not
first, discoverer, named it Australia Felix. His words are no less
memorable than highly descriptive of the country. " We traversed it in
two directions with heavy carts, meeting with no other obstruction than
the softness of the soil; and in returning over flowery plains and
green hills, fanned by the breezes of early spring, I named this region
Australia Felix, the better to distinguish it from the parched deserts
of the interior country, where we had wandered so unprofitably and so
long."
Port
Phillip, like Port Jackson, as we have previously recorded, was, in
the earlier period of the colony, passed over by mistake. In 1803,
Colonel Collins was sent from England to form a station on the southern
coast of New Holland. He entered Port Phillip, and abandoned it as an
undesirable place in which to form a settlement, because he could not
get a supply of fresh water; though he must not have taken much trouble
in the search for it. His convict fleet remained some time in the bay,
and several prisoners contrived to get away; these, with the exception
of three, were destroyed by the natives. Two returned and gave
themselves up; the third, a lad named Buckley, fell into the hands of
the natives, but some of the " gins," or native women, having fallen in
love with him, interceded for his life, which was spared, and he was
incorporated with their tribe, becoming one of them, and bearing a part
in their duties and wars. Thirty years afterwards, he was found by a
Van Dieman's Land vessel, and taken across the straits, leaving his
savage life reluctantly, and expressing a desire to return to his sable
wife and family.
At
the period of the discovery of Buckley, or the wild man of the woods,
as he was termed, a considerable sealing trade was carried on from Van
Diemen's Land, in Bass's Straits, and especially upon the shores of
what is now the colony of Victoria. These reported to the colonists
the beauty of the country, and its pastoral capabilities. It so
happened at that time, about 1835, that orders had been received from
home to raise Jthc price of land ; the colonists, not thinking themselves
