ANNUAL ADDRESS. XIII. 



as it was called in honour of Wellington's then recent Peninsula 

 victory. The work was under the direction of Mr. Phillip Elliot 

 as assistant engineer in charge. Although the history of this 

 pass, (the name of which has been since changed to Mount Vic- 

 toria) is often discussed, it does not seem to be generally known 

 how very far Major Lockyer had actually proceeded with the road 

 which he favoured, before his route was abandoned for that of 

 Major Mitchell. Over thirty years ago, when the author was 

 engaged in opening up the Kerosene Mines near Hartley, and in 

 laying out and constructing the company's railways and incline 

 up the mountain, to connect with the Government railway, his 

 Sunday excursions made him well acquainted with this mountain 

 district, and on one or two occasions led him to the recesses of the 

 bush where the remains of Major Lockyer's great rival pass to 

 Mount Victoria are to be found. All along the ridge of the 

 eastern branch of Mount York, there were hundreds of stumps, 

 and the clean unfilled holes from which they had been grubbed 

 forty years before, entirely undisturbed. Further on and down 

 in the dark heavily timbered gorge which lies in the forked ends 

 of this spur of the mountain, there were lengths of lofty stone 

 walls. These walls had been built to hold up the projected road, 

 like those at Mount Victoria where the cross section was too steep 

 to allow an ordinary siding on the face of the mountain. No 

 description of these remains has, so far as the author is aware 

 ever appeared in print. 



It is said that faction fights waxed fiercely over the respective 

 merits of these mountain routes seventy years ago, and the opinion 

 has often been expressed in the district, that if the engineer for 

 roads had been left to carry out his own proposal he would have 

 secured .quite as satisfactory if not better results, than were 

 attained in the more favoured and pretentious scheme of the 

 Surveyor-General. One thing seems certain from the published 

 accounts, that the labour and time which Major Mitchell estimated 

 woulo be required to fully complete his road, did not suffice to 

 make even a practicable bridle track into the valley. 



