CHAPTER XLV 



THE SQUATTER IN POLITICS 



It was impossible that men possessing such forcefulness 

 of character as the early landholders, so well educated 

 as most of them, and sometimes of such commanding 

 talents as one at least of them exhibited, should not 

 actively intervene in the government of the colonies. 

 The story of the first great typical squatter, though he 

 was a proprietor and not a runholder, has been already 

 told. John Mc Arthur was a political force in New 

 South Wales through three or four decades, and he 

 claimed in Dr. Lang's hearing to have been the means 

 of procuring the recall of the first four Governors, while 

 Dr. Lang believed that he was answerable for the recall 

 of the sixth. He went near to founding a dynasty of 

 politicians. Two of his sons inherited a portion of his 

 faculty and his influence and continued his policy on 

 his own lines. In his days the Governor was still 

 virtually absolute, and such power as the strongest 

 landowner enjoyed was moral solely, due to the rectitude 

 of his cause, the ascendancy of his character, or the 

 weakness of the Governor. While the strong-minded 

 Macquarie was in the saddle, the large landed proprietors, 

 still very few in number, kept in the shade. McArthur 

 M^as forcibly detained in exile — that is, in England — 

 most of the time, and the Governor had peace. An 

 agitation for the creation of a council, resembling the 

 early privy council of the sovereign, was got up by 

 these, but temporarily failed, and the autocrat rejoiced 

 that the project had been abandoned. Its abandon- 



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