Stanford’s Geogl. Estabt London.

London: Chapman & Hall.

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WESTERN AUSTRALIA.

CHAPTER I.
EARLY HISTORY.

An ingenious but sarcastic Yankee, when asked what he thought of Western Australia, declared that it was the best country he had ever seen to run through an hour-glass. He meant to insinuate that the parts of the colony which he had visited were somewhat sandy. It is sandy. The country round Perth is very sandy. From Freemantle, the seaport, the road up to Perth, the capital, lies through sand. From Albany, the seaport at which the mail steamers stop, the distance to Perth is about 260 miles, and the traveller encounters a good deal of sand on the way. The clever Yankee who thought of the hour-glass probably did not go beyond Perth. There is much soil in Western Australia which is not sandy,—which is as good, perhaps, as any land in the Australian colonies;—but it lies in patches, sometimes far distant from each other; and there is very much desert or useless country between. In this is, probably, to be found the chief reason why Western Australia has not progressed as have the other colonies. The distances from settlement to settlement have been so great as to make it almost impossible for settlers to dispose of their produce. This has been the first great difficulty with which Western Australia has had to contend; and to this have been superadded others: the absence of gold,—an evil not so much in itself as in the difference created by the presence of gold in the other colonies, whereby the early settlers in Western Australia were induced to rush away to Adelaide and Melbourne; its remoteness from the populous parts of the Australian continent; the fact that it is not the way from any place to any other place; the denseness and endlessness of its forests; its poisonous shrub, which in many places makes the pasturing of sheep impossible; and the ferocity of the aboriginal tribes when they first encountered their white invaders. These causes have made the progress of Western Australia slow, and have caused the colony to be placed in a category very different from that in which the other colonies are reckoned, and to be looked at from an exceptional point of view.

The other Australian colonies were originally founded on some ground or for some cause special to themselves. New South Wales, which was the first occupied, was selected as a penal settlement for the use of the mother country. Captain Cook had then but lately made himself acquainted with the coast, and had specially recommended Botany Bay to the British Government. Consequently, a young convict world, under the rule of Governor Phillip, was sent to Botany Bay; and finding Botany Bay unsuited for its purposes, the young world settled itself at Port Jackson. From this establishment Van Diemen’s Land was an offshoot, first colonised for the same purpose,—that of affording a safe refuge to British criminal exiles. An effort was also made in 1803 to establish a penal settlement near the site on which Melbourne now stands. And indeed the first attempt to set up the British flag on that part of the Australian continent which is now called Western Australia was a step made in the same direction. The governors of Port Jackson, or New South Wales, as it came to be called, having been nearly overwhelmed in their heroic struggles to find food for these convicts fourteen thousand miles away from home, on a land which, as far as they had seen it, was very barren, made a sister settlement, first at Norfolk Island, then in Van Diemen’s Land, and thirdly at King George’s Sound,—where stands the town of Albany, which place is now the Southern District of Western Australia. A small party of convicts, with Major Lockyer as their governor, were stationed here in 1826,—but the convicts were withdrawn from the place when it was recognised as belonging to the established colony of Western Australia. After this fashion and for this reason, that of affording a home to the transported ruffians of Great Britain,—the first Australian settlements were made. South Australia was colonised by private enterprise. Victoria and Queensland were separated from New South Wales to the south and north as they became sufficiently populous and strong to demand to be allowed to stand alone. But Western Australia arose after another fashion. She was colonised because she was there,—not because she was wanted for any special purpose, either by the community at large or by any small section of it. We had claimed, and made good our claim, to call all New Holland, hardly by this time known by the name of Australia, as our own. We had done something on the east coast, something in the southern island; some small attempts had been made to utilise the south generally. There were still the west and the north open to us. The northern coast, which even yet we have hardly touched except for telegraphic purposes, was very hot and very unpromising. But there came news to us that on an estuary which had been named the Swan River, running out into the ocean at about the thirty-second parallel of latitude, in a salubrious climate, a commodious settlement might be formed. News to this effect was brought home by Captain Stirling in 1827, and in 1829 the captain, now promoted to the position of Governor Stirling, returned to the Swan River, and founded the colony,—which dates from 1st June of that year. He was preceded, by a few months, by Captain Freemantle in the “Challenger,” who first hoisted the British flag on the spot on which the town of Freemantle now stands. In the month of August the town of Perth, twelve miles up the Swan River, was founded, and in the following month lands were assigned to the new-comers. In that year twenty ships arrived with settlers, stores, several immigrants, and a few soldiers. I do not know that these were specially high-minded men, flying from the oppressive rule of an old country, as did the Pilgrim Fathers who were landed from the “Mayflower” on the shores of Massachusetts;—nor that they were gallant, daring spirits, going forth with their lives in their hands, in search either of exceptional wealth or exceptional honour, as has so often been done by the Columbuses and Raleighs of the world. They certainly were not deposited on the shore because they were criminals. They seem to have been a homely crew, who found life at home rather too hard, and who allowed themselves to be persuaded that they could better their condition by a voyage across the world. What was their position, or what might have been their fate had they remained at home, no one now can tell. They certainly did not have light work or an easy time in founding the colony of Western Australia.

Ships continued to come. In 1830 there came thirty-nine ships, with 1,125 passengers, and stores valued at £144,177. I think it right to state that I take my details as to these matters from the early numbers of the “Western Australian Almanac,” which surely among almanacs deserves to be placed in the very highest rank. I may say of all Australian almanacs that they are much better than anything of the kind in England, telling one what one does want to know, and omitting matter which no one would read. Among them all, this “Western Australian Almanac” should stand high, and will, I hope, show itself to be as charitable as it is good, by pardoning the freedom with which I purloin its information.

Troubles, heavy troubles, soon arose among the young colonists. The heaviest, probably, of these early troubles came from the not unnatural hostility of the natives. All the first years of the colony’s existence were saddened by contests with the blacks—by so-called murders on the part of the black men, and so-called executions on the part of their invaders. Looking at these internecine combats from a distance, and by the light of reason, we can hardly regard as murder,—as that horrid crime which we at home call murder,—the armed attempts which these poor people made to retain their property; and though we can justify the retaliations of the white conquerors,—those deeds done in retaliation which they called executions,—we cannot bring ourselves to look upon the sentences of death which they carried out as calm administrations of the law. The poor black wretches understood no pleas that were made against them,—were not alive even to the Christian’s privilege of lying in their own defence, and of pleading not guilty. They speared a soldier here and a settler there, ran away with booty, fired houses, and made ravages on women and children, doubtless feeling that they were waging a most righteous war against a most unrighteous and cruel enemy. When caught, they knew that they must suffer. In the old records of the colony, one reads of these things as though all the injuries were inflicted by the blacks and suffered by the whites. Here, at home, all of us believe that we were doing a good deed in opening up these lands to the industry and civilisation of white men. I at any rate so believe. But, if so, we can surely afford to tell the truth about the matter. These black savages were savage warriors, and not murderers; and we too, after a fashion, were warriors, very high-handed, and with great odds in our favour, and not calm administrators of impartial laws.

I do not say that the black men were ill treated. I think that in Western Australia, as in the other colonies, great efforts were made by the leading colonists to treat them well, and, if possible, so to use the country for the purposes of the new-comers as not to injure the position of the old possessors. In this, however, the colonists failed egregiously, and could not probably have avoided failure by any conduct compatible with their main object. It was impossible to explain to the natives that a benevolent race of men had come to live among them, who were anxious to teach them all good things. Their kangaroos and fish were driven away, their land was taken from them, the strangers assumed to be masters, and the black men did not see the benevolence. The new-comers were Christians, and were ready enough to teach their religion, if only the black men would learn it. The black men could not understand their religion, and did not want it; and, to this day, remain unimpressed by any of its influences. But the white men brought rum as well as religion, and the rum was impressive though the religion was not. It is common to assert, when we speak of the effect which our colonists have had on uncivilised races, that we have taught them our vices, but have neglected to teach them our virtues. The assertion is altogether incorrect. We have taught them those of our customs and modes of life which they were qualified to learn. To sing psalms, and to repeat prayers, we have been able to teach the young among them. Of any connection between the praises and prayers and the conduct of their lives, I have seen no trace. Many arts they have learned from us, the breaking and training of horses, the use of the gun, the skill and detective zeal of policemen,—for in Western Australia and in Queensland the aborigines are used in this capacity,—and some adroitness in certain crafts, such as those of carpenters and masons. But we have been altogether unable to teach them not to be savage. They will not live in houses except by compulsion. They will not work regularly for wages. They are not awake to the advantages of accumulated property. In their best form they are submissive and irresponsible as children,—in their worst form they are savage and irresponsible as beasts of prey.