Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/420

 394 ADELAIDE AND VICINIFY The late Mr. David Bower THE memoirs of veterans of Australia contain the account of many incidents of other days the like of which can hardly be re])eated. With the advance of settlement and the inevitable extinction of the aborigines, romance and adventure largely disappear, and Australian life sounds a more prosaic note. Although the days of exciting experiences in sequestered parts of the bush are not altogether gone, they do not compare in vivifying interest with those of 50 and 60 years ago. With such reflections that respected veteran, the late Mr. David Bower, was possessed in his latter vears. In his time he roamed throuo:h lonely country which to-day is adorned with haystacks, and barns and town- ships. David Bower, gazetted a Justice of the Peace many years ago, was born at Upper Mill, in the Parish of Saddleworth, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, on April 11, 1819. He was the eldest son of a family of seven children, and, when 22 years old, left England for Australia, landing at Port Phillip, Victoria, in July, 1841. The territory at present embraced in the Colony of Victoria was then little known, and only the fringes of the more accessible districts were in- habited. The few colonists who had already taken up their residence there were not particularly prosperous, and seeing little chance of a prosperous career in that part. Mr. Bower left Victoria and went to New Zealand towards the end of 1841. He remained in Maoriland until 1 846, garnering the while a rich store of experiences. P'or some time he traded with the Maoris in the North Island. Mr. Bower traded with a ship which he built him.self on the Waikato River, and, notwithstanding trading risks and bodily dangers, his operations proved remunerative. In 1846 he set sail for .Sydney, and, landing in New South W^ales, travelled all over that Colony. He then decided to seek his fortune in South Australia, and arrived at Port Adelaide in December, 1846. In that growing seaport he established Hammer tSr' Co., Photo