The only good soil upon the two latter, is in the immediate neighbourhood of the Macquarie River: but, even close to its banks, the depositions are of little depth, lying on a coarse gravelly soil, the decomposition of the nearer ranges.

The former is found to diminish in thickness, according to the concavity of the valley through which the Macquarie flows, and at length becomes mixed with the coarser soil.

This deposit is alone fit for agricultural purposes; but it does not necessarily follow that the distant country is unavailable since it is admitted, that the best grazing tracts are upon the secondary ranges of granite and porphyry.

These ranges generally have the appearance of open forest, and are covered with several kinds of grasses, among which the long oat-grass is the most abundant.
COUNTY OF CUMBERLAND.
If we except the valley of the Nepean, the banks of the South Creek, the Pennant Hills near Parramatta, and a few other places, the general soil of the county of Cumberland, is of the poorest description.

It is superficial in most places, resting either upon a cold clay, or upon sandstone; and is, as I have already remarked, a ferruginous compound of the finest dust.
Yet there are many places upon its surface, (hollows for instance,) in which vegetable decay has accumulated, or valleys, into which it has been washed, that are well adapted for the usual purposes of agriculture, and would, if the country was more generally cleared, be found to exist to a much greater extent than is at present imagined.