The Chronicles of Early Melbourne/Volume 1/Chapter 3
CHAPTER III.
CORPORATIONS A N D MUNICIPALITIES.
SYNOPSIS: —Beating the Boundaries. —Aldermanic Procession. —Charon on the Styx. —Sandridge Nomenclature. —Emerald Hill —First Government Land Sale there —Mr. James Service its First Mayor. —St. Kilda known as "Euro-Yroke." —Its Street Nomenclature. —Champagne Corks. —Windsor and Prahran. —Murphy's Paddock. —Sir Charles Hotham and Colonial Beer. —Gardiner's Creek Road. —Political Cabals. —Big and Little Scandals. —"Cotmandene" -Mr. G. W. Rusden's Residence. —Hon. James Graham. —Docker's Hill. —Parson Docker —"Struck Oil." —Value of Land in Richmond. —Rus in Urbe. —Judge Pohlman. —"Billy Barrett." —Richmond Street Nomenclature.—Fitzroy Gardens and East Melbourne. —Bishop's Court. —The Quadrangle. —East Melbourne Street Nomenclature. —Laying Foundation Stone of First Johnston Street Bridge. —St. Helier's. —Fitzroy-cum-Collingwood Convents. —Collingwood Street Nomenclature. —Reilly Street Drain. —The Quarries. —Fitzroy Street Nomenclature. —The Prisoners' Stockade. —The Necropolis. —Tricks of Mayors and Councillors. —Residence of Sir Redmond Barry. —Carlton and Hotham Street Nomenclature. —Mirring-gnay-bir-nong.
IN olden times there was a Triennial Ceremony of the Corporation, which was the cause of much jollification for those who joined in it. It was what was known in Municipal phraseology as "the beating of the metes and boundaries of the city." The boundary line—a very crooked one—was traversed, and the sign-posts inspected to ascertain that no trespassers were poaching on the domain dedicated to the public. The procession usually consisted of the Mayor, Town Clerk, Surveyor, the Chief Constable, and as many Aldermen, Councillors, and newspaper-men as chose to accompany them. What with the stops and stays, the knocking in and the knocking out, and the divers " liquorings up" (for the early Mayors were loud "shouters"), it took two whole days to go through this not very interesting, but legally necessary, work. Following, then, such a time-honoured precedent, I invite as many readers as choose to accompany me, to a circumambulation of the old city suburbs, promising that our trip shall neither be as tedious nor tortuous as those I have indicated; but the only refreshment I can provide is unadulterated, and I would fain hope, pleasant, gossip by the way. I further propose to make the now bustling borough of Sandridge our starting point. Standing at the Bay Street pier, and looking around and over the water to the other side, it is amusing to contemplate the now and the then. Let any person, even the most seriously disposed, try, if he can, to read without a smile the following notice which appears in the Melbourne Advertiser of 1838, over the sign-manual of one H. M'Lean:—
"The undersigned begs to inform the public that he has a boat and two men in readiness for the purpose of crossing and re-crossing passengers between Williamstown and the opposite beach. Parties from Melbourne are requested to raise a smoke, and the boat will be at their service as soon as practicable. The least charge is five shillings, and two shillings each when the number exceeds two."
This sturdy Charon—evidently from his name and style a son of the "Land of the Mist,"—must have made Williamstown his terminus, as the wayfarers were to signal from the north or Sandridge side. He is rather unspecific in his language, for though he enjoins the "raising of a smoke," he does not define the sort of smoke it is to be, leaving that, as a matter of course, to the imagination of those requiring his services. It is plain, however, that he meant them to kindle afire, a process much facilitated by the immense quantity of ti-tree scrub then luxuriating everywhere all around. This was the fuel, which, when freshly pulled, if it did not produce a flame, was sure to end in more than a "bottle of smoke" with a vengeance. But M'Lean's career in crown-making was of short duration, as a regular line of Watermen was soon in full pull, and whether M'Lean is still in the land of the living or has transferred his services to the banks of the Styx, is more than I can say. Sandridge remained a poor, miserable place, until the gold discoveries, and consequent rush of people from all parts of the world, shoved it half a century ahead. Until 1851, its progress was inconsiderable, the chief business places being some three or four hotels which were tolerably well patronised by the sailors and boatmen knocking about, and such Melbournians as were disposed on fine evenings to undertake a pedestrian trip to the beach, to inhale the ozone, supplemented with a nip of the not over-proof rum or brandy which the seaside Taverners kept on draught.
Sandridge was very appropriately named by the Provincial Superintendent (Mr. Latrobe), for it was a veritable sand-hole when first visited by Europeans, and a barrel daubed with white paint had to be hoisted to a tree-trunk as afinger-postto point the way to Melbourne. The first civilised habitation there was a tent pitched on the wild beach, by an enterprising colonist named Liardet, some of whose family are still amongst us. The tent soon gave way to a tavern, another "pub" shortly sprang up a few yards off, and then an occasional house or two. When the corporate orbit of Melbourne was enlarged, Sandridge became one of the municipal adjuncts, and a troublesome and unprofitable one it was. The gold discoveries gave it a shove along, infused some life into what was almost moribund, and in process of time it expanded into a separate municipality, and thenceforth became a thriving town. Whoever had the naming of its streets made a sad mess of it, for with the exception of Liardet (the earliest inhabitant), Mr. Peter Lalor, Ex-Speaker of the Legislative Assembly, Mr. James Carton, an old Sandridgite, and Mr. Inglis, an enterprising resident, the nomenclature was distributed amongst a batch of local mediocrities. Certainly they have amongst them a Pickles Street—no misnomer considering the briny nature of the place; but if there was any respect entertained for thefitnessof things, to make the pickles go well, the streets should be grafted with a "pork," "cabbage," "onions," or "cold beef" street, but such an alliance seems never to have been once thought of. Sandridge, with the surrounding district, is believed to have formed at some remote period a delta of the Yarra, which discharged into the sea through the old lagoon, and from Sandridge to Emerald Hill by this route was not a pleasant, though not a distant stroll, for almost every step of the way one was more than ankle deep in sand.
Several of the localities around Melbourne were named after well-known and cherished spots in the old country; and the only one whose nomenclature has given rise to newspaper controversy is Emerald Hill. This once beautiful eminence which rivalled Batman's Hill, and much exceeded it in size, was the grazing ground of the kangaroo, until a sheep station and the strange looking animals accompanying it, scared them away. Captain Lonsdale is said to have purchased 200 lambs at two guineas each, and turned them out on the hill to depasture. It was at all times a favourite trysting-place of the blacks, who held corroborees and native dances there, a pantomimic performance occasionally witnessed by the Melbournians on fine summer nights. It was known simply as "the green hill over the Yarra" until 1849, when for the first time it was styled "Emerald Hill" by Mr. Edmund Finn,[1] a Melbourne journalist, in a notice written by him, announcing that a picnic of the Father Matthew Society would be held there on a certain day. At the time no name could be more appropriate, for it was as green as if it had been by some miraculous agency imported in globo, but shamrockless, from the Emerald Isle.
In after years when the verdure had been annihilated by bricks and mortar, builders, carpenters, and plasterers, an attempt was made to change the name to Clarkestown after Sir. A. Clarke, one of the most active agents in the introduction to the colony of the system of Local Self-Government, but so much disfavour of the innovation was shown by the Hillites that the project was abandoned. The Hill, though a picturesque and beautiful place in itself, was surrounded by swamps, and deemed a rather unhealthy locality. On the flat between it and the Yarra, Mr. J. P. Fawkner performed the agricultural feat of planting a crop of wheat, and this wheatfieid was afterwards transformed into the more payable "spec" of a brickfield, the bricks from which many of the earlier brickwalled houses were built. The brickfield remained for some years, until thrust out of the market by the brick kilns of other more suitable places, and is now being gradually taken up as sites for brick-residences of every kind and degree, and breweries, factories, and manufactories of the most mixed kind. Some future day, one of those terrible floods, more than once seen by old colonists, will come tumbling down from the Upper Yarra Ranges, and sweep one half of the modern improvements into the sea.
The first Government sale of land at Emerald Hill took place in 1849, but there was not much request for the building allotments. After a little time the demand sharpened, and the events of the few succeeding years established the settlement. Emerald Hill, though municipally attached to Melbourne, was the first to take advantage of the powers of severance conferred by the Municipal Institutions' Act, and accordingly a "Repeal of the Union," was speedily effected. In its efforts to introduce the Self Government System, the Bill had the great advantage of a few able indefatigable local men, who
"Knew their rights
And knowing would maintain them,"
and amongst them may be accounted as facile princeps—Mr. James Service, the first Mayor of the Municipality, who for years rendered a series of local services of a most invaluable nature, which never should have been, but were, forgotten. It is worthy to note the many civic improvements wrought on the Hill, which has within the past few years showed more signs of permanent advancement than any other suburb. It may be now said to join Sandridge, it is fast moving towards St. Kilda and South Yarra; and it is practically as near Melbourne as one of the principal streets of the City. Here there is something of a greater variety of street-naming than in Sandridge, for, whilst the municipal authorities took good care not to forget themselves, they have condescended to confer favours on Prince Albert, Lords Nelson, Raglan and Palmerston, and Mr. Cobden; and they have actually a St. Vincent amongst them.
The now fashionable watering-place, St. Kilda, was, in the "dark ages," known as "Euro-Yroke," after a sort of sandstone found there, with which the blacks used to shape and sharpen their rude stone tomahawks, and its present pleasant name was obtained in the following manner:—
Once on a time, there was a picnic in one of the then umbrageous nooks with which the beautiful suburb abounded. Many of the élite of Melbourne were there, and amongst them the Superintendent, Mr. Latrobe. Whilst the champagne corks were flying, someone said to Mr. Latrobe, "What name shall this place have?" and Mr. Latrobe, at the moment looking over the water, saw a small yacht sailing like a swan before him. The sight suggested the answer, and he replied, "Well, I don't think we can do better than name it after Captain ————'s yacht."[2] The name of the little clipper was "The St. Kilda," and so St. Kilda came to be thenceforward known. But St. Kilda was for several years little more than a pretty seaside retreat, visited by the well-to-do Melbournians who flocked on summer evenings to cool themselves after the heat and turmoil of the day. A comfortable hotel was kept there by a Mr. Howard, and half-a-dozen villa residences were put up at various times. T h e land about was either sandy or swamp scrub; and in winter all pedestrianism between it and Brighton was cut off by quagmires. Save on the Melbourne side, it was often both water and puddle-bound. Towards 1850, some co-operating land-buying societies were formed, and purchases were made about this quarter. The "Golden Age," the next year, pushed it and Windsor, Elsternwick, Caulfield, Malvern, and around there, ahead. St. Kilda began to spread its wings, and "Forward!" became its motto. At the time of the naming of the streets the Crimea furore had reached the colony, and the authorities must have been a good deal war-bitten, for St. Kilda was considerably War-officed by the martial designations of some of its highways. Honour was done to Wellington, Nelson, and Havelock, whilst the Alma, Balaclava, Inkerman, Sebastopol, and, the Malakoff were not forgotten. A dash of law and equity was added in Jervis and Westbury, statecraft commemorated by Carlisle, and Barkly, and old colonists not forgotten in Fawkner, Gurner, Greeves, Jackson, Dalgety and Burnett. Literature was commemorated in the illustrious names of Byron, Scott, Southey, Dickens, Tennyson, Mitford, and Burns—but proh, pudor! poor Moore was passed over! His umbra, however, need take no offence at the omission—for "Lalla Rookh" lives where "St. Kilda " is unknown.
Windsor never seemed to me a fitting designation for the district which got wedged between St. Kilda and Prahran. In one of the dialects of the aborigines, "Prahran" means sandy, and a miserable sand-blinding, slush-making and rarely-visited region it was in the good old times. By the strangest of all conjunctures, too, it got in some way municipally screwed up to South Yarra. In this Southern district there is a most amusing mixing up of street names, for we have Sir Walter Raleigh keeping company with Lord Chatham, and Dr. Lang, the old religious firebrand of New South Wales, exchanging compliments with Lord Aberdeen and George Washington; and Charon, the ferryman of the Infernal Regions attended 
first annexed by two partners named Gog and Walpole, but they did not make much of it for sheep or cattle feeding. A Mr. Glass (not the afterwards well-known Hugh) was more fortunate, for he declared himself the lord and master of green Boroondara, from lordly Toorak to lofty Tara, from bosky Burwood plain to Ballyshanassy; and Boroondara beef soon made itself known in the market. If the Gardiner's Creek Road could speak, what queer tales could it not tell since the time when Gardiner's bullocks stampeded along it; when Sir Charles Hotham made Toorak his vice-regal flagship, hoisted his broad pennant from its turret, and dispensed colonial beer to his guests at birthday festivals. There was no road in the colony better posted up in all the great changes which have swept over this community; better versed in all the political cabals that have taken place; better learned in all the big and little scandals of every day as it passed. If this road could speak, and only tell a tithe of what it has heard uttered by those who passed along it for the last thirty years, truth would be found stranger than fiction, and no mistake. Let us proceed, however, and turn the corner, where the late much lamented Judge Fellows once resided; and, standing on the top of Punt Hill, look round and ask where we are? We are opposite "Cotmandene," a queer, comfortable-looking hooded house, of monastic aspect, fit residence for a recluse; yet no anchorite dwells there, for it is the home of Mr. G. W. Rusden, the clerk of the Parliaments, so well known in the colony as a man who has the gift of tongues, and can write even more fluently than he can talk. And then on the opposite side, a little further north, is the feathered nest of the Hon. James Graham. It is called Elibank House, after a member of the Elibank family, the Hon. Erskine Murray, who originally bought the land thereabout. He was amongst the earliest barristers at the Port Phillip bar, and is mentioned in other chapters. The present occupant, when it passed into his possession, clung to the old name, though often asked to change it. The Hon. James Graham is one of our primitive merchants of whom so few survive. He arrived in 1838, and has witnessed all the commercial and political ordeals through which the colony has passed. Commercially he was known as "Jas.," conventionally as "James," but familiarly as "Jemmy." In the by-gone times he was always one of the foremost in getting up a birth-night or assembly ball, and was one of the few, who, by tact and caution, sailed clear of the financial maelstrom of 1841-3, within whose seething vortex so many mercantile craft foundered. Walking down the hill northward, we reach the Yarra ferry, the second oldest on the river, and pass right on to the heart of unclassic Richmond. In early days this suburb was a splendid section of green, undulating, well-timbered bush, and it was a favourite walk and drive with the citizens. Its prime piece was the part known as Docker's Hill, where the Rev. Joseph Docker made a profitable investment, by the purchase of no less thanfiftyacres at one of thefirstland sales in 1839. For one moiety of this he paid £24 per acre, and £15 for the other. He was mindful of the "loaves and fishes" in more than a Scriptural sense. If this land were kept until the present day, and now cut up and sold, what a fabulous number of "loaves andfishes" could be bought with the proceeds! Parson Docker, however, had not the gift of prescience, for, by degrees, the hill was sold out for residence sites, and no doubt, as times went, the vendor "struck oil" pretty considerably, and reaped a luxuriant interest harvest on the original outlay. The township of Richmond, of some three hundred acres, was divided into twelve lots of from twentyeight to twenty-five acres each, and the highest price fetched at the hammer was £28, and the lowest £13 per acre. The twenty-five acre lot, commencing at the corner of the Bridge and Punt roads, was purchased by a Mr. M'Nall, the chief butcher of the time, for £24 an acre, while the opposite one of twenty-eight acres was knocked down to Mr. Craig, a merchant, for £28 per acre, and twenty-seven acres at the corner of Simpson's Road and East Melbourne brought only £16 per acre. These subdivisions were intended for Rus in urbe boxes, where the well-to-do Melbourne merchants and professionals could retire after the worry and wear, the profit and loss, of a busy day, and smoke the calumet of peace in the bosoms of their families. It never entered into the sphere of probability that the then Richmond would, in a few years, become the great, thriving, working, hive of busy bees it is to-day. Comfortable, if not architecturally stylish, villas began to dot the place, and amongst the earliest Richmondites were Messrs. Campbell and Woolley, wine and spirit meichants; Mr. Cavenagh, the founder of the Herald; Mr. Ocock, one of Melbourne's earliest solicitors (now dead) ; the once well-known W. B. Burnley (who died some years ago, very wealthy); the old identity, Judge Pohlman; "Billy Barrett," an ancient,fidgetty,short-tempered auctioneer; Mr. Thomas Strode, for many a long year the "Father of the Chapel" of the Melbourne Press since 1839; Mr. William Hull, J.P., and two or three others, since removed from all terrestrial troubles. With the exception of Carlton and Hotham, our suburbs have been spoiled in consequence of the way in which they have been cut up by land-jobbers, to squeeze the largest number possible of building lots out of them. Streets, and lanes, and places, and terraces have been improvised—many of them mere culs de sac, and yards have been turned into the narrowest of thoroughfares, with the view of turning them again into as many pounds as they would bring during the pressure of the gold fever, and Richmond has been everlastingly marred in this way. Every hole and corner where a house could be squeezed in has been utilized; and, furthermore, I do not think that Richmond was well cared for in the early stage of its municipal endowment. For instance, I never pass the Richmond Town Hall without wondering how it ever came to be erected where it is, as such an edifice might be such an ornament and acquisition in a more central position. It is the right thing put in the wrong place; but the error cannot be rectified, and as it pleased the rate-payers of the time to be satisfied, of course so must I, mere outsider as I am. And here again is the usual ill-assorted agglomeration of street names, some perpetuating welldeserved public benefactors, and others the veriest ciphers. The Richmondites must have been hard up for some one or somewhere, after whom or which to dub their highways and byeways, for they travelled from Bendigo to Berlin, from Erin to Hamburg, and away from Edinburgh to Amsterdam, appellationhunting. The Rose and the Shamrock are not forgotten, but the Scottish and Welsh national emblems—the Thistle and Leek are given the go-by. Religion is honoured by having one of the best streets named after the Church, and Lennox, the first Superintendent of bridges, is in Godly company on the parallel line. Old colonists, like Sir Wm. Stawell and Sir J. Palmer, Messrs. W. Hull, W. Highett, W. B. Burnley, and D. S. Campbell, are not forgotten. Prince Patrick, the Duke of Wellington, and Neptune are comfortably provided for; and Lords Brougham and Lyndhurst, the great defiant and defunct Chancellors of England, are woolsacked near each other. St. James and the Lady Rowena are not overlooked, but surely it was an oversight not to have provided the lady with an Ivanhoe to "parade" with her. Some admirer of Petrarch, no doubt, suggested Vaucluse; but who was the printer in whose honour they proclaimed a Type Street? Melbourne's well-known town clerk, Fitzgibbon, is nDt forgotten; nor is George Coppin disregarded, and shame on Richmond were it so. I must now return by Bridge Road, and look into the aristocratic quarter of East Melbourne, sanctified by ever so many religious edifices, and two Episcopal mansions. The original boundary of old Melbourne was Spring Street, but after some time it was evident that the town would extend in that direction. A s proposed by Mr. Hoddle, there was to be a prolongation of the streets running eastward, with different names; but after some consideration it was vetoed by Mr. Latrobe, who compelled Hoddle, much to his annoyance, to block up the east end. A few years after, the Corporation had a plan of extension in this quarter prepared, but it was also negatived. The present Fitzroy Gardens in 1839, contained a quarry, which was then worked to supply the blue-stone for the foundations of the more substantial of the town buildings, and was, for years, a regular eyesore instead of the thing of beauty it is now, a consummation for which much praise must be given to Mr. Clement Hodgkinson an ex-Assistant Surveyor General. According to the newly-propounded scheme, a Crescent was to be formed in the Gardens, and though many favoured the notion, a majority of the City Council were adverse, and it fell through. The formation of a garden was in course of time decided on, and ultimately realized. This was why East Melbourne came to be laid out as it is.
Very little land was sold in East Melbourne, after the place was offered for sale, but by degrees it grew in public favour. In 1850, Bishop Perry obtained a grant of the Bishop's-court site, where a tasty edifice was soon put up; and as years rolled on, the quarter grew into much demand for private residences. As the quadrangle was select, it was only right and proper that its naming should be equally so, and therefore we find it divided amongst a Prince, Lords, and Commoners who did good service in their day, such as Albert, Clarendon, Gipps, Hotham, Grey, Powlett, and Simpson—whilst it is bounded on the north and south by Queen Victoria and the Duke of Wellington, and east and west by the Marquis of Lansdowne and Mr. Robert Hoddle. The last-named, too, obtained the longest street almost by accident, and how this happened is thus told by himself in his journal. He so writes:— "In conversation with me one day, Mr. Latrobe observed that I had been very modest not to have had a street named after myself. I told him that unless a good, broad street was named after me, I had rather be without one. He jocularly observed, I must have a street; which street did I prefer? I told him if I must have a street, the continuation of Collins Street would do very well. He wrote 'Hoddle Street,' accordingly. Some time after, in speaking about the streets, he remarked to me, 'I suppose Judge Willis must have a street, and, as he is a cross old fellow, he must have a cross street.' When Mr. Latrobe subsequently quarrelled with Judge Willis, he erased his name from the street assigned to him on the map, substituting my name on the 'cross' street, and erasing it from the continuation of Collins Street, and putting in its place the name of 'Fitzroy,' in compliment to Governor Sir Charles Fitzroy, to my annoyance and chagrin."
And thus it was that poor Willis (afterwards removed from the Bench) was done out of his street, and Hoddle got it, which certainly ought to have satisfied him, especially as, on the principle of some topers going in for a long drink, he went in for a good broad street, and he had not much reason to complain. As it turned out, if his name had remained d o w n for the continuation of Collins Street, he would have missed the mark, for that street was not continued, and for the proposed Fitzroy Street was substituted the Fitzroy Gardens.
Walking across the longest and finest thoroughfare of the City, I am in what was first known as Newtown, then Collingwood, and now Fitzroy. This was the first suburb operated upon in the way of Public Land Sales, and was primarily submitted to competition in blocks of about twenty-five acres each—evidently intended as a convenient place for the private residences of such of the towns-people as might be able to live privately. The sale taking place so far away as Sydney, the Melbournians were, to a great extent shut out of the market, and the consequence was that the purchasers were, with few exceptions New South Welshmen. The land averaged about £7 per acre; and a remarkable instance of a great bargain (if kept until to-day) is the north east corner of Nicholson Street and Victoria Parade, twenty-five acres of which were knocked down to Hughes and Hoskins, an old Sydney mercantile firm, for £6 10s. per acre. Fancy what a nugget could be now made out of these twenty-five acres at so much per foot! The Sydney men speedily commenced to turn over the pennies, and in their anxiety to realise, the sacred allotments were very soon cut up piecemeal, and sold and farmed and rented in every possible manner for the putting up of tenements of every conceivable kind, from the two-storied brick to the shaky weatherboard; from the "wattle-and-daub" to the bark hut, or canvas, sometimes old blanket-covered, tent. The villa notion vanished, and with some exceptions, the supplementary settlement presented to the spectator one of the queerest conglomerations of habitations for man or beast that could be well imagined. It was called Newtown, and its early limits of location comprised the square from Nicholson Street to Smith Street and from Victoria Parade to Moor Street. Newtown was changed in name to Collingwood, and so remained until that settlement began to advance down to the flat,when the original quarter was constituted a municipal ward of Melbourne and styled Fitzroy, after Sir Charles Fitzroy, a Governor of New South Wales, Gertrude Street was called after the daughter of a captain, whose name I forget. Mr. Robert Russell writes me that Napier Street was named in this way: "Suburban 50, 25a, Fitzroy, was subdivided for Captain Cole by me in August, 1849, and he, doubtless, thought of the illustrious Sir Charles, who had been nursed in the same cradle with himself, and after him named the street." If Mr. Russell's supposition be correct, it will be a white feather in the cap of Napier Street to be nominally associated with a hero who fills a distinguished niche in English history. When the time came for proclaiming the streets, the members of the Melbourne Corporation accepted a grand opportunity of gaining a nominal, though very empty, immortality, for we find no less than eight of the old mayors placated by themselves in this way, viz., Condell, Moor, Palmer, Hodgson, Nicholson, Bell, Greeves, and Smith. Just below Moor Street is a block, bounded by Brunswick, Greeves, Young, and St. David Streets, and this is "the lost Square of Fitzroy," whose queer story is told in the chapter on the "Melbourne Corporation," and which Mr. John M'Mahon, the mayor for 1880-1881 (and the most indefatigable mayor Fitzroy has ever had), has taken much trouble to find. Reilly and Johnston Streets were called after the names of two aldermen. Young Street after one of the first councillors for the Ward. A private property-owner, of very Orange proclivities, took an early opportunity of dedicating two adjoining streets—one to King William, and the other to his beloved Hanover; and a very distinguished and respectable citizen now in England—William Westgarth—is perpetuated in another. Brunswick Street, at an early date, blossomed forth into a kind of quasi-aristocratic region, for it contained a few neat cottages, which were tenanted by some of the then élite. The house now ornamented with the prominent scroll of "Blakemount House," and whose iron gate is emblazoned with a thick brass plate inscribed with the legend "J. R. M'Inerney, Physician and Surgeon," was the residence of Major St. John, one of our first police magistrates, of whom strange stories, recounted in another chapter, used to be told. The late Mr. Justice Williams, when he started in professional life amongst us, set up in a cottage, still standing, nearly opposite the last mentioned, until recently occupied by another physician, Dr. Browning. This is the spot rendered memorable by the confession made in Mr. Hartley Williams' maiden electioneering speech, some years ago, at St. Kilda, that Fitzroy can claim the high honour of being his birth-place. Mr. H. Williams is now a Judge on the same Bench where his father sat before him, so that one judge tenanted this house, and another judge entered the world there. The once well-known Mr. J. D. Pinnock was also one of the fashionable "swells" that abided here. He had arrived from Sydney with the appointment of Deputy-Registrar of the Supreme Court, an office held by him until Port Phillip was separated. Near the corner of Nicholson and Palmer Streets (then unnamed), two remarkable stone twin-houses-one the facsimile of the other—were erected for Messrs. Watson and Wight, mercantile partners, and for several years were occupied by them; but on the arrival of the first Sisterhood of Nuns from Ireland, in 1857, this place was considered a suitable spot for the founding of a nunnery. The "twins" were purchased, passed along to other guardians, and, after various processes of extension, alteration, and improvement, are almost unrecognisable in the comfortable, well-looking, well-ordered, Convent of Mercy of to-day.
On the subject of "nomenclature," Mr. Russell further wrote at length, thus:— "Few streets in Fitzroy, Collingwood, and Richmond—the true old suburban ground—have obtained their designation from public colonial men, Nicholson, Smith (John Thomas, no doubt, for it was not my father-in-law), stepped in in lieu of plain Government roads, their predecessors. Condell slipped in when a name was wanted; Kerr dethroned Argyle (if I mistake not, in suburban 83, sold 23rd October, '49, by the Bank of Australia). As similarly at Richmond, Coppin transplanted Elizabeth. Again strange cases occur when the original name is misunderstood. Thus Fraser, as now pasted up, takes the place of Euphrasia Street at Richmond. Large proprietors, as Otter and Docker, naturally retain a street in their own name. But, in general, the streets were named when the land was cut up; and it is amusing to look back to this process. For instance, suburban 49, in Victoria Parade, 25 acres, Crown to Thomas Walker, passes to Smyth and Baxter; and 8th May, 1849, they subdivided it, and forthwith appear Brunswick and Gertrude Streets; the latter, probably, a family name; whilst the half chain road, east of Brunswick Street not having been considered worthy of mention, years after is suddenly seized for, or by, the well-known David Young. Next on the east on suburban 50 comes our friend Napier, and then George Street. Suburban 51 again on the east presents us with Gore Street. The Crown purchaser was Thomas Gore. It was claimed by John Gore, 29th July, '42 by advertisement; sold 8th May, 1850, by Captain Cole, the name Gore sticking well to it from first to last. We then (still on the east) come to the Walmer Estate, upwards of 70 acres, Crown to Sandeman and to Donaldson, which subsequently passed to M'Killop the first subdivision of which, dated 15th February, 1840, was sold by Charles (known as Captain) Hutton, and here the tide sets in strongly for men of note, such as Peel, Stanley, Derby, and Wellington. Next on the eastward come 47¾ acres, Crown to D. S. Campbell and to Hughes and Hosking, which passed to Hodgson and M'Kenzie, who sold about 1843. Here we have Rupert and Cromwell Streets in close fraternity to Islington Terrace, Hyde Terrace, Rokeby and Burlington Streets. Still on eastwards came Dr. (afterwards Sir Charles) Nicholson 57, 58, and part of 59 suburbans, granted to himself and to Charles Bradly, which were subdivided by Penrose Nevins, surveyor, in 1851. Charles, William, Lithgow, Albert, and Mollison appear; names commonplace enough, but connecting with the owner, Mr. Mollison, who managed his affairs at Port Phillip. It is not, however, until we step over to Richmond and consider suburban 19 and 28 that we get another haul ff notabilities. These 50 acres passed into Thurlow's hands, and two subdivisions were made—the one (probably the first)by Williamson, the surveyor; the other by H. B. Foote, the surveyor. This last was acted upon, and forthwith appear the names of Brougham, Abinger, Lyndhurst, etc. Suburban 18 and 29 (which adjoin the last) take quite another character. These were first granted to Brodie and to another, and passed on to Watson and Hunter, who subdivided and sold them. The Richmond flat was at that time subject to water privileges, and Neptune and Corsair Streets show a feeling in that direction, Hunter and Euphrasia Streets being their associates. Again, the suburban in which was Highett's Paddock, with its Erin and Sackville Streets, probably obtained this distinction through Charles Williams, the auctioneer, who at one time possessed a large portion of it. And Type Street, near the Richmond Bridge, in suburban 30, receives its facetious title, I apprehend, from Strode, the printer, who held property there."
It would be unpardonable for me to pass without a word what was, until it recently vanished, the oldest two-storied house in Fitzroy, at the corner of Victoria Parade and Fitzroy Street. It was an old friend of mine, though it has put on half-a-dozen new faces since we first met. It was built as a private residence for Arthur Kemmis, one of our first merchants, who did not long survive his installation there. The next comer was a keen, quiet, canny little Scotchman—Alastair M'Kenzie—who, standing well with Downing Street, arrived in the colony with the appointment of Sheriff in his pocket, was subsequently nominated Treasurer by the Colonial Office, and died after enjoying his higher billet and its emoluments for two or three years. I next knew it as the "mia-mia" of jolly, good-natured J e m m y Stewart, of the firm of Brown and Stewart, wine merchants of Elizabeth Street, who was very much liked by the old colonists, and was the best judge of a glass of whisky in Port Phillip ; but "Jamie" would just as soon give as take a nip. He found his way into the Legislative Council, and represented the Eastern Province for a few years; but never made much of a stir in public life, if I except the stunning trade he used to do with the Melbourne pubs, for the house of Brown and Stewatt was a taking one. H e died at a comparatively early age, both respected and regretted. It was at one time rumoured that this house had a special ghost attached to it, and that the usual mysterious indications of an unearthly visitant were not wanting. If there were any truth in this his ghostship was effectually "laid" when the tenement passed to the possession of the well-known lawyer and politician, Mr. (now Sir A.) Michie. Probably it was hearing of this that induced Mr. Michie, several years ago, to deliver one of his eminently clever lectures on Ghosts, at the Mechanics' Institution, and possibly it was the preparation of the lecture that caused the ghost to skedaddle. The building was afterwards devoted to the purpose of a boarding school and young women's "home." It would be difficult to imagine a more irregular network of lanes and bye-ways (they were not thoroughfares) than obtained in these times. All about and along Moor Street, from Nicholson to Smith Streets, it was one bewildering way-maze which baffled all power of alignment until a clue was found in a £50,000 endowment of a Fitzroy Ward Improvement Fund, and this was the sesame by which the streets were finally opened. Mr. (afterwards Sir) John O'Shanassy, then a member of the Legislative Assembly, was a powerful means of effecting this, and such a good turn should never be forgotten. But it was forgotten very soon, for the definition of the Plebs' gratitude is a recollection of favours to come. Up to 1850 Smith Street was quite a one-sided affair, and a very queer ragged-regiment kind of affair too. All down the flat was a morass where one would hardly think human habitats could ever spring up. There was an excuse for a house of some kind or other thrown up here and there, and, "though few and far between," they were anything but "angels' visits." A change began, but slowly, to be effected, until the golden revelations of 1851-53 changed everything. One quaint-looking two-storied house, nearly opposite the Birmingham Hotel, was the "den" of John Pascoe Fawkner, and from the balcony in front, the old lion might be seen koo-tooing to his friends, and grinning at his foes as they passed by—and it was "Johnny's" lot to have friends and foes in abundance. Here the "oldest inhabitant" died, and the building turned into a toy-emporium. Mac's Hotel, nearly opposite Webb Street, was another very remarkable house, and cannot well be passed over in any historical reference to Smith Street. It was put up by a Scotchman, but from what ilk this special Mac hailed I cannot now say. Though the Mac has passed away, the hotel remains, and if its unwritten memoirs could be compiled, many strange yarns could be twisted out of them. It was the great focus of many of the agitations by which the Collingwoodites used to be convulsed. It was the head quarters of Stumperdom, for there was an open space in front, and an open space in rear, where the so-called great mass meetings used to be held—and stumping exhibited in perfection. Those gatherings used to eclipse the Eastern Market ones of after years, for this was the grand training ground of the agitators; and it was quite a treat to hear the Dons, the M'Minns, the Murphys, the Osbornes, and the Scotchmeres of the age exercising themselves. A roaring trade in "rum" and "two ales" used to be driven at the tavern bar where the "calls" were incessant on a stump night. Times, however, have changed, and there has been a change of venue in the meetings in consequence of the stonewallers and bricklayers having eradicated the stumps; and "Mac's" has since had to run through the usual vicissitudes of modern taverns, and take to its bosom as "lord and master," the good, the bad, and the indifferent. Presuming upon the consent of whoever may now be doing the Boniface, let us (metaphorically) ascend to the roof of the hotel, and behold some of the surroundings of the neighbourhood of old Melbourne, and note some of the changes they have passed through. The "flat" has undergone a transformation at the hands of the builder, and active enterprise and thriving industry go together. Glance along the sinuous Yarra's verge from bridge to bridge, and you behold factories and breweries, and spacious hotels, and miles of streets, big and little, built upon and kerbed and macadamised, where a few years ago mobs of blacks, and flocks of sheep, and the herdsmen and their cattle used to roam about. There is Studley Park, looking well enough to-day, but it was positively grand in the primitive times, when it was the wild bush, and free from the improving touches of civilization. It was one time rented by John Hodgson, who let it out as a grazing paddock at so much per head per week. But Hodgson went the way of all flesh, and his place was held by Mr. Thomas Halfpenny, as Government Ranger, until he retired in 1887. The Park is now a place of public recreation. This is the same "Halfpenny" who was once thought to have risked his life by camping in Collins Street in 1836. Possibly in his solitary park rambles he often sighs for the never-to-return days when, though but a "Halfpenny," he managed to turn into himself many a penny, shilling and pound in the "William Tell," one of the oldest of hostelries, which once stood in Collins Street, near the Queen Street corner, on portion of the present £60,000 site of the English and Scottish Chartered Bank. History tells us the Yarra Falls in Melbourne, the original crossing-place for stock, was dangerous, and once upon a time, twenty-six head were drowned there; and great was the joy of Gardiner when he found the "Falls" near Studley Park much safer for his sheep and bullocks. A Mr. Dight had a large paddock here, now cut up for sale with a square out of the centre for the use of the residents. These "Falls" were a favourite haunt of the aborigines, and a great fishing station for the early citizens, for herring was taken in large numbers at certain periods of the year.
The laying of the foundation-stone of the first Johnston Street Bridge was quite an event in East Collingwood many years ago. The day was fine, there was an immense gathering, and after the performance of the usual ceremonies, a sumptuous spread was served at the residence of Mr. J. Orr in the neighbourhood. There was a grand procession too, and Major John Hodgson, at the head of the Volunteers, and Mr. J. J. Moody, the Town Clerk, who wielded great Civic authority over the civilian element, were worth looking at. The vicinity of the bridge is now much altered—some of it for the worse and some very much for the better. In the bend of the river, to the south, were the grounds and villa of St. Heliers, the residence of Mr. Edward Curr, one of the ablest and best known, though not most popular, men of his day. St. Heliers in course of time, disappeared, and a worthier substitute occupies its place in the Convent of the nuns of the Good Shepherd with "the tinkling of the silver bell, and the Sisters' holy hymn." The district of Fitzroy-cum-Collingwood may well be proud of the fact of having the two chief Convents in the colony within its boundaries—each placed like a sentinel on the Eastern and Western frontiers. It is very amusing how some of the East Collingwood streets have been named. I am fond of harping on street nomenclature, because I think I see in it an indication of the public taste or feeling of the time. Smith Street, as I have said, was called after the once potent civic magnate— "John Thomas"—and then we have such names as Sackville, Regent, Oxford, and Cambridge, which, when compared with their name-sakes in British Capitals, are most laugh-provoking. We have Easy Street after a long "easy" going auctioneer of that name; Perry Street, but whether after a bishop or another auctioneer, I cannot say. We have Peel, and Derby and Stanley Streets appropriately enough—and the great Duke of Wellington is honoured with a very long street, which, if not "ironed" is always tolerably well metalled; but with execrably bad taste, we have a narrow, lanky, miserable-looking lane, called Napoleon Street, I suppose intended to convey a relative estimate of the military capacity of both heroes. Grim Oliver Cromwell, the gay and dashing Prince Rupert, and poetic Rokeby, are shunted off into an out-of-the-way, and not very salubrious, locality. In another place we have a street called "Gold" where things certainly do not look very golden, and there is a Ballarat Street, which is evidently a nominal relic of the auriferous era—when no people were more bitten by the gold mania than those of East Collingwood.
The region lying between the famous Reilly Street drain and the Merri Creek was bare, barren, and stony, if we except the portion now known as Clifton Hill; and as bluestone began to be required for building purposes, the pick, and the crowbar, and the shovel went to work—and so originated that network of quarry holes that used to be found everywhere here, many of which have been recently filled up. Hence the suburb known so long as "The Quarries," and extending along the Merri Creek and on to Brunswick. The sites of the Heidelberg and Northcote Bridges were the natural crossing places; and the Hill just beyond Northcote Bridge is historical, for it was there Batman entered into his celebrated treaty with the aborigines. It was for a long time surmised that building enterprise would never penetrate to any extent beyond the sickly Reilly Street drain. This due northern region was the most unpleasant of the surroundings of Melbourne; the cold north wind in winter and the hot wind in summer, produced climatic variations anything but agreeable. O n e was either half-drowned or half-baked, and between mud and dust, and wet and heat, you could hardly dream that homes and hearths could have an abiding place there. In a comparatively shoit time, however, the auctioneer's hammer knocked all such imaginings to pieces; the land was placed in the market, and then did not land jobbers reap a golden harvest? The result, as now seen, is that quite a town sprang up as if by magic, and Fitzroy is fast being linked to Northcote and Brunswick. In the nomenclature of North Fitzroy, the Fitzroy Council had their turn in naming after themselves, and the streets are called after a swarm of municipal nobodies. There are a few notable exceptions—for we have long M'Kean running head foremost into little Langton, and phlegmatic George Harker plodding the same way as mercurial Tom Rae. And then, as a sort of royal centre-piece, there are the Duke of Edinburgh's Gardens, while H.R.H.'s distinguished boon-companions, York and Newry, are not forgotten.
I must now rapidly keep moving, and ask my readers to clap on all steam and accompany me across by what was the Prisoners' Stockade, afterwards a branch Lunatic Asylum, and now a State School; and skirting along by the fence of the Necropolis, where some hundred thousand human beings have found a resting place in thirty years, we stand on the highest spot of the palaeozoic hill on which the greater part of Carlton is built. Looking around you, compare it as it now is with what it was not many years ago, when all the country around by the Royal Park and the other Hill of Hotham revealed a vista of hill and dale, well wooded and grassed, well suited for a delightful rambling excursion. The perspective now is an untold treasure, planted in the soil, and cropping up in splendid mansions handsome villas, busy marts, spacious streets, squares, parks, and gardens, and stately churches—all these practical evidences of civilization
"Where flourished once a forest fair."
Carlton and Hotham were once known by the general designation of North Melbourne, and the old Supreme Court building was quite out of town. I well remember when jurymen and suitors, during the adjournment of the court, instead of poking themselves into some neighbouring tavern to crack hard biscuits and drink bad beer, used to betake themselves to the "bush" at the rear of the gaol, where, sub tegmine fagi, they enjoyed their lunch in quiet comfort. The present exceptionally superior appearance of those suburbs, as compared with other localities, may be attributed to the relatively late period when the greater part of the land was sold, and the judgment evinced by the land speculators in subdividing their purchases. "When a large portion of Carlton and Hotham was put into the market, numbers of people who had saved money from the early gold years (and better still, knew how to keep it), invested it there to advantage. A taste also gradually grew up for dwellings with the comfort and conveniences of English life, and to such causes are to be traced the superior style of building, very generally prevailing. Municipal self-government was likewise a powerful agent and improver, and much as we may occasionally grumble at the fantastic tricks of Mayors and Councillors, no really impartial observer will be unwilling to accord them a very large share of credit for the substantial benefits they have conferred upon their respective districts, by the generally intelligent and efficient manner in which they have performed their corporate duties. It used to be said of the old unreformed English and Irish Corporations that "they bad neither bodies to be kicked nor souls to be damned;" and this was, to a great extent, figuratively true, for they were regular sinks of jobbery and corruption. But, taken as a whole, our own Municipal Institutions have been a great success, and no candid writer can fairly allege otherwise. The first member of the regular villa family in Carlton was the residence of Sir Redmond Barry, who removed there from a small comfortable two-storied house in Russell Street. The villa has been purchased as an hospital for sick children, and it is a transition of an amusing kind—to have the once so-much-admired semi-rural retreat turned into an infantile infirmary. Speaking of hospitals, mention should be made of the Lying-in Hospital (how much better to change it for the more appropriate appellation of Maternity Institution), whose foundation originated with Dr. John Maund, who died many years ago.
I cannot leave Carlton without paying a compliment to the street nomenclators for the improved taste they have displayed in their street-naming of the more modern part of it. The public thoroughfares are mated with names famed in story, for amongst them are some of the giant intellects of Britain meetly recognised, e.g. statesmanship in Pitt and Palmerston, administrative ability in Elgin, oratory in Grattan and Canning, science in Faraday, Owen, and Murchison, whilst our own Macarthur, Kay, and Neil are not forgotten; and though last not least, in its far north, Shakspeare holds a place. The older portion of it, eastward of the Carlton boundary line towards Elizabeth Street is, with the exception of Drummond Street, misnamed, and what on earth could have induced the naming of one of the two knock-kneed streets starting from the University, after such a symmetrically well-built man as Sir Redmond Barry? Hotham is much more prolific in the clarum et venerabile nomen line, for there we have quite an extensive commingling of English, Irish, Scotch, and Colonial worthies. We have streets called after Peel, Erskine, O'Connell, Shiel, Curran, Macaulay, Adderly, Arden, Brougham, O'Shannassy, Molesworth, Cobden, Haines, Chapman, Murphy, and, though last, not the least of the bunch—clever, slippery Richard Ireland, who, if his application had equalled his ability, would have had no superior either at our Bar or in our Senate. Leaving Hotham, and passing on to a sort of boundary mark dignified by the name of Railway Place, let me glance across the railway lines, far over the Swamp to the opposite Saltwater River—aboriginally known as the Mirring-gnay-bir-nong—formerly lined with a dense scrub, but now invaded by abattoirs and factories of all descriptions, and flanked on the other side by the rising town of Footscray. It is now styled the West Melbourne Swamp, but every one in days of yore called it Batman's. It ought to be called Higinbotham, because the eminent railway engineer of that name changed its surroundings very much, and certainly not for the better. Look at it now, and read the following account of its primitive state, when seen by Batman, and thus described by him:— "I crossed on the banks of the river a large marsh about one mile and a half wide, by three or four miles long, of the richest description of soil—not a tree. When we got on the marsh, the quails began tofly,and I think, at one time, I can safely say I saw a thousand quail flying at one time—quite a cloud. I never saw anything like it before I shot two large ones as I walked along. At the upper end of the marsh is a large lagoon. I should think from the distance I saw that it was upwards of a mile across, and full of swans, ducks and geese." This was penned upwards offiftyyears ago, and pondering over the now and the then, one must acknowledge the prophetic truth, if he cannot admire the poetic afflatus, of an anonymous Collins Street rhymer, who on the 14th February, 1839, worked off the following effusion for the benefit of an admiring community:—
"Melbourne will rise in mighty state,
And tho' a bantling now,
Will shame her Parent and create
A lustre round her brow.
"Melbourne left in her infant state
To flourish as she may,
Shall, notwithstanding this hard fate,
Behold a brighter day.
"Melbourne will flourish; raise the cup,
Loudly hurra to her glory!
Her day now dawns — her sun is up —
And SUCCESS will be her story."
The "mighty state" and the "brighter day" have come — but, where is the bard?