North Queensland

“ It is needless to dwell on the history of the dark days of bondage and weakly infancy, which has little to do with the early days of settlement in North Queensland, except to show the starting point. The North is free from the stain and drag of convictism. The real life of the colony began with the first days [Pg 6] of free settlers, then immigrants poured in rapidly, and the occupation of the interior advanced. With this strong growth of material progress, came also the desire for self-government, and separation from New South Wales. ”

“ The story of North Queensland’s childhood is simply one of gradual discovery and advancing settlement from the Southern districts, where the same severe course of wresting the land from uselessness [Pg 3] and sterility had been gone through. The source of this movement may be traced chiefly to a desire for pastoral extension by squatters, always on the move for new pastures, and to the ever roving prospector in search of fresh mineral discoveries.
First the navigator outlines the coast with its bays and islands and openings for ports; such were Cook, Flinders, Stokes, and others. ”

“ The pioneers of Australian civilisation in the territory known as North Queensland have mostly passed away; they were too busy with other activities and interests and more absorbing local topics to make notes of the days that are gone. ”

“ Very few of those energetic and indomitable men are now left—veritable giants they were—great because they attempted great things, and though few of them achieved financial success for themselves individually, they added by their self-denying labours a rich province to Queensland, which has become the home of thousands, and will yet furnish homes for ten of thousands under conditions of settlement and occupation adapted to the physical and climatic characteristics of North Queensland. ”

“ Queensland measures thirteen hundred miles from north to south, and is about eight hundred miles in width, containing a population at the present time of three hundred and forty thousand. The climate may be compared to that of Madeira, and it is entirely free from the hot winds which sometimes render Sydney and Melbourne so uncomfortable. Leaving out West Australia, which is yet so little developed, the country may be divided thus: Queensland is the best and most extensive grazing section; in this respect New South Wales comes next. ”

“ North of Lake Eyre, and on the Tropic, the Territory is crossed by the Macdonell Ranges, running east and west. Then comes a stretch of five hundred miles of sandy plains, with scrub and spinifex, and then the peninsula of Arnhem Land, a low plateau with a considerable rainfall. Right on the coast are mangrove swamps and tropical rainfall, as in North Queensland. Though some of this country is suited to cattle, and gold has also been discovered, progress has not been very rapid, in spite of the importance of the magnificent harbour of Port Darwin. ”

“ Those employed on stations as stockriders and horse-hunters become very useful and clever at the business, having a special aptitude for working among stock, and they are, as a rule, well treated, clothed, and fed. The Northern Peninsula up to Cape York is the only territory in Queensland where the natives may still be found in their original state, and on some of the rivers flowing into the Gulf they are still numerous. ”

“ Though of such a low type of the human race, the North Queensland aboriginal possesses certain admirable characteristics. His mind seldom swerves from a set purpose within view of attainment. He may be rebuffed and disappointed, and may assume indifference to or forgetfulness of his purpose; but in his heart he does not accept defeat until an absolutely decisive blow is received. ”

“ Let there be no misunderstanding with respect to the desirableness of the coastal tract of North Queensland as a territory capable of supporting a large, prosperous and healthful population. It is no part of the present purpose to extol the mineral or the pastoral districts. They lie apart. ”

“ Conditions and circumstances which in a few generations effect desirable changes in horses will assuredly be influential in respect of the physique and stamina and moralities of man. North Queensland will establish a type, just as Tierra del Fuego did many centuries since, and the type will be that which is best fitted to maintain itself. It will be brown of complexion, hardy and alert. North Queensland is expansive and varied. ”

“ With one of the finest harbours on the east coast, it is the key to the Torres Strait route and to New Guinea. The reef-bearing country on the Palmer has still to be developed, and the great extent of this mineral wealth is as yet quite under-rated. Besides containing tin and coal in abundance, North Queensland has other grand resources in its back pastoral and agricultural country.
The town of Normanton was opened by the settlers as a better port for shipping for the Lower Flinders stations than Burketown, which was inconvenient, being too far to the west, and difficult of access. ”

“ The large remainder of North Australia, to the eastward, falls in the meantime naturally into Queensland, whose colonists, after the galloping fashion of pastoral settlement in Australia, have already advanced their squatting outposts beyond Port Denison, in latitude 20°, and the mouth of the Burdekin in latitude 19°—places unknown to the world within the last three years. ”

“ The cause of exploration and discovery in Australia has never lacked enthusiastic volunteers, whether on sea or land. Like the North Pole, the hidden secrets of the continent have always attracted men of enterprise and energy anxious to penetrate the veil of mystery and silence that has hung over this vast territory since Creation’s dawn. Little by little has the land been explored and opened up for occupation ”

“ For several years travelling stock went out to the far north-west, and all had to pass through the Gulf country. The route followed from the borders of Queensland was by the track that Leichhardt took on his journey to Port Essington, between the tableland and salt water, crossing the Macarthur, Roper, Calvert, and other rivers. Stations were occupied on the Orde and Victoria Rivers on the Cambridge Gulf side with stock from North Queensland. ”

“ The boundary line of the new colony commenced at Point Danger, near the 28th parallel of south latitude and ran westward, leaving the rich districts watered by the Clarence and Richmond rivers, although much nearer to Brisbane than to Sydney, still belonging to New South Wales. After separation and self-government, came the commencement, in 1865, of the railway from Ipswich towards the interior. The discovery of gold at Gympie, near Maryborough, in 1867, and the rapid extension of the ever-spreading pastoral industry, laid the foundation of national life in Queensland. ”

“ It was my fortune to have now met in Townsville a man who was then bearing a high reputation in North Queensland, but who was soon to become famous farther afield. By some reason I cannot even now understand, the diggers very seldom put their confidence or trust in the wrong man, and in John Murtagh Macrossan, they found their idol. Mentally big, physically small, his eloquence, ability and courage brought [72] him, on their behalf, into conflict with strong and powerful influences.
I met him later in the Parliament of 1888. ”

“ With South Queensland the comparison shows a difference against New South Wales in 1891 of 14.79 per 1,000, and of 7.45 per 1,000 in 1901. As to children under five years the difference in favour of New South Wales in 1891, as against North Queensland, was only 0.16 per cent., and in 1901 0.43 per 1,000; and as against South Queensland it was 5.74 on the wrong side in 1891, and 2.65 in 1901. It is needless further to analyse the figures, but evidently the only States whose mortality among young children is more favourable than South Queensland are South Australia and Tasmania. ”

“ In Queensland what is recognised as the Western Interior occupies about half the area of the State and is distinct in its geological formation from the coastal belt, the waters of which run into the ocean to the east and north. The region of these watersheds, with the exception of some comparatively limited areas of downs country on the heads of the rivers, is regarded as unsuitable for sheep, the rainfall being more abundant than on the Western waters and the grass coarser, so that cattle are almost exclusively run there. ”

“ The roads were lined with flocks and herds of those entering on the pioneering work of the North of Queensland, and business men were following in the wake of the early stock settlers to commence a trade wherever an opportunity offered. The settlement was bona fide and genuine; men with means, energy and experience were entering on it with great enthusiasm and high hopes of the future of the new country. The wave of occupation passed on to the Burdekin River, causing a great demand for sheep and cattle for the purpose of stocking new country in the north and west. ”

“ Though the squatter is now, in the more settled districts, becoming a thing of the past, his work being finished and his day gone by, at the first enterprise, bush knowledge and a practical life were the most potent factors in making known the possibilities of the land of Queensland. ”

“ In spite of the miserable 79condition of the garden it was a pleasure to see that even in these uncivilised regions there existed a taste for the beauties and comforts of life, and not simply a love of money. The cheerful houses among the thriving trees could not fail to gladden the traveller, whose eyes in this part of the country rarely witness other than primitive cabins of bark. In Northern Queensland it is even more rare to find things done simply for comfort than it is farther south; farther west and north the country becomes still more wild and uncivilised. ”

“ The road crossed the Tate, the Walsh, and the Mitchell Rivers, and then followed up the Palmer River through some of the roughest country in North Queensland. When Cooktown was opened as a port for the diggings, the overland route was abandoned for dray traffic, and droving stock alone used it. The consumption of beef on the field for several years demanded an average annual supply of from 15,000 to 20,000 head, most of the cattle realising from £7 to £10 each. ”

“ But the tribe of “whalers,” as they were called in New South Wales, men who tramped up one side of the Darling River, and tramped down on the other side, never betraying any desire to find work, these can be found in the Queensland bush too, but not far out, where there are long dry stages between the stations, and a shortness of water which terrifies these old “bummers.” There are men who have tramped all over the colonies—every colony in Australia they have been through, and know all the tracks. ”

“ No country was ever endowed by Nature with a more permanent, healthy, and beneficial pasturage than Australia, though heavy stocking and hot dry seasons have somewhat diminished the value of this natural wealth in some of the earlier settled districts. The chief source of employment in the Colony of Queensland, and the leading export, is still derived from the stock depastured on the native grasses that were found when the State was first explored. ”

“ The quiet Inner Passage, between the shore of the Great Barrier Reef, 1200 m. long, favours the north-eastern Queensland ports. Brisbane was founded in 1826, but colonization was restricted until 1842, when the Moreton Bay district of New South Wales was thrown open to settlers. It was named “Queensland” on its separation from the mother colony in 1859. A broad plateau, from 2000 to 5000 ft. in height, extends from north to south, at from 20 to 100 m. from the coast, forming the Main Range. The Coast Range is less elevated. ”

“ In following the right bank of the Flinders, they passed Fort Bowen, a small mount rising abruptly from the plains near the right bank of the river, which was called after the first Governor of Queensland. Many springs were met with surrounding the base of the little mountain forming mounds on the top of which water may be found. The nature of the ground in places is very treacherous ”

“ From Cape York to the Great Australian Bight, and from the Leeuwin to the Great Sandy Spit on Frazer’s Island, there is no difference in the type of the [Pg 210] native of Australia, although the quality and quantity of their food has caused some of the tribes to be more robust and better developed than others. In the north, where food is plentiful, there are many fine specimens of men over the average height of the European. Many of the northern aboriginals are tall, muscular men, of great activity and endurance, with keen sight and observation, and they often attain to a good old age. ”

“ That Western Australia will be subdivided when its population and circumstances ap­proximate to those of Queensland does not admit of doubt, and in the mean time the interests of the inchoate states to the north­ west and east are not likely to suffer seriously under the sway of the Government at present centralised at Perth. ”

“ After the Canoona rush in 1858 and 1859, the tide of pastoral run hunting set in; the route northwards followed by stock going out to occupy new country led by Princhester and through Marlborough. Here the route turned off westwards towards the Peak Downs, and extended still further to the interior where the Barcoo, Thomson, and Alice Rivers flowed into a mysterious land. The northern road led on to Broad Sound, where Connor’s Range had to be passed; this spur of the main coast range comes close in to the coast. Overlanders could not avoid crossing it, and this was an undertaking. ”