In consequence of the report made by Lieutenant Oxley to the Governor upon the result of the expedition, an establishment has been since formed at this harbour; which at present is used only as a penal settlement:  hitherto no settlers have been permitted to take their grants at Port Macquarie; but when this is allowed it will, from the superiority of its climate and the great extent of fine country in the interior, become a very important and valuable dependency of the colony of New South Wales.

The natural productions of this place are, in a great measure, similar to those of the neighbourhood of Port Jackson; but many plants were found which are not known in the colony; and as these grow in all parts within the tropic, the climate of Port Macquarie may naturally be suspected to be favourable to the cotton-plant and the sugar-cane, neither of which have yet been cultivated to the southward:  among these plants, we found the Pandanus pedunculatus, which Mr. Brown found in the Gulf of Carpentaria, and many other parts within the tropic, in Captain Flinders’ voyage.  The face of the hill on the south side of the entrance possesses some good soil; and at the time of our visit* was covered with a profusion of herbage, and studded with groups of banksia, which the colonists call the honeysuckle; the wood of which is useful in ship-building on account of the crooked growth of its stem.

(Footnote.  It is on this hill that the penal settlement of Port Macquarie is now built, the situation having been selected at the recommendation of Lieutenant Oxley.  It was settled by Captain Allman of the 48th regiment in the early part of the year 1821.)

The banks of the river on both sides were thickly wooded; in most parts the country is open and grassy and is profusely timbered with the varieties of eucalyptus that are common at Port Jackson.  There is however a great extent of brushland in which the soil is exceedingly rich, and in which the trees grow to a large size; these, being covered with parasitical plants and creepers of gigantic size, render the forest almost impervious:  it is in these brushes that the rosewood and cedar-trees grow, and also the fig-tree before alluded to; this last tree is of immense size and is remarkable for having its roots protruding from the base of the stem, like huge buttresses, to the distance of several yards.

The natives are numerous, but they appear to depend more upon hunting than the sea for their subsistence.  This I judged from the very inferior state of their canoes which are very much less ingeniously formed than even the frail ones of the Port Jackson natives; being merely sheets of bark with the ends slightly gathered up to form a shallow concavity, in which they stand and propel them by means of poles.  Their huts are more substantially constructed and more useful as dwellings than any to the southward, and will contain eight or ten persons; while those to the southward are seldom large enough to hold three; they are arched over and form a dome with the opening on the land side; so that they are screened from the cold sea-winds, which, unless they blow in the character of the sea-breeze, are generally accompanied by rain.  Kangaroos are very numerous, and from their traces appeared of large size; but we saw neither emus nor native dogs.