Page:The founding of South Australia.djvu/26



extracts from a carefully written MS. will give a better idea of what manner of man Mr. Gouger was, in his earlier days, than can be given from any other source. He was, as we have seen, and as we shall see more fully later on, a man of an adventurous spirit, and the stirring times of 1830 gave him an opportunity to indulge his love of daring enterprise.

"On the 20th of August, 1830," he writes, "I left England to join Colonel Valdes, who was at Havre with the Spaniards whom I had seen on board the Mary. I landed at Calais on the day Louis Phillippe was proclaimed King of the French, and gave my first shout for liberty on that joyous occasion. It appeared a favourable omen to me. A despot had just been hurled from his throne, and a citizen king occupied his place. An officer who stood by me, threw me a tri-coloured cockade in return for my enthusiastic cry, and this I wore during the whole of my residence on the Continent&hellip;

"On the 24th I arrived at Havre, where I found Colonel Valdes and about 80 Spaniards, the greater part of whom were officers. On the following day, being summoned by Colonel Pinto, Valdes went to