44 THE PASTORAL AGE IN AUSTRALASIA 



their acquisitions, and, mingling the pure merinos with 

 the commoner breeds, soon saw their finer strains 

 disappear. McArthur was wiser. He kept his 

 Spaniards apart from his Indians and his Irish, and 

 bred them successfully, increasing their numbers and 

 maintaining the fine quahty of the wool. It was the 

 foundation, not of the cultivation of wool — that was 

 almost coeval with the birth of the Colony — but of the 

 growth of the finest kind of it — the pure Spanish merino. 

 It was of vast importance to the future of the all- 

 Australia. 



McAi'thur fought his battle as an ancient Hebrew 

 patriarch might have fought with a neighbouring sheikh, 

 his overlord. He addressed statements to the Secretary 

 of State. He pressed his views on the Treasury. Ho 

 presented memorials to the Privy Council. He proposed 

 to form a company for the breeding of sheep, and, to 

 preclude the charge of monopoly, he offered that a 

 stipulated portion of the stock bred should be annually 

 distributed among the settlers. He was even prepared 

 to conduct the undertaking single-handed, if he were 

 granted a large enough extent of land and a sufficient 

 number of convict shepherds. 



His perseverance was rewarded. He was a man of 

 determined character, and he had influential friends, 

 although he seems also to have had to have excited 

 dangerous enmities. In July of the same year he 

 appeared before a special session of the Privy Council, 

 or before a committee of it. McArthur then stated his 

 case, disclosed his plans, and appealed — not for aid, but 

 — for a sj^here of action, where he could sow the begin- 

 nings of an industry that would emancipate England 

 from her dependence on a possibly closed Continent 

 for her chief staple. The Privy Council, realising that 

 England was then being throttled by the Napoleonic 

 blockade, listened witli interest, hesitatingly approved 

 of his proposals, and cautiously reconmiended the 

 Secretary of State to authorise the Governor to make 

 a conditional grant of land. It was all that McAi'thur 



