Page:History of West Australia.djvu/155

Rh Sydney, but colonists were desirous of having Western Australia erected into a separate bishopric, with a bishop residing among them. To secure this, they undertook to contribute 10,000 acres of land towards the endowment of a bishopric.

In 1840 the Rev. W. Smithlea, an earnest and enthusiastic member of the Wesleyan denomination, arrived in the colony, and the foundation-stone of a Wesleyan Chapel to accommodate 300 persons was laid in Fremantle. A chapel of larger dimensions was projected at Perth, and opened on 1st January, 1842, when the Rev. W. Smithlea officiated. The Fremantle chapel was opened on 24th May, 1842.

A second weekly paper, The Inquirer, was launched in Perth in August, 1840, and shortly afterwards the Government began the issue of a weekly gazette.

A Grammar School was by this time established at Perth, under the superintendence of the Rev. J. B. Wittenoom. There were two ladies' schools in Perth, and a few establishments for elementary instruction in different parts of the colony. At York a boys' school was opened by a competent teacher. A special object of this institution, it is written, was to induce parents in India to send their children to be educated at York, in Western Australia, where a healthy climate was enjoyed. There were also the two native schools.

While English statesmen and local Governors were studying colonial land laws, and pastoralists and agriculturists were pursuing their occupations in the settled country, explorers were penetrating vast new areas of Western Australian territory. The gloom enveloping the country in the north-west and east was entered, and explorers, by painful toil, went far beyond the bounds of settlement. Grey in the north-west, the officers of the Beagle on the coast, and Eyre, the South Australian explorer, in the east, gathered a mass of information for colonists.

Lieutenant Grey remained but a few days in Mauritius after his explorations in the north-west in 1838, and in September of that year he returned to Fremantle. The charter under which his ship, the Lynhen, was engaged; expired, and he was compelled to seek for another vessel. The Government arranged that the colonial schooner Champion should be equipped to conduct him to the north-west. While the necessary preparations were being made, Grey went into the country on every side of Perth, and devoted much time to studying the natives. In January, 1839, Mr. George Eliot—a pioneer of the Parmelia—was lost in the bush in the Williams district, and Governor Hutt requested the explorer to search for him. Grey set out on January 12th, and on January 25th found Mr. Eliot on the banks of the Preston River, at Leschenault. The latter had strayed off his course, and subsisted for several days on native roots and boiled tops of grass.

Finally, Grey was not able to secure the Champion, and on 17th February he and his party sailed, with three boats and five months' provisions, for the north-west in the American whaler, Russell. The party numbered twelve, including Dr. Walker, the surgeon; Mr. Frederick Smith, a bright, young Englishman, anxious for colonial experience; Corporals Auger and Coles, and Kaiber, an intelligent native. They were landed on Bernier Island, in Shark's Bay, with their three boats, and the Russell then continued her cruise, leaving the party alone. After remaining on Bernier Island for two days, Grey proceeded to Dorre Island in search of water. While trying to reach the beach, one boat was wrecked in the fierce surf and breakers.

Almost from the beginning, Grey and his men were confronted by perils and hardships. In vain was search made for water on Dorre Island, and they had to be content with quarter allowance for some days, and that under a midsummer sun. Eventually they went over to the mainland, and put their boats into a mangrove creek. Three miles inland they secured fresh water. Then, entering the boats, they coasted to the northward, where they saw another mangrove creek. Entering its mouth, though expecting little from its appearance, the men pushed past the great mangroves which grew so luxuriantly on every side, until they got about a mile from the mouth. Here the water widened, and numerous large snags endangered the boats. The appearance and size of these snags suggested that they had been carried by storm waters from an inland river. After camping the night on the banks, Grey, on 6th March, went further inland, but as the channel became dry he was compelled to walk. There were tracks on the banks of numerous natives, and cockatoos and wild fowl rose in flocks before him. Grey called this channel the Gascoyne River, after a military friend of his.

He now closely examined the country on the banks of the Gascoyne, and concluded that it was very fertile. After quitting the bed of the river, and turning south by west, he came upon what appeared an immense delta of alluvial soil, covered with gently sloping, grassy rises. In the valleys lay many fresh water lagoons, set in red clay. The little island between the two mouths of the Gascoyne was named after his friend, Mr. C. Babbage. Proceeding to it, Grey camped, and on 6th March resumed his explorations before daylight. The weather was so excessively hot that little progress could he made in the middle of the day. North of the Gascoyne, he instituted, with the assistance of Kaiber, friendly relations with a tribe of natives. The line of sand-hills running parallel with the coast was named Lyell's Range. A return was made to the coast, and the party then went further north in the boats.

A second accident happened on the evening of the 9th; as the boats were putting in shore one of them swamped, and though the men landed in safety, the provisions were much damaged. Their outlook was not a pleasant one. Sand-hills rose with ugly continuity around them, and there was nothing to relieve the dismal scene. Then they experienced a dispiriting effect from the impressionable Australian atmosphere, which has brought suffering and death to so many men. A lake rose on the horizon, and towards it they proceeded with feelings of deep satisfaction. But though they travelled many miles they came no nearer to the lake, and when thoroughly weary they were bitterly disappointed to find it but a wanton mirage, which, with a siren's witchery, cruelly mocked them in their privations.

On 10th March, while Grey and his men were camped near the sea-shore, thirty or forty natives swooped down from a sandhill. They seized some of the provisions, but at the report of guns fled in intense fear. The explorers now put to sea and returned to the Gascoyne River, and on the 20th March left there for Gantheaume Bay. A provisions store had been left on Bernier Island, but upon going to the place they were greatly put out to find the provisions totally destroyed. Proceeding down the coast they at last reached Gantheaume Bay, where they sought to land in a heavy sea and a strong surf, A greater