(one of three brothers well known amongst the old colonists), is a native of Aylesbury, in Buckinghamshire. Articled to M r . T h o m a s Tindal, Clerk of the Peace for Buckinghamshire, he subsequently entered himself at Lincoln's Inn. In 1840, arriving in Port Phillip, he took up a squatting station at Cape Schanck, of which he is still a co-proprietor. Returning to England he was called to the Bar in 1843, and marrying, he re-emigrated to the colony in 1844. In 1849 he was appointed one of the several Commissioners under what was k n o w n as the Disputed Boundaries Act, and had assigned to him a portion of the then large Western District. O n the establishment of the new colony in 1851, Mr. Barker had conferred upon him the Clerkship of the first Legislative Council, and in November, 1856, when the two branches of Parliament were initiated he became Clerk of the new Legislative Assembly, a position which he retained until the beginning of 1882. when he was transferred to the Clerkships of the Legislative Council and of the Parliaments, a joint office vacated by the retirement of Mr. G. W . Rusden. O n terminating his long connection with the Assembly, his valuable services were commemorated by a special resolution of thanks, and the presentation of an unique and costly silver service, subscribed for by the Members. M r . Barker was not admitted to the Port Phillip Bar until November, 1851, and as his services were then retained for State purposes, he did not go into practice. In all branches of the law and usages of Parliament, M r . Barker is, in the fullest sense, a specialist, and many a difficulty has been smoothed over by the aid of his rare experience. Such is a cursory "brief" of the members of the Port Phillip Bar, known as such in the Province from 1841 to 1851, and of the number, so far as I a m aware, there are n o w (1888) only three of them in the land of the living, viz., Brewster, Stawell, and Barker.
JOHN BARKER
ATTORNEYS.
The first parchments executed here were prepared by Gellibrand, an Attorney-General of V a n Diemen's Land, w h o was an unit of the memorable Batman Copartnery, and when Batman came over in 1835 to negotiate a purchase of the country from the Aborigines, he fore-armed himself with what he believed to be valid legal transfers, cut and dry in his pocket. In this he was disappointed, for the bargain was annulled with scant ceremony by the H o m e Government. It is strange that in the versions of those memorable conveyances which I have seen printed in books on the colony, I have met with no absolutely correct one. T h e originals are in the Melbourne Public Library, the Trustees of which Institution were induced by Sir W . Mitchell to purchase them some years ago, and in another chapter of these C H R O N I C L E S appears a revised and genuine copy. The conveyancing branch then, as now, was the most lucrative, for Melbourne was not six months old when the game of mortgaging commenced, and during 1838 there was lent on town lands alone no less than ,£17,260, covered by sixteen mortgages, an enormous encumbrance considering the first cost of town lots, the limited extent of the town, and the very circumscribed population. In 1839 country lands were first so operated upon to the tune of ,£32,595, and the total mortgages upon town and country swelled to n o , covering .£"77,463. A s there was no local Supreme Court jurisdiction in Port Phillip until April, 1841, all the important legal business prior to that period was transacted in Sydney through Melbourne agencies. In 1843, the year of greatest financial depression felt in the colony, the mortgaging of town and country lands covered ,£113,262, which increased to ,£270,413 the year after. This year saw the commencement of borrowing by liens on wool, and mortgages on live stock, which in a few years assumed enormous proportions. was the first Attorney to arrive in Melbourne in September, 1838. He was not long alone in his glory, for a Quarter Sessions was established in 1839, and the hawks commenced their flight hither from Sydney, and before the year's close they were even on the wing from the old country. H e was the A d a m of "the brigade," and so lively on his "pins" that his activity in exploring the un-macadamised streets of early Melbourne occasionally got him into difficulties in which he stuck hopelessly until extricated by some timely aid. In 1840, within a space of six months,
WILLIAM MEEK
