colony of Victoria.  He was received with rejoicing, but he utterly failed to satisfy the people.  He thought anything was good enough for them.  One festivity I was invited to—­a ball given on the opening of the new offices of The Argus in Collins street—­and there I met Mr. Edward Wilson, a most interesting personality, the giver of the entertainment.  He was then vigorously championing the unlocking of the land and the developing of other resources of Victoria than the gold.  It had surprised him when he travelled overland to Adelaide to see from Willunga 30 miles of enclosed and cultivated farms, and it surprised me to see sheepruns close to Melbourne.  With a better rainfall and equally good soil, Victoria had neither the farms nor the vineyards nor the orchards nor the gardens that had sprung up under the 80-acre section and immigration systems of South Australia.  It had been an outlying portion of New South Wales, neglected and exploited for pastoral settlement only.  The city, however, had been well planned, like that of Adelaide, but the suburbs were allowed to grow anyhow.  In Adelaide the belt of park lands kept the city apart from all suburbs.  Andrew Murray was as keen for the development of Victoria agriculturally and industrially as Mr. Wilson, and they worked together heartily.  Owing to the state of my sister’s health I was much occupied with her and her children; but in August she was well, and I returned with Mr. Taylor and his sister in the steamer Bosphorus, when it touched at Melbourne on the way home.  He brought me 30 pounds for my book, and the assurance that it would be out soon, and that I should have six copies to give to my friends.  Novel writing had not been to me a lucrative occupation.  I had given up teaching altogether at the age of 25, and I felt that, though Australia was to be a great country, there was no market for literary work, and the handicap of distance from the reading world was great.

My younger sister married in 1855 William J. Wren, then an articled clerk in Bartley & Bakewell’s office, and afterwards a partner with the present Sir James Boucaut.  Mr. Wren’s health was indifferent, and caused us much anxiety.  My brother John married Jessie Cumming in 1858, and they were spared together for many years.  As the Wrens went on a long voyage to Hongkong and back for the sake of my brother-in-law’s health, my mother and I had the charge of their little boy.  But in that year, 1859, my mind received its strongest political inspiration, and the reform of the electoral system became the foremost object of my life.  John Stuart Mill’s advocacy of Thomas Hare’s system of proportional representation brought back to my mind Rowland Hill’s clause in the Adelaide Municipal Bill with wider and larger issues.  It also showed me how democratic government could be made real, and safe, and progressive.  I confess that at first I was struck chiefly by its conservative side, and I saw that its application would prevent the political