Sunday, 28th May, 1837

Thursday last I was shaken at the sight of a drunken William Light standing on a table in Fisher's kitchen yodeling the name of our new colony.

"Adelai - hee - hoo! Adelai - hee - hoo!"

If this is the much vaunted "culture" that traveling through Europe brings then thank the Lord I chose not to.

The occasion for this extraordinary display was the end of the committee meeting for the naming of the streets of Adelaide.

The committee was made up of Myself, Jeffcott, Gouger, Hack, Morphett, Stephens, Strangways, Gilbert, Brown and Gilles and, of course (no circus without a clown) Fisher. Light was there as well, although I don't recall him being asked. However, he told us that it was his map and if he didn't get a say then he'd take it home and not let us use it, so we had little choice but to include him. Besides, having him there would avoid last week's embarrassment of having the map facing the wrong way.

When we met we all had a view of what the street names should be. Colonists had submitted suggestions and the thing bode well to be a serious attempt to name the streets of the town.

However, within moments the thing was at sixes and sevens. Fisher still insisted (interminably) that the naming was his prerogative alone, while the rest of us insisted, politely, that he shut his cakehole.

It would appear that every man jack of the committee had used the promise of "a street named after you" as currency, gaining goods and favours from those colonists anxious to be commemorated and only too willing to donate something to ensure the committee's favourable consideration of their claim. Several of the committee had a sheaf of papers noting that they had committed to naming a street after some local in exchange for goods or service. I myself had obtained some sheep from a fellow named Archer on the promise that I would name something after him.

Gilbert, who, after all, runs the Storehouse, seems to have had enough people promise him a street name in payment for a new wheelbarrow or a pickaxe that we could have, in all probability, just named the whole place after him alone. Gilbert Street, Gilbert Road, Rue de Gilbert.

Added to that the determination of the committee to ensure that they themselves were properly remembered and the whole process began under such a welter of obligations that any thought of accommodating such ideas as Charlie Howard's "Names of the Old Testament" List (Bezaleel Boulevard, Jehoshabeath Mews) or my daughter's list of "Names from Gothic Novels" (Otranto Road. Udolpho Street. Vathek Place. Ambrosio Avenue. Indeed!) were immediately expunged.

In fact, between us we had made so many promises to people that we decided we had best split the roads running East & West at King William Street, just so we could use up more names. Fisher said that we could say that it was a mark of respect to His Majesty that no roads crossed the street named after him, but I don't think for a moment that anyone will buy such an obvious pig in a poke.

With the streets only half as long as they were going to be, at least the street numbers will be easier to fit onto the envelopes, which will keep Rowland Hill happy. Such a good idea was this that we also decided to split the North and South Roads as well, with the result that Morphett Street now mysteriously turns into Brown Street for no good reason and Pultney Street suddenly, and completely arbitrarily transforms into Hanson Street. Still, it meant we could keep another couple of promises.

We began the meeting with Gilles making two suggestions. The first was - unsurprisingly - that we have a few tots of brandy as we worked. I, myself, do not normally imbibe of spiritous liquors, but for the sake of conviviality I accept just one glass.

Gilles second suggestion was that rather than write directly on the map itself (as happened last week, allowing Hack to make a right bollocks of it when he tried to rub out a mistake) we write suggested street names on slips of paper and place them provisionally on the map, allowing us to move them around until we were satisfied.

The upshot was, of course, that every time someone sneezed, or opened the outside door slips of paper blew everywhere and we had to spend time finding them and putting them back where they were. And thanks to Gilles other suggestion, there being no such thing as "just one glass" when Gilles is pouring,  as the meeting dragged on and we became more and more lubricated, we became less and less capable of (a) finding all the slips of paper and (b) remembering where they had been placed on the map.

By the end of the night, with our job finished and four bottles of Gilles's brandy inside us, Light leaped onto the table - nearly spilling slips of paper everywhere again - and regaled us with his aforesaid celebratory display of Swiss yodeling.

Adelai - hee - hoo!

This morning Light - who looked just as dog eared as I felt (how much liquor did Gilles pour into us?) - delivered the final draft of the map of the City of Adelaide and I am perplexed by some of its features.

I cannot believe, for example, that when sober we would have named entire city squares after Wellington and Whitmore, whilst only bestowing street names upon Angas and Wakefield.

I yield to no-one in my admiration for the Iron Duke, but his connection with the colony is pretty damned slim. So too with William Whitmore - a man Lord Melbourne once called "the most affable waste of a seat in parliament I ever knew". So why we rewarded them with a Square each when we only gave only a street to Wakefield - who came up with the plan for the Colony - and Angas - the Chairman of the Company and hence the employer of most of the committee - I do not know.

I can only surmise that, when sober, we placed the names properly on the map, but as the night wore on we became less and less able to replace them whenever they blew away.

Even stranger, I note that, as expected, all the members of the committee have their own thoroughfare named after them. Jeffcott Street; Gouger Street; Morphett Street; Strangways Terrace; Gilbert Street; Brown Street and Gilles Street all appear as expected. But Stephens Street and Hack street I searched for in vain. True, we named Barton terrace and Hack is usually referred to by this name, but the man claims he named it after his mother. So he has at least something. But of Stephens street is there no sign.  How did this happen? That every other member of the committee is celebrated in a grand roadway and Sammy Stephens has nothing. (I admit that he probably deserves nothing, but still....)

Light thought that there might be some clue on the draft map we used on Thursday and sure enough, when we looked we discovered the answer. We had, in fact, assigned the name Stephens, not to a street, but to a largish crease in the paper and we had just been too drunk to appreciate the difference.

I do not imagine he will be at all pleased, but Light thinks that with luck we can keep him drunk and he'll never notice.

Walter Bromley sent me a letter this week telling me that some damned fool by the name of Hill had shot a native dog, skinned it and sold the pelt for three shillings and sixpence. The buffoon didn't seem to take into account that the dog actually belonged to one of the natives and was a devoted companion. Bromley tells me that the native canine fancier is greatly exasperated at the loss, as well he might be. We may need to either find the man another dog to replace the one that was shot or else give him some sort of recompense. I have suggested that we pay him three pounds and give him either the three and six or the actual pelt back. 

Why people do not try and consider the feelings of the natives as if they were what they are: our fellow human beings, I do not know. Hill is a blight! I don't know what I need to do to impress upon the idiot colonists that there are an awful lot more of the natives than there are of us and if we upset them and they stop being friendly we'll find ourselves being speared back to London.

After much hint dropping by me, people finally seemed to have recalled that it was my birthday last week. No gifts, but Mrs Harvey made a cake. So I was doubly disappointed.