THE SQUATTER IN POLITICS 319 



sake, they began to agitate for the separation of the 

 future Queensland from the Mother-Colony. Again the 

 squatters bowed to the inevitable — perhaps also seeing 

 their interest in it — and formed a Separation association. 

 But they advocated separation on one condition — that 

 convicts should continue to be imported. The demand 

 of the squatters for unfree labour and the demand of 

 the people for free immigration dug an impassable gulf 

 between the pastoralists and the bulk of the citizens. 

 A succession of minor contests ensued. When Went- 

 worth's Constitution bill had become law in New South 

 Wales, and new constituencies were created, the popular 

 representatives in the Northern districts defeated the 

 squatters' nominees. These elections decisively settled 

 the questions at issue. The party of " Separation with- 

 out exiles " definitely triumphed. 



Every political problem was entangled with the in- 

 terests of the pastoralists, who determined the solution 

 of it. Playing so large a part both in the industry and 

 the politics of New South Wales, the squatters formed 

 a huge factor in the movement that precipitated the 

 separation of Queensland from the Mother-Colony. Not 

 that they favoured the movement ; on the contrary, 

 they most strenuously opposed it. But it was eminently 

 their opposition to it, or, latterly, their adhesion to it, 

 coupled with impossible conditions, that made it prac- 

 ticable and inevitable. Dr. Lang believed that the 

 Clarence and the Richmond rivers district was retained 

 for New South Wales by them as a field " for the exten- 

 sion of the domain of squatterdom," and he roundly 

 asserted that the retention was "accomplished by 

 chicanery and fraud." * Yet it seems to be clearly 

 marked off as a necessary portion of a future Southern 

 Queensland, embracing a semi-tropical area, while the 

 northern and western portions of Queensland would 

 form other States. In some quarters he is held to have 

 contrived the inclusion of the Riverina in New South 

 Wales ; probably, he would have asserted that it too 

 * Lanq, Account^ etc., ii. 308 note. 



