William Hann, one of the pioneer squatters of the North of Queensland, took charge of a party sent by the Queensland Government to investigate the tract of country at the base of Cape York Peninsula, both for its mineral and other resources. Naming the Palmer, and finding here prospects of gold, the further examination of the river resulted in the discovery of what turned out to be one of the richest goldfields in Queensland.
Again the Queensland Government sent out an expedition, under charge of W. 0. Hodgkinson, to determine the amount of pastoral country to the west of the Diamantina River.
Buchanan and F. Scarr next attacked the country between the overland telegraph line and the Queensland border, and in 1878, Mr Lukin, proprietor of the COURIER, in Brisbane, organised an expedition for the purpose of exploring the country in the neighbourhood of a proposed railway line, which had been inaugurated in Port Darwin, and to find the nature, value, and geographical features of the unexplored portions. Under the leadership of Ernest Favenc, the party started from Blackall. This expedition had the effect of opening up a great area of good pastoral country, nearly all of which is now stocked.
In 1883, Favenc traced the heads of the rivers running into the Gulf of Carpentaria, near the Queensland border, and in the year following, crossed from the Queensland border to the telegraph line, and across the coast range to the mouth of the Macarthur River. Soon after, the South Australian Government surveyed this river, and opened it as a port; a good road was formed from the interior to the coast, and the settlement of the country followed.
In Western Australia, Alexander Forrest led an expedition from the De Grey River to the telegraph line, which they reached after a great struggle. It was a most successful trip, and the district found contains some of the best country in Western Australia, both for pastoral and mineral purposes.
Stockdale, with a view to settlement, explored the country in the neighbourhood of Cambridge Gulf. Landing there by steamer, he began the journey, which ended in a tragedy. After a hard struggle, he reached the telegraph line.
McPhee's exploration east of Daly Waters may be said to conclude the expeditions between the Queensland border and the overland line.
To complete the exploration of Arnheim's Land, the South Australian Government fitted out an expedition under the guidance of Mr. David Lindsay, but the country passed over was not available for pastoral settlement, some of it being good sugar country. Messrs. Carr Boyd and O'Donnell, undertaking another trip from the Katherine River to Western Australia, were more fortunate in finding good country, but no geographical discovery resulted.
Thus our island continent has been opened to us by the indomitable courage and endurance of navigators and explorers. Can we look for instances of greater bravery in the exploration of any other portion of the globe? Our old navigators, with their meagre equipment, searched minutely every portion of the coast, until the termination of the survey of the BEAGLE, for the mouth of some river that would communicate with the interior, as our earlier explorers hoped to find a waterway in the wilderness through which they travelled.
The idea of the work they did, being verified as it now is, could never have been dreamt of. Think of Flinders, in the old INVESTIGATOR, as he. sailed from group to group of islands, and from point to point of reefs; when he got at last through Torres Straits, and stood down the Gulf, looking up the old land marks of the early Dutch visitors to our shores—Duyfhen Point, the Van Alphen River, GROOTE EYLANDT, and the rest—names still preserved, that bear witness to the brave old navigator who visited these shores before we did. Many an anxious day and night, doubtless, he had. Now, with steam at our command, the straits have become the safe highway of traffic to all the leading marts of the world.