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TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE: A list of changes is detailed at the end of
the book.




[Illustration: MOUNT KOSCIUSKO.

_From the picture by J. S. Bowman, M.A._]




    Australian Pictures
    Drawn with Pen and Pencil

    BY
    HOWARD WILLOUGHBY
    OF 'THE MELBOURNE ARGUS'

    _WITH A MAP AND ONE HUNDRED AND SEVEN ILLUSTRATIONS FROM
    SKETCHES AND PHOTOGRAPHS, ENGRAVED BY E. WHYMPER AND OTHERS._

    LONDON
    THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY
    56 Paternoster Row and 164 Piccadilly
    1886




    LONDON:
    PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
    STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.




[Illustration: IN THE MOUNTAINS, FERNSHAW.]




PREFACE.


In one respect this work differs from its predecessors. The companion
volumes were written by travellers to the lands which they described,
but AUSTRALIAN PICTURES are by an Australian resident. Hence, when
praise is required, the author has often preferred to quote some
traveller of repute rather than to state his own impressions. Thanks
have to be given to the Government of Victoria, which kindly placed all
its works at the disposal of the author. The official history of the
aborigines compiled by Mr. Brough Smyth is especially a valuable
storehouse of facts for future writers. The proprietors of the
_Melbourne Argus_ liberally gave the use of the views and pictures of
their illustrated paper, the _Australian Sketcher_, and the offer was
gratefully and largely taken advantage of. Mr. R. Wallen, a President of
the Art Union of Victoria, gave permission for the reproduction of any
of the works of art published by the society during his term of office.
Australia is a large place, and it will be seen that, where the author
could not refresh his memory by a personal visit, he has here and there
availed himself of the willing aid of literary friends.

[Illustration: THE SCOTS' CHURCH, COLLINS STREET, MELBOURNE.]




CONTENTS.

    Mount Kosciusko                                       _Frontispiece_
    In the Mountains, Fernshaw                                         5
    The Scots' Church, Collins Street, Melbourne                       6




    SECTION I.--INTRODUCTORY.


    CHAPTER I.

    INTRODUCTION.

    AREA OF AUSTRALIA--ENGLAND'S HERITAGE--NATURAL
    RICHES--POPULATION--PRESENT PROSPECTS OF IMMIGRANTS--THE SIX
    COLONIES--FACILITIES OF TRAVEL--CHARACTER OF PEOPLE.           11-16

    _Illustrations_:

    A Native Climbing a Tree for Opossum                              12
    A Road through an Australian Forest                               13
    Coranderrk Station                                                16


    CHAPTER II.

    CONFIGURATION AND CLIMATE.

    DIMENSIONS OF AUSTRALIA--MOUNT KOSCIUSKO--THE MURRAY RIVER
    SYSTEM--WIND LAWS--THE HOT WIND--INTENSE HEAT PERIODS--THE EARLY
    EXPLORERS--STURT'S EXPERIENCE--BLACKS AND BUSH
    FIRES--DROUGHTS--UNEXPLORED AUSTRALIA.                         17-26

    _Illustrations_:

    The Giant Gum-tree                                                18
    Railroad through the Gippsland Forest                             19
    Junction of Murray and Darling Rivers                             20
    The National Museum, Melbourne                                    26


    CHAPTER III.

    THE AUSTRALIAN PEOPLE.

    AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACIES--THE FEDERAL MOVEMENT--IMMIGRATION--CURRENT
    WAGES--COST OF LIVING--ABSENCE OF AN ESTABLISHED CHURCH--RELIGION
    IN THE RURAL DISTRICTS--A TYPICAL SERVICE--SUNDAY OBSERVANCE--MISSION
    WORK--CHURCH BUILDING.      27-34

    _Illustrations_:

    Statue of Prince Albert in Sydney                                 28
    The Bower-Bird                                                    29
    The Independent Church, Collins Street, Melbourne                 33




    SECTION II.--BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF THE COLONIES.


    CHAPTER IV.

    VICTORIA.

    PORT PHILLIP--EARLY SETTLEMENT AND ABANDONMENT--THE PIONEERS
    HENTY, BATMAN AND FAWKNER--SIZE OF VICTORIA--MELBOURNE--ITS
    APPEARANCE--PUBLIC BUILDINGS--STREETS--RESERVES--PRIDE OF ITS
    PEOPLE--UNEARNED INCREMENT--SANDHURST--BALLARAT--THE CAPITAL OF
    THE INTERIOR--GEELONG--THE WESTERN DISTRICT--VIEW OF THE
    LAKES--PORTLAND--THE WHEAT PLAINS--SHEPPERTON--THE
    MALLEE--GIPPSLAND--MOUNTAIN RANGES--SCHOOL SYSTEM--COBB'S
    COACHES--FACTS AND FIGURES.                                    35-72

    _Illustrations_:

    Semi-Civilised Victorian Aborigines                               36
    Government House, Melbourne                                       37
    Melbourne, 1840                                                   40
    A Railway Pier in Melbourne in 1886                               41
    A Melbourne Suburban House                                        44
    Bird's-eye View of Melbourne showing Public Office                46
    Bird's-eye View of Melbourne looking Southwards                   47
    Bird's-eye View of Central Melbourne                              50
    Bourke Street, Melbourne, looking East                            51
    University, Melbourne                                             52
    The Fitzroy Gardens, Melbourne                                    53
    The Yarra Yarra, near Melbourne                                   55
    Bird's-eye View of Sandhurst                                      58
    On Lake Wellington                                                63
    A Victorian Lake                                                  65
    The Upper Goulbourn, Victoria                                     66
    Waterfall in the Black Spur                                       68
    A Victorian Forest                                                69
    Staging Scenes                                                    71
    A Sharp Corner                                                    72


    CHAPTER V.

    NEW SOUTH WALES.

    SURVEY OF THE COLONY--SYDNEY AND ITS HARBOUR--THE GREAT
    WEST--THE BLUE MOUNTAINS--THEIR GRAND SCENERY--AN AUSTRALIAN
    SHOW PLACE--THE FISH RIVER CAVES--DUBBO TO THE DARLING--THE
    GREAT PASTURES--THE NORTHERN TABLELAND--THE BIG SCRUB
    COUNTRY--TROPICAL VEGETATION.                                  73-96

    _Illustrations_:

    Views in Sydney: Government House,
      the Cathedral, and Sydney Heads                                 74
    Government Buildings, Macquarie Street, Sydney                    75
    Statue of Captain Cook at Sydney                                  77
    The Post Office, George Street, Sydney                            80
    Sydney Harbour                                                    82
    Macquarie Street, Sydney                                          83
    The Town Hall, Sydney                                             85
    Emu Plains                                                        88
    The Valley of the Grose                                           89
    Zigzag Railway in the Blue Mountains                              91
    Fish River Caves                                                  92
    Waterfall at Govett                                               93


    CHAPTER VI.

    SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

    CONFIGURATION--THE LAKE COUNTRY--HEAT IN
    SUMMER--FRUIT--GLENELG--ADELAIDE--MOUNT LOFTY RANGE--PARKS AND
    BUILDINGS--MOSQUITO PLAIN CAVES--CAMELS--THE OVERLAND TELEGRAPH
    LINK LINE--PEAKE STATION--THE NORTHERN TERRITORY--EARLY
    MISFORTUNES--PRESENT PROSPECTS--INSECT
    LIFE--ALLIGATORS--BUFFALOES.                                  97-114

    _Illustrations_:

    Overland Telegraph Party                                          98
    Government House and General Post Office, Adelaide                99
    Waterfall Gully, South Australia                                 100
    A Murray River Boat                                              101
    Adelaide in 1837                                                 102
    King William Street, Adelaide                                    104
    An Adelaide Public School                                        105
    Reaping in South Adelaide                                        106
    Camel Scenes                                                     108
    Peake Overland Telegraph Station                                 109
    Collingrove Station, South Australia                             111
    Sheep in the Shade of a Gum-tree                                 112
    The Botanical Gardens, Adelaide                                  114


    CHAPTER VII.

    QUEENSLAND.

    SIZE AND CONFIGURATION--EARLY SETTLEMENT--BRISBANE ISLAND AND
    COAST TOWNS--GLADSTONE--ROMA--GYMPIE--TOOWOOMBA--TOWNSVILLE--
    COOKTOWN--SQUATTING--THE CATTLE STATION--THE SHEEP STATION--THE
    QUEENSLAND FOREST--THE NETTLE-TREE--SUGAR PLANTING--POLYNESIAN
    NATIVES--STOPPAGE OF THE LABOUR TRADE--GOLD MINING--THE
    PALMER--SILVER, TIN, AND COPPER.                             115-130

    _Illustrations_:

    Brisbane                                                         116
    A Village on Darling Downs                                       117
    Valley of the River Brisbane, Queensland                         120
    Townsville, North Queensland                                     124
    Sugar Plantation, Queensland                                     127


    CHAPTER VIII.

    WESTERN AUSTRALIA.

    EARLY SETTLEMENT--MISTAKEN LAND SYSTEM--CONVICT LABOUR--THE
    SYSTEM ABANDONED--POISON PLANTS--PERTH--KING GEORGE'S
    SOUND--CLIMATE--PEARLS--PROSPECTS.                           131-140

    _Illustrations_:

    Sheep-Shearing                                                   132
    Perth                                                            133
    Government House, Perth                                          137
    Albany                                                           139


    CHAPTER IX.

    TASMANIA.

    A HOLIDAY RESORT FOR AUSTRALIANS--LAUNCESTON--THE NORTH AND
    SOUTH ESK--MOUNT BISCHOFF--A WILD DISTRICT--THE OLD MAIN
    ROAD--HOBART--THE DERWENT--PORT ARTHUR--CONVICTS--FACTS AND
    FIGURES.                                                     141-152

    _Illustrations_:

    View of Mount Wellington, Tasmania                               142
    Corra Linn, Tasmania                                             143
    On the South Esk, Tasmania                                       145
    Views in Tasmania                                                147
    Launceston                                                       148
    Hell Gate, Tasmania                                              149
    On the River Derwent                                             152




    SECTION III.--AUSTRALIAN LIFE AND PRODUCTS.


    CHAPTER X.

    HEROES OF EXPLORATION.

    TRAGIC STORIES--FLINDERS AND BASS--ADVENTURES IN A SMALL
    BOAT--DISCOVERIES--DISAPPEARANCE OF BASS--DEATH OF
    FLINDERS--EYRE'S JOURNEY--LUDWIG LEICHHARDT--DISAPPEARANCE OF
    HIS PARTY--THEORY OF HIS FATE--THE KENNEDY CATASTROPHE--THE
    BURKE AND WILLS EXPEDITION--ACROSS THE CONTINENT--THE DESERTED
    DEPÔT--SLOW DEATH BY STARVATION--LATER EXPEDITIONS.          153-164

    _Illustrations_:

    Native Encampment                                                154
    A New Clearing                                                   155
    Splitters in the Forest                                          157
    After Stray Cattle                                               160
    Monument to Burke and Wills in Melbourne                         163


    CHAPTER XI.

    A GLANCE AT THE ABORIGINES.

    FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH THE BLACKS--MISUNDERSTANDINGS--NARRATIVE OF
    A PIONEER--CLIMBING TREES--THE BLACKS' DEFENCE--DECAY OF THE
    RACE--WEAPONS--THE NORTHERN TRIBES--A NORTHERN
    ENCAMPMENT--CORROBOREE--BLACK TRACKERS--BURIAL--MISSION
    STATIONS.                                                    165-178

    _Illustrations_:

    A Corroboree                                                     166
    A Waddy Fight                                                    167
    Civilised Aborigines                                             169
    A Boomerang                                                      173
    A Native Encampment in Queensland                                174
    A Native Tracker                                                 175
    Church, Schoolhouse, and Encampment at Lake Tyers                176


    CHAPTER XII.

    SOME SPECIMENS OF AUSTRALIAN FAUNA AND FLORA.

    MARSUPIALS--THE 'TASMANIAN DEVIL'--DINGOES--KANGAROO
    HUNTING--THE LYRE-BIRD--BOWER-BIRD--THE GIANT KINGFISHER--EMU
    HUNTING--SNAKES--THE SHARK--ALLEGED MONOTONY OF
    VEGETATION--TROPICAL VEGETATION OF COAST--THE GIANT GUM--THE
    ROSTRATA--THE MALLEE SCRUB--FLOWERS AND SHRUBS.              179-202

    _Illustrations_:

    Australian Tree-Ferns                                            180
    Dingoes                                                          181
    The _Sarcophilus_ or 'Tasmanian Devil'                           182
    Bass River Opossum                                               183
    A Kangaroo Battue                                                184
    The Platypus                                                     186
    The Lyre-Bird                                                    187
    The Giant Kingfisher, or Laughing Jackass                        189
    The Emu                                                          190
    The Tiger-Snake                                                  192
    Australian Trees                                                 195
    Silver-stem Eucalypts                                            198
    The Bottle-Tree                                                  201
    Grass-Trees                                                      202


    CHAPTER XIII.

    THE SQUATTER AND THE SETTLER.

    PRESENT MEANING OF THE WORD 'SQUATTER'--CATTLE-RAISING--CAPITAL
    HAS CONFIDENCE IN SQUATTING NOW--ORIGIN OF MERINO
    SHEEP-BREEDING--MANAGEMENT OF A RUN--DROUGHT--BOX-TREE
    CLEARINGS--MODERN ENTERPRISE--SHEEP-SHEARING--'SUNDOWNERS'--FARMING
    PROSPECTS--CHEAP LAND--EASY HARVESTING--SMALL CAPITAL--SELECTION
    CONDITIONS--BUSH FIRES--BLACK THURSDAY--THE OTWAY DISASTER--LOST
    IN THE BUSH--MISSING CHILDREN.                               203-219

    _Illustrations_:

    Driving Cattle                                                   203
    A Merino Sheep                                                   206
    Ring Barking                                                     209
    A Bush Welcome                                                   213
    Before and After the Fire                                        216
    Found!                                                           218
    A Squatter's Station                                             219


    APPENDIX                                                         220

    INDEX                                                            221




SECTION I.

INTRODUCTORY.




CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

     AREA OF AUSTRALIA--ENGLAND'S HERITAGE--NATURAL
     RICHES--POPULATION--PRESENT PROSPECTS OF IMMIGRANTS--THE SIX
     COLONIES--FACILITIES OF TRAVEL--CHARACTER OF PEOPLE.

[Illustration: A NATIVE CLIMBING A TREE FOR OPOSSUM]

[Illustration: A ROAD THROUGH AN AUSTRALIAN FOREST.]


'Australian Pictures' must necessarily consist of peeps at Australia. It
seems presumptuous at first to ask that great island-continent to creep
into a single volume. But sketches of parts and bird's-eye views will
often reveal more to the stranger than a minute and fatiguing survey of
the whole. These pages, though few in number, will, it is hoped, convey
to the reader some idea of that vast new world where Saxons and Celts
are peacefully building up another Britain.

Some of the early errors about Australia must have already faded away.
Few can now believe that her birds are without voice and her flowers
without perfume, and that the continent itself is a desert fringed by a
habitable seaboard. Yet it is perhaps hardly realised by the many how
grand is the heritage secured in Australia for the British race. The
extent of territory is enormous. Twenty-five kingdoms the size of Great
Britain and Ireland could be carved out of this giant island and its
appendages, and still there would be a remainder. Its total area,
2,983,200 square miles, is only a little less than the area of Europe.

At first it was supposed that only a limited portion of this enormous
tract would be available for settlement, but this fear is dying out. The
central desert, that bugbear of a past generation, has an existence, but
man is pushing it farther and farther back. Where the explorer perished
through thirst a few years ago we now have the homestead and the
township; water is conserved, flocks are fed, the property, if it has to
be offered for sale, is described as 'that valuable and well-known
squatting block.' The tales that were first told were true enough, but
man, as he advances, subdues the country and ameliorates the climate.

Already Australia exports to the markets of the world the finest wheat,
the finest wool, and the finest gold. Her produce in these lines
commands the highest prices, and no test of superiority could be more
conclusive. In two at least of these items the export could be
indefinitely increased, and meat and wine can be added to the list. On
such articles as these man subsists, and they are produced here with a
minimum of expense and effort.

The total population of Australia is 2,800,000. The settlers have drawn
about themselves over 1,100,000 horses, 8,000,000 cattle, and 70,000,000
sheep. But three millions of men and tens of millions of creatures fail
to occupy; they do little more than dot the corners of the great lone
island. In the north-west of the continent there are tracts of country
which the white man has not yet penetrated. Tribes still roam there who
may have heard of the European stranger, but who have never seen him.
Adventurous spirits are now pushing into these distant regions, but
there will be pioneering work for many a long term of years, and after
the pioneer has had his day the task of settlement begins. Even in
Victoria and New South Wales, the most thickly populated of the
colonies, there are many fertile hillsides and valleys as yet untrodden
by man. The population has sought the plains, where the least
expenditure was required to make the earth bring forth its increase.
Some of the richest land in both colonies has yet to be appropriated,
the settler having neglected it because it has to be cleared. The giant
eucalypt of the uplands frightened the colonist away to the lightly
timbered, park-like plains; but now, thanks to the extension of the
railways, the mountain ash, the red gum, and the blackwood, with their
companions, are found to be sources of wealth. Thus, in the old states
and in the new territories alike, openings exist for the agriculturist
and the grazier as favourable as have ever been offered. More fortunes
have been made in Australia within the past ten years than have ever
been accumulated before. The labourer has put more money than ever into
the savings-bank or the building society. The farmer has more rapidly
become a comfortable, well-to-do personage; the grazier or squatter has
seen his income swell. The value of city property has increased as if by
magic. It may be truly said that the chances and prospects of the new
arrival are greater to-day, and are likely to be greater for years to
come, than they were even in the feverish flush of the gold era.

Australia is for the present divided into six colonies. As time rolls on
we may expect six times this number of states. If some of the larger
provinces were at all thickly populated they would be absolutely
unmanageable for administrative purposes. The states are named Victoria,
New South Wales, South Australia, Queensland, Western Australia and
Tasmania. They will be noticed in these pages in turn. Victoria, with an
area of 87,000 square miles, has a population of a little more than
1,000,000. Thus it is the most densely peopled of the group.
Agriculture, gold mining and wool growing are its prominent industries,
and it is the colony in which manufactures are most developed. New South
Wales has also a population of 1,000,000, with an area of 309,000 square
miles. She is a pastoral colony. Queensland, with an area of 668,000
square miles, has less than 350,000 people, a circumstance that shows
how little she has been developed. Her industries are pastoral and gold
mining; and in the far north sugar plantations have been established
under somewhat unhappy auspices. South Australia has an area of 903,000
square miles, and a population under 350,000. Much of her territory is
absolutely unexplored. Her little community is clustered about Adelaide,
and has relied so far upon the export of wool, copper and, above all,
wheat. Last of the continental states comes Western Australia, the
Cinderella of the group. Her population is only 35,000, her area is no
less than 975,000 square miles, much of it being absolutely unknown,
while the greater part has no other occupants than the black man, the
emu and the marsupial. Tasmania, the little island colony, has a
population of 135,000, and an area of 26,000 square miles.

All the capitals are on the seaboard, and, setting the Western
Australian Perth aside, the traveller can proceed from one to the other
either by the magnificent liners of the Peninsular and Oriental, the
Orient, and the British India Steam Navigation Companies, or he can
avail himself of splendid Clyde-built steamers run by local enterprise.
Very shortly he will be able to land at either Adelaide or Brisbane, and
journey from the one point to the other by rail, as the iron chain is
almost continuous now, and missing links are being rapidly completed.
Whichever capital he lands at, he will find a network of railways
branching into the interior, and seated behind the locomotive he can
visit places where a few years back the explorers perished! Only if he
is very ambitious of sight-seeing need he have recourse to coach, horse,
or the popular American--but acclimatised--buggy.

So far as the people are concerned, he will find that he is still in the
old country. Traveller after traveller, Mr. Archibald Forbes and Lord
Rosebery in turn, and a host of others, affirm that the typical
Australian is apt to be more English than the Englishman. There is no
aristocracy, it is true, and no National Church. Each state is a
democracy pure and simple, under the English flag. But the Queen has
nowhere more devoted and loyal subjects, and nowhere are the Churches
more numerous, more active, and apparently more blessed in results. The
traveller meets with English manners, English sympathies, and a frank
hospitality which, the compilers of books and the deliverers of lectures
affirm, is peculiar to Australia. But he finds the race amid novel
surroundings, amid scenery whose peculiarity is vastness, with a
distinctive vegetation unlike any other, with seasons which have little
resemblance to those of the old country; and the occupations of the
people, he discovers, are also often new. When a writer undertakes to
sketch the scene, it must be his fault if he has nothing of interest to
relate.

[Illustration: CORANDERRK STATION.]




CHAPTER II.

CONFIGURATION AND CLIMATE.

     DIMENSIONS OF AUSTRALIA--MOUNT KOSCIUSKO--THE MURRAY RIVER
     SYSTEM--WIND LAWS--THE HOT WIND--INTENSE HEAT PERIODS--THE EARLY
     EXPLORERS--STURT'S EXPERIENCE--BLACKS AND BUSH
     FIRES--DROUGHTS--UNEXPLORED AUSTRALIA.

[Illustration: THE GIANT GUM-TREE. [_See p. 196_]

[Illustration: RAILROAD THROUGH THE GIPPSLAND FOREST.]


It is not possible to understand Australia without a glance at the
physical conditions of the continent. A good angel and a bad, an evil
influence and a beneficial, are ever in contention in nature here. From
the surrounding sea come cool and grateful clouds; from the heated
interior come hot blasts, licking up life and absorbing the watery
vapours which would otherwise fall as rain. Sea and land are ever in
conflict.

[Illustration: JUNCTION OF MURRAY AND DARLING RIVERS.]

Australia measures from north to south 1700 miles, and from east to west
2400 miles--the total area being somewhat greater than that of the
United States of America, and somewhat less than the whole of Europe.
The peculiarity is that all its mountain ranges worth taking notice
of--all that are factors in the climate--are comparatively near the
coast. Thus the main dip is rather inland than outward, and this
formation is fatal to great rivers. An interior mountain chain such as
the New Zealand Alps would have transformed the country. The enormous
coast-line from Spencer's Gulf to King George's Sound is not broken by
the mouth of any stream. Such rainfall as there is in this district must
drain either into the sea by subterranean channels, or into the inland
marshy depressions called Lake Eyre, Lake Gairdner, and Lake Amadeus,
which are sometimes extremely shallow sheets of water, sometimes grassy
plains, and sometimes desert. The best land is that between the various
ranges and the sea, because there most rain falls. And the greatest of
the ranges is that which runs from north to south along the east coast
of the island, passing through Queensland, New South Wales, and
Victoria, and culminating in Mount Kosciusko, whose peak is 7120 feet
high, and whose ravines always contain snow. Only at Kosciusko does snow
lie all the year round in Australia, though the mountains near it, about
6000 feet high, are also almost always covered. To this range we owe the
one river system at all worthy of the continent. The waters from the
western side of the Queensland mountains--there called the Dividing
Range--flow down the Warrego into the Darling. Here they are joined by
the waters from the higher ranges of New South Wales and Victoria,
called the Australian Alps. These waters have been brought down by the
Murray, the Murrumbidgee, and the Goulburn, and the united floods fall
into the sea, through Lake Alexandrina, between Melbourne and Adelaide.

On paper this river system shows well. The Darling has been navigated up
to Walgett, which is 2345 miles from the sea, and this distance entitles
the Australian stream to rank third among the rivers of the world, only
the Mississippi and the Amazon coming before it. But the facts are not
so good as they seem. The Darling depends upon flood waters. Sometimes
these flood waters will come down in sufficient volume to enable the
stream to run from end to end, and sometimes they fail half-way. The
river is never open to navigation all the year round, and frequently it
is not open to navigation from year's end to year's end. The occasional
failure of the Darling for so long a period upsets all calculations. The
colonists will take this stream and the river Murray in hand some day,
and will lock both and preserve their storm waters, and the
south-eastern corner of the continent will then have a grand river
communication. Stores will then be sent up, and wool will be brought
down with certainty, where now all is doubt and speculation. Commissions
to consider the subject have been appointed both by the Victorian
Government and the Government of New South Wales, and conferences are
this year (1886) being held upon it and cognate subjects. Unhappily,
there are no other streams in Australia that can be so dealt with,
though it should be added that the last has not yet been heard of the
rivers of Northern Australia. We are ignorant of their capacities,
though a good guess can be made about them.

Taking Australia from east to west, we find a high range skirting the
coast on the east, and supporting a dense sub-tropical vegetation, and
giving rise to an extensive but uncertain river system. Next comes a
more sterile interior, composed of desert, of shallow salt lakes, and of
higher steppes in unknown proportions. Approaching the west coast we
meet ranges again, and rivers and fertile country.

Mr. H. C. Russell, Government Astronomer for New South Wales, in his
valuable pamphlet on the 'Physical Geography and Climate of New South
Wales,' points out that 'if water flowed over the whole of the
Australian continent, the trade wind would then blow steadily over the
northern portions from the south-east, and above it the like steady
return current would blow to the south-east, while the "brave west
winds" and southerly would hold sway over the other half--conditions
which now exist a short distance from the coast. Into this system
Australia introduces an enormous disturbing element, of which the great
interior plains form the most active agency in changing the directions
of the wind currents. The interior, almost treeless and waterless, acts
in summer like a great oven with more than tropical heating power, and
becomes the great motor force on our winds, by causing an uprush, and
consequent inrush on all sides, especially on the north-west, where it
has power sufficient to draw the north-east trade over the equator, and
into a north-west monsoon, in this way wholly obliterating the
south-east trade belonging to the region, and bringing the monsoon with
full force on to Australia, where, being warmed, and receiving fresh
masses of heated air, it rises and forms part of the great return
current from the equator to the south.'

The 'hot winds' of the colonists are produced by the sinking down to the
surface of the heated current of air, which in summer is continually
passing overhead; and when this wind blows in force upon a clear
summer's day things are not pleasant. The thermometer from time to time
indicates a degree of heat which is almost incredible. In Southern
Melbourne the official record gives a reading of 179 degrees in the sun,
and 111 in the shade, and at the inland town of Deniliquin, the official
register in the shade is 121 degrees. Man and beast and vegetation
suffer on these days. The birds drop dead from the trees, the fruit is
scorched and rendered unfit for market. The leaves of the English trees,
such as the plane and the elm, drop in profusion, so that in early
summer it will seem as if autumn had set in. The sick, especially
children, are terribly affected, and the doctors attending an infant
sufferer will say that nothing can be done except to pray for a change
of wind. Happily, such days as these are rare. The hot blast will not
often send the temperature up to more than 100 to 105 degrees, and the
duration of the heated wind is limited to three days, and often it
prevails during only one, sunset bringing with it a cool southern gale.

A moderate hot wind is relished by many people, for the air is dry and
even exhilarating to the strong for a while; and the claim is made that
it destroys noxious germs and effluvia. Sometimes the hot wind will
gradually die out, but on other occasions a rushing storm will come up
from the south, driving the north wind before it, and in that case the
welcome conflict will be preceded by whirling and blinding clouds of
dust, and will be accompanied by thunder and lightning and torrents of
rain. The fall of the temperature will be something marvellous. The
thermometer will be standing at 150° in the sun; then the wind will
change, rain will fall, and in the evening the register will be 50°,
making a difference of 100 degrees in seven or eight hours.

That these days are exceptional is shown by the manner in which
vegetation generally flourishes, and by the admiration which each
colonist has for the climate of that particular part of Australia in
which he resides. 'The Swan Settlements,' says the Western Australian,
'are the pick of the country. No hot winds there.' At Adelaide the
visitor is told: 'Yes, we are often hotter by ten degrees in the sun
than they are in Melbourne, but ours is a dry, not a moist heat.' In
Melbourne the tale is reversed: 'Sydney is muggy,' it is averred; 'you
cannot stand that. A dry heat is the thing, but those poor beggars at
Adelaide have it too hot altogether.'

No doubt many mistakes occurred in the descriptions of Australia given
by the early explorers. Brave and intelligent as they were, they were
'new chums,' and certainly not born bushmen. Transplanted from a small
island, continental features overpowered them. Forests which took weeks
to traverse; plains, like the ocean, horizon-bounded; the vast length of
our rivers when compared to those of England, often flowing immense
distances without change or tributary--now all but dry for hundreds of
miles, at other times flooding the countries on their banks to the
extent of inland seas--wearied them. Then we know that our cloudless
skies, the mirage, the long-sustained high range of the thermometer in
the central portion of the continent, troubled them a good deal more
than they do us, and helped to make them look on the dark side of
things. Hence, as a rule, their reports were unfavourable.

Sturt's account of his detention at Depôt Glen is enough to frighten
anybody, and cannot be read to this day without emotion. Here, 'stuck
up' by want of water, he dug an underground room, and he and his men
passed a terrible summer. The heat was sometimes as high as 130 degrees
in the shade, and in the sun it was altogether intolerable. They were
unable to write, as the ink dried at once on their pens; their combs
split; their nails became brittle and readily broke; and if they touched
a piece of metal it blistered their fingers. Month after month passed
without a shower of rain. Sometimes they watched the clouds gather, and
they could hear the distant roll of thunder, but there fell not a drop
to refresh the dry and dusty desert. The party began to grow thin and
weak; Mr. Poole, the second in command, became ill with scurvy. At
length, when the winter was approaching, a gentle shower moistened the
plain; and preparations were being made to send the sick man quickly to
the Darling, when Poole died, and the mournful cavalcade returned,
leaving a grave in the wilderness. Yet this locality proved in time to
be a very good sheep-run, differing in nothing from others around it;
and eventually was found to be a gold-field, and was extensively worked.
Runs about the spot are commonly advertised in the Melbourne or Sydney
papers as carrying immense flocks, and as valued with the stock at from
£50,000 to £100,000. The explorer was, in fact, within a few miles of
Cooper's Creek.

This process of conquering the interior is still going on. Man modifies
all countries, and Australia is no exception to the rule. Even the
blacks played their part, and it was a mischievous one. They had an
instrument in their hands by which they influenced the whole course of
nature. This was the fire-stick. With this implement the aborigines were
constantly setting fire to the grass and trees, both accidentally and
systematically, for hunting purposes, and probably in their day almost
every part of New Holland was swept over by a fierce fire on an average
once in five years. Hence the baked, calcined condition of the ground in
many parts of the continent, the character of our vegetation, and the
comparative scarcity of animal life. The eucalypts survived the fiery
ordeal, because of the hardness of their bark; and, when every other
creature perished, or had to abandon its litter, the marsupials leaped
over the flames with their young in their pouches. Strange as the
assertion may appear in the first instance, it may be doubted whether
any section of the human race has exercised a greater influence on the
physical condition of a large portion of the globe than the wandering
savages of Australia. The white man is working in an entirely opposite
direction. By clearing the forest he limits the area of the bush fire.
He constructs reservoirs, dams rivers, sinks wells in order to bring
subterranean water to the surface, and irrigates land, so that a spot
where even the hardiest scrub failed to grow in its natural state, is
covered with luxuriant crops. Province after province has been rescued
from the wilderness already, and the grand work is likely to go on.
Those who look at what has been done in the way of reclaiming territory
in Australia will be in no hurry to set bounds as to what man is likely
to perform.

It is not wonderful that the first inquiry of the practical settler
should be as to the rainfall of the country he proposes to occupy. The
map most eagerly scanned in Australia is the 'rainfall' map, prepared by
the Government, and issued by the leading weekly papers. A glance at
this production reveals the tale which it tells. The coast-line is shown
in a dark blue, to indicate the heavy rainfall of from thirty to seventy
inches. A pleasant blue represents a moderate rainfall on the interior
belt of plains, averaging from fifteen to twenty-five inches. Then comes
a faint tint spread over what is called the 'never, never' country,
where the rainfall is five or ten inches per annum, and where the rain
will descend at once, or for two years there will be none, and then the
whole average supply will drop from the clouds in one rushing downpour.
Under such circumstances it will be readily imagined that the terror of
the Australian settler is a drought. Even in the moments of his utmost
prosperity he has his anxieties about the next season. A district which
has been rainless for a year or two years is a pitiful spectacle of
desolation. The grass disappears; the wind carries with it whirling
columns of dust; the trees of the dreary plain become more sombre and
mournful than ever. If there is a little water left in any dam or
reservoir, it is rendered putrid by the carcases of sheep and cattle,
for the wretched animals become so weak that, once they fall or stick,
they are unable to rise or to extricate themselves. The sun rises in
heat, sails through a cloudless sky, and sets a ball of fire. The nights
are dewless. The moon only renders more ghastly the depressing
panorama.

Mr. Russell complains that pictures of the drought are usually
exaggerated, and it may be well therefore to quote official figures. In
two years, according to Mr. Dibbs, Treasurer and Premier of New South
Wales (November 1885), the drought in New South Wales has killed 200,000
horses, 1,500,000 head of cattle, and 13,500,000 sheep. A loss which is
estimated at from £10,000,000 to £15,000,000 has fallen upon a single
colony, and a single industry in that colony! But this drought was felt
with equal severity in parts of South Australia and of Queensland, and
it would be no exaggeration therefore to double the figures communicated
to Parliament by Mr. Dibbs. And when 400,000 horses, 3,000,000 cattle,
and 27,000,000 sheep die miserably of hunger and thirst, it is certain
that scenes must occur the gloom and wretchedness of which can hardly be
over-painted. One squatting company in the north lost 150,000 sheep out
of 250,000 in the drought in question, and the survivors were kept alive
with difficulty. Scrub was cut down for them. The living gnawed the
bones of the dead. The company's shares went down to two shillings in
the pound, and other squatting property similarly situated was equally
depreciated, when one January morning, 1886, the Melbourne, Sydney,
Brisbane, and Adelaide papers gave prominence to the welcome news of the
break-up of the drought. From this place, that place, and the other, all
down the line, came telegrams of the fall of three inches, four inches,
five inches, and six inches of rain, the water saturating the ground,
filling the dams, and sending the price of pastoral property up as
though by magic.

The drought disaster, of course, is most felt in the newly taken-up
country. Here a state of nature obtains, while, as time rolls on, and
profits are made, water is conserved, and the run is practically made
drought-proof. A minimum quantity of stock can be kept, and the
remainder can be travelled to a district which is not smitten. The
recuperative powers of the country are enormous; and if the squatter is
afflicted one year he holds on, with the consciousness that with three
or four good seasons in succession he is a made man.

How little we yet know of Australia as a whole has been brought under
the popular notice by an address delivered by Mr. Ernest Favenc at a
meeting of the Australian Geographical Society, held at Sydney in
January 1886. South Australia alone has an area of 250,000 square miles
unexplored, and Western Australia has an enormous tract of 500,000
square miles, which has been just rushed through, and no more, by three
explorers, Messrs. Forrest, Giles, and Warburton. Here is a total of
unknown area equivalent to the heart of Europe--say to Germany, France,
Switzerland, Austria, and Hungary, with Italy thrown in. Of course the
country to the west of the Overland Telegraph Line, being for the most
part unknown, is all described as hopeless desert, but Mr. Favenc doubts
the story, and no one is better qualified to express an opinion upon the
subject than this gentleman. He stands in the first rank of practical
pioneers. The facts that go to support the idea of the existence of
large belts of rich prairie land in this huge area are these: In the far
interior the transition from barren desert country to rolling downs is
sudden and abrupt; without warning, you step from one to the other. The
good and the bad country lie very much in bands; and an explorer making
an easterly and westerly track might travel in a bad band continuously,
if he had the misfortune to strike one.

Mr. Favenc's suggestion is that a well-supplied party should start from
a station on the Overland Telegraph Line, and should strike for Perth,
making, however, extensive excursions on both sides of their route. The
bee-line business is almost useless. It would be well if the Australian
Geographical Society could take up the idea, for it is somewhat of a
reproach to the three millions of inhabitants that Australia should be
less mapped out than Africa; and there is pleasure also in reducing to
its narrowest limits that bugbear of the youth of the colonies, the
great fiery untamed Central Desert.

If, however, no more exploration be resolved upon, the work will only be
postponed, and not abandoned. As one coral insect builds over the other,
or as one wave on a rising tide overlaps its predecessor on the shore,
so the last outlying pastoral station is speedily passed by one just
beyond it. In this way settlement creeps on. Progress, though slow and
unsensational, is sure.

[Illustration: THE NATIONAL MUSEUM, MELBOURNE.]




CHAPTER III.

THE AUSTRALIAN PEOPLE.

     AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACIES--THE FEDERAL MOVEMENT--IMMIGRATION--CURRENT
     WAGES--COST OF LIVING--ABSENCE OF AN ESTABLISHED CHURCH--RELIGION
     IN THE RURAL DISTRICTS--A TYPICAL SERVICE--SUNDAY
     OBSERVANCE--MISSION WORK--CHURCH BUILDING.

[Illustration: STATUE OF PRINCE ALBERT IN SYDNEY.]

[Illustration: THE BOWER-BIRD.]


The Australian colonies are, one and all, democracies of the most
advanced type. Annual Parliaments have been advocated, though at present
triennial legislatures are the rule. Payment of members, it should be
added, is not adopted by all the states, but the principle seems to be
spreading. Two Houses are established in each colony, a Legislative
Assembly and a Legislative Council. The former is always elected by
manhood suffrage; the latter, as in Victoria and South Australia, may be
an elected body, or, as in New South Wales and Queensland, it may be
composed of members nominated by the Crown. How the second chamber
should be constituted is one of the problems of the day. Every now and
then one or the other of the colonies is treated to 'a deadlock' between
the two bodies; and more than once in Victoria public payments have been
suspended in consequence, and popular passion has run high.

The Australian democracy has worked well upon the whole, and has given
security to life and property. The best proof of this is the rapid rise
of colonial securities in the public favour. When New South Wales, South
Australia, and Victoria commenced to build their national railways in
1857-1860, they were glad to sell six per cent. debentures at par in
London, and now they float four per cent. loans at a premium.

The colony of Victoria is altogether protectionist, and South Australia
has given in a partial adherence to the system. To the author the policy
seems to be wrong in theory and practice, but the belief is widespread
that, even if sacrifices are made, the resources of the colony are thus
developed.

Twenty years back the populations of the various colonies did not touch
each other: each colony spread from its own centre; but now this
isolation has disappeared. Settlement is contiguous with settlement, and
trade and intercourse are accelerated accordingly. The colonies can no
longer ignore each other, and hence the movement for federation has
gathered strength.

The first Federal Council met in Hobart in January 1886, but
unfortunately jealousies had crept in, and the new body was shorn of its
fair proportions. Federalists cannot help feeling greatly disappointed
that the results hitherto have been so small, and yet probably there is
much more to rejoice over than to be downcast about.

Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia were represented at
the Council, and such laws as it can pass will thus affect three-fifths
of the area of the continent. The absence of South Australia is
understood to be accidental. She is really one of the parties to the
federal bond, having agreed to the terms, and having invited the
Imperial Parliament to pass the Enabling Act, and her early adhesion is
expected with confidence. No continental state will then remain outside
except New South Wales, and it is fairly to be presumed that she will
not be insensible to the pressure of public opinion, both in Australia
and throughout the Empire, especially as care is being taken to soothe
the local susceptibilities that are now offended. The Federal Council
meets for the present at Hobart, the chief town of Tasmania, and this
town may, for the present, be called the 'federal capital.'

The immigration into Australia is about eighty thousand men and women
yearly. If double or treble that number came, they could well be
accommodated. The labourer of to-day is the employer of to-morrow; and
as soon as a man acquires landed property his chief complaint is the
paucity of hands to improve his holding.

A few specimens of wages may be taken from the official list of Mr. H.
H. Hayter, Government Statist of Victoria. On the whole, labour is more
in request in Victoria than in most of the sister states, and the
figures may be taken as representing fair average rates for Australia
generally. Servants, with board, coachmen, and grooms, 20_s._ to 30_s._
per week; female cooks, £40 to £65 per annum; laundresses, £35 to £52
per annum; general servants, 10_s._ to 14_s._ per week (these figures
are for 1884, and there has been a heavy rise in 1885-6); ploughmen,
25_s._ per week and board; blacksmiths, 10_s._ to 14_s._ per day;
boiler-makers, 10_s._ to 14_s._ per day; plumbers, £3 to £3 10_s._ per
week; lumpers, 10_s._ to 12_s._ per day; masons, carpenters, bricklayers
and plasterers, 10_s._ to 12_s._ per day.

On the other hand, the necessaries of life are cheap. Bread is 6_d._ the
4lb. loaf, and beef and mutton are retailed at from 3_d._ to 8_d._ per
lb.; butter varies from 9_d._ to 1_s._ 6_d._ according to the season;
milk is 4_d._ to 6_d._ per quart; potatoes 2_s._ 6_d._ to 4_s._ per
cwt.; tea 1_s._ 6_d._ to 2_s._ 6_d._ per lb.; rabbits are sold at 1_s._
per pair, and hares at 2_s._ each.

In the Australian colonies there is neither an Established Church, nor
is any aid given by the State to the cause of religion. The
denominations are now entirely dependent upon the voluntary exertions of
their members for support. A strong feeling has grown up both among
politicians and the people in Australia that the State ought not to
interfere in ecclesiastical matters upon any pretext. The Churches,
therefore, are simply corporations empowered to hold property upon
certain conditions, and at liberty to manage their own affairs as they
think fit.

There are, however, great difficulties in the way of maintaining
religious services regularly. In many of the country districts the
population is sparse and scattered; and, however willing the people may
be, the paucity of their numbers renders it hard for them to support a
church. Only a mere handful can be gathered together, most of whom have
a hard struggle in their private lives; for, although they own the land
which they cultivate, they have to wait until it is cleared for the
expected return. The difficulty is enhanced by the fact that each
denomination wishes to have a footing in every village, in order to meet
the wants of its own people. In many townships where there is room for
one strong and self-supporting Protestant congregation, there are three
or four, each of which is embarrassed by its own weakness. Some attempt
has been made to prevent the weaknesses of disunion by co-operation
among the Churches. The Episcopalians and the Presbyterians combine to
support a society which is intended to supply the religious wants of the
rural population. The money that is thus raised is spent principally in
the erection of buildings, which are used alternately by clergymen of
each denomination, so that the preferences of the people for their own
form of service are gratified at the least cost, and without any
rivalry.

By such means the Churches have spread their network well over the land.
There is not a township of any importance that cannot boast of two or
three neat and substantial edifices dedicated to the service of God.
There is not a district that is not visited at intervals by ministers or
agents of the different denominations, some of whom have to ride long
distances in order to overtake every part. The vast plains that stretch
between the rivers Darling and Murray are traversed by clergymen who
visit from station to station. The deep forests of Gippsland and the
Otway ranges, inhabited by a hardy race of farmers whose lives are
spent in clearing the jungle, are not left unprovided for. Though
everything is not done that could be desired, it may be said with
perfect truth that the Churches strive earnestly to keep pace with the
continual migration of the people towards the backwoods of the country.

It is a pleasant thing to attend a rural service on a typical Australian
day, when the sun is hot and the sky cloudless, and the whole landscape
steeped in peace and quiet. Driving along the road, we see the sheep
couched in the grass, or we pass a clearing where wheat and oats are
growing among the blackened stumps of fallen trees; and nothing disturbs
the stillness of the scene save, perhaps, the lazy motion of a crow, or
the rush of a startled native bear, a sleepy, gentle, little animal, an
enlarged edition of the opossum. The church stands a little apart from
the few houses that form the infant township. It is generally built of
wood, and surrounded by tall gum-trees, which, however, afford a very
scanty shade from the burning heat. Here is gathered on the Sunday
morning a collection of buggies and horses, for the people come long
distances, and it is necessary in Australia to drive or ride. The
congregation stand in groups before the door, chatting over the week's
news, and waiting for the clergyman to arrive. The Day of Rest is the
only day in the week in which they have an opportunity of meeting, and
many come early and loiter with their neighbours till the service
begins. They are all browned and tanned by scorching suns, but they
speak with the self-same accent that they learnt at home. There are
Scotchmen of whom, to judge by their speech and appearance, it is hard
to believe that they have not very recently left their native glens, and
Irishmen whose brogue is wholly uncorrupted by change of climate. Most
of them, however, have been settled for many years on the land,
retaining their old customs in the solitude of the bush, and among the
rest a due regard for the worship of God. The children have caught, to
some extent, the tone of their parents, and one could almost imagine
oneself in a remote parish of Britain. The service itself heightens the
illusion. The hymn-tunes are old and familiar, and sung very slowly to
the accompaniment of a harmonium. The exhortation of the preacher is
brief, telling the old and yet ever new story of the Saviour's love, and
it is listened to with evident attention. One hour suffices for the
whole worship, and the audience contentedly disperse, and turn their
faces towards their lonely homes.

In the towns the organisation of the different Churches is effective.
Their agencies are at work in the poorer quarters of the large cities,
where the evils that exist in the Old World are showing themselves on a
smaller scale. They have stood out strenuously for the observance of the
Lord's Day, and with marked success. Sunday observance, if not so strict
as it is in Scotland, is more general than in England. There is no
postal delivery. Trains are not run on the main lines, and a limited
suburban traffic is alone allowed. All movements for restricting labour
on the Sunday meet with cordial sympathy and practical support.

[Illustration: THE INDEPENDENT CHURCH, COLLINS STREET, MELBOURNE.]

Though now independent in their government of the Churches in England by
which they were originally founded, and which they continue to
represent, the colonial Churches maintain a close relationship with the
mother-country. Bishops, and the best preachers, are still brought from
home to the colonies. All the important congregations send to England
for a minister when there happens to be a vacancy, and all the men who
have made a deep impression on the community have been trained there.
The whole religious and spiritual life of the colonies is inspired and
stimulated by that of England, both in the sense that they naturally
lean upon the stronger thought of English writers, and that they are
guided by ministers who have studied in British universities. There are
colleges connected with the more important denominations, which, it is
hoped, will gradually grow till they rival those of other lands. As yet
they are incompletely equipped, and one or two men have to bear the
brunt of work that is usually divided among four or five.

In a new country, which attracts to itself all sorts and conditions of
men, nearly every form of belief is represented. Many of the sects,
however, are very small, and may be said to be practically confined to
the metropolitan cities. The Catholic Apostolic Church, the
Swedenborgians, Lutherans, Moravians, Unitarians, and various bodies of
unattached Protestants, are thus limited. The Episcopalians, the Roman
Catholics, the Presbyterians and Methodists have by far the largest hold
on the people, while Independents and Baptists are fairly numerous and
influential. Altogether, the Churches provide accommodation for more
than one-half of the people, and the ordinary attendance at their
principal weekly service amounts to fully one-third.

Sunday-schools flourish in every part of the country. The total number
of children attending them is returned in Victoria as 73-1/2 per cent.
of the whole who are at the school age, and the average is not much less
in any other colony. When allowance is made for the children who are
kept at home by parents that prefer to give their own instruction, and
for those in the country who cannot well attend a Sunday-school, it is
evident that there are comparatively few who receive no religious
education at all.

The love of church building, which every nation has displayed, is by no
means wanting among the Australians. In every town the ecclesiastical
edifices are the chief features, and in the larger cities some of them
are imposing structures. Cathedrals are gradually rising in different
places. Even the Churches which are not usually credited with paying
much respect to outward appearance are inclined to beautify their
buildings.

It would be too much to expect that the denominations could lay aside
their differences and unite. But a very kindly feeling exists for the
most part between them, whether it be due to their equality, or to the
novel circumstances in which they were placed when they began their
work. That it may continue and tend to further co-operation is the
earnest wish of all.

Statistics, giving the most recent facts about the condition of the
various Churches in the colonies, will be found in the Appendix.




SECTION II.

BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF THE COLONIES.




CHAPTER IV.

VICTORIA.

     PORT PHILLIP--EARLY SETTLEMENT AND ABANDONMENT--THE PIONEERS HENTY,
     BATMAN AND FAWKNER--SIZE OF VICTORIA--MELBOURNE--ITS
     APPEARANCE--PUBLIC BUILDINGS--STREETS--RESERVES--PRIDE OF ITS
     PEOPLE--UNEARNED INCREMENT--SANDHURST--BALLARAT--THE CAPITAL OF THE
     INTERIOR--GEELONG--THE WESTERN DISTRICT--VIEW OF THE
     LAKES--PORTLAND--THE WHEAT PLAINS--SHEPPERTON--THE
     MALLEE--GIPPSLAND--MOUNTAIN RANGES--SCHOOL SYSTEM--COBB'S
     COACHES--FACTS AND FIGURES.

[Illustration: SEMI-CIVILISED VICTORIAN ABORIGINES.]

[Illustration: GOVERNMENT HOUSE, MELBOURNE.]


It is strange that Victoria should be one of the youngest of the
colonies, for Port Phillip was amongst the places first noticed by the
early settlers of the continent. Lieutenant Grant, commanding the little
brig _Lady Nelson_, observed the inlet in the year 1800, when _en route_
for Sydney. In 1802 Governor King, of New South Wales, dispatched the
_Lady Nelson_, under Lieutenant Murray, to explore and report. The
account given was most favourable of the extent of the bay, the security
of its anchorages, and the beauty and apparent fertility of its shores.
The result was that it was decided to establish a convict settlement on
the shores of the gulf, and in 1803 Colonel Collins and a party of
prisoners, with their guards, landed at the site of the now fashionable
seaside resort, which has been called Sorrento at the instance of Sir
Charles Gavan Duffy, one of the first landowners there. To the lover of
beauty the scene, gazing from Sorrento down Capel Sound, is fair; the
blue sea ripples at your feet; the high hills around Dromana, draped
with the rich ultramarine blue not to be found outside of Australia,
form a charming background on which one can gaze and gaze again. But the
prose of the situation for Governor Collins was that he was landed on a
well-nigh waterless sand-spit, the most sterile portion of the district,
the resort to-day of the admirers of loveliness, but shunned even to-day
by the practical settler. The citizen in his Sorrento villa is lulled by
the roar of the league-long surf which ever breaks on the rocky ocean
beach, scarcely a mile away. But circumstances alter human views, and
the historian of the expedition reports that the monotonous booming of
the breakers irritated and depressed both soldiers and convicts, and
made a miserable company still more wretched. A search was made for
water that was not brackish, but the right places were missed, and at
last, happily for all concerned, the settlement was abandoned in favour
of the Hobart colony. Governor Collins rejoiced to get away from the
spot, the soldiers rejoiced, and the convicts also, and posterity will
never leave off rejoicing that Victoria was left to be a 'free colony'
from its inception.

The bad name given to the Port Phillip district clung to it for nearly a
generation. The great central desert was supposed to extend to the
sea-coast in this direction; but gradually the real district was
discovered by 'overlanders' from New South Wales, and at last, in 1824,
Hovell and Hume crossed the Murray river, skirted the Australian Alps,
and struck the shores of Port Phillip between Geelong and Melbourne.
Later on the Messrs. Henty, crossing from Tasmania, established a
whaling-station in Portland Bay, and began cultivation also. So the new
land was more and more talked about in the existing settlements, just as
the new country in North-western Australia is being talked of in Sydney
and Melbourne to-day. Tasmania sent the first batch of colonists, an
association, with Mr. John Batman at its head, being formed to take up
land there. In one sense Batman did take up land on an enormous scale.
He landed in May, 1835. He says in a despatch to the Governor of
Tasmania: 'After some time and full explanation, I found eight chiefs
amongst them who possessed the whole of the territory near Port Phillip.
Three brothers, all of the same name, were the principal chiefs, and two
of them, men six feet high, very good-looking; the other not so tall,
but stouter. The chiefs were fine men. After explanation of what my
object was, I purchased five large tracts of land from them--about
600,000 acres, more or less--and delivered over to them blankets,
knives, looking-glasses, tomahawks, beads, scissors, flour, &c., as
payment for the land; and also agreed to give them a tribute or rent
yearly. The parchment the eight chiefs signed this afternoon, delivering
to me some of the soil, each of them, as giving me full possession of
the tracts of land.' How the blacks could sign a parchment is somewhat
of a mystery. Batman seems to have recognised that a performance of this
kind would be laughed at, and so he goes on to describe another signing
away which took place. He travelled about with the natives, marking
boundary trees.

Batman was a hardy bushman, and acquired great fame in Tasmania by his
courage in capturing a notorious convict desperado; but if he imagined
that these deeds and purchases would ever be recognised, he was as
simple as the blacks themselves. As a matter of fact, no one ever took
any notice of them. Within a few weeks after the transaction, the second
or Fawkner party of settlers were on the river Yarra, had landed in the
gully now called Elizabeth Street, Melbourne, and the future capital had
been founded. When the deeds were shown to the new arrivals, they
laughed and declined to move on, but proceeded to clear away the site of
the city. Batman died from the effects of a severe cold in 1839, and
'Batman's Hill,' where he built his hut, has been cleared away to make
room for the great Spencer Street railway station. John Batman would
probably have become a rich man had he lived, but his estate was
frittered away, and his grandchildren are now working in the mass for
their living. Quite recently, a subscription having been organised for
the purpose, a suitable monument was placed over the grave of the
pioneer in the old Melbourne cemetery. The blacks would certainly have
very much liked the terms which Batman made with them to have been
respected, for Batman spoke of a yearly rent, and no one afterwards ever
dreamed of such a provision.

The rival pioneer was much more fortunate. John Pascoe Fawkner lived to
a ripe old age, became a member of the Legislative Council, and
'Fawkner's Park,' a handsome city reserve, perpetuates his name; while
his portrait is in the Victorian National Gallery. The last time the
author met the shrewd old man was in 1870, when he had stopped his
carriage on the Eastern Hill to gaze wistfully at the scene, and was
ready to talk with animation about the changes that had passed over it.
Those changes had been great indeed. On the whole, the lieutenant of the
convoy ship _Calcutta_ was not exactly happy in his prophecy, when he
wrote as he sailed away: 'The kangaroo now reigns undisturbed lord of
the Port Phillip soil, and he is likely to retain his dominion for
ages.' Sir Thomas Mitchell was more felicitous when, being commissioned
by the Sydney Government to explore and report on the country to the
south of the Murray, he wrote back in 1836-7: 'A land more favourable
for colonisation could not be found. This is _Australia Felix_.'

[Illustration: MELBOURNE, 1840. (_From the original sketch by Mr. S. H.
Haydon._)]

The surface of this south-eastern corner of Australia is strangely
diversified, and hence its charm. Its own south-eastern region is
occupied by the Australian Alps. Hundreds of peaks rising from 4000 to
7000 feet in height secure here an abundant rainfall, and in the
sheltered gullies a noble vegetation is to be found; then come the
uplands sloping down to the Murray plains. And back from the western
seaboard stretches the beautiful so-called Western District, composed of
open rolling plains studded with lakes, and with the isolated cones of
extinct volcanoes. A grand and terrible sight they must have presented
when these agents were at work sending forth fire, ashes and water, but,
happily for man, their powers have departed long, long ago. Mount
Franklin shows no sign of becoming a second Vesuvius, and the volcanic
deposit has secured for the west a wonderful luxuriance of growth--such
a growth as the grazier dearly loves. The beauty of the eastern district
of Victoria is of the kind that delights the artist; the pleasant
western spectacle is grateful to the banker. The capitalist will
build a cottage home in the one, but he will advance money freely on the
acres of the other. The gold-fields are the least picturesque of any
portion of the Austral region, though as gold-fields they possess a
romance of their own.

[Illustration: A RAILWAY PIER IN MELBOURNE IN 1886.]

But, turning from the country to the town, we have first and foremost
that special pride of Victoria, the great city of Melbourne. Batman
proclaimed the site 'a good spot for a village,' and the village has
become a metropolis. We give an engraving showing what Melbourne was
like in 1840, and as a contrast, one of a railway pier in the same city
forty-six years later. Its population of over 350,000 puts Melbourne
into the rank of the first score of the cities of the empire. And if
area were considered as the test, the city would not easily be
surpassed, except by London itself, for a ten miles' radius from the
Post Office is required to cover it all. There is much filling in to be
done, of course, but Brighton, Oakleigh, Surrey Hills, and other of the
long distance suburbs have not only been built up to, but are being
passed by the spreading population. The city itself is a compact mass of
about a mile and a half square, encircled by large parks and gardens,
all the property of the people, and permanently reserved for their use.
Built upon a cluster of small rolling hills, the views of Melbourne are
pleasantly interrupted, and yet it is possible to obtain frequent
glimpses from commanding points, either of the whole or of parts of the
whole. You will turn a corner and come upon a panoramic peep of streets,
of sea and of spires that takes one's breath away. Near Bishopscourt you
have one of these 'coigns of vantage.' You see the busy town below, and
hear its hum. On the one side are the suburbs where artisan and clerk
and small tradesman have their long rows of cottages and houses, costing
from £200 to £2,000 each, while on the other side are the high lands of
Malvern and Toorak, where the successful squatter, speculator, and
storekeeper have erected mansions, standing in at present prices from
£5,000 to £50,000. Government House, the residence of His Excellency,
the representative of the Crown, is a conspicuous object to the south;
to the north is the handsome Exhibition Building, in which the gathering
of 1880 was held. Numerous places of amusement speak of a
pleasure-loving people. The two or three spires upon every hill proclaim
a Christian community not averse to spending money and making sacrifices
for its religion. There is no veneer. The cottage is usually of brick;
the public buildings, from the twin cathedrals of the Roman and Anglican
Churches downwards, are of stone, which is costly here. The mushroom
Melbourne of 1857 has been exchanged for Mr. G. A. Sala's 'Marvellous
Melbourne' of the present year of grace, 1886.

[Illustration: A MELBOURNE SUBURBAN HOUSE.]

Melbourne streets are wide--a chain and a half or ninety-nine feet in
all--and they are busy. The shops seem 'squat' to most visitors from the
Old World, for two stories high was the rule until within the last few
years; but as the price of land goes up, so does the height of the
buildings. Nothing would be built in the city now under four or five
stories, and there are tradesmen's places and stores and 'coffee
palaces' that run up to six and seven stories, and are more than a
hundred feet above the level of the roadway. Thus the complaint of
squatness will speedily disappear. Not only are the streets wide, but
they are also regular. Some run north and south; others east and west.
Thus the city is something of a gridiron, or rather, giants could play
games of chess upon its plan. Usually towns have been built on the
tracks of the cows of the first inhabitants, but Melbourne is a
surveyor's city. All the streets are straight, and none would be narrow
but that lanes intended by the original designers as back entrances for
the residents of the main roads have been eagerly seized upon, and are
utilised as business frontages. The importers of 'soft goods'--that is,
of articles of apparel--have taken possession of one of these streets,
Flinders Lane, and as 'the lane' it is known everywhere throughout
Australia, without the need of any distinctive affix. Further north,
dilapidated buildings in another 'lane,' with their shutters up and a
profuse display of blue banners with golden hieroglyphics, proclaim
that Little Bourke Street has been converted into a Chinese quarter. The
main streets run their mile and more east and west. They are five in
number, with four lanes, while nine broad streets run north and south.
Of the five, Flinders Street is adjacent to the wharves and great
warehouses, and is commercial in character.

[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF MELBOURNE, SHOWING PUBLIC OFFICES AND
GARDENS: ST. KILDA IN THE DISTANCE.]

[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF MELBOURNE, LOOKING SOUTHWARDS TO THE
SEA.]

Collins Street runs from the public offices in the east to the country
railway-station in the west. The one end is given up to the fashionable
doctors and the favoured dentists, handsome churches and prosperous
chemists filling in the interstices. From the Town Hall corner, Collins
Street is gay with carriages and with pedestrians who come to see or to
shop. Farther on we enter the region of the banks, the exchange, the
offices of barristers and solicitors, and the rooms of the auctioneers.
Here men of business are hurrying about. The flutter about the tall
building on the left tells of some mining excitement. Farther on, a
bearded, sun-burned, but well-dressed group will attract attention.
'Scott's' is the squatters' hotel, and it has been selected as the place
for submitting to auction those 'well-known and extensive pastoral
properties entitled the "Billabong Blocks," within easy distance of
market (say eight hundred miles), together with all improvements and
stock.' The conversation is whether the station will bring £300,000 or
not--for it is a large property; whether a better sale could have been
effected in Sydney, and so on; and next day you read in your _Argus_
that 'the biddings reached £290,000, when the lot was passed in, and was
subsequently sold at a satisfactory price, withheld.' Last of all, in
Collins Street come Assurance Companies' offices, the buildings of
merchants, and great wool stores.

In Bourke Street, commencing again at the west, where the new Houses of
Parliament stand, we have first shops, hotels, and theatres, then hotels
and mews, and finally a region of hotels (now less frequent), and of
offices and stores. Lonsdale Street is in a transitive condition. La
Trobe Street is not recognised. Standing on the midway flat you see two
hills: the western hill is commercial, the eastern hill is social. After
six o'clock Flinders Street and Collins Street are deserted. In place of
busy scenes of life there is gloom and solitude, while Eastern Bourke
Street, where the theatres and concert halls are, is lit up and is
thronged. Leisured people who can promenade in the daytime use Collins
Street as their lounge; the toiling multitude, who must promenade in the
evening or not at all, patronise Bourke Street. On Saturday nights the
Bourke Street block is great; the footways will not accommodate the
crowds.

Another Melbourne feature is the rush from the city from four to six
o'clock P.M., and the inrush from eight to ten o'clock in the morning.
It is enormous, but it is easily met. There is an extensive suburban
railway system, the property of the Government--as all railways in
Victoria are. Omnibuses and waggonettes are numerous, the latter taking
the place of the London cab; and now there are gliding through the
streets the successful and popular cable trams, a company having
obtained a concession to put down fifty miles of these costly roadways.
Let a heavy shower of rain fall at or about six P.M., however, and the
rush is too great for the accommodation, and those 'too late' have to
wait for return vehicles, and to bewail their misfortune.

[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF CENTRAL MELBOURNE.]

[Illustration: BOURKE STREET, MELBOURNE, LOOKING EAST.]

In public buildings Melbourne would be really great, if all that have
been begun were finished. But few are. The citizens are not running up
miserable flimsy structures, but are building for posterity. Final
contracts have been taken for the Houses of Parliament, which are to be
finished with a newly-discovered stone of a beautiful whiteness, but
expensive to work. From first to last half a million of money will be
spent on these halls of legislation. They will crown the eastern hill.
The Law Courts, which cost nearly £300,000, are finished, and constitute
a handsome pile on the western hill. St. Patrick's Cathedral, on the
eastern hill, will be a marvel, and it is slowly creeping on. The
Anglican Cathedral, founded by Bishop Moorhouse, is in the heart of the
city, and is making more rapid progress. The Public Library is a noble
institution, containing 150,000 volumes, and is open without restraint
to all comers. So is a National Picture Gallery which is attached, and
which contains specimens of the work of many of the best modern masters.
There is a National Museum, in which the Australian fauna is admirably
represented, and the Melbourne University is near at hand. This
institution, beautifully situated and handsomely endowed, grants degrees
which are recognised throughout the Empire, and its doors are open to
male and to female students alike. Ladies have taken B.A. and M.A.
degrees already, and the number of the softer sex entering is on the
increase. Not a ladies' school of repute but has its matriculation
class. The Town Hall, where 2,000 people can sit to listen to the
organ--one of the world's great organs--is not to be passed over. The
Botanic Gardens are another show spot. They are well within the civic
bounds, and by visiting them you obtain a series of lovely views, and
become acquainted with the flora of the Australian continent, for
everything that can be coaxed to grow here has been provided by the
director, Mr. Guilfoyle, with a suitable home. There is a gully for the
graceful Gippsland ferns, a spot for the gorgeous Illawarra flame-tree,
a guarded receptacle for the great northern nettle-bush, which is here
twelve or fifteen feet in height, and which no one would presume to
handle. Cycads, palms, and palm lilies represent Queensland in one
division; a mass of foliage of a bright metallic green speaks of New
Zealand in another. Of no place is the Melbournite more proud than of
the Gardens, which Mr. Guilfoyle has only had in hand about twelve
years, but which he has transformed from a waste into a Paradise.

[Illustration: UNIVERSITY, MELBOURNE.]

Melbourne has a grand system of water supply. The river Plenty, a
tributary of the Yarra, is dammed twenty miles away, and the huge
reservoir when full contains nearly a two years' supply. The
reticulation allows of a supply of eighty gallons per head to each
consumer; but in hot days the demand for baths and for the Garden are so
great that this quantity is not found to be half enough, and
improvements are to be effected. The Yan Yean system has cost
£2,000,000, and now the Watts River is to be brought in, and as the
engineers speak of £750,000 being necessary, the presumption is that
£1,000,000 will be required. It is a grand spectacle to see a full head
of Yan Yean turned on to a fire, say at night, when there is no strain
to abate the maximum pressure. The flames are not so much put out as
they are smashed out of existence. On a wooden building the jet will act
like a battering-ram, sending everything flying. No engine is required
in these cases; the hose is wound on a light big-wheeled reel, and the
instant an alarm is given a brigade can start off at racing speed and
come into action on the moment of arrival.

[Illustration: THE FITZROY GARDENS, MELBOURNE.]

As to industries, a list would be wearisome. A hundred tall chimneys
make known to the observer the fact that Melbourne is becoming a great
manufacturing centre.

The reserves between the city and its suburbs must ever be the greatest
charm of Melbourne. To leave Melbourne on the south, you must pass
through the mile-long Albert Park, with its ornamental water and its
handsome carriage drives, or you must saunter through Fawkner Park or
the Domain. Yarra Park and the Botanic Gardens are to the south-east,
and they link with the beautiful Fitzroy Gardens. Carlton Gardens crown
the city to the north, and communicate by smaller reserves, such as
Lincoln Square, to the 1,000 acre Royal Park, in which, among other
attractions, are the well-stocked gardens of the Zoological Society,
open to the public on certain days, in consideration of a Government
subsidy, free of cost.

The Yarra Park, lying between Melbourne and Richmond, contains the
principal cricket grounds of the city. Here the Melbourne Cricket Club
has its head-quarters, and much its sward and its grand stand and its
pavilion are praised by our cricketing friends from the Old World. In
the season the big matches, All England _v._ Australia, or New South
Wales _v._ Victoria, will draw their tens of thousands of spectators,
and on other occasions the area is utilised for moonlight concerts, for
flower-shows, and for pyrotechnics.

A jealous eye is kept upon these reserves. Once or twice a minister,
eager to increase the land revenue, has made a dash at a city park, and
has essayed to sell a slice, but so great has been the uproar that no
Government is likely to indulge in the effort again. Indeed, in almost
all cases, the alienation has now been rendered impossible except by
means of an Act of Parliament, which could never be obtained. The belt
of reserves--5,000 acres in all--is secure, and it must grow in beauty
yearly, continually adding to the attractions of the town. As it is
within a stone's throw of city life, you can wander into cool glens and
sequestered shades, and hear the thrush sing, or study the beauties of a
fern gully. To the pedestrian the walk to business in the morning or
from it in the evening is thus rendered delightful; but if the ordinary
Australian can possibly avoid it he never does walk. You meet curious
traces in these reserves of that former time when the eucalypts
sheltered not the inevitable perambulator and nursemaid at noon, nor the
equally inevitable 'young people' at the 'billing and cooing' stage in
the evening, but rather the kangaroo and the black fellow. In the Yarra
Park an inscription on a green tree calls attention to the fact that a
bark canoe has been taken from the trunk. The canoe shape being evident
in the stripped portion, and the marks of the stone hatchet being still
visible on the stem. The blacks would find their way to the river
impeded now by a treble-track railway that runs close to their old camp,
carrying passengers to a station which three hundred trains enter and
leave daily.

Melbourne has a river. One knows this mostly by crossing the bridges, as
otherwise the Yarra plays but a small part in the social arrangements of
the community. The lower portion of the stream is being greatly
improved. It is to be straightened and deepened, so that the largest
liners are to come up to the city, as already do 2000-ton intercolonial
steamers. The works, which will cost millions, are now (1886) about
half-way through. Near Melbourne the stream is muddy and nasty. Sluicers
use the water for gold-washing purposes twenty miles away, and factories
were allowed years back to be started upon its banks, and though new
tanneries and new fellmongeries are forbidden, the old evil-smelling
establishments remain. Few who look upon the sluggish ditch at
Melbourne would imagine that five and forty miles away it is a brisk and
sparkling river, parrots and satin birds and kingfishers floating about
it, ferns bending over and hiding its waters, and the giant gum rising
from its banks to double the height of any city spire. The improvements
will make the Yarra below the city a grand stream, bearing the commerce
of the world on its bosom, and one may look forward to the time when the
city portion itself will be purified, and the river made worthy of its
romantic mountain home.

[Illustration: THE YARRA YARRA, NEAR MELBOURNE.]

The city has its drawbacks. There is dust in the summer, which the
water-carts seek in vain to control; and there is mud in winter, which
no raving against the Corporation appears to affect; and the less said
on the drainage question the better. Again, as to weather, there are
people who protest against the suddenness of the change when the wind in
January chops round from north to south, and after panting in the
morning you begin to think of a fire at night. But the three hundred
delightful days of the year, when existence is a pleasure, are to be
remembered, and not the odd sixty-five when ills have to be endured. A
favourable impression is usually made upon visitors by the city with its
charm of suburbs, its wealth and reserves, its crowds of well-dressed
people, always busy about either their pleasure or their business,
always obliging, the poorest showing no signs of poverty, nor yet the
lowest of the influence of drink. And if a visitor had ideas of his own
he would withhold any adverse dictum until he was away, and would not
seek to wound the feelings of his hospitable hosts. With them, at any
rate, it is a cardinal principle of faith that their much-loved home is
entitled to the proud appellation of the 'Queen City of the South.'

An 'unearned increment,' such as would satisfy the most glowing dreams
of the most ardent speculator, has occurred in the capital. One instance
may be given. One of the few original half-acre blocks now in possession
undisturbed--not cut up--of the family of the original purchaser is
situated in a good part of Collins Street. The colonist whose executors
are now holding the property gave £20 for it in 1837. To-day the
sixty-six feet frontage to Collins Street is worth £1,150 per foot; the
Flinders Lane frontage is worth £350 per foot. A little ciphering brings
out a sum total of £99,000 as the present value of the original £20
investment. And for decades the income derived from the block has been
counted by many thousands per annum. The £20 has by this time earned at
least £200,000 in all. In many country places a £5 lot will bring £500
when a decade has passed. But then the place may not become a centre,
and your 'unearned increment' will be no more substantial than the
evening cloud. There is a reverse to this shield, as to all others.

[Illustration: BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF SANDHURST.]

From Melbourne it is easy to journey to the two great gold-fields of
Victoria--Ballarat and Sandhurst. The latter is due north, and is
reached by a double-track railway, built in the early days at a cost of
£40,000 per mile. Single-track railways, costing £4,000 per mile, are
now the order of the day. Sandhurst is the Bendigo of old days. It has
had many ups and downs; has been deserted, and has been ruined; but the
result is the fine city of to-day, with its broad, tree-lined streets,
its splendid buildings, and high degree of commercial activity. As a
recent writer puts it: 'What vicissitudes has not the place undergone!
From enormous wealth to the verge of bankruptcy, from the pinnacle of
prosperity to the direst adversity; from financial soundness to
commercial rottenness; and yet, with that wonderful elasticity and
buoyancy which characterises our gold-fields, the falling ball has
rebounded, the sunken cork has again come to the surface, and Sandhurst,
after all her reverses, is perhaps now richer and on a safer basis than
ever--a city whose wide, well-watered streets are perfect avenues of
trees, bordered by handsome buildings and well-stocked shops,
brilliantly lighted by gas; whose hotel accommodation is proverbially
good, whose civic affairs are admirably regulated, whose citizens are
busy, hospitable, and prosperous.' There is no mistake about the
character of the town. Miles and miles of country before you enter it
have been excavated and upturned by the alluvial digger. And there are
few more desolate sights to be met with than a worked-out and deserted
diggings, for often Nature refuses to lend her assistance, and does not
hide the violated tract with trees or verdure. Ugly gravel heaps,
staring mounds of 'pipe-clay,' deposits of sludge, a surface filled with
holes, broken windlasses, the wrecks of whims, all combine to make a
hideous picture as they stand revealed in the pitiless sunshine.
Alluvial digging of the shallow type is a curse to the unhappy country
operated upon. But alluvial mining has long had its little day, and
ceased to be in and about Sandhurst, and the town lives now by deep
quartz mining. You come upon the 'poppet-heads' and the batteries
everywhere, even in the beautiful reserve which is the centre of the
city. Sandhurst contains 30,000 inhabitants, 8,000 of whom are miners,
while the value of the mining machinery and plant is three-quarters of a
million sterling.

Old Bendigo had busy scenes, but never did it witness such excitement as
when a share mania broke out in 1871. Then it was that the richness of
the so-called 'saddle reefs' was demonstrated. The old-established
companies were paying well, and the Extended Hustlers exhibited one cake
of 2,564 ozs. as the result of a crushing of 260 tons. This was just the
spark wanted to set the market aflame. From being unduly neglected,
Sandhurst was unduly exalted; new companies were projected in every
direction where a line of reefs could be imagined; existing 'claims'
were subdivided, and in a few months £500,000 was invested in Sandhurst
mines. Of course there was a reaction; but though the speculators lost
money to sharpers, there really were auriferous reefs in Sandhurst to be
honestly worked, and no town seems more likely to hold its own in
Victoria than the great quartz city. Foundries and potteries are
springing up in its midst, or rather have sprung up; vineyards and
orchards are found to be successes in its neighbourhood, and the visitor
is grateful for the tree planting in the broad streets, appreciates the
water supply, is duly dazed if he enters a battery chamber, and is
delighted when 1,500 feet below the surface he is allowed to break off
some fragment of glittering quartz.

Ballarat lies 100 miles to the north-east of Melbourne, or at least it
is that distance by rail, viâ Geelong, but a direct line will soon
reduce it to a distance of seventy miles. An upland plateau, with a
fringe of hills all around, some of these now denuded of their timber,
and glittering white, cold, and bare in the sun, the earth pitted with
holes and gullies, scarified as if by some gigantic rooster,
'mullock'-heaps, 'poppet-heads,' and engine-stacks everywhere. This is
one's first impression of Ballarat. Gold-fields are very much like each
other all over the world. 'Substitute pines for eucalypti,' says Mr.
Julian Thomas, 'and I could imagine this to be California. But when one
first drives from the station and sees the magnificent width of Sturt
Street, with the avenue of trees planted along the centre, the public
buildings, banks, and churches--you are possessed with astonishment that
this is a mining town. Ballarat is indeed a great inland capital. The
difference between this and Sandhurst is that at the latter the mines
obtrude themselves everywhere. One cannot go half a block but one has
mullock-heaps and poppet-heads in view. There is a mine in every
back-yard. At Sandhurst it is gold--nothing but gold! Small nuggets are
occasionally, so say the truthful inhabitants, picked up by
sharp-visioned pedestrians in the public streets. There is gold or
evidences of it all around, even in the very bricks of the houses in
which we live, for the old men tell that the first brick building ever
erected in Sandhurst was pulled down and crushed, yielding three ounces
to the ton! In Ballarat it is all different. Walk up Sturt Street, or
along Lydiard Street, and one sees nothing but substantial buildings and
avenues of trees. The mines are in the suburbs, and do not deface the
town, as at Sandhurst. After an experience of the plains the city is a
perfect Arcadia. Embowered in trees, the homes of the people are
surrounded with gardens. There is verdure and vegetation in every
street. One mentally associates an amount of roughness and coarseness
with a mining town. Here it is quite other than so. There is everything
to bring light and culture and sweetness home to the people. Sandhurst
is superior in one respect--that its public gardens are right in the
centre of the town, running by the side of old Bendigo Creek; but there
is nothing in the colonies to surpass Wendouree Lake, the walks around
it, and the adjacent reserves and Botanical Gardens. An easy walk from
the town, and you embark on one of the fleet of elegant little
steamers--perfect yachts--furnished with luxurious cushions and rugs as
protection from the spray. Here everything is calm and peaceful. There
is no dust, no noise, no smells. Sailing boats and rowing boats are
plentiful; in little punts fishermen are bobbing for perch. This is a
lung which gives health and happiness to the inhabitants of Ballarat.
And when, after crossing the lake, you land under the shade of English
oak trees, and the air is perfumed with the scent of new-mown hay, you
feel that in no other mining community in the world have the people such
privileges as here. The Botanical Gardens are always beautiful, and are
a model to other establishments of the same kind in much larger
communities.'

It was here, early in August 1851, that alluvial gold was discovered at
a bend in the Yarrowee Creek, renamed Golden Point, where the toil of
some of the earlier diggings yielded from twenty to fifty pounds weight
of gold per day. In some spots, indeed, the gold lay almost on the
surface, amidst the roots of the bush grass, to be turned up by the
wheels of the passing bullock-drays, or picked out by hand after heavy
showers. At first it was thought that the auriferous deposit did not
extend beyond the commencement of the pipe-clay stratum, and most of the
diggers moved further afield as soon as they had turned over the bare
skin, so to speak, of the ground; but one digger, more persistent than
the rest, dug beyond the clay, and was richly rewarded by finding that
here lay the true home of the precious metal, here were the 'pockets' so
dear to the heart of the true digger. The deserted 'claims' were quickly
reoccupied, fresh thousands of diggers poured to the locality, and in a
couple of months Ballarat was more vigorous than ever.

Then for a time it was thought that the golden riches lay solely in the
alluvial stratum; but more modern research led to the discovery of a
number of quartz reefs, from which large quantities of gold have been
taken. Amongst the leading mines at present being worked are the
celebrated 'Block Hill,' the 'Band and Albion,' 'Redan,' 'Washington,'
'Koh-I-Noor,' 'Band of Hope,' 'Victoria United,' 'Llanberis,' 'Smith's
Freehold,' 'Williams' Freehold,' together with scores of others,
employing upwards of three hundred steam engines, with an aggregate of
about ten thousand horse-power, besides numerous machines worked by
horses. The total value of the plant and machinery in use is nearly a
million sterling, and the number of miners engaged in active operations
is returned as nine thousand, of whom nearly one-seventh are Chinese.
The total number of quartz reefs proved to be auriferous is between 350
and 400, while the extent of auriferous ground worked upon in the
district is 187 square miles.

But, in addition to its mines, Ballarat is renowned for its pastoral and
agricultural advantages, the Ballarat farmers being always large
prize-takers at the various annual shows. The town is delightfully
situated at an elevation of 1,413 feet above the sea-level, and is
correspondingly healthy for all rejoicing in fairly robust
constitutions. In winter the weather is sometimes of an ultra-bracing
quality with sharp frosts, and even an occasional fall of snow, but on
the whole the climate is very good.

'The Corner' is a local institution. It was at the Corner in olden days
that a sort of open-air Stock Exchange was established, and here do
speculators of all degrees still delight to come. Many are the stories
of the fortunes that have here changed hands at a word--of the
Midas-like touch of some, the Claudian fatality of withering blight
possessed by others. Here, in the maddest times of the gold fever, was a
scene of gambling pure and simple, as reckless as ever broke a Homburg
bank. Here was the _auri sacra fames_ in its most maddening and
tantalising intensity. And here, even in these more prosaic times, are
sudden flashes of the old spirit, that keep gesticulating crowds surging
over the pavement, and the busy wires working hence to Melbourne,
Sandhurst, and other commerce-hives.

Now and again we read of half-a-ton or so of gold being sent by one or
other of the Ballarat banks to its Melbourne head office, and then we
may be sure, there is a bubbling over of excitement at the Corner. But
it soon calms down to the ordinary seething of the cauldron, to which
the shares of the various mining companies bob up and down with a
regularity that can be almost reduced to a certainty.

Anthony Trollope said of Ballarat: 'It struck me with more surprise than
any other city in Australia. It is not only its youth, for Melbourne is
also very young; nor is it the population of Ballarat which amazes, for
it does not exceed a quarter of that of Melbourne; but that a town so
well built, so well ordered, endowed with present advantages so great in
the way of schools, hospitals, libraries, hotels, public gardens, and
the like, should have sprung up so quickly with no internal advantages
of its own other than that of gold. The town is very pleasant to the
sight.' And with these pleasant words we may leave the great mining
capital.

If cities, like men, could enforce their rights by suits of equity,
Geelong would be the capital of the colony of Victoria, and many
heartburnings, past and present, would have been avoided. But as matters
stand, Geelong has to be content with third place in the list of
Victorian extra-metropolitan cities, and with a population of about
21,000. The claims of the town to greater consideration lie in its
situation on the shores of Corio Bay, thus nearer to the sea than
Melbourne, its central position as regards the first cultivated and most
fertile district of the colony, and its early settlement. John Bateman,
the pioneer, with his party of three white men and four Sydney blacks,
landed at Indented Head on May 29, 1835, and would have 'squatted'
thereabouts permanently had it not been for the proceedings of the
aboriginals. As it was, Geelong was really founded as far back as 1837,
when its site was planned by the then Surveyor-General, Robert Hoddle,
and in 1849, or before the golden days, it was incorporated into a town.
But fine harbour, excellent geographical position, and rich country at
its back, were not enough to enable Geelong to compete in the race with
Melbourne, Ballarat, and Sandhurst. It has grown truly, and the growth
has been of the steady nature which gives flavour and solidity; but
lacking the fertilising medium of gold, there is no luxuriance, no
profusion. In the glorious future--the good time coming--this may prove
to have been an advantage. At present it is regarded as a drawback. The
town is in almost hourly communication with Melbourne, both by rail and
steamer, and presents many other features showing it to be instinct with
vitality of the best sort, and ready at any time to forge its way to the
front.

Geelong exports goods, principally wool and produce, to the value of
three-quarters of a million sterling per annum, and sends cargoes direct
to London and Liverpool. To accommodate shipping three substantial
jetties have been built at an expenditure of nearly one hundred thousand
pounds, and the bar at the entrance of the harbour is kept clear to the
depth of twenty-two feet. Another feature which strikes the eye of the
visitor as he glances admiringly round the beautiful bay, on the shores
of which the town sits enthroned, is the number of bathing
establishments. There are no less than four of these, all of large size
and comfortable appointments.

[Illustration: ON LAKE WELLINGTON.]

Geelong tweed has achieved a high reputation in many markets, and the
shawls and blankets made in the town are also widely known.

After inspecting the gold-fields there can be no greater change for the
visitor than to proceed to that Western District, far famed in Australia
for the richness of its soil, the fineness of its pasture, and the soft
beauty of its scenery. It is easily reached, for the railway now runs
into its heart at Colac and Camperdown. This is the lake country of
Victoria. An easy climb takes you to the top of the mount at Colac, and
once there you can appreciate the description which Mr. Julian Thomas,
the most popular descriptive writer of the Australian press, gives of
the scene:--

'This lake country of Victoria,' says Mr. Thomas, 'possesses distinct
features, distinct beauties, as yet unsung and unheard of except by the
few. As I sit on a fragment of igneous rock and look around me, I indeed
feel that "the singer is less than his themes." I feel that I cannot do
justice to this magnificent view, I cannot describe all the pleasure it
gives me. My readers must come and judge for themselves. We are on the
edge of the extinct crater of an enormous volcano. Below us a number of
lakes. Fresh and salt, some fifteen can be counted from this spot. They
vary in size from the little mountain tarn filling up one of the mouths
of the crater to the great dead sea, Corangamite, more than 90 miles
round, and covering 49,000 acres. This lake is salter than the sea--no
fish will live in its waters. From the Stony Rises on the south to
Foxhow on the north its shores are outlined with jutting
promontories--quaint and picturesque rocky curves, which give it
additional beauty. Corangamite Lake is studded with islands, which
increase its attractions by the variety of their form. On these, I am
told, the pelicans, so numerous here, build their nests. Light and
shadow are depicted in the reflections of passing clouds. The shores are
white with accumulations of salt. Away in the north-west the dim, blue
line of the Grampians. All around, hills and mountains--the Otway
Ranges, Noorat, Leura, Porndon--are clearly defined. The park-like
plains stretching away to the horizon are dotted with trees, under which
thousands of cattle and sheep are sheltering from the rays of the
noonday sun. Here and there pleasant homesteads, green cultivation
patches, and fields of golden grain. But the especial glory of the scene
is in the variety and number of the smaller lakes filling the craters
below us. The yellow tints of the bracken covering the slopes are varied
with green glints from the foliage of choice ferns on the steep banks,
other colours being supplied by the mosses on the rocks. We have here
light and shade, form, outline, colour--everything which makes up beauty
in a landscape. And beyond that there is the wonderful interest in
thinking of the past. Of the age when the numerous volcanoes in the west
blazed forth their liquid fire over the land. Of the succeeding ages,
when the craters, cooled and filled by springs, for century after
century, shone in all their glory of lake and tarn under the actinic
rays of the morning sun, which darkened the skin of the few black
fellows camped on their banks. Now Coc Coc Coine, last King of the
Warrions, has gone. We possess the land, with none to dispute our right
to this earthly paradise. But the track of the serpent is even here. The
enemy of mankind has now taken the form of the rabbit, which swarms
around the Red Rock by the thousand.

[Illustration: A VICTORIAN LAKE.]

'A strange feature in the lakes here is that they are alternately
fresh and salt. Of five within gunshot of where we stand, three are
salt and two fresh, yet they are separated only by narrow isthmuses.
They vary also considerably in their height above sea-level. Corangamite
is higher than Colac--these crater-tarns higher than Corangamite. There
is a very high percentage of salt in some of these lakes. The saline
properties are caused by the drainage from the basalt rocks, "the water
being kept down by vaporisation, while the quantity of salt continually
increases." In the summer the lakes fall by evaporation considerably
below winter level, leaving on the banks large quantities of native salt
in crystals, the gathering of which forms a remunerative occupation to
many in the district. Cattle love this native salt, but Corangamite and
its fellows are avoided by mankind. None bathe in their waters; no boats
sail upon them. The large lake itself has not even been surveyed or
sounded. I am surprised that this has not been used for navigation. In
the United States there would be steamers towing flat-bottomed barges;
live stock and fire and pit wood, as well as passengers, would be
conveyed from north to south and east to west; for, although shallow in
places, there is ample depth for boats built on the American model.
There was a tradition amongst the blacks that Corangamite and Colac were
once dry, and again that at one time the lakes were all connected in one
running stream. But whether the water privileges are sufficiently
utilised or not, the lake scenery remains unequalled by anything I have
yet seen.

[Illustration: THE UPPER GOULBOURN, VICTORIA.]

The ports of this district are Warnambool and Belfast and Portland, and
near the two first-named places is land of an exceptional richness that
has gone far to make the locality wealthy. Here the potatoes of the
continent are grown. Warnambool and Belfast supply the Melbourne, the
Sydney, the Brisbane, and the Adelaide markets. There is no successful
competition, for nowhere do quantity and quality go so well together. A
maximum yield of twenty and thirty tons per acre has been obtained. The
land has been sold at £80 per acre. One landowner lets 1200 acres at £5
10s. per acre per annum. These are the 'top' prices, but they establish
the fact that the volcanic formation of the Western District gives
patches with a marvellous producing power. A small estate in _Australia
Felix_--for it was this region which Mitchell so named--is a large
fortune.

Portland Bay is the only harbour of refuge for hundreds of miles along
the coast of Australia. As we steam in, Cape Grant shuts out the new
lighthouse on Cape Nelson, the long swell is dashing with violence
against the sides of Lawrence Rocks, whose peaks are the home of the
gannet and other sea fowl. To the right at the extreme north is the
flourishing rural township of Narrawong. Above this the green slopes of
Mount Clay merge into the thickly-timbered forest land not yet cleared.
Ahead there is a lighthouse, a signal post, a few houses embowered in
trees, high cliffs of white limestone or dark basalt, and then, as we
round the promontory into the harbour, the quaint yet lovely town is all
before us, extending along the bluffs above the shore, the only natural
depression being where a stream flows into the sea from a lagoon in a
valley at the back of the town. The beauty of this crescent-shaped bay,
with its outlines of bold headlands, is striking. As to the town, the
white cliffs, the stone-built churches and houses, give it an English
look. It recalls many spots on the Sussex coast. It is not Australian in
any of its outer characteristics. The spirit of the English pioneer,
Edward Henty, seems stamped upon it.

Victoria is traversed for its greater part from east to west by a
mountain chain, which is lofty in the south-east corner. Gippsland,
takes the form of mere high land at the back of Melbourne, rises again
in the Pyrenees, and dies out in the Western District. Usually the chain
is about seventy miles from the seaboard. From the Gippsland sea-coast
it presents a grand sight, often of snow-topped summits. Going to the
north from Melbourne, you pass over the crest, which is 1700 feet high,
without being aware of the rise. But all the water on the one side flows
to the sea, and on the other to the river Murray. Crossing the range
from Melbourne to the north and the north-east, the country slopes to
the level Murray plains. Here you enter upon the wheat-growing district.
The level ground is fenced into fields which bear this one crop.
Shepparton, the agricultural centre of the north-east, aspires to be the
Australian Chicago, and may be mentioned as an instance of the rapid
changes which are possible in Australia. In a pictorial work published
seven years ago, Mr. E. C. Booth writes; 'The township of Shepparton
lies on the east bank of the Goulbourn. It gains its chief importance
from the pound of the district being within its borders, and it will be
remembered for years to come on account of the long and weary journeys
to it undertaken by bullock-drivers and carriers in search of their
strayed cattle.' How far off are those days now! Shepparton is to-day a
local capital, busy and self-important. Its streets are lined with shops
and houses; there are five banks, several assurance agencies, a handsome
town-hall, and a busy traffic.

What is said of Shepparton in the north-east applies to Horsham in the
north-west. Horsham, the newly-created capital of the Wimmera District,
is entitled 'the Prairie City.' The Wimmera climate is hot and dry, and
there were doubts as to whether the farmer would hold his own on these
arid plains; but the settlement is now twelve years old, and is
increasing mightily. This Wimmera District tapers off into the mallee
scrub, the old desert of Victoria, which has lain neglected for years,
while Victorians have opened up country 2000 miles away. Here the dingo
found his last refuge, and to the infinite joy of the dingo, as it may
be supposed, the rabbit appeared upon the scene. When the rabbit came,
the few squatters who were trying to turn the mallee scrub to account
gave up in despair, for first the rabbits devoured the scant grass on
which the sheep fed, and then the dingoes feeding on the rabbits grew
more numerous and strong. The mallee went begging in blocks of 100,000
acres, at an annual rental of £5 per block; and at last the district had
to be specially taken in hand by the State, and long leases have been
granted to tenants on favourable terms, on condition that they destroy
the 'vermin,' for that is the title bestowed upon rabbits here. Several
rivers strive to flow from the ranges through or by the mallee to the
Murray, but none succeed. The Avon, the Richardson, and the Wimmera all
collapse and disappear on their way. The Loddon has a watercourse for
the whole distance, but at its best in summer it will be but a chain of
water-holes. Yet crop after crop is taken off these plains; the farmers
all appear to make money, and now that works for conserving water for
irrigation are to be undertaken, the spirits of these sunburnt toilers
are of the highest.

[Illustration: WATERFALL IN THE BLACK SPUR.]

All this district is intersected by 'wheat lines' of railway, over which
in December, January, and February the crop is rushed to the seaboard.
Great are the blocks that occur, and indignant is the grumbling because
the whole yield cannot be carried at once. Horsham is hot with anger,
and Shepparton refuses to be satisfied, and the lot of the Chairman of
the Railway Commissioners is not at this period to be envied. The
railways run also to the mountains of the east. One line will take the
traveller to Beechworth, a charming town in the north-east; another line
will convey him to Sale--and soon to Bairnsdale--right away in
Gippsland. Beechworth should be visited because of the beauty of its
surroundings. And if the visitor is a pedestrian, he can accomplish a
grand and quite a fashionable walking tour through the Alps into
Gippsland, striking the railway either at Bairnsdale or Sale. He is in
the neighbourhood of romantic ravines, picturesque waterfalls, and grand
fern scenery. Lyre-birds, bower birds and parrots will be his
companions, and if he chooses to diverge a little from the route, he may
break into virgin solitudes, and may measure giant gums unheard of
before.

[Illustration: A VICTORIAN FOREST.]

One feature is common alike to all Victorian towns and the bush--the
State school. In the towns the State school is a political structure. In
the bush let there be twenty or thirty children in a three-mile radius,
and there will be a wooden erection for the young people to attend. In
some cases, where the children cannot be otherwise reached, the teacher
will meet two or three families at intervals at certain houses. With a
population of a million the State has 230,000 children on its school
books. The instruction is 'free, compulsory, and secular,' and about
this latter provision there is a great stir. It is not, however,
advisable to stray into vexed issues here. Suffice it that there is no
more general picture in Victoria, than that of the children trooping to
and from their lessons, and that many a parent feels his existence
brightened by the assurance that, come what may, 'schooling' is provided
for.

Where there are no railways which the tourist can use, he may depend
upon being able to proceed by 'Cobb.' 'Cobb' is the general name for the
stage coach of the colonies, no matter who owns the vehicle, where it
runs, what are its dimensions. Any one who has not travelled by Cobb has
not properly 'done' Australia; and yet the fate of the black man and the
marsupial will, one plainly sees, be the fate of Cobb. He will be
improved out of existence, and thus another element of romance will fade
away. Our illustrations tell their own tale of moving incidents by field
and flood. Mr. Anthony Trollope wrote: 'A Victorian coach, with six or
perhaps seven or eight horses, in the darkness of the night, making its
way through a thickly timbered forest at the rate of nine miles an hour,
with the horses frequently up to their bellies in mud, with the wheels
running in and out of holes four or five feet deep, is a phenomenon
which I should like to have shown to some of those very neat mail-coach
drivers whom I used to know at home in the old days. I am sure that no
description would make any one of them believe that such feats of
driving were possible. I feel that nothing short of seeing it would have
made me believe it. The passengers inside are shaken ruthlessly, and are
horribly soiled by mud and dirt. Two sit upon the box outside, and
undergo lesser evils. By the courtesy shown to strangers in the colonies
I always got the box, and found myself fairly comfortable as soon as I
overcame the idea that I must infallibly be dashed against the next
gum-tree. I made many such journeys, and never suffered any serious
misfortune.'

[Illustration: STAGING SCENES.]

Why 'Cobb'? it may be asked. Freeman Cobb was an American driver of some
New York express company, who came to Victoria in 1853 or 1854, and,
seeing his opportunity, sent for some brother drivers and started
coaches to Castlemaine and Sandhurst. For the hundred miles the fare was
£8, and the money was well earned. Other coaches followed in all
directions. No Americans were needed to drive. It was found that the
colonial-born youth had all the nerve and the spirit for dashing down
the side of a gully, for steering along a siding, for fording a
questionable creek, or for dodging fallen timber. Happily for the
tourist, visits to some of the show places of Melbourne are still partly
paid by coach. To see the romantic falls of the Stevenson and the silver
eucalypts of the Black Spur, a partial coach journey is necessary. At
Loutit Bay Waterfalls, the ocean and the big trees are all brought
together, and to reach this favoured and favourite spot the coach must
be utilised. It was well for the nerves of Mr. Anthony Trollope that he
was not required to perform this particular journey, Lorne or Loutit Bay
not having been opened up when he was on the land. The coaches cross a
succession of ranges running up to 2000 feet in height, and they had to
shave with remarkable closeness some of those gums whose nearness
alarmed the English author. One rush down a steep siding was made
between two giant eucalypts. There was just room to pass, but so little
to spare that the axle on the off side had cut a track through the one
tree by the process of frequent touching. If it had touched too hard the
passengers would have picked themselves up after a drop of several
hundred feet. Or they might have had a grand flight through the air into
the midst of the fern jungle that hid a purling stream far, far below.
The rush through the twin eucalypts was exhilarating; the steerer of
Cobb, a native of the place, cool and confident, enjoyed it immensely.

[Illustration: A SHARP CORNER.]




CHAPTER V.

New South Wales.

     SURVEY OF THE COLONY--SYDNEY AND ITS HARBOUR--THE GREAT WEST--THE
     BLUE MOUNTAINS--THEIR GRAND SCENERY--AN AUSTRALIAN SHOW PLACE--THE
     FISH RIVER CAVES--DUBBO TO THE DARLING--THE GREAT PASTURES--THE
     NORTHERN TABLELAND--THE BIG SCRUB COUNTRY--TROPICAL VEGETATION.

[Illustration: VIEWS IN SYDNEY: GOVERNMENT HOUSE, THE CATHEDRAL,
AND SYDNEY HEADS.]

[Illustration: GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS, MACQUARIE STREET, SYDNEY.]


New South Wales is the mother colony of Australia, and though, after the
gold discovery, she was for a time thrown into the shade by the prowess
of her former dependency, Victoria, she is making rapid strides to
recover; in fact, she may be said to have regained her old premier
position. Her eastern boundary is the Pacific Ocean, which washes a
coast-line of 800 miles, bold in its outline and studded with numerous
harbours. Imaginary lines divide her from Victoria to the south,
Queensland to the north, and South Australia to the west. The greatest
length of New South Wales is 900 miles; its greatest breadth about 850
miles; mean breadth, 600 miles. The superficial area is 309,100 square
miles. That is to say, the colony is as extensive as the German Empire
and Italy combined, or as France and the United Kingdom. The million of
population which the colony contains is thinly scattered about this vast
territory, the country districts obtaining the less, because more than a
third of the people are congregated at Sydney, the capital, and at
Newcastle, the coal port adjacent to the metropolis. High mountain
ranges are found in New South Wales, lofty table-land, and vast
low-lying plains, with the result that great variety of climate is
obtained. For instance, on a certain day in November, 1885, the
newspapers state that between the Warrego and the Paroo, north of the
Darling, one thousand out of five thousand sheep had dropped dead upon a
rough day's journey, wasted by the hunger and drought, and killed by
heat; that two out of a party of three travellers perished of thirst in
the Lechlan back blocks, and the third alone, naked and half mad,
reached a station to tell the tale; that on the lower reaches of
Clarence and Richmond rivers travellers saw cattle in the last stages of
starvation, dying in the mud of the river banks, while down upon the
Shorehaven a roaring spate was heaving haystacks to the sea; that while
enterprising tourists were chilled with ice and sleet upon Ben Lomond,
and snow was flattening crops of wheat in the gullies above Tumat,
Sydney, despite the coolness of the daily inflow of ocean water, was
suffering under a heavy sweltering heat. And while variations like these
are the exception and not the rule, yet all these varied experiences may
be endured in the colony on one and the same day.

New South Wales was discovered and named by Captain Cook, who landed in
Botany Bay, a few miles north of Port Jackson, on the 28th of April,
1770. A penal settlement was formed the following year, and four days
after the arrival of the little fleet, a French expedition, under the
ill-fated M. de la Pérouse, cast anchor in the bay. The officer in
command, Captain Arthur Phillip, soon recognised that Botany Bay was in
many respects unsuitable for a principal settlement; and having examined
Port Jackson, and found it to be 'one of the finest harbours in the
world,' he did not hesitate to substitute it as the position from which
to commence Australian colonisation. On the 26th of January, 1788, the
fleet and all the people were transferred to Port Jackson; a landing was
made at the head of Sydney Cove (the Circular Quay), and the colony of
New South Wales was formally declared to be founded. The first settlers
in all numbered 1030, of whom 504 were male exiles and 192 female
exiles. On the 7th of February Arthur Phillip, Captain-General and
Governor-in-Chief of the new territory, established a regular form of
government; and, in his address to the assembled colonists, expressed
his conviction that the State, of which he had laid the foundation,
would, ere many generations passed away, become the 'centre of the
southern hemisphere--the brightest gem of the Southern Ocean.' The
peculiar audience which he addressed did not share his enthusiasm, but
the prediction has been abundantly realised. The convict stage is now
forgotten as a dream. To-day New South Wales contains almost a third of
the population of all the colonies, has an annual import and export
trade of nearly £50,000,000, and raises annually £9,000,000 of revenue.
The colony has already constructed 1727 miles of railway, and is
constructing 416 miles, and Parliament has authorised the construction
of 1282 miles, and there are 19,000 miles of telegraph wires open. The
value of its annual export of wool is, in normal seasons, worth
£10,000,000; its sheep number 35,000,000; its horses, 350,000; its
horned cattle, 1,500,000; and its swine, 220,000. The land under crop is
1,000,000 acres; the annual out-put of coal is 3,000,000 tons, of which
nearly two-thirds are exported. The mines of gold, silver, tin, copper,
and manganese, are also very rich, and their export is great. The city
of Sydney and its suburbs have a population of 270,000.

[Illustration: STATUE OF CAPTAIN COOK AT SYDNEY.]

The following general description of Sydney and the colony is
contributed by Mr. F. H. Myers:--

'Naturally any notice of the colony of New South Wales begins with
Sydney and its harbour--

     "Like some dark beauteous bird whose plumes
      Are sparkling with unnumbered eyes,"

wrote Moore, as he looked up aloft at the sky by night, and found
companionship in the soul of beauty there. Often has the image occurred
to me when entering, on a summer's night, the harbour gates of Beautiful
Sydney, or looking down upon the stillness of the sleeping coves from
any of the surrounding hills. Lights are spread upon the blackness of
the hills--straight lines, crescents, squares, and marvellous
configurations--lights rise up from the harbour depths, straight shafts
and twisted columns, pillars and spires and trees of light, wherever
from ship's mast, or yard, or port, rays of white or blue or red strike
the waters, and straightway seem to grow as plants of fire. Along the
shores may be seen the blue gleams of electric fire, the duller green
and red of the oil lamps on the ships, still and bright in the quiet
water; alternating, mingling, shifting, blending, as the surface is only
slightly stirred. Every calm night brings such illumination.

'A traveller entering Sydney Harbour upon any still night sees this
panorama opening to him; and if he have the good fortune to be detained
in quarantine till morning, he may see a far more beautiful picture by
rising with the rising sun. The city and the harbour lie spread out
before him, the spires and towers standing out in the distance, clear
and shining in the morning sunlight. The long land arms run out on
either hand, while the blue sea, unruffled and smooth, forms a fine
contrast to rock and foliage and sky.

'To see Sydney well in the clear broad daylight, it is needful to travel
by the cable tram to the heights of North Shore, and walk thence by the
military road to the head of Morsman's Bay. A splendid view point is
thus obtained, above and opposite to the length and breadth of the city.
You see the light-tower upon the Moth Head, and following the coast-line
south you look along all the heights of Woolahra, Waverly, and
Paddington to Randwick. Between that ocean coast and the inner line of
the harbour are the homes of a quarter of a million of people. You may
see thence the spires of St. Philip's, and St. James', and St. David's,
and St. Patrick's, the towers of St. Andrew's Cathedral, and, through
the heavy foliaged trees of the domain, the high walls of the yet
unfinished St. Mary's. In the distance, and partly obscured by the smoke
of the University buildings, the various colleges are grouped, almost
joined by the distance. Near them are the Prince Alfred Hospital, and
the deaf, dumb, and blind institutions.

[Illustration: SYDNEY HARBOUR.]

[Illustration: THE POST OFFICE, GEORGE STREET, SYDNEY.]

[Illustration: MACQUARIE STREET, SYDNEY.]

'In the dense centre of city buildings rises the new tower of the
General Post Office. It overlooks everything, and waves its flag of
practical utility in the sight of the whole city. Very near to it
appears the Town Hall, small by comparison, though more elaborate, and
between them and the water the heavy masses of commercial buildings
fringed by the unbroken line of masts. The city yet to be on the North
Shore looks very small, and you are not surprised that no suspension
bridge overhangs the water. You must look into the future for that.

'Complete your picture of the present by a glance up the long estuaries
of the Paramatta and Lane Cove rivers, and a look across the rolling
woodlands westward to the giant barrier of the Blue Mountains. Look also
across the harbour, where right below you the round tower of Fort
Dennison stands in mid-channel, and a little lower down the perfect half
moon of Rose Bay, blue as the sky above. Look down to the Heads, where a
dozen craft are entering upon the long huge rollers which break upon
bluff Dobroyd opposite, or die down to ripples upon the innumerable
beaches of Middle Harbour. Watch the many lights and colours of the
water, the ultramarine of the mid-channel, the indigo in the shadow of
the hills, the emerald of a strip close beneath the cliff, where no wind
moves, nor any pulse of tide or ocean stir is felt; the glories of opal
and amber, where fierce sun rays burn about rocky shores.

'Take in all the greatness and beauty of the present, and then try to
realise the picture in the square miles of buildings already raised. You
can see how they are growing, how far away to south and west, and
through the forest and beside the waters of the north coast, houses and
establishments of various kinds are rising like _avant couriers_ of the
compact masses whose advance is by no means slow. Look from them to a
point of the city where roofs and chimneys are most closely packed,
where the smoke of the labour of human life seems ascending perpetually,
and you may see a succession of white puffs, and hear a louder, sharper
pulse of toil pierce the low murmur of distant and multitudinous sounds,
and you know that you look upon the present centre of the railway system
of the colony; you have fixed your eye upon the focussing point of two
thousand miles of railways. These are the feeders of the city; these
reaching out divide and grip and drain the colony. They gather its
produce, the results of its labour, and bring them down to this city,
which stands without rival or competitor along 800 miles of coast.

[Illustration: THE TOWN HALL, SYDNEY.]

'Let us travel along each of these lines, radiating somewhat as the
fingers of a spread hand from south to north.

'The South Coast Railway, the most recently opened and not yet completed
line, runs down the south coast to Kiama. This line is a purveyor of
many luxuries and necessaries of life, leading out first to broad
suburban breathing grounds on the country between the southern bank of
Port Jackson and Botany Bay, making a hundred square miles of good
building country accessible, crossing the historic bay three miles up
the tidal estuary of George River, crossing a somewhat barren plateau,
and arriving at the National Park. It penetrates next vast forests and
overruns tremendous gorges, winding about precipices, and getting down
by a way of its own to the country at the foot of the Bulb Pass. All the
seaward slopes and ravines of this pass are as a vast natural
conservatory. They take all the morning sun, they are never touched by
western or southern wind, they are plentifully watered with regular
rains, and they nurse and produce a beauty unfamiliar to the latitude.
Take a few steps over the brow of the hill on the old road, and look
down. You see tropical verdure and bloom, palms rising a hundred feet,
and spreading feathery plumes upon lance-like stems; myrtle and coral
trees, figs and lily-pillies, with a sheen upon their leaves like the
light on a summer sea; bowers and arches and impenetrable jungles of
great vines, trailing tendrils fifty feet long, and swinging masses of
perfumed bloom a hundred feet from the ground. There is nothing of the
old familiar Australian bush about it. You are 1,200 feet above the sea,
which stretches away to the world's rim beneath and before you. Below,
past all the wonderland of the bush, is the white tower of Woolongong,
and beyond that the fringe of white beach and snowy breakers, the Fern
Islands, set in sapphire. Far, far away goes the coast land.

'Between coast-line and mountains lies the fertile land, the strip of
country that serves and feeds the great city. The train comes here to be
laden with the rich produce--milk, butter, and cheese--which by tons
upon tons is taken in and distributed in Sydney every day. Out of the
bowels of the mountains the line brings also coal and iron and shale and
other mineral products, and from the dense forest pour down the little
coast rivers.

[Illustration: EMU PLAINS.]

'Halting at Kiama first, it will render all the beauties of the
Illawarra district proper accessible, as all its rich products
available; but in a very few years it must pass on across Shoalhaven and
Bega, and over the rugged country of the Victorian border beyond Eden
and Boyd Town.

'Our next finger, The Great West, is a mighty one in every sense, 574
miles in length, and crossing in that length a fair section of the whole
colony, and enclosing in the triangle of which it forms the northern
side, with the Southern and South-Western line and Murrumbidgee river
opposite, and the Darling for base, the wildest mountains, the richest
agricultural acres, and the broadest pastures of the colony. By
Paramatta, Castle Hill, and Toongabbie, the earliest agricultural
settlements the colony knew, which, however, seem rather to have reached
senility than perfect development, the North-Western line strikes out
for the rampart of the famous Blue Mountains--now one of the show-places
of Australia. Very soon the traveller perceives the great barrier
stretched right across the plain. Behind the dark green trees of the
middle distance it looms as the wall of some forbidden land. And nearer
the deep blue river at its feet looks like a moat specially made for
purposes of defence. Long indeed was the barrier effective, before the
strong right arm of civilization put down the stone pillars and carried
over the platform of the railway-bridge across which the train thunders
now, the great engines puffing and snorting, their force conserved for
the present, but ready to be expended by-and-by in the charge up the
mountain.

[Illustration: THE VALLEY OF THE GROSE.]

'The upward view from that bridge should never be missed. It is a long
glassy sheet of water, coming from the bold and densely timbered gate of
the hilly shore miles away, and flowing down to the bridge, past the
sleepy old town, between grassy banks or drooping willows, or groves of
whispering oaks. There is no perceptible current, the water-lilies sleep
on the surface, and if a boat be pulling upwards the ripples of the
water break gently on either bank. You may note so much in the rapid
transit of the train, which ten minutes after its departure from Penrith
station is fairly at the feet of the mountains. There are little knolls
there, lightly grassed and gracefully timbered, looking down upon

     "Long fields of barley and of rye."

Very soon we pass these fields; we are rising fast. The plains sink and
extend beneath us. The white stones of the little grave-garden at Emu
Plains glisten beside the tall black cypress trees, the river shines
like a band of steel, and the reflection of the willows and oaks are
faintly seen.'

Penrith looks as a child's toy village; and Windsor and Richmond, far
away, are but indistinct white dots. All quiet, tame, prosperous, and
very simply beautiful below; all above and beyond wild and rugged, and,
in the commercial sense, unprofitable. As marvellous a contrast as could
be imagined, the beginning and the end apparently of new orders, the
results of different forces, the work of the earth spent in opposite
moods. One must needs marvel in contrasting such scenes, and more
profound becomes the marvel and the wonderment, as with every mile a
vaster, wilder, grander region is found. Cliff-faces leagues long, and a
thousand feet perpendicular; huge basins, like veritable gulfs in space,
where a firmament of blue gathers between the rocky mountain head and
the forest growth below, isolated rocks that dwarf all monuments reared
in any city of old; deep calling unto deep in innumerable waterfalls,
and through all the summer months frequent thunder, as if the spirits
who had wrought their marvels below were still toiling at some other
labour in mid-air. The meanest mind becomes expanded in wonder, and the
least philosophical instinct begins to speculate and inquire. There has,
indeed, been much deep speculation, much zealous and competent inquiry
as to the phenomena of these mountains, and the startling contrast upon
their southern front. Tennison-Woods studied and wrote of them, and more
recently Dr. J. E. Taylor has, in a few graphic sentences, expressed his
opinions of the geological changes which have taken place, particularly
of the changes and causes which have produced the fertile plains and the
hills, whose chief present product is ozone, with the river rolling
between. Having touched lightly upon the facts generally known of the
Hawkesbury sandstone formation, overlaid on a great breadth of the
county of Cumberland by the Wianamatta shales, he says:--

'But the continuity of both the Hawkesbury sandstones and the overlying
and usually accompanying Wianamatta shales is interfered with on a
magnificent scale at Emu Plains. The entire country from this point to
Sydney Heads has been slowly let down by one of those great earth
movements known as a "downthrow fault." The downthrow was not the work
of one single act of disturbance--it went on for ages. Meantime the
Wianamatta shales, which overlaid the Hawkesbury sandstones of the Blue
Mountains, were denuded off, or nearly so, for there is only a small
patch now remaining, right on the top, after we have ascended by the
first zigzag, to show that they were once continuous with those of the
plains more than 2,000 feet below.'

There is infinite variety in the mountains. Even though wearied of the
grandeur and wildness of the gorges, the vastness of the basins, whose
great forest carpets appear but as robes of green evenly spread, or the
grotesquely piled rocks, and the bold and beautiful flora of the
table-lands and mountain heads, the traveller need not hasten back to
town, imagining he has seen all. Let him find his way down from
Blackheath to the entrance of a valley known as the Mermaid's Cave--a
great grey rock that juts out and almost blocks the valley, dividing a
somewhat arid gorge above from a lovely dell below. He passes through a
rock-cleft, and there before him is a scene beautiful as new. There
indeed,--

                     'A vale of beauty, lovelier
     Than all the valleys of the greater hills.'

Yes, this is the fairy land of the mountains. Tall, feathery-foliaged,
golden-blossomed wattles rise side by side with the olive-green
turpentines, and through them runs the mountain brook in cataract after
cataract. Upon the edge of the wattle-grove the tree-ferns grow, and
beyond them is a carpet of bracken--a broad slope at the hill-foot, rich
dark green with tips of pink, and shadows and hollows of russet and
brown, where new growths display yet their dainty shades, or dead leaves
have taken the rich autumnal brown. There is deep, grateful shade here
in the heat of the day, for no sunbeam penetrates the roof of wattle and
palm-like fern, and the water seems to bring down coolness from its
higher springs.

[Illustration: ZIGZAG RAILWAY IN THE BLUE MOUNTAINS.]

A bolder valley, one of the great gorges of the world, is the Lithgow,
the road to the western slopes and the long-locked interior. It was down
this great ravine that the first explorers looked awe-stricken at the
marvellous road that nature had prepared for them; and who can gaze
without awe and wonder and broadening conceptions of nature and nature's
work as he looks down that entrance way to Australia's heart, and
realizes the manner and the period of its making? The ages that have
clothed the mountain sides with forests are but as seconds to years by
comparison with those which have worn the world's crust away, and by
comparison with these stupendous results of natural forces, what pigmy
work appears the zigzag down which goes the inland train! This Lithgow
Vale is usually considered the western limit of the Blue Mountains,
though in their further northward range, notably about Capertee on the
Mudgee line, they rise again and display forms of rugged grandeur.

[Illustration: FISH RIVER CAVE.]

Beyond the mountains the artistic surveyor may travel fast. Branching
off at Walerawang, he may find the mountain scenery he has just left
repeated on the line to Mudgee, but there is another turn, and not by
rail, which he must not miss. It is at Tarana, in the Fish River Caves,
newly christened Jenola. The road runs off to the southward, a distance
of forty miles, to the west of a wild country on the western slopes of
the Blue Mountains, and then by a grim cavern in the hillside is entry
found to a natural temple, which travellers affirm has no equal in the
wide, wide world. The old guardian and guide of the place, who alone can
walk safely amid the labyrinth, tells us that we have hardly begun to
explore the caves so far, for every year some new grotto is discovered.
He plods his careful way along some dripping track through the tall
stalagmites, standing as monuments of the dead in fairy-land, feels some
fissure in the mountain side, works the point of his staff through, and
discovers--vacuity; makes carefully a small hole, introduces a thread of
magnesium wire, sets it ablaze, and in the long glow learns that he has
discovered another cathedral vaster than St. Peter's, with a dome that
mocks St. Paul's. By-and-by he will open a way to it; will add it to his
catalogue; will say to a party of visitors: 'I have found another cave,
and will flash light upon the glory which, could it be transported to
London or Paris, would be worth a million sterling.' How many more caves
remain to be discovered it is impossible to say; they may run miles into
the mountains. Future days may see mimic electric cars running through
the caves, and brilliant globes of light flashing like suns upon the
summits of tall lone columns ten miles from the entrance. Now there is
no tramway nor riding way whatever within the caves, but difficult
foot-paths and painful steps, and slightly hazardous creeping places,
and ladders to ascend, and narrow parts to pass, and a good deal of
labour to be performed to see even a little of the treasures which have
so far been unlocked. There are, to the traveller who has leisure and
who is content to live hard and sleep hard, so that he may delight his
more refined faculties, four days' good sight-seeing in the caves--four
days through which the world and all the things therein may be left
behind, and glories as of a kingdom of old may be fully enjoyed--four
days through which he may imagine himself entering into such a land as
that held by Lytton's 'Coming Race,' domes of the world above you vast
as the dome of heaven without. Far down below the strange black river,
running--

     'Through measureless caverns to the sea;'

mysterious echoes meeting you, great white ghostly figures appearing
suddenly in the fitful illumination, alabaster lakes, pools, baths,
spotless, stainless marble sanctuaries, and palace halls, which, lit by
the sudden flash from the magnesium wire, seem bespangled more thickly
and gorgeously than any royal crown with glittering jewels. You are
filled rather with wonderment than admiration, and the whole world
without seems utterly contemptible to you, whenever you return to the
cave's mouth.

[Illustration: WATERFALL AT GOVETT.]

There are green fields at the bases of great timbered hills all the way
to Bathurst, where the oldest and most considerable of all inland cities
of the colony sits beside the Macquarie river, on the crown of the down
country which rolls, rich with grass or grain, for leagues around. On
the long north-eastern flight we may hover a while over Bathurst, may
note with pleasure the fair country homes amongst the gardens and
bowers, the church spires of the city, and the many fair buildings. We
shall not find another such town as Bathurst, though country fair enough
is beneath us by Blayney and Orange, and southward thence through many
villages and little mining towns to Forbes. And almost due north to the
Wellington valley, and out to Dubbo, which is the gate of the great
pastures, the country is of the same character.

On leaving Dubbo we reach the magnificent distances of Australia, the
land of the mirage and the great drought, the land of marvellous flocks
and herds. There on the vast bush plain or amongst the box forest are
great hosts of cattle, one or two or three thousand head, already six or
nine months on the road, hoping to make the port or the trucking station
in three months more. Strange men are with them, white as to colour--as
white in pluck and endurance, but as uncivilised as the one or two
trackers who watch the horses. In this region during the bad seasons you
cross bare and bone-strewn plains. At a wretched homestead you may find
a man in the lowest deep of despair. Well-to-do a couple of years ago,
hoping to be rich before the decade had closed, he is lord now of twenty
thousand skeletons lying upon the soil, which looks as if indeed cursed,
and so effectively that it will never bear grass or herb again. You may
see river-beds of baked mud, and glistening veins of sand that once were
running creeks. Here grow brigalow and mulga, gaunt and weird as the
dragon-tree of the Soudan. Hundreds of miles stretches this dreary land,
the Lachlan winding through it from east to west, the least significant
stream in a dry or ordinary season that ever served as the watercourse
for so broad a land.

Out in its centre lies a village, Cohan, grown about a mountain of
copper, and along the Darling are other villages, Bourke, Bremoroma,
Welcanna, Wentworth, lingering on when no rain falls, and blossoming
with a dripping month as rapidly almost as the herbage of the black
flats. I never saw anything beautiful in them except the self-devotion
of some few good women who shine as stars amongst the general blackness.
But when the rain has fallen, particularly in the pleasant winter after
a genial autumn, it cannot be said that the land lacks beauty. I
remember winter days a hundred miles north and south from the Darling
river at Bourke, when the face of nature seemed to shine in open placid
beauty and to break into the tenderest imaginable smile with each dying
day; mornings in June, when, awakened by the glowing log to see the
flush of dawn through an oak hut or over a pine-ridge that seemed to
rise mysteriously with the sun, and, as though actually molten down by
the increasing heat, to vanish utterly in the full glow of day. There
was no painful mockery in the mirage that hung at noon on the horizon,
with its flat-crowned trees rooted apparently in the still blue
water--for by any clump of broad-leaved colane or drooping myall there
was water in abundance, water clear and cool in every hollow; and grass,
herbage and flowers knee-deep over all the land, when the spotted leaf
and trees were all abloom and the quandongs were heavily fruited, and
the nardoo with its life-saving seed ripened and decayed unheeded. Often
at eventide in that winter did the whole landscape seem pure and perfect
as a single crystal, the sky just after sunset of the palest primrose or
the colour of the neck of a wheat-stalk when the ear is just ripe; the
flood water through the lignum bushes glassy still; not a leaf of any
tree stirring nor a grass-blade or herb-bloom moving upon all the plain.
From the multitudinous flowers of the sand-ridge comes a rare sweet
fragrance mingling with the balsamic odour of the pines. There would be
noise and tumult a little later, as the crested galahs came cackling
homeward to rest, and then the long and solemn hush of night, with sound
enough and yet no lack of peace. The whistle of the wild duck's wing and
sharp blow of her descent on the water, the dull thunder of the wings of
great birds--pelicans, native companions, swan, ibis, and crane--rising
in hurried flight, scared by some movement of 'possum or night-feeding
kangaroo. Always the tinkle of the horse-bell and the prattle of the
flame-tongues within the little circle of heat and light. Beauty enough
in the inner lands in such a year, a marvellous contrast to the
ghostliness, the abomination of desolation, of the year when no rain
falls and all life dies.

The northern table-land is intersected by the Great Northern Railway,
and is bounded by the Pacific Ocean, the Macpherson range, the
Dumaresque and Darling rivers, and the Great Western line. The third
division of the colony contains upwards of 100,000 square miles of
country, of mountain and plain and wild forest and fertile down, and
infinite variety of scenery. Near to the coast, and south and west from
the line leaving Newcastle for the north, such country as we have seen
about Orange and Albany, but with the green in foliage and verdure which
comes from a somewhat warmer and more genial climate. Farther inland
there are more of the great pastures, and in the extreme north a
prosperous agriculture and a beginning of tropical industry, which
afford a pleasant contrast to all that we have seen before. We shall not
linger long here to look upon any New England villages or prosperous
towns. We shall not concern ourselves with the marvellous richness of
the Breeza plains--where in the wet summers grass grows so tall that
horses and bullocks are lost; and stockmen tell of patches where they
have had the long seed-stalks above their heads, and they on
horseback--but visit the north-eastern corner of the colony, where the
three sugar rivers come down from the mountains.

All their surroundings are tropical and rich, and never so rich perhaps
as in the heart of the country lying about the heads of the Richmond,
and northward towards the Tweed River. There we find the vegetation
whose density and glory and magnificence must be seen to be realised. It
is the country known as the Big Scrub, where everything is gigantic,
compared with ordinary Australian vegetation. The river flows deep and
navigable for small craft between low banks of rich deep soil,
chocolate loam, decomposed trap rock, spouted in remote ages from the
mountains whose high wild crests overlook the Queensland country, a
hundred miles to the north. The dense scrub growth covered all a
half-century ago, and the huge cedar-trees towering above the jungle
overhung the river; but now along many a mile the scrub has been cleared
away, and the cane-fields surround the settlers' houses. Wonderfully
delicate and fair look the canes beside the dark scrub, bright green or
pale yellow, as varied in tint as wheat-fields between the time of the
bloom and the harvest. They give grand evidence of the power of the
soil, and fully justify the wisdom of those bold speculators who built
the great mills lower down.

Quickly changes the foliage as the ascent to the table-land is made;
vines and flowers and orchids are left behind. Pine and cedar give place
to gum, box, and ironbark, while in the gullies are ferns of a hardier
growth, and trickling water that seems of near relationship to the
mountain snows. Higher and higher, and colder and fresher becomes the
air; and, turning now, the panoramic view below spreads broad and fair,
the half-dozen branches of the Richmond seen flashing at times through
the trees, the corn and cane patches but bright green dots in the dense
forest, and braids of a lighter green beside the broader stream, a
reflection of the ocean upon the farthest sky; and last, upon the
heights the distant northern mountains are seen the giant warders of the
Great Divide. Mount Lindsay is the grandest of all, lifting crags and
ramparts more than 5,000 feet from the downs below, as rugged in
appearance as any escarpment of the Blue Mountains, and of a vaster
height and bulk. The rich pasture-lands about his feet are buried in
haze, and occasional lagoons sparkle like flakes of silver or eyes of a
well-contented earth-spirit looking up to the sky. Waiting there till
evening, you may see Mount Lindsay afire with the floods of light which
catch his summit when all the trees below are dark; and farther south,
where the Clarence River springs, the tall gaunt peak of the Nightcap
will only lose the light before the mightier mountain. Both stand out
above all neighbours, though joining them is a mighty chain, with
beauties innumerable, stretching right along the line which separates
the tropic land of Queensland from the beautiful and prosperous colony
of New South Wales.




CHAPTER VI.

SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

     CONFIGURATION--THE LAKE COUNTRY--HEAT IN
     SUMMER--FRUIT--GLENELG--ADELAIDE--MOUNT LOFTY RANGE--PARKS AND
     BUILDINGS--MOSQUITO PLAIN CAVES--CAMELS--THE OVERLAND TELEGRAPH
     LINE--PEAKE STATION--THE NORTHERN TERRITORY--EARLY
     MISFORTUNES--PRESENT PROSPECTS--INSECT
     LIFE--ALLIGATORS--BUFFALOES.

[Illustration: J. A. G. LITTLE. R. G. PATERSON. C. TODD. A. J. MITCHELL.

OVERLAND TELEGRAPH PARTY.]

[Illustration: GOVERNMENT HOUSE AND GENERAL POST OFFICE, ADELAIDE.]


South Australia should rather be called Central Australia, for it lies
half-way between the western and the eastern seaboard, and the colony
runs right through the continent from north to south. It is an enormous
tract, 2,000 miles in length and 700 in breadth. The total area is
903,000 square miles, of which at present barely a tenth is in
occupation, though exploration has already made known the existence of
millions of acres of magnificent pasture-land ready for settlement. In
the colonies, when you speak of South Australia, you are understood to
mean the district of which Adelaide is the centre. If you referred to
the inland portion, you would speak of the 'far north;' and again, if
you meant the Port Darwin--Gulf of Carpentaria country--you would use
the term 'Northern Territory.' The original South Australia is first to
be noticed.

[Illustration: WATERFALL GULLY, SOUTH AUSTRALIA.]

No part of Australia is more strongly marked with Australian
peculiarities than this. The Murray is the only river, and this stream
brings down the waters of the ranges of the south-eastern colonies; the
other streams are merely courses in which, under favourable conditions,
water may be looked for, and not otherwise. The ranges are few in
number, and are of no great elevation. But the grass plains and the
scrub plains are immense. Gazing round from an eminence, the impression
produced by the equal height of the vegetation, and the dull glaucous
colour of the foliage, is that you are looking upon the open rolling
illimitable ocean. South Australia contains whole principalities of the
ordinary park-like bush of Australia; the eucalypts standing in grass
without any undergrowth, either singly or in clumps, as though planted
by a landscape gardener. If an expert were whisked during his
sleep--like another Bedreddin Hassan--and dropped from Europe, Asia,
Africa or America anywhere in these regions, he would exclaim the moment
he opened his eyes--''Tis Australia.' A glance at the map would lead to
the conclusion that the colony is well supplied with lakes. On paper,
Lake Torrens, Lake Eyre, Lake Gardiner, Lake Amadeus, cover large areas,
but unfortunately an antipodean meaning must be attached to the term;
for the most part these lakes are either muddy reed-covered swamps, or
salt marshes unfitted for navigation in winter, and evaporating into
vast glittering clay pans in summer. The level of several of these
extensive depressions is believed to be below that of the sea, and the
cutting of a canal to unite them to Spencer's Gulf, the deepest
indentation on the southern coast, has been suggested, and will probably
some day be carried into effect, and then there may be changes worked in
the climate.

[Illustration: A MURRAY RIVER BOAT.]

At present, however, South Australia is decidedly hot during its summer
months of December, January and February. The thermometer runs up to 110
and 112 and 116 degrees. 'But then,' says the typical South Australian,
taking you by the buttonhole, 'it is a dry heat, and really you do not
feel it; there is no enervating aqueous vapour about;' and there
certainly is not. No complaints of wet and sloppy weather are ever to
be heard. On the contrary, when the south-easter brings a heavy bursting
bank of cloud with it, there is a general rubbing of hands and utterance
of congratulatory remarks. 'Splendid rain to-day,' is the usual phrase;
and 'How far north does it extend?' is the current query. But, admitting
that the South Australian summer is hot, it must be added that the
climate during the other eight months is delightful. One enthusiast
declares that the pure soft balmy air is such as one would expect to
blow over 'the plains of heaven;' and at any rate there is first-class
medical testimony that for people with weak lungs there are few more
hopeful resorts. The 'far north' is subject to droughts and to floods,
and the Northern Territory has a weather system of its own. As the
description of its climate suggests, South Australia is a grand fruit
country. Grapes, peaches, apricots and oranges, grow practically without
cultivation, and attain perfection in the open air. In the season there
are few tables in Adelaide on which piles of grapes and plates of
apricots and peaches are not to be regularly found. The fruit can be
purchased in the market at a penny a pound, so that at current wages
there is no occasion for the poorest of the working classes to stint in
these luscious products of the soil.

[Illustration: ADELAIDE IN 1837.]

Adelaide, the metropolis of South Australia, called after the wife of
William IV., was founded in 1836. To-day, with its suburbs, it contains
about 170,000 inhabitants. On the 28th of December, 1836, Captain
Hindmarsh, who had served under Nelson at the Nile, landed from H.M.S.
Buffalo at Holdfast Bay, in St. Vincent's Gulf, and beneath the shade of
a patriarchal gum-tree, and in presence of a few officials, read his
commission as the first Governor of South Australia. The anniversary of
that event is observed as a public holiday by all classes in the
community, while the old gum-tree has become a source of solicitude, and
is reverently cared for by the municipal authorities of Glenelg--a
fashionable watering-place which has grown up within sight of Governor
Hindmarsh's landing-place.

And indeed this Glenelg is a fitting entrance to the fair city of
Adelaide, with which it is connected by two lines of railway. Facing the
dazzling white beach are the seaside residences of squatting kings,
wealthy merchants, and other successful colonists; while the bay itself
is studded with yachts and other pleasure craft, with perchance a
man-of-war, or two or three mail steamers, at anchor in the offing, for
all the ocean-borne mails are either landed or shipped at Glenelg.
During the summer evenings the sands and long jetty are thronged with
visitors from the capital, who have come down to enjoy the fresh cool
breezes, or to listen to the various bands of music.

Adelaide itself is laid out on a gently sloping ground, from 96 to 176
feet above the sea-level, on both sides of the Torrens, which is spanned
by three large handsome bridges. The part out north is called North
Adelaide, to distinguish it from 'the City,' which lies on the other
side of the river. The streets are all unusually broad, even for
Australian cities, and run at right angles, many of them being bordered
with rows of trees, the shade of which is very refreshing in the hot
summer days. One of the features of the place is the number and extent
of its beautiful public squares and park lands. In this respect it
transcends even Melbourne. The squares in each quarter of the city are
reserves of several acres in extent, embellished with flowers, trees,
and fountains; while the parks are extensive reservations, surrounding
the city on every side, separating it from the suburbs.

Adelaide, with ordinary care, can never be other than a healthy city.
Moreover, it can never extend its boundaries. This fact accounts for the
high prices obtained for city property. Land originally bought for eight
or ten shillings an acre has recently changed hands at £1000 a foot. Its
surroundings are the charms of the city. On the west is the sea. Four or
five miles to the east is the thickly wooded Mount Lofty range, so
called from the highest peak, 2400 feet above the sea-level, which,
trending away to the southward, closes in on that side the undulating
plain on which the city is built. To the northward the range takes a
more easterly direction for twenty or forty miles. These hills, which
are reached from Adelaide by railways and tram-lines, and excellent
carriage-roads, are a favourite summer resort of those citizens who can
afford to avail themselves of the coolness and seclusion which they
offer.

[Illustration: KING WILLIAM STREET, ADELAIDE.]

The buildings in Adelaide show well. A very white freestone has entered
largely into the more recent erections; and, as there are comparatively
few large factories in the city, and no shipping nearer than Port
Adelaide, they lose but little of their pristine freshness by smoke and
grime. Then the unpleasant effect produced by the sight of a hovel
adjoining a palatial bank or pile of warehouses several storeys high, is
of rare occurrence, while the broad streets offer the most advantageous
conditions for the display of the various architectural styles employed.
The town has been called 'the city of churches;' and the number of
ecclesiastical edifices which it contains places its pretensions to that
distinction beyond question. The Anglican Cathedral of St. Peter is a
large and imposing building, a portion of which is still uncompleted,
occupying an elevated position in the southern portion of North
Adelaide. The Roman Catholic Cathedral of St. Francis Xavier is in the
south, and recalls the early days of the colony, when the prophecies of
its future importance were few in number. All the other great religious
bodies are also creditably represented.

Nearly all the Government departments are in the vicinity of Victoria
Square, an ornamental reserve, through which King William Street, one of
the most handsome thoroughfares in Australia, has been carried. No
traveller should leave Adelaide without spending some hours in the
Botanical Garden. To omit that lovely resort would be an error indeed.

[Illustration: AN ADELAIDE PUBLIC SCHOOL.]

South Australia contains a little over 300,000 inhabitants. Its chief
industries are agricultural, pastoral, and mining. Very early in its
history it became the granary of the colonies, and, although it can no
longer claim that distinction, it is still one of the few places in the
world where the visitor can travel over three hundred miles in the same
direction between fields of waving yellow corn. Despite the small
returns from wheat-growing, the area under cultivation is enlarged every
year, and is now not less than two million acres. More attention is
being paid to scientific farming, thanks to the influence of the
recently established Agricultural College at Roseworthy, thirty miles
north of Adelaide, experimental farms in various parts of the colony,
and the lectures delivered in the chief agricultural centres. The yield
is so dependent on the rainfall that the average for the colony rarely
exceeds ten bushels per acre, and occasionally falls below three. The
subject of irrigation has lately been warmly taken up by the
agricultural community, and the next few years will see not only a more
rational system of farming, but the adoption of means to render that
community less dependent on the uncertain rainfall. At the London
Exhibition a splendid sample of wheat grown at Mount Barker--a
beautifully situated township amongst the hills, twenty miles south-east
of Adelaide--obtained the highest award.

[Illustration: REAPING IN SOUTH ADELAIDE.]

Of the show places of South Australia none are more interesting than the
curious caves of the Mosquito Plains. They have been described at length
by the naturalist Tennison Woods, in his _Geological Observations of
South Australia_: 'In the midst of a sandy, swampy country, a series of
caves is found, whose internal beauty is at strange variance with the
wildness of the scenery around. The entrance is merely a round hole on
the top of a hill, which leads to a small sloping path under a shelf of
rock. Descending this for about twenty-five feet, one gets a first
glimpse of the magnificence enshrined below. The observer finds himself
at the entrance of a large oblong square chamber, low, but perfectly
lighted by an aperture at the opposite end; and all around, above and
below, the eye is bewildered by a profusion of ornaments and decorations
of Nature's own devising. It resembles an immense Gothic cathedral, and
the numbers of half-finished stalagmites, which rise from the ground
like kneeling or prostrate forms, seem worshippers in that silent and
solemn place. At the farther end is an immense stalactite, which appears
like a support to the whole roof; not the least beautiful part of it
being that it is tinted by almost every variety of colour, one side
being of a delicate azure, with passages of blue, green, and pink
intermingled; and again it is snowy white, finally merging into a golden
yellow. The second cave or chamber is so thickly studded with
stalactites that it seems like a carefully arranged scene, which, from
the interminable variety of form and magic effect of light and shade,
might easily be taken to represent some fairy palace. Very soon the
cavern becomes as dark as night, and further exploration to the numerous
chambers and fissures beyond has to be made by the assistance of
torches. On leaving the last chamber, we return to the light; a narrow
passage, richly wreathed with limestone, is observed on the right hand
going out. Proceeding a little way down, a large vaulted chamber is
reached, so perfectly dark and obscure that even torches can do but
faint justice to its beauty. Here, above all other portions of the
caves, has Nature been prodigal of the fantastic ornament with which the
whole place abounds. There are pillars so finely formed, and covered
with such delicate trellis-work, there are droppings of lime making such
scroll-work, that the eye is bewildered with the extent and variety of
the adornment. It is like a palace of ice with frozen cascades and
fountains all round.'

A special feature of the settlers' life in the 'far north' is the
increasing use of camels. At Beltana a camel-breeding establishment has
been in existence for nearly twenty years. Sir Thomas Elder introduced
the animals first from Afghanistan, and, as they are found to be well
adapted for work in Central Australia, they are now largely used. They
are broken in to draw drays, or to trot with a buggy behind them; and
the 'belle of Beltana' uses one for a hack. Nearly a thousand camels
have been provided from this establishment for hauling stores and for
doing the every-day work of bullock and horses. The ordinary team is
composed of six camels. A team of eight will drag a dray with three tons
of goods through the heaviest sand. The animals wear large leather
collars, and their harness is in other respects very similar to that
used for horse teams. No great difficulty has been experienced in
training the camel to this novel sort of work. But the Australian
bushman would not hesitate about putting a hippopotamus into harness.

[Illustration: CAMEL SCENES.]

For pluck in public works South Australia has a character of her own.
One of her great enterprises was the construction of the 'Overland
Telegraph Line' from Adelaide on the one side to Port Darwin on the
other side of the continent, to meet the cable laid from Singapore to
that place, and thus to establish direct communication with Great
Britain. Two years were spent in this arduous undertaking. The country
was awkward; materials and stores had to be transported across the
desert as the work went on. For months the parties were stopped by
floods; some perished from thirst, and the blacks harassed others. When
at last the line was up it was found that the white ants had destroyed
the poles in the Northern Territory, and they had to be replaced with
iron columns. One contractor and one officer after another gave up in
despair, and at last Mr. Charles Todd, Superintendent of Telegraphs, who
was responsible for the scheme, had to leave his city office; and,
though he had no bush experience, his zeal and his intelligence were
rewarded with success. An engraving is given on page 98 of Mr. Todd and
three of his most energetic colleagues in the work: Messrs. Paterson,
Mitchell, and Little. The work was begun in 1870, and on August 22,
1872, the first message was sent over the 1700 miles of wire. It was
feared that the blacks would never let the line stand, but, though they
have 'stuck up' the stations occasionally and killed operators, they
have never interfered with the wires. While the line was being
constructed the operators gave every black who visited them the
opportunity of enjoying a gratuitous electric shock. The peculiar
sensation vividly affected their nerves and their imagination, and thus
a wholesome awe was engendered of what they called 'the white-fellow's
devil.' The illustration given on this page represents Peake Telegraph
Station, situated over seven hundred miles north of Adelaide. The large
building in the centre is the telegraph station and Government
buildings; to the right is a cattle station. The hills in the background
are mostly of a stony character common to Central Australia, with a
slight growth of bushes here and there. Round about the station there
are large numbers of blacks camped, and the officers have to go about
heavily armed. The station at Barrow Creek, farther north, was 'stuck
up' by the blacks a few years ago, and two of the officers killed. At
every station there are usually two operators and four line repairers.
As the adjacent station is 150 or 200 miles away, and there are no
nearer neighbours, the little garrisons lead a lonely life. Whenever a
breakage occurs two men start from either station between which the
fault exists; each party takes, besides a supply of wire, a field
instrument, and at every thirty miles a 'shackle' is put down, and the
party communicates with its own station, and so each proceeds until one
or the other finds and repairs the defect. Communication being restored,
the news is conveyed to the other party, and both take up their
instruments and retrace their steps without having seen each other.

[Illustration: PEAKE OVERLAND TELEGRAPH STATION.]

At the Barrow Creek station, a party of the employés were surprised in
1875 by the blacks, when they had left the building to indulge in a
bathe. They had to run for their lives through a volley of spears to
regain the shelter of their loop-holed home. Mr. Stapleton and a line
repairer were mortally wounded, and two others were badly hurt. Mr.
Stapleton was found to be sinking rapidly. The news was flashed to
Adelaide. In one room of the city stood the doctor and Mrs. Stapleton,
listening to the 'click, click' of the messages. A thousand miles away
in the desert, in a lonely hut beleaguered by the blacks, lay the dying
man with an instrument brought to his bedside. He received the doctor's
message that his case was hopeless. He heard his wife's adieus, and he
telegraphed an eternal farewell. It is easy to believe that the
affecting spectacle moved those around the group in Adelaide to tears.

South Australia's next great feat is to run a railway across the
continent. Already the line is completed a distance of nearly four
hundred miles northwards towards Strangeways Springs. Camels imported by
Mr. H. J. Scott are used to carry stores, rations and water to the men
employed in advance, whilst, from the other end, the Palmerston and Pine
Creek line, 150 miles in length, is in the hands of the contractors. It
is hoped that within the next ten years the transcontinental railway
will be completed, thereby uniting Australia and the east.

[Illustration: COLLINGROVE STATION, SOUTH AUSTRALIA.]

When John McDouall Stuart at last crossed the continent from sea to
sea and from north to south, there was great enthusiasm in Adelaide. The
explorer received £5000 from Parliament, and the colony obtained
permission to push its bounds up to the Indian Ocean, thus annexing a
nice little tract of 531,402 square miles. Thus, in the year 1863, was
the Northern Territory acquired. It was resolved at once to form a
settlement in the new country. The Imperial Government from time to time
had endeavoured to colonise North Australia, settlements being formed in
turn at Melville Island, Raffles Bay, and Port Essington; but each place
in turn was abandoned. Undeterred by these failures, the South
Australian authorities sold land, marked out a township, appointed an
official staff, and invited colonisation. And then South Australia went
through its painful experience. The owners of land warrants complained
that they had been 'sold' as well as the land; the expected colonists
did not put in an appearance; while the members of the staff were
quarrelling, the blacks made a raid and stole and destroyed nearly all
the stores, and finally many of the Government officers took to open
boats and escaped after a hazardous sea voyage to Western Australia. For
years and years the Northern Territory was a source of expense and
anxiety to the good people of Adelaide; but a colonist--and least of all
a South Australian colonist--never despairs. The party that counselled
abandonment was looked upon with scorn, and after every disaster a new
staff was sent up to Port Darwin, and more and more attractive land
offers were made. But the Adelaide Government was taught the lesson all
larger and more important Governments have yet to acquire: namely, that
you cannot force colonisation, that the one condition of success is a
natural growth. Times have changed recently. The overlanders, having
accounted for Queensland, pushed into the Northern Territory, and
consequent upon their favourable reports runs have been taken up in all
directions, and in immense areas, and in all probability the Northern
Territory is on the eve of a great development. In the last two or three
years tens of thousands of cattle have been moved from Queensland and
New South Wales into the new country, and at the Roper and Macarthy
rivers bush townships have been established, and the town of Palmerston
(Port Darwin) has witnessed a large increase in private and substantial
buildings. Prospectors have opened up gold, copper and tin mines. The
gold export is now £75,000 per annum, and copper mines are being
energetically worked; and a railway which is about to be constructed to
the present mineral centre is expected to effect a revolution, as the
want of carriage has hitherto checked mining progress.

[Illustration: SHEEP IN THE SHADE OF A GUM-TREE.]

Residents in the Northern Territory speak hopefully about the climate.
That the white man cannot perform the same amount of constant work in
tropical Australia that he can in his own climes and countries is
admitted, but still, it is contended, he can work and be healthy and
happy. There is an absence amongst the population of the enervation so
conspicuous in India, Java, Singapore, and Ceylon. Artisans ply their
callings on the eight hours system, as elsewhere in Australia, without
special precautions against the sun. The climate is, in fact, more
Australian than it is tropical. But at Port Darwin itself there is much
to remind the traveller that he is in the tropics, and is nearer to the
equator than to Capricorn. Mingled with the characteristic flora of
Australia are the palms, bamboos, rattan canes, and wild nutmeg-trees,
and other flora of the adjacent Spice Islands. The ground, the
vegetation, and the atmosphere are alive with insect life. Linnaeus has
eleven orders of insects, but, as one settler facetiously remarks, had
the eminent naturalist in question visited the Northern Territory, he
might have classified one hundred and eleven orders. Fire-flies flit
about; beetles display their metallic brilliancy; radiant moths and
butterflies fleck the gloom. The observant man admires and marvels; but
not always does the view charm, for myriads of mosquitoes and sand-flies
have at him, and the bung-fly, attacking the eyelid, will cause a
swelling that will close up the eye for several days. Ants are found
literally in legions. In the houses some amusement is to be derived from
watching the ant-eating lizard, who is allowed to run up and down the
walls without molestation, and is, indeed, welcomed as a highly useful
domestic animal. In the bush surprise is excited by the enormous
ant-hills. Some are twenty-five feet in height, and six or eight feet in
diameter; but usually they are from six to twelve feet high, and about
four feet in diameter; and along a belt of country extending perhaps one
hundred miles, they may stand apart but fifty or a hundred feet. To
level these cunningly devised cellular structures, occasionally, would
prove far more costly than levelling the ground of timber. In other
places the 'meridional' ant-hill is met with. These edifices are from
three to six feet high, and more. They are broad at the base, and taper
to a point at the summit. The form therefore is that of a long wedge,
and the peculiarity is that all the summit lines are true north and
south, as though laid down by a surveyor.

In the rivers the traveller is introduced to the alligator. Many are the
tales of horror and of escape related in connection with these saurians.
One member of the original exploring party of the South Australian
Government, a man named Reid, fell asleep in a boat on the Roper river,
with his leg hanging carelessly over the side of the craft. An alligator
seized the limb and dragged the man out of the boat, his screams too
late calling attention to his fate. The alligator is found right down
the Queensland coast. While writing, the following telegram appears in
the _Argus_ (Melbourne, March 10, 1886): 'A girl named Margaret Gordon,
the daughter of a dairyman on Cattle Creek, thirty miles from
Townsville, has been devoured by an alligator. She went with a
servant-girl to the creek for water, when a large alligator rushed at
her and carried her off. The occurrence was witnessed by the girl's
father, who was unable to render any assistance.'

The one trace left of the early settlements of Raffles Bay and Port
Essington is that herds of buffaloes are to be met with in the districts
in question, and also some Timor ponies. Both animals were introduced
from Timor, and when the settlements were abandoned males and females
were left to run wild. The buffaloes have spread along the north coast,
nearly, if not quite, to the Gulf of Carpentaria, and to the south as
far as the bottom of Van Diemen's Gulf. They are generally found
congregated in herds of twenty to fifty, under the guidance of a single
full-grown male, oftentimes of enormous size. But stragglers are often
met with far beyond these limits. The young males are turned out of the
herd by the patriarch as soon as they approach maturity, becoming
wanderers for life unless they can re-establish themselves, or gain a
footing in other herds; and this can only be done by killing or driving
off the leading bull. Of course many are doomed to a solitary life, and
roam far from the haunts of their fellows. There is no danger of the
buffaloes mixing with the herds of the settlers, as the antagonism
between these cattle races is pronounced and insurmountable.

[Illustration: THE BOTANICAL GARDENS, ADELAIDE.]




CHAPTER VII.

QUEENSLAND.

    SIZE AND CONFIGURATION--EARLY SETTLEMENT--BRISBANE ISLAND AND COAST
    TOWNS--GLADSTONE--ROMA--GYMPIE--TOOWOOMBA--TOWNSVILLE--COOKTOWN--
    SQUATTING--THE CATTLE STATION--THE SHEEP STATION--THE QUEENSLAND
    FOREST--THE NETTLE-TREE--SUGAR PLANTING--POLYNESIAN NATIVES--
    STOPPAGE OF THE LABOUR TRADE--GOLD MINING--THE PALMER--SILVER,
    TIN, AND COPPER.

[Illustration: BRISBANE.]

[Illustration: A VILLAGE ON DARLING DOWNS.]


The following sketch of the great colony of Queensland is from the pen
of Mr. Carl A. Feilberg of Brisbane.

In order to form a just idea of Queensland it is necessary to bear in
mind the broad divisions of its territory. First, there is the coast
country, which is often spoken of as a strip, though in reality it has
at some points a depth of over two hundred miles. A glance at the map
will show innumerable rivers finding their way into the sea along the
whole east and north coasts of the colony, and it is the country which
forms the watersheds of these rivers which is spoken of as the coast.
West and south of this bordering tract lies the great central plateau,
which is mainly a huge plain, where the surface, which sometimes rises
into rolling downs and sometimes spreads out in apparently limitless
flats, is only broken by a few ranges of low hills. From this great
plateau the whole surface drainage is to the south and south-west, a
small portion finding its way into the Darling, but the greater part
flowing by a network of channels through the thirsty sands which lie to
the north of the lakes, or more properly the huge swamps of South
Australia. In the coast country the rainfall in ordinary seasons is
sufficient in quantity and sufficiently spread over the year to permit
of agriculture. The rivers and creeks generally contain running streams
of water, and the air is moist enough to permit the fall of dew at
night. In the interior the rivers are watercourses that seldom contain
running streams, being during the greater part of the year merely chains
of pools, or 'water holes,' as they are locally called. Rain falls at
long and uncertain intervals: the annual total is small; night-dews are
not common, and agriculture is virtually impossible unless assisted by
irrigation. To this general description there is, however, one important
exception. In the southern part of the colony the table-land approaches
to within seventy or eighty miles of the seaboard, and therefore enjoys
a comparatively moist climate. The district so situated, known as the
Darling Downs, lies immediately to the west of Brisbane, and is the seat
of the most important agricultural settlement of the colony. The moister
climate of the Darling Downs changes almost imperceptibly as they
stretch to the westward, and it is difficult to fix on the point where
agriculture, carried on in the usual way, without irrigation, may be
regarded as a hopeless task.

The occupation of the territory now included in Queensland began almost
simultaneously at two points. Pioneer squatters, pushing northward from
the interior of New South Wales, discovered the fertile plains of the
Darling Downs, and the Sydney authorities determined to form a convict
station on the shores of the remote almost unexplored sheet of
land-locked water known as Moreton Bay. The convict station was founded
in 1826, and in the first instance on the coast at a place since known
as Humpy Bong, meaning, in the language of the blacks, 'dead huts or
houses.' This settlement was soon abandoned, as the water-supply was
precarious, and there was insufficient shelter for shipping. A site was
subsequently chosen about twenty miles up the channel of the principal
river emptying into Moreton Bay, which had been named after Sir Thomas
Brisbane; and 'The Settlement,' as it was at first called, soon came to
be known by the name of the river, and the decaying buildings of the
first attempted lodgment caused the wandering blacks to give the
locality the name it now bears.

At first, of course, there were nothing but the necessary buildings for
the convicts--dangerous characters who had been convicted for fresh
crimes in the land of their exile, and were therefore relegated to what
was then the safe isolation of Moreton Bay--and for the warders and
others in charge of the prisoners. Meanwhile, as we have said, pioneer
squatters had spied out the pastoral wealth of the Darling Downs, and
some bold adventurers had pushed overland with their flocks to occupy
it. These pioneers at first kept up communication by bush trails with
far distant Sydney, but, hearing that a new settlement had been formed
on the coast, they sought to open communication with it. A pass--known
as Cunningham's Gap--was found in 1832 through the ranges which form the
eastern flanks of the great plateau, and communication was opened with
the settlement. Townships were formed. Near the verge of the Darling
Downs plateau the seed of what is now the thriving and important town of
Toowoomba was sown by the carriers making a halting-place before
attempting the toilsome and dangerous descent through the ravines of the
thickly wooded range, which then swarmed with bold and hostile savages.
Another such halting-place was the spot where travellers, having emerged
from the broken country and having passed the great scrubs or jungles at
the foot of the hills--now a populated and thriving farming
district--first struck the navigable waters of the Bremer, the principal
affluent of the Brisbane. At that point the town of Ipswich came into
existence, and for many years it rivalled Brisbane in importance,
because the goods brought to the capital by sea-going ships were taken
in river craft to the former town, which was thus the point of departure
for all land carriage.

Brisbane grew slowly. There was no special attraction to induce people
to leave the more populated districts of New South Wales, and bury
themselves in so remote a settlement. There was the fever which attacks
settlers in all newly opened settlements, the blacks were dangerous, and
that the place was a station for doubly and trebly convicted felons told
against it. But the rich Darling Downs came to be regarded as a pastoral
paradise, and squatting occupation spread rapidly in the interior, so
that its expansion told slowly but surely on the outpost. The convict
establishment was in time closed. The plot of ground formerly cultivated
by the convicts is now occupied partly by a fine public garden, and
partly by the domain surrounding the Governor's residence.

Brisbane is a fast-growing city, with a population, including the
suburbs, of between 50,000 and 60,000, its growth since the census of
1881 having been so rapid that it is not possible to furnish more than
an approximate estimate of the number. Originally built on a flat,
partly enclosed by an abrupt bend of the river, the town has climbed the
bordering ridges, crossed the stream and spread out in all directions.
The principal street--Queen Street--runs across the neck of the original
river-side 'pocket;' at one end it touches the wharves, at the other it
meets the winding river at right angles, and the roadway is carried on
by a long iron bridge across to the important suburb of South Brisbane.
Queen Street, which is the combined Collins and Bourke Streets of
Brisbane, promises to be a fine-looking thoroughfare. Already it
possesses shops and bank buildings which may challenge comparison with
those of any Australian city, and every year the older buildings are
giving way to new and more imposing structures. On one side of the
thoroughfare the cross-streets lead through the oldest part of the city;
through blocks of buildings where fine warehouses and tumbledown hovels
are strangely intermixed with the Parliament Houses, the public gardens,
and the wharves. On the other side of Queen Street the same
cross-streets climb steep ridges to the terraces, where high and broken
ground offer cool breezy sites for streets filled with dwelling-houses.

The diversified surface of the ground over which the town of Brisbane
has spread itself, the broad noble river which winds through it,
doubling back almost on itself, as if loth to quit the city it has
called into existence, and the picturesque range of wooded hills which
closes the view to the westward, constitute a scene of great beauty. An
artist roaming round the town would find objects of interest everywhere.
From the elevated terraces he could look down on the main town, with the
river, a broad band of silver, winding through it, and his horizon would
include the blue peaks of the main range to the westward, and the
shimmer of the sunlight on the great land-locked sheet of Moreton Bay to
the eastward.

[Illustration: VALLEY OF THE RIVER BRISBANE, QUEENSLAND.]

One of the sights of Brisbane is the Garden of the Acclimatisation
Society--a body supported partly by private subscription and partly by
Government endowment. In these Gardens are collected a vast number of
trees and plants selected for their use and beauty, and the
sub-tropical position of Brisbane allows the propagation of the
vegetable products of almost every zone. The 'bush house' in these
gardens, a huge structure consisting of a rough framework roofed with
dried bushes, covers several acres, and is stocked with a most
interesting collection of ferns, lycopods, orchids, dracænas, colans,
begonias, &c. There is a public museum, which is well stocked, and its
specimens of natural history are well arranged.

The use of timber for buildings is very general in Brisbane. Pine is
abundant on the coast of Queensland, and the easily worked timber is
cheap. The climate is very mild, and their weatherboard walls are quite
sufficient to keep out the very moderate cold experienced in winter;
almost all the dwelling-houses, and many of the stores in the suburbs,
are therefore wooden buildings. The dwelling-houses also are nearly all
detached, standing each one in an allotment of its own, so that the
residential part of the town straggles over an immense area, stretching
out in fragmentary streets for miles from the main city. There are
hundreds of neat cottages and trim villas scattered over the low hills
and valleys, on the river bank, or nestling under the range of hills
which lie to the west of the town. It should be remembered, however,
that in the climate of Brisbane the 'verandah is the best room in the
house,' and people live as much as possible in the open air; the family
group gathers on the verandah in the evening instead of, as in a colder
climate, congregating indoors.

The extended coast-line of Queensland, and the peculiar position of
Brisbane in the extreme south, has prevented it from concentrating the
social and commercial life of the colony, as is done by Sydney,
Melbourne and Adelaide. It is by far the largest coast town, the centre
of government, and its commerce is larger than that of all the remaining
ports put together, but these ports are many of them also real capitals
and commercial cities. The first important town on the coast going
northward is Maryborough, on the banks of the Mary River, a town
containing probably 10,000 inhabitants, and the commercial capital of a
rich agricultural and mineral district, of somewhat limited extent.
Maryborough disputes with Brisbane the possession of the most extensive
ironworks in the colony, the demand for sugar and mining machinery
having called them into existence. Rockhampton, near the mouth of the
Fitzroy, is a town of equal if not greater population than Maryborough,
but it is a far finer and better built city. Being the west terminus of
the central system of trunk railways, it is essentially a commercial
capital, and a busy, thriving place. Agricultural operations are not as
yet very extensively carried on in the surrounding district, neither
sugar-growing nor general cultivation having at present helped to
increase the prosperity of Maryborough, nor is there any successful
gold-field in the vicinity, though one phenomenally rich mine, Mount
Morgan, is being worked in the neighbourhood. Rockhampton has grown and
prospered by trade, and as it is the outlet for over 100,000 square
miles of territory, it should have a very prosperous career before it.

The towns named are the most important on the coast-line of sub-tropical
Queensland. There are also the thriving little towns of Bundaberg, at
the mouth of the Burnett river, the outlet for a rich tract of
agricultural land, and Gladstone, a few miles to the south of the mouth
of the Fitzroy. The last-named township is next after Brisbane the
oldest settlement in Queensland, but it has never prospered. Hidden away
at the head of a great land-locked sheet of deep water--probably after
Sydney the finest natural harbour on the east coast of Australia--it
slumbers peacefully without any visible trade: a bush village, supported
by the stockmen employed on the neighbouring cattle stations, and
occasionally galvanised into life by a promising discovery among the
rich but fragmentary and erratic mineral lodes found in the volcanic
country in its vicinity. These constitute all the coast towns worth
mentioning.

Inland, on the line of trunk railway running westward from Brisbane, are
Ipswich and Toowoomba, both agricultural centres, but the latter the
more important of the two, with a population of eight or nine thousand
people. Just beyond Toowoomba, a branch of the railway curving to the
south runs to Warwick, another pretty country town of some four thousand
people, surrounded by rich soil and thriving farmers, and enjoying, from
its elevation, a pleasantly cool climate. Continuing, the branch railway
reaches Stanthorpe, near the border, mentioned elsewhere, and the line
is being continued to effect a junction with the New South Wales railway
system. After leaving Toowoomba, the main line continues in a nearly
direct line westward, passing through Dalby, a rather stagnant little
bush town of some two thousand people, set down in the midst of vast
plains more suited by reason of the climate for pasture than
agriculture. These plains may be regarded as the limit of the Darling
Downs. Beyond them the railway runs through a desolate tract of
scrub--not the fertile jungle of the coast districts, but an arid tract
closely filled with stunted trees, hard and gnarled by their long
struggle for existence. Emerging from this belt, the railway reaches
another open tract, consisting of the true pastoral downs country, and
runs into the pleasant little town of Roma, where from three to four
thousand persons find employment in supplying the wants of the
surrounding pastoral region. Still continuing, the railway is being
pushed on westward towards the great pastoral area of the interior--the
fertile wilderness which Burke and Wills first traversed, and where they
died, which now is being filled by millions of sheep, and adding rapidly
to the wealth of the colony. There are bush townships in the track of
the advancing railway which will no doubt become towns, but as yet they
are in no way noticeable. The same may be said of the townships reached
by the Central Trunk Railway running westward from Rockhampton and its
branches. The country through which it runs has not a climate very
suitable for agriculture--at least no agricultural settlement has taken
place--and with the exception of Clermont, a little town of about two
thousand inhabitants, which grew into some importance by means of
mineral discoveries in its vicinity, there are only bush townships of
varying sizes in the central districts. The thriving town of Gympie,
with five thousand inhabitants, the second gold-field of Queensland, and
also the centre of a thriving and spreading agricultural settlement,
lies about seventy miles to the south of Maryborough, with which it is
connected by railway.

The line of the Tropic of Capricorn runs close to the town of
Rockhampton; sub-tropical Queensland ends there. The first place of
importance on the coast going north is Mackay, a town of some three or
four thousand people, supported by a small rich district which has
become the chief centre of sugar cultivation in the colony. The Mackay
district is in a sense isolated, having little or no trade connection
with the interior. Next after Mackay comes Bowen, a sleepy, decaying
settlement of some one thousand inhabitants, occupying a most beautiful
site on a sheet of water land-locked by a ring of picturesque islands.
There is no prettier town on the coast of Queensland, no place which
seems more fitted for the site of a great city than Bowen; but trade
left it soon after its foundation, and it has mouldered half-forgotten
ever since.

From Bowen northward the coast of Queensland is sheltered by the line of
the Barrier Reef and a long chain of romantic and beautiful islands. The
traveller on this coast enjoys a perpetual feast of the eye. On the one
side the islands in the line of reef present every variety of form and
colour--the green of the timber or vegetation clothing them, the varying
lines of their fantastic, weather-beaten, rocky cliffs, and the dazzling
white coral sand of their beaches. On the other side, the mountains of
the coast range approach closely to the shore, sometimes apparently
springing upwards from the very beach; and their imposing masses,
clothed with dense vegetation to the very summits, smile rather than
frown on the blue sparkling wavelets of the sheltered water, which seems
to lave their feet. At various points the mountains fall back, opening,
as it were, avenues to the interior of the country. At the entrance to
one of these openings is Townsville, the chief commercial centre and the
virtual capital of the north. This fast-growing city is built on the
actual sea-coast; and though to some extent sheltered by islands, its
harbour is shallow and exposed. A breakwater, however, is being
gradually made, and in various ways an artificial harbour is being
formed. Townsville, which now contains probably a population of nine or
ten thousand people, is the terminus of the Northern Trunk line.
Immediately to the west of it are the great gold-fields of Charters
Towers and Ravenswood, and the railway is being pushed far to the
westward, traversing the northern portion of the pastoral plateau of the
west, and tapping the verge of the great plains which slope gradually to
the shore of the Gulf of Carpentaria. Townsville promises to be a very
fine city; and, although it is too new a settlement to contain many
buildings of special note, it will not long be without them.

[Illustration: TOWNSVILLE, NORTH QUEENSLAND.]

Still following the coast, and passing the little mountain-bound port of
Cardwell, which nestles at the feet of great hills which, by cutting it
off from inland traffic, have stunted its growth, and by the ports of
Cairns and Port Douglas, which dispute between them the lucrative
position of outlet for the mineral fields on the elevated mountain
plateau lying just behind them, we come to Cooktown. This town, built at
the mouth of the Endeavour River, on the spot where Captain Cook
careened his vessel after the discovery of Australia, was called into
existence by the great gold rush of the Palmer, described elsewhere. Its
fortunes waxed with the rush, and waned as the alluvial field became
exhausted; so that its population, Chinese and European, is now probably
not more than two thousand souls. There is, however, a future before it,
because a railway, now in course of construction, will soon link it with
the Palmer gold-field, where there are hundreds of gold-reefs awaiting
cheaper carriage and more certain communication with the coast for their
full development. In the meantime Cooktown is becoming a centre for the
nascent New Guinea trade, and a certain amount of settlement is taking
place in its vicinity. This is the best port on the mainland of the Cape
York peninsula, but at its extremity there is the port of Thursday
Island, a shipping centre, and the northern outpost of Australia. At
Thursday Island there is a Government resident, charged with the control
of the pearling fleet, which has its head-quarters there, and the
government of the scattered islands in Torres Straits, which are under
the jurisdiction of Queensland. Thursday Island is a port of call for
all vessels passing through Torres Straits, and several thousand tons of
coal are always stored there.

On the Gulf of Carpentaria are two small ports. The principal one,
Normanton, on the Norman River, is a growing town of over a thousand
inhabitants, and will probably be the terminus of a line of railway.
Burketown, on the Albert River, is a place which is reviving after a
strange history. About twenty years ago, when the pioneer squatters
first drove their herds into the Gulf country, a township was located
there; but the settlers formed their settlement and lived in such
reckless defiance of all sanitary rules that a fatal fever broke out,
which decimated them. The place was after this entirely abandoned, and
the grass hid the rotting posts of the mouldering houses, which rapidly
decayed in that hot, moist climate. A few years ago, however, the
attempt to form a town was renewed, and this time with more care.
Burketown is now quite as healthy as any tropical settlement; and as it
is surrounded by vast plains of exceptional fertility, abundantly
watered by flowing streams, it will probably become a place of some
importance. This completes the list of towns on the coast of Northern
Queensland.

Queensland is pre-eminently the cattle colony, possessing no less than
4,266,172 head of horned stock in 1884. Experience has shown that sheep
do not thrive in the coast districts, especially in the north. The
merino breed of sheep will thrive, in spite of an exceedingly high
summer temperature, provided the heat is dry, but not when the warmth is
accompanied by moisture; so that in Queensland sheep-raising is
practically confined to the table-lands of the interior. Cattle, on the
other hand, do as well on the short scanty grasses, and in the dry pure
air of the uplands, as on the rank luxuriant herbage and in the steamy
atmosphere of the great plains which lie sweltering in the sun round the
shores of the Gulf of Carpentaria. The whole colony is therefore
available for cattle, while probably not more than half, or at the
utmost two-thirds, can be used by the sheep-grazier. It is not possible,
however, to lay down any definite boundaries between the sheep and
cattle countries, because at many points the one melts insensibly into
the other, and prolonged experience is sometimes required to fix the
dividing line with any degree of accuracy.

The sheep-owner comes when the wilderness has been partly subdued, the
blacks tamed and reduced to idle drunken loafers, and the facilities and
cost of carriage greatly reduced. He must either be a capitalist or have
the command of large sums of money, for he has to subdivide his country
with great paddocks inclosed by wire fences; he must supplement the
natural stores of water by scooping out reservoirs, sinking wells, or
damming creek channels; and he must erect costly buildings as
wool-sheds, stores, huts, &c. The term squatter is quite misapplied to
the wool kings of the present day, who are here men of business,
watching the markets and the seasons, eager to utilise to its utmost
every crop of grass which a good rain yields, and to turn it into mutton
and wool, and buying and selling stock so as to profit by every turn of
the market.

A good deal of the sheep farming of the colony is now carried on not by
individuals, but by joint-stock companies with capitals of many hundred
thousands of pounds. In fact, the old-time squatter--the type depicted
in such books as Henry Kingsley's stories--is as extinct as the dodo in
Queensland, so far as the sheep districts are concerned.

The cultivation of cereals and crops such as are grown in the southern
colonies is only practised in Queensland on a considerable scale in the
district of Darling Downs, where the comparatively cool climate of the
inland plateau is accompanied by a sufficient rainfall to permit of
ordinary farming. Wheat is grown, but not to any great extent, the total
area under wheat in 1884 being less than 16,000 acres. The soil is very
fertile, and the yield of grain per acre is decidedly above the
Australian average; but for some reason red rust is a perfect scourge to
the farmer.

It is on the fertile scrub land that the most successful agriculture is
carried on. These scrubs are generally found on the banks of rivers,
although in certain localities broad areas, containing hundreds of
square miles, are clothed with scrub. The soil is a deep alluvial
deposit; and the close-growing trees on it spring straight and tall in
the struggle to reach the upper atmosphere and light, for the leafy roof
allows no sun to penetrate to the damp ground, soft with mouldering
leaves, but makes a cool green gloom even on the most fiery summer day.
There is something very solemn in the quietude of a scrub untouched by
the axe of the lumberer or settler. There is no undergrowth, properly
speaking, though delicate little ferns and fairy-like mosses nestle
close to the feet of the trees. But there is a wealth of parasitical
life. Giant lianas twine from tree to tree, hanging in great loops and
folds and contortions, suggesting the idea of huge vegetable monsters
writhing in agony. Much more graceful are the lovely shy orchids hiding
in crannies, and the bolder ferns, springing from great root-masses
attached to the stems of the trees, the graceful shape and curve of the
leaves, and their pure pale-green colour, undisturbed and undimmed by
wind or sun. Among the wilderness of trees may be noticed the victims of
the treacherous fig, the dead trunk of the original tree still visible,
but enveloped in the interlacing stem of the robber, which has seized it
in its cruel embrace, sucked life and marrow out of it, and reared
triumphantly its crown of glossy green leaves far above in the bright
sunlight. On all these beautiful or strange or weird objects one gazes
in a stillness which seems to be intensified by the continuous murmur of
the breeze in the leafy roof--a quiet so great that one is almost
startled by the timid thud of the tiny scrub marsupial, which, after a
gaze of fascinated terror at the intruder, hurries away, or by the
clatter of a scrub pigeon or turkey far up in the overarching foliage,
or the strange snoring call of the Australian sloth, or native bear.

In the tropical scrub the lianas, the creeping canes and creepers of
every description, bind the trees into compact masses of vegetation; and
it is a vegetation which, if one may be allowed the term, is of a
fiercer type than in the south. Every creeper seems to be armed with
thorns, to tear the clothes and lacerate the flesh of the rash intruder,
and poisonous and stinging plants abound. Chief among these must be
placed the nettle-tree, a shrub with broad green, soft-looking leaves,
covered with a down that carries torture in every tiny fibre. Even
horses brushed by these treacherous leaves go mad with pain. But in the
north, as in the south, the timber-getter rifles the scrub of its
treasures of timber, and the sugar planter clears all before him, and
skims with his cane-crops the incalculable store of fertility
accumulated in the soil.

[Illustration: SUGAR PLANTATION, QUEENSLAND.]

It is in connection with sugar-growing that the labour difficulty,
common in Australia, becomes unusually severe in Queensland. The
difficulty is two-fold--climatic and economical. Field work in the
tropics is everywhere shunned by white men, and in Queensland, north of
Mackay, it has not as yet been found possible to induce Europeans to
engage in it. Some of the work connected with cane-growing, also, is
peculiarly exhausting, because the canes, when they reach a height of
six or seven feet, shut out every breeze, and the heat between the rows
is stifling. Then a large staff of labourers is required on a
plantation, because during the planter's harvest--the crushing season,
which extends over some months--a considerable number of additional
hands are required. In a colony where labour is well paid and work
abundant there is practically no floating population to furnish these
temporary supplies. It follows therefore that the planter must keep all
the year round a staff equal to his harvest requirements, and the
expense of doing this, if the men employed were paid at the high rate of
wages current for white men, would be crushing. The difficulty has been,
up to the present time, solved by the importation of South Sea
Islanders, who are generally speaking good and docile labourers, not
affected by heat, and comparatively cheap. They are engaged for terms of
three years, at a wage in cash of £6 a year; but their employers have to
feed and clothe them, and to pay for the cost of their introduction and
their return to their homes when the engagements are terminated. It is
reckoned that the cost of Kanaka labourers, including everything, equals
from £25 to £35 a year for each 'boy' employed, though that of course is
very much less than the £1 a week, with food and lodging, generally paid
to white labourers.

The labour trade, as the procuring of Kanakas is termed, is, however, to
be stopped in 1890. In spite of rigid regulations and the care exercised
by the Government of the colony, it is a trade which, from its very
nature, is liable to abuse, and it has been abused. Vessels trading to
islands where the natives knew nothing of the colony or of regular work
endeavoured by fraud and misrepresentation, and sometimes, though
rarely, by actual violence to procure cargoes of labourers. It must be
remembered that the Queensland labour trade has been ever since its
establishment the bone of contention in fierce party disputes, and the
usual unscrupulousness of party politicians has been displayed alike in
attacking and defending it.

Taking a general view of agriculture, it must be admitted that
Queenslanders have not, except in regard to sugar, taken advantage of
their great opportunities. Sugar-growing, until the recent crisis in the
labour difficulty, was progressing rapidly. The yield for 1885, though
not officially stated, is computed by reliable experts at 50,000 tons of
sugar, which is nearly all of a high quality, and worth probably about a
million sterling. The wheat yield, as has been seen, is insignificant,
and even of maize--which grows freely in every part of the colony--there
is not enough produced to supply home consumption. In the tropical coast
districts some attention is being paid to the cultivation of fruit for
export. Pine-apples and bananas grow luxuriantly in all parts of the
colony, but in the north they attain great size and develop a very fine
flavour. These fruits, with mangoes, are now sent south in yearly
increasing quantities. Arrowroot growing and manufacture is spreading in
the districts round Brisbane, where the soil and climate seem to be
especially suitable to the tuber. Coffee has been grown experimentally
at several points on the coast, but nowhere in quantity, though the
experiments have been highly successful. Cotton growing, which at one
time was vigorously fostered by the Government in the southern coast
districts, flourished so long as a bonus was paid on every bale
exported, but when that support was withdrawn it was killed by the
labour difficulty. Olives, almonds, figs, and fruits especially suited
to a sub-tropical climate flourish in the same southern coast districts,
but no attempt has been made to cultivate them on a commercial scale. An
effort was made to establish silk production, and it resulted in the
production of just enough silk to secure the promised bonus, and there
the industry stopped. In fact, agriculture throughout the colony is
crippled by its very prosperity. The high rate of wages prevalent, and
the demand for labour in other fields, precludes the possibility of
pursuing any agricultural industry which requires many hands, unless the
product is exceptionally high-priced.

The mineral wealth of Queensland is surprising. Its gold-fields are of
vast extent, and as yet hardly touched. There are innumerable copper
lodes; stream and lode tin are being successfully worked; silver ores
abound, and are being mined now; iron has been found in great
quantities; extensive coal-fields exist, and are being worked in the
vicinity of Brisbane and Maryborough; lead, nickel, cobalt, and bismuth
ores have been found. The gold prospectors found their way to Queensland
soon after the great alluvial fields of the south began to show signs of
exhaustion, but for many years they found little to reward their
efforts. There was, however, a prevailing idea among regular
gold-miners--who, very soon after the first discoveries, began to form a
distinct class in the population--that rich finds would be made in the
northern colony. This belief led to the Canoona 'rush' in 1858, probably
the most remarkable wild-goose chase in which the excitable Australian
miners ever engaged. There was a report that gold had been found near
the shores of Keppel Bay, then occupied only by a few cattle stations,
and at once all the miners of Australia became excited. Steamers and
sailing vessels, filled with eager men, discharged their living freights
on the desolate shore, and in an incredibly short space of time many
thousands of miners, scantily provided with the necessaries of life, had
ascertained that the rush was a 'duffer'--that there was no gold--and
were spreading over the face of the country, prospecting it in all
directions. They found no gold, and were reduced to such straits that
the Government of New South Wales, which then included Queensland, was
compelled to charter craft to carry them away. But if they found no
gold, they discovered and made known the value of the country, and laid
the foundation of what is now the thriving town of Rockhampton. Gold was
found in sufficient quantities to repay mining at Peak Downs, about two
hundred miles inland from Rockhampton, where, it may be mentioned, the
proprietors discovered a wonderfully rich lode of copper ore that was
afterwards mined and produced many thousand tons of metal.

The gold yield of Queensland, however, for many years after separation
was only trifling. In 1860 the whole gold export of the colony was only
4127 ounces, and in 1862 it sunk to 189 ounces. But in 1868 a prospector
named Nash, travelling through the broken hilly country which forms the
upper watershed of Mary River, found 'prospects' in a gully, which
induced him to stay and try it. In a few days he rode into the sleepy
seaport of Maryborough--then a stagnant township with grass-grown
streets--and startled it by applying for a prospector's claim. In a few
weeks the colony rang with the news that a really rich alluvial
gold-field had been found, and in a few months from twelve to fifteen
thousand people had congregated in the field of Gympie. It was a very
rich but a limited field, and, though other neighbouring patches were
opened out and worked, the alluvial deposits were soon exhausted. But
there was better than alluvial gold at Gympie. The ridges were seamed
with quartz reefs, which were proved to be richly impregnated with
metal; and the gold yield from these reefs has been constant and
increasing ever since. In 1884 Gympie yielded 112,051 ounces of gold,
and it has given since it was first opened 1,043,131 ounces.

The last great gold discovery in Queensland was that of the Palmer in
1874. In the preceding year, Mr. (now Sir Arthur) Palmer, being Premier,
sent out an exploring expedition to examine the unknown interior of the
Cape York peninsula. In this report the explorers mentioned that they
had found 'the colour' in the bed of a river which they named after the
Premier. A party of four well-equipped northern miners acted on the
hint. Carrying with them plenty of provisions and spare horses, they set
out to examine the Palmer country, and soon found that the sand which
overlays its rocky bed and the gullies running into it were impregnated
with gold. A great rush ensued, and, though no very remarkable nuggets
were discovered, and no specially rich finds were made, the gold was
everywhere near the surface, and large quantities were unearthed. From
its discovery to the end of 1884 the Palmer yielded 1,243,691 ounces.




CHAPTER VIII.

WESTERN AUSTRALIA.

     EARLY SETTLEMENT--MISTAKEN LAND SYSTEM--CONVICT LABOUR--THE
     SYSTEM ABANDONED--POISON PLANTS--PERTH--KING GEORGE'S
     SOUND--CLIMATE--PEARLS--PROSPECTS.

[Illustration: SHEEP-SHEARING.]

[Illustration: PERTH.]


Western Australia, as its name implies, is the tract of country lying
upon the western side of the great island continent of the south. A
glance at the map shows that the eastern side of the island, and much of
the southern, is occupied by the colonies of South Australia, Victoria,
New South Wales, and Queensland, the land in which is taken up by
squatters, by agriculturists and miners for hundreds of miles inland,
while the coast-line is studded with large cities, like Melbourne,
Sydney, and Adelaide, and with numerous flourishing settlements. On the
other side is the enormous tract of Western Australia, 1300 miles in
length from north to south, and 800 miles in breadth, thus embracing in
extent one-third of the continent. Here, instead of ports, of towns,
and of settled districts, we find only a few scattered settlements, and
this is the case though the colony is an old one, and one for which much
has been done. By virtue of seniority of settlement, it ranks next to
New South Wales. It was founded in 1829, under Government auspices, and
with a great flourish of trumpets, mainly in consequence of a very
favourable report prepared by Captain Stirling, R.N., afterwards Sir
James Stirling, first Governor of the colony. To induce settlement,
enormous grants of land were made to men of influence and capital, who
in return were to bring out a proportionate number of labourers, and
perform other 'location duties.' Thus a Mr. Peel, a relative of Sir
Robert Peel, obtained 250,000, Colonel Latour 103,000, and Sir James
Stirling 100,000 acres.

It appears now to be agreed that this grant system was as injudicious as
it was lavish. Middle-class capitalists came to reside on their estates,
and not to work, and the settler of humbler but more useful pretensions
was led to believe that the colony was closed to him. The settlement was
hapless from the first. Old colonists give lively descriptions of how
ladies, blood horses, pianos, and carriages, were landed on a desolate
coast, while no one knew where his particular allotment lay. The
settlers found that they had no control whatever over the men they
brought out, and in some instances they were left to establish their
homes in the wilderness as they best could by themselves. Many, deciding
from the arid appearance of the place that there was no prospect of
success, abandoned it. Some who believed at one time that the Garden of
Eden lay on the banks of the Swan River, and that colonisation was a
perpetual picnic, returned wiser, poorer, and sadder, to the more
congenial sphere of settled and civilised England. Others, like the
Messrs. Henty, sought more favourable fields, and ultimately, in
_Australia Felix_, acquired both riches and reputation. Many of those
who remained do not seem to have possessed the stuff the real settler is
made of, but thought more of giving entertainments and seeking pleasure
than of work. When the supplies they had brought from England ran out,
they were very nearly starved, and they had to expend much of their
capital in importing provisions.

In after years their numbers were but little increased. Considerable
doubt existed about their progress being sure, and none whatever about
its being slow. Never well-to-do, they felt very severely the depression
general throughout Australia in 1848. People looked to their
money-chests only to see if they had sufficient left to take them away.
Casting about for relief, the York Agricultural Society suggested that
convicts should be applied for, and the proposal found favour with the
people. Backsliding seems as easy with communities as with individuals.
The colonists who had met more than their share of difficulties and
obstruction, while proceeding in the straight-forward path of
settlement, found everything prepared for them when they turned aside.
It so happened that, just before this time, the effects produced by the
vast influx of convicts into Tasmania had shocked the British public,
and provoked a spirit of resentment and resistance in the Australian
colonies such as had never existed before. The whole of the eastern
settlements stood arrayed against the mother country, and the conclusion
was forced upon the Imperial Government that the system must be
terminated. Earl Grey, who was then in office, and who had initiated
important improvements in the management of convicts, endeavoured to
find for the flood of British criminals a new outlet where these plans
could be tested. He addressed a circular on the subject to the colonies
of New South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia, New Zealand, the
Cape, the Mauritius, and Ceylon, explaining the improvements it was
proposed to make in the management of the convicts, promising to send a
free emigrant for every convict shipped, and asking whether, under these
conditions, the colonies would consent to receive criminals. The answer
was "No" in each instance, with the single exception of Western
Australia. Her reply was favourable, and a bargain was soon struck.
Western Australia entered into the contract upon the understanding that
the annual imperial expenditure should be sufficiently large to be of
importance to the colony, and in the hope that cheap labour would
attract capital to it.

The system was continued until 1868, when, in deference to the protests
of the sister states, and because also expectation had been greatly
disappointed as to the results, convict importation was finally closed
and determined. The protest was carried so far that it was proposed by
one Government to exclude from the ports of the free colonies ships that
had come from the convict settlement; and this decision would have shut
out the mail steamers. And Western Australia found that, while it
obtained convict labour, it frightened away free men, while immigrants
avoided the place as though it were a plague-spot. Now it may be said
the past is forgotten, the taint is dying away, and Western Australia is
awakening into life.

The country is being opened to the northward, but up to within the past
few years the bulk of the settlement was in the south-western corner of
the colony, in the neighbourhood of the Swan River--a stream which
possesses the peculiarities of being short, broad, and shallow, and
which, in consequence of its bar and its flats, is well-nigh useless as
far as navigation is concerned. At the mouth of the river lies
Fremantle, with a population of about 5000--the seaport of the colony.
Ten miles higher up is Perth, the capital city, possessing 2000 more
inhabitants than Fremantle. A like distance farther on is pretty
Guildford, and seventy miles from the seaboard, separated from it by the
Darling ranges, are the agricultural settlements in the Avon valley. The
town of Bunbury lies on the western sea-coast; and Albany, a settlement
of equal size on the southern coast, is indebted for its existence to
its harbour--King George's Sound--being a place of call for the mail and
numerous other steamers. Geraldton and Roebourne are northern ports--the
latter the centre of the pearl fishery trade.

Looking at its vast size, and the dispersion of its thin population--the
whole not equal to that of a Melbourne suburb--Western Australia can
only be described by one image--it is the giant skeleton of a colony.

A clever Yankee once described the colony of Western Australia as having
been run through an hour-glass. The American, however, possessed the
failing common to many humorists: he economised the truth for the sake
of uttering a smart saying. It is only to be expected that in a country
like Western Australia, possessing an area of a million square miles,
that sandy tracts are to be met with; but to assert that the colony is a
vast sandy waste--a Sahara--is to convey a wrong impression of its
physical features. In the far north the richest of Australian tropical
vegetation exists; fine rivers flow through tracts of splendidly grassed
territory, and the conformation of the country is bold. It is farther
south, where the tropical growth gives place to level plains and bush
vegetation, that the dreary sandy plains exist in parts, though not to
the extent sometimes imagined.

Along the south-west coast, however, where the splendid forests of
jarrah and other varieties of eucalypts are found, the soil is richer
and better watered, but the prevalence of dangerous poison plants
renders it less useful for pastoral purposes. Some districts are
infested with strong quick-growing bushes, the juices of which are fatal
to animal life. There are no less than fourteen known varieties of these
plants, but only four are commonly pointed out. These are the York-road,
the heart-leaf, the rock, and the box-scrub--the _Gastrolobium bilobum_,
the _Gastrolobium calycinum_, _Gastrolobium callistachys_, and the
_Gastrolobium anylobiaides_. The most common is the York-road plant, a
low bushy scrub, with narrow fresh green leaves, and a light coloured
stem. After a bush fire this plant is the first to spring up. Its young
shoots have a particularly green and attractive appearance; the sheep
feed eagerly upon it, swell to a great size, and die in a few hours. A
single mouthful at this period is sufficient to destroy them. The plant
is also very dangerous when in blossom, as then also the sap is fresh
and plentiful. In summer, when it is dried up, the sheep do not care
about it, and may even be fed on country where it is not very thick. It
is destructive to horned cattle, but it does not affect horses much.
Millions of acres are overrun with this poison shrub, which, however,
when cleared, may be profitably occupied. For instance, in the mahogany
forests about the Darling ranges, there is a coarse grass growing which
would support sheep well, but, in consequence of the prevalence of
poison, at present the land remains unproductive and unoccupied. As one
goes north the poison plants disappear, and the flocks which Victoria
and Queensland and New South Wales are now pouring into the new pastures
there feed as securely as they would in the Western District of
Victoria, or on the famous Darling Downs.

The city of Perth is built in a picturesque situation above the broad
reach of the Swan River known as Perth Waters. Its streets are broad and
well defined, and, considering that it only contains a population of
some seven thousand souls, it is a remarkably compact town. The Town
Hall, built by convict labour, is a pretentious structure, and within
easy distance of it are to be found the Legislative Assembly Chamber and
the commodious offices devoted to the use of the civil servants. The
principal buildings are to be found in St. George's Terrace, a fine wide
street lined with beautiful trees. The soil of Perth is admirably suited
to the growth of many varieties of fruits and flowers, and the love of
the residents for these gifts of nature is indicated by the well-kept
gardens that surround most of the houses. Indeed, no colony can produce
finer fruit than Western Australia.

[Illustration: GOVERNMENT HOUSE, PERTH.]

Fremantle, the principal port of the colony, is a modest little town
with narrow streets nestling at the mouth of the Swan River. Here was
maintained for many years the great convict depôt of the colony, and the
many public conveniences the residents possess are due to the efforts of
prison labour. The most remarkable feature about Fremantle is the
whiteness of its streets and buildings. This arises from the almost
universal employment of limestone as a building and road material. The
glare on a bright summer's day is both extremely dazzling and hurtful
to the eyesight. The Swan, which runs from Fremantle to Perth, is a
noble river. It opens out into splendid reaches of varying width. Its
banks are fringed with veteran gum-trees, whose rugged outlines are
reflected with mirror-like sharpness in the clear waters beneath. The
misfortune is that such a fine stream cannot be made practical use of
without considerable expenditure; but all entrance to it from the sea is
barred by a ridge of sandstone, which stretches, some six feet under
water, completely across its mouth.

The southern portion of the colony is singularly unfortunate in
possessing very few harbours. Fremantle is now an open roadstead, but
the State proposes by the expenditure of a large sum of money to give
effect to a scheme formulated by Sir John Goode, the eminent engineer,
which, it is believed, will render the port perfectly safe in all
weathers. King George's Sound, however, has been exceptionally favoured
by nature. The entrance to it is by either of the two passages which
surround the massive rock, appropriately named Breaksea, that rises up
with rugged abruptness in the centre of the channel. At the rear of
Breaksea the inlet opens into a grand harbour, where the largest ships
can lie with perfect safety in the roughest weather. The scenery along
the shores is diversified and beautiful, and no more charming place of
call could be found for the ocean mail steamers, which anchor there
regularly every fortnight. The little town of Albany is situated upon
the rising boulders of granite at the head of the sound; but its
isolated position has told against the prosperity of the place. The
harbour has been aptly stated to be the front gate of the colony, with a
blank wall behind it. That blank wall consists of the long tract of
dismal country lying between Albany and Perth; but the colonists hope,
with the aid of an English syndicate who have contracted to construct a
railway to join the Government system at Beverley, to abolish the
barrier which now cuts them off from Albany. They will then be able to
utilise the harbour and to elevate it to the position it should occupy.
Of late years the strategical importance of King George's Sound in case
of warfare has commanded the attention of Imperial and Colonial
statesmen.

The climate of Western Australia is decidedly salubrious. For years past
the residents have sought to induce the Indian authorities to make it
their sanatorium for invalid officers, but so far nothing definite has
resulted from their representations. Sport is plentiful in every part of
the province, and the homely hospitable character of the people renders
a visit to the colony a most enjoyable experience. The great pride of
Western Australians is in the wild flowers that cover their plains in
the spring time. The surface of the earth is then carpeted with an
endless variety of the most beautiful forms of the floral creation.
Every crevice and cranny is filled with blossoms, whose bright colours
contrast vividly with the more delicate hues of the 'everlastings' that
abound in the more level country.

The pearl fisheries off the coast of West Australia, and especially at
Shark Bay, produce the true pearl oyster, the _Avicula margaritifera_.
For a long time this shell was supposed to be valueless, on account of
its thin and fragile structure; but now there is a great demand for it,
both in Europe and America. It is especially prized by French and German
artists for fine inlaid cabinet work. During the year 1883, 619 tons of
pearl shell were exported from Western Australia, valued at $4000, and
the value of the pearls exported during the same period was $20,500.
Several of these pearls were of extraordinary size and beauty, one
weighing 234 grains. A mass of pearls in the form of a perfect cross was
found at Nickol Bay, West Australia, in the early part of last year,
each pearl being about the size of a large pea, and perfect in form and
colour.

[Illustration: ALBANY.]

The oysters in the West Australian fisheries are generally removed by
passing an iron-wire dredge over the banks, but divers are also
employed, the diving being carried on from the end of September to the
end of March. Pearl oysters are gregarious in their habits, and whenever
one is met with it is almost certain that vast numbers of others will be
found in the immediate neighbourhood.

Writing of Western Australia, Sir F. Napier Broome, C.M.G., says: 'Many
of the farmsteads I visited in the country districts are such as their
owners may well be proud of. They represent years of arduous toil, and
of courageous struggle with many difficulties. I find in some of them
the grey-haired, sturdy early settlers of the colony, still strong and
hale, after nearly a half-century of colonisation, now able, I was
rejoiced to see, to rest from their labours, and to enjoy growing
comforts and easier circumstances, while the farm or the sheep station
was looked to by the stalwart sons. Wherever I went, I perceived that
Western Australia, though not a country of richness, was nevertheless a
land in which an honest worker of shrewd wit has rarely failed to gather
round him, as years went on, the possessions which constitute a modest
competence, and perhaps something more, enjoyed amidst the affections
and the ties of a home in which he can take life easily in the evening
of his days, and from which he can see his children marry and go forth
to such other homes of their own. I did not find the feverish,
brand-new, shifting and disjointed communities of a wealthy colony, but
I found a people amongst whom ties of kindred are numerous and much
thought of, who have dwelt side by side with each other all their lives,
and who have preserved among themselves a unity and friendly feeling
most pleasant to encounter, and social characteristics natural and
agreeable in their unaffectedness, simplicity and heartiness. Each
little township resembles an English village rather than the colonial
assortment of stray atoms one is familiar with elsewhere. The more one
sees and knows of Western Australia and its people, the more they win on
one.'

The most important circumstance in connection with the Western Australia
of to-day is the discovery that the north-western corner contains fine
pasture-land, permanent rivers, and good harbours. Explorers from the
east have visited the place, and have reported favourably upon its
prospects, and now there is a good deal of _bonâ fide_ squatting
enterprise being displayed. Companies have been formed, and syndicates
and flocks and herds have been sent from Melbourne and Sydney by sea,
and cattle are also being pushed across from Queensland. If these
ventures have only half the success which is predicted for them, there
is a great future in store for this part of Western Australia. And
recent reports from the colony disclose the fact that there is every
indication that an extensive gold-field exists in the country between
King Sound and Cambridge Gulf. A 'rush' has set in, and there is
considerable excitement throughout Australia about the matter.




CHAPTER IX.

TASMANIA.

     A HOLIDAY RESORT FOR AUSTRALIANS--LAUNCESTON--THE NORTH AND SOUTH
     ESK--MOUNT BISCHOFF--A WILD DISTRICT--THE OLD MAIN
     ROAD--HOBART--THE DERWENT--PORT ARTHUR--CONVICTS--FACTS AND
     FIGURES.

[Illustration: VIEW OF MOUNT WELLINGTON, TASMANIA.]

[Illustration: CORRA LINN, TASMANIA.]


This island is the smallest of the Australian colonies, and the lover of
the picturesque pronounces it to be the fairest of them all. It is a
land of mountain and of flood--another Scotland, but with a perennial
blue sky and an Italian climate. Now that there is a leisured and a
wealthy class in Australia, this wealth of scenery is becoming a real
fortune to Tasmania. A twenty hours' run takes the holiday-maker from
Melbourne wharves to Launceston, and then the island, with its streams,
its hills and its fisheries, is open to him. The rush of excursionists
to enjoy the cool weather and the romantic views has become greater and
greater with successive years; and, though New Zealand is the
Switzerland of the colonies, yet Tasmania, being so much nearer the
mainland, and having so many native charms, is sure to hold its own as a
holiday resort.

Moreover Tasmania is held in affectionate regard by thousands of
Australians whose birthplace she is. Her material prosperity is not so
great as that of her neighbours, and consequently her youth are lured to
the mainland, where they usually establish themselves successfully, and
where they also acquire such substance as enables them at frequent
intervals to revisit the old land. So great is the migration of the
young men that it would have fared ill with the damsels of the isle but
for a compensatory influence. Their own youth were lured away to seek
for wealth and to woo wives in other lands; but the Tasmanian clime
enriches the fair sex with complexions which are the despair of their
more sallow sisters of the north, and the deserted maidens have always
had their revenge by captivating and winning their visitors. His lady
friends tremble for the Australian bachelor who spends a leisure month
across the straits. And then there are many territorial families in
Victoria and New South Wales whose sires emigrated from Tasmania in the
early days of colonisation. It is not surprising therefore that there is
a strong attachment between the rich sons and the poorer motherland
which it will take much to sever.

Bass Straits separate Tasmania from Australia, but the journey is easily
made in large well-equipped steamers which leave Melbourne regularly,
and which speedily reach the smooth water of the Tamar. This river
debouches on the north coast, and is a noble stream forty miles in
length, coursing through alluvial stretches backed in the far distance
by grand tiers of mountain ranges. Along its banks there are dots of
settlement, but, as they are at wide intervals, the traveller
appreciates the charm of navigating what appears to be an unexplored
tract. But for the beacons and buoys to mark the shoals there is little
to indicate the presence of man. Given a clear day--and all days are
more or less clear in Tasmania--a bracing breeze from the south, and a
trip up the Tamar cannot be excelled; and if it be that the traveller
comes in the early spring, before the snow has quite disappeared from
the highest hills beyond, and while the freshness of the new vegetation
still makes the near landscape glorious, he will wish for no better
communion with nature.

Launceston, on the Tamar, is the second city of the island--second in
point of picturesque surroundings, second also in political importance,
because Hobart, in the south, is the capital; but first in the material
aspect, from which point of view even lovers of the beautiful are
content to pay some homage. It is decidedly a pretty town. At its
wharves two rivers, the North Esk and South Esk, meet, and in their
mingling form the Tamar. The North Esk comes down over crags and
precipices, through a striking gorge, whose bold sheer cliffs frown at
each other and on the deep silent stream below. The most romantic spot
of all is Corra Linn, on the South Esk, where the river dashes over
boulders through a gateway of basalt, changes into a quiet restful
stream, reflecting foliage and rock in its peaceful depths, and then
dashes on again, falling and falling and falling, cataract after
cataract, whirlpool after whirlpool, until its force is expended in the
deep Tamar, and its bosom becomes dotted with the 'white-winged
messengers' of commerce. The South Esk flows through rich agricultural
country, where the land has been farmed for more than a generation, and
where the hedged fields on the hillsides recall Kent and Sussex to the
mind of the Englishman, and give the average Australian, whose knowledge
of farm landscape is made unpleasant by the recollection of mile after
mile of rail fencing, a splendid idea of how husbandry may be made to
present a charming aspect.

[Illustration: ON THE SOUTH ESK, TASMANIA.]

A fine railway runs through fertile country to the town of Deloraine, on
the River Meander, and on to the north-west coast to the mouth of the
Mersey, a distance of eighty miles. It passes large properties devoted
to the breeding of high-class sheep, which have served to make the
colony famous throughout Australia, because the flocks which now supply
a vast proportion of the world's wool have been bred from studs imported
from these areas.

The train passes through glades and over plains, round mountain sides
and over streams; and at Deloraine the traveller is delighted by the
bold appearance of Quamby Bluff, jutting from the end of a long range
against the blue sky. The Mersey has beauties, and so have the Don, the
Cam, the Forth, and numberless other limpid streams which 'bring down
music from the mountains to the sea'--this music being particularly
grateful to the visitor who, it may be, has just left the parched plains
of Central Australia.

Back from this coast, through wild country to wilder, lies Mount
Bischoff, the richest tin mine in the world. This prize was secured,
unhappily not for himself, by an old gentleman voted eccentric by his
neighbours, but so strongly inspired with the belief that rich tin
deposits must exist in the interior that for months and months he would
wander through the bush prospecting under conditions of hardship
scarcely conceivable--a long way from the tracks of humanity, absolutely
self-reliant and thoroughly confident. At last, where a pretty river,
the Waratah, turns a prominent hill and runs over a high precipice, he
found the long sought-for treasure. He also found on his return to the
haunts of men that his story was not believed, that 'Philosopher Smith,'
as he was designated, was not able to easily secure the assistance
requisite for the development of his discovery. In time, however, he
succeeded, and the Mount Bischoff Company was formed, and started upon
its career. Mr. Smith held his allotment of stock through the early
years of work, but gradually he was compelled to realise in the market
at ridiculously low rates. Twelve years ago the shares went almost
begging at thirty shillings each, and they have since ruled as high as
eighty pounds. It is difficult, on looking at the mine, to conjecture
when the lode will be exhausted. The 'faces' being worked from part of
the mountain, and as the material is brought under treatment, of course,
the picturesqueness of the scene has to suffer.

When 'Philosopher Smith' broke upon it he must, if he was anything of a
philosopher, have been greatly impressed with its magnificence, for then
not only were the mountains lofty, but they bore magnificent forests,
and the babbling streams were delightfully pure. Now the traveller can
only admire the mountains, which are still high, unless, of course, he
is also impressed by the enterprise which has drawn the wealth from the
hillside, albeit that in so doing the forests have suffered and the
waters have been stained.

Beyond Mount Bischoff the woods grow denser, and traffic through them to
newer tin-fields on the west coast is infrequent and hazardous. Twelve
or fifteen years ago very few men visited that district, and even now
nobody goes there unless impelled by strong business reasons. When you
stand on Mount Bischoff and look across the hills which rise in this
wild region, you are presented with a grand spectacle, and you wonder if
the day can ever come when clearings and cultivation will be where now
the bush appears to be impenetrable.

[Illustration: VIEWS IN TASMANIA.]

From Launceston, in an easterly direction, the traveller finds much to
interest him, particularly in that quarter where stand Ben Lomond and
other mountains, each upwards of 5000 feet high. St. Mary's Pass is a
natural gateway through the ranges, and the coaches which traverse the
road rattle along alarming ridges; but pleasure and surprise are so
strongly excited that there is no time for a thought of danger. Through
to Fingal, and on to St. Helen's at George's Bay, on the east coast, the
variations of scene are endless. And then the cliffs are reached; and,
gazing on the broad blue ocean once more, it is vividly brought home to
the continental Australian that he is on an island, and a beautiful
island also. Tin and gold mines have been worked in this division of the
colony more or less successfully; but the interests were not permanent,
and the attention of investors has long since been diverted to finer
fields.

[Illustration: LAUNCESTON.]

Launceston is connected with Hobart by one of the finest macadamised
roads--120 miles in length--in the world, and by a narrow-gauge railway
of 132 miles. The railway is a comparatively new institution, but the
road has stood for years, and will stand for ages. In 'the old days,' as
the past is happily and conveniently termed in Tasmania, there were only
two settlements--Hobart and Launceston; and it became as necessary to
establish others as to connect them. At that time hundreds of convicts
were being landed from England, and the additional necessity to find
employment for them induced the governing authorities to embark upon the
enterprise of making the road and making new towns. It cost more than a
railway would cost nowadays, for prison labour has always been
expensive. But it is thoroughly substantial, and has the great
advantages of passing through the richest agricultural and pastoral
lands of the colony, and the great charm of running over many bold hills
and of crossing many of the most beautiful streams of the island.
Thirteen hours were required to perform the journey between the two
towns when coaches were running, and there are many who, while
thoroughly appreciating the quicker transit of the railway, nevertheless
sigh for the good old invigorating coach-ride, and the rests at the old
hostelries--just such as would be found on an English turnpike. The
railway had to be constructed along a devious course, and consequently
traffic was diverted from the direct road, and from the ancient hamlets
to newer settlements, where everything is spick and span. The old
resting-places have not yet disappeared, but many of them are decaying,
and present striking contrasts to the new order of things on the rail
route. 'For a young country you have an elegant supply of ruins,' was
the comment of an American who was driven over this road. He was quite
right, but the ruins are revered by all who remember the traffic when it
was at its best. They are not signs of national decay, but the result of
a change of transit. As they stand now even they are not unprofitable.
Without them many a picturesque scene would be less interesting.

[Illustration: HELL GATE, TASMANIA.]

Hobart is a lovely city. It has been made beautiful by nature, and it
will become famous by the act of man, for it is the spot where the first
Federal Council of Australasia met in January 1886. It is rather
inverting the order of things to first dwell upon the newest
characteristic of the town, but the departure is justified by the
promise of the great good which must follow the establishment of the
Union. In due course the federal spirit must expand, and when
Australians, in years to come, revert to the starting-point of their
national life, they will think kindly of Hobart.

The city of 'balmy summers and cheerful winters' stands on the
big-volumed Derwent. The river rises far inland, up among high
mountains, where Lake St. Clair and Lake Sorell reflect the snowy peaks
of their basaltic guardians. It runs through rich country, where
settlement has become permanent, down to New Norfolk, where it bends and
twists, and skirts lofty cliffs, passes through hop-fields, whose golden
crops in the autumn make the landscape beautiful and the air fragrant,
develops into a noble course a little farther on, and at Hobart is in
some places seven miles in width, and in no place less than a mile.
There are high mountains on both sides, and the valleys are
exceptionally productive. The city is seated on seven hills; behind it
is Knocklofty, a respectable eminence; and behind that again Mount
Wellington, 4166 feet in height, forms a grand background. The
population numbers about thirty thousand, and the citizens are tolerably
thrifty, although not so enterprising nor so wealthy as the colonists of
the mainland. The city was established early in the century, and for
very many years it was the _entrepôt_ for the thousands of wretched
convicts expatriated from Great Britain. It was an important military
station, and its palmiest days were thirty-five years ago, when the
Imperial Government spent £1000 a day in the maintenance of the gaols
and the barracks. At that time the city was an important place, but the
curse of transportation was upon it. In 1851 the last convict ship
discharged its cargo, and since then the system has gradually run down,
and is now very little more than a memory. The traces must necessarily
linger, but their ultimate effacement is only a question of time. It is
a pity that so fair a spot was ever used for so ill a purpose.

Being the capital, Hobart possesses all the usual official institutions:
a Government House in a beautiful garden on the Derwent, in which
resides a well-paid representative of Her Majesty; Parliament Houses, in
which sit two Chambers, who legislate upon the most approved
constitutional plan; a Supreme Court, Civil Service Court, and other
accessories suited to the requirements of the colony. Its monetary and
trading institutions are sound, and its commercial relations with other
ports expanding. The harbour is lined with well-built wharves, and the
depth of water is astonishing. Twelve miles down the river are the
Heads. The Southern Pacific is beyond; and so easy is the navigation
that vessels very rarely have to employ pilots. Reefs and shoals are
unknown.

A two or three hours' trip seawards to the south-east enables one to
reach the famed Port Arthur, in a land-locked bay hedged by bluff
promontories whose aspect is so stern that the beneficent calm within is
made the more beautiful when they are passed. Port Arthur was the centre
of convictism for many years, and the prisons stand now, though the
place has long since been given up as a penal settlement. It is on the
southern point of a peninsula, which is connected with the mainland by a
narrow strip, not more than one hundred yards wide, called Eaglebank
Neck. This was, and is, the only means of communication by land with the
outer world, and the authorities devised stringent if inhuman means to
prevent the escape of prisoners. Fierce dogs were chained at such
intervals that it would be impossible for a man to pass between them,
and they kept watch by night, while armed men were on guard by day. It
was a straight and narrow path, but no one ever passed that way. To swim
through the water on either side was equally hazardous, because of the
risk of being attacked by sharks, and consequently the number of escapes
was extremely small. The only authenticated break away from bondage was
performed by three men--Martin Cash, Cavanagh, and Jones, who swam
Pirates' Bay in the night, reached a farm-house before morning, equipped
themselves for highwaymen's work, and defied arrest for some years. The
last prisoners were removed from Port Arthur in 1876, and the
magnificent buildings, than which there are none better in the world,
have been allowed to decay, the rich fields and meadows, which were
pictures in the busy days of the establishment, are fast becoming
obliterated, and desolation promises to encompass all. Slowly but surely
Nature is reclaiming her own, and is effacing the memorials of an infamy
which none care to look back upon. Chapter after chapter might be
written upon the annals of Port Arthur, but they would be inconsonant
with the tone attempted to be given to these pages.

On the west of the mouth of the Derwent is a magnificent channel
forty-five miles in length, deep and beautiful. It is called
D'Entrecasteaux Channel, after an early French navigator, and is a
passage-way to Hobart for ships coming from the westward. It is lined
with fine harbours, and among other rivers receives the Heron, which
comes down through dense forests from the region referred to in the
remarks made concerning the view from Mount Bischoff. This is indeed a
wild country, but hardy adventurers have made homes among the giant
trees and slowly cleared patches for fruit-gardens and farms. Far back
on the west coast is Macquarie Harbour, which was a convict station
before Port Arthur, and whose history is willingly being forgotten.

Tasmania contains an area of 26,300 square miles, so that she is a
little smaller than Scotland, and a little larger than Greece. Her
population on January 1st, 1885, was 130,541. Her total revenue was
£549,000. She had 215 miles of railway open, and she was constructing
160 miles. Her exports were valued at £1,475,000, and her imports at
£1,656,000. All English fruits--such as the strawberry, the raspberry,
and the apple--grow with a marvellous profusion, and the hop industry
flourishes.

[Illustration: ON THE RIVER DERWENT.]




SECTION III.

AUSTRALIAN LIFE AND PRODUCTS.




CHAPTER X.

HEROES OF EXPLORATION.

     TRAGIC STORIES--FLINDERS AND BASS--ADVENTURES IN A SMALL
     BOAT--DISCOVERIES--DISAPPEARANCE OF BASS--DEATH OF FLINDERS--EYRE'S
     JOURNEY--LUDWIG LEICHHARDT--DISAPPEARANCE OF HIS PARTY--THEORY OF
     HIS FATE--THE KENNEDY CATASTROPHE--THE BURKE AND WILLS
     EXPEDITION--ACROSS THE CONTINENT--THE DESERTED DEPÔT--SLOW DEATH BY
     STARVATION--LATER EXPEDITIONS.

[Illustration: NATIVE ENCAMPMENT.]

[Illustration: A NEW CLEARING.]


The story of Australian exploration is for the most part of a tragic
character. Great geographical results have been achieved, but the price
has been paid in great sacrifices. The records of success are saddened
by many episodes of disaster and of death.

The tale of heroism and suffering begins with Bass and Flinders, two
young men who have left their names writ large upon the map for ever.
They went out in 1795 with the second Governor of New South Wales, Bass
as surgeon of the ship Reliance, and Flinders as midshipman. The two
were soon friends; they had an equal love of adventure, and the new
circumstances in which they were placed fired their ardent imagination
with the hope of discoveries that should benefit mankind, if not bring
reputation to themselves. Never did enthusiasts set to work with more
scanty material. With a little boat eight feet long, and a boy to help,
they cleared Sydney Heads, and faced the unknown Southern Ocean, and
mapped out a section of the Australian coast. They used to row or sail
as far as they could in the day, and at night throw out a stone, which
served them as an anchor, and lie at these primitive moorings till
daylight. Many were their narrow escapes by sea and shore.

Once they were upset near the shore; their powder was wet, and they lost
their supply of fresh water. On reaching land and righting the boat, a
body of natives came down upon them, and, as the savages were well armed
and were hostile in their demeanour, it looked as if the defenceless
party would be sacrificed. But after a hurried consultation Bass spread
the powder out on the rocks to dry, and went off to a creek to fill the
keg with fresh water, while Flinders, trading on the personal vanity of
the blacks, and their love for hair-dressing, trimmed the beards of the
chiefs with a pair of pocket-scissors. He had no lack of candidates.
Long before he had finished his task, Bass had repacked the dry powder,
had loaded the muskets, and the two friends with a rush regained their
boat, leaving many would-be customers lamenting, and disappointing
probably some would-be slayers. A few weeks afterwards a vessel called
the Sydney Cove was wrecked in the unsurveyed Tasman seas, the escaping
boats were thrown ashore in a storm near Cape Howe, and this very tribe
massacred most of the crew.

Ingenuity and boldness rescued the adventurers from one peril after
another. As their exploits attracted attention, their friend Governor
Hunter helped the discoverers to some small extent. Flinders had to sail
with his vessel to Norfolk Island, but Bass obtained a whaleboat and a
crew of six men, and with this aid he pushed boldly along the coast of
what is now the colony of Victoria, discovered Corner Inlet and Western
Port, and proved that Tasmania was an island, and not, as was then
supposed, a part of the mainland. The separating strait rightly bears
his name to this day.

On the return of Flinders, Governor Hunter placed a small sloop, the
Norfolk, at the service of the friends, and with it they surveyed the
entire coast of Tasmania, Flinders preparing the charts. Their
discoveries were numerous, the river Tamar being among them. This, alas,
was the last joint expedition of the gallant comrades! Bass was tempted
to join in some trading speculation to South America, and unhappily his
vessel was confiscated by the Spaniards for a breach of the customs
laws. Bass was sent as a prisoner to work in the silver mines, and was
never heard of more. Well can it be imagined that many a hope, many a
bright career, many a noble aspiration, have perished in those living
tombs, but surely they never closed over a bolder or more unhappy victim
than Bass.

Flinders for a time continued his successful career. He visited England,
and was raised to the rank of lieutenant, and he was authorised to
proceed with his surveys in a vessel called the Investigator. A passport
was obtained for him from the French Government, exempting him from
capture during the time of war. At the same time, however, the French
Government sent out an expedition under M. Baudin. With characteristic
energy, Flinders did his work in advance of his French rival, who was
driven by scurvy to Sydney. Flinders was returning home when the state
of his rotten vessel forced him to put into the Mauritius, which then
belonged to France. Here, despite his passport, his ship was seized, and
he was thrown into prison. M. Baudin called at the Mauritius soon
afterwards, and he is accused by history of a great treachery. Certainly
there is much that charity finds it difficult to explain in M. Baudin's
conduct. It is written that he copied the charts and papers of the
prisoner. This seems to be an incredible meanness; but it is certain
that he connived at the detention, and that on his return to France he
published a work anticipating all that Flinders could say, ignoring the
labours of the prisoner, and representing himself as the great
Australian discoverer of the day.

[Illustration: SPLITTERS IN THE FOREST.]

More than six years elapsed before Flinders was released; and, upon
reaching England, he found that the discoveries he intended to announce
had been given to the world, and that the public was familiar with them.
Exposure, hardships, and, above all, the long weary years in the French
prison, had all told upon him. He set to work to bring out his book and
his charts, and just managed to complete his task, but sank immediately
afterwards. It is a mournful chapter. But the fame of Flinders survives
and is growing. In Australian annals no name is more justly honoured.

Very soon the colonists began to push inland from their settlements on
the coast, feeling their way, and gradually becoming acquainted with the
novel features of their new abode. There was great joy when, after many
endeavours, a Sydney party discovered a pass through the extraordinary
precipices of the Blue Mountains, which had long hemmed in the infant
colony. The adventures of Oxley, who thought that he was stopped by an
inland sea, of Sturt, who nearly perished in the Central Desert, and of
Mitchell, who opened up the Western District of Victoria, have already
been incidentally mentioned in these pages.

One of the first efforts to reach the centre of the continent was made
by Edward John Eyre, in after-days Governor of Jamaica. He left Adelaide
in 1840, his party consisting of five Europeans and three natives, with
thirteen horses. But the year was one of drought. The great marsh, now
called Lake Torrens, was a sheet of glittering salt. The horses broke
through the crust, and a hideous and tenacious black mud oozed out.
Advance on this line was impossible; and, upon taking a more westerly
route, the explorer was stopped by the still larger marsh now called
Lake Eyre, which was also a deceptive sheet of salt. Disappointed, Eyre
returned to the head of Spencer's Gulf, and decided to make a dash at
Western Australia, following the line of the cliffs in order to
intercept any rivers. Alas, there were none to intercept! The party had
to depend for subsistence upon the chance of finding water-holes not
dried up, and the little clay pans formed by the aborigines, and called
native wells.

At an early stage Eyre sent all his party back, except his overseer
Baxter, his black boy Wylie, and two natives. The farther he went the
more sterile the country became, and the worse was his position. The
burning sand suffocated the travellers, and day after day passed without
water. Most of the horses died. Eyre was watching the remnant feeding on
some scanty vegetation one night, and was musing on his gloomy
prospects, when he heard a musket shot. The two natives had murdered the
overseer, decamped with the stores, and left Eyre and his boy Wylie to
their fate! The night was dark, and Eyre gives a vivid description of
his feelings as he sat in the gloom by the side of the corpse of his
friend, expecting every moment that the treacherous blacks would use
their muskets upon him and Wylie. He could not bury the body, for the
ground was hard rock, and he had no tools. Day after day he plodded on.
Had Wylie deserted him he must have perished, for in the boy's quickness
in detecting traces of the natives and indications of their 'wells' lay
the only chance of safety. At last, when nearly exhausted, Eyre saw two
boats at sea. They belonged to a French whaler. Eyre was taken on board,
was well fed, was supplied with stores and ammunition; and, after a rest
of eleven days, he and Wylie continued their journey, and, the country
improving, they reached King George's Sound in safety.

Thirty years after this journey was made it was repeated from the
opposite side by Mr. John Forrest, a fine young West Australian
explorer, who with a small party passed over it with but little
inconvenience or difficulty. Mr. Forrest again and again camped on
Eyre's old camping ground, which he recognised at once, and which seemed
to have remained undisturbed from the time Eyre and Wylie left it.

Next comes the tale of the explorer over whose fate a veil of mystery
and romance has fallen. In 1844 Ludwig Leichhardt was an eager young
German botanist. He set his heart upon exploration. His first trip was
most successful, as, starting from Sydney, he made his way to the Gulf
of Carpentaria, and discovered many of the fine rivers of Northern
Queensland. So much enthusiasm was occasioned by these revelations of a
grand country in tropical Australia that the Sydney people subscribed
£1500 for Leichhardt, and the Government presented him with £1000. After
a short trip of seven months in the Queensland bush, Leichhardt
organised an expedition to cross Australia from west to east, a feat
which no man has yet performed, though explorers from the west have met
the tracks of those coming from the east. His party consisted of H.
Classen, six white men, and two blacks, with cattle and sheep. His last
letter, which was dated from McPherson's Station, Cogoon, April 3rd,
1848, concluded in the following words: 'Seeing how much I have been
favoured in my present progress, I am full of hopes that our Almighty
Protector will allow me to bring my darling scheme to a successful
termination.'

The hope was not realised. He has been tracked to the banks of the
Flinders, in Northern Australia, but his fate is unknown. The
disappearance of his party has been absolute, and the Australian
imagination has dwelt long, anxiously and lovingly upon the mystery. No
theory has been so wild but that it has found some eager adherents;
every straw of hope has been grasped at. Expedition after expedition has
sallied forth to rescue the living or to bury the dead, but all in vain:
the tales have proved false, and slowly hope has faded away.

The explanation now generally accepted is that the party was surprised
in low country by some tropical flood, in which all perished. A capital
bushman, Leichhardt was not likely to starve. And if he had died from
thirst, or if he had been murdered by the natives, some of his animals
would probably have escaped, or some weapon or some piece of their
equipment would have been found, and would have furnished a clue to the
mystery. But the earth gives no more trace of him than the deep sea of a
vessel that has foundered, or the air of a bird that has passed by.

[Illustration: AFTER STRAY CATTLE.]

The Kennedy disaster was on a large scale. Edmund Kennedy had explored
the course of the Barcoo with success, and in 1838 he was landed with
twelve men at Rockingham Bay, to strike across country, to a schooner at
Cape York. The dense jungle of the tropical bush and the vast swamps
checked their progress. He left eight men at Weymouth Bay, and proceeded
with three men and a black boy, Jacky, on his journey to the schooner.
The blacks were numerous and hostile, and the bush gave them shelter.
Kennedy was speared by an unseen hand, and died in the arms of Jacky.
The three men were never heard of, and only two of the other party of
eight escaped. Jacky, however, turned up at the schooner with the papers
confided to his care, a living skeleton. He is one of the many instances
of the fidelity of the Australian black when once he has become attached
to his master.

The rush to the gold-fields checked exploration for a time. All thoughts
were directed to the auriferous treasure. But after the new population
had settled down somewhat, a strong desire manifested itself to discover
the secret of the continent. The South Australian Government offered a
reward of two thousand pounds to the first person who should cross the
continent from south to north, and the intrepid John McDouall Stuart was
soon in the field to earn the money and to secure the fame. Stuart had
been one of the officers in Sturt's last party, and he had discovered
for South Australian employers a fine belt of pastoral territory beyond
the salt lakes that had discomfited Eyre. In Victoria the public
subscribed a large sum of money, which the Government doubled. The
Government also sent for camels, at a great expense, and the Royal
Society appointed a committee to organise the expedition. The command
was given to Robert O'Hara Burke; Landells, who had brought over the
camels, was second; and a young man from the Melbourne Observatory, W.
J. Wills, was placed in charge of the instruments. The dash and energy
of O'Hara Burke, and the talent and Christian fortitude shown by Wills,
have endeared the memory of both these leaders to the country; but the
admission must be reluctantly made that the tragic issue was due to
Burke's unfitness for the command. He was no bushman, and was too eager
and impulsive for a leader. As a second in command he would have been
invaluable; as a chief he was overweighted.

The expedition left Melbourne August 20, 1860. Burke's orders were to
take his stores up to Cooper's Creek, and, when he had established his
depôt there, to start for Carpentaria. On the way up Burke quarrelled
with Landells, who resigned, Wills taking his place. At the same time
Burke met with a man named Wright, who struck his fancy, and this
stranger, utterly unqualified for the post, was placed in an important
command. Burke left the bulk of the stores and most of the party on the
Darling in charge of Wright, who was to bring them on with all possible
speed, while the leader made a forced march with a light party to
Cooper's Creek. Days passed without Wright's appearing; and, instead of
returning to hasten up his stores, Burke, with characteristic boldness,
resolved to make a dash for Carpentaria. He divided his party and his
stores, leaving Brahe and three men at the creek to wait for Wright, and
started with Wills, King and Gray, on December 16, with six camels and a
horse.

The party made a rapid journey through fair and good country. Box
forests and well-grassed plains--a good squatting country--was
traversed, and finally the explorers struck a fine stream, the
Concherry, running to the north, whose banks were clothed with palms
and tropical vegetation. They were greatly pleased, for they knew they
had but to follow this river to reach the northern sea. But the camels
broke down. Leaving them in charge of Gray and King, the leaders
proceeded on foot, and came with exultation to an inlet of the great
Northern Gulf.

Their task was done; they could turn back. But this was their last
moment of joy, troubles thickening afterwards to the end. Their rapid
travelling over broken country under a tropical sun, with scanty
rations, began to tell upon all. There was no time for rest nor for
hunting. The party must push on and on to reach the depôt where food
awaited them. Gray complained of a failure of all his powers, and in
particular of an inability to use his legs. It was thought he was
shamming, and he was punished and hurried on; but soon afterwards he
laid down and died, and the same symptoms attacked them all, Burke
bitterly regretting his severity. They began to kill their camels, and,
scarcely sustained by this food, they pushed on, their pace dwindling to
a crawl, and then to a totter. On April 21 they came in sight of the
depôt, and a grateful 'Thank God!' burst from their lips. They fired a
gun. It was not answered, and they found the place deserted. Wright,
with the stores, had never reached the creek, and Brahe, seeing week
after week elapse, had fallen back to ascertain what was the matter in
his rear, leaving half of his remaining provisions for Burke and Wills.

When the three travellers entered the desolate depôt they gazed round in
dismay, and Burke threw himself on the ground to conceal his
feelings--they had expected safety, and they were confronted by death.
But a tree marked 'Dig' caught their eyes, and they came upon the buried
provisions. A rest for a couple of days was indispensable. And then
Burke came to the decision not to strike for the Darling, as Wills
desired, but to make for a pioneer cattle station at Mount Hopeless on
the South Australian border. This was a fatal choice, the camp being a
few miles away. The same day Brahe, who had met Wright, rode back to the
depôt. By one of those fatalities which mark the expedition, Burke had
buried his despatches in the _cache_, and had taken some pains to
restore it to its original condition, and so Brahe thought it had not
been disturbed. It was clear that some disaster had happened to Burke.
But Wright, who was in command of the stores, decided to fall back on
the Darling to report matters to the committee. Thus were Burke and
Wills abandoned. Wright and Brahe, when at the depôt, were within two
hours' journey of the perishing leaders. Growing weaker and weaker, the
forlorn and deserted trio struggled on. The country became worse and
worse. They struck the wretched desert where Sturt suffered so severely.
Water failed there, and all vegetation disappeared, and all hope of
food, from the country. Their torn and rotten clothing dropped from
their backs. They killed their last camel. In despair they walked back
to Cooper's Creek, on the chance of finding the natives--just at the
moment when another day would have rewarded them with the sight of Mount
Hopeless on the horizon.

[Illustration: MONUMENT TO BURKE AND WILLS IN MELBOURNE.]

When they regained the creek their provisions were gone. The blacks
showed the hapless men how to gather the little black seeds of a grass
called the nardoo, on which they mostly lived themselves. The white men
hoped that it would support them, but could only starve upon it. An
effort was made to reach the depôt to see if relief had arrived, but
the strength of Burke and of Wills gave out. Wills was the first to
sink. As he could travel no farther, Burke and King left him in a native
hut with nardoo seed and water by his side, while they sought assistance
from the blacks, who had given Wills a meal of fish a few days before.
When King returned a few days later with three crows which he had shot,
the pure and gentle spirit of Wills had taken its flight. Burke had only
tottered a few miles from the hut. He laid down to die, asking King to
place his pistol in his hand, and not to bury him. The strong man had
become as a child. He sent many messages to friends. Then he was silent;
and the early morn saw the earthly end of a generous, ardent, manly
leader, whose faults were of the head and are forgotten, while his
virtues were of the heart and endear his memory.

King made his way to the natives, with whom he lived many months, until
he was rescued. The Government granted him a substantial pension. A
married sister devoted herself to his care. But those who looked upon
his face saw his fate there. Thirst, hunger, and privation had smitten
him too severely, and very soon he also fell asleep.

Great energy was shown in sending expeditions to the relief of Burke and
Wills, when Wright returned to the Darling without them. One party under
M'Kinlay started from Adelaide, another under Walker from Queensland;
Landsborough led a third, which was landed at the Gulf of Carpentaria to
reach Melbourne, and Howitt proceeded from Melbourne viâ Cooper's Creek.
The knowledge these expeditions gave of the country was great, and when
McDouall Stuart, in 1862, crossed the continent, interest in exploration
lapsed. Ten years afterwards a series of efforts were made by Giles,
Gosse, Lewis, Forrest and Colonel Warburton, to cross from South
Australia to the western seaboard. Forrest pushed his way through from
the west, and Warburton from the east. This latter party had a terrible
battle for life, and without the camels, and without an intelligent
black fellow who hunted for the native clay-pans, all must have
perished. The men abandoned everything, even their clothing, down to
shirts and trousers; and Warburton arrived, strapped to a camel's back,
rapidly sinking from exhaustion.

Still there are vast territories in Australia untrodden by the foot of
the white man, but the task of filling up the blanks is now left to the
pioneer settler. One squatter pushes out beyond another, as the coral
insect builds on its predecessor's cell. Without any stir a district
that was once in the desert is occupied, and then the blocks beyond are
attached. The process is sure, though without sensation.




CHAPTER XI.

A GLANCE AT THE ABORIGINES.

     FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH THE BLACKS--MISUNDERSTANDINGS--NARRATIVE OF A
     PIONEER--CLIMBING TREES--THE BLACKS' DEFENCE--DECAY OF THE
     RACE--WEAPONS--THE NORTHERN TRIBES--A NORTHERN
     ENCAMPMENT--CORROBOREE--BLACK TRACKERS--BURIAL--MISSION STATIONS.

[Illustration: A CORROBOREE.]

[Illustration: A WADDY FIGHT. (_See p. 168._)]


From large portions of the continent the native has now been absolutely
swept away. The immigrant who intends to settle in the populated parts
of South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, Tasmania and Queensland,
will have no more to do with the natives than he would have to do with
the Redskins if he visited Ohio or Pennsylvania. The aborigines, unless
in the harmless guise of mission blacks, are not to be found except in
the far-off outlying parts where the pioneer squatter is prosecuting his
labours, and there the old sad tale of plunder and of murder by the
tribes, and of revenge by the white man--too often on guilty and
innocent alike--is still repeated.

The blacks of Australia differ in appearance and in size greatly, quite
as much as do the inhabitants of Europe. There are poorly fed tribes who
are correctly described by Dampier, while on the other hand men of a
splendid physique can be found amongst them. It may be said at once that
the tales that deny their intelligence and which degrade them almost to
the level of brutes are unfounded. They live in their natural state,
without care or responsibility, very much as children, and they have
the cleverness and the uncertain tempers and the mercurial happiness of
children. They could live, it must be remembered, with a minimum of
exertion. So long as a country was not over-populated, opossums, fish
and roots were obtained with little labour, and there was no occasion
for house-building. As animals like the sheep and the horse flourish in
the open in most parts of Australia without artificial shelter, so man
can 'camp out' with comparative ease. Thus the black was not, and is
not, called upon to exercise his higher faculties. Food was too scarce
to enable him to multiply and to form permanent settlements. Yet, such
as it was, its collection did not brace him up to any mighty efforts.
His life was never in danger from wild animals. If he found many
opossums, he indulged in a surfeit; if marsupials, lizards, birds and
roots were scarce, he pinched for a time. If the black had discovered
agriculture, his state might have been very different, but of
cultivation he never had the slightest idea. Once when a tribe was
induced by an enthusiastic settler to plant potatoes, the men and women
rose in the night and dug up the seed and feasted upon it. It was
inconceivable to them why the white man should desire to bury good food.

Thus the black man wandered in one sense aimlessly over vast tracts of
country, living on its chance fruits: a restless nomad, with no apparent
prospect of rising on the social scale. Even in Victoria, the garden of
Australia, it took 18,000 acres to maintain a black. It must be admitted
that this waste of power was too great. The European had a right to
conceive that the land was not in an occupation that need be respected,
though more consideration for the original tenants might have been and
ought to have been shown. The mischief was that colonisation was
unsystematic. No one knew how to deal with the blacks. The blacks did
not know how to establish friendly relations with the white man.

We give two illustrations here of Victorian natives. The likeness in
profile is that of a civilised black, and is strongly characteristic of
the Victorian race. The woman is also a good representative of the
Victorian lubra. In civilised races the woman eclipses the man in
beauty, but the rule reads backwards in savage races. The Australian
black man is often stately and picturesque--his mate is generally
hideous.

An offence committed within a tribe was generally settled by the
disputants fighting the issue out with spears or with waddies until the
elders thought that justice was satisfied. Terrible wounds would be
given and received, but to the healthy black man, cuts, smashes, and
bruises that would be fatal to the white are as nothing.

Although many pioneer settlers lived on friendly terms with the blacks,
yet their sheep would be stolen, and then there were reprisals. Here and
there all the hands on a station would be sacrificed. When the settlers
were at all near each other, it was the custom in Victoria to fix heavy
bells on posts near the house, and thus the warning of an attack was
passed through a district, and a force would be brought together to
relieve the white men and to punish the black. So it has been in turn in
all the settlements.

[Illustration: CIVILISED ABORIGINES.]

Mr. G. F. Moore, when Advocate-General at the Swan, gave the following
narrative of a defence made to him by a black, who for his crimes had
been outlawed: 'A number of armed native men had surrounded the house,
when Mr. Moore went to the door to speak to them, having his fire-arms
close at hand. He soon recognised Yagan, but the natives near the door
denied that he was present. However, when the outlaw perceived that he
was known, he stepped boldly and confidently up, and, resting his arm on
Mr. Moore's shoulder, looked him earnestly in the face, and addressed
him, as the first law officer of the Crown, to the following effect:
"Why do you white people come in ships to our country and shoot down
poor black fellows who do not understand you? You listen to me! The wild
black fellows do not understand your laws; every living animal that
roams the country and every edible root that grows in the ground are
common property. A black man claims nothing as his own but his cloak,
his weapons, and his name. Children are under no restraint from infancy
upwards; a little baby boy, as soon as he is old enough, beats his
mother, and she always lets him. When he can carry a spear, he throws it
at any living thing that crosses his path; and when he becomes a man his
chief employment is hunting. He does not understand that animals or
plants can belong to one person more than another. Sometimes a party of
natives come down from the hills, tired and hungry, and fall in with
strange animals you call sheep; of course, away flies the spear, and
presently they have a feast! Then you white men come and shoot the poor
black fellows!" Then, with his eagle eye flashing, and holding up one of
his fingers before Mr. Moore's face, he shouted out--"For every black
man you white fellows shoot, I will kill a white man!" And so with "the
poor hungry women: they have always been accustomed to dig up every
edible root, and when they come across a potato garden, of course, down
goes the wanna (yam-stick), and up comes the potato, which is at once
put into the bag. Then you white men shoot at poor black fellows. I will
take life for life!" And so far as in him lay Yagan kept his word.'

Generally speaking, the colour of the natives is a chocolate brown;
their dress is of the simplest kind: the opossum cloak, the strips of
skin worn round the loins and the apron of emu feathers constitute their
wardrobe. The aboriginal is essentially a hunter. His hands reveal his
occupation at once, as they exclude the idea of manual labour. An
English ploughman, it has been said, might squeeze two of his fingers in
the hole of an Australian shield, but he could do no more. Like most
nomads, the objection of the natives to steady work is insuperable. In
pursuit of game, in stalking an emu or a kangaroo, they will concentrate
their attention for hours, and will occasionally undergo great fatigue,
but without some excitement or object they will do nothing. No black man
will ever stoop to lift an article if he can raise it with his toe. And
the big toe of the black man in the bush is almost as useful and as
flexible as the thumb. The missionaries at the blacks' stations have
achieved wonders with their pupils, but the one thing they cannot do is
to induce the pure aboriginal to labour in any such way as the white man
works. Give him a horse, however, and he is happy.

Mr. E. M. Carr, Chief Inspector of Stock in Victoria, in his interesting
and valuable _Recollections of Squatting in Victoria_, brings the daily
life and the customs of the blacks vividly before the reader. His father
took up country so far back as 1839, in the Moira district; and Mr.
Carr, though a stripling, was left in charge. He came in contact with
the blacks therefore when they were absolutely in a state of nature. He
gives a long and interesting account of some matrimonial negotiations
carried on between the Ngooraialum and Bangerang tribes. We have space
for only a small part of his graphic story. The young people are
betrothed to each other years before the time of marriage, and, of
course, have no voice whatever in the arrangements. While Mr. Carr was
staying with the Ngooraialum tribe, the Bangerang, preceded by one of
their number named Wong, arrived. 'The Bangerang, after they had
satisfied themselves by a glance that it was really Wong, continued as
if entirely unconcerned at his arrival; taking care, however, to keep
their eyes averted from the direction in which he was coming. This
little peculiarity, I may notice, is very characteristic of the blacks,
who never allow themselves to give way to any undue curiosity as regards
their fellow-countrymen, and as a rule refrain from staring at any one.
Wong, when he arrived within twenty or thirty yards of the camp, slowly
put his bag off his shoulder without saying a word, gazed around him for
a moment in every direction save that of the Bangerang camp, and sat
down with his side face towards his friends, and quietly stuck his
spears one by one into the ground beside him, with the air of a man who
was unconscious of any one being within fifty miles of him; the
Bangerang, in the meantime, smothering all signs of impatience. Probably
five minutes passed in this way, when an old lubra, on being directed in
an undertone by her husband, took some fire and a few sticks, and,
approaching the messenger, laid them close before him, and walked slowly
away without addressing him. Old Wong, as if the matter hardly
interested him, very quietly arranged his little fire, and, as the wood
was dry, with one or two breaths blew it into a blaze. Not long after,
an old fellow got up in the camp, and, with his eyes fixed on the
distance, walked up majestically to the new-comer and took his seat
before his fire. Though these men had known each other from childhood,
they sat face to face with averted eyes, their conversation for some
time being constrained and distant, confined entirely to monosyllables.
At length, however, they warmed up; other men from the camp gradually
joined them; the ice was broken, and complete cordiality ensued; and
Wong having given the message of which he was the bearer, that the
long-expected Ngooraialum were coming, the conference broke up, the
new-comer being at liberty to take his seat at any camp-fire, at which
there was no women, which might suit his fancy. The next evening, from
amongst the branches of a tree in which they were playing, some young
urchins announced the arrival of the Ngooraialum. The bachelors, being
unencumbered, arrived first; next, perhaps, couples without children;
then the old and decrepit; and, lastly, the families in which there was
a large proportion of the juvenile element. As they arrived they formed
their camps, each family having a fire of its own, some half-dozen yards
from its neighbour's; that of the bachelors, perhaps, being rather
further off, and somewhat isolated from the rest. After the strangers
had arranged their camps (which, as the weather was fine, consisted
merely of a shelter of boughs to keep off the sun), and each group had
kindled for itself the indispensable little fire, which the aboriginal
always keeps up even in the warmest weather, they began to stroll about.
On this occasion two or three Bangerang girls found husbands amongst the
Ngooraialum, who returned the compliment by making as many Bangerang men
happy. In every instance it was noticeable that the husband was
considerably older than the wife, there being generally twenty
years--often much more--between them; indeed, as I frequently noticed,
few men under thirty years of age had lubras, whilst the men from forty
to fifty had frequently two, and occasionally three better halves.'

In another chapter Mr. Carr shows his friends in an unamiable light.
One of the warriors of the tribe died. 'Pepper' was buried with all
honours; but, as usual, the great question was who had bewitched him.
The common practice was resorted to for discovering the enemies.

'Shortly after sunrise the men, spear in hand (for no one ever left the
camp without at least one spear), went over to the new grave. Entering
its enclosure, they scanned with eager eyes the tracks which worms and
other insects had left on the recently-disturbed surface. There was a
good deal of discussion, as, in the eyes of the blacks, these tracks
were believed to be marks left by the wizard whose incantations had
killed the man, and who was supposed to have flown through the air
during the night to visit the grave of his victim. The only difficulty
was to assign any particular direction to the tracks, as in fact they
wandered to and from every point of the compass. At length one young
man, pointing with his spear to some marks which took a north-westerly
direction, exclaimed, in an excited manner: "Look here! Who are they who
live in that direction? Who are they but our enemies, who so often have
waylaid, murdered, and bewitched Bangerang men? Let us go and kill
them." As Pepper's death was held to be an act particularly atrocious,
this outburst jumped with the popular idea of the tribe, and was
welcomed with a simultaneous yell of approval which was heard at the
camp, whence the shrill voices of the women re-echoed the cry.

'A war-party, fifteen in number, proceeded stealthily, and chiefly by
night marches, to the neighbourhood of Thule station, visiting on their
way those spots (known to one of the volunteers) at which parties of the
doomed tribe were likely to be found. After several days' wandering from
place to place, subsisting on a few roots hurriedly dug up, and
suffering considerably from hunger and fatigue, they caught sight, as
they were skulking about towards sundown, of a small encampment, without
being themselves seen, upon which they retired and hid in a clump of
reeds. About two o'clock in the morning the war-party left their
hiding-place and returned to the neighbourhood of the camp, and having
divested themselves of every shred of clothing, and painted their faces
with pipe-clay, they clutched their spears and clubs, and, walking
slowly and noiselessly on, soon found themselves standing over their
sleeping victims.

'According to native custom, no one was on watch at the camp, and I have
often heard the blacks say that their half starved dogs seldom give the
alarm in cases of strange blacks, though they would bark if the
intruders were white men. They gently raised the rugs a little from the
chests of the doomed wretches, and at a given signal, with a
simultaneous yell, plunged their long barbed spears into the bosoms or
backs of the sleepers. Then from the mia-mias, which were quickly
overturned, came the shrieks of the dying, the screams of the women and
children, blows of clubs, the vociferation of the prostrate, who were
trying to defend themselves; the barking of the dogs and the yells of
the assailants, who numbered fully three to one. Altogether it was a
ghastly, horrible scene that the pale moon looked down on that night at
Thule.'

Mr. Carr describes the agility displayed by the men in such feats as
mounting the trees for opossums, &c., and the illustration on page 12
tells the story of one of these hunts.

Of Australian weapons the most interesting is the boomerang. Mr. Brough
Smyth, in his work on the aborigines, discredits the idea that there is
any connection between the boomerang and the throwing or crooked stick
of the Dravidian races of India, as has been contended, and insists that
it is _sui generis_. Its peculiar action depends upon a twist in the
wood, the twist of the screw, which may be imperceptible to the careless
observer, but which is always there.

[Illustration: A BOOMERANG.]

When a skilful thrower takes hold of a boomerang with the intention of
throwing it, he examines it carefully (even if it be his own weapon, and
if it be a strange weapon still more carefully), and, holding it in his
hand, almost as a reaper would hold a sickle, he moves about slowly,
examining all objects in the distance, heedfully noticing the direction
of the wind, as indicated by the moving of the leaves of the trees and
the waving of the grass, and not until he has got into the right
position does he shake the weapon loosely, so as to feel that the
muscles of his wrist are under command. More than once, as he lightly
grasps the weapon, he makes the effort to throw it. At the last moment,
when he feels that he can strike the wind at the right angle, all his
force is thrown into the effort: the missile leaves his hand in a
direction nearly perpendicular to the surface; but the right impulse has
been given, and it quickly turns its flat surface towards the earth,
gyrates on its axis, makes a wide sweep, and returns with a fluttering
motion to his feet. This he repeats time after time, and with ease and
certainty. When well thrown, the farthest point of the curve described
is usually distant one hundred or one hundred and fifty yards from the
thrower. It can be thrown so as to hit an object behind the thrower, but
this cannot be done with certainty. The slightest change in the
direction of the wind affects the flight of the missile to some extent;
but the native is quick in observing any possible causes of
interference.

The northern blacks are the southern blacks, but are 'much more so.'
They are finer and fiercer men; more given to slaughter, building better
houses, more intractable. The engraving on the next page depicts an
encampment of blacks on the shore, at the mouth of Wreck Creek,
Rockingham Bay, Queensland. The figure to the right of the picture is
engaged painting a shield. The curiously-shaped huts of the North
Australian blacks form characteristic objects in the engraving.

The engraving on page 166 of a corroboree in the far north is from a
photograph by Mr. P. Foelsche, at Port Essington. The males group
themselves as shown in our illustration, and stamp the ground with both
feet simultaneously, making a peculiar sound, and keeping tune with a
guttural exclamation. The first who sounds a false note or misses a beat
leaves the group amidst the ridicule of the bystanders, and this process
is continued until the number of performers is reduced to a pair, who
divide the honours. These northern tribes are guilty of revolting acts
of cannibalism.

[Illustration: A NATIVE ENCAMPMENT IN QUEENSLAND.]

No keener observers of nature in the world are to be found than the
Australian blacks. Their gaze is microscopic rather than extensive. They
have no appreciation of natural beauty and taste; but their attention is
directed to the broken twig, the crushed grass, the displaced stone, the
light impression--to anything and everything that may reveal the
proximity of a foe or the presence of food. No such trackers exist
anywhere. Celebrity has recently been thrust upon them. In 1880 a gang
of marauders took to the bush in Victoria. They committed many daring
crimes, and the police were unable to check or to capture them, though
the best men in the force were employed, and tens of thousands of pounds
were spent.

The idea of employing black trackers was mooted, and some of the
Victorian aborigines were first tried. But civilisation dulls the
instinct. Trackers were obtained from the far north, who did their work
well. The criminals were surprised and brought to bay. Three were killed
in the conflict, and the leader, who was captured severely wounded, was
hanged in Melbourne Gaol. It was acknowledged on all hands that the
presence of the trackers paralysed the gang, and a few blacks have been
kept about Melbourne ever since.

[Illustration: A NATIVE TRACKER.]

So soon as the black has been dispossessed, and has ceased to be
dangerous, the heart of the white man relents towards him, and he
proceeds to look after the remnants of the tribes. Philanthropists, lay
and clerical, find liberal support from the state and from individuals.
Thus Government stations and mission stations are called into existence
in Victoria, in South Australia, in New South Wales, and in Western
Australia, where the blacks have homes provided for them and food, and
where strenuous efforts are made to improve their morals and to
Christianise them. They are taught to grow hops and to look after cattle
and to repair their fences, but it is all essential that reserves and
streams should be at hand in which they can hunt and wander. Under these
favourable circumstances the full-blooded black is dying out; and, as
there is a movement to distribute all half-castes amongst the general
population, the time will come when these institutions will be closed,
owing to a lack of inmates. The visitor should not miss the opportunity
of inspecting one of the establishments, most of which are easily
reached. Illustrations are given here of the Lake Tyers station, which
is under the charge of the Rev. J. Bulmer. A railway journey of a
hundred miles to the town named Sale, and steamer thence to the entrance
of the Gippsland lakes, brings the visitor to the spot, and he is sure
of a hospitable reception. The upper view represents the mission church,
a handsome building, constructed of wood, and erected by the Rev. Mr.
Bulmer. Service is held morning and evening. Other sketches show the
school building, in which the aboriginal children are taught by Mr.
Morriss, state school teacher; and a native camp, occupied by natives
who decline the accommodation of the huts.

[Illustration: CHURCH, SCHOOLHOUSE, AND ENCAMPMENT AT LAKE TYERS.]

There are many missions to the blacks. How far is the race capable of
Christianity? On such an issue only one who has closely studied the
natives can pronounce an opinion. If there is any one person who is more
entitled to be heard on the subject than another, it is the Rev. F. A.
Hagenauer, who has had nearly a thirty years' experience with the
Australian black. Mr. Hagenauer came to Australia in 1858 as a Moravian
missionary to the aborigines, and has been engaged in his self-denying
labours ever since. Recently he has associated with the Presbyterian
Church of Victoria, and he has acted--without any stipend from the
state--as manager of the Government aboriginal station, Ramahyuck. The
following letter speaks for itself:--

                       ABORIGINAL MISSION STATION, RAMAHYUCK, GIPPSLAND,
                                               _January 30, 1886_.

     DEAR SIR,--I gladly comply with your desire, to furnish you with
     some reliable information as to my views and experiences among the
     aborigines in reference to their capability of understanding and
     receiving Christianity as a power to change the hearts and lives of
     these people.

     The beneficial influence of true Christianity, through the progress
     of education and civilisation, has worked a wonderful change in the
     lives, manners and customs of the blacks. Any one not acquainted
     with their former cruel and most abominable habits, but knowing
     them only as now settled in peaceable communities, would scarcely
     believe that the description of heathen life which the apostle Paul
     gives in the Epistle to the Romans was a correct picture of their
     mode of life. Given to the continual licentiousness of their carnal
     minds, they were slaves to their lusts and passions, which, working
     with their superstitious and cruel nature, made them ever ready,
     and their feet swift, to shed blood. Without a settled home, they
     wandered about from place to place in a most miserable and depraved
     condition, adding to their native vices drunkenness and other
     evils, which they had learned from white people. The different
     tribes, either from superstitions or family quarrels, or from
     violation of tribal territory and the sacred surroundings of their
     dead, were at continual warfare; and their fear of revenge by
     secret enemies was sometimes terrible to behold. Their howling
     noises for many days and weeks before and after the deaths of their
     friends and relatives, which told but too plainly that they were
     without hope in this world, were most pitiful to hear, and the
     disgusting scenes in connection with their nocturnal corroborees
     cannot be fully described. Added to this came the tormenting custom
     to which some of them were subjected at their peculiar native
     festivities, and especially the barbarous treatment of females by
     their tribal lords. It is not necessary to refer to the many
     atrocities and crimes committed by them in days gone by, for it is
     well known that they gave trouble to the earlier settlers, and were
     a terror to lonely women and children in the bush; nor need I say
     anything about their loathsome diseases, which were prevalent among
     them in consequence of their immoral lives and habits. Having lived
     for so many years among them as a close observer, I can testify
     that the above statements give only a faint picture of what
     actually took place, for there is not one hour of the night or day
     in which I did not witness one or other of their cruel customs.

     In the midst of their quarrels and bloody fights, at their ghastly
     corroborees, and during the time of their most pitiful cries around
     their sick and dead ones, we have been able to bring to them the
     Gospel of life and peace, and many times did they throw down their
     weapons and stop their nocturnal dances in order to listen to the
     Word of God and the joyful news of salvation through our Lord Jesus
     Christ. In the beginning of 1860 a remarkable awakening amongst the
     blacks began with earnest cries to God for mercy, and sincere tears
     of repentance, which was followed by a striking change in their
     lives, manners and habits. The wonderful regenerating power of the
     Gospel among the lowest of mankind worked like leaven in their
     hearts, and, through patient labour and the constraining love of
     Jesus, we were soon privileged to see a small Christian church
     arise and a civilised community settled around us. To the glory of
     God it can be said that a comparatively large number of the remnant
     of this rapidly decreasing race has been brought to the knowledge
     of the truth, and a good many honoured the Lord by their humble
     Christian life for many years, and a still greater number died in
     full assurance of eternal happiness through faith in Jesus Christ.

     The old manners and customs of the blacks have changed even among
     the remaining heathen under the influence of the Word of God. The
     war-paints and weapons for fights are seen no more, the awful
     heathen corroborees have ceased, the females are treated with
     kindness, and the lamentable cries, accompanied with bodily
     injuries, when death occurred, have given place to Christian sorrow
     and quiet tears for their departed friends. With very few
     exceptions, all the wanderers have settled down as Christian
     communities on the various stations, and, where they are kept under
     careful guidance and religious instruction, the change from former
     days is really a most remarkable one.

     Whilst, on the one hand, we have reason to rejoice that God has
     blessed His work to such an extent, we feel sorrow at stating that
     our joy is often mingled with disappointment, in so far that so
     very many of these people pass away either through the consequences
     of their former diseases, or for some unknown reason. The Lord does
     what seemeth good in His sight; and we have reason to thank Him for
     so many tokens of His grace, and for the triumphs of the Gospel in
     the redemption of those members who passed away in peace to their
     eternal home, to be for ever with the Lord.

     The carrying out of the Saviour's commandment to His Church, to
     preach the Gospel to every creature, has accomplished that which
     was considered by many an impossibility; for the influence of the
     Word of God proved its Divine power, and many of these poor
     depraved blacks soon began to sit at the feet of Jesus, 'clothed,
     and in their right mind.' General civilisation and education, in
     and out of school, for young and old, followed step by step as a
     fruit of true Christianity, and showed in reality a greater
     progress than we ourselves could have expected in accordance with
     the generally adopted opinion in reference to the capability of the
     aborigines.

     I may state here that in every case of conversion we have been most
     careful and cautious not to administer the ordinance of baptism too
     soon, but only after long trials and careful instruction in the
     Word of God. Some of the converts have honoured their confession of
     faith by most honest, faithful, and consistent lives from beginning
     to end; some have been, and still are, weak in their Christian
     course, whilst others have often to be reminded, and have even had
     to be put under Christian discipline, in consequence of
     backslidings and sins; but even of those it can be stated
     truthfully that, though weak, they did cling to Jesus for
     salvation, and cried for mercy to Him who alone can forgive sins.

     To enter into particulars of individual conversions and triumphs of
     faith would be out of place in such a short statement as this; but
     there are very many instances, both of young people, and of the
     very oldest aborigines, who lived and died as faithful humble
     Christians. On the whole, I believe that there is not any great
     difference between these blacks and any new converts from the
     heathen in other lands, or even among some classes of white people.
     It may also be stated that many people here and elsewhere at once
     expect the converted aborigines to be model Christians, whilst they
     forget that Christianity truly teaches all to grow in grace and in
     truth, and with patience and perseverance to press forward to the
     great aim; and this certainly is carried out by the converted
     aborigines in this colony.

                  I remain, dear sir, yours very truly,
                                                    F. A. HAGENAUER.




CHAPTER XII.

SOME SPECIMENS OF AUSTRALIAN FAUNA AND FLORA.

     MARSUPIALS--THE 'TASMANIAN DEVIL'--DINGOES--KANGAROO HUNTING--THE
     LYRE-BIRD--BOWER-BIRD--THE GIANT KINGFISHER--EMU
     HUNTING--SNAKES--THE SHARK--ALLEGED MONOTONY OF
     VEGETATION--TROPICAL VEGETATION OF COAST--THE GIANT GUM--THE
     ROSTRATA--THE MALLEE SCRUB--FLOWERS AND SHRUBS.

[Illustration: AUSTRALIAN TREE-FERNS.]

[Illustration: DINGOES.]


No large carnivorous animals roam over the Australian plains, to
endanger the life of man or to destroy his flocks and herds. Australia
is the mother country of the meek and mild marsupial, which is found in
abundance, varying in size from the great red 'old man' kangaroo, which
stands between six and seven feet high, to the marsupial mouse, which
will sleep in a good sized pill-box. There is the stupid, heavy wombat,
which seems a mere animated ball of flesh, which burrows in the ground,
and which apparently cannot move a mile an hour when it appears on the
surface, though its pace is really better than that. On the other hand,
there is the elegant flying fox, or rather flying opossum, which by
means of a bat-like membrane glides through the air at night,
astonishing the traveller, who sees hundreds of large forms sweep
noiselessly by. Great fruit-eaters are these flying foxes, and there is
tribulation when a horde visits a settled district. The native bear, as
a marsupial sloth is termed, is the most innocent-looking of animals,
and the most harmless, feeding on the leaves of the gum. It swarms in
the various colonies. In the next tree will be found a family of the
_Dasyuridæ_ or native cats, beautiful spotted creatures, the size of a
half-grown cat, whose sharp face and continuous activity betray at once
a restless and a wicked disposition. It is carnivorous, fierce and
intractable. The marsupial pictured on page 183 is a specimen of an
elegant variety of the common opossum, found principally in the
neighbourhood of the Bass River, Victoria. The common opossum is found
everywhere.

[Illustration: THE _Sarcophilus_ OR 'TASMANIAN DEVIL.']

While the native cat is the only mischievous carnivorous marsupial on
the Australian mainland, Tasmania is possessed of two much larger and
more destructive animals, the _Thylacinus_ or 'tiger-wolf,' and the
_Sarcophilus_ or 'Tasmanian devil;' the former is nearly as large as a
wolf, and is shapely and handsomely marked with stripes on the flanks.
The latter is a smaller animal. It has been described as 'an ugly
bear-like cat.' It is a thick-set creature, black in colour, with white
patches, and its hideous appearance and its untameable ferocity quite
entitle it to its popular designation. Both 'tiger' and 'devil' are
nocturnal, and both have been so hunted and trapped by the settlers,
whose sheep and poultry they killed, as now to be very scarce. Neither
has ever been known to attack man. At one time, as geological
examination shows, the marsupial 'devil' and his relative were both
found in Australia, and the wonder is that they should have so
completely disappeared from the scene as they have done.

[Illustration: BASS RIVER OPOSSUM.]

An animal that stands entirely apart from the marsupials in Australia is
the wild dog. The dingo is one of the mysteries. Whence did he come? He
is allied to the wild dogs of India, but why should this Indian animal
be in Australia--his form on the surface and his bones in ancient
deposits--while no other representative of the fauna of the Old World is
known? Leaving science to unravel this problem, it may be said of the
dingo that he is a good-looking but an ill-behaved animal. He is
compared to the sheep-dog, to the wolf, and to the fox, and, in fact, he
has a dash of each of these creatures in his appearance. He is about two
feet high, is well-proportioned, with erect ears and a bushy tail. He
stands firmly on his legs, and shows a good deal of strength in his
well-constructed body. His colour varies from a yellowish-tawny to a
reddish-brown, growing lighter towards the belly; and the tip of his
brush is generally white. He cannot bark like other dogs, but he can
howl, and he does howl with a soul-chilling effect. His note is to be
likened unto

The wolf's long howl from Oonalastra's shore.

Campbell's melodious line conveys the idea of misery, and discomfort and
uneasiness are engendered when the slumbers of the sleeper in the bush
are disturbed by the blood-curdling cry of these breakers of the
nocturnal peace. The blacks used to catch the puppies of the wild dog,
and then train them to hunt, but they found the European dog sufficient
for their purposes, and much more docile and affectionate. As dingoes
worry sheep, the first task of a squatter is to get rid of them. When
they breed in shelter and a semi-settled district--if they can issue
from mallee scrub--a handsome reward is always offered for their heads.
In parts of Victoria as much as £2 per head is paid. An engraving of the
creature is given on page 181.

[Illustration: A KANGAROO BATTUE.]

Man has to be fed, and therefore game has to be shot and fish has to be
caught. The animal life of Australia had little rest when the blacks
roamed over the country, but it has still less, now that the white man
is in possession. The kangaroo hunt varies from a necessary slaughter of
the blue and red kangaroos of the plains, to an exciting run and
desperate fight for life at the finish of it, when the game is the big
dark forester living in the timber belts that line most of the
Australian streams. The battue of kangaroos is often rendered imperative
by the rapid increase of the marsupials after the disappearance of their
old enemies, the aborigines and the dingo. As regards the kangaroo,
matters are apt to become very serious for the grazier. On an average,
these animals consume as much grass as a sheep, and where a few score
originally existed there soon come to be a thousand. In some places they
have threatened to jostle the sheep and his master out of the land; and,
in consequence, energetic and costly steps have to be taken to reduce
their numbers. In a battue of this description a whole neighbourhood
joins. It may seem hard that this aboriginal should be ruthlessly
destroyed in favour of the sheep, because he has no wool; but then, if
he could reflect, he would see that, fed and cared for as the merino is,
yet his fate would usually be the butcher at last.

The battue is not so welcome to the sportsman as the chase of the
forester. The 'old man,' when finally run down, backs like a stag into a
convenient corner, perhaps the hollow of a great gum-tree, the trunk of
which has been partly burned away with a bush fire, and there, with a
calm no-surrender expression in his mute face, and just the merest blaze
in the big deer-like eyes, waits for the enemy like the splendidly
resolute old veteran he is. If he can find a water-pool or river in
which to 'stick up,' so much the better for him and the worse for those
who attack him. He wades in until only his nervous fore-arms and head
are above water, and in this position can keep even a half-dozen dogs
from coming to quarters. The forester, standing six feet high, has the
advantage over the dogs that, while he stands upon his hind-legs, they
must swim.

Of the amphibious platypus everybody has heard. The creature has been
playfully likened unto a creditor, because it is a 'beast with a bill';
but its peculiarities do not stop here. As a survival, or a 'connecting
link,' it has other qualities that render it an object almost of
veneration to the naturalist. It is a mammal, suckling its young, and
yet it lays eggs. This fact was long known to bushmen, but it was
doubted by the scientific world, and Mr. W. H. Caldwell, 'travelling
bachelor,' of Cambridge, visited Australia in 1884-5, to specially study
the subject, and his researches proved that, as the bushmen had
declared, the platypus is oviparous. On the one hand, the platypus, with
its duck's bill and its webbed feet, connects the beast with the bird,
and, on the other hand, its peculiar oviparian qualities are held to
establish a relationship with the reptile. The name once given it,
'water-mole,' indicates its size, though certainly the platypus has
considerably the advantage of the mole. It is larger, indeed, than the
largest water-rat. When the first specimens were taken to Europe a hoax,
we are told, was suspected, the idea being that the bill and the feet
had been cunningly attached to the body; but the platypus is too common
a creature for the idea to be long entertained, and so its existence was
officially acknowledged, and it received the title _Ornithorhynchus_.
The platypus is a 'survival,' and it is likely to survive for many a
generation. It breeds in security in a chamber at the end of a long
passage which it constructs from the river banks. It is sensitive to
sound, and, as it dives with alacrity, and swims with only its beak
above water, a shot is no easy matter. As it is still to be obtained in
streams so well visited as the Yarra and the Gippsland Avon, it may be
imagined that its existence in other rivers is perfectly secure. Yet its
skin is much valued. As a fur it is equal to the sealskin; and if the
animal were only larger it would be systematically hunted for its
covering.

Australia is rich in the abundance and variety of birds of the parrot
tribe, and in the occurrence of peculiar species of the feathered race.
She possesses the birds of Paradise, the king parrot, the blue
mountain-parrot, the lories, parroquets and love-birds. The plumage of
other birds is often of the gayest type. Thus, the blue wren is common
about Nutbourne; and this bird, says Gould, is hardly surpassed by any
of the feathered tribe, certainly by none but the humming-birds of
America. The cockatoo, with white, black, or rosy crest, flies in
flocks, and few sights in the world are prettier than one of these
flights. When they finally settle on a tree, they cover it as with a
snow-drift. Noisy they are, and clever, never feeding in the settled
districts without posting sentinels to warn the rest of the approach of
the human enemy.

[Illustration: THE PLATYPUS.]

One of the most interesting birds of Australia is the so-called
lyre-bird, the _Menura Victoriæ_ of the naturalist, the 'pheasant' of
the settler, and the 'bullard-bullard' of the aborigines, the two words
somewhat resembling the native note of the graceful creature. Gould was
strongly of opinion that the lyre-bird, and not the emu, should be
selected as the emblem of Australia, since it is very beautiful,
strictly peculiar to the country, and 'an object of the highest
interest.'

[Illustration: THE LYRE-BIRD.]

The lyre-bird is about the size of the pheasant, and is valued because
of the magnificent tail of the male bird. The tail is about three feet
long. The outer feathers are beautifully marked, and form the lyre from
which the bird takes its name. There are also curious narrow centre
feathers crossing each other at the base, and curving gracefully
outwards at the top. The habitat of the lyre-bird is the romantic fern
country of South-eastern Australia, and the creature is in accord with
its lovely surroundings. It has many peculiarities. Thus, the male bird
forms a mound of earth, on which it promenades, displaying its tail to
its utmost advantage, and uttering its liquid notes for the benefit of
its female audience--for the female, dowdy as she is in comparison with
her lord, has to be wooed and won. Then they are the best of
mocking-birds. They imitate with precision the notes of the laughing
jackass, the parrot, the solemn mopoke, and moreover they reproduce
every sound made by man. Every splitter on the mountain-side has his
story of endeavouring in vain to discover the users of a cross-cut saw
in the neighbourhood, until he found that a 'pheasant' was mocking him;
and another favourite topic is the perplexity of the 'new chum' settler,
who hears an invisible mate chopping wood on his allotment, with an
invisible but barking dog at his heels. The lyre-bird is slow of flight,
and he would have a poor chance of escape from the shot-gun were his
haunt not in the thick fern vegetation; but this jungle protects him.
The birds are not so common as they once were in the ranges immediately
about Melbourne, but in the fastnesses of Gippsland they are met with in
their old numbers.

The satin or bower-bird is another of Australia's wonders. It not only
builds a 'bower,' but decorates the structure with the most
gaily-coloured articles that can be collected, such as the blue
tail-feathers of the rose-bill and Pennantian parrots, bleached bones,
the shells of snails, &c. Some of the feathers are stuck in among the
twigs, while others, with the bones and shells, are strewed about near
the entrances. The propensity of these birds to pick up and fly off with
any attractive object is so well known to the natives that they always
search the runs for any small missing article, such as the bowl of a
pipe, that may have been accidentally dropped in the bush. In the
spotted bower-bird the approaches are decorated with shells, skulls, and
bones, especially those which have been bleached white by the sun; and
as these birds feed almost entirely upon seeds and fruits, the shells
and bones cannot have been collected for any other purpose than
ornament.

Another bird peculiar to Australia is the 'giant kingfisher,' or 'piping
crow,' or 'musical magpie,' or 'settler's clock,' or, to use the term
everywhere applied, 'the laughing jackass.' Its extraordinary note, and
insane and yet good-humoured prolonged and loud cachinnation is unique,
and so is the appearance of the bird. It is a great Australian
favourite, is never shot, and as a consequence is tolerant of man. It is
called the 'settler's clock' in the bush by virtue of its regular
hilarious uproar at noon-tide and of its far-heard 'salutation to the
moon,' and it will equally make any city reserve lively with its note. A
dog-show was recently held in the Melbourne Exhibition. Five hundred
dogs naturally made themselves audible. But above all the discord was
heard the laugh of the giant kingfisher, intimating that he had secured
a golden perch from the pond, and was disposed to rejoice accordingly.
It is doubtful whether the laughing jackass destroys snakes. His critics
deny the assertion, which is made on his behalf. His admirers cling to a
belief which is widespread and has earned for the jackass the immunity
from destruction which he enjoys.

[Illustration: THE GIANT KINGFISHER, OR LAUGHING JACKASS.]

The largest game bird is the emu, but it is not pursued by sportsmen.
The chase is cruel, and is only indulged in by stockmen and Bohemians of
the plain, who traffic in the skins, for which, unfortunately for the
emu, there is a good commercial demand. Before a horse can be of any
service as an emu hunter he must become accustomed to the peculiar
rustling sound of the long light tail-feathers when the bird is in rapid
motion. Further, he must be sound of wind and limb to keep alongside an
emu; and these virtues are centred in some of the veteran stock-horses,
which by long practice have become accustomed to tread closely upon the
heels of a racer while the rider uses his long stock-whip. Swerve as the
hunted animal may, the old stock-horse never leaves the line. In this
way the emu is generally run down, only horse and whip being used. At
first he runs with a long clean swinging stride, but as he tires the
legs bend outward and get farther apart, until the movement is more akin
to the waddle of a fat barn-yard goose. He struggles along bravely until
every fragment of strength is gone, and then falls never to rise again.

[Illustration: THE EMU.]

The finest game-bird in Australia is the bustard, or wild turkey, which
is found all over the continent, but more plentifully in the Western
District of Victoria. On those clear frosty winter mornings peculiar to
the interior you may see them standing rigidly out in the centre of the
plain, as though the cold of the night had frozen them into
bird-statues. As they avoid the timber, and keep almost constantly to
the open, it is only by artifice that the sportsman can get within
range. For generations they have been stalked by the blacks, and have
thus inherited a dread of man when on foot. They are shot without much
difficulty from the saddle or a vehicle, the usual method being to drive
round the bird in narrowing circles until within range.

The native companion, a bird of very much the same habits and size as
the wild turkey, but very different from him in plumage and appearance,
also frequents the plains, and is often found in very large flocks.
Although not generally esteemed as a table bird, he sometimes finds his
way into the game market, plucked and dressed, and masquerading as a
turkey. An occasional blue feather beneath the wing instead of the
spangled grey of the turkey now and again betrays the deception, but, as
the birds at table are accepted by all except experts as being genuine
wild turkeys, the difference in the flavour of the bird is not very
marked.

Wild ducks are almost universal in Australia. The finest of them all is
the beautiful mountain duck, found all over the continent, but which
seems more closely associated with the woods and waters of Lake George,
in New South Wales. On this broad sheet of water they float in countless
thousands, and nest in the thickets upon its banks. Next to them in size
comes the black duck, a long low bird as seen in the water, and one of
the finest of Australian wild ducks. The wood-duck is, according to
strict scientific classification, a diminutive goose. It has the head,
bill, and body of a goose, and yet in popular estimation it is, and
always will be, a wild duck, and one of the most beautifully plumaged of
Australian ducks. The drakes have some of the brilliant tints of the
English mallard, and the neck and head are a rich velvet brown, while
the breast-feathers are beautifully spangled. The Australian teal is
much larger than the English bird, but otherwise not unlike it. These
four varieties are the best known, but the widgeon and blue-wing are
also plentiful, and outside these are at least half a dozen varieties
less familiar to Australian sportsmen.

The black swan can hardly be called a game bird, but it is shot on all
the lakes and swamps along the southern coast. In the Gippsland lakes it
is not an uncommon thing to find thousands of swans in a single flock,
and when these rise for a flight, striking the water with feet and
wings, the noise can be heard for miles across the lake. When means have
been taken to get rid of a rather rank flavour, just as the taste of the
gum-leaves is removed from opossum flesh, the swan is occasionally eaten
as game. Both swans and ducks are very largely shot from light punts,
and for many years punt and swivel guns were used with terrible
destruction by men whose business it was to supply the game markets of
the large cities. In Victoria the Legislature has by enactment declared
the swivel gun an illegal instrument, and since its abolition the ducks
are returning in hundreds to their old breeding-grounds.

Smaller game is abundant everywhere. The snipe, as nearly as possible a
prototype of the British bird, provides good shooting, more especially
in Gippsland. British epicures would be shocked at the uses to which the
bird is put in rough bush cookery, where its virtues are held in small
esteem. An Irish recipe for cooking a snipe is merely to burn its bill
in a candle, but some Australian cooks go to the other extreme. One
recipient of a present of a few brace 'just fried them with steak.' The
heresy as regards the steak was bad enough, but such treatment of snipe
was altogether unpardonable. The Argus snipe is a rare but rather
beautiful bird, the markings on its back and wings being exceptionally
fine. Of Australian quail there are at least a dozen varieties, ranging
from a small partridge down to the little king quail. In some parts of
the colony, without the slightest efforts being made at game
preservation, enormous bags are frequently made.

[Illustration: THE TIGER-SNAKE.]

Amongst the game of southern forests the wonga-wonga and bronze-wing
pigeons are two really splendid birds, the latter as large as an
ordinary blue-rock, and the former making all varieties of the pigeon
tribe look like mere dwarfs beside them. They keep closely to the
thickets. It requires a quick eye to detect them.

Snakes are often considered a drawback in Australia, but then it must be
remembered that a man may live ten years in a snaky part of the country
and never see one of these reptiles. Now that rational ideas of
treatment are gaining ground, death from snake-bites will not average
above one per million of the population per annum.

The most vicious as well as the most dangerous of these reptiles is the
tiger-snake, so called from its tawny, cross-banded colouring. Like its
near ally, the cobra di capello of India, when irritated it flattens and
extends its neck to twice its natural size. A full-sized tiger-snake in
the summer season, when it secretes its maximum amount of poison, can
inject a dose that is speedily fatal.

The treatment in snake-bite cases is still in dispute. The Indian
doctors reject ammonia, and are followed by the Central Board of Health
(Victoria), which has issued notices recommending excision and the use
of the ligature. Spirits are given in abundance by some medical men.
Walking the sufferer about to avert sleep and coma is a popular
procedure. It is the general use of the excision treatment, however,
that has reduced the death-rate so wonderfully. If a schoolboy is bitten
now he pulls out his knife and excises the bitten part, or he sacrifices
the joint of a finger. Keep the poison out of the system, and no harm is
possible, and the bitten person now directs his energies to carry out
that, instead of wasting his time in running after a doctor, who cannot
repair the neglect.

One sport there is in Australia which can be most heartily enjoyed by
all. This is shark-catching. The shark is a worse terror than the snake.
Every harbour contains some monsters fourteen, sixteen, and eighteen
feet long, and every year there is some tale of horror. The catching of
one of these creatures is a popular event, men rejoicing over the
destruction of a dreaded enemy.

To the angler Australian waters offer great attractions. Trout were long
ago established in the streams of Tasmania and New Zealand, and within
the last few years they have become very plentiful in Victorian rivers.
Within twenty miles of Melbourne good trout-fishing may now be had. The
fish are slightly more sluggish than in British waters--a fact no doubt
accounted for by the warmer climate; and experts say that at table
something is lost in flavour also. The Californian salmon have also been
acclimatised with fair success. There are several varieties of perch in
the colonies; but those of the Gippsland rivers, discarding the
traditions of their kind all the world over, rise eagerly to the fly,
and give splendid sport. To kill fifty a day with the fly, many of them
going up to five pounds, is not an uncommon feat. The bream in all the
southern rivers and lakes are strong, lusty fellows, that make the reels
whistle in a style that is sweetest music to the angler's ear; but if
one wants a bag, he must use double-gutted hooks. Gamer or better fish
than these bream no fisherman could desire. The triton of Australian
sweet-water streams is the Murray cod; but he has nothing but his size
to recommend him. Along the coast and in the tidal rivers the so-called
sea-salmon is another source of gratification to the fly-fisher, for he
rises freely, and the largest ones make quite a gallant rush when
struck. In the lagoons bordering on the chief of Australian rivers,
there are large Murray perch that at certain times bite voraciously. But
the handsomest of his kind in Australia is undoubtedly the golden perch,
found in the Murray and its tributaries. Its scales have the beautiful
burnished gleam of old gold, and when a big one is brought to bank it is
something to admire. Judged from the standard of the epicure alone, the
black-fish is perhaps the finest of all Australian fresh-water fish, its
flesh being snow-white, and of a remarkably fine flavour. The fish is
found to greatest perfection in the clear mountain streams that come
tumbling down from the Otway ranges, in the southern part of Victoria;
but he is of sluggish habits, and by no means the angler's ideal. When
these streams are discoloured by storm water very good fishing may be
had through the day; but if the water is clear the black-fish comes from
his hiding-place only when the shadows from the hill-tops begin to
deepen over the water.

In some few rivers widening into the sea whiting are caught at certain
periods of the year. The best sea-fishing is perhaps that to be had with
the schnapper in Port Phillip Bay, where the fish are plentiful about
the lines of reef, and range in weight up to forty pounds.
Notwithstanding the merits of some of the native fish, the traditional
love for trout has risen superior to every other inclination with the
anglers of Victoria and Tasmania. The trout in many places have worked
themselves so far up the streams that man can only follow with the
greatest difficulty, and the scrub is so thick that an angler would find
it hopeless to attempt a cast. With these natural preserves extending
for miles, the supply of trout in colonial rivers is inexhaustible. In
fly-fishing for trout in the colonies it has been found, however, that
the most sacredly observed rules of British angling are entirely
useless. Flies that were deadly in the old country are impotent here;
and, as far as the Australian is concerned, all the main tenets of the
fly-fisher's faith must be absolutely cast aside, and a new angling
creed built upon the basis of colonial insect life and the changed
habits of the trout as we know them in Australia.

Australian vegetation is sometimes considered monotonous in appearance.
But this is the criticism of the stranger, and not of the resident. The
first idea of the observer is one of uniformity. When the Chinese
originally came to Australia, no one could see any difference between
the units of the Mongolian horde. Often did robbers of fowl-houses
escape punishment from the inability of the prosecutor to identify the
men he had chased and lost sight of, and frequently, it is to be feared,
was the wrong wearer of the pigtail stoutly sworn to. The yellow skin,
the round face and the flat nose conveyed the idea of identity. And to
Chinamen all Europeans were alike. The puzzled Celestial could not
distinguish between Englishman and German, and still less between
individual beef-eaters.

But Australian vegetation has distinctive features that quickly catch
the eye. The eucalypt is always the eucalypt, with its sombre green and
its peculiar adjustment of foliage. The leaves do not spread out
horizontally, but depend vertically from the boughs, an arrangement
which minimises the shade afforded in the daytime, but gives beautiful
effects in the gloaming, when the tree, not obscuring the light,
becomes a network of elegant tracery. Viewed in the daytime in
juxtaposition to oak or elm, and the confession must be made that the
average gum of the plains is scraggy; but in the moonlight the oak or
elm will be a black blotch, when the eucalypt is transformed into a
wonder of light and shade and of graceful outlines. An acquaintance with
the bush soon dispels the notion of monotony. The eucalypts are found to
differ one from another; the handsome Banksias, the curious Casuarinas,
or shea-oaks, the graceful acacias, all claim attention and
individualise the scene, while palms, grass-trees and tree-ferns add
charm and character to many a landscape.

[Illustration: AUSTRALIAN TREES.]

In vegetation as in other matters Australia delights in the vast,
sometimes in the _outré_, often in the contrast of extremes. Dwarf scrub
will cover whole regions. One tract of the mallee scrub, shared between
Victoria and South Australia, covers an area of nearly 9000 square
miles. The mallee is just high enough to render it impossible for a man
on horseback to look over it. And on the mountain ranges in the same
colony are to be found long stretches and avenues of the 'giant gums,'
whose pure white silvery columns seem as though intended to support the
sky. Between these two extremes is to be found a pleasantly-wooded
country presenting a park-like appearance. Farther afield are the
interior plains, covered often with the terrible spinifex, or porcupine
grass, a hard, coarse and spiny grass, uneatable by horse or ass, or, I
believe, by camel, and apt to wound the feet of the unfortunate animal
that journeys over it.

Different indeed from these treeless, waterless steppes are the valleys
and mountains of the seaboard. In these regions, protected from hot
winds and favoured by a heavy rainfall, we have a luxuriant and elegant
vegetation. Beginning with the gullies of the Dandenong ranges, near
Melbourne, the traveller can proceed from fairy scene to fairy scene
along the coast to far-away Carpentaria and Papua, the vegetation
preserving its identity, and yet slowly changing from a sub-tropical to
a tropical character. In the Victorian region there are rivulets of
clear water hidden from sight by the tree-ferns which flourish on their
banks. Journeying northwards, the vegetation thickens. Parasitical
ferns--the staghorns of the conservatory--depend from every branch.
Palm-trees make their appearance, the noble _Livistonia_ attaining in
suitable places a height of eighty feet. The musk-tree and the
_Pittosporum_ scent the air, and lovely twining plants help to form an
impenetrable foliage. On reaching the ranges of New South Wales, the
luxuriance is found to have further developed. From some hill-top you
gaze upon a verdant lawn gay with flowers and studded with shrubs.
Descending, you find that the surface is a vegetable canopy formed by
stout and hardy creepers and climbers that spread from tree to tree,
only the tops of the lofty eucalypts appearing above this mid-air
canopy. Lower down, fern-trees and cabbage-palms form a second roof,
while the soil supports an undergrowth of mosses, lichens and ferns.

But the gum-tree is as distinctive of Australia as are the emu and the
kangaroo. It pleases Australians greatly that their country contains the
'tallest tree in the world.' For years it was believed that Nature had
done her utmost in the big trees of California, but experts and visitors
admit that this belief must be abandoned. The two countries have the
issue to themselves; but the _Sequoia gigantea_ has had to retire in
favour of the _Eucalyptus amygdalina_, or giant gum. The following list
of generally accepted heights will show how completely the indigenous
vegetation of other lands is put out of court:--

      The elm                      60 feet to 80 feet.
      The oak                      60 feet to 100 feet.
     _Pinus insignis_              60 feet to 100 feet.
      Himalayan cedar              200 feet.
     _Sequoia gigantea_, or
        'big tree' of California   200 feet to 325 feet.
     _Eucalyptus amygdalina_,
        or giant gum               250 feet to 480 feet.

The giant gum is rich in a peculiar volatile oil, and it supplies a
splendid timber for shingles, palings, &c. Hence, in all accessible
parts, the fine specimens are doomed to early destruction by the
splitter. The woodman does not spare the tree. The more huge the round,
straight, polished, and beautiful stem, the more likely he is to mark it
as his own. Confident statements have been made that in favoured spots
the giant gum attains the height of 500 feet; just as equally confident
assertions have been published that the _Sequoia_ of California runs up
to 450 feet. The highest gum of which there is authentic record is
growing on Mount Baw-Baw, Gippsland. Mr. Clement Hodgkinson, C.E., gives
the official measurement as 471 feet. The highest tree now standing in
California is 325 feet, so that the eucalypt is the taller by 146 feet.
If two tall elms, 70 feet high, were placed on the top of the tallest
_Sequoia_ in existence, the Mount Baw-Baw eucalypt would still overlook
the three.

The Fernshaw or Black Spur timber is famous because it is easily reached
from Melbourne, but the trees themselves are not the head of their clan.
A gum felled in the Otway ranges, at the instance of the late Professor
Wilson, measured 378 feet to the spot where its top had been broken off,
and, allowing for the average taper, 40 feet had been carried away. A
gum felled at Dandenong, and measured by Mr. D. Boyle, measured 420
feet. And the quantity of the timber supported by the soil where these
large trees are found is very remarkable. The secretary of the State
Forest Board noted the growth on one acre of ground in the Upper Yarra
district, and he found that the plot contained twenty eucalypts of a
height of 350 feet, and thirty-eight saplings of a height of 50 feet,
these trees emerging from a dense undergrowth of fern and musk trees.

In his _Goldfields of Victoria_ Mr. Brough Smith photographs a tree 69
feet in circumference, and 330 feet in height, and of greater
proportions therefore than the greatest of the _Sequoias_. This tree,
with hundreds of others, was felled for splitting purposes. The
Australian giants abound, and new discoveries are constantly made; and
it is quite possible that in some one of the valleys yet to be broken
into by man the real giant of the globe will be discovered. The picture
on page 16 of the Gippsland railway running through a cleared track
gives some idea of a primæval forest in Victoria.

Mention has been made of the silver columns of the giant gum. The tree
sheds its bark annually, and the new skin is of a pure and dazzling
whiteness. As the stem is perfectly cylindrical, and as the huge fabric
towers 200 and 250 feet high without a branch, the sight of a group of
these monarchs is at these times especially beautiful. Below are the
tree-ferns and a lovely bush undisturbed by the wind, which may be heard
rustling the far-off tops of the grove. The elegant lyre-birds will be
drinking at a spring. Parrots of gorgeous plumage flit by. Few can gaze
upon such a scene without emotion, without realising with silent awe
that this fair spot is Nature's temple. And then the oppressed heart,
acknowledging the charm, will turn from all that Nature gives to what
she must bring.

Of the other gums the pride of place must be awarded to the noble
_Eucalpytus rostrata_, or red gum of the colonists. Fine specimens are
still to be found near Melbourne, though the value of its wood has
marked them out for destruction in the neighbourhood of towns and
cities. The _Rostrata_ has an enormous spreading upper growth. Some of
the limbs rival in size the parent stem, and will be gnarled and
contorted in a manner recalling the writhings of the Laocoon. It should
be studied from a distance, for their enormous weight sometimes causes
the branches to snap suddenly without the slightest warning, to the ruin
of all below.

[Illustration: SILVER-STEM EUCALYPTS.]

The rival of the red gum as a timber tree is the jarrah, an eucalypt
peculiar to Western Australia, where it grows in forests. Seen in its
home on the Darling range, or the hills of Geographe Bay, the jarrah is
a magnificent tree, running up to a hundred feet before it branches, and
reminding the spectator sometimes of the rostrata, and sometimes of the
giant gum. The specialty of the jarrah is its power to defy the ravages
of the insect world and of the sea. This is complete. An examination
recently made of a pier at Banjoewangie, which was constructed thirty
years ago of jarrah, showed that the piles were as sound as the day they
were put in, although the seas of Java swarm with the _Teredo navalis_.
The official examination made by a select committee of Parliament in
South Australia, in 1870, of the Port Adelaide bridge, erected in 1858,
disclosed the fact that while every other timber employed below water
'had been completely destroyed by the teredo and other submarine
insects, the jarrah remained unscathed,' and had apparently saved the
work from collapse. In point of beauty many award the palm amongst the
gums to the _Eucalyptus ficifolia_, or scarlet flowering gum. It is met
with in groups. The tufts of bright scarlet blossom contrast well with
the dark-green foliage, and the tree adds greatly to the attraction of
the West Australian bush.

The mallee (_Eucalyptus dumosa_) is one of the strangest products of a
strange country. The root is a globular mass, varying in size from a
child's head to a huge mass which a man can hardly carry. From this bulb
a tap root descends to a great depth to reach moist ground below, while
other roots spread more horizontally. Above ground a few saplings shoot
out to a maximum height of about twenty feet, each sapling having a tuft
of leaves at its top. The appearance is that of a skeleton umbrella,
with the central stick or handle removed. No surface water is to be
obtained in the mallee district; its silence is only disturbed by the
melancholy wail of the dingo. Miserable is the fate of the luckless
wretch who wanders into such tracts as these. Unable to discern his way,
or to gain any point of vantage, and suffering from thirst, the man's
reason often succumbs, and he perishes a maniac. Yet the Victorian
mallee district is now being cleared by energetic colonists, who aver
that when they have exterminated the rabbit, and poisoned the dingo, and
got rid of the scrub--which succumbs to treatment--these plains will
prove the most fertile in Australia.

Here allusion may be made to the question whether or not the eucalyptus
is a fever-destroying tree. The subject has been thoroughly investigated
and discussed by Mr. Joseph Bosisto, M.P., Commissioner for Victoria at
the Colonial and Indian Exhibition, 1886, and his decision is in favour
of the utility of the eucalypt. Mr. Bosisto dwells specially upon the
fact that malarious diseases are not native to Australia, and that
imported fevers are believed to diminish in virulence; and he directly
connects the absence of malarious disease with the presence of a
peculiar aroma-diffusing vegetation. Mr. Bosisto mentions the powerful
root action of the eucalyptus, which, being an evergreen, is continually
at work, absorbing humidity from the earth, and upon its large leaf
exudation of oil and acid. His contention is that the volatile oil
thrown off by the eucalyptus absorbs atmospheric oxygen, and transforms
it into ozone. This much is certain: that if a small quantity of any of
the eucalyptus oils be sprinkled in a sick room, the pleasure of
breathing an improved air is realised at once. And as Mr. Bosisto
contends that he has established the diffusion of volatile oil by the
eucalyptus, and the chemical consequences of such diffusion, he submits
with a calm confidence that 'there is an active agency in Australian
vegetation unknown in other countries,' and that the eucalyptus is
rightly described as an anti-fever tree.

The tree most favoured for this purpose is the blue gum, or _Eucalyptus
globus_. The blue gum is extensively cultivated outside of Australia,
because experiment shows that it produces the most timber in the least
time. The rapidity with which the Australian forest recovers itself
after apparent destruction is indeed one of its marvels. In conversation
a landed proprietor of Benambra mentioned how, twenty-five years back,
there were places in his district in which scarce a stick could be
seen--then diggers had cut down every tree for firewood and for their
workings. But the diggers have gone, and now there is again the original
dense forest.

Next to the eucalypt the tree most prized in Australia is the graceful
acacia, varieties of which flourish throughout the continent. The tall
slender stem of the 'wattle'--as the tree is termed--supporting a
feathery foliage is everywhere to be met with in the south-eastern
colonies. In the spring-time the valleys and their river-courses are lit
up with the golden bloom which the tree bears in rare profusion, and the
perfume scents the air. In a room the odour of a mere twig of the wattle
will often be found to be overpowering. In England the young people can
'go a-Maying,' and in Australia they have no happier time than when they
go 'to bring the wattle home.' The quotation is the refrain of a song
which the sentiment made popular. Not only is the wattle 'a thing of
beauty' in itself, but the circumstance that its bark is one of the most
powerful tanning agencies in the world, and has a high commercial value
accordingly, renders it to its possessor 'a joy for ever.' The tree is
now being extensively planted in Victoria, where the valuable varieties
flourish, not by landscape gardeners, but by shrewd agriculturists
intent upon netting £10 per ton from the bark.

A world of other vegetation demands notice. The seaboard has a
characteristic shrub of its own in the so-called tea-tree scrub,
described by Baron von Mueller as a 'myrtle-like _Leptospermum_, of tall
stature, with half-snowy, half-rosy flowers.' It is the best of
sand-binders. No tract is so inhospitable but that the tea-tree will
flourish there. It fights the ocean to its edge. On some jutting
promontory on which not a rush will grow, exposed to every storm and
swept by spray, the tea-tree will be found, stunted and deserted, but
still battling bravely for existence against sea and breeze.

Inland the shea-oak (_Casuarina striata_) attracts attention. It is
scattered over the continent, and once seen is always remembered. The
tree is well shaped, but is leafless, long thin thongs taking the place
of foliage. The dark and gloomy appearance of the tree impresses itself
upon the spectator, and so, if he camps near it at night, does the
melancholy moaning of the wind through its pendent whip-like
branchlets.

[Illustration: THE BOTTLE-TREE.]

Small space has been left for a notice of such marvels as the
bottle-tree, and such beauties of Australian vegetation as the
flame-tree. The Sydney or Queensland visitor in the summer season may
see in full bloom, in the Illawarra bush, the local 'flame-tree'
(_Sterculia acerifolia_). The tree bears a profusion of scarlet racemes
of flowers, and of large bright green leaves. The foliage sheds itself
to make room for the profuse inflorescence, so that the tree has
veritably the appearance of a fire. Cycads and palm-lilies are
picturesque wherever they are met with.

The grass-trees (_Xanthorrhoea_) are peculiar to Australia, and in some
places cover myriads of acres. I have seen them in valleys in Western
Australia growing so thickly that it was impossible to push a horse
through their ranks. A rugged resinous stem five to ten feet high
supports a drooping plume of wiry foliage, from which a flowering
bulrush springs. The 'black boy,' as the grass-tree is called in the
west, is often weird, and is essentially Australian. Useful advice to a
settler would be, 'Be chary of buying land where the grass-tree grows,'
for, though there are exceptions, the _Xanthorrhoea_ has a weakness
for the desert. The warratah, with its single stem of six feet, bearing
a crimson blossom resembling a full-blown peony, is one of the most
popular of the wild flowers of New South Wales. The boronia, with its
powerful perfume, will be admired by the visitor; the _Araucarias_ have
here their home. The heaths are beautiful; and it may be said of them in
their place and season, 'You scarce can see the grass for flowers.' For
a long time the wild flowers of the country were neglected, but now in
some places shows are exclusively devoted to them. The dictum of Mr. A.
A. Wallace is not to be lightly challenged, and it is that 'no country
in the world affords a greater variety of lovely flowers than Australia,
nor more interesting forms of vegetable life.'

The grape is providing us with a national industry; the orange-groves of
Sydney, Perth, and other districts are amongst the sights of the place.




CHAPTER XIII.

THE SQUATTER AND THE SETTLER.

     PRESENT MEANING OF THE WORD 'SQUATTER'--CATTLE-RAISING--CAPITAL HAS
     CONFIDENCE IN SQUATTING NOW--ORIGIN OF MERINO
     SHEEP-BREEDING--MANAGEMENT OF A RUN--DROUGHT--BOX-TREE
     CLEARINGS--MODERN ENTERPRISE--SHEEP-SHEARING--'SUNDOWNERS'--FARMING
     PROSPECTS--CHEAP LAND--EASY HARVESTING--SMALL CAPITAL--SELECTION
     CONDITIONS--BUSH FIRES--BLACK THURSDAY--THE OTWAY DISASTER--LOST IN
     THE BUSH--MISSING CHILDREN.

[Illustration: GRASS-TREES.]

[Illustration: DRIVING CATTLE.]


The terms 'squatter' and 'squatting' are now misleading. They cover a
number of different occupations, and perhaps the words 'grazier' and
'grazing' ought to be substituted. The original squatter paid his £10
licence fee, and he was at liberty to go where he pleased and to take up
as much land as he required for his sheep and for two years' increase.
Whether he had five hundred sheep or five thousand did not matter.
Australia was large, and the adventurous pioneer was at liberty to pick
and choose. The flocks were 'shepherded'--that is, were not confined
between fences, but were looked after by men who drove them to their
feed during the day, and placed them inside hurdles at head-quarters at
night. But, as land was taken up, the squatter obtained a particular run
for a term of years. He subdivided it by fences into paddocks, and so
reduced his number of herds and conducted his operations more
scientifically.

When a new run is taken up, it is pretty sure, in the first instance, to
be stocked with cattle. Cattle-raising requires no heavy outlay of
capital, because, beyond horses for the men, yards to work the stock,
and perhaps one or two paddocks to enclose young heifers and separate
them from the general herd, no buildings have to be erected. Then the
produce of a cattle station--the fat stock--can be cheaply driven to
market. Travelling with stock through the bush costs no more than the
wages of the men employed, and, if carefully driven, the bullocks do not
deteriorate. Last but not least among the advantages possessed by the
cattle squatter is the fact that he can make shift with comparatively
few water-holes. Cattle can feed their way to water much more readily
than sheep.

At first cattle are not happy on a new country, and will make frequent
efforts to break away. Often have the stockmen left a herd quietly
grazing at night, and found not a hoof in the morning, whereupon comes a
fine gallop after the runaways, who always head straight for home.
Nevertheless skilful herding of the cattle on the run, and extra
vigilance for a few months, suffice to accustom the animals to their new
home. Once 'broken in to the run,' as it is called, the cattle remain on
it, and can indeed hardly be driven away. They select their
camps--generally tracts of open country, with trees growing in groups,
and near water--and the choice is often directed by the stockmen when
first they are brought on to the country. On these camps the cattle
assemble in the heat of the day, lying lazily in the shade, and moving
off to feed at night and in the afternoon and morning. They are easily
trained to assemble on the camp whenever hunted up, and the crack of a
stock-whip anywhere on a cattle-run, with a well-broken herd, will set
all the animals within hearing moving off to the camp. Mustering is
attended to at frequent intervals on a well-worked cattle station. The
stockmen ride round, hunting up all stray groups, and direct them to the
central camp, where they assemble in a great compact herd. When thus
gathered together, the animals required for any special purpose--fat
bullocks for market, or cows and calves for branding--are ridden out of
the mass by the stockmen on their well-trained horses, and collected in
a separate herd.

There is no more interesting sight than this 'cutting out,' as it is
called. The stockman rides into the mass of animals, which opens out
uneasily as he enters. A touch of the stock-whip on the selected beast
indicates him to the intelligent horse, whose rider practically leaves
to him the rest of the work. The selected beast tries to escape by
wedging himself into masses of his companions; but the horse, who
apparently enters thoroughly into the fun of the thing, turns and twists
with surprising rapidity, and, before the hunted animal knows what is
happening to him, he finds himself edged outside of the main herd, and
driven to a separate little group. Other men guard this group, and
prevent them from rejoining the mass, plying their stock-whips with
terrible effect on any refractory beast. When the selection is complete,
the chosen herd is driven towards the head station yards, and the main
body of cattle allowed to disperse again.

Cattle-raising is a pursuit full of excitement and danger. Chasing the
wild animals through the bush or down the steep sides of precipitous
hills is work that requires sure feet on the part of the horse, and cool
heads and firm seats on the part of the riders. Even more perilous is
drafting in the yards. The men who enter the great enclosures full of
angry frightened animals, to separate and drive them into different
compartments, often run quite as much risk as the Spanish bull-fighters.
But they have quick feet, sharp eyes, and cool heads, and fatal
accidents seldom occur; though it often happens that a charging cow or
bullock will send all the men in the yard scrambling precipitately to
the top rail of the strong high timber enclosure.

Drought is the great enemy that these pioneers have to dread. Nature has
fitted the grasses and herbage of the interior to withstand prolonged
dry periods. By many beautiful adaptations the herbs growing on the
plain are enabled to flower and mature their seed with great rapidity;
so that even one soaking downpour will often suffice for the lifetime of
a plant, and allow it to shed its ripened seed, which lies hidden in the
cracks of the arid, sun-baked soil till the next favourable season
occurs. The principal grasses have a remarkable power of remaining in
what seems like a state of suspended animation. This is especially
noticeable in the case of the Mitchell grass, which becomes white and
apparently dead, but still retains nourishment for stock in its dried
leaves, and vitality in its apparently withered stems.

One great reason why the squatter is better off now than he ever was
before is that capital has confidence in the occupation. Thus the
individual is more secure than he was. And large institutions have been
formed that make it their business to finance for the squatter. These
institutions have their one, two, or three millions of English and
Scotch capital, and they are managed by men of great colonial
experience, who know it is bad policy to do other than support a
deserving pioneer right through. Their capital is indeed subscribed for
the purpose of making stations drought-proof, and their record shows
that the system is highly profitable. An enormous amount of the
annexation of the desert which is now going on has English and Scotch
gold as its basis; and this union of home capital and of colonial
enterprise is as happy and as effectual a form of federation as can be
desired.

The following remarks on squatting are contributed by Mr. G. A. Brown,
author of the standard work, _Sheep Breeding in Australia_: 'It is
curious that the first settlers in Australia firmly believed the country
to be quite unfitted for rearing wool-bearing sheep. For fully a
quarter of a century the hairy sheep of India and the Cape of Good Hope
were bred by the colonists; and it was not till Captain McArthur sold
Australian grown merino wool in the London market at the rate of 5_s._
per lb., that the sheep-owners became aware of the splendid industry
that awaited development. Merino sheep then became the rage, and large
sums of money were spent in importing the finest specimens of the breed
from the purest flocks in Germany. In a few years Australia took her
place at the head of the list of fine wool-producing countries, and has
held it ever since. The world never before saw merino wool so soft, so
bright, or so long in staple. It produced a revolution in the
manufacture of woollen fabrics, and it brought within the reach of the
artisan cloths of a quality that only the wealthy could afford in the
previous century. This great work has been effected by the Australian
squatters.

[Illustration: A MERINO SHEEP.]

The management of live-stock in the old squatting days was thoroughly
patriarchal. The sheep were kept in flocks varying from 800 to 2000
head, according to the character of the country, tended all day by
shepherds, and inclosed at night in hurdle yards. As a further
protection against lurking blackfellow or prowling dingo, a man slept in
a small wooden portable cabin, called a watch-box, close by the sheep.
It was no uncommon thing for the men to be roused up two or three times
during the night; but, as they had plenty of time to sleep during the
day, this was thought no great hardship. The shepherds led an
inexpressibly dreary life; they were out at daybreak, and, having turned
their sheep in the proper direction, they followed them all day, seldom
exchanging a word with a human being till they returned to the hut at
night. Many of them became eccentric, or, as the working bushmen called
it, "cranky," and were quite unfit for any other occupation. As the
stock increased, the whole flock could not be fed from the home station,
round which the grass was usually reserved for the horses and working
bullocks; huts were then erected from three to ten miles or even farther
away, according to the size of the station or run, as the leaseholds
were called. At these huts, known as out-stations, generally two flocks
of sheep were kept, a hut-keeper being employed to cook for the
shepherds and shift the hurdle yards every day, so that the sheep might
have a clean bed.

'In the old days the country was all unenclosed from one end to the
other. Vehicles were scarce--there were few coaches, and occasionally a
gig would be seen on a main road. The ordinary mode of travelling
through the country was on horseback. On arriving at a station the usual
plan was to ride up to the principal hut, ask for the proprietor, and
announce your name; an invitation to stay all night followed as a matter
of course. Hospitality was a duty that was most religiously performed by
almost every squatter. There were a few exceptions, and they were
branded with the prefix of "hungry" attached to their names, and, being
known, were avoided alike by horsemen and footmen.

'Improvements in bush life were being steadily made when the discovery
of gold brought the country prominently under the notice of European
countries. The old pastoral life, with all its rustic charm and
quietude, disappeared as thoroughly as if it had never been. In the rush
and turmoil that ensued many of the old squatters were ruined, while
others, more lucky, succeeded in making immense fortunes. Over the
greater portion of Victoria and a considerable area of New South Wales
the land has been converted into freeholds, and squatting is confined to
Queensland, and the vast sultry plains of Northern, Central and Western
Australia. In these countries the areas held under leasehold from the
Crown are of immense size, many of them being capable of carrying
300,000 sheep in good seasons. These great runs are all fenced in and
subdivided by wire fences. The sheep are run in paddocks often
containing over 20,000 acres. As there are few watercourses the stock
are watered by means of immense excavations, called tanks, containing an
area of 10,000 cubic yards of water when filled. Large as they are many
of them were dried up by the long drought of 1885 and 1886. The result
has been that the holders of these great pastoral properties have
suffered heavy losses. I passed by one cattle station in Queensland,
four years ago, on which 60,000 head of cattle were grazing. Since then,
so severe has been the drought, the stock has been reduced by deaths
from starvation to 20,000 head. The deaths of stock on the sheep
stations in the same district have been equally heavy. When the seasons
have a fair average rainfall in these hot districts everything goes
well, and squatting is the most profitable occupation in the colonies,
but when a series of dry years set in the squatter's lot is a
heartrending one. He can do nothing for the poor creatures he sees
slowly starving to death, while overhead, month after month--ay, and
year after year--there is the cruel clear sky and the bright hot sun
steadily withering up all life. The birds and wild animals die in
thousands, and the few that still live are so feeble that their wild
nature seems gone out of them. This last drought is not an exceptional
event. Since Central and Northern Australia have been known, the country
has suffered from periodical droughts; but every year the skill of the
squatter is exercised in providing fresh supplies of water for his
stock, and that is the great requisite in this climate. Given a good
supply of water, and it is wonderful what a little food will keep sheep
alive on the plains of Central Australia. I have seen sheep in excellent
condition on country that to all appearance was absolutely bare of
grass. A stranger would not believe that any animal could support life
on such scanty pastures.

'Under the new order of things that followed the discovery of gold many
large freehold estates were put together by the old squatters, and then
it was found that a different style of management was required to make
the properties pay interest on the capital expended on them. The runs
were fenced and subdivided, dams were constructed on the watercourses,
and where the country was too flat for dams tanks were made for
supplying the stock with water. Good houses were built, and fine gardens
and pleasure-grounds formed. As the proprietors of these estates became
wealthy, they erected houses that for size, style and convenience would
rival the pleasant homes of the country gentlemen of England. Often in a
country that a score of years ago was considered a remote district in
the back country, one will now meet with a handsome mansion surrounded
by extensive gardens, pleasure-grounds and plantations. Where in the old
squatting days water was often very scarce, there is now ample to
irrigate a garden, and indeed water is usually laid on all over the
modern squatter's establishment.

'Over a large area of New South Wales and Victoria the surface of the
country was covered by a dense forest of the eucalypt called the
box-tree. They were of medium size, and their timber was of little or no
value. Having surface roots, they robbed the soil of all substance, and
the result was that the box-forest country was always bare of grass. It
was noticed by a few observant bushmen that the soil in these forests
was excellent, and a few experiments were made in the way of clearing
the land. The result was satisfactory, but felling the trees was too
expensive to practise on a large scale, while the stumps were very apt
to throw up a number of vigorous shoots that did as much harm as the
parent tree. What use to make of the box-forest country was a puzzle,
and most people regarded it as worthless. At this time a firm of
squatters astonished their neighbours by purchasing a block of 20,000
acres of box-forest, at £1 per acre, that the Surveyor-General of the
colony declared was not worth 2_s._ 6_d._ per acre. The plan they
adopted for killing the box-trees was one that had only lately been
tried. It consisted in cutting a notch round the tree through the bark
and into the sap wood, to prevent the sap rising. This plan, called
'ring barking,' when performed at the proper season, effectually kills
the tree, and it has since come into general practice all over
Australia. I have ridden over the estate in the box-forest that was
formed by the squatting firm mentioned, and where, years ago, there was
not a blade of grass to be seen, is now a fine pasture, that even in
indifferent years will keep a sheep to the acre.

[Illustration: RING BARKING.]

'Drought does not always ruin the squatter, and there are many instances
of their surviving the hard time. A squatter of my acquaintance embarked
in a heavy purchase in Central Australia. The run was of vast size, and
the soil admirable, but soon after he purchased the property a severe
drought set in, water was scarce, and grass almost entirely disappeared.
There was no disposing of a portion of the sheep, for every one was
short of grass, and there were no buyers. Before the drought broke up he
had lost eighty thousand sheep from starvation, and the remainder of the
flock were in a very emaciated condition. At last the welcome rain set
in--not in a heavy shower, but in a continued downfall that lasted for
several days. Such an ample rain at that time of the year meant
abundance of food and water for the next twelve months. The squatter was
a man of quick perception and prompt to act in an emergency. His station
was in telegraphic communication with Melbourne, and, knowing how to
operate, he purchased through the stock agents about ninety thousand
ewes to lamb from the best flocks in the country. The story is told that
he walked up and down his verandah watching the rainfall, and as each
successive inch was registered over a certain point he telegraphed to
Melbourne to purchase ten thousand more sheep. He got the season's
lambing and the fleece from the sheep he bought, and then sold the
greater portion for nearly double what he paid for them a few months
before. That splendid rain made all the difference between ruin and
wealth.

'Sheep-farming is carried on everywhere in Australia, while squatting on
Crown lands, as we have said, is confined to the vast area of Central
Australia and Western Australia. The shearing on one of the great
stations in the interior is a most important operation, there being a
small army of men employed while it lasts. Some of the wool-sheds are of
great extent, and provide shelter for seven thousand sheep. I have seen
as many as a hundred shearers at work at once. They work very hard, and
earn a considerable amount of money during the season. They form bands
of from forty to eighty men, and start in Queensland in July, gradually
working their way south. During shearing-time the wool-shed presents a
very busy and interesting scene. A hundred shearers are all working as
if for a wager, for the element of rivalry enters largely into the work;
a dozen half-clad blacks, male and female, are picking up the fleeces
and carrying them to the wool tables, where they are skirted, rolled up,
sorted and thrown into their several bins. Immediately behind the
wool-bins are the presses, in which the wool is packed into bales, and
at the rear the waggons are loading with bales for the distant railway
station. Outside the shed men are engaged in branding the sheep after
each man's work has been counted from his yard.

'The waggons load heavily, and have often teams of twenty bullocks each,
while there are always a few spare bullocks travelling loose to be used
as required, when one of the team gets a sore neck or knocks up. The
carriers form a distinct class in the back country. They generally
travel in bands of four or six teams, which are often owned by one man,
who generally accompanies the caravan in a buggy, or, if unable to
afford that comfort, drives one of the teams.

'A peculiar feature in station life in Australia is the existence of a
class of wanderers known as "swagmen," or "sundowners," who wander over
the face of the country under the pretence that they are looking for
work; but they seldom accept it when offered. They lead a lazy, careless
life, making for the shelter of some station towards the close of the
day, when they go through the formula of asking for work, after which
follows the usual inquiry for accommodation for the night. On some
stations these men are such a nuisance that huts are put up for their
accommodation; and, instead of permitting them to mingle with the men at
their meals, they are given a certain quantity of flour, and sometimes
meat. During the day they camp by the side of a creek where there is
shelter from the sun, whence they do not stir till it is time to start
for the station where they intend passing the night, timing their
arrival about sunset. Once a man becomes a "sundowner" he is useless for
any honest employment.

'The life of a successful squatter is a very pleasant one, with a large
freehold estate in a settled part of the country, and an extensive
mansion in which to entertain his friends, he can pass a few months very
enjoyably in the country; but his real home is in one of the most
aristocratic suburbs of Melbourne or Sydney, where he lives in a house
that cost fully five times the value of his squatting run in the old
pioneer days. The pioneers deserve rest and prosperity. They did good
work in their day, and their successors are emulating their example in
the great sultry plains of Central Australia.'

In due course everywhere the Australian squatter gives way to the
agriculturist. The sheep become a secondary agent to the plough. In
place of the squatter we have the 'selector.' Land is not given away by
the state in Australia to the immigrant, and yet it is unusually
easy--even for a new country--for the poor man to start farming. This
remark is made on the authority of Mr. T. K. Dow, the agricultural
'special' of the _Australasian_ newspaper, with whom the writer
conversed on the subject for the purposes of this volume. Mr. Dow had
just returned to the colonies after a tour through America, made for the
purpose of procuring information on agricultural matters, and he could
thus speak as an expert. He says:--

'In Australia a man selects a piece of land; he pays the survey fee, and
then he pays for the fee-simple by annual instalments. But nearly all
the land so selected is fit for the plough. The man gets a crop off it
the very first year, so that he can pay his way as he goes. The land you
get for nothing in other countries is worth nothing in the first
instance. It has to be made valuable. There are expensive improvements
that have to be effected, and so you want more money to start with there
than you do in Australia. It is surprising with how little capital men
do start here.

'The Australian harvesting system is the cheapest in the world, and is
peculiar to the country. There is a dryness about the crops of the
northern plains, on which the bulk of the wheat in South Australia and
Victoria is grown, and this enables the "stripper" to be used. The
stripper is an Australian invention. It is described by its name. It
squeezes the corn out, and leaves the stalk standing. The corn is
threshed upon the straw, and the straw is afterwards burnt off or is
ploughed in.'

Mr. Dow is an enthusiastic irrigationist, and it is pleasant to hear
him converse about what is to be the future of farming in Victoria,
when water has been systematically impounded, in order to flood the land
in due season. Our farmers, it is to be noted, have hitherto sought the
plains, where the timber was not more than was required for firewood,
and where they could sow and reap at once. But the value of the forest
country is now being appreciated. There is heavy clearing to be done, no
doubt; but then the land is rich, and gives astonishing root crops, and
fattens many sheep to the acre. And when a railway is run into the
forest it is found that the timber pays for itself, and for the land
also, and is as good a crop as the selector is ever likely to take off
the soil.

The following are the present conditions under which land can be
selected in Victoria: The best unsold portions of the public estate,
amounting in the aggregate to 8,712,000 acres, are divided into 'grazing
areas,' not exceeding 1000 acres in size, each of which is available for
the occupation of one individual, who is entitled to select, within the
limits of his block, an extent not exceeding 320 acres, for purchase in
fee simple at £1 per acre, payment of which may extend over twenty
years, without interest. The selected portion is termed an 'agricultural
allotment,' and of it the selector is bound to cultivate one acre in
every ten acres, and make other improvements amounting to a total value
of at least £1 per acre. The unselected portion of the original area is
intended for pastoral purposes, and for this the occupier obtains a
lease, at a rental of from 2_d._ to 4_d._ per acre, for a period of
fourteen years, after which it reverts to the Crown, an allowance up to
10_s._ per acre being made the lessee for any improvements he may have
effected calculated to improve the stock-carrying capabilities of the
land. In New South Wales, Queensland, and South Australia, and Western
Australia, the facilities are greater than in Victoria. But it is better
to state the minimum than the maximum advantage. All classes go on the
lands with success, because 'high farming' or 'scientific culture' is
not attempted in the bush--only in exceptional instances near the towns.
A county prize for the best-kept farm was recently awarded to a
freeholder whose culture and whose crops were highly commended by the
judges. 'You were trained in a good school, evidently,' said one of the
judges to the prize-taker. 'Not at all, sir,' was the reply; 'until I
took up this land I was serving all my life behind a linen-draper's
counter.' A handsome endowment has, however, just been made for the
establishment of Agricultural Colleges in Australia.

Without a wife the settler's is but a lonely lot. There are bachelors,
of course. Our picture represents a forlorn individual returning to his
home. He will have a warmer welcome no doubt some day from wife and
weans than that which he receives from the cockatoo which he has taught
and tamed.

The settler has few enemies. The only two worth naming are drought and
fire. The systematic storage of water throughout the country is in part
mitigating the one, and already in Victoria no selector is more than
three miles from permanent water for his stock. And as irrigation is
coming apace, the fire risk, such as it is, will be diminished. Even now
it is not serious. Not one farmer will be burned out, but at the same
time a watch is required to see that no flame gets the upper hand. When
a man burns off stubble he must give notice to his neighbours.

[Illustration: A BUSH WELCOME.]

Some of the most dramatic incidents of bush life occur when an alarm of
fire has been given, and the entire neighbourhood turns out to beat down
the conflagration with bushes. The males form a line and work with all
their energy to stamp out the flames, and the women and children help by
supplying the toilers with refreshments and with a fresh stock of boughs
and bushes.

'Black Thursday' (February 5, 1851), the memorable day of the colonies,
would be impossible now. On that dread occasion Southern Australia was
all ablaze, there was a sad loss of life, and the lurid atmosphere was
noticeable as far away as New Zealand. Bishop Selwyn (who was afterwards
translated to Lichfield) told the writer that he was in his yacht off
the New Zealand coast at the time, and he was struck by the appearance
of a fiery glow in the sky towards the island continent.

But the year 1886 unexpectedly witnessed a 'Black Thursday' on a small
scale. In one corner of Victoria are situated the Cape Otway ranges,
which are covered by fine forests and are the scene of a new and sparse
settlement--hardy pioneers venturing in advance of the railways which
they expect in due course to come up to them. The summer of 1886 opened
with great heat: 100° F. was registered in the shade, and over 150° in
the sun. And soon the news spread in the towns and cities of a disaster
at the Otway. Steamers coming into port reported that they had passed
through a pitchy darkness in the straits. One of their log records
reads: 'Off Cape Otway at noon the darkness became so intense that it
was necessary to light the binnacle lamp. The gloom was caused by smoke.
A considerable quantity of ashes and charred sticks fell upon the deck.'
This smoky volume rolled across the straits to Tasmania, and it
proclaimed the fact that the forest was on fire. Fortunately to the
south there is nothing behind the forest but the sea. The northerly
wind, which alone fans these conflagrations, blew smoke and fire, not
over parched tracts ready to burst into flame, but across the straits
towards Tasmania, and the enveloped ships were not put in jeopardy, as
hamlets would have been. At first it was almost forgotten that the
forest was no longer lonely, but was showing here and there patches of
occupation; but so it was, and a sad tale of ruin was soon told. Mr. S.
H. Whittaker, who was on the heels of the flames as an '_Argus_
special,' kindly supplies the following narrative: 'The night before the
great fire was an anxious one in the forest. There was an ominous
deep-red glow at sunset--a redness deepened by smoke rising from distant
hills. The settlers, as they watched the smoke from the highest points
near their selections, fervently hoped for a change of wind, for the
country, scorched by the heat of midsummer, was ready to burst into a
blaze. Daybreak brought with it the fierce north wind, fiery as the
blast of a furnace, and strong as a gale. The bush fires could be
plainly seen from many a homestead, but there was at first no
apprehension of a general calamity. Some damage is done in the forest
every year by fire, but never before has one hundred miles of country
been left a smoking ruin. Never before have the selectors been driven
half-blinded from their houses, which they had vainly sought to save, to
find refuge only for their lives in their small green patches of
cultivation. The settlers had seen brushwood fires, had fought the
flames and conquered them after suffering some loss, and, profiting by
the experience, had cleared the brushwood around their homesteads. The
whole forest ablaze, the sky red with lighted fragments flying before
the high wind over cleared spaces, creeks, and roads, and igniting, like
the torches of a thousand incendiaries, fences, orchards, farms, crops,
and buildings in many places at once, had happily never been seen
before. The people vividly remember the scenes of that terrible day--how
the smoke made the day blacker than night, until the flames got nearer;
how these made "leaps and bounds" from tree to tree, and the terrified
wallaby, dogs, cattle, fowls, and kangaroo helplessly crowded among the
people, seeking shelter and protection from the common danger.

'The struggle to save the home is sometimes touchingly told. Mrs. Hurley
was alone on the selection at Cowley's Creek with her seven children,
her husband being away cutting grass-seed to plant in the autumn. The
eldest children were a boy of fourteen and a girl of twelve. She said:
"When I saw the fire coming I sent the children to the water-hole to get
water in the bucket and dipper and everything that would hold it. We put
the water on the fence and houses. The children all worked till they
were ready to drop to save the place, even the youngest. The boy was on
the roof of the house pouring water on the rafters, and the girl was on
the shed. The fire came quick and scorched us. It burned in the tree
branches more than on the ground. The wind blew the big sparks right at
us and burned our clothes, but the little ones and myself kept going to
the water-hole with the dippers and pans to keep the house wet. The boy
kept the house well soaked on the roof, and I thought we might keep it
safe, when one of the girls cried out, 'Mother, it's alight inside.'
Then the place went all up on fire, and we couldn't get anything out.
The sheds and the reaper and binder and thresher went just after, and
the orchards and fences as well. The children asked me to run with them
to Mrs. M'Donald, our neighbour's. I told them to run on ahead, as one
of the boys had a bad foot, and I had to help him. The other children
got to Mrs. M'Donald's all right, but before I could get through with
the boy the forest was all burning, and the branches were coming down in
showers. My boots were burnt off my feet, and I have not been able to
wear a boot since. Mrs. M'Donald and the neighbours kindly helped me to
put some things on the children, and Bob Cowley gave me the tent we're
living in now."

'The cry, "The house is alight inside," was the despairing message from
many a watcher to those who, mounted on the ridge, were striving in the
blinding smoke and scorching heat to beat back the fire from the
dwelling. The high wind blew live coals underneath the shingles to
enkindle the canvas lining, and then the exhausted settler, foiled in
his endeavour to save his or his neighbour's home, could only throw
himself face downwards in his potato crop to get a breath of fresh air.
But Mrs. Power, of Curdie's River, was more fortunate, and it was
impossible to belie the simple and unaffected sincerity with which she
devoutly ascribed her escape to the direct interposition of Providence.
Her husband, like too many other selectors in the wild and inhospitable
Heytesbury forest--inhospitable until by laborious toil it has been
reclaimed--was away at other work when the fire happened. The holding
was directly in the track of the fire. "It was on the hill yonder," said
Mrs. Power, "that we were burned out seven years ago--I mean there where
the scrub is as thick as ever, which shows how hard the scrub in this
forest is to kill. After we lost our first home we came to this side of
the creek, and got on a little better. On the Tuesday morning the fire
got all about us, in spite of my boys cutting down a tree and putting
water on the fences and houses to keep them from burning. They said we
had better go away; but wherever I looked there was fire; and I said,
'Where shall we go? We might as well be burnt here, beside the old
place, as anywhere else.' So I got the boys around me, and I dropped on
my knees just here and prayed to the Almighty God that it should be His
will to spare us, and not leave us again without a home over our heads.
The clothes of one of the boys caught fire, as you see, so did the
pigstye, and the eighteen bags of grass-seed that I had put in the
little garden in front of the house. I expected it to go every minute,
but the house stood through it all. It took fire in four places inside
and out, but it did not burn, and the roof was left to cover us, in
answer to my prayer. It was too hot to go into the house, and I stayed
under the blackwood tree; and the wind changed, and the drenching rain
came and doused the fire. If the rain had not come, there is no knowing
where the fire would have stopped."

[Illustration: BEFORE AND AFTER THE FIRE.]

'The rain, which will be remembered as one of the greatest downpours
ever experienced in the colony, did indeed save the forest selectors
from annihilation. It came just when the fire was at its height, when
the trees were crashing to the ground in all directions, and when the
fire, not merely scorching and singeing the bark of trees, as bush fires
usually do, was consuming thousands of huge boles to charcoal, and the
ground, as can still be seen, was at white heat, like a smelter's
crucible. The mournfulness of the gaunt, weird scene which the fire has
left is peculiarly striking and depressing. Such a mingling of night and
day as the sunlight lighting the pitchy blackness of the landscape, as
far as the eye can reach, is indescribably grotesque and desolate. It is
hard to conceive anything like this contrast of the sunshine sparkling
brightly upon the wide, inky, silent waste. It is almost like a smile
upon a ghastly death's-head. There is not a bird to flutter a wing or to
break the oppressive silence with a single note. There is no sign of
life or what has been life, except here and there the roasted carcase of
a wallaby or kangaroo. The dense forest of straight black bare boles
alone reveals the might and fury of a bush fire.'

More frequent than the fire, and as thrilling, is the episode in bush
life of 'the lost children.' This is a drama that is constantly enacted
in the one place or the other. Australian children are quick, and they
learn in a wonderful way how to travel about country, but still, where
there is scrub in the neighbourhood or much undergrowth of any kind, the
younger members of the family are terribly apt to go astray. The father
or mother returns home to learn that 'little Johnny and the girl' were
playing about, and did not come in for their evening meal. They could
not have tumbled into the water-hole, for that is fenced off. They have
not found their way to neighbour Dean's. There is no time to be lost.
The biggest boy jumps on the colt and rides in hot haste to the nearest
police-station, and rouses up neighbours on his way. The policeman
telegraphs all about for aid, but faster still 'the bush telegraph'
spreads the intelligence that 'Big Giles, of Wattle Tree flat, is in
trouble. Two of his little ones are astray.' Then it is that human
fellowship shows to advantage. All business is laid aside. The sheep
that were being bargained for are neither bought nor sold; the hay is
left unstacked; the reaping is discontinued. Nothing can be done that
night beyond searching around the homestead, but all night long the
clatter of horses' hoofs will tell of new arrivals, and the morning will
witness a couple of hundred men ready to be divided into parties and to
take care that no portion of the country is unsearched. From east and
west parties will return disconsolate and silent; but the joyous
'Coo-e-e!' of the returning horsemen on the southern hill-top will tell
its own tale of rescue. But rarely does a second night elapse before the
distracted mother has her children with her again, and one night in the
Australian bush is not likely to have injured the little ones much.

One of the most singular cases on record is that of the girl Clara
Crosbie, who was lost for twenty days in the depth of winter in the
Victorian uplands, where frosts will set in and where snow will fall,
and who lived without food during that time. Clara was a town-bred girl,
twelve years of age. Her mother took a situation in the year 1885 as
housekeeper to a Lilydale farmer, some twenty-five miles away from
Melbourne towards the mountains. Clara was left at a neighbour's house
after she had been a few days in the district, but before she was
fetched she wanted to go to her mother, and so she slipped out, got off
the track easily enough, and was soon hopelessly involved in the reedy
fens with which this part of the country is intersected.

[Illustration: FOUND!]

[Illustration: A SQUATTER'S STATION.]




APPENDIX.

THE RELIGIOUS STATISTICS OF THE CHIEF COLONIES.


Numbers are but poor tests of the religious condition and progress of a
country, but they have their value, and many of the readers of this
volume may find the following facts interesting. It has not been found
possible to get the information respecting Queensland and Western
Australia. It is quite evident at a glance that there is a large number
of trained men who are engaged in the great work of the Gospel, and that
their efforts are supported by a very considerable section of the
Australian people.

VICTORIA.--There being no State religion in Victoria, and no money voted
for any religious object, the clergy are supported by the efforts of the
denomination to which they are attached. The ministers in all sections
of the Church number 828, of whom 185 belong to the Church of England,
121 to the Roman Catholic Church, 177 to the Presbyterian Church, 161 to
the Methodist Churches, 54 to the Independent Church, 38 to the Baptist
Church, 29 to the Bible Christian Church, 56 to other Christian
Churches, and 7 to the Jewish Church. Besides these there are other
officials connected with these bodies, who, without being regularly
ordained, perform the functions of clergymen, and are styled lay
readers, lay assistants, local preachers, mission agents, &c. The number
of these is not known, but it no doubt materially swells the ranks of
religious instructors in the colony. The buildings used for public
worship throughout Victoria number at the present time (1886) about
3700, of which 2000 are regular churches and chapels, 400 school-houses,
and 1400 public or private buildings. Accommodation is provided for
500,000 persons, but the number attending the principal weekly services
is said not to exceed 315,000. More than 304,000 services are performed
during the year. Of the whole number of buildings used for religious
worship, 764 belong to the Church of England, 618 to the Roman
Catholics, 906 to the Presbyterians, 962 to the Methodists, 76 to
Independents, 99 to the Baptists, 154 to the Bible Christians, 146 to
other Christians, and 6 to the Jews. The Salvation Army have erected
their "barracks" in various localities, and sometimes rent edifices for
Divine Service, but no statistics of their operations have yet been
obtained.

NEW SOUTH WALES.--With regard to religion, all the Churches stand on the
same level of equality, there being no Established or State Church.
These Churches are supported entirely by voluntary subscriptions, as all
State aid ceased in 1862, except some small outstanding liabilities to
the then existing incumbents. Roughly speaking, out of a population of
950,000 there are some 600,000 Protestants, the great majority belonging
to the Church of England, and about 280,000 Roman Catholics, the
remainder being made up of various denominations. At the taking of the
census of 1881 the numbers were as follows: Church of England, 342,359;
Lutherans, 4836; Presbyterians, 72,545; Wesleyan Methodists, 57,049;
other Methodists, 7303; Congregationalists, 14,328; Baptists, 7307;
Unitarians, 828; other Protestants, 9957; total Protestants, 516,512;
Roman Catholics, 207,020: Catholics undescribed, 586; total Catholics,
207,606; Hebrews, 3266; other persuasions, 1042; unspecified
persuasions, 13,697; Pagans, 9345. In 1883 there were 770 ministers of
religion and 1521 churches, with an average attendance at public worship
of 243,369 persons. The Sunday Schools have 105,162 scholars on their
registers.

SOUTH AUSTRALIA.--Of this Colony the only facts obtainable are the
following round numbers. The number of churches or chapels existing in
1884 was 928; the number of sittings provided was 200,123; the number of
Sunday schools was 727; teachers, 6729; scholars. 57,311.




INDEX.


  ABORIGINES:
    appearance, 167;
    life, 168;
    fighting, 168;
    Mr. Moore's narrative about, 169;
    customs, 169;
    dress, 170;
    Mr. Carr's story, 170;
    Ngooraialum and Bangerang tribes, 170;
    weapons, 173;
    fierceness of Northern blacks, 173;
    Corroboree, a, 174;
    cannibalism, 174;
    trackers, their usefulness as, 174;
    Mission stations, 175;
    Lake Tyers station, 176;
    Hagenauer, Rev. F. A., letter of, about, 177

  Acacia, 200

  ADELAIDE:
    founding, 103;
    Glenelg, 103;
    houses, 103, 104;
    streets and parks, 103;
    surroundings, 103;
    churches, 104;
    Victoria Square, 105;
    King William Street, 105;
    Botanical Gardens, 105

  Albany, 138

  Albert, river, 125

  Alligator stories, 113

  Amadeus, lake, 101

  Araucarias, 202

  Argus snipe, 192

  AUSTRALIA:
    former errors about, 14, 23;
    exports, 14;
    population, 14;
    prosperity, 14;
    colonies, 15;
    capitals, 15;
    people, 16;
    area, 19;
    mountains, 20;
    snow, 20;
    river system, 20;
    physical geography, 21;
    climate, 21, 76, 101, 112, 138;
    hot winds, 22;
    temperature, 22;
    storms, 22;
    natives, 23, 167;
    fires, 23, 213;
    rainfall, 24;
    drought, losses by, 25, 76, 94, 208;
    not yet fully explored, 25;
    democracy, 29;
    securities, rise in, 30;
    federation movement, 30;
    immigration, 30;
    wages, 30;
    prices, 31;
    religion, 31;
    service, a rural, 32;
    Sunday observance, 32;
    sects, 34;
    Sunday schools, 34;
    church building, 34

  _Australia Felix_, 40

  Australian Alps, the, 40

  Avon, river, 68


  BAIRNSDALE, 69

  BALLARAT:
    impressions, 59;
    Botanical Gardens, 60;
    discovery of gold, 60;
    situation, 61;
    the Corner, 61;
    Trollope on, 62

  Barcoo, river, 164

  Barrier Reef, the, 123

  Barrow Creek, station at, 109

  Bass, story of, 155

  Bass's Straits, 144

  Bathurst, 93

  Batman, settlement of, in Victoria, 38

  Baudin, M., treachery of, 157

  Baxter, murder of, 158

  Bear, native, 181

  Beechworth, 69

  Belfast, 66

  Ben Lomond, 147

  Bendigo, _see_ SANDHURST.

  Big Scrub, New South Wales, 95

  Birds of Paradise, 186

  Bishopscourt, view from, Melbourne, 43

  Black boy, 202

  Black-fish, 194

  Black Spur, the, 72

  Black Thursday in South Australia, 213;
    in Victoria, 214

  Blackheath, 90

  Blayney, 94

  Blue gum, 200

  Blue Mountains, 87

  Blue wren, 186

  Boomerang, the, 173

  Booth, Mr. E. C., on Shepparton, 67

  Boroina, 202

  Bosisto, Mr. J., on Eucalyptus, 199

  Botany Bay, discovery of, 76

  Bottle-tree, 201

  Bourke Street, Melbourne, 49

  Bourke, New South Wales, 94;
    a winter day at, 94

  Bowen, 123

  Box-tree, 208

  Bower bird, 188

  Box-scrub, the, 136

  Bream, 193

  Breeza plains, 95

  Bremer, river, 119

  Bremoroma, 94

  Brighton, a suburb of Melbourne, 43

  BRISBANE, population, 119;
    site, 119;
    streets, 119;
    beauty, 120;
    garden of Acclimatisation Society, 120;
    houses, 121

  Broome, Sir F. N., on life in Western Australia, 140

  Brown, Mr. G. A., on sheep breeding, 205

  Buffaloes, 113

  Bulmer, Rev. J., at Lake Tyers, 176

  Bundaberg, 112

  Bunbury, 135

  Burke, R. O'Hara, expedition of, 161

  Burketown, 125

  Burnett, river, 122

  Bustard, 190


  CAIRNS, 124

  Caldwell, Mr. W. H., on the platypus, 185

  Cam, river, 146

  Camels at Beltana, 107

  Canoona rush, the, in Queensland, 129

  Cape Grant, 67

  Cape Nelson, 67

  Cape Otway ranges, fire at, 214

  Capertee, 91

  Capitals, 15

  Cardwell, 124

  Carr, Mr. E. M., on the natives, 170

  Carriers, 210

  Castle hill, 87

  _Casuarina Striata_, 200

  Cats, native, 182

  Cattle-raising, 204

  Cattle, number of, in Australia, 14

  Central Trunk Railway, Queensland, 122

  Charters Towers, 123

  Churches, the, state of, 31

  Clarence, river, 96

  Clermont, 123

  Climate, 21, 76, 101, 112, 138

  Coaching, Trollope on, 70

  Cobb, who he was, 70

  Cockatoo, 186

  Cohan, 94

  Colac lake, 65

  Collins lands at Sorrento, 38

  Collins Street, Melbourne, 49

  Concherry, river, 162

  Cook, Captain, discovers Botany Bay, 76

  Cooktown, 124

  Cooper's Creek, native settlement at, 164

  Corangamite lake, 64

  Corra Linn, 145

  Corroboree, a, 174

  Cotton growing in Queensland, 129

  Crosbie, Clara, story of, 219

  Cunningham's Gap, 119

  Cutting out cattle, 204

  Cycads, 202


  DALBY, 122

  Darling Downs, 118, 119

  Darling, river, 21, 94

  _Dasyuridæ_, the, 182

  Deloraine, 145

  Democracy, 29

  D'Entrecasteaux Channel, 151

  Depôt Glen, Sturt at, 23

  Derwent, river, 150

  Devil, Tasmanian, 182

  Dibbs, Mr., on losses by drought, 25

  Dingo, 183

  Dog, wild, 183

  Don, river, 146

  Dow, Mr. T. K., on farming, 211

  Drought, losses by, 25, 76, 94, 208

  Dubbo, 94

  Ducks, wild, 191;
    mountain duck, 191;
    black duck, 191;
    wood duck, 191;
    teal, 191;
    widgeon, 191;
    blue wing, 191


  EAGLEBANK NECK, 151

  Elder, Sir Thomas, introduces camels, 107

  Emu, chase of, 188

  Emu Plains, 88;
    Dr. J. E. Taylor on, 90

  Eucalypt, 194

  _Eucalyptus amygdalina_, 196

  _E. dumosa_, 199

  _E. ficifolia_, 199

  _E. globus_, 200

  _E. rostrata_, 197

  EXPLORATION:
    Sturt's exploration, 23;
    Bass and Flinders, story of, 155;
    Baudin, M., treachery of, 157;
    Eyre, E. J., travels of, 158;
    Forrest, J., journey of, 159, 164;
    Leichhardt, L., story of, 159;
    Kennedy disaster, the, 160;
    Stuart, J. McDougall, journey of, 161;
    Burke's expedition, 161;
    M'Kinlay's party, 164;
    Landsborough's party, 164;
    Walker's party, 164;
    Howitt's party, 164;
    Warburton's party, 164

  Exports of Australia, 14

  Eyre, E. J., explorations of, 158

  Eyre, lake, 101


  FARMING, 211

  FAUNA:
    alligators, 113;
    buffaloes, 113;
    pearls, 139;
    kangaroo, 'old men,' 181, 185;
    marsupial mouse, 181;
    wombat, 181;
    flying fox, 181;
    native bear, 181;
    native cats, 182;
    Bass River opossum, 182;
    Tasmanian tiger-wolf, 182;
    Tasmanian devil, 182;
    dingo, 183;
    platypus, 185;
    birds, 185;
    parrots, 185;
    birds of Paradise, 185;
    king parrot, 186;
    blue mountain parrot, 186;
    lories, 186;
    parroquets, 186;
    love-birds, 186;
    blue wren 186;
    cockatoos, 186;
    lyre-birds, 186;
    bower birds, 188;
    laughing jackass, 188;
    emu, 188;
    bustard, 190;
    native companion, 191;
    wild ducks, 191;
    black swan, 191;
    snipe, 191;
    quail, 192;
    wonga-wonga, 192;
    bronze-wing pigeon, 192;
    snakes, 192;
    shark catching, 193;
    trout, 193;
    salmon, 193;
    perch, 193;
    bream, 193;
    Murray cod, 193;
    sea salmon, 193;
    Murray-perch, 193;
    golden-perch, 193;
    black-fish, 194;
    whiting, 194;
    schnapper, 194

  Favenc, Mr. E., on exploration, 25

  Fawkner, settlement of, in Victoria, 39

  Fawkner's Park, 39

  Federation movement, the, 30

  Feilberg, Mr. C. A, on Queensland, 117

  Ferns, 196

  Fig-tree, the, 126

  Fingal, 147

  Fires, 23, 213

  Fish River caves, 91

  Fitzroy, river, 122

  Flame-tree, 201

  FLORA:
    nettle-tree, 127;
    poisonous plants, 136;
    box scrub, 136;
    rock plant, 136;
    heart-leaf plant, 136;
    York road plant, 136;
    wild flowers, 138;
    eucalypt, 194;
    mallee scrub, 195;
    giant gums, 195, 197;
    spinifex, 195;
    ferns, 196;
    palm-tree, 196;
    musk-tree, 196;
    _Pittosporum_, 196;
    silver gum, 197;
    red gum, 197;
    jarrah, 136, 198;
    blue gum, 200;
    acacia or wattle, 200;
    tea-tree scrub, 200;
    shea-oak, 200;
    bottle-tree, 201;
    flame-tree, 201;
    cycads, 202;
    palm lilies, 202;
    grass-trees, 202;
    warratah, 202;
    boroina, 202;
    araucarias, 202;
    heaths, 202;
    grapes, 202;
    Mitchell grass, 205;
    box-tree, 208

  Flinders, story of, 155

  Flinders' Lane, Melbourne, 44

  Flying fox, 181

  Forbes, 94

  Forrest, John, journey of, 159, 164

  Firth, 146

  Fremantle, 137


  _Gastrolobium anylobiaides_, 136

  _G. bilobum_, 136

  _G. callistachys_, 136

  _G. calycinum_, 136

  Gardiner, lake, 101

  GEELONG, founding, 62;
    growth, 62;
    exports, 62;
    tweeds of, 63

  Geraldton, 135

  Gippsland, scenery of, 67

  Gladstone, 122

  Glenelg, 103

  Golden perch, 193

  Golden Point, discovery of gold at, 60

  Gould on Australian birds, 186

  Grant, Lieut., discovers Port Phillip, 37

  Grapes, 202

  Grass-trees, 202

  Gray, story of, 161

  Great Divide, the, 96

  Great West Railway, New South Wales, 87

  Grey, Earl, circular of, on convicts, 135

  Guildford, 135

  Guilfoyle, Mr., director of the Botanic Gardens, Melbourne, 52

  Gulf of Carpentaria, 125

  Gums, giant, 195; height of, 196, 197

  Gympie, 123;
    discovery of gold field at, 130


  HAGENAUER, Rev. F. A., on the aborigines, 177

  Harvesting system, 211

  Hawkesbury sandstone, 90

  Hayter, Mr. H. H., on wages, 30

  Heart-leaf, the, 136

  Heaths, 202

  Henty, Messrs., in Portland Bay, 38

  Heron, river, 151

  Heytesbury forest, 215

  Hindmarsh, Captain, first governor of South Australia, 103

  Hobart, description of, 150

  Hoddle, Robert, lays out Geelong, 62

  Holdfast Bay, first landing at, 103

  Horses, number of, in Australia, 14

  Horsham, 67

  Hospitality, 207

  Hot winds, 22

  Hovell arrives at Port Phillip, 38

  Howitt, party of, 164

  Hume arrives at Port Phillip, 38

  Hurleys, the, at the fire at Otway ranges, 215


  IMMIGRATION, extent of, 30

  Ipswich, 119, 122


  JACKY, the black, fidelity of, 160

  Jarrah forests, 136, 198

  Jenola, 91


  KANAKAS, the, 128

  Kangaroo, old man, 181, 185

  Kangaroo hunting, 184

  Kennedy, Edmund, story of, 160

  Kiama, 87

  King, story of, 161

  King George's Sound, 138

  Kingfisher, or laughing jackass, 188

  Knocklofty, 150


  LAKE ST. CLAIR, 150

  Lake Sorell, 150

  Lake Tyers Mission Station, 176

  Landells, story of, 161

  Landsborough, expedition of, 164

  Laughing jackass, 188

  Launceston, 144

  Leichhardt, Ludwig, story of, 159

  _Leptospermum_, 200

  Lithgow Vale, New South Wales, 91

  _Livistonia_ palm, the 196

  Loddon, river, 68

  Lories, 186

  Lorne, 72

  Lost in the bush, 217

  Loutit Bay, 72

  Love-birds, 186

  Lyre-bird, 186


  MACARTHY, RIVER, 111

  Mackay, 123

  Macquarie Harbour, 151

  Macquarie, river, 93

  Magpie, musical, 188

  Mallee scrub, rabbits in, 68;
    extent of, 195

  Mary, river, 121

  Maryborough, 121

  MELBOURNE:
    site, 43;
    population, 43;
    area, 43;
    description, 43;
    houses, 43;
    Government House, 43;
    Exhibition Building, 43;
    streets, 43;
    Flinder's Lane, 44;
    Collins Street, 49;
    Scott's, 49;
    Bourke Street, 49;
    inrush and outrush, 49;
    railways, 49;
    public buildings, 50;
    university, 52;
    botanic gardens, 52;
    water supply, 52;
    reserves, 53;
    cricket, 54;
    the Yarra, 54;
    drawbacks, 55;
    climate, 55;
    unearned increment, 56

  Meander, river, 145

  _Menura Victoriæ_, the, 186

  Merino sheep, 206

  Mermaid's Cave, the, New South Wales, 90

  Mersey, river, 145

  Mitchell, Sir Thomas, verdict of, 39

  Mitchell grass, 205

  M'Kinlay, expedition of, 164

  Moreton Bay, 118

  Moore, Mr. G. F., on aborigines, 169

  Morriss, Mr., school teacher to the blacks, 176

  Morsman's Bay, view from, 80

  Mosquito Plains, caves of the, 106

  Mount Barker, 106

  Mount Baw-Baw eucalypt, height of, 197

  Mount Bischoff tin mine, 146

  Mount Clay, 67

  Mount Franklin, 40

  Mount Kosciusko, 20

  Mount Lindsay, 96

  Mount Lofty range, 103

  Mount Wellington, 150

  Mountain system, 20

  Mouse, marsupial, 181

  Mudgee line, New South Wales, 91

  Mueller, Baron von, on tea-tree scrub, 200

  Murray cod, 193

  Murray perch, 193

  Murray plains, 67

  Murray, river, 21, 100

  Musk-tree, 196

  Myers, Mr. F. H., on Sydney, 79


  NARRAWONG, 67

  Nash discovers Gympie gold-field, 130

  Native companion, the, 191

  Natives, destructiveness of, 23

  Nettle-tree, the, 127

  New Norfolk, 150

  NEW SOUTH WALES:
    area, 15, 75;
    population, 15;
    losses by drought, 25;
    climate, 76;
    drought, 76, 94;
    settlement, 76;
    Port Jackson, 76;
    statistics, 79;
    Sydney, 79;
    South Coast Railway, 84;
    Kiama, 87;
    Great West Railway, 87;
    Paramatta, 87;
    Castle Hill, 87;
    Toongabbie, 87;
    Blue Mountains, 87;
    Emu Plains, 88;
    Penrith, 89;
    Windsor, 89;
    Richmond, 89;
    geology, 90;
    Blackheath, Mermaid's Cave, 90;
    Lithgow Vale, 91;
    Capertee, 91;
    Mudgee line, 91;
    Walerawang, 91;
    Tarana, 91;
    Fish River caves, 91;
    Jenola, 91;
    Bathurst, 93;
    Blayney, 94;
    Orange, 94;
    Forbes, 94;
    Wellington Valley, 94;
    Dubbo, 94;
    cattle, 94;
    Darling, the, 94;
    Cohan, 94;
    Bourke, 94;
    Bremoroma, 94;
    Welcanna, 94;
    Wentworth, 94;
    Great Northern Railway, 95;
    Newcastle, 95;
    Breeza Plains, 95;
    Richmond, the, 95;
    Tweed, the, 95;
    Big Scrub, 95;
    Cane fields, 96;
    Great Divide, the, 96;
    Mount Lindsay, 96;
    Clarence, the, 96;
    Nightcap, the, 96

  Newcastle, 95

  Nightcap, the, New South Wales, 96

  Norman, river, 125

  Normanton, 125

  North Esk, river, 144

  Northern Territory, _see_ S. Australia.

  Northern Trunk Line of Queensland, 123


  OAKLEIGH, a suburb of Melbourne, 43

  Opossum, 182

  Orange, 94

  _Ornithorhynchus_, the, 185

  Overland Telegraph Line, 108


  PALM-LILIES, 202

  Palm-trees, 196

  Palmer gold-field, 124, 130

  Palmerston, mines of, 111

  Palmerston and Pine Creek line, 110

  Paramatta, 87

  Parrots, 185

  Parroquets, 186

  Peake Telegraph Station, 109

  Pearl fisheries of Western Australia, 139

  Penrith, 89

  Perch, 193

  Pérouse, expedition of, 76

  Perth, description of, 136

  Phillip, Captain Arthur, governor at Port Jackson, 76

  Physical geography, 21

  Pigeon, bronze-wing, 192

  Piping crow, 188

  _Pittosporum_, 196

  Platypus, 185

  Poole, death of, at Depôt Glen, 23

  Population of Australia, 14

  Porcupine grass, 195

  Port Arthur, convicts at, 151

  Port Darwin, vegetation at, 111

  Port Douglas, 124

  Port Essington, 113

  Port Jackson, 76

  PORT PHILLIP:
    discovery, 37;
    beauty, 38;
    Howell and Hume arrive at, 38;
    settlement, 38

  Portland, 66

  Portland Bay, 67

  Potatoes, yield of, 66

  Power, Mrs., at the fire at Otway ranges, 215

  Prices, 31


  QUAIL, 192

  Quamby Bluff, 146

  QUEENSLAND:
    area and population, 15;
    description, 117;
    settlement, 118;
    convicts there, 118;
    Toowoomba, 119, 122;
    Bremer, the, 119;
    Ipswich, 119, 122;
    Brisbane, 119;
    Maryborough, 121;
    Rockhampton, 121;
    Bundaberg, 122;
    Gladstone, 122;
    Warwick, 122;
    Stanthorpe, 122;
    Dalby, 122;
    Roma, 122;
    Central Trunk Railway, 122;
    Clermont, 123;
    Gympie, 123, 130;
    Mackay, 123;
    Bowen, 123;
    Barrier Reef, the, 123;
    Townsville, 123;
    Charters Towers, 123;
    Ravenswood, 123;
    Northern Trunk Line, 123;
    Cardwell, 124;
    Cairns, 124;
    Port Douglas, 124;
    Palmer gold field, 124, 130;
    Cooktown, 124;
    Thursday Island, 124;
    Gulf of Carpentaria, 125;
    Normanton, 125;
    Burketown, 125;
    cattle, 125;
    sheep farming, 125;
    agriculture, 126;
    scrublands, 126;
    vegetation, 126;
    labour question, the, 127;
    sugar growing, 128;
    exports, 128;
    cotton growing, 129;
    olives, 129;
    almond, 129;
    figs, 129;
    silk, 129;
    mineral wealth, 129;
    coal, 129;
    Canoona rush, the, 129;
    Nash discovers Gympie gold field, 130


  RABBITS, CURSE OF, 68

  Raffles Bay, 113

  Railways in Victoria, 49;
    in Sydney, 84;
    in Tasmania, 152

  Rainfall, 24;
    in Sydney, 84;
    in Tasmania, 152

  Rainfall, taking advantage of, 209

  Ravenswood, 123

  Red gum, 197

  Richardson, river, 68

  Richmond, 89

  Richmond, river, 95

  Ring barking, 209

  River system, 20

  Rock plant, the, 136

  Rockhampton, 121

  Roeburne, 135

  Roma, 122

  Roper, river, 111;
    alligators in, 113

  Russell, Mr. H. C., on physical geography and climate of Australia, 21


  ST. HELENS, 147

  St. Mary's Pass, 147

  Sale, 69

  Salmon, 193

  Sandhurst, ups and downs of, 56;
    gold in, 60

  _Sarcophilus_, the, 182

  Satin bird, 188

  Schools of Victoria, 70

  Schnapper, 194

  Scott's, Melbourne, 49

  Sea-salmon, 193

  Selectors, 212

  Service, a rural, 32

  Settler's clock, 188

  Shark catching, 193

  Shea-oak, 200

  Sheep, number of, in Australia, 14

  Sheep breeding, 205

  Sheep runs, 207

  Sheep shearing, 210

  Shepherds, life of, 206

  Shepparton, 67

  Silk cultivation in Queensland, 129

  Silver gum, 197

  Smith, philosopher, story of, 146

  Smyth, Mr. B., on native weapons, 173;
    on gum-trees, 197

  Snakes, 192;
    treatment for bites of, 193

  Snow, 20

  Snipe, 191

  Sorrento occupied by Collins, 38;
    beauty of, 38

  SOUTH AUSTRALIA:
    Area, 15, 99;
    population, 15;
    divisions, 99;
    Murray, the, 100;
    scenery, 100;
    Lake Torrens, 101;
    Lake Eyre, 101;
    Lake Gardiner, 101;
    Lake Amadeus, 101;
    climate, 101;
    fruits, 102;
    Adelaide, 103;
    Mount Lofty range, 103;
    industries, 105;
    wheat, 106;
    Mount Barker, 106;
    Caves of the Mosquito Plains, 106;
    camels at Beltana, 107;
    Overland Telegraph Line, 108;
    Peake Telegraph Station, 109;
    Barrow Creek 'stuck up' at, 109;
    railway construction, 110;
    Northern Territory: history, 110;
    settlement, 111;
    climate, 112;
    Roper, the, 111;
    Macarthy, the, 111;
    alligators, 113;
    buffaloes, 113;
    Black Thursday, 213

  South Coast Railway, N. S. Wales, 84

  South Esk, river, 144

  South Sea Islanders in Queensland, 128

  Spinifex, 195

  SQUATTERS AND SETTLERS:
    Description, 203;
    cattle raising, 204;
    cutting out, 204;
    sheep breeding, 205;
    merino sheep, 206;
    hospitality, 207;
    mode of travelling, 207;
    sheep runs, 207;
    drought, 208;
    houses, 208;
    sheep shearing, 210;
    carriers, 210;
    swagmen or sundowners, 210;
    farming, 211;
    harvesting system, 211;
    stripper, the, 211;
    selecting,
    mode of, 212;
    fires, 213;
    lost in the bush, 217

  Staghorn fern, 196

  Stanthorpe, 122

  Stapleton, Mr., murder of, 110

  _Sterculia acerifolia_, 201

  Stevenson, falls of the, 72

  Stirling, Sir James, in Western Australia, 134

  Storms, 22

  Strangways Springs, 110

  Stripper, the, 211

  Stuart, J. M. D., travels of, 110, 161

  Sturt's detention at Depôt Glen, 23

  Sunday observance, 32

  Sundowners, 210

  Surrey Hills, a suburb of Melbourne, 43

  Swagmen, 210

  Swan, black, 191

  Swan, river, 135, 138

  SYDNEY:
    harbour, 79;
    North Shore, 79;
    view from Morsman's Bay, 80;
    churches, 80;
    public buildings, 80;
    railways, 84

  Sydney Cove, 76


  TAMAR, river, 144

  Tarana, 91

  TASMANIA:
    a holiday resort for Australians, 143;
    Tamar, the, 144;
    Launceston, 144;
    North Esk, the, 144;
    South Esk, the, 144;
    Corra Linn, 145;
    Deloraine, 145;
    Menada, the, 145;
    Mersey, the, 145;
    sheep, 145;
    Quamby Bluff, 146;
    Don, the, 146;
    Cam, the, 146;
    Forth, the, 146;
    Mount Bischoff, 146;
    Waratah, the, 146;
    Ben Lomond, 147;
    St. Mary's Pass, 147;
    Fingal, 147;
    St. Helen's, 147;
    macadamised road, the great, 148;
    Hobart, 150;
    Derwent, the, 150;
    Lake St. Clair, 150;
    Lake Sorell, 150;
    New Norfolk, 150;
    convicts at Port Arthur, 151;
    Eaglebank Neck, 151;
    D'Entrecasteaux Channel, 151;
    Heron, the, 151;
    Macquarie Harbour, 151;
    area, 151;
    population, 152;
    revenue, 152;
    railways, 152;
    exports and imports, 152

  Taylor, Dr. J. E., on Geology of Emu Plains, 90

  Tea-tree scrub, 200

  Temperature, 22

  Tennison Woods on the caves of the Mosquito Plains, 106

  Thomas, Mr., on Lake District of Victoria, 64

  Tiger snake, 192

  Tiger-wolf, Tasmanian, 182

  Thursday Island, 124

  _Thylacinus_, the, 182

  Todd, Mr. Charles, and the Overland Telegraph Line, 108

  Toongabbie, 87

  Toowoomba, 119, 122

  Torrens, lake, 101

  Trackers, black, 174

  Townsville, 123

  Trollope, Anthony, on Ballarat, 62;
    on coaching, 70

  Trout, 193;
    fly-fishing for, 194

  Turkey, wild, 190

  Tweed, river, 95


  VICTORIA:
    area, 15;
    population, 15;
    protectionist, 30;
    foundation, 37;
    convicts there, 38;
    bad name given to, 38;
    settlement, 38;
    mountains, 40;
    Melbourne, 43;
    railways, 49, 56;
    Sandhurst, 56;
    Ballarat, 59;
    Wendouree, lake, 60;
    discovery of gold at Golden Point, 60;
    Geelong, 62;
    Corangamite, lake, 64;
    Lake Colac, 65;
    Warnambool, 66;
    Belfast, 66;
    Portland, 66;
    potatoes, 66;
    Portland Bay, 67;
    mountains, 67;
    Gippsland, 67;
    Murray plains, 67;
    Shepparton, 67;
    Wimmera District, 67;
    rabbits, 68;
    Avon, the, 68;
    Richardson, the, 68;
    Wimmera, the, 68;
    Loddon, the, 68;
    wheat lines of railway, 68;
    Beechworth, 69;
    Sale, 69;
    Bairnsdale, 69;
    State schools, 70;
    Cobb, story of, 70;
    coaching, 70;
    Falls of the Stevenson, 72;
    Black Spur, the, 72;
    Loutit Bay, 72;
    Lorne, 72;
    Black Thursday, 214


  WAGES, 30

  Walerawang, 91

  Walker, expedition of, 164

  Wallace, Mr. A. A., on flowers of Australia, 138

  Waratah, river, 146

  Warburton, expedition of, 164

  Warratah, 202

  Warwick, 122

  Wattle, 200

  Welcanna, 94

  Wellington Valley, 94

  Wendouree, lake, 60

  Wentworth, 94

  WESTERN AUSTRALIA:
    area, 15, 133;
    population, 15;
    foundation of the colony, 134;
    large estates in, 134;
    convicts, 135;
    Swan, river, 135;
    Fremantle, 135;
    Perth, 135;
    Guildford, 135;
    Bunbury, 135;
    Albany, 135;
    Geraldton, 135;
    Roeburne, 135;
    vegetation, 136;
    jarrah forests, 136;
    poisonous plants, 136;
    King George's Sound, 138;
    climate, 138;
    wild flowers of, 138;
    Sir F. N. Broome on life there, 140;
    gold discoveries, 140

  Western District of Victoria, 40, 63;
    Mr. Thomas on, 64

  Wheat lines of Wimmera, 68

  Whittaker, Mr. S. H., on fire at Otway ranges, 214

  Whiting, 194

  Wianamatta Shales, the, 90

  Wills, W. J., story of, 161

  Windsor, 89

  Wimmera District, 67;
    rabbits in, 68;
    wheat lines of, 68

  Wimmera, river, 68

  Winter day at Bourke, New South Wales, 94

  Wombat, 181

  Wonga-wonga, 192

  Wornambool, 66

  Wreck Creek, native encampment at, 173

  Wright, story of, 161

  Wylie, the black boy, faithfulness of, 158


  _Xanthorrhoea_, 202


  YAGAN, an aborigine, story of, 169

  Yarra Park, Melbourne, 54

  Yarra, river, 54

  York-road plant, the, 136




LONDON: WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, STAMFORD STREET AND
CHARING CROSS.




TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:

Punctuation has been standardised.

Unexpected spelling has been retained as it appears in the original
publication for Lechlan (which might be meant to be Lachlan), Morsman's
Bay (possibly now Mosman's Bay), Woolahra (Woollahra), Walerawang
(Wallerawang), Wornambool (Warnambool).

Both Goldfields and Gold-fields have been retained as they appear in the
original.

The following changes have been made:

Title Page - Add closing ' to 'The Melbourne Argus'

Page 8 - Waterfall at Gowett changed to Waterfall at Govett

Page 9 - Corra Lynn, Tasmania changed to Corra Linn, Tasmania

Page 9 - Ludwig Leichardt changed to Ludwig Leichhardt

Page 64 - There is no indication in the original publication where the
quotation starting "This lake country ..." attributed to Mr. Julian Thomas ends

Page 84 - Paramatta and Lan Cove changed to Paramatta and Lane Cove

Page 87 - Begar changed to Bega

Page 94 - brigalow and nulga changed to brigalow and mulga

Page 110 - lonely hut beleagured changed to lonely hut beleaguered

Page 139 - expecially at Shark Bay changed to especially at Shark Bay

Page 139 - Avicula margaratifera changed to Avicula margaritifera

Page 143 - Corra Lynn, Tasmania changed to Corra Linn, Tasmania

Page 155 - Ludwig Leichardt changed to Ludwig Leichhardt

Page 159 - Ludwig Leichardt changed to Ludwig Leichhardt (3 instances)

Page 197 - Ecalpytus rostrata, or red gum changed to Eucalyptus
rostrata, or red gum

Page 202 - The boroina, with change to The boronia, with

Page 206 - There is no indication in the original publication where
the quotation attributed to Mr. G. A. Brown in Sheep Breeding in
Australia ends

Index - boroina, 202; change to boronia, 202;

Index - Gympsie, 123; changed to Gympie, 123;

Index - Leptospernum, 200 changed to Leptospermum, 200

Index - Leichardt changed to Leichhardt (2 instances)

Index - Menada, river, 145 changed to Meander, river, 145

Index - Nash discovers Gympsie changed to Nash discovers Gympie

Index - Tennisson Woods on the caves of the Masquito Plains, 106;
changed to Tennison Woods on the caves of the Mosquito Plains, 106;





End of Project Gutenberg's Australian Pictures, by Howard Willoughby