DESPATCHING THE WOOL-PACKS FROM A VICTORIA _Frontispiece_ STATION A BIRD’S-EYE VIEW OF MELBOURNE AND ON THE _Between_ 34 _and_ YARRA 35 DAIRY HERD AND SILO _Facing_ 46 BRINGING WHEAT TO STATION ,, 60 MILKING-TIME ON A DAIRY FARM ,, 64 BUCK-SCRAPING ,, 88 HOMESTEAD AND BULLOCK TEAM ,, 92 WOOL-PRESSES ,, 102 CUP DAY AT FLEMINGTON RACECOURSE, MELBOURNE ,, 208 LOADING FRUIT ON THE MURRAY AT MILDURA ,, 234 RING-BARKED TREES AND MAIZE ,, 240 A BUSH GIANT ,, 242 A HAELESVILLE GULLY ,, 248 EXCAVATING AN IRRIGATION CHANNEL ,, 264 AN ABORIGINAL CLIMBING A TREE ,, 300 CHAPTER I EARLY DAYS IN VICTORIA THE first landing in Victoria was purely involuntary, a vessel having been wrecked in 1797 on Furneaux Island, in Bass Strait, the supercargo, a man named Clarke, and two sailors—the only people saved out of a total of seventeen—making the Victorian shores, and by some incredible means reaching Sydney. Six years later an attempt was made to colonize what was then known as Port Phillip, by means of a convict colony, and a penal expedition of nearly 400 persons, 300 of whom were convicts, were sent out under the charge of Captain Collins. But water was scarce, the weather in the bay was stormy, and the blacks distinctly hostile; the whole outlook seemed so gloomy that Collins, who must have been pretty well distracted between the blacks on shore and the seething discontent of the convicts on his ships, applied for—and at last, after three months of unutterable misery in Port Phillip, received—permission to remove to Van Dieman’s Land, one of the very few children who accompanied this wretched party being John Pascoe Fawkner, who, thirty-two years later, assisted in the foundation of Melbourne.