The lanes, or
Little Flinders and Collins streets, were already fairly filled, as the
land there was much cheaper. In the former were Heap and Grice's
offices, and the Adelphi Hotel, approaching the Lamb Inn in noisy
repute. The latter had Bells and Buchanan, the Post-Office under D.
Kelsh, and, where Elizabeth-street crossed, G. Lovell and Company and
Campbell and Woolley. The Catholic Church in Lonsdale-street was under
construction, and on the western brow was Mr. Abrahams's good house,
with his two pretty girl children, one of whom was in succession Mrs.
Pike, Mrs. Gray, and Mrs. Williams, and is still alive, with a
creditable total of family. Beyond was the trackless bush, excepting the
bush tracks to Sydney, and in the Flemington and Keilor direction. But
outside the town were already several suburbs, of which Collingwood was
the largest, having the residences of John Hunter Patterson and other
leading early colonists.
I used to traverse not a few dreary empty allotments in the hot summer
sun to reach the stores of my friend the Honourable James Graham, whose
dwelling and business place in Russell, by Bourke street, seemed then
quite far out of the village, but is since in the very heart of the
great city.
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