The White Hat Guide to Bishop Perry

“An event to be red-lettered in the ecclesiastical history of the Province, took place on the 23rd January, 1848, viz., the arrival of the ship "Stag" from London, which, amongst other passengers, brought . . . Dr. Perry and Mrs. Perry. The new Bishop brought with him a high reputation for piety, erudition, and zeal, in all of which he thoroughly stood the test throughout an active and distinguished missionary career. On St. Peter's day, 1847, he was consecrated the first Bishop of Melbourne in Westminster Abbey. The Bishop . . . was welcomed [to Melbourne] with loud peals of acclamation . . . and was driven to St. James' Parsonage, whence he subsequently moved to the Southern Cross Hotel, then and still in the western part of Bourke Street . . . The Bishop was installed at St. James' on January 28th, and, as to be expected, such a ceremonial novelty, brought together as many persons as the church could contain, including a large sprinkling from the other religious denominations . . . and he delivered a very eloquent discourse from 2nd Cor., Chapter v., verse 20. " Now then we are Ambassadors for Christ, as though God did beseech you for us; we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God."

This sermon was “by special request” (of Bishop Perry himself?) “published in pamphlet form, and widely circulated”.

"It was not long before the good bishop found that things in the new colony did not follow the old class and social lines back in England.

“The Rev. Father Geoghegan, the Roman Catholic Pastor, accomplished gentleman as he was, wishful to pay meet respect to a distinguished stranger, though the head of another creed, called for the purpose on Bishop Perry.” [Finding the bishop not at home he left his card. ] “The Bishop, instead of treating the clerical paste-board as a badge offering the conventional courtesies of one gentleman to another, recoiled from it as if it were a snake, and if he even touched it, only did so to drop it into an envelope and return it with a curt, caustic note, a freezing intimation that he could not recognise "The Rev. P. B. Geoghegan" in any shape or form, officially or otherwise-in fact conveying the idea that he wished to shun the card-sender as though he were an emissary from the Evil One. This unmerited rebuff to probably the most popular man then in the Province, provoked a deep feeling of anger against the Bishop, without the pale of his own communion, and even within, there was by no means a consensus of opinion that he had done the right thing. Many a conscientious Protestant believed that His Lordship had done what was egregiously wrong.”