306 THE PASTORAL AGE IN AUSTRALASIA 



hyperbola, or, with M. Cheysson, an exponential equa- 

 tion, or even, it may be, a spiral, where each ascending 

 curve repeats the curves below, but on a higher plane. 

 The essential point is that, after passing through a 

 succession of very different stages, the end of a social 

 institution repeats, but in a different form, its beginning. 

 This seems likely to be the law of the development of 

 landed property. All the land in Australia was at first, 

 or was assumed to be, virtually possessed by the State. 

 The nationality of the land, which is noAV the ideal of 

 many land-reformers, was, in Australia, the first phase 

 of landed property. The next phase was when smaller 

 or larger pieces of land were granted as a reward for 

 services rendered or for good behaviour. A third phase 

 arrived Avith the granting of large tracts to immigrants 

 who possessed the means of using them. Then, as 

 settlers overflowed the recognised boundaries of the 

 settlement, and sat down without " the pale," a license 

 was granted to such hitherto unauthorised squatters, 

 but revocably and annually (at least, in theory), and 

 conjoined with the jDayment of an annual fee, which 

 was the equivalent of the services, latterly nominal, 

 rendered by the vassal to his seigneur. Next, this 

 pastoral land was leased for a term — ostensibly limited, 

 but practically indeterminate — which signified in many 

 cases something like absolute property on the part of 

 the occupier. Property, indeed, it commonly became, 

 as absolute as British law ever allows it to be. Mean- 

 while, and still earlier, the practice of selling land by 

 auction was introduced, and in this way a large portion 

 of the agricultural land of the State, together Avith a 

 portion of its pastoral land, was parted with. Whether 

 broken up into large farms, or leased in vast tracts for 

 pastoral purposes, the land of the Colony appeared 

 equally to be lost to the State. Then, after nearly forty 

 years of this phase, the return of the curve began. A 

 belief in the desirableness of nationalising the land 

 sprang up in the wake of Henry George's propagandist 

 works, especially his Progress and Poverty. The Govern- 



