DESCRIPTIVE SKETCH OF VICTORIA   

Atlas Page 43
By James Smith

MELBOURNE - THE SUBURBS   1....

Spring Street terminates at Victoria Street, and turning into this, the visitor sees before him the square plain edifice belonging to the Royal Society, in which the various scientific associations of the city hold their meetings. The society itself is the result of an amalgamation of the Victorian Institute and the Philosophical Society, both of them formed in the early days of Melbourne, and blended into one under the presidency of Sir Henry Barkly in 1860. As far back as 1854 and at a time when men’s minds were engrossed by material pursuits, the late Sir Redmond Barry and Mr. Sidney Gibbons succeeded in bringing together several zealous friends of scientific research, and these are entitled to the credit of having been the founders of the present Royal Society, which is in correspondence with all the principal associations of a kindred character in other parts of the world, and with whom it exchanges "Transactions."

The Trades’ Hall, at the corner of Victoria and Lygon Streets, is the place of assembly of what has not been inaptly called the Parliament of Labour, which formerly held its sittings in a primitive wooden building that has been replaced by a substantial brick structure having a frontage of seventy-two feet to Victoria Street. When completed, it will have cost something like ten thousand pounds sterling, and will nearly cover the acre of ground granted by the Legislature for its perpetual use.

The organisations of from seventy to eighty trades, representing almost every variety of handicraft, have their headquarters here. They elect a Council, to which are entrusted large administrative powers, and this body deals authoritatively with a variety of questions, arising out of disputes between employers and employed in regard to the current rate of wages, trade usages, and other matters affecting the welfare of the operative classes. It is also the guardian of the "eight hours" principle; and as it is clothed with the large powers devolved upon it by a constituency which embraces the whole of the trades, it has a voice potential in the social polity of the metropolis and its suburbs.

The hall of the Horticultural Improvement Society, devoted almost exclusively to flower shows and similar purposes, is passed on the left-hand side before reaching the Melbourne Gaol, a massive and gloomy-looking building, which, with its circular bastions and its armed sentries pacing the summit of its lofty walls, might easily be mistaken for a fortress. It occupies a spacious and exceptionally valuable site, where it is an eyesore, and from which it is pretty certain to be removed at no very distant date.

Within a stone’s throw of the prison is the lofty tower and huge appurtenances of the Carlton Brewery, which has acquired a special repute in. connection with the exploits of a volunteer fire brigade composed exclusively of persons belonging to the establishment. Trained with special care, and disciplined by incessant practice this valuable corps has maintained its supremacy for many years against all competitors at the annual demonstrations of the whole of the fire brigades of the colony.

In the Victoria Markets, with its double frontage to Victoria and Elizabeth Streets, the great bulk of the orchard, garden and dairy produce, raised in the country districts around the metropolis, finds its way to the retail distributors on Wednesdays and Saturdays. At other times it is comparatively deserted. In the early hours of the morning on both those days, heavily laden carts converge upon the markets from all points of the compass, bringing with them wafts of fragrance from far-off flower beds and pleasant evidences of the fertility of the soil on the mountain slopes, where walnuts, gooseberries and raspberries flourish, and in valleys where serried rows of apple and pear, cherry, peach and plum trees make the spring beautiful with their pink and snowy blossoms, and the summer and autumn gay with the gold and crimson of their abundant fruitage. Mingling with the spoils of Victorian orchards are cases of oranges from Parramatta, dray loads of bananas from Fiji, heaps of pine apples from Queensland, and tons of grapes from South Australia and the valley of the Murray. The suburban nurseries send in a wealth of flowers and pot plants, the former arranged for the most part with a nice perception of harmonies of colour and of agreeable contrasts of form. As the concourse of buyers is considerable, and includes numbers of frugal housekeepers, a miscellaneous mart has been established by way of supplement to the main traffic of the place; and new and cast-off wearing apparel, second-hand books, confectionery, cheap jewellery, glass and china ware for household use and ornament are offered for sale with such glowing eulogiums of their utility and value and such opportunities to purchase them as a long experience in the practice of itinerant hawking is capable of suggesting to the persistent vendors.

To pass from this scene of bustle and animation, of noise and confusion, of bargain and sale, to the silent grass-grown cemetery, which is partly walled in by the Market buildings, forms quite a solemn antithesis. On one side of the brick partition is the din of many voices and the tumultuous movement of a jostling crowd, with a sprinkling of pickpockets and a contingent of disorderly boys and on the other, the stillness and the dreamless repose of death. All the entrance gates are locked, with one exception; and passing through this the stranger probably finds that he is the only living inmate of an enclosure which has been watered by the tears of a generation. Among the hundreds of tombstones there are very few which do not bear date in the forties or fifties. Half a century has elapsed since some of those who lie beneath were committed to the earth; but that their memories are still tenderly cherished is evidenced by the fact that upon graves which have been closed for forty, or even five and forty years pious hands have placed offerings of freshly-gathered flowers. A few conspicuous monuments mark the last resting-places of early colonists of note. Among these is a simple obelisk of dressed blue stone erected several years ago above the grave of one of the founders of Melbourne. It bears the inscription John Batman, born at Parramatta, New South Wales, 1800; died in Melbourne 6th May, 1839. He entered Port Phillip Heads 29th May, 1835, as leader of an expedition which he had organised in Launceston, V.D.L., to form a settlement, and founded one on the site of Melbourne, then unoccupied. This monument was erected by, public subscription in Victoria, 1881. "Circumspice!" The necessary funds were raised by a shilling subscription from two thousand five hundred persons; and the memorial was unveiled by the Mayor of Melbourne in the presence of a number of old colonists, including an early friend of Batman’s, Mr. G. A. Thomson, at that time eighty-three years of age.

Victoria Street terminates at the grounds of the Benevolent Asylum, occupying one of the most elevated sites in the town of Hotham. The institution owes its origin mainly to the joint efforts of Mr. J. P. Fawkner and Sir John O’Shanassy, and the foundation stone of the modest edifice, which then sufficed for the accommodation of a mere handful of aged and infirm people, was laid by Mr. Latrobe upwards of forty years ago. It now shelters between six and seven hundred inmates, and the demands upon the charity are so much in excess of the resources of the establishment to cope with them, that the expediency of disposing of the buildings, and of the ten acres of orchard, flower gardens and pleasure grounds by which they are surrounded, is beginning to be generally recognised, and the removal of the asylum to more spacious premises, with a larger area of land a few miles from Melbourne, is merely a question of time.

In the suburbs, as in the city itself, certain industries seem to be drawn together by the force of attraction and cohesion, and without any obvious reason. Hotham is the principal seat for the manufacture of agricultural implements, and many acres of ground are covered by the extensive works of different firms. Each establishment has arisen from comparatively small beginnings to great magnitude and importance; and the energetic "captains of industry," to whose enterprise they owe their foundation and present prosperity, have every reason to be proud of their work. The local meat market concentrates most of the wholesale carcass trade, and the extent of the business annually transacted there may be gauged by the fact that it involves the exchange of three quarters of a million sterling. In Hotham, also, the co-operative Vegetable and Fruit-growing Company carries on its business, and formerly found a valuable market in Sydney, to which city it was accustomed to dispatch thousands of dozens of cabbages and thousands of bags of potatoes per annum. Tanneries and glass and other factories contribute to the welfare of the town, and the aggregate amount of money distributed in wages every week is sufficiently ample to maintain a large and lucrative retail trade. Errol Street is one of the busiest and most popular of the leading thoroughfares of Hotham, and corresponds with the High Street of an English county town. The Town Hall occupies a commanding position at the corner of Errol and Queensberry Streets. It was erected in the Italian style, in 1875. A tower, five storeys in height, surmounted by a mansard roof, occupies one angle of the building, which is admirably arranged within, comprising a spacious and ornate main hall, an excellent library, one of the largest schools of art in the colonies, post and telegraph offices, a council chamber, court-house, and all the necessary offices for the administration of the municipal government.

An extensive area of marshland and lagoon, now in process of reclamation by drainage canals, separates Hotham from a group of rapidly expanding suburban townships; namely, Flemington, Kensington, Essendon, Newmarket, Ascot Vale and Moonee Ponds. The first two have been united to form a municipality, and the third is also locally governed. Newmarket is not, as its name would seem to indicate, one of the racing centres of the colony, but a great sheep and cattle market, through which between three and four hundred thousand of the former and from fifty to sixty thousand head of the latter pass every year for consumption by the three hundred thousand inhabitants of the metropolis and its suburbs. Its highest point overlooks a natural amphitheatre, the level arena of which comprehends an area of upwards of three hundred acres, forming what is generally acknowledged to be one of the finest racecourses in the world. Behind two grand-stands, providing accommodation for many thousands of persons, rises a natural hill, from which fifty thousand can command a view of the whole course, and of every race from start to finish; while an equal number of spectators usually congregate on the flat when the Melbourne Cup is run for, an event which, according to an official estimate, has been known to draw together as many as one hundred and thirty thousand persons.

In the immediate neighbourhood of Flemington, on the east side of a serpentine creek separating it from Brunswick and Carlton, lies the Royal Park, which contains between two and three hundred acres. Its elevated position and undulating surface combine to render it one of the most picturesque of the numerous reserves, which have been wisely, set apart for purposes of public health and recreation, in the immediate neighbourhood of Melbourne. It has, however, been, encroached upon at different times, by Governmental institutions. These include a deserted powder magazine, a "calf-lymph vaccination farm," a commodious edifice devoted, under the supervision of the Immigrants’ Aid Society, to the shelter of the destitute, and an Industrial and Reformatory School. At least, this was the purpose for which the great barrack-like structure was originally used, until experience demonstrated, the superiority of the home life and domestic training, obtainable under the boarding-out system, as compared with the practice of herding together the little waifs and strays of society under one roof, where they were found to suffer alike in health and in morals. At present, the school serves as a receiving house for boys and girls, who are thence drafted off to various parts of the country. Under this improved method of dealing with them, there has been a remarkable falling off in the number of children thrown upon the State for their maintenance, for, during a period in which the population of the colony has increased by three hundred thousand, the number of these wards of the Government has declined from nearly two thousand four hundred to less than two thousand, and the cost of supporting them from forty-six thousand seven hundred to about thirty-seven thousand three hundred pounds sterling.

In the centre of the Royal Park an area of fifty acres has been granted to the Zoological and Acclimatisation Society, and here the Council of that body, with an annual income which rarely exceeds four thousand pounds sterling, has succeeded in collecting from all parts of the world specimens of its most representative fauna. The larger cages are occupied by lions, tigers, wolves, leopards, bears and living examples of the mammalia generally. Elephants and camels are led about the grounds for the conveyance of childish passengers; hundreds of birds of every variety of plumage, from the brilliant hues of the tropics to the sober grays and browns of northern latitudes are suitably housed in the midst of picturesque surroundings; and the gardens have been planted with shrubs and flowers so as to augment their attractiveness. A mia-mia constructed of sheets of bark and furnished with the nets and weapons of the aborigines of Victoria, connects the present with the past by faithfully reproducing one of the native habitations which not more than fifty years ago were reared upon this very spot, when the site of Melbourne was occupied by grassy glades and groves of venerable trees.

On the east side, the Royal Park is skirted by a suburb of recent growth, entitled Parkville, composed of pretty villas and handsome terraces, some of which face the Sydney Road —one of the broadest of the approaches to the city, and planted with avenues of elm and pine. On the other side of a reserve which has received the name of Prince’s Park, is situated the Melbourne Cemetery, which has been used as a burial ground since the year 1853. During the interval, it has received the mortal remains of one hundred and twenty-five thousand persons, and so but a limited area of its hundred and one acres is now available for future interments. Each of the leading religious denominations has its own separate province in this silent realm, which is made as beautiful by trees and shrubs and flowers as nature and art can render it. One of the most conspicuous monuments in the cemetery is that erected to the memory of Sir Charles Hotham, which consists of a lofty pillar of polished red granite, with a richly carved capital surmounted by a cross. Another, covering the grave of Lady Barkly, resembles a Gothic chapel; and a third, consisting of a huge monolith of rough hewn granite resting on a massive plinth, marks the final resting place of the bones of Burke and Wills, the explorers: "Comrades in a great achievement companions in death and associates in renown" so reads the epitaph.

The suburb of Carlton has already enveloped the cemetery on three sides, and the time is fast approaching when, from the inability to find room for any more graves, this, like its predecessor, will have to be closed. It has been resolved, therefore, to select a site for a much larger necropolis at such a distance from Melbourne as will place it beyond the reach of metropolitan extension, at any rate for some centuries to come and a tract of land, close to the railway, comprising some hundreds of acres in an elevated position and with a sandy soil, has been marked out for this purpose near Frankston, on the eastern shore of the Bay.

Leaving the cemetery and turning to the southward, a short walk across the College Crescent leads straight to the fine University Reserve; this comprehends within its limits an area of a hundred acres, forty of which have been set apart for the uses of the institution and sixty as sites for Church of England, Roman Catholic, Presbyterian, Wesleyan and other colleges, and also for a recreation ground. The University is indebted for its existence mainly to the efforts of the late Sir Redmond Barry and other public spirited colonists at a time when the Victorian Treasury was overflowing with money, and the great mass of the community had neither the leisure nor the inclination to bestow the slightest attention upon any but material pursuits. Thanks to the personal influence of these gentlemen and the sympathies of a Government composed of men who had been college-bred, the Legislature was induced to grant a block of land, a sum of money and an endowment for a University, which commenced its career in 1855 with four professors and just four times that number of students, and is now looked up to as their Alma Mater by upwards of two thousand undergraduates.

The University buildings, covering three sides of a quadrangle, have been somewhat dwarfed by the edifices which have grown up around them. One of the handsomest of these is the Wilson Hall, which owes its existence to the munificence of Sir Samuel Wilson, who appropriated the sum of thirty thousand pounds —the accruing interest on which eventually raised it to nearly forty thousand pounds —to the foundation of a hall one hundred and forty feet long, fifty feet wide and upwards of eighty feet high, in which the annual commencements might be held. Both externally and internally the Wilson Hall recalls some of the noble structures which grace the collegiate cities of England. The style of its architecture is that of the best period of the perpendicular Gothic. The building is divided into five bays, which are formed externally by boldly projecting buttresses crowned by pinnacles, while the angles are emphasised by octagonal turrets. At the south end is a very large and richly traceried window, underneath which, in the interior, is placed the dais. On either side of this are handsome bay windows —the one on the west side rectangular and the one opposite semi-octagonal. The hall has an open roof, richly decorated with carvings, the hammer-beams terminating in winged angels upholding shields.

Up to the present time, only three colleges have been erected in connection with the University —the Church of England (or Trinity), the Presbyterian and the Ormond College. The latter was constructed, and is about to be enlarged, at the sole expense of the Hon. Francis Ormond, who has also founded a chair of music in the University. Trinity College has found a very generous friend in Sir W. J. Clarke, Bart., whose successive donations to it have not fallen far short of ten thousand pounds sterling The National Museum of Natural History and Biology and the buildings of the Medical School both stand within the grounds of the University.

Quitting this seat of learning, by the Grattan Street, entrance, and proceeding in an easterly direction, the visitor reaches, the Carlton Gardens, which comprise an area of sixty-three acres planted with trees, shrubs and flowers, and contain three artificial lakes, each of which have small islands serving as coverts for aquatic birds. The ground rises somewhat towards the centre of the gardens, and advantage has been taken of this circumstance to erect the International Exhibition Building on a site so elevated that the lofty dome forms a conspicuous object for many miles round, and the view from its summit is consequently an extensive one. The building was calculated to provide upwards of half a million feet of space for exhibitors, but this was subsequently extended to nine hundred thousand feet by the erection of annexes; the style of architecture is the Italian Renaissance. Two monumental fountains —the one near the main entrance and the other opposite the eastern portico surrounded by mosaics of grass and flowers —contribute materially to the picturesqueness of the approaches and the beauty of the gardens, which are of immense value as a means of health and recreation to a thickly populated neighbourhood. The Convent of Mercy, the Hospital for Sick Children, the Erskine Church and the Wesleyan Home occupy sites immediately adjoining.

Turning out of Nicholson Street, which skirts the Carlton Gardens on the east side, into Moor Street, a walk of ten minutes or hereabouts leads to the Collingwood Town Hall and Mechanics’ Institute; this is situated in the very centre of a populous district, and one which contains probably a greater proportion of artisans and manual labourers than any other suburb of Melbourne. It was also the first electoral district which sent an operative mason into the Legislative Assembly, and it has generally taken the lead in popular movements. The structure just spoken of is one of the largest and handsomest near Melbourne, and, covers an area of about two hundred feet square, the site forming part of seven acres belonging to the Council. The architecture is of the Renaissance style. Over the main entrance is a tower one hundred and fifty feet, high, and at each angle of the building is a pavilion enriched with coupled columns and surmounted by a curved mansard roof. These pavilions are united with the central tower in the principal facade by means of an arcade, and the general effect of the whole elevation is decidedly rich. Inside is a fine hall, one hundred and twenty feet by fifty, capable of accommodating seventeen hundred persons, while the balconies above can seat three hundred and fifty more. Most of the public business of this suburb is centralised in its town hall, which contains the post and telegraph offices, a free library, the court-house and lock-up, the municipal offices, the police barracks, the mechanics’ institute, a public reading-room, a large lecture-room and other apartments. It faces’ Hoddle Street, following which, in a northerly direction, the visitor reaches Johnston Street, which runs at right angles to it. Traversing this thoroughfare towards its outlet over the bridge which receives its name, access is gained to Studley Park, a sylvan eminence containing about three hundred acres, exhibiting all the characteristics of the primitive bush, as the indigenous vegetation has been left almost untouched. With the exception of two relatively small reserves known as the Edinburgh and Darling Gardens, this is the only public park in the immediate vicinity of Collingwood, and the elevation of its position gives it the command of an extensive prospect to the westward, southward and northward, the view being bounded, in the last-named direction, by the Plenty Ranges and Mount Macedon. Just after sunset, when the after-glow, be it crimson or orange or amber, is lingering in the west, the outlook in that quarter is very fine, for the dark silhouettes of the domes and towers and cupolas of the numerous public buildings which crown the ridge of the eastern hill stand out in sharp relief against the lustrous sky; and when the brief twilight fades, thousands of lights begin to sparkle in the valley below, which is covered by the suburbs of Richmond and Collingwood. The folds of the river Yarra, flowing at the foot of the park, are so voluminous as to carve, it into three peninsulas, which also resemble promontories. One of these overlooks the spacious grounds and extensive buildings of the Convent of the Good Shepherd, at Abbottsford, an institution in which a beneficent work is being accomplished for the reclamation of fallen women. A second, looks down upon the original lunatic asylum of the colony, deriving from its situation the, name of Yarra Bend. The scenery on the banks of the river is eminently picturesque, owing to its numerous convolutions, the precipitousness of the high ground on one side, and occasionally on both, and the beautiful groups into which the trees arrange themselves. The park itself lies within the borough of Kew, and where the reservation ceases, advantage has been taken of the exceptional loftiness of the site, and the wide expanse of country which the eye ranges over, to erect some of the finest mansions in the outskirts of the city. Founded on the village or cottage system, this asylum has been built piecemeal during a period of forty years. It was commenced in 1848, and placed in the most sequestered position that could be found within so short a distance of Melbourne. Almost encircled by the Yarra, on the other side of which rises a wooded amphitheatre, the seclusion of the spot is perfect. The buildings include ten separate cottages for women and eight for men, and as these are protected from the sun by verandahs overgrown with creepers, and each has a small garden attached, they have a homelike and pleasant look. There are also spacious and airy dormitories, dining-rooms and officers’ quarters, providing accommodation for upwards of seven hundred patients. A farm of fifty-five acres furnishes occupation to such of the inmates as are capable of manual labour, and to whom it is likely to prove beneficial, and a prettily-situated cricket ground is much resorted to for purposes of recreation.

Recrossing the river, and ascending the high ground which overlooks the old asylum, the visitor gains the commanding eminence occupied by the huge edifice, known as the Kew Asylum, erected at a cost of nearly two hundred thousand pounds sterling, and covering twenty-one acres of ground. With its two lofty and massive towers and extended wings, it is a conspicuous object for miles around. It stands in the midst of a park of four hundred and sixty acres, and was originally intended for the reception of six hundred patients; but the growth of insanity in Victoria is unfortunately so rapid that the institution is usually over-crowed. It contains a library of six hundred volumes, and every effort is used to amuse and employ the inmates so as to facilitate their restoration to reason where this is practicable. There are carpenters’, shoemakers’ and blacksmiths’ shops for those who have been accustomed to occupations of this kind; a farm and garden for husbandmen, a cricket ground, bowling green and other places of out-of-door recreation; and a ball and concert room in which periodical entertainments take place. In the spacious quadrangles are exercise grounds and shelter sheds, and the asylum is surrounded by shrubberies and flower gardens covering an area of twenty-five acres, irrespective of forty-six under cultivation, the total area of the park in which it stands being three hundred and ninety-six acres.

The adjoining suburb, of Kew —which is reached on leaving the asylum by passing along Princess Street —has been rendered a favourite place of residence owing to the elevation of its position and the beauty and extent of the prospect commanded from some portions of it. The view from the Bulleen Road —before it dips into the hollow approaching the Boroondara Cemetery, where the valley of the Yarra spreads our between a succession of undulating hills, with a fine mountain chain in the distance —will remind the visitor from England of the far-famed prospect from Richmond Hill in Surrey. On account of the salubrity of the neighbourhood, several educational establishments have been instituted at Kew. One of these, the College of St. Francis Xavier belonging to the Society of Jesus, occupies a site of seventy acres bounded on one side by Denmark Street —a continuation of Princess Street. The situation of the building is an exceptionally pleasant and healthy one. Architecturally unpretending as regards its exterior, he college has been so planned internally as to render it in every way worthy of its educational purpose. It is calculated for the accommodation of a hundred pupils, most of whom are drawn from the higher classes in the Roman Catholic Church.

Turning up Barker’s Road, which forms the boundary line between Kew and Hawthorn, the visitor sees the turreted tower and spire of the Ladies’ College, recently founded by the Methodist Church of Victoria. It is built in the early decorated Style of Gothic architecture with gabled wings, to which the bay windows and flanking towers impart an agreeable variety of line, and is picturesquely situated.

Not many years ago Hawthorn was a village containing a population of a few hundreds, scattered over a large area which comprised two parks and many spacious paddocks; to-day it numbers ten thousand inhabitants, and includes within its municipal limits seven churches and three State schools. Its western boundary is defined by the river Yarra, the left banks of which are high and precipitous, crowned with pretty residences, and in places graved into terraced gardens, and are elsewhere clothed with trees; while the serpentine course of the stream and the beautiful forms of the willows which dip their pendent foliage in its waters contribute to render this part of the river exceedingly picturesque. A certain historical interest attaches to the trees themselves, for most of those that were planted in the early days sprang from slips procured at St. Helena, at which island nearly all outward-bound vessels touched, and every, visitor to the tomb of Napoleon brought away as a relic a cutting from the willows which overshadowed it.

Crossing the river, and following it down through a large reserve bearing the name of the Richmond Park, but still better known by its earlier designation of the Survey Paddock, a pleasant walk of a quarter of an hour will conduct the visitor to the Horticultural Gardens, in which there is one of the largest and most varied collections of apple, pear and fruit trees in this part of the world. Almost surrounded by the Yarra, the situation of these gardens is so sequestered as to render them a favourite place of resort for persons wishing to get into the quietude of a really rural retreat within a ten minutes’ ride of Melbourne by railway; and the other portions of the park, which are similarly accessible from Picnic Station, present the aspect of a large country fair on public holidays. Temperance societies, schools and benevolent organisations make it a place of rendezvous on such occasions.

In crowds they flock to hear the minstrels play,
And games and carols close the busy day.

cont...