Page:Some account of the wars, extirpation, habits.djvu/82

74 after some one of his marvellous adventures in the North, that he came into Launceston so emaciated by privation and overwork, and altogether so wretched, that he might have passed for a pauper, as indeed he appeared to be.

Though both himself and mission were known to the community he was sojourning amongst, the ill-feeling referred to a little above, showed itself unworthily enough just now; and the friendless man might have wandered through the streets uncared for and hardly noticed, but for one gentleman, who, though a stranger to him personally, knew him by repute, and who held very different opinions from others respecting the real character of the man, and of the great value of his services to Tasmania, which he had the moral courage to avow, whilst he vindicated him and the cause he served from the aspersions of those who affected to treat him, at one time as a madman, and at others as an impostor. Moved by the pitiable condition of the wretched wanderer, he at once offered him and his attendant blacks a home so long as it suited him to remain in Launceston, which Robinson willingly and gratefully accepted, and on every after visit he made to the town both he and his followers were welcomed at the same friend's roof. This gentleman was Mr George Whitcomb.

The service thus feelingly rendered was never afterwards forgotten by Robinson, and to the end of his life he kept up a most friendly correspondence with his old benefactor, under whose roof, as the poet Campbell says, he found

I am unable to name the time of Robinson's arrival here. I believe he was in humble circumstances then, a poor artizan and probably a steerage passenger, a class whose names seldom appear in the published shipping reports. He was a good tradesman and soon established himself here as a master builder, but he was no designer or architect, as may be seen in the case of his own residence in Elizabeth-street (now No. 168), which was built by himself, or after his own designs, and its present curious roof added in after times under his own direction.

After quittiug the service of our Government he received the appointment of Chief Protector of Aborigines in Victoria, on quitting which employ, he retired to England, where he died on the 18th of October, 1860 (at Bath, I believe). He was twice married, and some of the sons by his first wife I hear are still living on some of the islands of Furneaux Group, Bass's Straits.