1 62 NORTHMOST AUSTRALIA 



Surveying and sounding in this neighbourhood occupied the time 

 till 2 1st July. 



Two boats were sent out from Investigator Roads on 9th July, 

 under Lieutenants Forsyth and Parker. They returned on the 

 1 3th with the report that they had passed to the south of Bentinck 

 Island and landed at POINT BAILEY (SEE MAP N), between which 

 and the south end of Mornington Island were what were named 

 the FORSYTH ISLANDS. At POINT BAILEY (139 4' E. ; 16 55' S.), 

 a native well was observed. Ten and a half miles to the south-east 

 was POINT PARKER, where, from a hillock 30 feet in height, there was 

 a view of " a vast level." 



[In 1 88 1, Point Parker became " a name to conjure with," as it, or some place 

 near it, was designated as the northern terminus of a " Transcontinental Railway " 

 which, as an " all-Queensland " line, was to connect the existing railway from Brisbane 

 to Charleville with the Gulf of Carpentaria, and thus shorten the line of communication 

 between Australia and England. The distinguishing feature of the undertaking was 

 that, on the American model, the interior of the country was to be settled along the 

 railway on a land-grant system, of which principle Sir Thomas Mcllwraith's govern- 

 ment approved. The railway was to be constructed by a British syndicate and handed 

 over to the Government, the syndicate receiving as a consideration alternate blocks 

 of land on both sides of it. There seemed no reason why the settlement of a large 

 inland population should not have followed the realisation of such a scheme, as was 

 the experience of America. 



It was, however, too good an opportunity to be missed by the rising Labour Party, 

 and the Government fell, on a cry, raised by Sir Samuel Griffith and his followers, 

 of the danger involved in the " alienation of the people's patrimony." The immediate 

 construction by the new Government, on borrowed money, of a railway to the Clon- 

 curry copper-field was promised as an alternative. It was not, however, till the end 

 of 1907 that Cloncurry was connected with Townsville by rail. The delay of twenty- 

 six years deprived the great majority of the pioneer discoverers of the copper-fields of 

 the just reward of their struggles ; there was no population settled on " alternate 

 blocks " ; and the Townsville railway does not answer the purpose of a " trans- 

 continental " line, as it adds, for the produce of the mines, the circumnavigation of 

 Australia to the distance from a European market. 



Major-General the Hon. William Feilding was in charge of the Transcontinental 

 Railway Expedition, and he traversed the country from Charleville to Point Parker 

 in what proved to be an exceptionally hot and dry summer, and was consequently 

 delayed beyond expectation. Acting under instructions from the Colonial Treasurer 

 of Queensland, I rode from Townsville to Cloncurry (558 miles), where I arrived on 

 2Oth September, 1881. General Feilding only arrived on yth October, so that I 

 had already had an opportunity of inspecting a portion of the mining district. After 

 his arrival, while the main body of the expedition toiled on in the direction of Point 

 Parker, I accompanied him and Ernest Henry, one of the leading pioneers, on 

 excursions to outlying mining properties, which, of course, still lay idle from the want 

 of facilities for transport. My reports were dated between I2th October, 1881, and 

 1st March, iSSz. 1 I parted with General Feilding on 9th October, 1881, at Gregory 

 Downs and, after spending some further time in the mineral district, returned to 

 Townsville by a route south of that by which I had travelled to Cloncurry. 



It is evident, from the soundings given in modern charts, that the immediate 



1 Six Reports on the Geological Features of Part of the District to be traversed by the 

 Proposed Transcontinental Railway. By Robert L. Jack, Government Geologist. 

 Brisbane, by Authority, 1885. Reissued, with Notes and Additions, as Bttlletin No. 5 

 of the Geological Survey of Queensland, 1898. 



