"He loves his own barn better
Than he loves our house."
--First Part Henry IV.
Up to that time, and for some time longer, the religious conversion of
these natives was regarded as hopeless, so deeply "bred in blood and
bone" was aboriginal character. Consequently all the earlier missions
were abandoned in utter despair, with only one exception, that of the
Moravians, which, in faith and duty continuing the work, was at length
rewarded with success. Naturally some few, especially amongst the young,
were less severely "native" than the rest, and these were more or less
gained. But the change came with the next generation, "born in the
purple" of surrounding colonial life. The blood and bone had been
partially neutralized, and this is still more the result of yet another
generation that has followed, so that, in spite of the black skin, the
missionary now deals with natures much more amenable to his teachings.
A remarkable illustration of aboriginal tenacity, which, however, I am
quoting only from memory, occurred in South Australia. Two aboriginal
children, separated from babyhood from aboriginal life, were trained and
educated like colonists. For the earlier years little difference was
noticed, but as they advanced into boyhood some restlessness became
evident. When, on one occasion, a native tribe, presumably their own,
happened to be near Adelaide, these children, who had either seen them
or heard of them, made their escape at the earliest opportunity, and,
having reached the native camp, at once threw off the habiliments of
civilization, and never after showed any disposition to return to the
conditions they had so summarily rejected.
"THE BEACH" (NOW PORT MELBOURNE).
"Thinking of the days that are no more."
--Tennyson.
At the time of my arrival, all Melbourne-bound passengers were put out
by their respective ships' boats upon that part of the northern beach of
Port Phillip that was nearest to Melbourne, whence, in straggling lines,
as they best could in hot winds, they trod a bush track of their own
making, which, about a mile and a half long, brought them to a punt or
little boat just above "The Falls," where the owner made a good living
at 3 pence a head for the half-minute's passage. This debarkation place
got to be called, par excellence, "The Beach." It consisted already of
two public-houses, kept respectively by Liardet and Lingham. Both were
respectable people in their way, but the first was also a character. Of
good family connection, he had enjoyed a life of endless adventure,
which, however, had never seemed any more to elevate him by fortune than
to depress him by its reverse. He was a kind of roving Garibaldi, minus,
indeed, the hero's war-paint and the Italian unity, but with all his
frankness and indomitable resource. Having a family of active young
sons, he secured the boating of "the Beach" as well as the other thing.
But his untold riches of experience seemed never to condescend to
develop into riches of mere money--and perhaps without one pang of
regret to his versatile and resourceful mind.
This Beach was a sterile spot, afterwards fittingly called Sandridge,
and presented so little inducement to occupancy that these two
public-houses were the whole of it till well on to the days of gold.
Then The Beach awoke to its destinies. When the Melbourne and Hobson's
Bay railway was projected, in 1852, there were already a good few
houses, mostly wooden, straggling along either side of the original bush
track. Then arose the respectable suburb of Sandridge, to be finally
superseded by the municipality of Port Melbourne, which, with its mayor
and corporation, can now enter the London market with its own loan
issues.
The only other indigenous feature of this somewhat featureless Beach
which I recollect was a little virulently salt lagoon, situated in
complete isolation near the Bay, and only some hundred yards on the
right-hand side of the track to Melbourne. We all knew it was there, but
it had extremely few visitors, owing to its unapproachable surrounding
of bushes, and its bad repute from a countless guard of huge and
ferocious mosquitos. Without outlet for its extra-briny waters, and in
its desolate solitude, it might have aspired to be a sort of tiny Dead
Sea. With the advance of Sandridge this evil-omened southern Avernus
came in for better consideration, and by 1854, with a cutting into the
Bay, it had become a ready-made boat haven. The Melbourne maps now show
me that it must have reached still higher destinies.