without any city lot. From this cheap investment came the frequent
lamentation, "Why did not I buy Waterhouse's corner for 12/6?" But
there was more than 12/6 needed. The investment was of 80 pounds, which
secured the ownership of the corner block facing King William street
and Rundle street, and besides 134 acres of valuable suburban land.

There were connected with The Register from the earliest days the
enterprising head of the house. Robert Thomas, who must have been well
aided by his intelligent wife. The sons and daughters took their place
in colonial society. Mr. George Stevenson left the staff of The Globe
and Traveller, a good old London Paper, to try his fortunes in the new
Province founded on the Wakefield principle, as Private Secretary to
the first Governor (Capt. John Hindmarsh, R.N.). It is matter of
history how the Governor and the Commissioner of Lands differed and
quarrelled, the latter having the money and the former the power of
government, and it was soon found that Mr. Stevenson could wield a
trenchant pen. He had been on the "Traveller" branch of the London
paper what would be called now a travelling correspondent. The Governor
was replaced by Col. Gawler, and Mr. Stevenson went on The
Register as editor. Mrs. Stevenson was a clever woman, and could help
her husband. She knew Charles Dickens, and still better, the family of
Hogarth, into which he married. My father and mother were surprised to
find so good a paper and so well printed in the infant city. Then there
were A. H. Davis, of the Reedbeds, and Nathaniel Hailes, who wrote
under the cognomen of "Timothy Short," who had been publisher and
bookseller. There was first Samuel Stephens, who came out in the first
ship for the South Australian Company, and married a fellow passenger,
Charlotte Hudson Beare, and died two years after, and then Edward.
manager of the South Australian Bank, and later, John Stephens who
founded The Weekly Observer, and afterwards bought The Register. These