The Sun.
London, England, 1863-02-12 00:00:00

A Successful .Exploration through the Interior of
Australia. From the Journals and Letters of Wil-
liam John Wills ; edited by his father, William
Wills. Richard Bentley.
It is melancholy to recall the fact that the first
successful exploration across the continent of Aus-
tralia was attended with such fatal results to those
who accomplished it. The more so that the deaths
of Robert O'Hara Burke, the leader of the expedition,
and of William J. Wills, the surveyor and astronomer,
who was second in command, were owing not to
any fault of their own or to hostility of the natives,
or to other circumstances over which they
had no control, but rather to a combination
of personal ill-feeling, neglect of duty, and
gross incompetence on the part of those who should
never have been intrusted with responsible situa-
tions. This interesting volume emanates from
the pen of Dr. Wills, the father of the deceased
surveyor, a promising young mac, who, in
his endeavour to earn fame and advance the ends of
science and the prosperity of his adopted country,
fell a victim to ill-regulated arrangements, and died
of exhaustion in the wilderness at the early age of
twenty-seven. The work contains a short bio-
graphy of Mr. Wills, but the principal portion of
the volume is devoted to a full narrative of the ex-
pedition, and a reprint of his diary and notes dur-
ing the memorable months of his adventures. In
the year 1861, when the first intelligence of the re-
sult of Mr. Burke's exploration became known in
this country, we endeavoured to give our readers an
idea of the work that had to be done, the hardships
to be endured, and the precautions necessary in an
Australian exploration. We showed that unless the
sole power were vested in the hands of an energetic
and practical man, to whose will all others con-
nected with the expedition must subserve with the
implicit obedience and discipline of a military com-
mand, ill feeling and trouble would be sure to take
place. Likewise that all employed as subordinates
should be competent men ; that is to say, thorough
bashmen, and men of some education. Hundreds
of such are to be found in Australia. The gold
mania drew thousands of adventurers from this
country—men whose volatile disposition and whose
thirst for riches in a lump led them to throw up
good situations at home and seek their fortune in
the unknown world. From men such as these, who
having proved the folly of their trust in the aurife-
rous deposits of the antipodes, turned their energies
to practical account, and becam4 stock-keepers or
rough riders in the interior, really useful and practi-
cal assistants could be procured; in the want of these
lies the secret of the failure of all Australian explo-
rations. Money to a liberal extent has been granted
many a time and oft to enable parties to penetrate
the interior by the various Australian Governments,
but the same penurious and fatal mistake has pre-
vailed throughout them all. The Government is
liberal, private individuals send in contributions,
a large sum is raised, large salaries are given to
the leader, the doctor, and half-a-dozen other
men in authority, but a fatuity seems to hang
over those who sit in office in Melbourne, Sydney,
or Adelaide, which blinds them to the
fact that it is by the competency of tire
minor agents that the talent of the scientific
leaders can be developed. We will ask the question
of any reasonable individual—is it likely that, for
the poor pittance of six shillings a day, men of colo-
nial experience will work—men who know the bush
as well as the aborigines—men who have devoted
years to the study of a science unknown in a
civilised country, viz., the reading of past events
from the footprints of those who have passed before?
It is an instinct in the savage ; it is a science in
the European—and as a science, with his knowledge
of the habits of his countrymen, the " old hand,"
or long-experienced stockman, can " strike off a
track" or find water where science is at fault. These
are the men who should be the accessories to an
exploration—men who from habit will ride for
four-and-twenty—aye, and for forty-eight hours, if
necessary, without food or drink, and care little
about it—men who have self-reliance. But men
of this class have their price. Their value is known
by proprietors, and it is not likely that they will
throw up lucrative situations, or even forego the pros-
pect of them if out of employ to join a hazardous
undertaking for less pay than stonebreakers on the
roads can earn. It was partly from this cause that
the fatal results of this expedition emanated. The
man left in charge of the depot at Cooper's Creek
deserves more our pity than our censure. William
Brahe, left in a responsible position, in charge of
the depot at Cooper's Creek, deserted his post the
morning of the day that Mr. Burke, Wills, and
King reached it in the evening. Four of his men
had died, others were ill, and he yielded to the
prompting of his feelings rather than his sense of
duty. Yet a last hope induced him after his party
had retraced their steps for two days to ride back
on the chance of yet meeting the lost ones. He
came to the trysting place which had already been
visited by Burke and his companions, and, finding
no one, seems not to have noticed the fresh tracks
of the camel, and so returned to his party. Thus
by sheer stupidity two valuable lives have been lost.
From the time that the three wanderers after much
toil and distress reached Cooper's Creek only to
find it deserted, the conduct of all parties seems in-
explicable. True, Brahe and his companions had
deserted them, but they had left provisions in the
cache which, if not in large quantities, was sufficient
to restore their strength and enable them to follow
in the track of Brahe, but Burke seems to have com-
mitted the fatal mistake of trying first to reach
South Australia, relying only on a report he had
heard that there were cattle stations near Mount
Hopeless, a name of evil omen, as it too surely
proved to himself and friends ; failing in this
they once again returned to the cache, and from
that period seem to have gradually sunk from ex-
haustion. King, the sole survivor, is indebted to
the kindness of the natives for his preservation, for
when his two companions had died he sought their
camp and was hospitably received and supported
until discovered by a party sent in search of the
missing ones. The question may be asked,what were
the authorities in Melbourne about all this time P
We do not wish to dwell upon this painful scene,
but we wish it to be distinctly understood that,
through their petty prejudices and unwarrant-
able favouritism in confiding places of trust to
incompetent men, the Exploration Committee
are responsible for the deaths of O'Hara
Burke and William J. Wills. Burke is
said to have been hasty, perhaps he was ;
bat if properly supported, he was the man
to carry out such an undertaking as he entered
upon, and Mr. Wills was the man to take part with
him. But as the case now stands—betrayed, de-
serted, and forsaken by their followers, neglected
by those in Melbourne who had undertaken to look
to their wants, the unfortunate adventurers perished
of want when aid was within a few days' journey of
them. Victoria is an energetic colony, but when
the next exploration is to take place, let a public
meeting of its inhabitants subscribe to have the
work done by private contract, and never again
sacrifice the lives of its explorers to the caprice of
incompetent members of a makebelieve society. In
conclusion, we must state that Dr. Wills has forborne
any expression of angry feeling towards those who,
in his anxiety for the safety of his son, and his
indignation at the supineness of the administration,
treated his exhortations with contempt, and, as it
were, referred him to the " Circumlocution-office."
While sincerely sympathising with him for the loss
of his gifted son, we beg him to remember that the
names of O'Hara Burke and William John Wills
will be read of hereafter in the pages of history as
the first successful Australian Explorers, and that
though his son died in early
d by Posterity.long enough to be remembers
manhood he had lived

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