showed upon the clearest evidence that in some cases Malays who had been employed as divers had, at the conclusion of the pearling season, been left without the means of support, with the result that some of them had been reduced to a state of semi-starvation. In his report, however, he was able to point out that the employers in disbanding their foreign crews in a strange land had acted rather with a want of thought as to their helpless position and want of means than with a callous insensibility to the claims of humanity and justice. The report, which was drawn up with a lucid grasp of all the bearings of the case, no less than with the utmost fairness to both masters and servants, still further raised Mr. Fairbairn in the estimation of the Cabinet, and formed the basis for the introduction of reforms in the terms of the labour contracts in vogue in the pearling industry. In 1875 Mr. Fairbairn's valuable services were recognised by his being appointed Resident Magistrate of the Toodyay district, chief centre of which is Newcastle.
Mr. Fairbairn's next forward step was Acting Resident Magistrate at Albany and to be gazetted Acting Chairman of the Quarter Sessions. Having spent six months in this capacity, he returned to the magisterial charge at Newcastle, and remained there until, in 1880, he was appointed Resident Magistrate of the Vasse district, in which he had first commenced his official career as Clerk of Courts. On two other occasions Mr. Fairbairn's services were called into requisition as a special commissioner in the northern parts of the colony. A Malay having murdered a native in the Gascoyne district, which had just been settled, Mr. Fairbairn had to undertake a toilsome and arduous journey to place the circumstances of the tragedy before the Crown Law Department. He was also twice sent to Geraldton to take temporary charge of the bench there, and he was instructed to enquire into the alleged harsh treatment of natives by the white population in the Murchison and Gascoyne districts. After travelling through the whole of the district, in the conscientious discharge of this duty and taking evidence from both whites and blacks, Mr Fairbairn found that many of the charges had been substantiated. The report, in which he unflinchingly threw deserved blame upon his own countrymen, of course created a great deal of animosity against him, but those who sought to asperse him from motives of malignity failed to shake the strong testimony which he had adduced of the cruel oppression of the inferior race. Mr. Fairbairn saw the Kimberley before gold was discovered there, and he was the first Government officer to report the finds at Hall's Creek, which occasioned the famous rush of diggers from all parts of Australia. At the time that he was appointed Government Resident at Kimberley there was no township or even a house for the accommodation of its first officer of the law. When he arrived to take up the position there were only two white settlers, and the natives were at first so wild that they fled upon the arrival of the vessel in which he travelled to the scene of his labours. But from the first Mr. Fairbairn made his camp a place where the blacks could rely upon obtaining kindness and protection, and they quickly made friends with him and flocked to his tent in large numbers, glad to get meat and flour from his stores to eke out their sometimes precarious supply of kangaroo and baobab nuts. It is to the credit of the tribes that they never abused the kindness of their benefactor, for although his camp was often left unguarded he never lost the smallest trifle by theft. The tribes who had never come into contact with the whites were, however, not to be trusted, as the murder of Captain Ricketson, Mr. C. Shenton (a well-known pearler), and one of his crew was perpetrated about 100 miles from Kimberley, at Cygnet Bay. Mr. Fairbairn's stay at Kimberley was made memorable by the opening up of Hall's Creek as a goldfield. The original prospectors, Messrs. Hall and Slattery, brought to the Government Resident Police Magistrate, in 1885, nine ounces of gold. Mr. Fairbairn communicated the important news to the Government, and thereupon Kimberley became the cynosure of all eyes and the goal of hundreds of miners. On leaving Kimberley he vas succeeded by Dr. Lovegrove, the present principal Medical Officer, and Mr. Fairbairn then became Government Resident and Chairman of Quarter Sessions at Roebourne, vice Mr. Hayes Lawrence; but after a few months the subject of our notice had the pleasure of being transferred to the temperate regions of the south as Resident Magistrate of Bunbury and Chairman of Quarter Sessions, in succession to Mr. Pearse Clifton. As a native of Bunbury he had the gratification of having steadily risen in the Civil Service until he held one of the highest and most responsible posts in the town in which he was born. But this was only the prelude to still greater preferment, for on the death of Mr. Slade Mr. Fairbairn was then given the larger jurisdiction of Police Magistrate at Fremantle, the office which he now holds. He has also acted as Police Magistrate at Perth during the absence on leave of Mr. Leake Cowan. During his long experience on the bench Mr. Fairbairn has presided at the hearing of some sensational cases, notably that of Thomas Hughes, who shot two policemen who endeavoured to arrest him for alleged theft.
Mr. Fairbairn is the Visiting Justice of the Fremantle Gaol, in which capacity he has had the oversight of some remarkable and well-connected criminals who, in spite of education and intelligence, have developed strange moral obliquity. and besmirched honourable and ancient family escutcheons. Mr. Fairbairn is able to relax from the severe dignity of his office when he leaves the bench, and is a strong supporter of physical culture. He is president of the Caledonian Society and of the Fremantle Rowing Club, also patron of the local football club. He is the father of two children, his wife being the daughter of Mr. Patrick Taylor, formerly of Kitton Hill, Montrose, Forfarshire, who arrived in the colony with the colonising expedition which was led by Governor Stirling.
It will be seen that Mr. Fairbairn has had an almost unique career as a magistrate, and that officially he has worn the white rose of a blameless life. He has performed the judicial function in all latitudes of this vast colony, and has faced danger, hardship, and the stirring up of hornets nests by plain speech in the interests of the public. He has shown in many different spheres that he possesses the wisdom, the firmness, and the unassailable probity to be just to all men, without fear, favour, or affection. His name occupies an honoured place among those who have administered the laws and protected the welfare of society in Western Australia.
