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"When George Gordon McCrae was 17, his father suggested that he consider surveying as a profession. Though George would have preferred to become a naval architect or a sailor, he fell in with his father's suggestion and joined a government survey party as a probationer. Thus it was he found himself, soon after, working in the area around Mount Macedon in February 1851. This description of 'Black Thursday' is taken from his reminiscences which, in turn, drew on his diaries."