However, Mr. Hoddle came out of the encounter with flying colours, for he had the better half of the compromise; and it is solely owing to the persistent conscientiousness with which he urged his views, that the city of Melbourne has its grand, broad highways of to-day — the big streets thrice instead of twice as large as the little ones. To estimate the incalculable boon which this gentleman's sense of duty secured for the city, we have only to imagine Collins, Bourke, Elizabeth, and Lonsdale Streets one-third narrower than their present width, and this would inevitably have happened but for Hoddle's success in bringing Sir Richard Bourke to listen to reason. For such an action, as things have turned out, Mr. Hoddle may fairly be considered the best public benefactor the city ever had. The streets, it was ordered, should extend from west to east, and north to south, at regular intersections, the former batch to be handicapped with the "lanes." The boundaries of "Old Melbourne" were from the Yarra by Spring, Latrobe, and Spencer Streets, back to the river, and for years no sane man ever dreamed, that for any business purposes, the township would require any extension. The streets from the Yarra to Latrobe Street were named after Captain Flinders, one of the earliest navigators of Port Phillip Bay; Colonel Collins, the Commandant of the Convict Settlement of 1803; Governor Bourke, and the Captain Lonsdale, before mentioned. The streets from west to east were called after Lord Spencer (the Lord Althorpe of a Melbourne Administration), Governor King, of New South Wales; William Street, after William the 4th, and Queen Street after his Consort, though the compliment would have been more marked, and the nae more distinctive, if they had called it "Adelaide" Street. There is a difference of opinion as to the lady whose name is borne by Elizabeth Street. Some years ago it was stated in a Melbourne publication that it was a compliment paid by Sir Richard Bourke to one of his daughters; but I am assured, on the authority of Mr. Hoddle, that it was meant for Elizabeth, the "Virgin Queen " of English history. Swanston Street distinguishes a captain of that name, the chairman of the Batman Association; Russell Street is a memento of the once popular Earl Russell; and Stephen Street a tribute to a permanent Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies.
For years Spring Street was an enigma, which neither myself, nor any one I asked, could solve. The only theory that ever suggested itself to my mind, with any show of probability was that, the street, when pegged out, was so far away in the "bush," and passed over such a smooth, grassy, picturesquely timbered stretch of country, up a beautiful hill from the Yarra—across towards the Carlton Gardens, that either Governor or surveyor was induced by the fragrance of the gum trees and the freshness of the day, to present a votive offering to the goddess of Spring, whose season in another country they seemed to be enjoying, and so Melbourne came to have a Spring Street. This fanciful surmise has been singularly sustained by the testimony of Mr. Hoddle, to the effect that when Sir Richard Bourke and he arrived on the crown of the Eastern Hill, there was such an abundance of beautiful black and white wattle-trees growing where the Parliament Houses and Treasury are built, that the Governor, in a fit of happy inspiration, pronounced in favour of a "Spring" Street. Another idea is that Governor Bourke intended it as a compliment to Thomas Spring Rice, afterwards Lord Monteagle, a once distinguished British Statesman, the private friend and political patron of Bourke.
At first the streets were only opened from Spencer to Swanston Streets; the rest were soon added, and after Mr. Latrobe's arrival as Superintendent in 1839, he named the Northern boundary road, Latrobe Street, as a solatium for himself. The street now known as Market Street was not originally provided for. Its formation was first suggested by Mr. Robert Russell, and adopted by the Government. A few years after the streets known as Therry, A'Beckett, and Jeffcott were formed and so called after three of our early judges, and a fourth commemorates the name of the great Arctic explorer, Franklin, who was once Governor of Van Diemen's Land. All the country at the other side of the Yarra, from the Punt Road to Fisherman's Bend, went under the general designation of South Melbourne, and was of very little account—for the major part of it was a dense, snaky, scrubby jungle, and it was the opinion of some of the early engineers that no large ships could safely lie at Sandridge. What a practical contradiction the Railway Pier has offered to such professional vaticinations! When Melbourne was incorporated by the New South Wales Legislature, in 1842, the town was subdivided into wards, called after Latrobe, Bourke, Lonsdale, and Gipps (the last mentioned being Sir George Gipps, who succeeded Sir R. Bourke as Governor.) He was, in due time succeeded by Sir Charles Fitzroy, after whom the straggling and seedy looking suburb of Newtown, modernized into Collingwood, was associated to the Melbourne Corporation as
