Page:The Dictionary of Australasian Biography.djvu/72

 Bright & Co. He was twice Chairman of the Melbourne Harbour Trust, and for many years Trustee of the Public Library, Museum, and National Gallery of Victoria. He was Commissioner to the Exhibition of London, 1861-2; Dublin, 1864; Melbourne, 1866-7; London, 1873-4; Melbourne, 1880; Calcutta, 1883; Adelaide, 1887; and Melbourne, 1888. He married, on August 25th, 1868, the Hon. Anne Maria Georgiana Manners-Sutton, daughter of the third Viscount Canterbury (Governor of Victoria 1866-73), by Georgiana, youngest daughter of the late Charles Thompson, of Witchingham Hall, Norfolk; and was created C.M.G. on May 24th, 1883.

Bright, Hon. Henry Edward, M.L.C., son of Edward Bright and Mary Ann his wife, was born in London on June 30th, 1819, and arrived in Adelaide in April 1850. He was member for Stanley in the Legislative Assembly of South Australia from 1866 to 1874, and for Wooroora from 1875 to 1885. From July 1873 to June 1875 he was Commissioner of Public Works in the Government of the Hon. (now Sir), and in May 1885 was elected to the Legislative Council, of which he is still a member. Mr. Bright married, at St. George's, Hanover Square, London, W., on March 15th, 1841, Miss Jane Prudence King, with whom he recently celebrated his golden wedding.

'''Brisbane, General Sir Thos. Makdougall''', Bart., G.C.B., G.C.H., D.C.L., sometime Governor of New South Wales, was descended from the ancient family of the Brisbanes of Brisbane, Ayrshire, and was born on July 23rd, 1773, at Brisbane House, Largs, the seat of his father, Thomas Brisbane, his mother being Eleanor, daughter of Sir Wm. Bruce. He entered the army in 1789 as ensign in the 38th Infantry, stationed in Ireland, where he became acquainted with the Duke of Wellington, then a lieutenant in a cavalry regiment. In 1793 Captain Brisbane took part in all the affairs of the Flanders campaign from St. Amand to Nimeguen, and in 1796 he served in the West Indies, under Sir Ralph Abercromby. In 1810 he was appointed Assistant Adjutant-General to the staff at Canterbury, which he held till he obtained command of a brigade under the Duke of Wellington, whom he joined at Coimbra in 1812, and under whom he served during the remainder of the Peninsular war. At the battle of the Nive he highly distinguished himself, and for his bravery received the thanks of Parliament. In 1813, on the recommendation of the Duke of Wellington, Sir Thomas was appointed to a command in Canada, and in 1821 was nominated to succeed General Macquarie as Governor of New South Wales, where he remained four years, viz., from Dec. 1821 to Dec. 1825. In New South Wales he improved the condition of the convicts, substituting useful labour for the treadmill and giving them tickets of leave for good conduct. He was mainly, however, a man of science, and established an observatory at Parramatta, where he is said to have fixed the positions of and catalogued 7,385 stars, hitherto scarcely known to astronomers. For his work "The Brisbane Catalogue of Stars" he received the Copley medal from the Royal Society, and the universities of Cambridge and Oxford conferred on him honorary degrees. During his term of office in New South Wales, he introduced good breeds of horses into the colony at his own expense, and encouraged the cultivation of the sugar-cane, vines, tobacco, and cotton. His government is memorable as inaugurating free immigration on a large scale. To arrivals who paid their passages to the Colony he gave every encouragement to settle. He conferred on them grants of land, and assigned to them as many prisoners as they were able to employ. Very speedily, as Mr. Blair narrates, the fine lands of the colony were covered with flocks and herds, and the applications for prisoners became so numerous that at one time two thousand more were demanded than could be supplied. Hence began an important change in the colony. The costly Government farms were one after another broken up, and the prisoners assigned to the squatters. The unremunerative public works were abandoned, which all tended to good, as when the convicts were thus scattered they were more manageable and more likely to reform, than when gathered in large crowds. In Macquarie's time not one prisoner in ten could be usefully employed; seven or eight years after, there was not a prisoner in the colony whose services were not eagerly sought and well paid for by the  56