Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/341

 Hon. Sir w. Milne ADELAIDE AND VICINITY 315 Captain s commission. F"or a number of years he represented several wealthy absentees, and was for a long period Chairman of the Wallaroo and Moonta Mines Company, besides others. He was a trustee of the Savings Bank, and was a member of the Council of the Zoological Acclimatisation Society. He was also a member of the Committee of the Blind and Deaf and Dumb Institution. Sir William attained a ripe old age in South Australia, and was a magnificent example of the healthiness of the climate. Even though his local career had been an active one, it was in itself the span of a long life. P"or several of his last years he lived in well earned retirement, and then, on April 23, 1895, he died at his country residence at Mount Lofty. On his death the newspapers published very flattering eulogiums upon the veteran, and agreed that he had been a durable bulwark to the State. His eldest son is Mr. William Milne, who was born in Adelaide in 1849. The reader may judge, from this hurried sketch, of the prominent place Sir William Milne holds in the history of South Australia. He devoted his talents sincerely to the welfare of the Province, and was as popular and respected in private as in public life. I The late Mr. George Woodroffe Goyder, C.M.G. GOYDER'S line of rainfall " has become almost a proverb in the Province — signifying an imaginary line defined by Mr. Goyder as separating the wet from the dry districts of South Australia, based upon observations made by that gentleman during a 30,000 miles' ride on horseback over the pastoral lands. Mr. Goyder was born in 1824, and received his education at Glasgow. After serving an apprenticeship with a firm of engineers, he emigrated to South Australia in 1848, entering the public service on June 10, 1851. On January 17, 1853, he became Chief Clerk in the Lands Office ; was appointed Assistant .Surveyor-General on September 14. 1854; Deputy Surveyor-General on January I, 1858; and .Surveyor-General on January 19, 1861, occupying that position until his resignation on June 30, 1894. In the furtherance of his official duties he made several exploratory expeditions to the interior of the Province, and was sent to the Northern Territory upon the recall of the Hon. B. T. F'inniss. Whilst there he fixed upon Palmerston as the site for the capital, and surveyed some 500,000 acres in the surrounding neighborhood. For this work he was given the thanks of the Parliament and a bonus of /500. Other of his official duties were the valuation of pastoral leases, the draining and reclaiming of .swampy country — more particularly in the South-East, and the conserving and providing of water by damming or well-sinking for the development of the far northern country. After his retirement he lived at Warrakilla, near Echunga, in the hills, where he had an orchard and valuable estate. He died on November 2, 1898. V2