258 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



in Australia of an instalment towards Representative Government, 

 by the creation of a Legislative Council in Sydney, wherein Port 

 Phillip was to be represented by six members, in 1843 ; the advent 

 of a bishop of the Anglican Church, which raised Melbourne to the 

 dignity of a city in 1848 ; and the successful public resistance to the 

 British Government on the question of transportation in 1849. 

 Cropping up continuously through all these years there were the 

 repeated passionate appeals and demands for separation from New 

 South Wales, and the establishment of a local Government. This 

 question was not only the most absorbing for the colonists, but 

 it was the most disastrous for the Superintendent. Whether, in- 

 fluenced by the limitations of official training, he felt unable to lead 

 an attack that seemed adverse to and was certainly discountenanced 

 by his official superior, or whether his knowledge of the community 

 led him sincerely to distrust their capacity to manage their own 

 affairs, his action brought him into antagonism with the bulk of 

 the people, and the press denounced him as being adverse to their 

 interests. The controversy was so protracted and the issues were 

 so important that it is necessary to treat the question of separation 

 at some length in a future chapter, in connection with an examina- 

 tion of the Constitution Statute of 1842. 



Early in 1841 the authorities in Sydney found it necessary to 

 open a branch of the Supreme Court in Melbourne and to appoint a 

 Eesident Judge for the district of Port Phillip. The existing Court 

 of Quarter Sessions was limited in its jurisdiction to the trial of 

 petty offences and small civil cases, all important issues having to 

 be referred to Sydney, at great cost both to the litigants and to 

 the Government. The appointment was unfortunately conferred 

 on a very unsuitable man, Mr. John Walpole Willis, one of the 

 Puisne Judges of the Sydney Court, whose antagonistic relations 

 with his colleagues on the bench made them greatly rejoice at his 

 removal. He was admittedly a very able lawyer, particularly on 

 the Equity side, but during the two years and a half that he presided 

 over the Melbourne Supreme Court he involved himself in undigni- 

 fied and offensive quarrels with nearly every member of the Bar, 

 with his officials, with the clergy, and most of all with the press. 



He arrived in Melbourne on the 10th of March, 1841, and on the 



