THE CONSTITUTION STATUTE OF 1842 299 



the Act, officially known as the 13th and 14th Victoria, cap. 59, 

 received the Royal assent on the 5th of August, 1850. 



Although this important piece of legislation introduced repre- 

 sentative institutions into South Australia and Van Diemen's 

 Land, and made provision for their ultimate extension to Western 

 Australia, its wider basis was quite overlooked by the denizens of 

 Port Phillip, who, in the tumult of their joy at their translation 

 into the Colony of Victoria, were wont to speak of it as the 

 " Separation Act," which had been the deserved result of their own 

 persistent efforts and representations. So as the time drew near 

 when they might expect the official announcement of their libera- 

 tion, they took counsel together as to the proper celebration of 

 such an event. Municipal and public meetings were held during 

 September, and elaborate plans were laid for combined revelry and 

 thanksgiving on the spot, and the spread of the glad tidings through- 

 out the country by a series of beacon fires, flashing from hill to hill 

 in imitation of that momentous day in England when "the red 

 glare on Skiddaw roused the burghers of Carlisle ". Batman's 

 Hill, then a fair eminence at the western end of Flinders Street, 

 was to give the signal, and during the intervening weeks of wait- 

 ing it became once more a thickly wooded crest, carrying a hundred 

 tons of firewood, piled in daring outline against the sky. 



At length, on Monday, llth November, the ship Lysander 

 arrived from Adelaide, bringing London papers to the 4th of August, 

 with the news that the Bill had passed both Houses, and Melbourne 

 thereupon gave itself up to a week of delirious demonstrations. 

 The great news was blazoned forth in special issues of the local 

 papers, with headlines of monumental type, and in language of 

 hysterical jubilation. The Superintendent having received con- 

 firmatory advices, a formal proclamation of the fact was made 

 next day at noon on Flagstaff Hill, when the hoisting of the Union 

 Jack was saluted with twenty-one guns. Wednesday was given 

 over to feasting by day, and to a general illumination of the city 



views in this step, for he says : " The circumstances of the Colony rendered, in 

 my judgment, such a reduction in the franchise desirable, in order to keep in 

 check the emancipist class, and to prevent by a timely concession the demand 

 for Universal Suffrage I " 



