AUSTRALIAN LITERATURE. 807 



to principle, his stubborn cliampionship of abstract justice in 

 every form, public or private, should serve as an exemplar 

 and beacon-light to latter-day politicians. 



William Bede Dalley was born in Sydney in 1831. He 

 was chiefly, indeed almost entirely, educated at the Grammar 

 School, then known as the Sydney College. 1 shall always 

 consider Dalley, whom I had the honor of knowing intimately, 

 one of the most surprising instances of the uprising of genius 

 amid circumstances not particularly favourable, which this 

 century has produced. Like Carlyle, his parents were of 

 humble birth and station, neither having any pronounced 

 tendency towards the pursuits in which their gifted son was 

 destined so prominently to excel. Wonderful indeed must 

 have been the natural capacity from which the sound, but 

 not exceptional, method of education which he received, pro- 

 duced such astonishing results. As an orator, a poet, an 

 essayist, a debater, a succts de salon, he Avas indeed almost 

 unequalled ; as a barrister he took high rank. Poetical and 

 imaginative, he yet filled the high office of Attorney-General 

 without failure of the good sense and practical knowledge in 

 which the sons of genius are held to be deficient. The most 

 charming of conversationalists, with a winning manner, 

 refined, persuasive, dehcately deferential, dignified by turns, 

 there was no society, European or Australian, of which he 

 was not fitted to be a distinguished member. His range of 

 reading was widely comprehensive, his memory accurate and 

 tenacious. He was an exceptionally good linguist, as well as 

 an advanced classical scholar. As a minister he will always 

 be remembered in association with the memorable Soudan 

 expedition, through which, for the first time, Australia was 

 enabled to repay in kind a portion of the lavish expenditure 

 by which our infant nation had been fostered by their august 

 motherland. 



Daniel Henry Deniehy was another of the brilliant 

 coruscations fated to arise amid the sombre atmosphere of 

 colonial life. Born in Sydney in 1828, he was fortunate, 

 after having commenced his studies under a master who was 

 a remarkable linguist, in continuing them at the Sydney 

 College, then, as afterwards, famous for the imparting of a 

 sound classical education. Unlike the majority of classical 

 students, he still pursued his French and Italian studies, 

 reading under his first teacher, Mr. Johnson. At the age of 

 fifteen he was taken by his parents to England, with the view 

 of entering the University of Oxford. But, for certain 



