Page:The Dictionary of Australasian Biography.djvu/290

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DICTIONARY OF AUSTRALASIAN BIOGRAPHY.
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a transfer to the literary staff as shipping reporter, and in 1870, at the age of twenty, became sub-editor of the Daily Southern Cross and Weekly News, which were then owned by Mr. (now Sir Julius) Vogel, Colonial Treasurer. Compelled by ill-health to relinquish night work, he resigned and joined the editorial staff of the Auckland Star, assuming the chief editorship in Feb. 1875, a position which he still retains, having also acquired a partnership interest in that paper, the New Zealand Farmer, New Zealand Graphic, and the large printing and publishing business connected with those journals. In the scant leisure which falls to the lot of the editor of a daily newspaper, Mr. Leys has done much literary work. He contributed the Auckland section of Sir Julius Vogel's "New Zealand Handbook", edited the "Early History of New Zealand," covering the period from the earliest times to 1845, and also the "Colonist's Guide," a standard textbook for settlers in New Zealand. He has also edited for sixteen years the annual issues of the Auckland Almanack, a valuable compendium of statistical and descriptive matter relating to New Zealand. Being one of the party formed at Rotorua on the day after the Tarawera eruption to visit Rotomahana and ascertain the condition of the Terraces, he wrote a graphic description of that great volcanic outburst, which was published in separate form. Among his minor literary works are a brochure on "The Doctrine of Evolution," in reply to Professor Denton, and notes of a holiday excursion to the South Sea Islands, "The Cruise of the Wairarapa". In 1891 Mr. Leys represented a syndicate of New Zealand journals at the Federation Convention in Sydney.

Ligar, Charles Whybrow, sometime Surveyor-General of Victoria, was born in 1809 at Ceylon, where his father was stationed with his regiment. Educated at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, he received a commission in the Royal Engineers, which he shortly afterwards resigned. He was employed on the Ordnance Survey of Ireland until 1840, when he was appointed Surveyor-General of New Zealand by Lord John Russell. Being wrecked at the Cape of Good Hope, he did not arrive in New Zealand until the end of 1841. In the latter colony he purchased a vast quantity of land from the Maoris for the European settlers, and was appointed colonel and commandant of the New Zealand Militia, in which capacity he took part in the war at the Bay of Islands. He retired from the position of Surveyor-General of New Zealand in 1856, and after residing for a short time in the southern portion of that colony, went to Victoria in 1857 as land commissioner for the province of Otago. In 1858 he became Surveyor-General of Victoria, retiring on a pension in 1869. He then returned to Europe, but finally settled in Texas, where he embarked in stock-raising. Mr. Ligar married in 1839 Grace, daughter of Thomas Hanyngton, of Dungannon, Tyrone, and granddaughter of the Earl of Charlemont, and in 1869 Marie, daughter of the late Captain Williams, of Auckland, N.Z. He died in 1879.

Lilley, Hon. Sir Charles, Chief Justice of Queensland, is the son of the late T. Lilley, of Newcastle-on-Tyne, where he was born on May 27th, 1830, and received the chief part of his education at University College, London. He was articled to an eminent London solicitor. He arrived in Moreton Bay in 1856, and re-entered upon the profession of the law as an articled clerk to Mr. Robert Little, Crown Solicitor, and was editor and joint lessee of the Moreton Bay Courier, in partnership with Mr. C. Belbridge. On the separation of the colony from New South Wales, Mr. Lilley was elected member for Fortitude Valley, which electorate he continued to represent until the end of his parliamentary career. In 1861 he was called to the bar, and in 1865 appointed Q.C. In September of the same year he became Attorney-General in the Herbert Ministry, and continued to hold that office under Mr. Macalister's premiership until July 1866. Mr. Herbert came into power again for another month, with Mr. Pring for his Attorney-General; but in August, when Mr. Macalister was reinstated, Mr. Lilley returned to his old post, and held office till August 1867. He became Premier and Attorney-General in Nov. 1868, and whilst in power established free education throughout the colony. In May 1870 he resigned, in consequence of Parliament censuring him for having ordered the building of the steamer

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