CHAPTER IV. 



CAPTAIN STURT ON THE MURRAY THE SETTLEMENT OP 

 PORTLAND BAY MAJOR MITCHELL'S " AUSTRALIA FELIX ". 



THOUGH the adventurous voyage of Captain Sturt on the river 

 Murray had a more direct effect on the colonisation of South 

 Australia than on that of Victoria, yet it presents many points of 

 interest to the student of the history of the latter colony. With 

 the exception of the flying visit of Hume and Hovell, his was the 

 first expedition that reached the territory from any point but the 

 sea-board, and he traversed for upwards of 200 miles the line 

 which was subsequently decided upon as its northern boundary. 

 The long and really dangerous journey was made under conditions 

 of the most heroic endurance, and was successful in establishing 

 the fact that, despite the dictum of Mr. Surveyor-General Oxley, 

 the waterless desert he had condemned was traversed by more than 

 one fine navigable river. But above all, the remembrance of Sturt's 

 exploits are endeared to Victoria by the high estimate in which his 

 personal character has ever been held. Brave, honourable and 

 gentle, patient under calamity, resolute in action, devoted to duty, 

 he was a high type of a Christian gentleman. Having spent many 

 years of his life in enterprises that frequently exposed him to 

 hostile relations with the aborigines, he was able to say in his old 

 age that on no occasion had a black man, woman or child suffered 

 harm at his hands or those under his command. 



Though barely five and twenty years of age when commissioned 

 by Governor Darling on his second journey, Sturt had already 

 enlarged the geographical knowledge of Australia by an exploration 

 to the north-west of New South Wales, in which, after following 

 the Macquarie down until it was lost in a reed-covered swamp, he 



pushed on over a barren desert and discovered the Darling, though 



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