CHAPTER VIII. 

 THE PORT PHILLIP ASSOCIATION ITS CLAIMS AND COLLAPSE. 



IN order to avoid a too frequent interference with the continuity of 

 the narrative, it is desirable to deal with the protracted negotiations 

 between the first adventurers and the British and Colonial Govern- 

 ments in a separate chapter. 



The Port Phillip Association, which was assailed by Mr. John 

 Pascoe Fawkner with savage ridicule and scornful denunciation for 

 more than twenty years after it had ceased to exist, formed the 

 subject of many a caustic article in the Sydney Press, and was 

 treated generally with an amount of obloquy which savoured strongly 

 of injustice. It must be conceded that its claims in their entirety 

 were really untenable, but they were not without precedent, and 

 it is only in view of subsequent developments that they now appear 

 so preposterous. The enormous tracts of land granted by the 

 British Government to officials and capitalists in Western Australia 

 attracted no adverse comment, because the lack of progress in that 

 colony left these vast estates most unprofitable acquirements. Had 

 Perth, however, become a second Melbourne, the wrong done to 

 the community would have been less defensible than a moderate 

 recognition of the claims of Batman and his friends, because in no 

 sense were the grantees there entitled to their possessions in virtue 

 of discovery or exploration. Undoubtedly, the value of the Port 

 Phillip district would, sooner or later, have attracted attention if the 

 Association had not existed ; but to the leading spirits of that com- 

 pany belongs, at least, the credit of having made it available to 

 settlement earlier than would otherwise have been the case, and, 

 what is even more important, of having practically forced the 

 Government of the day to admit its importance and its suitability 

 for colonisation. 



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