The weather was slightly frosty, and the air clear and elastic.
As we followed the windings of the noble rushing stream, at a height of
seldom less than three hundred feet above his bed, the Doctor was busy
pointing out the alternations of primitive sandstone and slate, and
the great streams of volcanic bluestone which had poured from various
points towards the deep glen in which the river flowed. Here, he would
tell us, was formerly a lofty cascade, and a lake above it, but the
river had worn through the sandstone bar, drained the lake, leaving
nothing of the waterfall but two lofty cliffs, and a rapid. There again
had come down a lava-stream from Mirngish, which, cooled by the waters
of the river, had stopped, and, accumulating, formed the lofty
overhanging cliff on which we stood. He showed us how the fern-trees
grew only in the still sheltered elbows facing northward, where the
sun raised a warm steam from the river, and the cold south wind could
not penetrate. He gathered for Mrs. Buckley a bouquet of the tender
sweetscented yellow oxalis, the winter flower of Australia, and showed
us the copper-lizard basking on the red rocks, so like the stone on
which he lay, that one could scarce see him till a metallic gleam
betrayed him, as he slipped to his lair.
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