Page:The three colonies of Australia.djvu/48

 Among the events of this five years may be noted the use of a printing-press, the discovery of the lost herd of cattle, and the foundation of a settlement, called Newcastle, on the Coal or Hunter's River.

A printing-press had been sent out with the first fleet, but no printers. All public and private announcements were made in manuscript, or by the bellman, until Governor Hunter discovered a printer among his convict subjects, and established a government gazette. In this age of newspapers, it seems incredible that a number of officers and gentlemen should have been satisfied for so many years without something in the shape of a newspaper; but the colony was divided into slavedrivers and slaves, who were equally content to spend their time in feeding pigs and getting drunk.

The reports of the natives led the governor to send out as scouts men employed as hunters, to collect fresh provisions for public use; and they discovered, feeding on rich pastures on the other side of the River Nepean, still known as Cow Pastures, a herd of sixty cattle, the produce of the five cows and two bulls lost in 1788.

To realise this sight, so pleasant to the eyes of men condemned to perpetual rations of salt meat, rarely varied by fresh pork, the governor himself set out on an expedition, and tracked and viewed the herd with great delight. An old bull, fiercely and obstinately charging, was slaughtered in self-defence; he proved to be of the humpy-shouldered Cape breed of the lost stock, which left no doubt of the identity of the herd, and dispelled the notion of indigenous cattle. The party made a delicious meal, and a few pounds were carried back thirty-eight miles, over a rough road, to Paramatta, the rest being left to the native dogs and hawks, with deep regret, "as meat, fresh or salt, had long been a rarity with the poor sick in the hospital." Many an Australian within the last ten years, galloping through Cow Pastures to purchase the finest cattle at 2 a head to boil down for tallow, has been reminded of the time when a bit of bull beef, that a well-bred dog would now reject, was a luxury to a governor and his suite!

These wild cattle were preserved, and increased greatly, dividing into "mobs," each under the charge of a victorious bull, until the general increase of stock diminished their value. Many were consumed by surrounding small settlers, and the rest, being fierce and a nuisance, were destroyed by order of the government, when beef ceased to be a luxury.

About the time these wild herds were discovered, three miserable cows of the Indian breed sold for 189, and two years afterwards two