I am going out to dinner this evening expressly to meet two of the finest girls in Melbourne.  Some of my cautious friends say that I am running a great risk, and that I shall never recover from the effects.  I cannot say that I feel much frightened.  If anything serious should happen, and the consequences are not immediately fatal, I shall add a few lines to-morrow.  Look sharp about photographs.  I begin to suspect you are ashamed to show your faces in this remote region.  Give my love to H., C., etc., and accept the same from

Your ever affectionate brother,

William J. Wills.

P.S. 19th.—­The elements interposed to save me from the danger I wilfully determined not to avoid.  It rained so heavily last evening that the syrens stayed at home.

. . .

In the month of May 1860, I went to Melbourne for a few days, and spent many pleasant hours with my son.  I found him contented and happy.  His appointment to the Exploring Expedition, so long the yearning desire of his heart, he appeared to consider as a fait accompli.  He was in comfortable lodgings, and had established an intimacy with a gentleman of superior literary acquirements, personally acquainted with many London celebrities of our day.  I remember the delight with which he came to my hotel and said:  “You must dine with me to-day; I want to introduce you to a person you will much like.  His greatest fault is one you possess yourself, a turn for satire, which sometimes makes him enemies.”  On the same morning he had announced to his friend with beaming eyes, “My father is here;” and when the next day that same friend wished to engage him to an evening party, he replied:  “You forget that I have a wild young father to take care of.”  Alluding again to this, in a letter to his mother, on the 17th of May, he says:  “You must excuse a brief epistle this time.  The Doctor has been in town for a few days lately, and of course seduced me into all sorts of wild habits.  He is looking well, in good condition, but not so fat as he was two years ago.”  At that time I had been living very frequently on little more than one hard egg per day.  Milk and coffee in the morning, and half a pound of meat twice a week.  In another letter to his mother, shortly after the above date, he says:  “I have not heard from my father for the last fortnight.  I am in very good lodgings, at a boarding-house, not working hard, and have time to cultivate some agreeable society.  The landlady is all that can be desired and more than could be expected—­the company far above the average.  There is Mr. B., a barrister and Cambridge man, first rate; and a nice old lady, Mrs. F., very intelligent and good-natured.  We three are great friends.  Taking it altogether, the house is so comfortable, that I did not go to the theatre once last month.”  The mutual good opinion may be estimated by the following introduction from the gentleman alluded to above, to the Colonial Secretary at Perth, in the event of his explorations leading my son to Western Australia: