Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/93

 '^''"^"'^""^ ADELAIDE AND VICINITY 67 While the boom was at its height, a rush was made for Port Lincohi. In 1839 the manager of the South Australian Company went to that neighborhood, and selected an area of land ; but before he returned to register his selection it had been applied for and taken. Early in that year an association was formed in Adelaide for the purpose of examining and taking up land in that locality, and the life of the earliest settlers there was highly adventurous. The natives were uncommonly hostile, and, having committed several murders, their boldness increased until the white people who were courageous enough to take up land did so at the peril of their lives. Even the exploring parties were attacked ; but the danger did not daunt intending setders. and they, or those who followed them, accomplished their purpose, but at a terrible cost. Stock was sent to Port Lincoln, and a route was eventually forced around the gulf. Sometimes the natives in the northern areas killed the stock or a white man here and there ; at others, when these dangers were .surmounted, Nature won where aborigines failed, and the pathfinders were .struck down. Upon the route were abandoned carts, rusted and broken, and the white bones of horses, sheep, and cattle. Not a few travellers and settlers were sacrificed as an offering to the de.sert .sphinx or to bloodthirsty natives ; but the British colonist is not easily dismayed. At Port Lincoln runs were taken up in 1839, 1840, and sub-sequent years ; were abandoned, re-stocked, and abandoned a second time. Then, despite failure, they were re-occupied. Were it possible in this work, it would be interesting to tell the stories of unrecorded deeds of bravery and persistence which have won colonial empires. As early as 1839, trading vessels went to Port Lincoln with passengers, building materials, and stock ; and " for a time it seemed as if the capital would be supplanted " — Hodder. Whaling ships were at work along the coast leading to Fowler Bay, and, in common with the temper of the boom, a brilliant future was predicted for Port Lincoln. Even a newspaper, the Port Lincoln Herald, was established ; but the district did not make any permanent advance, and many of the people returned to Adelaide. Thus, during these years, the energy of a part of the populace was employed. The land boom was aided and fostered by other conditions set in motion by Governor Gawler himself. By the Act of 1834 it was provided that the proceeds of land sales in the Province were to be devoted by the Colonising Commissioners to sending emigrants from England. When the large sums obtained by this over-speculation were sent to the Commissioners, they dispatched shipload after shipload of people to South Australia, independently of the questions of demand and supply. The speculators did not cultivate the land, and hence what under normal conditions of investment might have been an economic triumph became a source of intense anxiety to Governor Gawler. There was an abundance of good land, and labor to cultivate it ; but the bulk of the people hung about the city and production grew with exasperating .slowne.ss. The population of Adelaide, compared with that of the Province, wa.s. altogether disproportionate, and, instead of relieving it, each speculative purcha.se accentuated the trouble, because it supplied more funds for immigration. There was a slight diminution in the proportion in 1840, but in that year and in 1841 most of the difficulties occurred. In 1839, many thousands F2