Page:Diary of ten years.djvu/440

 422 opposed to progress, or at any rate, to the steps which lead to progress, and, generally, to be a drag upon the youthful energies of the present generation. Whether this idea is, or is not, well founded we do not pretend to say, though it is certain that some ground for it is occasionally given. But in their impatience of the attitude of the old settler of to-day, people should not forget that when that old settler was a young settler he was a particularly fine fellow, and that to him we owe the accomplishment of an arduous task of which we, who followed him, are now reaping the benefit. When we read of the difficulties, the trials, and privations which attended the settlement of New South Wales, South Australia, New Zealand—colonies possessing rich natural resources to assist the pioneers—it should be with a feeling of profoundest admiration that we turn to the story of the settlement of the Swan. The Pilgrim Fathers of Swan River lighted upon a corner of the continent more infertile probably than any other, where they had to contend against sand and scrub and poison, and nearly every drawback with which it was possible to meet. They laid the foundations of the colony amid hardships and harassment unknown elsewhere, deprived of those resources of nature which helped others in their contests with the wilds. It is a story of brave men, of indomitable pluck, of a patient, long continuing resistance to difficulties, and of steady determined effort to succeed. The old settlers, whatever new blood may think of them at present, were a body of Englishmen of whom we have every reason to be proud, a set of men, taking them all round, perhaps the best that has ever formed a first group of colonists. Certain it is that, had this not been so, the settlement of the southern part of the colony would have been abandoned or long retarded.

Mr. Moore's diary, written in somewhat quaint but graphic style, vividly brings the scenes of the early struggle before the eye, with a striking realism of detail. There is one thing about the pictures he paints which is particularly noticeable.