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CHAPTER VII.
GOVERNOR MACQUARIE.
Macquarie's rule began under favourable auspices. The period of suspense after Bligh's deposition was satisfactory to no one. Its termination gladdened all. The new military defenders of the colony were his own regiment. No bitter remains of past struggles would willingly have been kept in remembrance by the community. The general cordiality might have been at least for some years promoted by a prudent Governor. He received loyal addresses, and when sworn in he made what the Sydney Gazette called an animated speech at the grand parade. He was laborious and ambitious. He promoted discovery. He erected public buildings, and affixed his name to them. He gave it to natural and artificial objects. He would have been the founder of a new era if the construction of ugly buildings could have conferred such a title. His wife has given her name to a rocky spot called Mrs. Macquarie's Chair, from which the lounger on the picturesque promontories of the Government Domain in Sydney may admire the never-wearying charms of Port Jackson. She planned the drive which winds around the jutting promontory and picturesque domain; and it was her wish that the spot should be preserved for the enjoyment of all. It is to be hoped, and is not improbable, that the inhabitants will never part with this public possession; and thus the simple selection of a site of natural beauty may transmit the remembrance of the wife to a posterity which would otherwise not care for the husband. Her project of love was completed in
