By this date the whole of the central portion of Australia was known, and the greater part of it mapped; while all the permanently-watered country had been rapidly utilised by the pastoralists. PART 3. THE WEST. [Illustration. John Septimus Roe, First Surveyor-General of West Australia.] CHAPTER 17. ROE, GREY, AND GREGORY. 17.1. ROE AND THE PIONEERS. Whilst Sturt and kindred bold spirits had been painfully but surely piecing together the geographical puzzle of the south-east corner of the Australian continent, a similar struggle between man and Nature had commenced in the south-west. Here, Nature kept close her secrets with no less pertinacity than in the east; but, though the struggle was just as arduous, the environment was very different. Instead of rearing an unscalable barrier of gloomy mountains, Nature here showed a level front of sullen hostility. Nor did she lure the first explorers inland with a smiling face of welcome once the outworks had been forced, as she had drawn Evans when he reached the head-waters of the Macquarie and Lachlan. Beyond the sources of the western coastal streams, she fought silently for every eastward mile of vantage ground, spreading before the adventurous intruder the salt lake and the arid desert. As far back as 1791, George Vancouver, a whilom middy of Cook's, discovered and named King George's Sound, when in command of H.M.S. Discovery. He formally took possession of the adjacent country, and remained there some days, making a careful survey of both the inner and outer harbours. On the 9th of December, 1826, Sir Ralph Darling, then Governor of New South Wales, sent Major Lockyer, of the 57th, with a detachment of the 39th, a regiment intimately associated with the early settlement of Australia, to form a settlement at King George's Sound, where they landed on the 25th of December of the same year. This settlement was established in order to forestall the French, who, according to rumour, intended to occupy the harbour and adjacent lands. On the 17th of January, 1827, Captain James Stirling, of H.M.S. Success, left Sydney, intending to survey those portions of the west coast unvisited by Lieutenant King, and also to investigate the nature of the country in the neighbourhood of the Swan River with a view to its suitability for settlement. Stirling was accompanied by Charles Fraser, who had considerable experience as adviser upon Australian sites for settlement. Both Stirling and Fraser reported favourably on the Swan River; and the latter waxing enthusiastic on its eligibility, it was decided to found a new colony there. In 1829, Captain Fremantle of H.M.S. Challenger hoisted the British flag at the mouth of the Swan River, and thenceforth the whole of the Australian continent was under British sway. Captain, now Lieutenant-Governor, Stirling arrived a month later in the transport Parmelia, and the free colony of Western Australia was launched on its varied career.