Amor de Cosmos

"The British Colonist the first paper to be published, with Amour(sic) de Cosmos, as Editor, came into existence shortly after my arrival on the scene, to be exact on the 11th December 1858, according to copies in my possession. Mr. De Cosmos was an able and pungent writer, a bitter opponent of Mr. Douglas' administration and he therefore unhesitatingly and persistently attacked the Government, his strong points being of course the fact that Mr. Douglas had been connected with the Hudson's Bay Company as its head and presumably was favourably inclined towards it, and was therefore not an impartial administrator.

Mr. De Cosmos came to the Colony with the rush from San Francisco in 1858; his real name was William Smith. He was a curious mixture of vanity and intellectual capability. His first named quality induced him to adopt the curious hybrid name of Amor De Cosmos, signifying as he intended "Lover of the World" - Latin French and Greek being employed in its construction. He was unquestionably a man of no mean capacity intellectually, fearless and pungent in his writings and on the public platform a forceful debater, albeit somewhat given to declamation for gallery applause. To the day of his death he was ever in the lime light of public life; he never married and died in Victoria in 1897."