NOMENCLATURE OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA. 469 



speaking generally, that no due sense has existed of the impor- 

 tance of preserving the kind of information contained in the latter 

 part of this paper, here for the first time, I believe, set forth in a 

 systematic manner. Nor can any hope of improvement be entei-- 

 tained with regard to a large class of names embracing hundreds 

 and towns (concerning which it is not usual to record any reason 

 for names given), unless the executive officers of the Government 

 will accept a suggestion upon the matter. The rapidly extending 

 list of towns and hundreds proclaimed by the Government calls 

 urgently for some change in tfie manner or spirit of nomenclature. 

 Many of the names on that list are names of persons and places 

 unknown to the public here. It not unfrequently happens that 

 persons who have made homes in various parts of the country are 

 surprised and annoyed by the appearance of a strange appellation, 

 officially notified as the designation of a new town or hundred, 

 superseding the local name with which they have been long 

 familiar. The Governors have probably not been made acquainted 

 with these facts, for surely they would not. disregard a respectful 

 re[)resentation ])reviously made of the claims of a traditional local 

 name against one selected from a distant part of the globe or from 

 their own household. Nominally, we all jjrefer native names ; 

 actually, we allow them to fade from memory, and replace them 

 with our own evergreen patronymics, or with those belonging to 

 members of Parliament. 



Ignoring the wealth of history and romance that is wrapped up in 

 the names given by the natives to various natural features and 

 localities, we have obliterated them for the sake of names more 

 dear to vice-regal representatives, such as Alice, Caroline, Anna, 

 Joyce, Joanna, Julia, Laura. George, John, and James. Our terri- 

 torial rights may be equivocal, but this surely does not trouble our 

 conscience so much that we need hasten to destroy evQry vestige 

 of the people who were once supreme here. We are said to be 

 making history, but are we not lacking in courtesy in effacing the 

 history of a less fortunate jjeople whom we have displaced? We 

 are not carrying into our colonial life the spirit of the instruction 

 given by the Home Government to the South Australian Commis- 

 sioners, nor following the best examples of older nations. The 

 Romans had a good deal of experience in colonisation, and they 

 were particular to preserve the names of places of the people they 

 conquerfd. This was ordered upon the ground that names of 

 places chronicle scenes, sights, actions, wisdom, folly, and fate, and 

 are the people's heritage. Camden (ad. 1586), quoting from 

 Porphyry, a learned Athenian (a.d. 278). notes that barbarous 

 names are emphatic and concise, and considers it the duty of an 

 enlightened people to preserve them, as fixing ideas, images, or con- 

 ceptions of preceding races. He believes that all native languages 

 are significative ; that is, they all have a meaning, and are not 

 mere appellatives. What is here quoted appears to be equ<illy 



