" On the 29th of September the "Rattlesnake," Captain Hobson, arrived in the bay, bringing Captain Lonsdale, who was afterwards to act as resident magistrate. The harbour was thoroughly surveyed by the commander of the "Rattlesnake," and it received his name in consequence; one of his lieutenants gallantly bestowing upon Mounts Martha and Eliza the epithets they bear in honour of Mrs. Lonsdale and Mrs. Batman respectively. A survey was soon afterwards made by Mr. Russell and his assistants of the site of the present city of Melbourne, a spot which was sometimes spoken of as Bearbrass, and sometimes as Dutergalla, its native name. When a census was taken on the 8th of November, 1836, the population of Port Phillip was found to number one hundred and eighty-six males and thirty-eight females; while the, aborigines within a circuit of thirty miles round the settlement were ascertained to consist of seven hundred men, women and children. They composed three tribes —the Wawoorongs, Boonoorongs, and Watourongs. It was with the last-named tribe that Buckley had become affiliated.
The year 1836 was memorable in other respects. Not only had the pioneers of settlement signified their desire for orderly rule and self-government, but they had taken steps to secure for themselves the ministrations of religion, and divine service was celebrated for the first time under a group of trees upon the slope of Batman’s Hill, in the month of April, by the Wesleyan minister previously referred to. Nor were the spiritual wants of the natives overlooked, for Mr. George Langhorne was entrusted with the charge of a missionary station which was established on the site of the present Botanical Gardens, and Mr. John Thomas Smith, subsequently celebrated as the "Australian Whittington," acted as his assistant. In Mr. Arden’s pamphlet some authentic particulars are given of the appearance of the little township at this date: —"In the six months which had elapsed since the close of the preceding year (1835), the settlement had assumed the appearance of a village, several buildings, although of rude construction, having been erected; of these many had their plot of ground attached. A blacksmith’s forge was at work; soil fit for the manufacture of bricks had been discovered and experimentally tried, and upwards of fifty acres of rich light black loam had been brought into general cultivation." A public-house erected and occupied by Fawkner in Collins Street west, near the corner of what is now Market Street, may be regarded as the core and centre of the infant settlement, which spread thence in an easterly direction. The cottages, constructed for the most part of wattle-and-dab, were few and far between, the thoroughfares were mere bush tracks, and the rising ground eastward of Swanston Street was a sylvan wilderness. During the rainy season, a turbulent creek flowed down the valley, separating the two divisions of the present city, and the blacks came in and camped and held corroborrees upon sites now occupied by some of the most important buildings in Melbourne.” P 165/166

" Captain Flinders quitted Port Phillip for Port Jackson on the 3rd of May, and his report to Governor King was of such a favourable character that that functionary warmly urged upon the Duke of Portland the advantage and necessity of authorising the formation of a settlement at Port Phillip, partly on account of the fertility of the soil and the amenity of the climate, and partly to forestall the French, who contemplated a similar step —Captain Baudin, of "Le Geographie," having explored portions of the Australian coast with that object in view. Before Governor King could receive a reply from the Home authorities, he commissioned Surveyor-General Grimes and Lieutenant Charles Robbins to walk round the harbour discovered by Lieutenant Murray and to report upon it. This was in December, 1802. In fulfilment of the duty thus imposed upon them, Mr. Grimes, This was in December, 1802. In fulfilment of the duty thus imposed upon them, Mr. Grimes, as the leader of the expedition, discovered the river Yarra on the 30th of January, 1803, and ascended it as far as Dight’s Falls.”
“ The British Government, however, had meanwhile arrived at a different conclusion, and had issued instructions, eight days after the discovery of the Yarra, to Lieutenant-Governor Collins to proceed to Port Phillip, or any part of the southern coast of New South Wales or the islands adjacent, and establish a settlement there. The selection of that officer was unfortunate, for he appears to have come out to Australia with a foregone conclusion that his mission would prove an unsuccessful one. Collins sailed from England in the "Calcutta," accompanied by the "Ocean" as a store ship, on the 24th of April, 1803, having on board two hundred and ninety-nine male convicts, sixteen married women, a few settlers, and fifty men and petty officers belonging to the Royal Marines. The "Calcutta" entered Port Phillip Heads on the 18th of October following, and found that the "Ocean" had preceded her. A landing was effected at what is now Sorrento, and Lieutenant Tuckey, with two assistants, was dispatched in the "Calcutta’s" launch to survey the harbour, which occupied the party nine days. "The disadvantage of Port Phillip," and the unsuitability of the "bay itself, when viewed in a commercial light," for the purposes of a colonial establishment, were strongly dwelt upon by Collins in his despatches to the Admiralty, and he ventured to predict that the harbour would never be "resorted to by speculative men.” P159

“ Sorrento stands on the neck of the promontory, which is here not more than a mile in width from sea to sea. A good road climbs over a ridge, from the summit of which both the bay and the ocean are visible. When the visitor gains the outer beach he finds himself in view of two coves, resembling in outline one moiety of the figure eight vertically bisected. Each is environed by tall cliffs, in which limestone laminae thrust themselves out from between layers of sand and gravel. Into these twin recesses the sea comes tumbling and foaming with restless energy, slowly eating into the land, and leaving here and there, in the midst of the gambolling "white horses," isolated masses of rock, grotesque of form and grim of aspect, as trophies of its victorious invasion of the opposing shore. The great transparent breakers pursue each other in endless chase, and there is no pause in the sullen roar of the unslumbering waves, which deepens into thunder when a gale is blowing from the south or south-west. The whole of the land surrounding this romantic bit of sea-beach has been judiciously reserved by the Government, and has received the title of the Ocean Park. It has been laid out in winding paths, and furnished with seats and pavilions for the accommodation of visitors.
Ascending the bay from Sorrento, Arthur’s Seat attracts the eye by the peculiarity of its form, sloping down to the water with a graceful curve from its highest point of elevation, and falling inland with a continuous descent until it reaches the level of the plain behind, throwing out three short spurs before it does so. At the foot of Arthur’s Seat lies a watering place bearing the euphonious name of Dromana. A firm beach, a far-stretching pier, and the fine views which are obtainable from the neighbouring eminences, combine to endow Dromana with special attractions for health-seekers who do not shrink from vigorous exercise. Mount Martha on the south, and Mount Eliza on the north, of the prettily situated watering place of Mornington, are the only other hills near the shoreline, and neither of these rises to an elevation of five hundred and fifty feet. Mornington is more sequestered, and at the same time more picturesque, than the places just named. The coast line, curving round to, the southward, so as to form the headland known as Schnapper Point, serves both to define and shelter a miniature bay; and the high and undulating land behind it is dotted with several charming residences, partially embowered in the foliage of exotic trees and erected in such positions as to give them a commanding view of the waters of the bay. Soon after passing Mount Eliza the coast recedes to the eastward, and having no, high land behind it, nothing is visible but a thin white riband of sand forming the Nine-mile Beach, with Frankston at one end and Mordialloc at the other, the nascent township of Carrum lying between.” P206

“ Brighton has now a population of six thousand inhabitants, covering so large an area as to require three railway stations for their accommodation. One of its streets perpetuates the name of the purchaser of the "special survey" —Dendy’s —upon which he depastured his flock in early days, little foreseeing perhaps, that the land for which he paid a pound an acre would be selling at from five pounds to twenty pounds sterling a foot within the lifetime of a single generation.”
“ Of the three Brightons which constitute the borough, the first, North Brighton, is urban; the second, Middle Brighton, is suburban; and the third, Brighton Beach, is purely marine. The shoreline at the latter forms a succession of curves, commencing at Point Ormond to the north and ending at Picnic Point to the southward. The glare of the sea beach is relieved by the sombre colouring of the belt of ti-tree which follows its windings, and, above it, arise the dark crowns of groves of stone pine and other hardy exotics belonging to the same family, encompassing the many villa residences which have been erected within an easy distance of the bay, so as to give their occupants the advantages of sea bathing. Looking towards the city, the view is bounded by the crescent-like sweep of the eastern shore of the harbour, flanked by the populous boroughs of St. Kilda, South Melbourne and Port Melbourne, which form an almost continuous line of habitations; and in the background, midway between the two horns of the crescent, the campanile of Government House, the domes of the Exhibition Building and of the Law Courts, and the spires of Melbourne are dimly visible through the haze and smoke that overhang the city.”
“ A substantial jetty, running out a hundred and fifty yards into the shallow waters of the bay, offers a pleasant promenade, and the sunsets visible from here are remarkable, at certain seasons of the year, for their splendour and beauty. Brighton is a favourite place of residence with such of the citizens of Melbourne as do not begrudge the half-hour occupied by the railway journey morning and evening, and its reputation for salubrity is such that when it was considered expedient to remove the Protestant Orphanage from South Melbourne —where it occupied the crown of what had originally been a green meadow, but had come to be hemmed in by a populous city —this suburb was selected as the site of the new structure. The choice was also influenced by the quietude and comparative seclusion attainable in such a spot. North Elwood and Elsternwick intervene between Brighton and St. Kilda.” P207

“ Port Melbourne, a designation which has only recently superseded the more expressive name of Sandridge —originally Liardet’s Beach —is a thriving suburb of Melbourne, with a distinctly nautical air about it; for most of its retail trade is connected with the shipping arriving at its two piers and departing therefrom; while the extensive biscuit factories of Messrs. Swallow and Ariell furnish employment to some hundreds of hands and contribute to the general prosperity of the borough. A rail way line two miles in length —the first constructed in Victoria connects the port with the city, and, from its terminus, another line branches to St. Kilda, skirting the city of South Melbourne on its way.
Facing Port Melbourne, and on the opposite side of Hobson’s Bay, is Williamstown, where the largest steamers from Europe receive and discharge passengers and cargo, partly on account of the greater depth of water on the western side of the harbour and partly on account of the sheltered’ position of its numerous piers, the largest of which is an extension of the somewhat circuitous line of railway which connects this seaport with Melbourne. The stately vessels of the P.and O. and Orient Companies, of the Messageries Maritimes, and the Norddeutscher Lloyd are berthed at this pier.” P209

“ One of the sights of Williamstown is the Alfred Graving Dock, which is four hundred and fifty feet long, and is to be still farther extended in order to meet the requirements of modern shipping. It is faced with freestone, and its caisson, in the construction of which two hundred and thirty tons of ironwork were used, is pointed to with pride as a specimen of local manufacture. The first vessel to enter the dock was the "Nelson." From an obscure "fishing village," as it used to be slightingly designated, Williamstown has grown into a place of considerable importance —an arsenal, a sea port and a railway terminus combined. Its business is mainly nautical —its hotels have nautical signs, the contents of many of its shop-windows denote that the retail trade of the place is associated, more or less, with the provision of sea stores and objects that are associated with shipbuilding and the necessities of a long voyage; and the atmosphere is redolent of the ocean. Most of the men on the piers and in the streets have the fresh complexions of those who are habituated to feel the sea breeze and the salt spray beating on their bronzed faces, and they turn quick glances of the eye skyward, as is natural to persons who are closely observant of the weather. There is certainly a strong maritime element in the population, which becomes much less obvious, however, at noontide and at the close of the afternoon, for then the dockyard, railway workshops and the factories discharge a stream of artisans homeward bound for the mid-day or the evening meal, as the case may, be, and the streets are; resonant with the confused noise of rapid feet.” P210

“ On the opposite bank of the river, the visitor, following it up from the end of the wharf on that side, will observe that a large basin has been excavated, so as to double the width of the waterway at this point. Here timber-laden vessels are discharging their cargoes, and several acres of land in the rear are covered with symmetrical stacks of sawn and grooved pine, representing the spoil of many a devastated forest in Norway, Oregon and British Columbia. Adjoining, is a large area of what was waste swamp land not many years ago, but is now swarming with the foundries and workshops of coppersmiths and ships’ plumbers, engineers and boilermakers, and iron ship-builders; with wire and nail works, coalyards, sail-lofts and sawmills; and the whole neighbourhood resounds with the clang of hammers, the whirr of machinery, the panting of steam engines, the whiz of belting as it flies round the swiftly- revolving wheels, and with the hissing of the circular saws as their sharp teeth plough their way through logs of red gum and jarrah and scatter a shower of dust, like so much spray, around them. Two dry docks open out of the South Wharf above the basin, and between them lies the platform reserved for vessels unloading lime. Beyond the entrance to the second dock, is the landing stage of the steam ferry. The Adelaide steamers are berthed above it, and during the vintage season hillocks of cases containing grapes cumber the wharf. Then comes a large steamer about to take its departure for New Zealand, with luggage and cargo being rapidly hoisted on board, and passengers and their friends hurrying down in all manner of vehicles, public and private.” P212

“ From the deck of a steamer of the Tasmanian, Adelaide, or Sydney lines —as it nears its moorings alongside one of the wharves, below the Falls Bridge —the aspect of Flinders Street West is animated and busy, and on landing on the wharf all the activity of Melbourne bursts upon the visitor in a moment. The street is here broad enough for the requirements of a large traffic conducted by ordinary vehicles, and for a double tramway, in addition to a line of rails connecting the two railway termini, upon which converge the whole of the lines in Victoria; and, from morning till night, there is a continual passing to and fro of lorries, drags, carts, cabs and timber wains, with now and then a lengthy goods train cautiously moving through the crowded thoroughfare. Wood and coal yards and places covered with stacks of malt tanks line the extremity of this busy thoroughfare, and these are succeeded, as the wayfarer proceeds eastward, by the shops or warehouses of packers and salters, sail-makers, outfitters, grain and produce merchants, manufacturers of oilskin hats and dreadnoughts, engineers and boilermakers, eating-house keepers and shipping agents. Outside the taverns are congregated groups of lumpers awaiting the arrival of the vessels they are to unload, and inside are seamen not yet converts to temperance principles. Nearly opposite the wharf, on the north side .of Flinders Street, is the Customhouse, which was enlarged and altered in 1873 to meet the exigencies of an expanding commerce, and a fiscal system involving the collection of a multiplicity of import duties. It is a building of no great architectural pretensions, but well planned internally for the despatch of public business. P212

Flinders Street West -
It occupies, with the Melbourne Savings Bank and the offices of the Harbour Trust, an isolated block of land surrounded by four streets, most of the more important navigation companies and shipowners having their offices in its immediate neighbourhood.
With the exception of a small area occupied by the Corporation Fish Market on the west side of the approach to Prince’s Bridge, the whole of the river frontage from the Falls Bridge to the eastern extremity of Flinders Street is covered, or will be so in a short time, by the two railway termini, their goods and engine sheds and shunting lines. The stations themselves are of a mean and makeshift character, and quite unworthy of the sites on which they stand, and of the magnitude of the traffic conducted in them. But they are to be replaced by edifices more in keeping with the architecture of the neighbourhood, and affording better accommodation alike for the public and for the officers administering the local business of the Department.
On the north side of Flinders Street, in an easterly direction from the Custom-house, are the extensive bonded stores of Messrs. Grice, Sumner and Co., one of the oldest mercantile firms in Melbourne, the offices of a local printing and publishing company, and the large warehouse of Rocke, Tompsitt and Co. Beyond Elizabeth Street, at one corner of which still survives a fragment of primitive Melbourne, the mingled simplicity and solidity of the facade of the Mutual Store arrest attention, and perhaps invite inquiry as to the business transacted in such spacious premises. P213

“ A few paces farther, and Swanston Street opens out to the left and the approach to the new Prince’s Bridge on the right. In the early years of the colony there was no other method of crossing the Yarra than by a punt, and when, at the latter end of the year 1850, a bridge of a single arch had been thrown over the river and opened for traffic, a work was believe to have been achieved which would last for centuries. But its duration did not extend beyond the lifetime of a single generation, and it was pulled down to make room for a structure not unworthy to span the Thames, the Tiber, or the Tacrus. It consists of three arches of one hundred feet each and two land openings —one at each end; the northerly one thirty-six feet across and the southerly one sixty, the height of the roadway being forty feet above the summer level of the river; the total length of the bridge and its approaches is five hundred and fifty feet, and its width three hundred feet. Two massive piers and abutments of blue stone ashler support a column of Harcourt granite, capped with foliated capitals in the early French-Gothic style. The spans are composed of ten wrought iron ribs, with wrought iron spandrils and cross girders filled in with highly relieved foliated work, surrounding a circular panel containing the arms of Victoria and Melbourne, and scrolls; while the cornice and parapet above are also constructed of wrought iron, deeply intermoulded and bracketed at intervals of six feet with foliated corbels.” P214

“ Diverging for a few moments from his easterly course, and turning into Swanston Street towards the Town Hall, the visitor may arrest his steps at the corner of Flinders Lane, where a somewhat remarkable architectural vista opens out before him as he looks toward the west. Were it not for the newness of the buildings and the traffic which chokes the busy thoroughfare, he might imagine it to be one of those narrow streets lined with the severely simple and solid palaces and mansions of old and noble families, to be met with in many of the cities of central Italy. The buildings here are mostly soft-goods warehouses filled with countless bales of textile fabrics from the looms of Great Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, and Switzerland; but in massiveness and magnitude, they bear a striking resemblance to the dwelling places of the turbulent patricians of the middle ages, who built themselves residences combining strength and security, with amplitude and commodiousness, in Florence, Pisa, Siena, Bergamo, Pistoia, and other old places.” P215

“ The south-east angle of Swanston Street was unfortunately chosen as the site of the Protestant Cathedral in preference to a block of land originally intended for it in Clarendon Street, East Melbourne, where it would have occupied a commanding position, equidistant from three great centres of population besides being placed amidst surroundings resembling those which heighten the architectural beauty of similar edifices in the mother country. Almost the lowest level of the city is reached at the southern extremity of Swanston Street, and, as the city must extend skyward, owing to the continually advancing value of land, a noble monument of architecture promises to be dwarfed in time by neighbouring warehouses.” P214

“ Returning to Flinders Street and following an easterly course towards the, Fitzroy Gardens, the steep ascent of Russell Street is reached, so named after the statesman who was a conspicuous figure in English politics at the time Melbourne was founded, the visitor climbs to the crown of the hill, from which the Burke and Wills statue has been recently removed in order to avoid obstructing the tramway traffic, and pauses to survey the four vistas which open out at the intersection of this thoroughfare with one of the main arteries of the city. Looking eastward, the eye is led through an avenue of young elm trees and sycamores, above which, on the right-hand side of Collins Street, tower the two cupolas of the Freemasons’ Club, to the arcaded facade of the Treasury. Nearly opposite the rendezvous of the craft, is the Melbourne Club the earliest institution of the kind in the city, the most hospitable and the most exclusive.” P215

“ The first Town Hall belonged to the period just spoken of, and was an ugly pile of blue stone. In the rear was a square tower containing the fire-bell, and facing Swanston Street was a gloomy-looking police court and lock-up. From the barred but open windows of the latter there would frequently float out upon the air the incoherent ravings of an inmate or two suffering from delirium tremens, or the songs and shouts of culprits arrested on a charge of being drunk and disorderly. The whole of these buildings were levelled to the ground in 1867-8, and the first stone of the present Town Hall was laid by H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh on the 29th of April, 1867; the capital of the first of the pilasters upon the tower was placed by him on the 3rd of March, 1869. The style of architecture adopted is a free treatment of the Classic, the modifications introduced having been suggested by the Renaissance. There are four storeys comprising a rustic basement, an attic, in lieu of a parapet, which is relieved by circular-headed windows, with rounded gables over each, and two intermediate piani, with Corinthian columns and pilasters flanking the recessed windows of both. The main front to Swanston Street is composed of five architectural divisions, embracing a centre terminating in a mansard roof, and two pavilions. On one of these is superimposed the clock tower, one hundred and forty feet in height. A portico is about to be added to the principal entrance, which is approached by a double flight of steps.” P217

“ The south-east angle of Collins Street, at its intersection with Swanston Street, is occupied by the extensive block of buildings which compose the Town Hall. The municipal organisation of Melbourne dates from the year 1842, when it was placed under the government of a Corporation elected by the ratepayers, and a Mayor who is chosen by the aldermen and councillors. At present there are seven of the former and twenty-one of the latter, and the city is divided into seven wards, each of which returns one alderman and three councillors.” P217

“ Forty-five years ago the streets of Melbourne were bush tracks, and after a heavy rain a roaring torrent ran down a gully, following the course of what is now Elizabeth Street. At this moment there is nothing to differentiate the city from one of the capitals of Europe. Its streets are as well paved, as well channelled, as well lighted and as well watched as those of London, Paris, or Vienna and much of the credit of the remarkable transformation the city has undergone in four decades and a half, is due to the efficiency and integrity with which the municipal rulers of Melbourne have performed their civic duties.” P217

“ To-day a massive edifice of many storeys the western frontage of which extends from Bourke Street to Little Bourke Street, receives and distributes upwards of thirty-three million letters and fifteen million newspapers, per annum, and is in communication with about fourteen hundred branch offices and more than four hundred telegraph stations. A flight of steps gives access to a lofty corridor fading the south and west; the columns and modillions of the arched colonnade are of the Doric order, the Ionic being employed on the second and the Corinthian on the third storey. Between the latter and the balustraded parapet some panelling has been introduced to give additional elevation to the mass; and a mansard roof, pierced with dormer windows, augments its altitude. At the south-west angle a lofty clock tower, effectively treated, attains a sufficient height to enable the signal flag upon its summit to be visible within a wide radius of the building.” P225

“ Retracing his steps along Queen Street in a northerly direction, the visitor presently arrives at the Law Courts, or Palace of Justice, covering a block of land three hundred feet square, surrounded by four streets and having entrances from each. Previous to the recent erection of this extensive pile of buildings, the Supreme Court held its sittings in a small wooden structure near the gaol in Latrobe Street, the inferior courts transacting their business in equally unsuitable premises situated in other parts of the city. All of them were inadequate and incommodious, oppressively hot in the summer and unpleasantly cold in the winter, and so badly ventilated as to be injurious to the health of judges, juries, barristers and witnesses. Moreover, the accommodation they afforded was altogether incommensurate with the magnitude of the business which had to be judicially dealt with, and the Government accordingly resolved on the construction of an edifice large enough to contain the whole of the courts, eight in number, together with the offices of the various functionaries connected with the administration of the law in its higher jurisdiction. The two principal facades of the palace face north and west, the main entrance being in the centre of the west front. The style of architecture adopted is the Classic as modified by Italian influences. Plenty of variety has been obtained in the lines by means of a projecting portico, a double arcade with Doric columns on the basement and Ionic above, and by the prominence given to the two wings; and the parapets have been treated so as to conduce to, the same result. Internally, the building is a labyrinth of echoing corridors and bewildering passages, staircases, rotundas and vestibules; so that it has been found necessary to erect a finger post at each of the numerous four-course ways for the guidance of strangers who might other wise wander about the maze for hours in distressing perplexity of mind. The outer shell of the edifice encloses a quadrangle one hundred and thirty six feet wide; in the centre is a tower-like structure, circular in form but throwing out four semi-octagonal and equidistant chambers, which serve as the receptacles of the Supreme Court Library. The intervening space is domed, with a gallery running round it, having niches in the wall to receive the busts of distinguished ornaments of the Bench.”
“The dome itself is somewhat depressed, so that at a distance it bears a certain resemblance to a magnified dish-cover. From its summit, the spectator commands a view of the whole city and of all its suburbs, excepting those portions of Collingwood and Richmond which are concealed from sight by the Eastern Hill. Looking in that direction, he sees the upward curve of the three great arteries of traffic from east to west, namely, Lonsdale, Bourke and Collins Streets, most of the ecclesiastical and nearly all the more important of the public buildings of Melbourne embracing St. Francis’ Cathedral, the Wesleyan, Congregational and Scotch churches, the Public Library and Museum, the General Post. Office and the Town Hall; and on the high ridge in the middle distance, the Exhibition Building, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and the Houses of Parliament; while —beyond the green heights of Studley Park —Kew, Hawthorn, and Camberwell have for their background the dark mass of the Dandenong Ranges. Southward the eye is carried past the watchtower of the fire brigade, and ranges over the Protestant Cathedral, the windings of the river Yarra, the undulating uplands covered by the suburbs of South Yarra and Toorak, Government House and the fair domain by which it is surrounded, the Botanical Gardens, the Observatory, the Fawkner and Albert Parks, St. Kilda, South Melbourne, with the campanile of its town hall rising high above the neighbouring buildings, the Bay, stretching away to the dimly defined horizon, and Port Melbourne, leading the vision round to the western outlook. This comprehends the lower Yarra and the harbour improvements, Williamstown and the shipping at its moorings, the suburbs of Newport, Footscray, Kensington, and the Racecourse, with the You Yangs in the far distance.”
“To the northward the eye takes in Hotham, Flemington and Carlton; with the Melbourne University, the Wilson Hall, and Ormond College as the chief architectural features of the prospect, which is agreeably diversified by the bosky verdure of the Flagstaff Gardens and the old Cemetery, with the Royal Park beyond, and Mount Macedon closing in the view in one direction, as the Plenty Ranges bound it in another.” P227

“ An Act was passed by the Victorian Legislature in 1878 appropriating the sum of one hundred thousand sterling for the erection of a building in the Carlton Gardens, for which the designs prepared by Messrs. Reed and Barnes were accepted by the Royal Commission appointed to conduct the undertaking. It was found necessary to supplement the space covered by the main building by the erection of two annexes, and in the end the total cost of the structure amounted to upwards of a quarter of a million sterling, which represented five per cent of the current revenue of the colony. The garden facade has a frontage of five hundred feet, the dome an elevation of two hundred and twenty, and the two towers flanking the southern entrance rise to a height of one hundred feet. The eastern and western facades are four hundred and sixty feet in length. The principal edifice is cruciform, the dome rising from the intersection of the naves and transepts. Both the drum and cupola are octagonal, each having an internal diameter of sixty feet, while the apex of the dome is one hundred and sixty-five feet above the floor. At the extremity of the western nave an organ was erected by Mr. Fincham, a local builder, at a cost of five thousand pounds. The space covered by the main structure is less than one-fifth of the area embraced by the annexes, which were less substantially built; but even then they were not more than adequate for the immense volume of exhibits which poured in from all parts of the world.” P178

“ The style of architecture adopted is that variety of English Gothic known as the Geometrical Decorated, the general design embracing a nave with aisles, north and south transepts having aisles to each, an a choir or chancel, surrounded by an ambulatorium out of which seven chapels open, five of them octagons and two parallelograms, the central one forming the Ladye Chapel.
At the west end of the church are two towers, which are intended to carry spires rising to a height of two hundred and twenty feet; while the central tower, at the intersection of the nave and transepts, will attain an altitude of three hundred and thirty feet. Inside the walls, the length of the building is three hundred and forty-five feet, while that of the transepts is one hundred and sixty feet, and the height of the ridges of the main roof is ninety-two feet. Three spacious sacristies for the archbishop, the clergy and the acolytes, form part of the general plan. The church is built of the basalt or blue stone which forms the bed rock of the neighbourhood, the white freestone from Sydney and Hobart being employed for the doors, windows, inner arches and decorative work externally and internally, as well as for the groining of the aisles; but the main roofs are of timber. A liberal use of flying buttresses, pinnacles and turrets contributes materially to the architectural richness of the edifice; and the three large windows with their foliated tracery, in the north and south transepts and the west front, are also conducive to a like result; the last-named window being filled in with stained glass of remarkable beauty. The central tower will strike the critical observer as deficient in altitude, but it seems that to remedy this defect would have left the architect but two alternatives —either to forego the erection of a spire, as in York Minster, or to impose a crushing weight upon the supporting piers, as was done in the case of Salisbury Cathedral, with the result of a deflection from the perpendicular internally, the prevailing characteristic of St. Patrick’s Cathedral is a massive simplicity, produced by the height and dimensions of the clustered columns sustaining the arches of the nave.” P232

The Government Offices.
“ Most of the Government offices are grouped in this neighbourhood, and proceeding along Gisborne Street the visitor reaches the Treasury, the facade of which faces the eastern extremity of Collins Street. Its depth is so shallow in proportion to the frontage, that, viewed in perspective, the building bears too close a resemblance to an architectural screen. The principal front is divided into three members by a recessed basement, over which is an arcade of five coffered arches, resting on coupled columns and rising to the cornice. On each side of this central portion of the facade is a projecting doorway carrying a handsomely treated window above it, flanked by Doric columns and terminating in a pediment. The building, which is three storeys high, has been erected in the Italian style; the two wings harmonise with, the general design, and the approaches to the main entrances are by a lofty flight of steps, which can be brilliantly illuminated by half a dozen, clusters of powerful lamps.
Turning into the Treasury Gardens, which extend from Spring Street to Lansdowne Street, and have for their southern boundary the road leading out to Richmond, the visitor immediately comes in sight of the Public Offices, standing on the same level as the Treasury, and rising from a raised terrace extending to the latter building. These offices cover a block of land three hundred and seventy-five feet long and one hundred and fifty feet deep, and rise to a height of eighty feet in the centre. The principal facade has a southerly aspect, and consists of three divisions; the main body of the structure containing four storeys and the wings three. The style of architecture adopted is a modification of the Italian; columns of the Doric order being employed for constructive and decorative purposes in the basement storey, Doric in the next and Corinthian above.” P232

“ The area covered by the Parliament Houses is three hundred and twenty feet by three hundred and twelve feet, forming part of a spacious reserve bounded by four streets, and planted with trees and shrubs. A flight of one hundred and forty steps gives access to a decastyle portico, one hundred and forty feet long, consisting of nine bays. At each end of this, doorways lead to the offices, committee- rooms, etc., and from the centre admission is obtained by three portals to the entrance vestibule, forty-four feet square, above which will rise a double stone dome forty-six feet in diameter, to be surmounted by a stone lantern, the summit of which will be two hundred and eighteen feet above the ground. Immediately behind the vestibule is the Victoria Hall, eighty-five feet long, forty-five wide, and fifty-four high, so that it approaches a double cube in its dimensions. In the centre stands a full-length marble statue of the Queen in her robes of state, sculptured by the late Marshall Wood. This hall separates the two Chambers, and the east end communicates with the library. Above the entrance to the latter is a small gallery, supported by an elegant loggia, forming part of the line of communication between the two Chambers, the gallery itself serving as a nexus between the reporters’ gallery in both Houses.
The Legislative Council chamber is on the south side of the Victoria Hall, and has an extreme length of seventy-seven feet by forty feet wide, and a height of thirty feet. Its form and proportions are extremely agreeable to the eye. The style of architecture followed throughout is the Corinthian, the alcove, containing the President’s chair, being correspondingly constructed and decorated. The ceiling over the centre portion is vaulted and coffered, and that over the end portions is vaulted and domed. Ceiling lights cover the side galleries and illuminate the main body of the Chamber. On the north side of the Victoria Hall is the Legislative Assembly chamber, which does not differ materially in its dimensions from those of the Upper House.” P234

“ Up to the present time, only three colleges have been erected in connection with the University —the Church of England (or Trinity), the Presbyterian and the Ormond College. The latter was constructed, and is about to be enlarged, at the sole expense of the Hon. Francis Ormond, who has also founded a chair of music in the University. Trinity College has found a very generous friend in Sir W. J. Clarke, Bart., whose successive donations to it have not fallen far short of ten thousand pounds sterling The National Museum of Natural History and Biology and the buildings of the Medical School both stand within the grounds of the University.
Quitting this seat of learning, by the Grattan Street, entrance, and proceeding in an easterly direction, the visitor reaches, the Carlton Gardens, which comprise an area of sixty-three acres planted with trees, shrubs and flowers, and contain three artificial lakes, each of which have small islands serving as coverts for aquatic birds. The ground rises somewhat towards the centre of the gardens, and advantage has been taken of this circumstance to erect the International Exhibition Building on a site so elevated that the lofty dome forms a conspicuous object for many miles round, and the view from its summit is consequently an extensive one. The building was calculated to provide upwards of half a million feet of space for exhibitors, but this was subsequently extended to nine hundred thousand feet by the erection of annexes; the style of architecture is the Italian Renaissance. Two monumental fountains, the one near the main entrance and the other opposite the eastern portico surrounded by mosaics of grass and flowers contribute materially to the picturesqueness of the approaches and the beauty of the gardens, which are of immense value as a means of health and recreation to a thickly populated neighbourhood. The Convent of Mercy, the Hospital for Sick Children, the Erskine Church and the Wesleyan Home occupy sites immediately adjoining.” P242

“ Crossing the St. Kilda Road, which skirts the west side of the college grounds as well as those of the charitable institutions, the visitor finds himself in Albert Park, which embraces an area of five hundred and seventy acres, planted with various kinds of pines, and with elm trees in clumps and avenues. It also contains an extensive natural lagoon, deepened and widened so as to admit of boating and yachting on its surface, and this is dotted with artificial islands. The great extent of this reserve; its open spaces for cricket, football, polo or lacrosse; its pleasant drives, and its nearness to the sea, combine to render it a very, popular place of resort on Saturday afternoons; and among the numerous lungs of Melbourne and its suburbs this is probably the most valuable from a hygienic point of view; while its area is so extensive, that after three full-sized cricket grounds have been carved off for the special use of as many clubs a large area still remains. The surroundings of this fine and capacious pleasure ground have marked it out as the future Hyde Park or Bois de Boulogne of the southern suburbs of Melbourne, and in 1885 steps were taken for the establishment of something corresponding to Rotten Row. The movement was instituted and warmly supported by Lady Loch, and the result was that on Friday afternoons during the summer months the carriage drive in Albert Park became a fashionable rendezvous where might be seen the best horses and the best appointed equipages which the city and its environs could turn out, and a large gathering of equestrians, as well as of spectators on foot —a band of music adding to the other attractions of the scene.
Albert Park is bounded on the south side by the borough of St. Kilda, which was erected into a municipality in the year 1857. Since then its population has not increased proportionately to that of Prahran or of South Melbourne, being less than that of the more distant borough of Brighton, and numbering less than five thousand two hundred. It contains many handsome residences, some of which, owing to the undulating character of the ground, command extensive sea views, even although remote from the beach. The esplanade curves round from Fitzroy Street, the southern boundary of the park, to Carlisle Street, and the business portion’s of the borough contain some excellent shops. The Town Hall, at the junction of Grey and Barkly Streets, is a primitive edifice erected in 1858, but it is shortly to be replaced by a structure worthier of a suburb inhabited chiefly by the well-to-do classes of society. There is a recreation ground of sixteen acres, and a skating rink recently established attests the popularity of a northern diversion pursued under artificial conditions in southern latitudes.” P247

“ From the entrance to Corner Inlet the coast line ruins down nearly due south, for a distance of more than five-and-twenty miles, to the extremity of a mountainous peninsula, having an average breadth of sixteen miles and terminating in the bold headland known as Wilson’s Promontory. On the eastern side it is indented by Scalers’ Cove and Waterloo Bay, between which the land juts out so as to form four prominences, entitled Horn Point, Hobb’s Head, Brown’s Head and Cape Wellington a well-sheltered harbour, appropriately, named Refuge Cove, lies between the second and third of these. On the western, which is also the windward side of the peninsula, there are three bays —Leonard, Norman and Oberon —partially protected from the violence of the sea by some islands four or five miles distant from the mainland and following its southerly trend.
By far the greater part of the area of the peninsula is covered by irregular ranges, or by isolated mountains, which nowhere attain a greater altitude than two thousand five hundred feet, but, massed together, present an imposing appearance by reason of their bulk. Such trees as flourish on their slopes are deflected and contorted by the fierce winds with which they have to wrestle both in summer and winter, and the sea mists which are driven inwards are condensed into rain as they impinge upon the shaggy sides of Mount Boulder, Mount Wilson, Mount Oberon and Mount Ramsay, and thus form the sources of half-a-dozen streams which speedily lose themselves in the ocean.
Wilson’s Promontory is the most southerly point of the Victorian coast, and is crowned by a lighthouse which rises nearly four hundred feet above the level of the sea. From the eminence on which it stands, the cliff shelves obliquely downward to the roaring surf below, which, when a strong south-westerly, gale is blowing, leaps up the rocky, barrier erected by Nature against its encroachments, and is shattered into clouds of spray, or churned into snow-white ridges of froth and foam.” P182

“ So rugged is the coast that, from Barwon Heads to Cape Otway, there are only two places at which it is possible to effect a landing, namely, Loutit Bay and Apollo Bay, and neither of these is easily accessible when a south-easterly wind is blowing. The ranges, which run inland for a distance of upwards of twenty miles in a northerly direction from Apollo Bay, and reach their culminating point at Mount Sabine, one thousand eight hundred and thirty-eight feet above the sea-level, are densely wooded: on the tertiary slopes honeysuckle scrub, the grass tree and ti-tree are found to prevail; the stringy-bark predominates on the lower spurs, while the iron-bark flourishes at a loftier elevation; near the corner of the range, messmate and blue gum rise out of a thick undergrowth of shrubs and creepers; in the valleys the vegetation is luxuriant in the extreme, the blue gum, the beech, and the blackwood being intermingled with the tree-fern, so that the finest foliage of the Australian forest is here combined and contrasted with an enchanting effect. Owing to the number of springs which issue from the northern slopes of the range and the moisture of the atmosphere, the tree-ferns not merely abound in their natural habitat among the damp valleys, but climb to the summit of the secondary spurs and crown them with their graceful plumes. The lighthouse at Cape Otway is admirably placed at the western extremity of an imposing headland about three miles in width, if measured from Point Flinders to Point Franklin; the land rising behind it to a plateau, composed of calcareous sandstone, overlaid in places by dunes, the result of sand washed up on the shore and thence swept inland by the south-westerly gales. These dunes contain curious concretions resembling the fossilised branches and roots of trees, for which, in fact, they have been occasionally mistaken; on examination, however, they are found to be composed of a magnesian limestone.” P184

“ The only conspicuous landmarks which attract the eye as the voyager skirts the coast are Flaxman’s Hill and Point Buttress. Just before reaching the flourishing seaport town of Warrnambool, is perceived the outfall of the Hopkins River, which, taking its rise in the Great Dividing Range, a hundred miles distant as the crow flies, absorbs an immense number of affluents in its tortuous course. The coast curves round somewhat at Warrnambool and thus forms a pretty bay, and a breakwater is in course of construction which will shelter it, from the violence of the south-westerly gales and seas. From a geological point of view, the whole of the coast from this point westward as far as the embouchure of the Shaw and Eumeralla Rivers at Yambuk, a distance of something like forty miles, is highly interesting, because over, the whole of this tract of country a stream of lava must have flowed, projected from the then active volcano of Mount Rouse, thirty-six miles inland. Belfast, or Port Fairy, as it was formerly called, which lies midway between these points, was formed of basalt thus ejected; while the indurated tufas of Tower Hill, in its immediate neighbourhood, are found to have been originally composed of ashes, red-hot stone of a vitreous structure, dust and vapour.
Three distinct coast lines are traceable hereabouts, with limestone bluffs running from east to west for a distance of six or seven miles, while, in a marshy flat on the right bank of the River Moyne, which flows into the sea at Belfast, shafts which have been sunk for wells, have bottomed on the original sea-bed, plentifully strewn with shells. Two small islands guard the entrance to the harbour, and just behind the town the waters of the Moyne, after having formed the Tower Hill Swamp, expand into a lagoon somewhat resembling a boomerang in shape. Five miles westward is the entrance of Portland Bay, the scene of the earliest settlement in Victoria, although long before the landing of the Hentys it had been often visited by ships engaged in the capture of whales; and it is remarkable that the contour of the bay strikingly resembles that of the head and shoulders of one of these leviathans of the deep, with its nose resting on what is known as Whaler Point. Sixty or seventy years ago, schools of these sociable creatures used to visit Portland Bay at certain periods of the year, and as this was soon discovered by the hardy adventurers engaged in their pursuit, the place was selected as a whaling, station, and at various "points of vantage" look-outs were established; one of these, as Mr. Richmond Henty tells us, having been stationed at the Lighthouse Point, another at the Whalers’ Bluff, and a third at a spot seven miles north from Portland known as the " Convincing Ground.” P186

“ In one direction, Cape Nelson lifts its rugged outline against the western sky, while, in another, the eye takes in the graceful sweep of the bay, with Percy Island breaking the unwrinkled level of the slumbering sea to the eastward, the Lawrence Rocks, only two miles off, serving as a foreground. The far-distant line of the horizon is almost undistinguishable in colour from the sky, which bends down to it, and the whole scene is suggestive of drowsy languor and dreamy reverie.
Nelson Bay, shaped like a sickle, has Cape Nelson for its heft, and the cliffs, with high land behind them, heavily timbered in part and in part covered with scrub, maintain the same rugged character from point to point. Upon a platform of rock jutting out into the ocean, like a vast bastion reared by Titanic might, stands the lighthouse, overlooking a wide expanse of sea; and, beneath that lofty ledge, there is a belt of dark-red storm-beaten crags, which grimly face The baffled billows that lie ever panting at their feet, or gurgling in black-throated caves where still they moan and beat.” P187

“ Mount Feathertop is one of a cluster of eight peaks, three of them unnamed, none of which is less than five thousand eight hundred feet above the sea-level, nor more than five miles distant from the centre of the Bogong High Plains; but it is extremely probable that other eminences quite as lofty as the highest of these remain undiscovered in this intricate labyrinth of mountainous country, so much of which awaits thorough exploration.”
“ By night or day, the transitory glimpses afforded of these huge ranges impress one with a deeper feeling, not only of their bulk and magnitude, but of their elevation, for they loom through the mist, or reveal themselves with imposing effect when the clouds are suddenly riven asunder, with an augmentation of their mass attributable to the vapoury medium which interposes itself between them and the eye of the spectator. Other transformations occur in the aspect of these ranges after an interval of cold clear weather, at the same period of the year, when the free selector on the distant plains, issuing from the door. of his hut in the earl morning, sees the crests of the far-stretching mass sharply outlined against a steel-blue sky, wearing a robe of spotless white, woven by the deft and subtle fingers of the frost, during the stillness of the night, out of the wreaths of vapour which had been drifting along the ridges, when the darkness fell upon them a few hours before.” P192

“ Thirty miles to the north-east of Mount Zero, which marks the termination of the Grampians in a northerly direction, there rises abruptly from the dead level of an extensive plain abounding in miniature lakes, both salt and fresh —these lying sometimes almost side by side —a curiously fantastic mass of rock, one thousand one hundred and seventy-six feet in height, which has received the name of Mount Arapiles. In its horizontal laminations and vertical fissures, it resembles the stupendous foundation walls of some vast edifice planned and commenced by Titans and then abandoned, leaving Nature to adorn the ruin, according to her gracious wont, by crowning its summit with forest trees and weaving a robe of foliage about its feet. A little to the northward of it, surmounting a wooded mound is another columnar rock, but of very much smaller dimensions, with a cleft-crest, whence it has derived the appellation of the Mitre Rock. Near by is a salt-water pool which has received the name of Mitre Lake, and it stands midway, between two sheets of water, Lake Natimuk and St. Mary’s Lake, both of which are fresh.
Northward of the Grampians and Mount Arapiles, the country slopes gradually downward to the Murray, with scarcely a hill to break the monotonous level of the landscape, and the mallee scrub commences within about seven miles from the Mitre Rock. In the sandy soil of the district, the trees, from which it takes its’ name, thrive amidst the most discouraging circumstances, covering the ground so thickly in places as to form a perfect jungle, interweaving their sombre foliage overhead and having their stems interlaced at times by a species of wild vine, or liana, as supple as cordage when it is twining round them, and as rigid as a wire cable when it has got them well within its grip. Lowan, in which Mount Arapiles is situated, takes, its name from a native bird, also variously entitled the brush turkey, the mallee pheasant, and the mallee hen, the Megapodus Tumulus of naturalists. It is somewhat larger than a good-sized fowl, and it lays its eggs, which are disproportionally large, in an artificial mound constructed by the co-operation of many pairs of birds, by whom they are annually enlarged and repaired.” P194

“ The road, from the lakes’ entrance to Lake Tyers, climbs over the saddles of two hills, with deep glens between them, where the undergrowth is massed together in close battalions of lofty and leaf-wreathed hazel scrub, and the wild cherry and the native honeysuckle tree mingle their foliage with that of the wattle, eucalyptus and shag moss. Here, too, the pale lavender and faded pink tints of patches of dead ti-tree, looking like enormous bunches of delicate coral, together with the greenish azure of the blue gum sucklings and the white blossoms of the cauliflower scrub, lend an acceptable variety to the otherwise uniform colour of the sylvan scene. Then the devious track crosses a bit of naked moorland —a lofty promontory overlooking a wide expanse of sea —and dips down presently to the beach itself, traversing a narrow strip of glittering sand, which constitutes the southern boundary of Lake Tyers. This is the most beautiful sheet of water in south-eastern Victoria. Its distinctive charm consists in the irregularity of its outline and in its lofty banks, feathered with foliage to their very summit. It bears, indeed, a striking resemblance to Port Jackson, and does not yield to it in variety or in loveliness, while, perhaps, it can boast of a still greater number of coves and inlets. There are the same exquisitively curved lines, and the same grace of form and freshness of tint in the timber, which present themselves in that famous harbour. In some places, the trees are grouped in compact masses; in others they alternate with lawny interspaces of soft turf, or a thick carpet of bracken, or a tangled undergrowth of scrub, with here and there a patch of bare limestone protruding from the soil and indicating its formation.” P196

“ Lake Corangamite lies in the midst of entirely different scenery, three hundred and eighty feet above the level of the sea. Its waters are salt, and they cover an area of ninety square miles, It is about sixteen miles long, with a breadth of eight miles in its widest part. Situated at the junction of four counties —Grenville, Hampden, Heytesbury and Polwarth —forms the centre of a cluster of lakes and lagoons, nearly fifty in number, five of which, Colac, Elingamite, Terang, Purrumbete and Connewarren —are fresh, while the others are nearly all salt or brackish. Lakes Elingamite, Terang and Purrumbete occupy the craters of extinct volcanoes, the original magnitude of which may be inferred from the fact that the first covers an area of eight hundred acres, the second of nearly three hundred, and the third of no less than one thousand four hundred and fifty. The district in which these lakes are situated, divides, with Gippsland, the claim to be considered the garden of Victoria. It is greatly favoured as regards soil and climate. Much of the former is of volcanic origin, and is extremely fertile in consequence; and the annual rainfall, which ranges from thirty to forty inches within forty or fifty miles of the coast, is nowhere less than from twenty to thirty inches, a higher average being reached in the Valley of the Wannon. Hence the general verdure of the landscape and the favourable conditions under which the pursuits of husbandry are conducted. Amenity, is the most striking characteristic of the scenery; the hills rarely attaining a greater altitude than fifteen hundred feet, except in the case of Mount Emu, which reaches a height of three thousand feet; and the lakes, faithfully reflecting all the moods, the sailing clouds, and the glory or gloom of the heavens overhead, confer a special charm upon the landscape. Corangamite and Colac, which are only six or seven miles apart, are eminently picturesque, both in themselves and in their surroundings, for above the fair champaign which girdles them, tower the isolated hills of Great Warrion, Leura, Porndon, Wiridgil and Myrtoon, to say nothing of the stony rises to the south; and the whole district, with the numerous flocks and herds browsing on its pastures, its comfortable homesteads and substantial country mansions, girdled by clumps of exotic trees and well-kept pleasure grounds, breathes an air of prosperity and comfort.” P197

The Upper Murray and Mount Dargal.
“ The principal source of one of the rivers just named. the Tambo, is near Mount Leinster, on the southern slope of the Bowen Mountains, and on the opposite side rises the Limestone Creek, which some explorers suppose to be the real commencement of the River Murray, flowing northward for something like a hundred miles through country, not less romantic than that which has been described above. When the Tambo, the Nicholson, the Mitchell and the Avon emerge from the fastnesses amidst which they have pursued their devious course in a southerly direction, their progress becomes more sedate and measured, as if they had exchanged the impetuosity of youth for the seriousness of maturity. They no longer hasten seaward, but expatiate leisurely with "many a winding bout," through alluvial plains of great fertility. These rich bottom lands resemble, indeed, a bank of deposit in which nature has been storing up, for a long succession of centuries, a fund of wealth for many generations of agriculturists to draw upon; and here, if anywhere, the words of Jerrold are true: "If you tickle the ground with a hoe, it will laugh with a harvest." The orchards and gardens of the district resemble in their fruitfulness those of the English county of Kent; and as the tourist journeys down the Gippsland lakes in a steamboat, he finds at the principal stopping-places men, women and children offering for sale the fruit then in season, as large in size and as luscious in quality as he is accustomed to see taking the chief prizes at the horticultural shows in Melbourne and elsewhere. Of the hop gardens which formerly beautified the banks of the Tambo and the Mitchell in their lower reaches, comparatively few remain, as the cultivation of that plant has been abandoned in favour of more remunerative products; and this must be a source of regret to every lover of the picturesque, for, where they still exist, they lend a charm to the scenery, which no other objects can supply.” P199

“ The Wimmera is the most westerly of those Victorian rivers which belong to its northern water-shed, and may be grouped with the Avon and the Avoca on account of their common characteristics, for each fails to find its way to the Murray, which is the reservoir of the whole of the streams to be spoken of hereafter. Taking its rise in the neighbourhood of Ben Nevis, and augmented in volume by a number of creeks from the Pyrenees and the Grampians, the Wimmera flows in a north westerly direction until in the vicinity of Longernong it sends off a branch, locally known as the Yarriambiack Creek, which eventually disappears in the mallee scrub surrounding Lake Corong. Beyond Horsham the main stream bends round to the north, flows into and out of Lake Hindmarsh, goes by the name of Outlet Creek, between this and Lake Albacutya, resumes that appellation in quitting the latter, and disappears amidst the sand hills which emboss the surface of the and plain beyond the last named lake. The Avon, which heads to Mount Navarre, and receives the Richardson, a river that ceases to flow entirely during seasons of protracted drought, runs into Lake Buloke, four miles north of Donald, and this is subject to the same infirmity as its tributaries, as it is sometimes dry for years together. The Avoca, which takes its rise in the amphitheatre formed by the Great Dividing Range in the neighbourhood of Ben Major, and has one of the most beautiful birthplaces a lover of the picturesque could desire to see, flows through an equally beautiful country during the earlier portion of its course. The valleys are bright with verdure, and the hills in some places are table-topped, in others softly rounded, and carpeted with succulent grasses; while here and there, among the recesses of the ruggeder of the mountains, are hidden deep romantic ravines, masses of rock piled up in fantastic confusion, and caves in which hermits or bushrangers might find all the seclusion they could desire. By-and-by, however, as the Avoca flows northward, its banks become less and less picturesque until, at a point almost twenty miles due south of the junction of the Loddon with the Murray, the stream dwindles down to a mere thread of water, and then disappears.” P203

“ The source of the Goulburn must be sought in the vicinity of Mount Matlock, and from its rise in this romantic region, until it reaches Avenel, the course of the river lies through some of the grandest scenery in Victoria. Ranges of heavily-timbered mountains flank it on both sides, leaving in some places a narrow and tortuous hollow through which the stream winds in an endless succession of curves. At other times a valley widens out and offers a soil of wonderful richness for the enterprising husbandman to exploit. And all the tributaries of the Goulburn —the Jamieson, the Howqua, the Seven Creeks and. the Broken River have their birthplaces in the midst of labyrinthine ranges, and lend an additional beauty to scenery which it would be difficult to over praise.” P203

" The Hopkins, which enters the sea about a mile to the eastward of Warrnambool, takes its rise on the southern slopes of the Pyrenees, in the neighbourhood of Mount Ararat, and receives, in its southward progress, the waters of a dozen tributaries, the most important of these being Mount Emu Creek, which heads to the Great Dividing Range. The Hopkins is a favourite stream with anglers. It flows through a pretty country, and the scenery upon its banks is agreeably diversified —now presenting high cliffs, tapestried with shrubs and creepers; now a sylvan landscape and anon undulating pastures, sprinkled with sleek cattle or fleecy sheep, and then a rising township, with its cottages clustering round a primitive church; or a country mansion, like that of Hopkins Hill, framed in a stately zone of trees, and not unworthy to emulate the country houses which lend such a charm to rural England." P202

“ The Murray drains an area, in this colony alone, of upwards of forty thousand square miles, and is navigable by steamers from Wodonga to its outlet in Lake Alexandrina, though the depth of water in it fluctuates materially from time to time and from year to year. In the early summer, when the snow begins to melt on Mount Kosciusko and the neighbouring ranges, the river will sometimes rise bank high; and during the rainy season, when its waters are swollen by those of the Murrumbidgee, the Billabong, the Lachlan and the Darling, they overflow the low-lying country in various places, filling up back-water creeks and forming extensive lagoons. Steamers freighted with wool and other pastoral produce lend a character of unwonted animation to the great waterway at such a time, and squatters occupying stations in the far interior of New South Wales, hundreds of miles distant from the river’s junction with its main affluents, gladly avail themselves of the facilities afforded by the stream for the conveyance of their products to port facilities which are apt to be interrupted by long and trying intervals, during the too frequent periods of protracted drought.”
“ In the south-east of Victoria, the rivers which head from the northern slope bear a strong general resemblance to each other. They take their rise in the mysterious recesses of mountains so thickly clothed with timber and so inaccessible that the sanctuaries of Nature have remained for centuries unprofaned by human foot, but it almost impossible to indicate with any degree of accuracy the precise fountain-head of either of these rivers. A score of, little rills, issuing from moist crevices high up among the hills, will trickle down their furrowed sides and mingle their waters in a runnel that glides beneath a grove of tree-ferns in a narrow gorge impenetrable to the sunlight.” P198

“ The undulating nature of the ground on which the city stands sets of’ its architectural features to great advantage, and the buildings are for the most part worthy of their sites. There are probably few boulevards south of the Equator superior to the Sturt Street of Ballarat. It is three chains wide; and has a double avenue of trees in its centre with well kept roads between them and the houses on either side. The government offices, places of public worship, scholastic establishments, warehouses and hotels, are on a fine scale, and when the streets are lighted up at night by means 1 of electric lamps, and crowded with visitors from outlying hamlets, the scene presented is lively and beautiful in no ordinary degree. There are literary institutions and free libraries in each of the three towns, and the local journals are conducted with great spirit and ability. The city of Ballarat, formerly Ballarat West, has a double claim to its title, inasmuch as it is the seat of both the Protestant and the Roman Catholic sees.”
“ The town hall is a splendid structure, with a frontage of one hundred and twenty feet to Sturt Street, and a clock tower one hundred feet high, from which a wide spreading, diversified and most pleasing view can be obtained.” P260

“ Thirty-seven miles farther along in the same direction and one hundred and sixty, miles from Melbourne is Warrnambool, on the shore of Lady, Bay. Immediately to the west of the town the Merri Creek empties itself into the sea, while on the east, two miles and a half distant, is the Hopkins River. These streams afford excellent sport to the angler, abounding as they, do in blackfish, bream and mullet, while they, are also the resort of wild fowl in great variety, and abundance. Warrnambool, by reason of the mildness of its climate and the salubrity of its atmosphere, is much resorted to by, invalids and convalescents. It is separated from the sea by, a swamp known as Lake Pertobe, which it is proposed to deepen and convert into a veritable lake, or else to raise its level and to drain it. A tramway crosses the lagoon, and over it the shipping trade of the port is conducted. This consists largely of the export of potatoes, which are grown here to great advantage, as well as in the neighbouring districts of Tower Hill and Koroit, the land being so favourable to the industry, that portions of it have been sold at the high price of forty, pounds per acre, and other portions let at tip to nine pounds per acre for one season. The principal dairy farm and cheese factory, of the colony is situated at Tooram, within a few miles of Warrnambool, and on this the proprietor has set an excellent example to his neighbours by, initiating irrigation works at his ‘own expense and introducing new and improved methods of agriculture. The town is built chiefly of sandstone found in the immediate vicinity, and its churches and public buildings are both substantial and ornamental. It is not much favoured by nature in the way of shipping facilities, the bay being of limited extent and exposed to south and south-east gales, but with the improvement works now in progress, and the uninterrupted railway communication with the metropolis which it will have at an early date, its trade requirements will be amply provided for. The "common" which surrounds the town is a beautiful woodland area, but it is being steadily encroached upon by the new buildings required for the accommodation of an increasing population. To the eastward is Albert Park, a reserve of one hundred and forty-four acres permanently set apart for the use and recreation of the public. Beyond this is the racecourse, an elliptical enclosure surrounded on all sides by lofty hills.” P260

“ On their floors and sloping sides are giant eucalypti shooting straight up from the earth as if eager to reach a freer atmospheric stratum than that in which they were born. One of these gullies on fire on a hot summer night is a sight not easily forgotten. Flames rush up through the partially, decayed trunks of the older trees is if through a blast furnace; the branches of the consuming eucalypti are flame-tinged to their very tips; clouds swept of incandescent carbon are abroad on the wings of the wind, and every now and then a fresher puff will scatter a shower of glowing sparks, and cause the whole of the surrounding scenery to lit up with a glare of lurid splendour.” “ The route continues in a north-westerly direction through, good agricultural land, enriched at frequent intervals with comfortable-looking farm houses, most of them with orchards and vineyards attached, until Clunes is reached at a distance of twenty-three miles from Ballarat. Gold was found in the quartz of this locality as early as 1851, and the reefing industry has been pursue ever since, of course with the fluctuations that characterise this mode of money getting, but generally with highly satisfactory results. Since 1857, the Port Phillip company, using the very best obtainable skill and the most highly improved mechanical appliances, has compelled the quartz to yield up gold to the value of about two million sterling, while the New North Clunes company has realised about half that amount in one-half the time. Clunes has an excellent water supply, brought in from the Bullarook Forest, where it is collected in a reservoir having a capacity of two hundred and sixty-five million gallons. The town has had its trials by ordeal of fire and of water, and was at one time flooded out as regards its low-lying shops and houses, while those on a higher level were suffering a conflagration. Nevertheless it has triumphed over all its difficulties, and is now a flourishing and important settlement in the enjoyment of self-government and of all the appliances of civilisation. Four miles from its centre is Mount Beckwith, sixteen hundred feet high, and from the summit of this hill there is to be obtained a view seldom surpassed for its richness and beauty.” P270

“ From Clunes the railway trends northwest and crosses Stony Creek, upon which stands the hamlet of Caralulup; a short distance to the south-west of this village is Mount Mitchell, and still farther in the same direction the little quartz-reefing settlement of Lexton, which, by a coach line, is in communication with the railway at Talbot Station. After leaving Clunes the first stopping-place is Dunach siding, on the east of which are Mounts Green, Glasgow and Cameron, and still further east the village of Campbelltown, on Glengower Creek.” P271

“ In the vicinity of Clunes is the famed Port Phillip company’s Victorian quartz mine with its reducing apparatus. The operations of this gold-mining association, the results of which have already been mentioned, illustrate the most successful methods of raising and treating auriferous quartz in Victoria. It commenced mining in March, 1857, on private property held on lease, and under covenant to pay a certain royalty on the gold obtained to the owners of the estate. This of course has been a serious drain upon the profits of the mine owners. During the first twenty years of the company’s operations, over nine hundred and fourteen thousand tons of its own quartz were raised and treated, and forty thousand one hundred and fifteen tons raised by tributers under the company were reduced at its works. The profit accruing from the twenty years’ work amounted to three hundred and thirty-six thousand one hundred and sixty-six pounds, of which the owners of the land received one hundred and twenty-three thousand one hundred and sixty-six pounds in the form of royalty, the balance going to shareholders in England and the colony. In addition to this much gold was got by other companies working in the Port Phillip company’s ground on tribute. The largest quantity of quartz crushed by the company in one year was sixty-nine thousand three hundred and nineteen tons; the highest yield of gold per ton for one year, was one ounce nine pennyweights, and the lowest, seven pennyweights twenty-three grains. The smallest yield of gold per ton that the company can make pay is four pennyweights, and this leaves nothing for the shareholders. The company operated on is basaltic, reaching to a depth ranging from a foot to one hundred feet, and under this, quartz intermixed with other minerals, so far as the mine has been explored. Much of the quartz treated came from depths of seven hundred and eight hundred feet, and richer stone is now being searched for at depths of one thousand feet and upwards. When the mine is in full operation four hundred men are employed, three hundred of whom work underground.” P270

“ At Stawell the railway line enters another important gold region. As far back as 1856, extensive mining operations were carried on there, and the place was known as the Pleasant Creek quartz reefs. Eighteen years ago the "reefs" became a borough under the designation of Stawell. Until 1880 this was a mining centre of considerable importance, ranking next to Ballarat and Sandhurst in productiveness. When its alluvial mining was prosperous, it supported a population of from fifty to sixty thousand, and its career commenced with a "rush," which was one of the most extensive of the kind that has ever taken place in the colony. Later on its alluvial deposits were exhausted, but its quartz mines continued to maintain about ten thousand inhabitants. Its present population, which has shrunk to six thousand, appears to be in fairly prosperous circumstances. Its principal mine is the Moonlight-cum-Magdala, which promises to equal in productiveness the once famous North Cross and Scotchman’s lines of reef in the same district. The Magdala is raising quartz from a depth of nearly three thousand feet; the Newington from a depth of above two thousand; and the Prince Patrick and Scotchman’s from a depth of nearly two thousand feet. The town is one hundred and seventy-five miles from Melbourne in a north-westerly direction, seventy-four from Ballarat, and eighteen from Ararat. It is thoroughly well-built, chiefly of sandstone from the Grampians, and its streets and footpaths are well made and well kept, but rather crooked in their alignment, the main street looking as if it followed an ancient cow-path, instead of having been originally laid out by the town surveyor. But this is not an unmixed evil, since the sinuousness of the road affords a not unpleasant relief to eyes accustomed to the severely straight lines of most Victorian towns. There are ten churches in the town, some of them very handsome, four substantial banks and a large general hospital, which provides for the necessities of a widely extended district. The town hall is large and commodious, and the place possesses in addition a shire hall in what is called the old township. Stawell possesses flourmills, a brewery on a considerable scale, and shops and hotels bearing all the outward appearances of permanency and comfort.” P277

“ Hamilton, an important inland centre, which, not without some reason, claims the title of the metropolis of the West. Its municipal existence dates from 1859. The town grew up out of a ‘ford,’ which was the most convenient place for teamsters and other travellers in the earlier days to cross the Grange Burn. The place is only twelve miles from the Wannon River, which is farther west, and on which are some beautiful falls. The geological formation of the district is miocene and newer volcanic, the surface consisting of good grazing and farming land. The town, which is picturesquely situated at an elevation of about sixteen hundred feet above the sea level, contains, besides the usual State schools, two colleges and one academy —the Hamilton and Western District College for boys —one of the most architecturally imposing of the local structures —the Alexandra College for young ladies, and the Hamilton Academy, which last is a high-class educational institution for boys. The State school is capable of accommodating five hundred children, and there is also a Roman Catholic school. There are published here two newspapers, one tri-weekly and one weekly. The water supply of the town is very efficient, and the works were completed at a cost of nearly fourteen thousand pounds; the reservoir has a storage capacity of thirty million gallons. The metropolis of the West has nine churches —including the exceptional denominations, Gælic and German Lutheran —and three banking establishments which occupy premises worthy of the substantial character of the business transacted within their walls. Besides the foregoing and a savings bank, two financial and several insurance companies have agencies here. The local pastoral and agricultural society have biannual exhibitions, at which gallant shows are made of stock and produce. Hamilton has a fine oval-shaped racecourse of about one hundred and twenty acres, upon which the race club celebrates high carnival twice a year; this course is also, used for occasional races between the allotted dates of the regular festive meetings. Various other sports and pastimes receive attention, and the Western District coursing club has its headquarters in Hamilton. One of the attractions, of the place is a handsome private club-house —erected by the members at a considerable cash outlay —which has now been established eight years. Amongst the noteworthy public buildings are the treasury, lands, post and telegraph offices, which occupy the ground upon which stood the post office of former days.” P281

“ Kyneton lies in the midst of a plateau which stretches from Riddell’s Creek to Elphinstone, a distance of thirty-five miles, and in the centre of arable and pasture land of exceptional value, owing in part to the quality of the soil and in part to the fact that the average annual rainfall of the district is from thirty to forty inches. The place is sufficiently old and well-established to give it a general resemblance to an English country town in one of the midland shires. The public buildings, banks and principal hotels are solidly built, and wear an air of prosperity and respectability. Outside the shops in the high street, the carts, buggies and drays of rural folk who have come in shopping are drawn up, and are receiving parcels and packages of divers shapes and sizes. The yards of agricultural implement makers are occupied with ploughs, carts and waggons in various stages of manufacture or repair, and inside the wayfarer may: See the flaming forge And hear the, billows roar, and catch the turning sparks that fly Like chaff from a threshing floor.
There are capacious produce stores to receive, the grain grown on the surrounding farms, and although population seems to have ebbed away somewhat from the north-western corner of the town the commercial activity of the leading thoroughfare has probably been intensified by the movement. The general plan of Kyneton is ambitious; there are plenty of blank spaces available for building on, and at the east end of High Street the cornfields come close up to the footpath. There are green crofts and spacious church reserves, and, large gardens and orchards, within a stone’s throw of the shire hall; and these help to increase the pleasantness of the general aspect of the place, which is still further enhanced by the grand dimensions of some of the ornamental trees and shrubs encircling certain of the private residences. There is something substantial, restful and enduring about the look of Kyneton. The surrounding landscape is full of undulations, and its curved lines are repeated with greater emphasis in the embracing hills while the more imposing silhouette of Mount Macedon, with its shelving slope to the westward and its hump in the centre, shuts in the view to the south. Hedgerows divide many of the farms, and on breezy hills rural residences have been built overlooking a fair expanse of cornfield and pastureland. Sloping down to the deeply-cut channel of the Campaspe are the botanical gardens, where the natural advantages of the site have been improved upon by judicious planting, and an agreeable place of resort has been provided within a few minutes’ walk of the town. Six churches, most of them structures of solid blue stone, a shire hall, an unusually fine police station, and the government offices, are among, the most conspicuous of its buildings, and Kyneton forms the administrative centre of an extensive district.” P288

“ Sandhurst disputes with Ballarat the distinction of being the premier goldfield of Victoria. It is situated on the upper part of the Bendigo Creek and its tributaries, which, taking their rise in an offshoot of the Mount Alexander Ranges, afterwards assume the name of the Piccaninny Creek, and this disappears in a marsh about seven and twenty miles due north of the city. The area of the goldfield is not less than eleven hundred square miles, of which no more than an insignificant fraction is actually operated upon. In the early days many thousands of diggers found profitable occupation in surface mining, and some tons weight of quartz was extracted from the remarkably rich gullies. Long before these were partially exhausted, it was discovered that gold in large quantities was embedded in the rocks of the district, and these were so extensive that, in so far as their magnitude could be roughly calculated, they held out the prospect of affording remunerative returns for half a century to come. But even this forecast came to be regarded as inadequate, when it was ascertained that gold-bearing quartz could be found at a depth of two thousand feet below the surface; hence the permanence and stability of the gold-mining industry in Sandhurst, and the confidence felt by its citizens in its prosperous future. Up to the present time, only four thousand eight hundred acres of the auriferous area of the district are in process of exploitation, and two hundred and seventy-two well-defined reefs have been proved to he gold-bearing, the yield of these ranging from ten pennyweights to eighteen ounces per ton.
Up to the 30th June, 1887, the total yield of this goldfield was fourteen million six hundred and fifty-one thousand six hundred and twenty-one ounces, of the value of fifty-eight million six hundred thousand pounds. The three principal lines of reefs have been traced for seven miles, running parallel with each other in a north-westerly direction, between eight and nine hundred yards apart, and there is every reason to believe that they extend for twenty miles. The greatest depths to which shafts have been sunk with remunerative results are these: —The Great Extended Hustlers, two thousand and twenty feet; Lansell’s, two thousand and forty feet; and the Victory and Pandora, on the Garden Gully line of reef, two thousand one hundred feet.”
“ The New Chum United gold-mining company has a paid-up capital of one thousand four hundred and seventy-five pounds, and has declared dividends to the extent of sixty-four thousand nine hundred; the Garden Gully company, with a paid-up capital of twenty-one thousand six hundred and forty-six pounds, has disbursed eight hundred and eighty thousand two hundred and twenty-five in dividends.” P290

“ The cattle trade of an extensive area of pastoral country, stretching out for miles in every direction, is concentrated here, as a loop-line of railway connects it, via Traralgon, with Melbourne. From Heyfield, a small station on the Thomson River, anyone with some knowledge of the bush may follow up that stream until he reaches the famous mining region of Walhalla, one of the most remarkably situated goldfields in Victoria. Lying in a deep and narrow trough between steep and lofty ranges, it resembles, in everything but the character of its habitations, one of those secluded villages to be met with in out of the way valleys in Switzerland. But in place of the lowing of cattle, the tinkling of their bells among the tree-clad hills, and the horn of the herdsman, may be heard the rushing of steam, the whirring of machinery and the thud of quartz crushing mills; for the place has been called into existence by mining enterprise. This industry has met with magnificent rewards, the Lone Tunnel mining company, with a paid-up capital of only twelve thousand pounds, having divided upwards of a million among its fortunate shareholders, with no immediate prospect of a diminution of the yield; while the Long Tunnel Extended and Toombon appear to have a prosperous career before them. The tramways, which bring down timber from the mountains, and the flumes which serve as aqueducts, help also to diversify the aspect of Walhalla, and the approaches to the place itself are as picturesque as its position.” P297

“ From Cumberland Creek to Melbourne, the route lies through Marysville to Fernshaw, and, after crossing the Black Spur, it minds amidst a magnificent shrubbery composed of hazel scrub with its lance-like stems and clinging foliage, the uniform height of which gives it the appearance, when seen in a mass at a little distance, of a hop-garden. Native laurel, musk, sassafras, the yellow blossoms of St. John’s wort, the creamy flowers of the catwood-tree, the sheen of the sunshine on the myrtles turning their leaves to burnished silver, the graceful fronds of the ever-recurring tree-ferns, the mountain springs which are heard but not seen, the glimpses obtained from time to. time of Mounts Sugarloaf and Strickland and of the now familiar Cathedral Rock combine to produce such an impression upon the mind that, as one descends from these sylvan heights, he leaves behind him, with a sentiment of regret, the superb trees which attain such imposing altitudes and proportions on the summit of these intricate ranges.
Healesville, the first town reached after quitting the little hamlet of Fernshaw, is built on a slope that falls down to the edge of the Graceburn, a mountain stream which here effects a junction with the Watts, and is environed by, orchards, hop-gardens, and pastures. The place is pleasantly situated, is gradually rising in importance, and promises one day to become the centre of a populous district; while an aboriginal station has been established for upwards of twenty years at Coranderak, about two miles off.” P302.

Text: "Picturesque Atlas of Australasia 1886"