Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/211

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CAPTAIK WILLIAM PATKKSON, LT* GOVERNOR. 18^ and the arrival of Hunter may be treated as homogeneous ill the production of mischief- Paterson was an eneourager of exploration, and had him- self headed a party of discovery in 1798. The rapids which foiled Phillip's large boats were surmounted by Paterson in smaller ones, but others were encountered, and the chief results of the expedition w^ere the finding of new species of plants^ and the naming of the Grose river, after a vain attempt to pierce the mountain chain by ascending the deep gorge through which the Grose winds its way to the Hawkesbury, Pater son appears to have been kind-hearted, though weak. He wrote of a raid against the natives — I *' It gives me concern to have been forced to destroy any of ^Uhese people, particularly as I have no doubt of their Hhaving been cruelly treated by some of the first settlers ^Bwho were out here/* ^m Drunkenness was still the curse of the colony; and not ^Rontent with ordinary opportunities of traffic, a settler at liLiberty Plains was found to have procured in 1793 a small still from England, with which (according to Collins) he found it more advantageous **to draw an ardent diabolical spirit from bis wheat than to send it to the store and receive lOs. per bushel from the commissary/' In 1795 this man and others removed to the richer lands at the Hawkesbury. The very riclniess of those lands proved a bane to the dissolute owners. In April 1795 Collins tells us that the farmers everywhere began putting in their wheat, ** except at the river, where they had scarcely made any preparation, consuming their time and substance in drinking and rioting, and trusting to the extreme fertility Pvt the soil, which they declared would produce an ample lerop at an^^ time without much labour/* Short as was Paterson's reign, he made many grants of land. Phillip, it must be remembered, had never received authority to make extensive grants to officers. To settlers he had in nearly five years granted 8389 acres; Grose (in many cases contrary to orders) granted in two years to various persons 10,674 acres; Pafcerson in nine months I granted 4Dl>5 acres* Mr. JohuHon, the chaplain, received a coUeaf^ae e^vl^ in 1794, when by the provision skip William ?i%*sixsL^