VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume III, Issue 171, 20 March 1847, Page 4

VAN DIEMEN'S LAND.

We stated in our Journal of the 9th inst., that on the landing of Sir W. T. Dennison, at Hobart Town, on the 24th January, the usual salute was dispensed with, in consequence of the illness of Sir Eardley Wilraott. In papers which came to hand yesterday, we find that the new Governor's inauguration was conducted with as little display as possible. It took place on 26th January, and after the ceremony, his Excellency Sir W. I*. Dennison made the following brief speech to the spectators : — " I thank you for the honour you have done me in attending here this day, and I hope I shall be able to administer the Government to the satisfaction of all." As no doubt the ladies would like to know what " sort of a man" Sir W. T. is like, we lay before them the opinion of the Hobart Town Advertiser : — " He appears to be a man of quiet, determined disposition, and the lines about his mouth and brow show self-ieHance, and thought, and decision. €t will be fortunate for himself and the colony, should oar estimates of his character in these respects be correct. He is rather below than above the middle height ; stout and well proportioned, with the air more of a civilian than a military man." One half of his Excellency the LieuteuantGovernor's salary, it is said, will be paid by the Home Government. It is our painful duty to announce the decease qf Sir John Eardley Eardley- Wilraott, Bart., which took place at the residence of his Private Secretary, in Macquarie-street, on Wednesday morning. Sir Eardley-Wil-mott represented a branch of the Derbyshire family of Wilmott of Osmaston, and was a descendant from the ancient house of Eardley, of Audeley, in Staffordshire. He was grandson of the Lord Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas, who twice refused the Great Seal as Lord Chancellor, with a peerage. Sir John Eardley- Wilmott was born in 1783, and was twice married ; first to Elizabeth, daughter of C. H. Parry, Esq., a celebrated physician at Bath : and secondly, in 1819, to Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir Robert Chester, of Bush Hall, Hertfordshire. In politics Sir Eardley-Wilmott was of the moderate Tory party, and was returned by the Liberal interest for the county of Warwick. Early in 1843, Sir Eardley-Wilmott received the appointment of Lieutenant-Governor of ■ this island, and was superseded in his appointment by Charles Joseph La Trobe, Esq., who arrived on the 13th October, 1846, as Administrator of the Government. The cause | of Sir Eardley's death is stated to have been | complete exhaustion of the frame — in customary phraseology, a decay of nature. This melancholy event, subduing all private and party animosity, has called forth the usual demonstrations of regret. We believe it v/as his expressed wish, previously to his decease, that his remains should be conveyed to England, to be placed in the family " restingplace." Since the particulars of the death of Sir Eardley Wilmott werein type, we have learned that his remains will be interred in the colony ; and after decomposition has taken place, the body will be exhumed and sent to England, there to be deposited in the family vault of his ancestors. A public funeral will take place on Wednesday next, the 10th instant. — Hobart Town Courier.