CHAPTER
XXXI.
O U R T W O OLDEST INSTITUTIONS.
SYNOPSIS—The Melbourne Club: Its Creation, Rise, and Progress—The Mechanics' Institute : Its Inception and Progress— First Lectures Delivered in Melbourne—Sir George Gipps Refuses a Grant of Land.—Early Financial Troubles.— Purchase of Land in Collins Street. —Election of Officers and Board of Management.—Government Grant Sanctioned. — Financial and Numerical Progress.—More Lectures.—£300 Voted by Government for a " Theatre."—Statistics of the Institution, 1832, 1881, and 1887.
|OT the least singular fact to be recorded in the history of Early Melbourne is that of the flourishing j existence of two Sodalities, originating in what must be regarded (measuring the age of the colony by its unrivalled progress) as a very remote era, one of them about a year the others ^1|T senior, each in its way initiated for a purpose praiseworthy in itself, yet both differing as day and night in the ends to be attained, and the means to be employed for such attainment. Rocked in their cradles at a time of yvhich nothing can be noyv discerned but a feyv puffs of mist—which are yearly growing thinner, and will soon be completely dissipated—their infancy was perilous, and their nonage beset by difficulties and perils of no ordinary character. Through the sea of financial embarrassment by yvhich Port Phillip was flooded, and almost overyvhelmed, in 1842-43, a risky course was steered. Breakers ahead, "poopers" astern, quicksands on each side, and often obliged by necessity to hug a lee shore, the storm was " weathered," the breakers cleared, and yvith favouring gales a haven of prosperity was reached. AA'ith these few preparatory remarks I proceed to briefly sketch the Institutions indicated. THE MELBOURNE CLUB
Was first mooted in that eventful month of November, 1838, when the first cricket match was played in the colony, at the foot of Batman's Hill. This happened on the 12th, yvhen the necessity for organizing a club wasfirstformally talked over. There was a fair muster of the Melbourne "respectabilities" of the time, and in the course of some casual conversation the Club question cropped up. O f all the gay young felloyvs sunning themselves on the green grass that day, there are only tyvo of them, Messrs. Benjamin Baxter and Robert Russell, noyv (1888) alive in Melbourne. Before the next evening a Prospectus yvas prepared by Mr. Baxter, yvho succeeded in obtaining several eligible signatures in approval of the project. O n the 17th November, 1838, a meeting of all taking an interest in the then hazardous venture yvas held at the quarters of the military officers at the south side of West Bourke Street, yvhen the formation of a Club yvas ratified, and the following names yvere announced as the original members: —Captain Lonsdale, P.M., Dr. Cussen (Colonial Surgeon), Colonel White, Captain Bacchus, Lieutenant Smyth, Messrs. Munday, Powlett, Yaldwyn, Murdoch, Meek, McFarlane, Darke, Bacchus, J u n , White, Arden, Baxter, Russell, Scott, Hamilton, Smythe, and the Ryries (three). T h e neyv-born Club went on sloyvly but surely, and ere thefirstweek of 1839 passed over, the Port Phillip Gazette, 5th January, thus reports progress : — " O n thefirstday of the year a general meeting of the members of the Melbourne Club yvas held for the purpose of appointing a committee, and to take into consideration the building of a house suited to the convenience of the service it is intended to be applied to. T h e list showed nearlyfiftynames, amongst w h o m w e m a y mention Mr. H a w d o n , to yvhose enterprise the district is indebted for having opened a communication by land to South Australia. About twenty of the members subsequently sat d o w n to a dinner at the Lamb Lnn, laid out on a most splendid scale, comprising all the varieties this infant settlement could afford." cc
