Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/44

 i8 ADELAIDK AND VICINITY The Architects The years 1828-40 may be regarded as an experimental period in colonisation, when schemes and principles were debated upon with some asperity in Parliament, in newsixii>ers and magjizines. and among a certain coterie of men who, considering their energ)-. might be «iid to have been gifted with prescient sagacity. Early in the period these 'individuals adxocated colonisation with an earnestness suggesting that they were fully imbued with the importance of a policy which did not obtain national recognition until nearlv sixty years later that of assuring the future ascendency of the British people by founding a colonial ICmpire unparalleled in history. Since then a vast amount of varied and useful exjxirience in colonisation has been gjiined by Great Britain, but, notwithstanding several subsequent attempts and much jingoistic bragga- docio, it is certain that the ideal has not yet been attained. The moving power of the day wjLs Edward Gibbon Wakefield, a man of commanding [)ersonality, of un- doubted talent and statesmanship, who had jjassed a life of singular social vicissitude. He founded a school of for many years, and upon whose principles immense sums of money were expended in forming new settle- ments. He was influentially associated with colonisiition in Western Australia, South Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. His last years were sjient in New Zealand, where he was inde- fatigable in establishing the settlements of Otago and Canterbury. Born in 1796, he wa.s educated for the Bar, Ixicame a popular writer on political subjects, and first obtained distinction for immphlets on prison management and the condition of the lower classes. His most complete work — "A View of the Art of Colonisation" — was issued in 1849. He died at Wellington, New Zealand, on May 16, 1862. His efforts were so appreciated by the British Government that a white marble bust of him was placed in the vestibule of the Colonial Office among those of famous promoters of colonisation. Edward Gibbon Wakefield Wakefield energetically protested against awarding unconditionally and without
 * K>litical economy, which was popular