1894
13 July 1894
II. RYLSTONE.
Not only is Rylstone itself a high ground, but it is almost encircled by still higher hills - some of them isolated peaks and crowns, backed by the dark blue mass of the Dividing ranges, and distant ranges beyond. The Cudgegong river winds peacefully round two sides of Rylstone; and a lovely stream it is. Away, some miles up stream, there are deep holes, close under the mountain's rocky sides, full of splendid fish, some of them perfect monsters of the cod species; while wild duck and other game are plentiful. Rylstone never suffers from floods; its founders were wise in their generation, and built the town on a spur - from which the visitor, in the hot summer days, is enabled to get a delightful blow, while feasting the imagination upon the scene around him. From this point of vantage one has in view every spot of interest at 'one sitting,' so to speak. If he face the north he has, a little to his right, Rumker's Peak; the singular looking Cox's Crown; to the east, up the river, Mount Brace and the far distant Nullo; to the north west, towards Mudgee, Mounts Dorale and Frune; while close at hand is the huge mass of Tongbong, which is a veritable mountain of coal. Due west lies lofty Bocoble - a round shapely mountain situate in the county of Wellington, and which maybe seen for many a mile round. To the south lie Mounts Inaccessible, Marsden and the 'Hay Stack;' while eastward lie Cooawan Towinbing and Coomber Mellon. From this latter mountain flow the waters which find their way into the Colo, and finally, into the Hawkesbury. The Cudgeegong rises near Mount Durambong nearly due east from Rylstone. The scenery reminds one of Cumberland and Westmoreland, and no doubt it was because of this likeness that the early surveyors named the town as they did - after that immortalized by Wordsworth in his 'White Doe of Rylstone.' Nothing can excel the beauty of sunset, as seen from the higher portion of the town; the broken hills to the northward and eastward are lit up by the long slanting rays of the setting sun; and every ragged face shows its own peculiar strata, while the deep gullies from base to crown are distinct with dark shades which the sun cannot reach. Just as the clouds vary in colour and form at sunset, so do the long shadows on these noble hills assume the most fantastic forms, and the tints of burnished gold, changing rapidly to the deepest violet, form a kaleidoscope not easily forgotten. Rylstone is blessed indeed; for not only are her surroundings unique and beautiful, but the town itself is clean, bright and pretty. Its roads and streets are white and hard, its houses of the whitest freestone which forms a marked contrast to the lovely foliage of the nicely kept gardens with which almost every tenement is adorned flowers and fruit are in abundance and the residents take a commendable pride in their culture - which they promote by means of an excellent horticultural society. As a sanatorium Rylstone holds a very high position - in fact, the age to which people live, and the complaints of the resident medical man prove the assertion. Then, what lovely drives there are around the north western beauty spot. Drives to Narrango and Olinda take one up among the crags of the northeastern ranges; to Coomber Mellon, where one finds oneself among a number of sequestered farms right under Coomber Mellon's sheltering barrier; out to Bylong, by one of the roughest of bridle-tracks, where one gets a glimpse of some bona fide mountain scenery, and experiences something of real Australian bush riding; and yet it is no uncommon sight to see twelve or thirteen young fellows - and possibly a lady or two - riding up and down these steep passes en route to a cricket match, and the inevitable ball.
III. FURTHER ON.
Not near so rugged a road is that by way of Dungaree, Lue, and Havilah, to Mudgee; it is good all the way, notwithstanding a number of sharp pinches. The ground is hard under foot, even in wet weather, and a couple of good nags in a light buggy, make the thirty-six miles to Mudgee a pleasant trip. The road winds round old Coaly Tong Bong with the fine squatting runs of the Cox's and Dowling's on either side - with here and there an oasis, as it were, in the desert of ring-barked trees and luxuriant grass. When leaving Rylstone one also leaves the railway line close to the town. The railway line makes a detour round Tong Bong in one direction, we in the buggy taking another.
At about fourteen miles, after passing the pretty settlement of Dungaree, with its school house and pleasant homesteads, we drive parallel to the line until we cross it at sixteen miles, and again leave it to our left - though we have it in sight, more or less, the remainder of the distance to Mudgee. White's Havilah estate, takes the place of Cox's - though the Dowling property still holds out to the right - and a splendid property it is. Havilah homestead has, I suppose, the finest position that any home station could have. It is situate on Lawson's Creek - which the traveller crosses some eight or times before reaching Mudgee. All around the station are evidences of care, method, order, and of prosperity. Opposite the house is a sharp spur, with a cleared track up the point of it, having English trees planted on either side and on the top. About here should furnish an artist with subjects for pictures for weeks at a stretch, and a descriptive writer with 'copy' for a few hundred pages of type. Seldom have I seen such a combination of wild Australian scenery. It is one of the beauty spots of the district - and certainly, not the least. Past Bumberra - a small settlement and railway station four miles from Mudgee - is a splendid level road through land having the appearance of an English park, until quite close to the town, and then one sees farms cropped with maize and lucerne equal to Hawkesbury farms. To any one visiting Rylstone and Mudgee I would strongly advise the Havilah drive to Mudgee, and the return by way of Mudgee. Apple-tree Flat and Cudgeegong. By the bitter road one misses much of the fine scenery, it is true, but then there is change, besides, one gets an excellent road.
In concluding this paper, may I hope that those who desire fresh fields for pleasure, new scenery, and varying incidents, will avail themselves of the Mudgee line one way and coach (or better still, a horse) on the return journey, and I promise them they will not repent it If they can use pencil and brush, so much the better in that they can transfer to paper, or canvas some at least, of the mountain grandeur and peaceful loveliness of the valley farms and meadowlands, which, in fancy, I have still in view in all their beauty - however inadequately I may have sketched them here. In describing such scenery one feels the lack of poetic fire, the cunning of the artist's pencil; and plain prose, however, true in detail, must always fall flat compared to the handiwork of either painter or poet. Those fine lines of Sir Walter Scott's in the 'Lady of the Lake,' express all that one feels while viewing some of these stupendous chasms one sees in the neighborhood of Glen Alice and Capertee:-
'The Western waves of ebbing day
Boiled o'er the glen their level way;
Each purple peak, each glinty spire,
Was bathed in floods of living fire,
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below,
Where twined the path, in shadow hid
Round many a rocky pyramid,
Shooting abruptly from the dell
In thunder-splintered pinnacle;
So wondrous wild, the whole might seem
The scenery of a fairy dream.1
'
1922
17 August 1922
A CROSS COUNTRY TRIP
WELLINGTON TO RYLSTONE VIA MUDGEE.
(By W. S.)
Leaving Cudgegong, I returned to Rylstone and from there to Lue. On leaving there the river is crossed by a wooden bridge and the railway line to Mudgee is also crossed. The land passed through is very fine light and black loam. Up to the present very little farming has been done, sheep being the principal industry, but some of the larger holdings have just been sold into smaller farms, and already dairying and cultivated areas are replacing a portion of the sheep run. Some very fine country is passed where the road to Lue turns off the Bylong road. Hundreds of acres of land could be put under crop very cheaply, as the timber has been ringbarked and dead for many years. Being such fine land within such a close radius of the railway it seems a great pity for it to be only used as a sheep run. However, now that the land is being sold to new comers no doubt this will be altered. To the right on an open flat Mr. Keech has a very fine farm, the timber all killed and cleaned up, but here again very little farming. Mr. Keech is a noted breeder and seller of fat sheep. It speaks well for the richness of the land that the natural grasses should produce such fine stock, both as fats and wool. Passing along one comes to a part of the district called Camboon, Mr. H. McLachlan, has a very good property and goes in for mixed farming, being also a breeder of blood stock. Some of his horses have been very successful on the racing track. There was much to interest a visitor on this property. The homestead commands a very fine view of the surrounding district2
.