June 1959 School Magazine

July, 1959

"Brisbane Girls ' Grammar School Magazine

July, 1959

Brisbane Gh1s' Grammar School Magaz ine

Middle and Lower School Lyric Competition, 1958 THE TRACK

BRISBANE - 1859 The old man sat on the verandah of his home, smoking his evening pipe. Before him lay the township of Brisbane, with the river winding throuqh the town and snaking away into the distance. The light of the setting sun touched the houses with gold a nd softened the harsh outlines of the buildings of rough, quarried stone. Andrew Petrie, one of the oldest free residents of the colony, gazed at the scene with unseeing eyes-he had been blind for e leven years. But not even the loss of his sight could dim his memories of Brisbane. As a young man he had come to the colony, and in the years that followed he had s hared in its hardships and sorrows, as the little settlement struggled to establish itself. This year had seen the fulfilment of a ll the ir aspirations, but of that first handful of loyal settlers only he, Andrew Petrie, was left to witness the historic occasion -the birth of Queensland. As he sat on the verandah of his home at Petrie Bight that December evening, he saw as clearly as his own sight could ever have shown him, the scene which lay before him. There was Oxley's river, whose banks were the site of the township. And there by the river bank was the only ferry across the river. Punctually at half-past eight every morning old Tom Kinsla, the ferryman, stood on the bank crying "Oh-ver," in a loud voice. The people hearing his cry knew that the ferry was waiting, and hurried down to the river to be rowed "over the water", as it was termed. The town really must have a bridge, thought Andrew Petrie, and for a moment he longed passionately for his sight, that he might build that bridge, as he had built so many of the older buildings in the town. That large pond of water down there by Roma Street had been christened by the townsfolk the "Horse Pond". Little did Andrew Petrie dream that on the very site of the Horse Pond would one day be built one of Brisbane's finest buildings, the City Hall. And there towards the eastern part of the town was Fortitude Valley, where Dr. Lang's firs t colonists had settled, naming the district in honour of the ship whiCh bore them to their new home. Over there on the hill stood the Old Windmill, where the convicts had laboured, grinding the corn for their meagre rations. The day of the convicts had passed, but the old mill still stood there, a grim reminder of the years when Brisba ne had been a penal settlement. The part the convicts had played 17

When rust-rimmed clouds Fleck filtered fire on the glossy Curves of slow-maturing apples; When misted myriads of minute insects Din the empt iness With heavy-winged singing, A whitely-winding track, deep-grooved Of boisterous towns; Trembles, as passing Footsteps flc:g the thirsting Grass with speckled palls of dust; Broods in the long-dra·wn Shadows of straight-limbed gums; And falters on the brink of night and day. With scars as old as Time, Lingers shyly at the bounds .

-JENlFER KELLY.

-KAY HARDCASTLE, VB.

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