90 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. [1 Ava., 1902. 
and dragged along an isolated, painful existence, still harassed by the natives, whom 
they found utterly indifferent to their endeavours at proselytizing, and whom they 
were constrained on more than one occasion to repulse with musket-shots. At 
Sandgate, also, which to-day is studded with marine villas, hotels, and cottages, and 
to which numerous railway trains daily run from Brisbane, the late T. Dowse and his 
son were wounded by the aborigines in 1853, or perhaps the late T. Dowse—“ old 
Tom Dowse,” as he liked naming himself—was the son. As recently as the sixties, 
several murders by the natives of lone fishermen and other white men occurred, and @ 
detachment of black troopers was consequently stationed there for some years. 
Cape Moreton is next indicated on the dial. A fine day, good eyesight, or a good 
telescope are necessary to distinguish this northern headland of Moreton Island. 
Captain Cook was the first man to sight this projection and to chart it, so far as 
maritime history tells. Following him came Captain Baudin of the French Navy, 
‘then Lieutenant Flinders entered the Bay, and thenceforth it was doubtless sighted by 
tthe people on numerous vessels which, after discharging at the Sydney settlement, 
voyaged to China or India. Some vessels also at the very beginning of the last 
century sailed from these places in Asia to Port Jackson, and their people may have 
sighted this among the other projections of the coast. One such vessel was 
despatched from India, expressly to convey to the penal establishment at Sydney 
there to serve a sentence of transportation, a young officer, Lieutenant Bellasis, 
convicted of having killed in a duel another who had insulted a lady of his family. 
On arrival at Sydney, however, the Governor appointed him to a military command, 
and a curious complication ensued. ‘The officers of the New South Wales corps 
refused to associate with the “convict,” and protested. A peculiar feature of their 
repugnance was that at least two of them had, not long before, themselves been 
duelling. Captain Macarthur, who before sailing from England had fought a 
bloodless duel with the master of the ship in which he was embarked, had challenged, 
fought, and wounded in Sydney the Commander of his regiment, Colonel Paterson, 4 
very short time before this offender arrived under sentence. , 
But, although other old traditions are associated with Cape Moreton, it 15 
necessary to pass on. : 
Indicated next on the dial is Moreton Island. The bearing points also to the 
South Passage, between Moreton and Stradbroke Islands. The aT land on 
the horizon is that of Moreton Island. The South Passage can scarcely be 
distinguished. That was the entrance to Moreton Bay used by nearly all shipping 
from the South for many years subsequent to the creation of a penal outpost at 
Brisbane in 1824, a crooked channel, rendered dangerous by sandbanks, which 
altered their shape after every gale. The wreck of a passenger steamer, the 
“Sovereign,” in 1847, attended by terrible loss of life, and subsequently the 
stranding of an immigrant ship. the “Phawbe Dunbar,” resulted in shipowners avoiding 
this perilous short-cut, although it was occasionally taken, in fine weather, till quite 4 
recent date. 
The visitor to Mount Coot-tha will, however, not overlook what is nearer. Along 
the same line of direction his vision travels over a portion of the general cemetery at 
Toowong, of which the white monuments and gravestones arrest the attention. 
Beyond these, to the left, cluster the buildings of metropolitan suburbs, and straight 
ahead lies the very heart of the city, partly hidden, however, by the ridge along which 
runs Petrie’s Terrace. A little more to the right gleams one of the reaches of the 
Brisbane River, and other more remote reaches can be perceived in part, even to the 
lowest, where the river joins the Bay. 
Whichever way one faces to look in the directions indicated in the dial, the 
Brisbane River is so prominent a feature of the landscape that it is natural to follow 
its course and to interest oneself in its story. When first seen by white men, this 
beautiful river had been, as far back as even imagination can carry one, short 0 
geological conceptions, simply a haunt of aborigines. First visited by Hnropene 
when three castaways from Sydney, their boat bilged on Moreton or Stradbroke 
Island, had been humanely succoured by the aborigines there, it was ascended 12 
1823 by Lieutenant Oxley.. That gentleman, then Surveyor-General of New South 
Wales, was on a voyage of discovery on the coast, his object being to find a suitable 
place for an out-station for convicts. Falling in with one of these castaways among 
the blacks at Bribie Island, and learning from him of the existence of such a rivet; 
he sought and found its mouth in the Bay, and ascended in a boat as far as Goodnay 
naming some of the reaches as he went. ‘the first, from the mouth of Breakfast 
‘Creek, he named Sea Reach; the next name on his chart is Long Reach, This is the 
Milton Reach of to-day. The old name is preserved by a hotel at the corner of 
Queen Street and North Quay. ah aeaht CH bel! i 
