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More than any other group of settlers, the ItaUan speakers were concemed with
the potential of the mineral springs and fought to have their value recognised. The
early aim of the group was to have completed a quantitative analysis of the water by
the govemment analytical chemist and an area around the springs declared a reserve.
Among the names put forward by the Committee as tmstees of the reserve were many
ItaUan speakers mcluding Vincenzo Perini who, though not always present at the
committee meetings held regulariy over many years, was active in the workings of the
group. On 24 October 1864 he undertook, wdth other committee members, a visit to
the springs to examine damage to the site and improvements which had been made to
rectify them. Over the years, the committee worked long and hard writing letters and
petitioning govemment and local bodies. The waters were analysed by the govemment
chemist, doctors and other experts, and declared to be of great value both medicinally
and for drinking purposes. They were compared with the spa waters of Europe and
judged to be of an equal, if not higher, standard. The area was declared a reserve of
approximately twelve and a half hectares (ref figure 10) by January 1869 (although
power was not vested with the committee to enable it to accept money for
improvements). Through the efforts of the Mineral Springs Committee ~ notably
Rotanzi, Crippa, Lucini and Perini ~ the springs had been declared to be potentially
'one of the future and probably most attractive spas of Victoria'.^^ Had it not been for
the foresight of the Italian speakers, evidenced as early as the 1850s with the work of
Dr Francesco Rossetti, the mineral springs may never have received the recognition
which they have so clearly enjoyed throughout the twentieth century.
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