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My Melbourne: Queen Victoria

Long ago, on the twelfth of July in 1690, Irish Protestants celebrated a victory at the Battle of the Boyne. In the small hours of the morning, as I was lying awake in South Yarra with my baby daughter, on the twelfth of July in 1975, I heard the explosion. We were 6 km from the statue of Queen Victoria, which was blown up in 1975, a belated but vigorous antipodean response to the Battle of the Boyne. Until they blew it up, I wasn't aware that the statue was there.

I recently visited the statue, which has long since been restored. High up on top of a marble structure, she stands, orb and sceptre in hand, overlooking the city of Melbourne. She is one of the several statues throughout the parklands and gardens stretching from the Royal Botanic Gardens, past Government House and the Shrine of Remembrance to the Yarra River which edges the city centre. After the railway station, the first building she can see is the graceful, Gothic Protestant cathedral.

She is on a little grassy eminence, close to a shady pond, and you can even miss the sight of her grim stare if you don't look right up, for the base of her pedestal is very elaborate and eye-catching. There are four sides to it, and beneath the arch in each side there is a statue. These are women, named Wisdom, Justice, History and Progress. They are vigorous and active figures; the Queen is very, very still.

Read the engravings in the base and you will see that the first stone was laid in 1905, that the whole thing was unveiled in 1907. The monument is in honour of Her Most Gracious Majesty who Wrought Her People Lasting Good. You can learn the dates of her birth, her death, her coronation. And there she is on the pinnacle, unscarred by Catholic bombs, guarded by four enormous stone lions. From the back, at a little distance, you would in fact swear she was a statue of the Virgin Mary, blessing the city which she still has in her sights.

Not far away is the Floral Clock warning us of the relentless passing of time. I do hope she doesn't have to come down off her pedestal in a flurry of anti-monarchist fervour. For she is an eerie, ghostly, toothless reminder of past truths. The monument is strange and absurd, charming in its lost relevance. I believe that if we try to remove from the scene such weird old statements as this, we will lose part of the texture of the city of Melbourne, part of the flavour and perfume of the greenery which sweeps down from the Gardens to the River with a gentleness, peace and harmony that are too precious to disturb.

Carmel Bird