Peter Gait,
A NATIVE of Alloa, a pleasant river port of Scotland, in the County of Clackmannan. He went to Portugal at an early age, and was for some years engaged in superintending important railway works on behalf of the eminent contracting firm of Waring Brothers. Whilst in Portugal he had a sunstroke which affected him somewhat seriously, though upon relinquishing his work there and on arrival in South Australia he seemed to have quite recovered from its effects. He was engaged as resident engineer on the Roseworthy and Burra Railway, parts of which were opened in 1869 and 1870. He remained in this position from the beginning of the work till its completion, and the conspicuous ability and energy which he displayed led the Government to appoint him Resident Engineer for the Hope Valley Waterworks and the Aqueduct Channel. When these works were finished, he retired from the Service and purchased a flour mill at Allandale, near Kapunda, where he remained till about four years ago, when he left the business, at which, unfortunately, he had not been successful. About this time the contract for the first section of the Adelaide and Nairne Railway was let to Messrs. Walker & Swann, and upon Mr. Gait applying for the position of Resident Engineer under the Government, he was at once appointed. Mr. Gait's temperament was such, and his energy so great, that he often overexerted himself, and perhaps needlessly exposed himself to the weather. Hence, beside the sunstroke in Portugal, he suffered another on the Burra railway works, and a third at Hope Valley. From this last he took months to recover, and there can be no doubt that these repeated attacks, preceding work entailing so much physical exertion as the difficult engineering of the Hills railway, completely broke down his health. On the occasion of the formal opening of the line to Aldgate, he was strangely excitable, though as warm-hearted
