CHAPTER X 



THE EVOLUTION OF THE STATION 



The arrangements for taking up new land in districts 

 " beyond the boundaries of settled occupation " were 

 in those days primitive. Only one thing was needful : 

 official application had to be made to the Commissioner 

 of Crown Lands of the district for a Hcense to occupy. 

 This license did not necessarily — indeed, it did not 

 usually — define the boundaries of the contemplated 

 " run." These were provisionally and amicably settled 

 in conference with neighbours, Avho were only too glad 

 to have good neighbours.* The license permitted the 

 grazier (the name was already in use in 1836) to de- 

 pasture stock for one year, and the grazier had to 

 produce evidence that he possessed real or personal 

 estate sufficient to serve for visible lawful means of 

 support. It looked no further than the end of the 

 next ensuing year. No hint is there of that fixity of 

 tenure or right of pre-emption that were afterwards to 

 be bones of contention between the squatters and the 

 agricultural farmers. f 



The extent of the country taken up was often a 

 matter of free choice. One individual, like Mr. Brod- 

 ribb, might take up only 100 square miles ; but it was 

 no uncommon thing for squatters to claim 200 or 300 

 square miles. Land was a drug in the market ; it was 

 free as the air to all who had the means of stocking it ; 



* Brodribb, W.A., Recollections of an Australian Squatter, 

 Sydney, 1883, p. 12. 



t Ibid., p. 12. Mr. Brodribb reprints the license, pp. 213-4, 



68 



