| CUSTOMS. | |||||||
| Collector | £600 0 0 | Landing Surveyor | £400 0 0 | ||||
| First Clerk | £260 0 0 | ||||||
| Four Clerks, viz., one at £210, one £160, one 130, and one at £110 | 610 0 0 | Total | ... | £1,870 0 0 | |||
| PUBLIC WORKS. | |||||||
| The Colonial Architect | £450 0 0 | Messenger at 2s. 6d. per day | 45 15 0 | ||||
| Clerk of Works | 180 0 0 | ||||||
| Draftsman at 8s. per day | 146 0 0 | ||||||
| Clerk of 3rd Class | 120 0 0 | Total | ... | £941 15 0 |
There was set apart for public buildings, including £800 as rent of temporary offices, a sum of £29,850.
A bridge branch was likewise provided for with the following staff:—
| Superintendent | £300 0 0 | Clerk 3rd Class | £130 0 0 | ||||
| Assistant Superintendent | 160 0 0 | ||||||
| Total | ... | £590 0 0 |
And it was proposed to expend £14,000 upon, "roads, bridges, and other public works."
There were six branch Customs establishments from Port Albert to Portland, and the total contingencies were put down at only £380. In addition to the Port expenditure there was that of the Harbour Masters, Pilot stations, lighthouse keepers, telegraph stations, etc., etc.
The first Audit Office was in a house rented for the purpose a few yards below William Street, at north side of Lonsdale Street. Mr. Ebden, the first Auditor-General, burst suddenly into light as a Master of Finance, but I believe I am correct in stating that the gentleman who practically put the new machine in motion was Mr. E. C. Symonds (until lately--1888-one of the Commissioners of Audit), who was detached from Sydney for that purpose.
The Government Printing Office.
Amongst the earliest appointments made was that of Government Printer, the first holder of the office being Mr. Edward Khull, who held the position only about three months, when he was succeeded by Mr. John Ferres, for some time overseer of the Herald. During Khull's régime little was done towards the formation of an office, except ordering some types and presses from England, and collecting a few miscellaneous articles in town. Khull picked up an old press, for all printing purposes worth about its weight in iron; and the first press secured by Ferres was a foolscap Albion, which lived and worked all through the vicissitudes of wear and tear, until it came to a tragic end by incremation in the fire at the Printing Office on Queen's Birthday (24th May, 1882.) Mr. Ferres lost no time in putting his little house in order, and a very small beginning it was. He opened shop in the month of November, 1851, on the ground floor of a small two-storey building in Lonsdale Street West. The number of hands at the commencement was half-a-dozen, with two presses. The Government Gazette commenced its issue from this place in January, 1852, and in February, 1853, a movement was made to a tenement still standing, though in a very so-so condition, in Lonsdale Street, next to the Law Courts site. In old times it was well known as the residence of Dr. Cussen, the first Colonial Surgeon. Ferres found much more elbow-room here, though the place soon became inadequate; but an unexpected stroke of good luck soon turned up. After the festivities occasioned by the Governor's Ball on the 24th May, 1853, Mr. Ferres conceived the happy notion that the best use to which the empty ball-room could be put would be to convert it into a printing office. Accordingly the subject so unceremoniously started was subsequently well considered, and orders were given to fit up the place for a printing office, wherein work was begun on the 14th July, 1853. The same Mr. John Ferres, who may be designated its accoucheur and wet nurse, and who subsequently dry nursed it with not only a nurse's but a mother's care, is still its faithful guardian (1886.) He was once separated from the object of his parental solicitude through
