
With respect to the statement made that trees give no shade is of course false - they {generality [generally?] if is [?], give but little - for the leaves being something like our Willow & the foliage being thin {& this hang perpendicularly}, there do not appear to be many sorts - the principal are commonly called 'Box' and 'Stringy Bark' - all hard - the [word crossed out] name stringy bark is not I think inappropriate, for I have seen the bark on these some trees [where the foliage is all near the top of the trees of a small diameter - long straight] peel off in strings of a few inches wide & hanging swing loosely perhaps from 20 to 80 ft high - x x
The Forest is about 12 Miles through, the road is some places cannot be called a road at all - there are perhaps a dozn [dozen] tracks in some places - the drivers of teams going round [?] feeling for the hardest ground, going in some places a mile out of way to prevent risk of slick - winding & turning in all directions to avoid running against the trees - Saw sevl [several] drays in very awkward predicaments - it must [be] terrible doing getting thro [through] here in the winter & wet season - We at one time were [indecipherable] up & thought it would be a case of [?] by a deal of great exertion each
putting his shoulder to the wheels. We made a [?] - clearing the Load [?] . We went a few miles further on - & recamped at a place called Jefferies Station - it is a forestry spot by the side of a hill