and _private_ exertion." See
Lang's Narrative of the Settlement of the Scots' Church in New South
Wales, p. 8. The Doctor, in his Presbyterian zeal, had forgotten Mr.
Johnson's church.

In August, 1806, Captain King resigned his office, and was succeeded in
the government of New South Wales by Captain Bligh, also of the royal
navy. His name is well known from the history of the mutiny of the crew
in the ship _Bounty_, which he had formerly commanded; and he was not
less unfortunate on shore, in the art of governing his fellow-creatures.
With many good qualities and excellent intentions, his manner of ruling
men was not either happy or successful. But before we proceed to the
great event in colonial history, which brought to a sudden termination
the reign of Governor Bligh, it will be well to notice a remarkable
occurrence which happened soon after he came into power. The banks of
the river Hawkesbury have already been stated to be distinguished for
their fertility; and at this time they formed the chief source from
which the supply of wheat for the colony was drawn. Many acres of land
had been cleared there, and the whole district, with smiling farms
scattered about upon the rising banks of the beautiful stream, offered
one of the most pleasing scenes in the whole settlement. But, within
the first year of the government of Captain Bligh, the farmers on the
Hawkesbury, and indeed the whole colony, were doomed to undergo a severe
trial.[119] In March 1799, the river had been known to rise suddenly to
the enormous height of fifty feet, and the destruction of property which
had been then occasioned was very great.[120] But now, without any
considerable rains having fallen upon the eastern side of the Blue
Mountains, between that range and the sea, the river rose, in one
place at least, to the enormous height of ninety-three feet, so that
buildings, stock, or corn, which were not secured upon rising ground
equal in height to that of an ordinary church-tower, must have been
overwhelmed and borne away by the flood. It is said that a settler,
whose house stood on an eminence at a beautiful bend of the Hawkesbury,
saw no less than thirty stacks of wheat at one time floating down the
stream during a flood, some of them being covered with pigs and poultry,
who had thus vainly sought safety from the rising of the waters. The
consequences of this unexpected disaster were very calamitous, and
before the ensuing harvest could b