another remarkable identity, was a Waterloo man, and a Peninsula veteran. Old T o m was fond of expatiating at all times and seasons upon his soldiering and recounting THOMAS
("TOM")
WATSON,
" The story of his life F r o m year to year; the battles, sieges, fortunes, That he had pass'd."
If credence were to be given to a tithe of his " tall talk," one would fancy him to have been as deep in Wellington's confidence as the most trusted of the "Iron Duke's" staff. There was little doubt, however, that he had served in the 33rd Regiment of British Infantry. " T o m , " from his arrival in the province, took an active interest in promulgating the benefits of abstinence from intoxicating fluids, and both by his precept and example was m u c h of an acquisition to the early Temperance Societies. H e was master of the Russell Street Band, and his portly figure, decked out in scarf and rosette, with a AVaterloo medal shining on his breast, advancing with the regulation military step in the van, was of itself worth looking at. T o m Watson was such an intense teetotaller, that, not satisfied with being an openly avowed water drinker, he resolved to obtain a livelihood by vending the precious element. H e was soon recognized as one of the most efficient of the corps of " watermen," the first known m e d i u m of water supply between the Yarra and the householders of Melbourne. H e lived a long, active, and useful life until his last earthly barrel was emptied. I know not if any epitaph was inscribed over his grave ; but if so, none would be more appropriate than the one dictated by the poet Keats for himself— "Here lies one whose name was writ in water."
BUCKLAND.—When what is known as the Flagstaff Hill West Melbourne was occupied as a signalling station, a person named Buckland was employed there, as an assistant. H e was possessed of a large fund of general information, widely read and especially communicative. Unfortunately for him he was an "expiree" convict, and on the erection of the province into an independent colony the employment in the public service of persons of convict antecedents was considered so objectionable that Buckland and his billet parted company. T h e dismissal preyed so m u c h upon his mind, that he retired moodily to his cottage in Fitzroy. O n e day he m a d e a valuable present of books to the Mechanics' Institute. Ere a week passed, his friends were horrified by the intelligence that he had committed suicide by blowing out his brains. A letter was found declaring that all his money was exhausted, and as he was too proud to seek a situation, he had determined to put an end to his life. The day following, his coffin was taken on a dray to the cemetery, and interred close by the eastern fence. T h e sexton did his work so carelessly, that the covering consisted of only two or three inches of mould, and a heavy rainfall coming d o w n during the night, in the morning the coffin lid was quite exposed, and a re-burial the inevitable consequence. Buckland had at the Flagstaff a queer old helper known as George Fisher, a " Jack tar," w h o had fought at Navarino, and was a great card at yarn spinning about his wonderful adventures in " T h e Battle and the Breeze." H e was the proprietor of a really splendid telescope, which he brought with him from England. It was fixed upon a rude wooden stand, and its owner positively declared that through it he could not only view exteriorly any ship in Hobson's Bay, but absolutely everything on board. " Old George " soon tired of his post of observation after Buckland's death, and withdrew to some very humble quarters at Brighton, where he, for several years, eked out a precarious livelihood. His friends, however, did not altogether abandon him, and one warm-hearted Scotch brewer, still alive, sent him regularly a small cask of ale weekly, not a very stinted ration to keep one antiquated throat from getting parched. Finally he found a comfortable harbour of refuge in the Benevolent Asylum. of the early colonists were better known, or more thoroughly esteemed than he w h o first figured in Port Phillipian life as accountant at the mills of Manton and Co., in Flinders Street. O n the closing of that concern, Ballingall transferred hisfinancialallegiance to the
JAMES BALLINGALL.—Few
