Had there been even a
much larger society, the choice would probably have been as surely the
same, for it would have been difficult indeed to find anyone, who, in
the grace and command of natural presence, exceeded this inaugurator of
authority in Victoria. His figure, rather tall, shapely, well-developed,
surmounted by a noble head, bald with age, just touching the venerable,
and with a genial expression of face, which, however, never descended to
levity, although times without number to a smile or slight laugh, he sat
erect upon the bench, facile princeps, as though institutions were to
bend to him, and not he to them. When we entered the little hut-like
structure in the middle of the Western Market area, so long Melbourne's
only police-office, James Simpson seemed to us as much a part of its
fittings as the rude little bench itself; and it was a disappointment
not to find him there, as the indispensable complement to the scene,
even although better conduct in the community was to be inferred. How so
striking, so influence-wielding a man did not get or take a still more
leading position than he had was due, perhaps, to some indolence of
nature, to a rare and enviable contentment, or to a mixture of both.
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