"One subject of high satisfaction to me is that we have never had even an angry word with the natives; they are constantly about us in numbers, and are useful to us, bringing fish, grass, honey, and a sort of bean their confidence in us is astonishing. "One of them went with me in the brig, and another is now in her on her present voyage. In conclusion, my dear Sir George, I cannot but congratulate you, and myself, on the complete and perfect success of my undertaking-this place cannot fail to become most valuable; in truth, I anticipate that in a few years it will be the Singapore of Australia. I look forward with great pleasure to the prospect of meeting you. I have an infinity of important matter to discuss with you. I only await the arrival of the 'Beagle,' or other vessel to determine me. "I hope that the middle of June will afford me an opportunity of repeating that, I am, "Dear Sir George, your Faithful Friend, "J. J. GORDON Bremer. I forgot to mention that I had named my city-in-embryo: Victoria. I believe it to be the first Colony founded in Her Majesty's reign." Sir James John Gordon Bremer, K.C.B., created 1841; K.C. and Knight Bachelor, created 1836; married in 1811 Mrs. C. Glasse, of Rochester; was made lieutenant in the navy in 1805; commander in 1807; in 1812 captured the "Bon Génie," privateer; in 1813 took an American letter of marque of 280 tons; became post-captain in 1814; was appointed to the "Comus," 22 guns, in 1816, which was lost off Newfoundland in October of that year; to the "Tamar," 26 guns, was despatched to form a settlement on Melville Island; returned to England in 1827; was appointed to the "Alligator," 26 guns, on the East India station, in 1837. So closely is Owen Stanley associated in my first recollections of Sydney with Port Essington, that I cannot keep his name apart from that of the settlement, of the prospects of which Sir Gordon Bremer makes so high an estimate in this letter. Owen Stanley had been promoted to the rank of commander on the 26th of March, 1839, and had aided, in the "Britomart," in forming the new colony on which Sydney afterwards built such grand hopes. He was a son of the then Bishop of Norwich, born on the 13th June, 1811; entered the Royal Naval College 5th August, 1824; embarked as volunteer in the "Druid" frigate, 8th January, 1826, and in the following March was midshipman on board the "Ganges," 84, then fitting for the flag of Sir Robert Waller Otway, commander-in-chief in S. America, whence he was removed in December, 1829, to the "Tartar," 44. In January, 1830, he joined the "Adventure," sloop, Captain Philip Parker King, employed in surveying the Straits of Magellan. On his return to England the following November, he became mate to the "Belvidere," 42, and to the "Rainbow," 28-Captains, the Honourable Richard Sanders Dundas and Sir John Franklin-both in the Mediterranean in 1831; then to the "Kent," 78; the "Procris," 10; the "Malabar," 74; and the 'Mastiff," 6, in succession, all in the Mediterranean. In 1836, 11th May, he was appointed to the "Terror," and on the 21st December, 1837, to the command of the "Britomart," in which he remained until the 27th April, 1843. In the interval, having aided at Port Essington, he made a track survey of the Arafura Sea, &c. He then became post-captain in 1844, on September 23rd, since when he commanded the surveying ship "Rattlesnake," in which he made many valuable additions to hydrography, especially in the examination of Simon's Bay, the inner route through Torres Straits from Dunk Island to Bligh's Farewell; his last work being the survey of the south-east coast of New Guinea and the Louisiade Archipelago. F.R.S., F.R.A.S., Captain Stanley died at Sydney on the 10th March, 1850. Before his coming into Port Jackson, he had heard at Cape York of a brother's death: on anchoring, of his father's. He was buried in the North Shore cemetery. While lying at Cape York in the preceding October, a watering party from the "Rattlesnake" brought off a white woman and some of a tribe who had come over from Prince of Wales Island to the mainland. Upon coming on board, she could scarcely make it understood that she wished to be rescued from the natives, as she had almost forgotten the English language. Her maiden name had been Barbara Crawford, daughter of a tinman, a Scotchman residing in Sydney, who had arrived in the "John Barry " as an immigrant: had married a man named Thompson at Moreton Bay, which she left with him and some other men in a small cutter called the "American" for Port Essington, where they wished to settle. They were cast away on Prince of Wales Island, and all but herself drowned. The natives had treated her very humanely for the five years she had been with them, but refused until now to allow her to communicate with any passing vessels. Having seen the "Rattlesnake" anchored at Cape York, she induced them to take her on board, saying she wished to shake hands with her countrymen. Captain Stanley rewarded the blacks liberally. From her much information was received as to the manners and customs of the islanders of Torres Straits. Port Essington had been discovered by Captain P. P. King, in the cutter "Mermaid" (84 tons, 56 ft. in length, beam 18 ft. 6 in.), on the 23rd of April, 1818, and so-named in honour of the "late Vice-Admiral Sir William Essington, K.C.B." "As a harbour," writes Captain King, in his narrative published in 1824, "Port Essington is equal, if not superior, to any I ever saw, and from its proximity to the Moluccas and New Guinea, and its being in the direct line of communication between Port Jackson and India, as well as from its commanding situation with respect to the passage through Torres Straits, it must, at no very distant period, become a place of great trade, and of considerable importance." How little the pledges of success given by the reports made about the settlements on the Northern Coast of South Australian Territory have been redeemed, twenty-five years after the first stick had been cut and laid for Fort Dundas, on Melville Island, proved in a manner unpalatable to the promoters of the early schemes for extending trade. It remains for Port Darwin, which may claim to be one of the group, to bring about in due time the honour so long deferred to each flattering earnest. There is something to wonder at, and attract to the spot at which our Mercury takes his first sub-marine plunge upon our Australian errands. In sombre contrast with the gay colouring of Sir Gordon Bremer's descriptions do we find the shadows which had successively fallen upon each nest of dwelling-places, which spoke of the building, but from which the birds had flown, in the year 1847. On the 9th of November, Port Essington was declared by Captain Stanley-according to Macgillivray's Narrative-to be insalubrious; to give no hope nor promise of improvement: men sick; provisions bad and scanty; the site of Victoria injudicious and unhealthy. The first step had been taken by Captain G. Bremer on the 20th September, 1824, in H.M.S. "Tamar," at Port Essington. For want of water he at once had gone on to Melville Island, and founded Fort Dundas, on the Apsley Strait. Four years afterwards-31 March, 1829 —this had been deserted. Government still persisting in the Port Raffles.-All Abandoned. MAR 31 1910 47 desire to plant firm foot in these quarters, Captain Stirling, in H.M.S. "Success," had the gratification of finding a nook in the neighbourhood which seemed to be, and proved to be free from disadvantages which had as yet impeded the progress of the past speculations. This had been at Port Raffles, and was denoted by the erection of Fort Wellington-on 18th June, and when the kernel of this Colony had begun to mature into a really flourishing state of sound health, sudden ordersunexpected and unaccountable-had been received for its entire abandonment, which had been effected by the 29th August, 1829. Eight years afterwards Government had a fourth time. resolved upon an establishment on the north coast with the twofold object of affording "shelter to crews wrecked in Torres Straits, and endeavouring to throw open to British enterprise the neighbouring islands of the Indian Archipelago." Thus had Captain Sir G. Bremer been again sent forth on the 27th October, 1837, to re-form a settlement at Port Essington, whence he wrote the letter given already. Subsequently, the "Alligator" having left, Captain John Macarthur, with a subaltern and forty men of the Royal Marines, was left in charge. The "Britomart" remained several years as a tender to the military post, and was succeeded by H.M.S. "Royalist." In October, 1845, the remains of the original party, which had been there for seven years (including also a small detachment sent down from China), were relieved by a draft from England of two subalterns, an assistant surgeon, and fiftytwo men of the Royal Marines; Captain Macarthur still remaining in charge; "and now "and now" says Macgillivray, "after the settlement has been established for eleven years, they were not even able to keep themselves in fresh vegetables." And so Port Essington was finally abandoned on November 30, 1849, when all was removed to Sydney by H.M.S. "Mæander," commanded by Captain the Honourable H. Keppel. CHAPTER III. Therein, ye gods, you make the weak most strong; Shakespeare. Julius Cæsar.) THE year 1825 brought forth the triumphant cry, "Freedom of the Press." Hitherto there had been a mild censorship exercised by the Colonial Secretary; such surveillance was abolished and the papers of the day were jubilant. And good reason there was for gladness over the harvest of the past year: the new Charter of Justice: the formation of a Legislative Council: trial by jury the liberty of the press: a quadruple alliance beginning to equip itself for an onward march. The sinews of war were beginning to stiffen in the young life: capital was turned towards us substantially the Australian Agricultural Company was girding itself for the work of development: a new era was dawning. The Gazette affirmed that "Posterity will do every justice to the year that is gone." On the 17th of March the vessel first mentioned as having been sent to Moreton Bay for the sole purpose of supplying it, returned in a leaky condition. Her name was the "Nancy." In the following May we have the Rev. Thomas Hobbes Scott on the scene, by the ship " Hercules," as our first Archdeacon, and holding his primary visitations in the Church of St. James on the 9th of June. In the train of our civil enlargement follows the inevitable harlequin, Agitation. The unwonted summons, the novel scene of empanelling a jury for the first time, on the 12th of last February, to dispose of a case (such cases having hitherto been disposed of in a very summary manner), such as that of "The King v. Robert Cooper," our great Australian distiller, in whose favour a verdict was recorded, may have been sensational enough to cause further fermentation. In August began the exciting claim for representative government: the question grew warmer as it proceeded through September into October. The Gazette shot out its leading articles with plenty of powder, and Governor Brisbane |