"Needs must when the devil drives" is an ancient proverb, and some idea of corresponding force must have passed through her marsupial mind as she cast forth from her pouch poor "Joey"—a good-sized youngster of more than a month old. He recognised the situation, for he scudded away with all his might, but was caught and killed by "Br'er" Dingo before I could interfere, his mother sitting up, a few yards off, making a curious sound indicative of wrath and fear. I somewhat unfairly deprived dingo of his supper by placing it carefully out of his reach in a tree; but in the kangaroo battues which ensued, it more than once occurred to me that I was interfering with a natural law, of which I did not then foresee the consequences.
On the eastern side of Port Fairy lay Grasmere, which on my first introduction to the district, in 1843, was the property of the Messrs. Bolden Brothers. Pleasantly situated on the banks of the Merai, its limestone slopes formed beautiful paddocks for the blue-blooded Bates shorthorns, of which these gentlemen were, at that time, the sole Australian proprietors. They had also a share in the Merang and Moodiwarra runs jointly with Messrs. Farie and Rodger. It was, however, arranged that they should remove their cattle within a certain time, and, I think, early in 1844 the arrangement was carried out. These enterprising and distinguished colonists also owned Minjah, then known as "Bolden's sheep station," now Mr. Joseph Ware's magnificent freehold estate.
A considerable sum of money for those days had been spent, as early as 1843, at Grasmere, when the Rev. John Bolden and I rode in there, having been piloted from the "lower station," where we had spent the previous night, by a grizzled old stock-rider hight Jack Keighran. It was pitch dark, and I was glad to hear the kangaroo dogs set up their chorus, and to know that we were at home. Messrs. Lemuel and Armyne Bolden were then the resident partners.
In the morning I was able to look around at my leisure, and as I had just become inoculated with the shorthorn complaint, which I have never wholly lost, I had a treat. The paddocks, in size from fifty to two hundred acres, were securely enclosed with three-rail fences, and were well grassed, watered, and sheltered.
I have never ceased to regret that the low prices which ruled then and for several years afterwards, coupled with the failure of a well-considered experiment in shipping salt beef in tierces from Melbourne, should have caused the breaking up of that model stud farm, the dispersion of a priceless shorthorn tribe. I had been previously introduced to "Lady Vane," a granddaughter of "Second Hubback," and her inestimable calf "Young Mussulman," at Heidelberg. Here I had the pleasure of seeing them again, if not on their native heath, still in pastures befitting their high lineage and aristocratic position. Also a former daughter of Lady Vane and the Duke of Northumberland. There grazed the imported cows Lady and Matilda; the imported Bates bulls Fawdon, Tommy Bates, Pagan, and Mahomet. Besides these a score or more of Circular Head shorthorn cows, then perhaps the purest cattle which the colony could furnish.
No pains or expense were spared in the keep and rearing of these valuable—nay invaluable cattle—for which, indeed, high prices, for that period, had been paid in England. Everything seemed to promise well for the enterprise—so incalculably advantageous, in time to come, to the herds of Australia. And yet ere the year had rolled round the whole establishment had been disposed of to the Messrs. Manifold. The bulk of the herd cattle went to Messrs. John and Peter Manifold, of Lake Purrumbeet, with a proportion of the bulls. The shorthorns were purchased by the late Mr. Thomas Manifold, who for some years after made Grasmere his residence. In the Spring Valley, a lovely natural meadow, were located a lot of beautiful heifers, the progeny of picked "H over 5" cows (the Hawdon brand), and then the best bred herd in New South Wales.
I was present at the purchase of Minjah from the Messrs. Bolden by Mr. Plummer, of the firm of Plummer and Dent, which took place in 1843. With him came Mr. Richard Sutton, as amicus curiæ, in the interest of Mr. Plummer, who was a newly-arrived Englishman—verdant as to colonial investments. There was a certain amount of argument; but finally Minjah was sold with fifty head of Spring Valley heifers and a young bull, the price, I think, being £5 per head for the heifers, £50 for the bull, and the station given in. This was the origin of the famous Minjah herd. Grasmere and Spring Valley, as also the run of Messrs. Strong and Foster, were subsequently "cut up" and sold. They were too near the town of Warrnambool to escape that fate. Mr. Manifold saved part of his run, but Messrs. Strong and Foster were less fortunate, losing nearly the whole of "St. Mary's." It was not sold, I think, until the gold year, 1851, which accounted for its wholesale annexation. This is the only instance I can recall in that district of the proprietor losing his run in its entirety. The land, however, was exceptionally good, and unmixed with ordinary pastoral country.
The Messrs. Allan Brothers—John, William, and Henry—held Tooram, and the country generally on the east bank of the Hopkins, where that river flows into the sea. It was a picturesque place, having a fine elevated site, and overlooking the broad, beautiful stream not far from its mouth. I thought they should have called it "Allan Water," but apparently it had not so occurred to them. The country was more romantic than profitable, it was said, in those days, being only moderately fattening, and wonder was often expressed that, having the rich western country all before them when they arrived in 1841, or thereabouts, they did not make a better choice. But pioneers and explorers are often contented with country inferior to that which is picked up by those who come after.
The real secret is that explorers are far more interested in the enterprise and adventure than in the promised land which should be the reward of their labours. They delight in the wilderness, and often undervalue Canaan. No spot could have been more suitably situated than the locale the Messrs. Allan selected for ministering to such tastes.
On the south was the coast-line, stretching away to far Cape Otway. On that side they had no neighbours, and Mr. John Allan, who was an intrepid bushman, made hunting and exploring excursions in that direction. I paid them a visit in the early part of 1844. I regarded it as a perfectly lovely place, with all kinds of Robinson Crusoe possibilities. Wrecks, savages, pathless woods, an island solitude—it was on the road to nowhere; nothing was wanting to enable the possessors to enjoy perfect felicity. The romantic solitude has, however, of late years been invaded by a cheese-factory. No doubt it supports a population, but the charm of the frowning, surf-beaten headland looking over the majestic, limitless ocean—of the broad reaches of the reed-fringed river—of the south-eastern trail leading into "a waste land where no one comes, or hath come since the making of the world"—must be fled for ever.