The three colonies of Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia : their pastures, copper mines, & gold fields

Sidney, Samuel · 1852 · Historical

South Wales. 1788. — January 20th. Captain Arthur Phillip, the first Governor of New South Wales. 1788. — January 20th.

This 1852 document, The three colonies of Australia, New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia : their pastures, copper mines, & gold fields, is preserved in the Mountain Man Mining Library for research and reference. Original source: archive.org.

Ouuu24529S

The

Three Colonies

Of

Ait Stralia

New South Avales, Victoria, South Australia;

Their Pastures, Copper Mines, & Gold Fields.

Samuel Sidney,"* ! %

AUTIIOll or "TIIK AUSTRALIAN HAVWOK/ -EY vN"

Mtttlj Numerous <5ngcabings.

f

t

To

The Colonists Of Australia,

And Thb

Frugal Industrious Classes

Of

England, Ireland, And Scotland,

This Attempt To Describe

The Rise, Progress, And Present Position

Op

New South Wales,

Victoria, And South Australia,

The Author.

LOWDOM : nUTtKD BT PKTTKS, DUFF, AXD CO., PLATHOUU YARD, BLACKVKIAJM.

Chronology Of Eemarkable Events

The History Of Australia.

1770. — Captain Cook lands at Botany Bay : he afterwards explored the coast

as far as Cape York, and took possession, under the name of New

South Wales. 1788. — January 20th. Captain Arthur Phillip, the first Governor of New

South Wales, anchored in Botany Bay with the first fleet of convict*.

On the 20th of the same month removed to Port Jackson, and founded

the future city of Sydney.

July. First brick store finished. 1793. — Temporary church built. 1795. — September. Governor Hunter arrives. Origin of pastoral Australia.

Cow pastures, with herd of sixty cattle, from three lost in 1788, discovered.

November. Government orders first printed by a lately-arrived

prisoner.

1798. — Surgeon George Bass discovers Bass's Straits, and proves that Van Diemen's Land is an island.

1800. — Governor King supersedes Governor Hunter.

1802. — Foundation of first brick church. Flinders surveys South Australia, Port Lincoln, and Kangaroo Island.

1803.— l%a Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser (the first newspaper) published by authority. A colony planted in Van Diemen's Land.

1805. — First colonial ship built.

1806. — First great flood of the River Hawkesbury brings on a famine : 21b. loaf sold for 5s. Governor Bligh arrived.

1808.— Governor Bligh deposed by an insurrection of the military and colonists.

1809. — Governor Macquarie arrived with the 73rd regiment.

1810. — A free school, a public market, and Sydney races established. St. Phillip's (the first permanent church) consecrated. A road cut through the bush from the market at the end of George-street to the market wharf, where the boats from the Hawkesbury lay with provisions. Governor sets out on a tour.

a 2

1313, — M**-rv Wenswcrth, Lawjoo, and BLoxland. en in exi-icrir ezz*dixifXL. ytrjtxnztd acne* the Blue Mountains and discover th* Batborat district, the River Macquarie, Jcc, now a great gvld

1*17— /mtatfnr. Mr. the ftarreTor-fivnermL explores from Bashers

autfi? the River Laehkn up to 34 s 5.

Febnary. Mr. Barron Field, the first judge, arrived.

March. The Anxiliarv Bible Societv established. Mr. Oxlev travel*

frjta the marr-hes of the Macquarie overland to Port Macquarie. I%. — Foundation-Atone of .St- James's, the second church, laid. 1 21 ,— -Governor Sir Thomas Brisbane arrives. 1*53, — Maneroo Plains, or Brisbane Down*, explored by Captain Currie.

Moreton Bay and the River Brisbane explored by Mr. Qxley. 124. — Hie first chief justice arrives, first attorney-general, with the

new charter of justice superseding' courts martiaL Penal settlement

founded at Moreton Bay. Liberty of the press acknowledged, and

fint independent "Australian" newspaper established by W. C.

Went worth and Dr. WardeH. Messrs. HoveH and Hume explore

overland Port Phillip. 1825.— Cuniringham discovers Pandora's Pass, allowing-access to Liverpool

Plains from the Hunter River district. First archdeacon arrives.

First constitutional public meeting, with the sheriff in the chair, for

the purpose of voting an address to retiring Governor Brisbane.

Governor Darling arrives. 1820.— First thoroughbred foal p r op erty of Thomas Icely, Esq. In 1849

gold was found on Mr. Icely's estate at Coombing, forty miles from

Bathurst. Sudds and Thompson tried. 1827. — Public meeting to petition the King and Houses of Parliament for trial

by jury in civil cases, and a house of assembly. Darling Downs

discovered by Cunningham. 1828.— -Mr. Justice Dowling arrives, who afterwards died in the discharge of

his duty from overwork and want of rest. 1829. — Legislative Council established in accordance with charter granted

in 1829. Their first act to establish trial by jury in civil cases. Swan

River founded. Captain Sturt travels from Yass along the Murrumbidgee

to the Murray, takes boat, and discovers South Australia and

Lake Alexandrina. 1831.— First steam-boat launched. Sir Richard Bourke succeeds Governor

Darling. The Australian College instituted. Sale at 5s. an acre by

auction substituted for grant of land. 1832.— A savings bank established, first free emigrants imported at cost

of land fund. 1833.— Public mooting to petition for a representative assembly. Foundation of Scots' church laid. 183-1 .—First regntta in Port Jackson, March 30th. John Arthur, the

founder of the exports of Australia in merino wool, died at his seat at

Chronology. V

Camden. Great public meeting to petition against the appropriation of the land revenue. 1835. — March. Mr. Cunningham, colonial botanist, lost on an exploring expedition with Major (now Sir Thomas) Mitchell. May. Political association formed, with instruction to correspond with Henry Bulwer, M.P., since Sir Henry Bulwer, K.C.B. September. First Roman Catholic bishop, Polding, arrives from Liverpool.

November. A Baptist chapel founded by the Rev. John Saunders. Port Phillip colonized from Van Diemen's Land. 1836.— June 2nd. The Right Rev. W. G. Broughton, Lord Bishop of Australia, the first Australian bishop, arrives from England, and is installed. The church act establishing the principle of state assistance to all forms of the Christian religion passed. The Irish system of national education proposed by the governor, but withdrawn. South Australian colony founded. 1837. — November. Sir Richard Bourke bestows the name of Melbourne on the town laid out on the River Yarra Yarra. Governor Bourke returns to England. 1838. — February. Sir George Gipps arrives. Samuel Terry, who arrived in the colony as a prisoner, dies worth half a million sterling. June 6th. The sittings of the Legislative Council first open to the public. 1839. — Price of land raised from 5s. to 12s. an acre. 1840. — The Hunter River Steam Navigation Company established.

October. Governor Gipps announces that transportation had ceased since August, 1839. Same month last convict-ship, the Eden, arrived. Price of land raised to a minimum of £1 an acre and up to £100. 1841. — Census taken in May: males 87,200; females 43,500* Gas first used to light Sydney. Insolvency universal. Sheriff shoots himself. Registrar of Supreme Court discovered to have embezzled the funds of intestates to a large amount. 1842.— July 16M. A stormy public meeting to petition for legislation by representation.

August 1st. The Sydney Morning Herald established on The Sydney Herald enlarged. Bill for incorporating the city of Sydney passed,

In this year six hundred persons took the benefit of an insolvent act passed in February. 1843. — January 1st. Despatches arrive containing the act passed by the British

Parliament establishing representative institutions in New South Wales.

June 13th. W. C. Wentworth, Esq., and Dr. Bland returned at the

head of the poll for Sydney.

August 1st. First meeting of the partly -elected Legislative Council.

Sheep and cattle first boiled down for tallow in this year.

1844. — First peal of bells rung in St. Mary's Cathedral. Centenary Wesleyan

Chapel opened. Governor Gipps's squatting regulations cause

agitation for fixity of tenure. First exportation of horses to India.

Vi Chronology.

Sir Thomas Mitchell, surveyor-general, elected representative for Port Phillip. Resigns his seat, on finding that the governor requires unqualified support. Robert Lowe, crown nominee, resigns for the same reason.

1845. — Public meeting to petition the British Parliament for leave to import Australian grain into England on the same terms as Canadian : Petition refused.

1816. — Census taken: males 114,700; females 74,800; including Port Phillip. Mrs. Chisholm leaves the colony : is presented with a testimonial raised by subscription, as an expression of thanks for her active and zealous exertions on behalf of the emigrant population during the last seven years. Dr. Nicholson (now Sir Charles Nicholson) succeeds A. M'Clcan, Esq., as speaker of the Legislative Council.

June 4th. Governor's Border Police Act rejected. Vote of censure on crown land question by a large majority of the Legislative Council. Governor Sir Charles Fitzroy succeeds Sir George Gipps. October 22nd, At a public meeting to petition against transportation, seven thousand signatures were obtained in Sydney, and one thousand in Maitland, in a few hours.

1847. — Report of select committee, being the fifth, against the minimum price of land — against the coal monopoly of the Australian Agricultural Company.

1848. — Select committee on railway communication with the interior of New South Wales — on steam communication with England. Compromise concluded which gave fixity of tenure to squatters.

1849. — Agitation against transportation, renewed by Earl Grey, and for further representative institutions.

1850. — Earl Grey's proposed constitution rejected. Port Phillip erected into a separate province as Victoria, representative institutions granted to the two other colonies by 13 and 14 Victoria, cap. 59 — those of New South Wales enlarged.

1851. — Gold discovered. A select committee issue a remonstrance against the act of Parliament — declaration of rights.

1852. — Steam communication established. Exports exceed five millions sterling. Census gives 106,000 males ; 81,000 females ; without Port Phillip, which has a population of 80,000.

Introduction.

In this work I have endeavoured to trace the rise and progress of the Australian Colonies from the several periods when New South Wales was established as a distant receptable for British felonry until it acquired first self-supporting prosperity, then freedom — the progress of colonization under the various systems followed in New South Wales, where prisoner slaves laid the foundation of exports — in Port Phillip, where the sheep were many and the officials few — and in South Australia, where a theory and theorists, acts of Parliament and boards of commissioners, were found very inferior to merinoes as colonizing agents. As a review of the Art of Colonization, illustrated by facts and figures, this part of my book is new, and, I may add, both true and instructive. All the colonizing legislation of the last twenty years has been based upon the assertions and assumptions of land -jobbing companies founded by the modern John Law, Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield, which I show, on evidence which cannot be contradicted, to be utterly unfounded.

An examination of the high-priced land system of colonization is of the utmost importance. It has injuriously affected all our crown colonies. In Natal the second rebellion of the Boers was caused by the colonial minister setting up royal prerogative claims to land which was of no value whatever, except in the hands of Dutch farmers, and which, after two wars, we have been obliged to abandon.

In the Falkland Islands, where no trees or corn grow, and no people willingly live, we keep up an establishment of £6,000 a year under pretence of selling land at 6s. an acre which no

V1U Introduction.

one ever buys ; and then the price of land In the Falkland Islands is made the pivot for fixing the price of land somewhere else.

In New Zealand, a country especially fitted for colonies of fisher farmers, on small holdings, in consequence of the difficulties of internal communication, and the very small patches in which fertile land is found in beautiful valleys opening to the sea, vested interests in high priced-land have been created in favour of associations to which large tracts have been handed over in the southern islands. These lands they cannot sell ; the emigrating public, more wise than the government, will neither buy land at Otago nor at Canterbury ; but, because the price of land which people will not buy is £3 an acre at Canterbury, it will be difficult to reduce the price to 5s. an acre in other districts of New Zealand a week's sail and a month's land journey distant, at which people would settle if they could get a freehold at American prices.

In Australia it is the interest of the colonies and of this country that the rude men who crowd to the gold-diggings should be counterbalanced by an influx of well-disposed, educated, intelligent families, prepared to carry on colonization by cultivation, and to rent the flocks of fine-woolled sheep which the wealthy stockowners cannot afford to retain at the present rate of wages. The high price of land, coupled with the expense of the voyage, deters an admirable class of agriculturists from proceeding to Australia ; because the £1 an acre law says, If you do not choose to dig gold, you may be a shepherd, but land you shall not buy unless you have more hundreds of capital than you have shillings.

For these reasons it will be found that I have not devoted too much space to this the first history of the Australian land question — a question on which the character of the future colonization of our gold colonies rests.

In the chapters devoted to emigration I have looked at the

Introduction. Ix

question from an emigrant's point of view, and I have endeavoured to ghge such practical advice, founded on my large experience of the emigrating classes, as would encourage those who are fit, and discourage those who are unfit, for so great a change. I have kept in view two points of which colonizing theorists of the Wakefield school have lost sight — First, that emigration, to be continuous and not spasmodic, must be for the benefit of the emigrant ; therefore all schemes based on a mere desire to get rid of troublesome paupers, or to supply rich colonists with cheap servants, will fail, and always have failed. The failure of the aristocratic Colonization Society founded by Mr. Boyd, at Charing-cross, in 1847-8 — the ill odour in which government emigration was and is held among the superior class of hardworking men — are to be traced to the evident selfishness of the two movements. Secondly, the emigrating classes will always consist chiefly of the most frugal and industrious of the working classes who desire to rise to a higher condition. All attempt to fill ships with the higher and middle classes have, after a brief period of enthusiasm, failed, because they are not the class who, in a body, can succeed so well in a country where high wages are the cause of colonization as the hard-handed ; therefore any attempt to keep working men down as hired servants will only end in keeping down the colony. One family of ambitious labourers is worth a shipload of glutton paupers to the colony and to the mother country. Campbell has painted the great incentive to the best class of colonists —

" The pride to rear an independent shed, And give the lips we love unborrowed bread, To skirt our home with harvests widely sown, And call the blooming landscape all our own, Our children's heritage in prospect long."

Holding these views, my practical directions on the mode of emigrating, and on conduct in a colony, have been chiefly devoted to the frugal labouring class : they are the fruit of the observa-

X Introduction.

tions and notes of my brother the bushman, Mrs. Chisholm, and other equally experienced authorities.

In the descriptive part I have not been able, for want of space, to follow out my original plan, or to satisfy myself; but with such works as those of Haygarth, Townshend, Wilkinson, Mackenzie, and A. Harris, all painting their landscapes from colonial investigation, it would be impossible to compete.

In conclusion, I feel that there is much to correct, and something, perhaps, that needs apology. I regret that I have been obliged, by want of space, to omit chapters on the aborigines and the natural history of Australia, and on the transportation question ; but still I believe that I have produced a useful, honest, truthful book, which I hope to have an opportunity of amending more than once.

LoKwnr, 26th August, 1852.

Contents.

Part L Chapter I.

PAOl

Introduction— Plan of Work IT

Chapter Ii.

First Discoverers — Spaniards — Dutch — English — French — 1520 — 1605 — Quiros — Torres — Tasraan — Dampier — Cook — Landed at Botany Bay — Named New South Wales, a.d. 1770 20

Chapter Iii.

Origin of Transportation — White Slavery in James II.'s Reign — Howard's Labours — Americans Refuse White Slaves — First Colonists of Botany Bay 27

Chapter Iv.— Governor Phillip To Governor King.

Foundation of New South Wales — The Constitution and Judicial System — The Lash— The Law— The First Church— Famine— Wild Cattle Found — Governor Hunter — Governor King 36

CHAPTER V. The Discoveries of Matthew Flinders and George Bass . . . .53

Chapter Vi.— Governor Bligh.

Bligh of the Bounty — His Brutality — M'Arthur — Founder of Australian Wool Trade — Bligh Attempts to Crush M'Arthur — Revolution — Arrest of Governor — He is Superseded — Results of Revolt . . . .61

Chapter Vii.— Governor Macquarie.

Depressed State of the Colony — A Convict created a Magistrate — Impulse given to Industry — Discovery of Bathurst Plains — The Prosperity of the Colony Due to Administration of Macquarie, and Merinoes of M'Arthur 68

xii CONTENTS.

Chapter Viii.— Governor Brisbane.

Governor Brisbane and Governor Darling — Charter of Justice Granted — Executive Council Appointed— Discoveries of Brisbane River — Pandora's Pass — Overland Route to Port Phillip — Brisbane suddenly superseded by Darling — The Land Board — Case of Sudds and Thompson — End of Despotic Government in New South Wales . .82

CHAPTER IX.— GOVERNOR BOURKE. 1831 to 1838.

Sir Richard Bourke — Religious Equality established by Church and School Act — Regulations for Assignment of Convicts — Step toward Abolishing Transportation — Squatting Regulations Systematized— Summary of Changes in Land System from 1788 to 1831— Origin of Wakefield's Colonization Bubbles — Foundation of New Colonies of Port Phillip, South Australia 93

Chapter X.-Governor Gipps.

Origin of Discontent of the Colonists— The Revenue— Pastoral Interest — Land Sales — Crown Patronage — Emigration — Legislative Council becomes Elective— Committees Appointed — Their Reports — Case of the Insolvent Registrar — Prothonotary — Madhouse Keeper — All repudiate Colonial Control 112

Chapter Xi.— Emigration.

Effects of Cessation of Grants of Land — Free Emigration in Pairs of both Sexes— Anxiety of Squatters to bring down Wages — Their Alpha and Omega, to Breed Sheep and Grow Wool— Seven Committees of Legislative Council— The Contrast — Boyd— Campbell . . .131

CHAPTER Xn.— CAROLINE CHISHOLM.

Neglected State of Emigrants— Mrs. C. founds the "Home"— Travels through the Bush — Distributes Servants and Wives — Her Book — Collects Voluntary Information showing Land of Australia to be Fertile. . 139

CHAPTER Xm.— SIR CHARLES FITZROY.

Retrospect of Sir George Gipps's Government— Contest on District Councils—Sir Charles Fitzroy's Administration— The Squatters obtain Fixity of Tenure— Futile Attempt to Reintroduce Convicts . . .164

CONTENTS. Xlll

Chapter Xiv.— Victoria, Port Phillip.

Sketch of the Rise of a Colony founded by Colonists with Sheep, without Act of Parliament 171

Chapter Xv.— South Australia.

Bean Brummel and Gibbon Wakefield— Origin of South Australian Scheme — Progress of Negotiation — Act Obtained — Captain Hindmarsh Governor — Recalled — Colonel Gawler Appointed — The South Australian Commissioners — Their Muddling Management 179

Chapter Xvi.-Colonel Gawler'S Government.

Injustice to Governor Gawler— Fallacious Calculations — The Street Manufacturers in Adelaide — A Contrast — Court of Governor Gawler — The Overlanders— The Crisis— A Rival Colony— The Bubble Bursts . . 195

CHAPTER XVII.— GOVERNOR GREY. 1841 to 1844.

Reaction— Proceedings in England— Case Cooked for the House of Commons—Acts of Parliament— Statistics of South Australia— Discovery of the Copper Mines 210

PART n.

CHAPTER XVIII. Why Emigrate — Who should Emigrate 219

Chapter Xix.— Outfit And Passage.

Three Modes of Emigration : Pauper Emigration, Associated Emigration, Family Colonization, Cabin Emigration — Preparations for Voyage — Outfit — Choice of Ship — Lloyd's Register— Dietary — Measurement — Extra Stores— Sea Sickness 255

Chapter Xx.— Landing In A Colony.

From Sea to Shore— From Salt Meat to Fresh— What to Do— What to Avoid— Life of Shepherd— Of Small Farmer 268

Chapter Xxl

How to Buy or Lease Land from the Crown— Sheep Runs— The Shepherd's Life— Hut Keeper— Lambing — Sheep Washing— Shearing— Purchase of Sheep— Diseases of Sheep— Cattle and Bullock Teams — Dairy — Stockmen — Branding Cattle — Horse Breeding — Riding in Australia . 293

Xiv Contekt8.

pabt m.

Chapter Xxil

A Glance at the Extent, Form, Soil, Climate, Riven, and Productions of Australia 321

Chapter Xxiil— Port Jackson— The Sydney District To Wide Bay.

Cumberland and Camden Counties— Hunter's River and Maitland — Port Stephens— Port Macquarie— Moreton Bay— The Dugong — Wide Bay — The Bunya-Bunya— Dr. Leichardt— The Bronze-winged Pigeon . . 327

Chapter Xxiv.— Port Jackson To Port Phillip.

Botany Bay — Illawarra — Railway to Jervis Bay— Twofold Bay — Boyd Town and Eden — Port Phillip Bay — Williams Town — Melbourne — Geelong — Portland Bay — Divisions of Victoria Province — Gipps's Land — Discovery — The Lyre Bird of Gipps's Land— Grass Trees . 344

Chapter Xxv.— South Australia.

South Australia — Mount Lofty — Mount Barker — City of Adelaide — The Rivers Murrumbidgee and Murray — Navigation of the Murray — Calculation for Steam Traffic— Birds of South Australia — Description of Adelaide — Mines of Copper, Lead, Silver, and Gold — The Burra Burra — Statistics of South Australia 355

Chapter Xxvi.— Religion— Education— Law.

Foundation of Bishoprics — The Voluntary System insufficient — Church Schools — National School System — Colonial Education — Normal School of Sydney — "Order for a Schoolmaster"— How Executed— Courts of Law 372

Chapter Xxvii— Gold.

Rumours of Gold Discovery— Certainty— Sketch of History— Old Shepherd — Edward Hargreaves points out Gold Fields— Correspondence with Governor — Stutchbury — Proclamation issued — First Gold Commissioner appointed— John Hardy's Description of Summerhill Creek — Preaching at the Diggings . 379

CHAPTER XXVnL— CONCLUSION . .415

Appendix.

Abridgment of the Australian Colonies Government Bill, and Protest of the Retiring Legislative Council presented to the House of Lords by the Duke of Argyle 421

Places where Gold has been found— New South Wales Census, 1851.

List Of Illustrations

Frontispiece. — Return of the Dray.

Monument to La Perouse 34

, Newcastle on the Coaeve or Hunter's River 46

Merino Ram 63

Native Dog or Dingoe 71

Bathurst Plains in 1862 76

The Duck-hilled Platypus or Paradox . . - 77

City of Sidney 112

Mrs. Chisholm 146

Bushing it 166

The Antipodes, Islands - . 170

A Wool Store at Geelong .171

Gum Trees near Melbourne 173

Bunynong Hill, near Ballarat 176

Adelaide from" the Hills" 179

City of Adelaide 206

Emigrants leaving England 221

A Shepherd's Hut in the Neighbourhood of Gou lb urn 271

Opossum 297

Top- Knot Pigeon 299

Branding Cattle at Illawara 310

Wonga Wonga Pigeon 333

Bronze-winged Pigeon 340

Dr. Leichardt . . 341

Emu 343

Blacks under Gunyah 345

Geelong 349

Gold-washing at Ballarat .' 361

Lyre Bird 353

Grass Trees 366

Xvi List Of Illustrations.

Page

More Pork Bird 361

Megapodius, or Mound-building Bird 362

Bower Bird 363

Cascade at Greenhill Creek, South Adelaide 364

Straw-necked Ibis 366

Bonded Myrmicobius, or Ant-eater 367

A Nugget of Gold 378

Edward Hargreaves 379

Gold Diggings at Ophir 381

Mr. Hardy, the first Government Commissioner 384

Gold Diggers at Dinner 385

Gold Escort 387

Issuing Licences 389

Coombing, forty miles from Bathurst . 394

Gold-seekers* Graves on the Turon 398

Dodging the Commissioner 398

Removing Goods j 398

The Disappointed Gold-seeker 400

Laughing Jackass 406

A Cradler ,. 408

Coreopsis Goose 409

Children Cradling 410

Washing the Gold 410

The Post-office, Sofala, Turon River 412

Paet I.

Historical.

The

Theee Colonies Of Australia.

Chapter I.

Introduction— Plan Of Work— Historical— Descriptive— Practical.

AUSTRALIA— New South Wales— Botany Bay— these are the names under which, within the memory of men of middle age, a great island-continent at the antipodes has been explored, settled, and advanced from the condition of a mere gaol, or sink on which our surplus felonry was poured — a shecpwalk tended by nomadic burglars — to be the wealthiest offset of the British crown — a land of promise for the adventurous — a home of peace and independence for the industrious — an El Dorado and an Arcadia combined, where the hardest and the easiest best-paid employments are to be found, where every striving man who rears a race of industrious children may sit under the shadow of his own vine and his own fig-tree — not without work, but with little care — living on his own land, looking down the valleys to his herds — towards the hills to his flocks, amid the humming of bees, which know no winter.

Under the genial variations of the climate of Australia all the productions of southern and temperate latitudes flourish — the palm and the oak, the potato and the yam, the orange and the apple, wheat and Indian corn. Over her boundless pastures millions of sheep wander — sheep of " noble race," w T hose feet, according to the Spanish proverb, "turn all the earth they touch to gold," and cattle by tens of thousands, that may compare with the best of Durham, or Hereford, or Devon, and horses as swift and untiring as ever bounded over the stony deserts of Arabia. In her mountain ridges and river beds gold is gathered in greater profusion than ever Cortes or Pizarro dreamed — gathered without shedding one drop of blood. Peaceful seas surround — safe harbours give access to — this goodly land, which may be traversed inland for hundreds of miles on foot or horseback — no ravenous

B

18 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

wild beasts threaten or affright the timid — the aborigines are few, and quick to learn submission.

The hard work of colonization has done ; the road has been smoothed and made ready ; yet there is ample verge and room enough for millions to follow in the track of the thousands who have conquered and subdued the earth, and planted and reared, not only corn and cattle, but an English race, imbued with English traditions, taught by English literature, enjoying English institutions, and practising English love of order and obedience to law while cherishing the firmest attachment to liberty.

With these elements of social and political prosperity, only needing for full development a tide of population which this country can well spare, it cannot be doubted that a very few years will transform what our fathers considered the meanest, into the greatest of Britain's dependencies ; and that, at a period when Continental Europe seems retrograding into deeper than mediaeval darkness and despotism, side by side in friendly rivalry with the great American republic, we shall realize the threat of the baffled statesman (when the rising liberties of Spain were crushed under the armies of the soon-tobc-exiled Bourbon), and " call a new world into existence to redress the balance of the old"* — a new field for the employment of ablebodied industry, which, overflowing from the crowded competition of Europe, may there help on the march of unrestricted commerce by digging capital out of the soil, or, at less exercise of strength, produce choice raw material for the triumphs of machinery.

For some fifteen years armies of emigrants have annually proceeded in greater or less numbers to the Australian colonies, yet it is but recently that the general public have cared to inquire more than how bread was to be earned or how capital invested. Late discoveries have invested these with new importance in the eyes of all who follow witli interest the progress of the Anglo-Saxon race. The time seems propitious for attempting not only to describe the features, the resources, and the prospects of these colonies, but to trace the series of political, social, and commercial events by which an insignificant penal settlement in the most distant quarter of the globe, supportwl at great cost by the parent state, has given birth to a cluster of prosjKjrous self-supporting colonies, largely contributing, directly and indirectly, to the imperial revenues, by the production of valuable raw materials, by the consumption of British manufactures, and by the employment of any amount of labour that can be landed on their shores

George Canning.

Plan Op Work. 19

This work will be divided into three principal sections : —

1. Historical; 2. Descriptive; 3. Practical.

The Historical section will include an account of the discovery of the island by Spanish, Dutch, English, and French mariners ; of the foundation of the first settlement at Botany Bay, the early government and the gradual changes which have converted a kind of transmarine gaol into a community of free men, claiming, and at the present time, to a great extent, enjoying, free institutions; of the beginning and progress of the great pastoral interest from the eight merinos imported by Arthur to the fourteen million fine-woolled sheep which now graze over the three colonies of New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia ; of the progress of emigration from the few scattered traders, farmers, and officials who, for more than a quarter of a century, formed only the free additions to the population, except by births, to the time when colonists were shipped by thousands, on a colonizing crusade ; of the progress of the value of land from the period when the bribe of free rations and the gift of slave labour was needed to induce any one to accept it, until the time when lots in an unbuilt, unpeopled city were sold by the yard, at the rate of thousands of pounds per acre ; of the progress of trade from the mere barter of the year 1800, dependent on the expenditure of the colonial government, to a steady export, in 1851, of millions sterling in wool, tallow, and copper ore, and lastly gold ; of the progress of colonization by which the despised Botany Bay has called into existence " Three Colonies" in which labour is better rewarded, and life more easily sustained,, than in any country in the world.

The time has not arrived — the public is not prepared to reward the labour required — for the execution of a complete historical work on Australia. The author has contented himself with sketching from authentic, and in many instances unpublished, documents the series of events which influence the present, and are likely to influence the future, moral, social, and commercial condition of Australia.

The Descriptive section will contain a popular account of the principal districts colonized, their ports, their pastoral, their agricultural, their mining resources; of the aborigines, and of the natural history of Australia ; of the present condition of the " Three Colonies " as fields for the exercise of trade, agriculture, stock-farming, and mining pursuits ; of the legislative, religious, and educational institutions which those colonies enjoy. It will, in fact, be an attempt to draw a picture of the present, as the first section is of the past, condition of Australia.

The Practical section will be a hand-book, in which the subjects of emigration, from the hour when the idea of leaving this country for a

b 2

20 The Thbeb Colonies Of Australia.

colony has first occurred, to a final settlement at the antipodes, in some one of the several pursuits there open to the enterprising and industrious of all ranks, if mentally and physically qualified, will be treated in a plain, practical manner, with copious extracts from original letters from intending emigrants and successful colonists, and from the MS. journal of the brother of the author — an Australian bushmaa.

Chapter H.

FIRST DISCOVERERS — SP AXIARDS — DUTCH — ENGLISH — FRENCH — 15 — ltS — QUIROS — TORRES — TASMAN — DAMPIER — COOK — LANDING AT BOTANT BAY —NAMED NEW SOUTH WALES, A.D. 177Q.

THE name " Australia," now universally adopted to designate the whole island-continent, was suggested by the gallant, unfortunate, and ill-requited Flinders, in his " Account of a Voyage of Discovery to Terra Australis." From this work almost all writers on Australian geography have copied their accounts of the progress of discovery previous to the voyage of Captain Cook.

The Dutch, who first explored the whole northern coast, called it New Holland in their own language. Captain Cook, after sailing round the south-eastern coast, gave it the name of of New South Wales, from a supposed resemblance to that part of Great Britain, and by that name the whole island was known in English works until other settlements were formed. But colloquially, until very recently, Botany Bay, the first landing-place of Captain Cook, was vulgarly and popularly the designation given to Australia, although no settlement was ever formed there ; and it remains to this day a swampy suburb, at an hour's ride from Sydney, to which idlers resort, to drink, smoke, play quoits, and from which part of the water for the supply of that city is obtained.

Port Phillip, the name first given to the great bay on which are the of Geolong and Melbourne,* after Captain Phillip, first governor of New South Wales, has been applied to the whole province ; and, although by the act of Parliament which created it a separate colony the name of Victoria has been affixed to this region, it will be long before the old inhabitants will remember or consent to give any other name than Port Phillip to the district which Sir Thomas Mitchell endeavoured to designate as Australia Felix, and Dr. Lang, Phillipslmnd.

Melbourne stands on the Tarra Yarra River, navigable by steamers of two hundred tons. Larger vessels lie off its mouth in Hobson's Bay.

Discovered By Spaniards And Dutch. 21

The act of Parliament that created the third colony fixed the name of South Australia.

Official and parliamentary documents have superseded the old name of Swan River by Western Australia. Van Diemen's Land retains its old Dutch name, although also occasionally more conveniently known as Tasmania.

Dutch, Spanish, and English have succeeded in affixing nominal marks of their discoveries on Australia, which is almost the last country peopled by an European race ; but the French, in spite of efforts of great pains and cost, have been generally superseded, although at one time they had appropriated all the discoveries of Matthew Flinders.

The earliest authentic records of the discovery of any part of Australia are Spanish. The traces supposed to be found by some geographers in ancient charts of " Jave le Grand," and in a copy of Marco Polo's travels, with a map, are too obscure to deserve serious consideration.

That Chinese navigators knew of the existence of Northern Australia at a very remote period is, looking at the unchanging habits of that people, more than probable. They have formed a settlement on the Island of Timor, distant only 250 miles from Cape York, and are in the habit of resorting to the coast near the abandoned settlement Port Essington to collect a Chinese dainty, the trepang or seaslug.

Between 1520 and 1600 the Spaniards, in the course of their voyages from their South American possessions, discovered several islands of the Australian group ; and, in 1605, Pedro Fernandez de Quiros and Luis Vaez de Torres made a voyage of discovery in two ships. After finding land, which they named Terra del Esperito Santo, now known as the New Hebrides, the ships parted company in a gale of wind : Torres, the second in command, coasted along New Guinea, and sailed through the dangerous straits which are still the dread of the mariner in stormy seasons, and still bear his name. He passed two months in this difficult navigation, mistaking the portions of the coast of A ustralia which he sighted for islands. Of this voyage he transmitted a full account in a letter to the King of Spain ; but, in accordance with the jealous policy of the age, the record was suppressed, and the existence of the straits remained unknown until they were re-discovered by Captain Cook in 1770.

But in 1762, during our war with Spain, we captured Manilla by storm, and in the archives of that city Mr. Alexander Dalrymple, the historiographer of the British Admiralty, discovered a copy of the letter to the King of Spain, which had been deposited there by Torres.

22 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Dalrymplc, with that sense of justice and right feeling which should inspire all men of science, did justice to the discoverer by inscribing on the official maps issued from his department, against the intricate passage between Australia and New Guinea, " Torres Straits."

About the same time that Quiros and Torres were pursuing their investigations, the Dutch, then in the height of their maritime power, were prosecuting voyages of discovery in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.

From the instructions prepared for the guidance of Abel Janz Tasman previous to his voyages in 1642 and 1644 (instructions which were signed by the Governor-General Antonia Van Diemen, and four members of the council, at Batavia), in which the previous discoveries of the Dutch in New Guinea and the "Great South Land" were recited, it that a Dutch yacht, on a voyage of discovery in 1605-6, discovered the " South Land," mistaking it for the west side of New Guinea; that a second expedition, in 1617, met with no success ; and that, in 1623, a third, consisting of the yachts Pcra and Arnhem, was despatched from Amboyna, by which were discovered " the great islands of Arnhem and Spult," being, in fact, the north of Australia, which still bears the name of Arnhem's Land. Other records show that, up to 1626, the Dutch had either accidentally, or by voyages of exploration, discovered and given names to about half the coast of Australia.

Many of these names are preserved to this day, for we have not the passion which afflicts some nations of re-naming after the standard of our own language — we can afford to be generous in ]>eace and war. The Gulf of Carpentaria is still called after General Peter Carpenter, who explored it : at tlmt period military titles were indifferently applied to commanders at sea as on land ; and captains of ships then, as at present in the Russian navy, wore spurs. The names of Arnhem, Tasman, De Witt, Endrachts, and Edel, cover the whole of the coast of Northern Australia as far as Sharks' Bay.

It is curious that none of these explorations led to any permanent settlement ; and that in this instance, as in many others — in America, at the Cape, and in India — England has reaped the fruits of Dutch industry and enterprise. They have scarcely been more fortunate than the indolent, anti-commercial Spaniard. The Dutch, of all their rich colonial possessions, retain only Java, and the Spaniards Cuba. And the two new gold-fields discovered by Dutch and Spaniards, Australia and California, have fallen into the hands of an English-speaking race.

TASMAN — D'eNTRECASTEAUX — CARSTEN8. 23

Of Tasman's voyage no account has ever been published. There was found on one of the islands forming the roadstead called Dirk Hartog's Roadstead, at the entrance of Sharks' Bay, in 1697, and afterwards again in 1801, a pewter plate, attached to a decayed log half sunk in earth, which bore two inscriptions in Dutch, of different dates, of which the following are translations : —

" 1616. On the 25th October the ship Endracht, of Amsterdam, arrived here; first merchant, Gilles Miebais Van Luck; Captain Dirk Hartog, of Amsterdam. She sailed on the 27th of the same month for Bantam. Supercargo Janstins ; chief pilot, Peter Ecores Van Due. Year 1616."

The second inscription was —

" 1697. On the 4th February the ship Geelvink, of Amsterdam, arrived here; Wilhelem de Planting, captain -commandant; John Bremen, of Copenhagen, assistant ; Michel Bloem Van Estoght, assistant. The dogger Nyptaught, Captain Gerril Coldart, of Amsterdam ; Theodore Hermans, of the same place, assistant ; first pilot, Gerritzen, of Bremen.

" The galley Nel Wesetje, Cornelius de Planting, of Vielandt, commander ; Coert Gerritzen, of Bremen, pilot. Our fleet sails hence, leaving the southern territories for Bat a via."

In 1642 Tasman discovered, and sailed along the coast of, the Island of Van Diemen's Land, supposing it to be part of the " South Land."

In successive investigations by Captain Marrion, of the French navy, in 1772 ; by Captain Tobias, of the British service, in 1773 ; by Captain Cook, in 1777 ; and by the French Rear-Admiral D'Entrecasteaux, the coast line to the south and east was further explored ; but the insularity of Van Diemen's Land, the harbour of Port Jackson, and the Rivers Hunter, Brisbane, and Yarra, all destined to be the outlets to important districts in future colonies, remained undiscovered.

The many hundred leagues of coast so frequently visited by the Dutch had afforded no encouragement for the plantation of settlements similar to those which they had founded with such brilliant results in the Indian Seas.

The Commander Carstens, sent by the Dutch East India Company to explore New Holland, describes it as " barren coasts, shallow water, islands thinly peopled by cruel, poor, and brutal natives, and of very little use to the company ." Tasman's Land was pronounced to be the abode of " howling evil spirits."

In these discouraging reports all mariners, until the time of Captain Cook, agreed ; which is not extraordinary, considering that, after the time of Columbus, maritime discoverers sought lands in which either

24 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

gold was to be had for gathering, or where rich tropical fruits abounded in pleasant harbours.

In New Holland the natives were hostile and miserably poor, in the lowest state-of human existence ; they built no huts, they wore no ornaments of gold or precious stones, they cultivated no ground, their barren, unfruitful coast afforded no indigenous fruits for barter; neither the yam, the cocoa, nor the pineapple, the lemon, the citron, the gourd, nor indeed any other fruit grateful to European taste.

As the Spaniards were the first, so the British were the last, and, in their first attempts, the least successful, in exploring the coast of Australia.

William Dampier, one of the boldest and most scientific navigators of his age, author of a " Voyage round the World," from which Defoe drew many hints, visited New Holland three times — on the first occasion with his companions the buccaneers ; again as pilot of H. M. S. Roebuck, when he spent about five weeks in ranging off and on the coast of New South Wales, a length of about 300 leagues ; on the third occasion he passed through Torres Straits as pilot to Captain Woodes Rogers, in 1710, when ho explored Sharks' Bay, the coasts of New Guinea, New Britain, and New Zealand.

In July, 1769, Captain James Cook, after having observed the transit of Venus at Otaheite (or Tahiti), and cruised for a month among the other Society Islands, sailed southwards in search of the continent Terra Australia Incognita, which geographers for a preceding century had calculated must exist somewhere thereabouts, as a counterpoise to the great tract of land in the northern hemisphere.

In this search he first visited the Islands of New Zealand, which had been previously discovered by Tasman in 1662 : he spent six months in investigating them, and ascertained that they consisted of two large islands. New Zealand owes the pig and potato to Cook, for which his memory was long honoured and even worshipped among those heroic savages. In his report to the Admiralty, Cook recommended that any settlement which it might be considered advisable to establish should be planted at the Valley of Thames, where Auckland, the capital of the northern colonies, has since been founded.

Leaving New Zealand, and sailing westward, he sighted New Holland on the 11th of April, 1770, and on the 27th anchored in the roadstead to which he afterwards gave the name of Botany Bay. On the following day he landed, with Mr. (afterwards Sir Joseph) Banks, President of the Royal Society, Dr. Solander, and a party of seamen. They were all charmed with the bright verdure of the scene, in which

Captain Cook. 25

every natural object, the kangaroo bounding through the open forest, the evergreen eucalypti, the grass-trees, the birds, were unlike anything they had ever seen before in the course of their voyages in various quarters of the globe.

After exploring the country for several days, during which a favourable estimate was formed of the capabilities of the district for supporting a colony,* and vainly endeavouring to open a communication with natives, through Tupia, a South-sea Islander, Cook sailed to the northward, passing without visiting the opening into Port Jackson : taking it for a mere boat harbour, he gave it the name of the look-out seaman who announced the indentation in the dark, lofty, basaltic cliffs wliich open a passage into that noble harbour.

On the 17th of May, Cook anchored in a bay to which he " gave the name of Moreton Bay ; and, at a place where the land was not at that time visible, some on board, having observed that the sea looked paler than usual, were of opinion that the bottom of the bay opened into a river;" but Cook came to a contrary conclusion; it was not until 1823 that the navigable River Brisbane, which gives access to a fine pastoral country, was discovered.

Leaving Moreton Bay, Cook ran down the coast as far as Cape York, taking possession in the usual form wherever ho landed. Afterwards passing between New Guinea and Australia, he proved, as Torres had before him, that they were distinct islands.

Cook landed altogether five times on this coast — first at Botany Bay, on the 28th of April, 1770 ; secondly on the 22nd of May, when he shot a kind of bustard weighing 17 lbs., and named the landingplace Bustard Bay ; the third time on the 30th of May, at a spot which, from the absence of water, he named Tliirsty Sound. The fourth time was on the 18th of June, 1770 (seven days after his vessel, the Endeavour, had struck upon a coral rock), at Endeavour River, where they refitted. It was during his stay at Endeavour River that one of his crew came running to the boat declaring that he had seen the devil, " as large as a one-gallon keg, with horns and wings, yet he crept so slowly I might have touched him if I had not been feared." This " devil" was a grey-headed vampyre. (See Engraving on next page.)

On the 21st of August of the same year, having passed and named a point on the mainland " Cape York," Cook anchored, landed for the fifth

The author of the narrative of Cook's first voyage says :— "It was on account of the great quantity of plants which Mr. Banks and Or. Solandcr collected in this place that Lieutenant Cook was induced to give it the name of Botany Bay. In cultivating the ground there would be no obstacle from the trees, which arc tall, straight, and without underwood, and stand a sufficient distance from each other."

The Three Colonies Oe Aubtbalia.

time on an island which lies in 1st. 10° 30' 8., and having ascertained that he had discovered an open passage to the Indian Seas, by ascending a hill from whence he had a clear view of forty miles, before reembarking took possession in the following words : —

"As I am now about to quit the eastern coast of New Holland, which I have coasted from lat. 38° to this place, and which I am confident no European has ever seen before, I once more hoist English colours ; and, though I have already taken possession of several parts, I now take possession of the whole of the eastern coast, by the name of New South Wales (from its great similarity to that part of the principality), in the right of my sovereign, George the Third, King of Great Britain."

His men fired three volleys of firearms, which were answered by the same number from the guns of the ship, and by three cheers from the main shrouds, and, then re- -em barking, he named the spot Possession Island.

Origin Of Transportation — First Colonists. 27

These explorations of Cook completed the circuit of the island commenced and prosecuted from the commencement of the seventeenth century by the Spanish and Dutch, with the exception of the coast opposite Van Diemen's Land, which was reserved for the enterprise of Flinders and Bass.

In his exploration of Australia, Cook's usual sagacity and good fortune seem to have failed him, although his contributions to our knowledge of an important navigation were of the most valuable character.

He selected Botany Bay, a dangerous harbour, which must remain for many years an undrained swamp. He passed without examination Port Jackson, the site of Sydney ; Moreton Bay, with its navigable river ; and, concluding that Yan Diemen's Land was part of the Island of Australia, and the dividing straits a deep bay, lost the opportunity of investigating the great bay of Port Phillip, on the shores of which the most flourishing colony in the British dominions is now rising.

In God's good providence the discovery was reserved for a fitting time.

Chapter Hi.

ORIGIN OP TRANSPORTATION—WHITE SLAVERY IN JAMES II/S REIGN— HOWARD'S LABOURS— AMERICANS REFUSE WHITE SLAVES— FIRST COLONISTS OF BOTANY BAY.

THE accumulation of criminals in our gaols at the close of the American war became an embarrassing question for the county magistrates and the government : projects for the renewal of transportation and its effect on criminals became a subject of discussion among statesmen and philanthropists.

Banishment from a very early period was an ordinary punishment, which permitted the sentenced to proceed to any country he pleased. Thus Shakspere's " Richard H. " :

" we banish you our territories! You, cousin Hereford, upon pain of death, Till twice five summers have enriched our fields, Shall not regret our fair dominions, But tread the stranger paths of banishment.

Norfolk, for thee remains a heavier doom 1

The hopeless word of never to return Breathe I against thee, upon pain of life."

28 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Even at the present day it is common in Guernsey and Jersey to "banish a criminal to England;" that is to say, to land him at Southampton, and then leave him free to go where he will so long as he does not revisit the Channel Islands.

In the same manner the smaller German principalities occasionally pay the passage of great criminals whom their forms of law prevent from executing without a confession of guilt, in order to save the expense of their maintenance during a perpetual imprisonment.

At Hamburg, a few years ago, it was accidentally discovered that the official representative of one of the northern dukedoms had arranged to despatch a small batch of murderers, burglars, and forgers by an emigrant ship bound to New York ; but the exiles having ill— advisedly made too much display of the deadly weapons, in pistols and daggers, with which, as stock in trade, they had provided themselves, the paternal intentions of the German prince were frustrated, and the throats and pockets of the honest passengers saved.

The first legislative trace of the punishment of transportation is to be found in the 39th of Elizabeth, c. 4, authorizing the banishment of rogues and vagabonds. This act James the First converted into an instrument for transportation to America, in a letter written in 1619, addressed to the council of the colony of Virginia, commanding them " to send a hundred dissolute persons to Virginia that the Knight-Marshall would deliver to them for that purpose." These being the very class of persons against whose introduction the celebrated hero of Virginia, Captain John Smith, had specially protested, in the same year, as a kind of counterpoise to these dissolute persons, the Company sent ninety agreeable girls, young and incorrupt ; and again, in 1621, sixty more, " maids of virtuous education, young, and handsome." The first lot of females brought 120 lbs. of tobacco each, and the second 150 lbs. each.

The first distinct notice of transportation is to be found 18 Car. II., cap. 3, which gives the judges power at their discretion to execute, or transport for life," the moss-troopers of Cumberland or Northumberland.

The punishment was inflicted very frequently, in a very illegal manner, up to the reign of George the First, when its operation was extended and legalized.

Defoe, who always drew the outlines of his stories from actual life, no doubt gives a true picture of the life led by the convicts in the American plantations in his " History of Moll Flanders."

During the reign of James the Second, transportation, or rather

Anecdote Of Judge Jeffries. 29

reduction to slavery, was a favourite, and to certain parties a profitable, punishment.

Dr. Lingard quotes a petition setting forth that seventy persons who had been apprehended on account of the Salisbury rising of Penruddock and Grove, after a year's imprisonment, had been sold at Barbados for 1,550 lbs. of sugar a-piece, more or less, according to their working faculties. Among them were divines, officers, and gentlemen, who were represented as " grinding at the mills, attending at the furnaces, and digging in that scorching island, whipped at whipping-posts, and sleeping in sties worse than hogs in England."*

After Argyle's defeat the planters were on the alert to obtain white slaves, and were successful. Some of the common prisoners, and others, who were Highlanders, were by the Privy Council delivered to Mr. George Scott of Petlockey, and other planters in New Jersey, Jamaica.

After Monmouth's rebellion Lord Sunderland wrote from " Winser, Sept. 14th, 1685, to Judge Jeffries " to acquaint him from the king that, of such persons as the judge should think qualified for transportation, the following individuals were to be furnished with these numbers : — Sir Philip Howard to have 200 (convicts) ; Sir Richard White, 200 ; Sir William Booth, 100; Mr. Kendal, 100 ; Mr. Nipho, 100 ; Sir William Stapleton, 100 ; Sir Christopher Musgrave, 100 ; a merchant whose name Lord Sunderland did not know, 100. Thus it was proposed to give away 1,000. The King directed Chief Justice Jeffries to give orders for delivering the said numbers " to the above persons respectively, to be forthwith transported to some of his Majesty's southern plantations, viz., Jamaica, Barbados, or any of the Leeward Islands in America, to be kept there for the space of ten years before they have their liberty. In the end, eight hundred and forty-nine of Monmouth's followers, all from the west, were sold."f Macaulay's account of the traffic between the maids of honour and the relatives of prisoners will be in the recollection of all our readers, as well as the question of who was the Mr. Penn who acted as broker.

But the following Bristol legend of an incident in the life of Jeffriee proves that he did not permit aldermen to follow the example of the maids of honour : —

"As saints sometimes, after a life of asceticism, are in a weak moment betrayed into a faux-pas, so did Chief Justice Jeffries once stumble into a virtuous action.

" On his return from Taunton, where his mornings were passed in sentencing to hanging and burning, and his evenings with a congenial

Lingard, xi. 143. f Roberta* " Duke of Monmouth," rol. 2, p. 248.

30 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

soul, Colonel Kirke, in drinking, he stopped at Bristol. Now, the mayor, aldermen, and justices of Bristol had been used to transport convicted criminals to the American plantations, and sell them by way of trade ; and, finding the commodity turn to good account, they contrived a way to make it more plentiful. Their legal convicts were but few, and the exportation inconsiderable: when, therefore, any petty rogues and pilferers were brought before them in a judicial capacity they were sure to be terribly threatened with hanging, and they had some diligent officers attending who could advise the ignorant, intimidated creatures to pray for transportation, as the only way to save their lives ; and in general, by some means or other, the advice was followed : then, without any more form, each alderman in turn took one, and sold him for his own benefit ; and sometimes there arose warm disputes among them about the next turn. This trade had been carried on unnoticed many years, when it came to the knowledge of the Lord Chief Justice, who, finding upon inquiry that the mayor was equally involved with the rest of his brethren in this outrageous practice, made him descend from the bench where he was sitting, and stand at the bar in his scarlet and furs, and plead like any common criminal."

This system and the demand for labour led to frequent cases of kidnapping of the poor and friendless, and of parties who had made themselves obnoxious to any powerful and unscrupulous individuals. Thus debtors disencumbered themselves of their creditors, wives of their husbands, and guardians of their wards. Even in vengeance the commercial spirit of Britain was displayed; and, while the clumsy Italian stabbed or poisoned his enemy, the Englishman sold him for a soldier, a sailor, or a slave.

Before the commencement of the American war of independence, the introduction of the more docile and laborious negro had rendered the American planters hostile to the importation of white convicts. That war put a stop to the traffic in white flesh, and crowded our gaols. At the same period the prison labours of Howard commenced. In his vocation he personally examined every place of imprisonment. He found the convicted prisoner with money in his purse revelling in debauchery, while the untried poor man was half starved, lodged on damp stones, exposed, through unglazed windows, to every blast, or crowded promiscuously with the vilest of mankind in deep dungeons, where fever and every kind of foul pestilence were ever smouldering. Sometimes a black assize swept away prisoners, gaolers, and even judges. The barbarity of the system may be appreciated from the circum-

Proposition For Shovelling Out Criminals. 31

stance that Howard counted as a great triumph having obtained an order for a daily allowance of a penny loaf and small piece of cheese for each untried prisoner.

Howard was anxious to establish reformatory prisons or penitentiaries, but his humane schemes met with little favour. With the experience we have since had, we cannot imagine that he would have had any success, except in establishing a clean and wholesome system of management.

The country was no more prepared then, than it is at present, to permit desperate ruffians to be unloosed to renew their crimes on the expiration of their terms of imprisonment. But no one then contemplated prisons as costly as palaces, and almost as comfortable, in which the hard-labour test would consist in composing moral essays, and collating texts of Scripture.*

The annual accumulation of roguery was to be got rid of! — That was the problem ; and, so long as it was solved, few cared how. Hanging had been stretched to its utmost limits ; transportation had been checked by the revolt of a country which had decided to employ no slaves who had not at least 25 per cent, of black blood in their veins, and to receive no rogues, except those who had escaped unconvicted.

Under these difficult circumstances, a proposition for " shovelling " out our criminals on the shores of the antipodes, recently re-discovered by Cook, was eagerly entertained. There it was presumed, on very insufficient grounds, the place of punishment could Jbe rendered selfsupporting ; at any rate, the prisoners would cease to be a nuisance to the life and property of this country.

Howard opposed the project, but his opposition was fortunately unheeded, although founded on very sufficient grounds.

When we now examine the population, the wealth, the commerce, the sources of annually increasing power and prosperity in the Australian colonies, the undeniable elements of empire which they enjoy, it is scarcely possible to believe that the first settlement was formed with the overflowing of our gaols, and the sweepings of our street*; that, for a long series of years, its very existence was dependent on supplies of food, which the famine, occasioned by a month's delay of a store-ship, would have rendered useless, and on grants of money voted at a time when votes, except on the grand field-days of contending parties, were passed un-discussed in Parliament, and unreported in newspapers.

At this day, when care for the health, education, and religious

Reading Gaol, Berks.

32 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

instruction of criminals is carried to an extent which shows, in painful relief, the neglect our peasantry endure, it is with amazement am} horror that we look back on the cool, careless indifference with which the ministers of George the Third, in 1797, set about founding a penal settlement at the opposite side of the world.

The nearest approach to it may be found in the proceedings of the New Zealand Company in 1839, when they sold land, and sent out credulous colonists to take possession of barren forest-covered hills of an unknown island, in the occupation of fierce aborigines.

Captain Cook and his companions had passed a few days on the intended site of the proposed penal colony, and had found a small river, a profusion of curious plants, and an indifferent harbour. They had not seen any plains of pasture fit to feed live stock. They had not found any large edible animals, such as deer, or bufialoes, or pigs. They had no means of ascertaining whether the soil was capable of carrying crops for the support of a considerable population; and the nearest land at which live stock and dry stores could be procured was the Cape of Good Hope, a colony in the possession of the Dutch.

As little judgment, as little forethought, as little common humanity was displayed in selecting the colonists as the colony. The first detachment consisted of the first governor, Captain Arthur Phillip, R.N., with a guard of marines, viz., a major-commandant, twelve subalterns, and twen-four non-commissioned officers, one hundred and sixty-eight rank and file, with forty women, their wives. These were the unconvicted section of the intended colony. The prisoners were six hundred men, and two hundred and fifty women, the latter being not only the most abandoned of their sex, but many of them aged, infirm, and even idiotic.

This fearful disproportion of sexes was maintained, and even increased, until the proportion of men to women was as six to one, and the results became too horrible to be recorded.

This "goodly company" was embarked in a frigate, the Sirius, an armed tender, three store-ships, and six transports, under the command of Captain Hunter. At the last moment, by an afterthought, one chaplain was sent on board. There was no schoolmaster, no superintendent, or gaolers, or overseers, except marines with muskets loaded in case of revolt. No agriculturist was sent to teach the lughwaymen and pickpockets to plough, and delve, and sow. No system of discipline was planned, nothing beyond mere coercion was attempted. Even the supply of mechanics required for erecting the needful houses

"

V Discovery Of Port Jackson. 33

and stores was left a matter of chance, dependent on the trades of the six hundred felons ; and, as it turned out, there were not half a dozen carpenters, only one bricklayer, and not one mechanic in the whole settlement capable of erecting a corn-mill.

The " first fleet " sailed on the 13th May, 1787, and, after a voyage of eight months, during which they touched at the Cape de Verd Islands, Rio de Janeiro, and the Cape of Good Hope, everywhere received with the greatest attention and courtesy, on the 20th January, 1788, anchored in Botany Bay.

Within four and twenty hours after landing, Governor Phillip ascertained that Botany Bay was quite unsuitable for the site of a colony, that a sufficient quantity of cultivable agricultural land, and of fresh water, were wanting, and that the harbour was unsafe for ships of burden.

Without disembarking his charge, he set out with a party of three boats, to explore the coast to the northward, and particularly Broken Bay, an inlet favourably mentioned by Captain Cook, distant about eighteen miles from Botany Bay ; but, as he sailed along the barrier of cliffs which line the shores, he decided to examine a narrow cleft which Cook, passing by as a mere boat harbour, had named after the look-out man who viewed it, Port Jackson.

The day was mild and serene. The expedition sailed along the coast near enough to see, and hear the wild cries of, the astonished natives, who followed them as far as the rugged nature of the land would permit. As they approached Port Jackson, the coast wore such an appearance that Captain Phillip fully expected to find Captain Cook's unfavourable impressions realized ; but he was destined to be most agreeably disappointed.

The first tack carried the expedition out of the long heavy swell of the Pacific Ocean into the smooth water of a canal protected by two projecting " heads," and soon they came within sight of a vast landlocked lake, stretching as far as the eye could reach, dotted with small islands, whose shores sloped, forest-covered, down to the water's edge. Black swans and other rare water-birds fluttered up as the white strangers sailed on, charmed with a scene in which every feature was beautiful, yet strange : they had discovered one of the finest harbours in the world. Coasting round the shores of this great natural basin, Governor Phillip determined to plant his colony on a promontory where a small clear stream trickled into the salt water. After three days spent in exploration, he returned to Botany Bay.

On the morning of the 25th January, as they were working out,

34 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

the English fleet were astonished by seeing two strange ships of war sailing into the bay. These were the Boussole and Astrolabe, the French expedition of discovery under the command of M. de la Perouse, which had left France in 1785. La Perouse " had sailed into Botany Bay by Captain Cook's chart, which lay before him on the binnacle. Having heard at Kamtschatka of the intended settlement, he had expected to have found a town built and market established." Thus it was probably but by a few days that the honour of discovering Fort Jackson fell to England. The French squadron remained until the 10th March to refresh and refit, and, then departing, were never heard of more until, in 1826, Mr. Dillon discovered at the Manicola Islands traces of arms and ornaments which proved their mournful fate — shipwrecked and murdered by savages.

A monument has been erected to the memory of La Perouse and his crew in Botany Bay.

Chapter Iv.

Governor Phillip To Governor King.

FOUNDATION OF NEW SOUTH WALES— THE CONSTITUTION AND JUDICIAL SYSTEM —THE LASn — THE LAW— THE FIRST CHURCH — FAMINE — WILD CATTLE FOUND— GOVERNOR HUNTER— GOVERNOR KINO.

ON the 26th January the English fleet, having been brought round, anchored in deep water close along the shore of Sydney Cove, so called after Lord Sydney, one of the lords of the Admiralty ; a formal disembarkation took place — a detachment of marines and blue jackets leaped from their boats into the shades of a primaeval forest ; after hoisting British colours " near where the colonnade in Bridge-street now stands," the proclamation and commission constituting the colony were read, a salute of small arms was fired, and the career of the province of New South Wales commenced.

The whole party landed amounted to one thousand and tliirty souls, who encamped under tents, and under and within hollow trees, " in a country resembling the more woody parts of a deer park in England."

Such were the accidents of the foundation, and such the founders, of our colonial empire in Australia.

No sooner had the convict colonists been disembarked, and the erection of the necessary buildings commenced, than the want of a sufficient body of artificers was experienced. The ships furnished sixteen, and the prisoners twelve, carpenters ; and by a piece of unexpected good fortune, which caused much rejoicing, " an experienced bricklayer was discovered among the convicts. He was at once placed at the head of a party of labourers, with orders to construct a number of brick huts : in the meantime the governor occupied a tent."

This first example is a fair specimen of the manner in which the penal discipline in the colony was conducted for a long series of years. A useful man was placed in authority, and allowed a variety of indulgences, quite irrespective of his moral qualities. The greatest ruffians became overseers, and occupied places of trust. Men of no use — mere drudges— were treated worse than beasts of burden.

In the month of May the entire lire stock of the colony, public

and

private, consisted of —

2 Bulls,

5 Cows,

1 Horse,

3 Mares,

5 Babbits,

3 Colts,

The cattle were of the Cape breed, humpy on the shoulders, and long-horned, a fact which it afterwards became of consequence to remember.

In the ensuing month it is recorded as a public calamity that two bulls and four cows wandered away from the pickpocket herdsman who had them in charge, and were lost in the woods. In the sequel it was shown that the cattle were better colonists than their owners.

The entrance to Port Jackson, as already partly described, is through projecting capes, or two heads — which conceal and shelter the far extent of the harbour. A channel, about two miles in breadth, opens a land-locked harbour, about fifteen miles in length, of irregular form, the shores jagged with inlets, coves, and creeks, which, when the first adventurers landed, were covered to the water's edge with the finest timber. At the western extremity a current of fresh water mingling with the sea tide gave signs of the winding Paramatta Biver, navigable for vessels of small burden for eighteen miles.

The settlement was planted on the banks of an inlet or " cove," about half a mile in length and a quarter in breadth, which received a considerable stream of fresh water at the upper end.

The native blacks, who then swarmed along the whole coast from Botany Bay, and far beyond in either direction, came to meet the white strangers naked, armed with the shield, the spear, and the boomerang, which the settlers often took for a wooden sword.

From the circumstance of the aborigines not being subject to the authority of any sort of government except that of the strongest man, from the imperfection of their arms, and their mental incapacity for combination, their communications and skirmishes with the white intruders do not occupy that place in the history of the colony which is filled by the Bed Indian tribes in the history of North America, or the semi-civilized Peruvians and Mexicans in that of the Spanish South America.

On the 7th February, 1788, the king's commission for the government of the "territory of New South Wales and its dependencies" was

The Form Of Government And Courts Of Law. 37

read. By this instrument the colony was declared " to extend from the northern extremity of the coast called Cape York, in the latitude of 10° 37', to the southern extremity of South Cape, in the latitude of 43° 39', including all adjacent islands within those latitudes, and inland to the westward as far as the 135th degree of east longitude."

At the same time were read the letters patent issued under the 27th George IH., cap. 56, for establishing courts of civil and criminal judicature in the colony. Under these the governor, or, in his absence, the lieutenant-governor, was authorized, whenever, and only when, he saw fit, to summon a court of criminal jurisdiction, which was to be a court of record, and to consist of the judge-advocate, and six such officers of the sea or land service as the governor should nominate by presents under hand and seal. This court was empowered to inquire into and punish all crimes of whatever nature ; the punishment to be inflicted according to the laws of England, as nearly as might be, considering and allowing for the circumstances and situations of the settlement and its inhabitants ; the charge to be reduced to writing ; witnesses to be examined upon oath ; the sentence of the court to be determined by the opinion of the majority ; but the punishment not to be inflicted, unless five members of the court concurred, until the king's pleasure should be known; the provost-marshal to cause the judgment under the governor's warrant.

In this court the judge-advocate was president (there was no provision that he should be a man of legal education) ; he was also to frame and exhibit the charge against the prisoner, to have a vote in the court, and to be sworn like the members of it. The military officers were to appear in the insignia of duty — sash and sword ; they had the right to examine witnesses as well as the judge-advocate ; he alone centred in his person the offices of prosecutor, judge, and jury.

There was also a civil court, consisting of the judge-advocate and two inhabitants of the settlement, who were to be appointed by the governor, " empowered to decide, in a summary manner, all pleas of lands, houses, debts, contracts, and all personal pleas, with authority to summon parties, upon complaint being made, to examine the matter of such complaint by the oath of witnesses, and to issue warrants of execution under the hand and seal of the judge-advocate." From this court an appeal might be made to the governor, and from him (where the property exceeded the value of three hundred pounds) to the king in council. To this court was likewise given authority to grant probates of wills, and administration of the personal estates of intestate persons dying within the settlement.

38 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

A vice-admiralty court was also established for the trial of offences committed on the high seas.

The governor was captain-general and vice-admiral, with authority to hold general courts-martial, to confirm and set aside sentences.

Powers equal to those of the first governor of New South Wales, if held, have never been exercised by any other official in the British dominions.

He could sentence to five hundred lashes, fine five hundred pounds, regulate customs and trade, fix prices and wages, pardon capital as well as other punishments, bestow grants of land, and create a monopoly of any article of necessity. All the labour in the colony was at his disposal, all the land, all the stores, all the places of honour and profit, and virtually all the justice, as the case of Governor Bligh afterwards proved. His subjects consisted of his subordinates, officers, — for, as captaingeneral, the commandant of the troops was under his orders, — of the few who resorted to New South Wales to trade, whose profits were at his disposal, and the convicts, outcasts without civil rights. The distance from England, the few means of communication, the indifference of the English public to the fate of the inhabitants of a penal colony, or of any colony, rendered the governor, so far as the control of law extended, actually irresponsible. As there was no law, so there was no publicity and no public opinion to restrain the exercise of the despotism which was the only possible government in such a penal colony.

The chief officers were naval and military, of the old school ; not the school of Cook and Keppel, Nelson and Collingwood, Wolfe and Cornwallis, but of that school which, by its tyranny, its abuse of power, its neglect of common honesty, of common decency, of common humanity, in the treatment, the wages, the clothing, and the food of sailors, created the alarming mutinies of Portsmouth and the Nore.*

The powers vested in the governor were exercised without the restraining influence of council or law adviser until 1822.t

Amazement and horror overcome us when we look back on the early days of New South Wales. Under the absolute government described, the settlers were crowded together on a narrow space — a promontory cleared of a dense forest. The soil was a barren sand — every yard required for cultivation had to be gained by removing enormous trees of a hardness that tried the temper of the best axes, wielded in skilled hands. On one side was an unknown shore and a ship-

Portsmouth, May ; the Nore, June, 1797. t The Charter of Justice was not formally promulgated until the 17th May, 1824.

Want Of Discipline — Classification — Religious Teaching. 39

less sea ; on the other, an apparently limitless country, inhabited by savages, in which not a step could be taken without danger of being totally lost ; a country which produced no wild fruit or root fit for the sustenance of man ; and, with the exception of a wandering kangaroo, or a shy swift emu, no game of any size fit for food.

The want of enterprise which marked the early career of the colonists, and left them so long in ignorance of the rich districts on which, after a long interval, the colony became self-supporting, cannot but be attributed to the form of government and to the moral blight caused by the composition of the society : the mass of the community were slaves — slaves without the contented spirit of negroes or Russian serfs, for they had been born in a free country, and could not learn to submit and be happy even if in the matter of food and lodging they had been well provided, instead of being burned with heat, perished with cold, and always half starved. They were slaves too, labouring hard, but scarcely producing anything.

The voyage was a bad preparation for useful labour. The convicts were heaped on board ship without selection, the vilest and most venial criminals chained together. No classification of degrees of crime, or for the purposes of useful labour, was attempted. The overseers were prisoners selected by favouritism, or for their bodily strength ; and the work was divided between personal service on the officers, handicraft, and mere drudgery.

One chaplain enjoyed a salary for preaching occasionally to an ignorant uninstructed multitude, of whom one-third were Irish rebels and prisoners transported for agrarian offences, of the Roman Catholic faith. Religious teaching, bedside prayers, the solemn call to repentance were seldom heard in that miserable Gomorrah.

Far from all civilizing, humanizing influences, in such society the finest natures became brutalized into tyrants, while the criminals under their command dragged on a miserable existence or rebelled with all the dogged ruffianism of despair. Although the chief records of the early days of the colony are drawn from the writings and reports of officials, who were naturally inclined to put the best face on a system of which they were the paid instruments, and whose eyes, whose ears, whose consciences were seared by constant contact with misery and tyranny, yet there is more than enough testimony of the cruel and stupid despotism which prevailed.

We learn from the journals of Howard, and the reports of the parliamentary inquiries instituted through his influence, how frightful were the abuses practised on tried and untried prisoners at the close of the

40 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

eighteenth century in England, where the gaols were daily visited by numerous individuals of various ranks, where the common-law rights of the subject had been established, where what was considered in those days a free press flourished, where, from Sabbath to Sabbath, Christian ministers assembled and led Christian congregations to prayer and praise, where a Parliament held its sittings whose orators made Europe resound with their denunciations of tyranny, and where laws were administered by incorruptible, independent judges. We may more easily imagine how in New South Wales, where there was no law but the law of the lash, tyranny became chronic, and the plague of cruelty festered and spread through the whole body corporate of the colony.

A singular succession of serious, pitiable, ludicrous, and disgraceful incidents mark the history of the settlement, from the day of proclaiming the king's commission to the end of the year 1800, which has been minutely recorded by Collins. At one time " a person named Smith, on his way to India, professing some knowledge of agriculture," is engaged by the government, and created a peace-officer at Rosehill, the site of the future town of Paramatta, the said Smith being apparently the only freeman with any claims to the kind of knowledge on which the subsistence of the colony was likely to depend. At another, one Bryant, a Devonshire prisoner, employed in his calling of a fisherman, is detected in secreting and selling large quantities of fish, and is severely punished ; but, " being too useful a person to part with, and send to the Brick Cart," he is retained to fish for the settlement.

This man afterwards escaped with his family and a party of other prisoners in an open boat to the Island of Timor ; he was there captured by a man-of-war, and carried to Batavia, where he died. His wife was conveyed to England, tried, and confined in Newgate until the term of her original sentence expired !

Then we find convicts, " when little more than two years had elapsed," claiming their discharge on the ground that the time of their sentence had expired, which was possible, as it would date from the day of their sentences. When, in answer to these claims, inquiries are made for the documents containing the particulars, " it is found that they have been left in England, and that, therefore, it is impossible to affirm or deny the claims." Consequently, the prisoners are told they must wait for an answer to a despatch to be sent by the first opportunity to England, a period of two or three years. One of the prisoners, not very well pleased with the prospect of such delay, expresses himself

Six Hundred Lashes Fob Insolence. 41

disrespectfully of the lieutenant-governor in the presence of the governor. Thereupon he is seized, tried by a criminal court, found guilty, and sentenced to receive six hundred lashes, and wear irons for the space of six months.

About the same time a soldier having been found guilty of a horrible criminal assault on a female child, his sentence is commuted to banishment for life to the auxiliary agricultural settlement of Norfolk Island.

These are but a few gems of the judicial system by which New South Wales was ruled for nearly the first quarter of a century of its existence.

In 1790, the third year of colonization, the four ships arrived filled with convicts, of whom the greater number were in a dying state : two hundred and sixty-one had died at sea ; two hundred were brought on shore in the last stage of exhaustion, from scurvy, dysentery, fever, foul food, and foul air. The men had been chained together in rows, and confined below nearly throughout the voyage, in order to save the parties in charge trouble. On board one of the ships, the Neptune, several of the prisoners had died in irons ; their companions concealed their deaths in order to share the extra allowance of provisions, and the horrible fact was not discovered, so slight was the supervision, until betrayed by the offensiveness of putrefaction.

Many years elapsed before a system was adopted by which the preservation of the health of prisoners and troops became the interest as well as the duty of the surgeon in charge. At that time the more and the sooner prisoners died the more profitable the transaction was to the contractor ; so they died commonly like rotten sheep.

Those were the days in which transportation really was a punishment almost as terrible as death. New South Wales was an awful over-sea gaol, offering no prospect of advancement or liberation, where the will of a prisoner-turnkey was law, where death was the punishment of the most trifling crimes, and a reproachful look was punished with the lash.

A few days before four ships landed one thousand male and two hundred and fifty female convicts, the arrival of one storeship, the Justinian, saved the whole colony from perishing of famine. The Guardian, laden with a great supply of provisions, stores, and live stock, under the command of Rion, " the gallant good Rion" of Campbell's " Battle of Copenhagen," had struck on an iceberg, and, after almost all the cargo had been thrown overboard, was with difficulty carried into the Capo of Good Hope. For weeks before the arrival

42 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

of the Justinian the whole settlement had been put on short allowance. The governor, says Collins, had thrown his store, 3001bs. of flour, into the common stock. The weekly allowance of each prisoner had been reduced to 2 lbs. of salt pork, 2£lbs. of flour, and 2 lbs. of rice. " Labour stood suspended for want of energy to proceed ; the countenances of the people plainly bespoke the hardships they underwent." " Garden-robbing became prevalent, the most severe measures were employed to repress the crime caused by, and yet increasing, the effects of the scarcity, but in vain. A man caught by the clergyman stealing potatoes was sentenced to three hundred lashes, to have his ration of flour stopped for six months, and to be chained for that period to two others caught robbing the governor's garden; but this and many similar punishments produced no more effect than the clemency of the governor, who remitted three hundred out of four hundred lashes to which one man was sentenced." The proverb that " hunger will break through stone walls" was exemplified night and day.

" So great was the villany of the people, or the necessity of the times, that a prisoner lying at the hospital from the effects of punishment, part of which he had received, contrived to get his irons off one leg, and in that state was caught robbing a farm ;" but the historian reports that at Rosehill, where they had vegetables in abundance, no thefts were committed.

The Justinian, which brought relief from this state of destitution, when within hail was driven off Sydney Heads : it was for some hours doubtful whether she would not strike and become a total wreck on the reefs by Broken Bay. If after that event the twelve hundred and fifty additional convicts had safely made the port, death by starvation, or in a struggle for food, must have been the fate of the whole settlement.

Could it be wondered if, under such a system of despotism, without discipline in the colony, and in the face of such neglect at home, the descendants of these men had grown fiercely disloyal and anti- British ? But yet it is not so. The Australians are a loyal, orderloving, law-obeying race, as they have recently proved more than once. Even gold-digging has not corrupted their honest hearts.

It was not until five years after Governor Phillip's landing that a temporary church was erected, and divine service performed on the 25th August, 1793.

The founders of New England — themselves tyrannical and intolerant, although flying from tyranny and intolerance — did not let a week elapse without making permanent arrangements for religious worship

A German Overseer Ignorant Of English. 43

and education which endure to this day, and have spread their humanizing influences all over the wide empire of the American republic. While under the rule of a sovereign which some, disparaging the present, are accustomed to specially glorify as the reign of a Christian king, the lash, the pillory, the gallows, were afforded as freely as teaching and preaching were neglected.

It sounds strangely in this age to hear that, " the clergyman complaining of non-attendance at divine service/' which was generally performed in the open air, alike unsheltered from wind and rain, as from the fervour of the summer's sun, "it was ordered that three pounds of flour should be deducted from the ration of each overseer, and two pounds from each labouring convict, who should not attend prayers once on each Sunday, unless some reasonable excuse for absence should be assigned."

In 1791 (April) we And Mr. Schaffer, a German, arriving from England as a superintendent of convicts ; but ondiscovery that, as he spoke no English, he was unable to discharge his duties, he retired, and accepted a grant of land of 140 acres at Rosehill. One cannot help feeling curious to know under whose patronage and for what services a German, not speaking English, was sent as superintendent of convicts at the antipodes. Is it possible that Miss Burney's friend, Madame Schwellenberg, could have had anything to do with this little appointment ?

At the same time James Ruse received a grant of the same quantity of land as a reward for being the first settler who had declared himself able to support himself on a farm he had occupied fifteen months, and to dispense with an allowance from the government stores.

These incidents, with the arrival, in two detachments, of a regiment raised for the purpose of serving in the colony, under the title of the New South Wales Corps, are the most remarkable events during the latter years of the reign of Governor Phillip, who resigned his office to Lieutenant-Governor Grose, and returned to England on the 11th December, 1792.

At that date there were sixty-seven settlers, holding under grant three thousand four hundred and seventy acres, of which four hundred and seventeen acres were in cultivation, and a hundred more cleared. We have no means of ascertaining where all these grants were situated, but the greater part is now occupied as building land, and was miserably barren, yet covered with gigantic gum-trees.

But this summary of the cultivation by free or freedmen settlers is interesting, because it marks the first step towards rendering the colony self-supporting. These settlers were, if they required, victualled and

44 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

clothed from the public store for eighteen months from the time of their going on their grants, furnished with tools and implements of husbandry, grain to sow their grounds, such stock as could be spared from the public, and, at the discretion of the governor, the use of as many convicts as they would undertake to clothe, feed, and employ. Every free or freed man had a hut erected on his farm at public expense.

On ground of ordinary fertility, with settlers of average industry, these terms would have ensured early independence ; but the greater part of the district was and is as barren as the seashore, and the majority of the settlers who were not idle were perfectly ignorant of agriculture. As for the difficulties of cutting down and removing the forests of gum-trees, they were so great that, without the assistance of compulsory convict labour for a quarter of a century, the Sydney district never could have been cleared.

During this period the government was obliged to carry on cultivation as well as it could on public account, although with indifferent success. A principle as old as the first step the first tribes made toward civilization, which, however, many statesmen and economists even now appear not to understand, was illustrated by the answer of a settler, when he was reproachea with not having worked so well for the jointstock account as he did on his own grant of land, — " We are working for ourselves now."

The following were the prices of agricultural stock and produce at the close of 1792 :—

Flour, 9d. per lb.

Potatoes, 3d. per lb.

Milk goats, £8 8s.

Breeding sows, £7 7s. to £10 10s.

Laying fowls, 10s.

Tea, 8s. to 16s. per lb.

Sugar, Is. 6d. per lb.

Spirits, 128. to 20s. per gallon.

Porter, Is. per quart. At these famine prices the mortality among the convict population was fearful. Between the 1st January and the 31st December, 1792, there died two persons of the civil department, six soldiers, four hundred and eighteen male convicts, eighteen female convicts, and seventy-nine children.

Governor Phillip took with him to England two of the aborigines, with whom, throughout the period of his government, he had endea-

Alcohol The Currency Op The Colony. 45

voured to promote a good understanding — a task involving great difficulties, arising from the brutality of the convicts and the untameable nature of the savages. The tribes that swarmed round Port Jackson and Botany Bay have, with one exception, all died out ; the character and customs of those who survive in less settled districts remain unchanged, or at any rate not more changed than the fox chained in a courtyard, or a pheasant in an aviary.

In September, 1795, Governor Hunter arrived, superseded Lieutenant-Governor Grose, and remained the usual term of five years. His difficulties were less formidable than those of Governor Phillip, which were not extravagantly rewarded by a retiring pension of £500; his office was no sinecure.

He had had a large body of convict colonists under his command who would not work, who would drink, and who were therefore dependent for subsistence on supplies imported from England and India. By every ship that left the harbour there was an attempt, generally successful, to escape, on the part of convicts ; fifty were taken from one ship at a time " when the loss of the labour of one man was important ;" and it was no wonder that all who could endeavoured to fly from a colony where the population was annually put on short allowance of food, and very often in danger of actual starvation.

At this period, and for more than twenty years, spirits were the ordinary currency of the colony. Almost all extra work was paid for in spirits, and it was thought quite proper to stimulate the diligence of prisoners, in unloading a vessel laden with government stores, by giving half a pint of spirits to each. Among free and bond, drunkenness was a prevailing vice. The tyranny of the prisoneroverseers was so great that the best-inclined convicts were goaded to recklessness and crime. Criminal assaults on women were so common that "the poor unfortunate victims were designated by a title expressive of the insults they had received."

The whole population, on the arrival of Captain Hunter, with the exception of one hundred and seventy-nine, were dependent on the public stores for rations, many of the exceptions being reputed thieves, presumed to subsist on plunder from stores and gardens.

The most favourable feature of this epoch was the extension of cultivation by settlers along the rich alluvial land on the banks of the River Hawkesbury, one of the first districts which seemed to yield a fair return to industry.

Among the events of this five years may be noted the first use of a printing-press, the discovery of the lost herd of cattle, and the

Hie Three Colonies Of Austi

foundation of a settlement, called Newcastle, on the Coaevc or Hunter's River.

A printing-press had been sent out with the first fleet, but no printers; and all public and private announcements were made in manuscript, or by the bellman, until Governor Hunter discovered a printer among his convict subjects, and established a government gazette. In this age of newspapers it seems incredible that a number of officers and gentlemen should have been satisfied for so many years without something in the shape of a newspaper ; but the colony was divided into slavedrivers and slaves, who were equally content to spend their time in feeding pigs and getting drunk.

The reports of the natives led the governor to send out as scouts men employed as hunters, to collect fresh provisions for public use, and they discovered, feeding on rich pastures on the other side of the River Nepean, still known as Cow Pastures, a herd of sixty cattle, the produce of the five cows and two bulls lost in 1788.

To realize this sight, so pleasant to the eyes of men condemned to perpetual rations of salt meat, rarely varied by fresh pork, the governor himself set out on an expedition, and tracked and viewed the herd with great delight. An old bull, fiercely and obstinately charging, was

The Loot Herd Of Cattle. 47

slaughtered in self-defence ; he proved to be of the humpy-shouldered Cape breed of the lost stock, which left no doubt of the identity of the herd, and dispelled the notion of indigenous cattle; the party made a delicious meal, and a few pounds were carried back thirtyeight miles, over a rough road, to Paramatta, the rest being left to the native dogs and hawks, with deep regret, " as meat fresh or salt had long been a rarity with the poor sick in the hospital." Many an Australian within the last ten years, galloping through Cow Pastures to purchase the finest cattle at £2 a head, to boil down for tallow, has been reminded of the time when a bit of bull beef, that a well-bred dog would now reject, was a luxury to a governor and his suite !

These wild cattle were preserved and increased greatly, dividing into " mobs," each under the charge of a victorious bull, until the general increase of stock diminished their value : many were consumed by surrounding small settlers, and the rest, being fierce and a nuisance, were destroyed by order of the government, when beef ceased to be a luxury.

About the time these wild herds were discovered, three miserable cows of the Indian breed sold for £189, and two years afterwards two colonial ships were employed eight months in bringing 51 cows, 3 bulls, and 90 sheep from the Cape, at a cost exceeding the highest price ever paid for the finest short-horns.

Governor Hunter, with the best intentions and an excusable ignorance of the laws of political economy, more than once endeavoured to fix the wages of labour, by a convention of employers, and mutual agreement not to outbid each other. Harvest wages were settled at 10s. a day; but we find, from frequent proclamations, that the rule of supply and demand prevailed, and labourers when much needed obtained " exorbitant terms," although a reward and indemnity were offered to informers.

At this period officers were allowed the use of ten prisoners for agricultural and three for domestic services, and so on in a diminishing scale to every description of settler down to the emancipist, who was allowed the use of one prisoner to assist in tilling his grant. All these servants were fed and clothed by the crown.

In 1797 the first school building was erected for the benefit of three hundred children, and the chaplain, the Rev. Mr. Johnson, began to catechise them after the service on each Sunday.

That instruction was much needed among all classes there can be no doubt; for on one occasion the sails of the public mill, by which the

48 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

corn of the settlers was gratuitously ground, were stolen in the absence of the miller. On another, with a superstition worthy of the middle ages, the authorities compelled a soldier suspected of murdering his comrade to handle the dead body, in order to see whether it would bleed, and so accuse him.

In 1798 the great Irish expedition in search of China took place. We laugh at it, yet it was not more foolish than many expeditions and theories patronized in the 19th century. It is also memorable for the foundation of the first brick church, built on the model of the stables of a citizen's mansion, with clock tower.

A return made in this year shows 6,270 acres in crop with wheat or maize, a much larger quantity of arable land in proportion to the population than is now cultivated in any of the Australian colonies. Among the more industrious settlers, George Barrington, the celebrated pick- jMX'ket, figures as the owner of twenty acres of wheat, thirteen sheep, fifty-five goats, and two mares : he was a constable.

In the following year the colony was again threatened with famine, partly owing to the deficiency of live stock, and partly to the incurable barrenness of the Sydney district.

In 1800 Captain Hunter was superseded by Captain King.

Under Governor King the Female Orphan School was founded, and the first issue of coin took place. The Sydney Gazette and New South Wales Advertiser, the first Australian paper, was founded by a prisoner, George Howe, and published by authority in 1803. The insurrection of prisoners, two hundred and fifty strong, armed with muskets, broke out at Castlehill, on the 4th March, 1804, and was defeated in fifteen minutes by Major Johnstone, of the New South Wales Corps, with twenty-four men. Sixty-seven insurgents fell on the field ; ten were tried and five hung.

A penal settlement was formed in Van Diemcn's Land by Captain Collins. In the first instance he proceeded to Port Phillip, but unfortunately landed on the eastern arm, where there was a deficiency of water ; and as most military men are, a bad colonist, he abandoned it and proceeded to the Derwent. Had he made his way to the Yarra Yarra River the probability is that Sydney would have become the second settlement ; and, with the profusion of white slave labour then available applied on the fine agricultural land of Port Phillip, it is probable that by this time a population of five millions would have been established there.

1806 was signalized by the great flood on the River Hawkesbury, on the banks of which the principal grain cultivation of the colony was carried

Recollections Of Prisoners. 49

on. The Hawkesbury in ordinary periods winds in a strangely tortuous course through a deep valley, between the precipitous banks above which, on the occurrence of heavy rains, it rises as much as thirty feet in a very few hours. These floods are not periodical. Until 1806 none of importance had occurred ; the people had settled down on the rich "interval" land, the deposit of former overflowing. Crops, houses, and many colonists were all swept away in one night, without warning. Famine was the immediate result. The two-pound loaf rose to 5s. ; wheat fetched 80s. a bushel, and every vegetable in proportion. A serious flood had occurred in 1801, but this far exceeded it. Indeed it is difficult to teach caution in such matters. A flood which occurred in the Maneroo district in May, 1851, turned into lakes twenty feet deep two townships carefully laid out by the Government surveyor, besides destroying several farms, drowning a number of settlers, and a tribe of blacks.

But this great flood on the Hawkesbury caused eventually a complete rearrangement of the cultivation and occupation of that district.

Calamities, according to popular prejudice, seldom come single ; it was certainly the case in New South Wales in 1806, for the clock tower fell, and Governor Bligh arrived. Captain King resigned his command on the 13th of March.

Recollections Of Prisoners.

On the Hawkesbury and its tributaries the first successful agricultural colonies were planted, and there dwell a few representatives of the first fleeters.

These settlers, who are chiefly known by nicknames, such as Old Red Jacket and Smashem, are all in comfortable circumstances, some positively wealthy. Among the last was Mr. Smith, better known as ' Smashem,' from the Thurlow-like energy with which he spoke his mind, to high and low. Smashem had been free almost ever since he arrived in the colony, and had never been 'in trouble.' He was an old man, with a large-featured, handsome, military sort of face, of a red-brown complexion, shaved clean. His dress consisted of a red flannel shirt, with a black bandana, tied sailor fashion, exposing his strong neck, and a pair of fustian trousers. Out of compliment to the lady he put on a blue coat with gilt buttons, but, being evidently uncomfortable, consented to take it off again. He refused to see the party until he learned that it was 'the Mrs. Chisholm;' and is usually rough and rude to those he does not respect.

D

50 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

A Dr. , who had the reputation among the prisoner population of never having spared any man in his anger, or any woman in his lust, during the old flogging days, met Smashem one day, face to face, coming out of the bank in Sydney ; and holding out his hand said, ' Come, shake hands, Mr. Smith, and let bygones be bygones : I am glad to see you looking so well/ Smith, putting his hands behind him, answered, ' I suppose, because I have got a velvet waistcoat, and money

in the bank, you want to shake hands ; but no! Dr. , it would take

a second resurrection to save such as thee.' The doctor slunk away.

The following recollections are extracted by permission from the MS. " Voluntary Statements of the People of New South Wales," collected by Mrs. Chisholm : —

Joseph Smith.

u Macdoxald's River, County op Hukter, 3rd Oct., 1845.

" I arrived in the colony fifty-six years since ; it was Governor Phillip's time, and 1 was fourteen years old ; there were only eight houses in the colony then. 1 know that myself and eighteen others laid in a hollow tree for seventeen weeks ; and cooked out of a kettle with a wooden bottom : we used to stick it in a hole in the ground, and make a fire round it. 1 was seven years in service (bond), and then started working for a living wherever 1 could get it. There was plenty of hardship then : I have often taken grass, and pounded it, and made soup from a native dog. I would eat anything then. For seventeen weeks I had only five ounces of flour a day. We never got a futt ration except when the ship was in harbour. The motto was, ' kill them or work them, their provision will be in store.' Many a time have I been yoked like a bullock with twenty or thirty others to drag along timber. About eight hundred died in six months at a place called Toongabbie, or Constitution-hill. I knew a man so weak, he was thrown into the grave, when he said, 'Don't cover me up; I'm not dead; for God's sake

don't cover me up !' The overseer answered, 'D your eyes, youll

die to-night, and we shall have the trouble to come back again !' The man recovered, his name is James Glasshouse, and he is now alive at Richmond.

" They used to have a large hole for the dead ; once a day men were sent down to collect the corpses of prisoners, and throw them in without any ceremony or service. The native dogs used to come down at night and fight and howl in packs, gnawing the poor dead bodies.

" The governor would order the lash at the rate of five hundred, six

Famine And Flogging. 51

hundred, to eight hundred ; and if the men could have stood it they would have had more. I knew a man hung there and then for stealing a few biscuits, and another for stealing a duck frock.* A man was condemned — no time — take him to the tree, and hang him. The overseers were allowed to flog the men in the fields. Often have men been taken from the gang, had fifty, and sent back to work. Any man would have committed murder for a month's provisions : I would have committed three (murders) for a week's provisions ! I was chained seven weeks on my

back for being out getting greens, wild herbs. The Rev. used

to come it tightly to force some confession. Men were obliged to tell lies to prevent their bowels from being cut out by the lash.

" Old (an overseer) killed three men in a fortnight <et the saw

by overwork. We used to be taken in large parties to raise a tree;

when the body of the tree was raised, he (Old ) would call some of

the men away — then more ; the men were bent double — they could not bear it — they fell — the tree on one or two, killed on the spot. Take him away ; put him in the ground ! ' There was no more about it.

" After seven years I got my liberty, and then started working about for a living where I could get it. I stowed myself away on board the Barrington, bound for Norfolk Island, with eighteen others ; it was not a penal settlement then. Governor King was there. I had food plenty. I was overseer of the governor's garden. Afterwards I went to live with old D'Arcy Wentworth f and a better master never lived in the world. Little Billy, $ the great lawyer, has often been carried in my arms.

"Old D'Arcy wanted me to take charge of Home-Bush § property, but I took to the river (Hawkesbury), worked up and down till I saved money to buy old Brown's farm at Pitt Town. No man worked harder than I have done. I have by me about one thousand pounds ready cash. I have given that farm of forty acres to my son Joseph, and three other farms, and about five hundred head of cattle ;

J. Bennet, a youth 17 years of age, wm convicted and immediately executed for stealing to the ralue of 6e. out of a tent.— Collins, p. 27, History of New South Wales.

f Who came out as a political exile lor having been concerned in Irish treason, was appointed surgeon to the Norfolk Island settlement. Ha took an active part in the Bligh rebellion. Was afterwards a magistrate. A man of great ability and eloquence, but by no means popular, being of the old fierce republican school of politics of the last generation. Irish too.

% William D'Arcy Wentworth, barrister-at-Iaw, author of a description of New South Wales, published 1819,— a work, or rather large pamphlet, chiefly political, written with great power and eloquence, which first called the attention of the reading public to the resources of New South Wales. The emancipation of New South Wales is in a great degree due to Mr. Wentworth* s exertions.

f The Goodwood Park of New South Wales, where races ranking colonially with our Ascot, are held annually, about eight miles from Sydney.

D 2

52 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

and about the same to my other son. I have also got 80 acres — 30 acres, 50, 75, — beside my house, and some fine cattle. We are never without a chest of tea in the house ; we use two in the year. I have paid £40 for a chest of tea in this colony. Tea is a great comfort."

Mrs. Smith's Statement.

u I have seen Dr. take a woman who was in the family way,

with a rope round her, and duck her in the water at Queen's-wharf.* The laws were bad then. If a gentleman wanted a man's wife, he would send the husband to Norfolk Island. I have seen a man flogged for pulling six turnips instead of five. One Defrey was overseer, the biggest villain that ever lived — delighted in torment. He used to walk up and down and rub his hands when the blood ran. When he walked out, the fiogger walked behind him. He died a miserable death — maggots ate him up not a man could be found to bury him. I have seen six men executed for stealing 21 lbs. of flour. I have seen a man struck when at work with a handspike, and killed on the spot. I have seen

men in tears round Governor , begging for food. He would

mock them with Yes, yes, gentlemen ; 111 make you comfortable ; give you a nightcap and a pair of stockings!'"

Mrs. Smith was blind : she acted as she spoke, and wept on recalling the horrors of her early life. The house was large, and crowded with furniture. Smith presented Mrs. C. with a loaded pistol as a souvenir, which he pulled out of his belt, saying, " You may depend on it I"

Henry Hale.

" Well's Creek, Hawtcbsburt Biter, ith Oct., 1846.

"I arrived in the third fleet on the 10th of October, 1791 ; it was on a Sunday wo landed. The ship's name was Barrington, Captain Marsh. I was sent to Toongabbie. For nine months there I was on five ounces of flour a day — when weighed out, barely four ; served daily. In those days we were yoked to draw timber, twenty-five in gang. The sticks were six feet long ; six men abreast, We held the stick behind us, and dragged with our hands. One man came ashore in the Pitt ; his name was Dixon ; he was a guardsman. He was put to the drag; it soon did for him. He began on a Thursday and died on a Saturday, as he was dragging a load down Constitution-hill. There were thirteen hundred died there in six

This was a common punishment for female prisoners, until s young girl was killed on the spot by the shock. — C. C.

Discoveries Of Flinders And Bass. 53

mouths. Men used to carry trees on their shoulders. How they used to die ! The men were weak — dreadfully weak — for want of food. A man named Gibraltar was hung for stealing a loaf out of the governor's kitchen. He got down the chimney, stole the loaf, had a trial, and was hung the next day at sunrise. At this time a full ration

was allowed to the governor's dog. This was Governor I

have seen seventy men flogged at night — twenty-five lashes each. On Sunday evening they used to read the laws : if any man was found out of camp he got twenty-five. The women used to be punished with iron collars. In Governor King's time they used to douse them

overboard. They killed one.* Dr. was a great tyrant. Mine is

a life grant from Governor Bourke — fourteen acres. I grow tobacco, wheat, and corn ; just enough to make a living."

Chapter V.

The Discoveries Of Flinders And Bass.

FROM these doleful chronicles of irresponsible tyranny y of crime and famine, it is a relief to turn and contemplate the heroism of the two men to whose ill-rewarded enterprise the most brilliant discoveries on the Australian coasts are due.

In 1795 Captain Hunter, who had commanded the " First Fleet," was sent out again to supersede Governor Phillip. Among the gentlemen under his command were Matthew Flinders, midshipman ; and George Bass, surgeon. Flinders was born at Donnington, in Lincolnshire. Like Cook, and many other illustrious seamen, he commenced his career in the merchant service. Of the birthplace of Bass we are as ignorant as of the place of his death. In their silent paths they were both heroes who ventured and endured shipwreck, thirst, famine, the attacks of black barbarians, and displayed not less humanity than courage and sagacity while pursuing discoveries of the highest possible importance to their country, with faint and distant hopes of any other reward than that inherent feeling which supports unknown and unrewarded genius and heroism — the consciousness of power rightly exercised, of the "talent" put out to interest tenfold — a hundredfold.

This confirms Mrs. Smith's statement.

54 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

When they arrived in the colony, seven years after the axes of the "First Fleet" rang in the forests of Sydney Cove, little had been done to work out in detail the investigations made previous to the landing in Botany Bay. " Jervis Bay, indicated, but not named, by him, had been entered by Lieutenant Bowen, and Port Stephen had been examined; but the intermediate portions of the coast, both north and south, were little further known than from Captain Cook's general chart ; and none of the more distant openings, marked but not explored by that celebrated navigator, had been seen."

The feelings of the colonists seem to have been expressed in a touch of nature which escapes Collins in a note to his heavy grandiloquent history of New South Wales : —

" In many of these arms of Port Jackson, when sitting with my companions at my ease in a boat, I have been struck with horror at the bare idea of being lost in them, as, from the great similarity of one cove to another, the recollection would be bewildered in attempting to determine any relative situation. Insanity would accelerate the miserable end that must ensue."

Within a month after their arrival in Port Jackson, in 1795, Bass and Flinders set out in a little boat, eight feet long, appropriately called the Tom Thumb, with a crew of one boy, proceeded round to Botany Bay, and, ascending George's River, explored its course twenty miles further than the survey had been carried by Captain Hunter.

On their return, a voyage to Norfolk Island interrupted further proceedings until March, 1796, when they set out again in the Tom Thumb to explore a large river, said to fall into the sea some miles south of Botany Bay. They were absent eight days, explored Port Hacking in the course of their expedition, experienced great danger from the sea, and on land from the savage tribes : as when, " on a dark night, steering along an unknown shore, guided by the sound of the sea breaking against overhanging cliffs, without knowing where they should find shelter, Mr. Bass kept the sheet of the sail in his hand, drawing a few inches occasionally, when he saw a particularly heavy sea following, I (Flinders) was steering with an oar, and it required the utmost exertion and care to prevent broaching to; a single wrong movement would have sent us to the bottom. The boy baled out the water which, in spite of every care, the sea threw upon us." On another occasion, when their little boat was tossed upside down on the shore, saved from utter destruction by its lightness— their muskets rusted and their powder wet — Flinders amused the semi-

Discovert Op Port Phillip. 55

hostile savages who surrounded them by clipping their beards, while Bass dried the powder, and obtained some much-needed fresh water.

In December, 1797, during the absence of Flinders, who had been despatched to Norfolk Island, Bass obtained leave to make an expedition to the southward, for which he was provided by the governor with a whale-boat, six seamen from the ships, and six weeks' provisions. With the assistance of occasional supplies of petrels, fish, seals' flesh, a few geese and black swans, and by abstinence, he managed to prolong his absence eleven weeks; and in a boisterous climate, with an open boat, in spite of foul winds, he explored six hundred miles of coast, discovered Western Port and the fine district now known as Port Phillip, and satisfied himself that Van Diemen's Land was separated from New South Wales by the straits that now bear his name.

Bass, having returned on the 24th March, in September following he sailed with Flinders, whom Governor Hunter had placed in command of the Norfolk, a colonial-built sloop of twenty-five tons, for the purpose of penetrating beyond Furneaux Islands, and, should a strait be found, passing through it and returning by the south of Van Diemen's Land. With a crew of eight men they went through the straits, and returned to Port Jackson in three months and two days, during which part of the coast of Van Diemen's Land, including Port Dalrymple and the River Tamar, was explored, and such information gained as led to founding a settlement there in 1805-1804.

From this time we hear no more of Bass. We cannot learn that, beyond inscribing his name on the straits between Port Phillip and Van Diemen's Land, he received either reward or honour : he left Sydney for England in 1802 as mate of a trading vessel, and there we lose all trace of him. Flinders, writing his account of the explorations made by his gallant and well-loved comrade, speaks of him as no more.

Flinders obtained the rank of lieutenant, and sailed again in 1799, in the same small vessel, on a short voyage to explore the coast to the north of Port Jackson, which he examined minutely as far as 25°. He says, " Of the assistance of my able friend Bass I was deprived, he having quitted the station to return to England."

On Lieutenant Flinders's return to England, in the latter end of 1800, the charts of the new discoveries were published, and a plan proposed to Sir Joseph Banks for completing the investigation of the coasts of Terra Australia was approved by him and Earl Spencer, the First Lord of the Admiralty.

In February, 1801, Flinders was promoted to the rank of commander,

S6 THE THREE COLONIES OF ITtnUUJL

and appointed to the Investigator sloop. A proof of the popularity of his character and the adventurous spirit of the British sailor was given, when eleven men being required to complete his crew, out of three kaadred seamen on board the Vice- Admiral's ship two hundred and fifty volunteered.

On July 18th he sailed from Spithead, furnished with die following passport from the French Government, which was granted after precedents of similar protection afforded to Admiral La Perouse, and to Captain Cook, by the respective authorities in England and France : —

"Le Premier Consul de la Republique Francaise, sur la compte qui lui aete rendu de la demande faite par le Lord Hawkesbury,au citoyen Otto, conunissaire du gouvernement Francais a Londres, d*un passport pour la corvette Investigator dont le signalment est ci-apres, eipediee par le gouvernement Anglais, sous le commandment du Capitaine Matthew Flinders, pour un voyage de decouvertes dans la mer Pacinque, ayant decide que ce le passport seroit accord, et que cette expedition, dont Fobjetet d'etendre les connoissances humaines, et d assurer d 'avantage lea progres de la science nautique et de la geographic, trouveroit de la part du gouvernement Francais la surete et la protection necessaires.

"Le Ministre de la Marine et des Colonies ordonne en consequence a tout les commandants des tratiments de guerre de la Republique, a sea agens dans toutes les colonies Francaises am commandants des batements porter de lettres de marque, et a tous autres qull appartiendra de laisser passer librement, et sans empechment, ladite corvette Investigator, ses officers, equipage, et eftets pendant la duree de leur voyage ; de leur permettre d'border dans les difterents ports de la Bepublique, tant en Europe que dans les autres parties du monde, soit qu'ils soient forces par le mauvais temps d'y chercher un refuge, soit qu'ils viennent y reclamer les secours et les moyens de reparation necessaires pour continue r leur voyage. II est bien entendu, cependant, qu'ils ne trouverant ainsi protection et assistance, que dans le cas ou ils ne se seront pas volontairment detourne de la route qu'ils doivent suivre, qu'ils n'auront commis, ou qu'ils n'annoncerent l'intention de commettre aucune hostility eontre Republique Francaise et ses allies, qu'ils n'auront procure, on cherche a procure aucun secours a ses enemies, qu'ils ne s'occuperont d aucune espece de commerce, ni de contrebande."

In consequence of this passport, Flinders received directions from the Admiralty " to act in all respects towards French vessels as if the two countries were not at war." Subsequent events render this passport and these directions noteworthy.

So miserably slow was the progress of the first Australian colony

Discovery Op Spencer&#x27;S Gulp. 57

that at this period, thirteen years after its foundation, it was found advisable to take a supply of salt meat for eighteen months, and to have a general supply of provisions for twelve months more, to be sent after the departure of the Investigator, and lodged in storehouses at a Port Jackson for the sole use of the Investigator.

Among the gentlemen who accompanied the expedition was William Westall, landscape-painter.

A passport was also applied for, and # granted by the English Government, to Captain Baudin, who was said to be going round the world on a voyage of discovery.

In November, 1801, Captain Flinders sighted the coast of Australia, and proceeded to examine the coast line hitherto unexplored. In the course of his investigations he discovered and surveyed King George's Sound, on which the settlement of Swan River, or Western Australia, was planted in 1829, Port Lincoln, Kangaroo Island, Spencer's Gulf, and the coast line of the country which, principally from his report, was selected for the operations of the South Australian colonists, and sailed into and surveyed Port Phillip, which had been discovered ten weeks previously by a government schooner, the Lady Nelson, from Port Jackson. But Western Port, a bay in the district of Port Phillip, had previously been discovered by Bass in his whale-boat.

In April, 1802, immediately after discovering and surveying Spencer's Gulf, Port Lincoln, and Kangaroo Island, Captain Flinders fell in with Captain Baudin and his ship La Geographe,* which apparently, instead of sailing round the world, had sailed direct for Australia ; but, instead of pursuing further discoveries from the point where the English navigators had ended, they repaired to Van Diemen's Land, following the track of their countryman, Admiral D'Entr£casteaux, and there remained many months, thus losing the opportunity of discovering and taking possession (which was the

" The situation of the Investigator when I hove to for the purpose of speaking Captain Baudin was 35° 40' south and 138° 58' east. At the above situation, the diteoverie* by Captain Baudin upon the south coast have their termination to the west, as mine in the Investigator have to the eastward ; yet Monsieur Peron, naturalist to the French expedition, has laid a claim for his nation to the discovery of all parts between Western Port, in Bass's Straits, and Xuyts' Archipelago; and this part of New South Wales is called Terre Napoleon ; my Kangaroo Island, which they openly adopted in the expedition, has been converted into L'Isle Decres Spencer's Gulf is named Golfe Bonaparte; the Gulf of St. Vincent, Golfe Josephine; and 60 on along the whole coast to Cape Xuyts, not even the smallest island being without some similar stamp of French discovery." Monsieur Freycinet, first lieutenant of the Geographe, said at the house of Governor King, Port Jackson, to Flinders, Captain, if we had not been kept so ong picking up shells and catching butterflies at Van Diemen's Land, you would not have discovered the south coast before us." M I believe M. Peron wrote from overruling authority, and that smote him to the heart."— Flindert Voyage to Terra Atutralu.

58 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

secret object of their voyage) of more than one site for a colony; ust as La Perouse — a very different man from Baudin — lost by a few days the chance of discovering Port Jackson.

From Port Phillip Bay, Flinders returned to Sydney, where he arrived the 9th of May, 1802. He sailed again the 22nd of July, and, steering north, surveyed the great Barrier Reef, and made the route clear and safe for future navigators through the Torres Straits and round the shores of the great Gulf of Carpentaria, and only ceased his labours on finding his ship " quite rotten." After refreshing at the Island of Timor, he returned to Port Jackson on the 9th of June, 1803, having lost many of his best men.

No suitable ship to complete his survey was to be found in Port Jackson : he, therefore, embarked in the Porpoise store-ship, "in order to lay his charts and journals before the Admiralty, and obtain, if possible, a ship to complete the examination of Terra Australia."

The Porpoise was accompanied by two trading vessels, the Cato and the Bridgwater. In passing through Torres Straits on the night of the 17th of August, 1804, the Porpoise struck on a coral reef, and " took a fearful heel over on her larboard beam-ends. The Bridgwater was on the point of following, but, the Cato giving way, the former, grazing, escaped, while the latter struck and went over two cables' length from the Porpoise. The coward captain of the Bridgwater, one Palmer, having escaped, sailed away, in spite of the remonstrances of his mate, without making an effort to aid his companions."

Flinders took the command, safely landed the crew of the two vessels on a sandbank, of which a narrow space was clear at high water, collected stores, erected tents, formed an encampment, and established a disciplined order of proceedings. The reef was a mere patch of sand, about three hundred yards long and one hundred broad, on which not a blade of vegetation was growing.

It was determined that two decked boats, capable of conveying all but one boat's crew, should be built from the materials of the wreck, and that the largest cutter should be repaired and despatched, under the charge of Captain Flinders, to Port Jackson, a voyage of 750 miles.

On the 26th of August, a Friday, the cutter was launched, named the Hope, and pushed off " amidst the cheers and good wishes of those for whom we were going to seek relief. An ensign with the union downwards had hitherto been kept hoisted as a signal to Captain Palmer of our distress ; but, in this moment of enthusiasm, a seaman quitted the crowd, and, having obtained permission, ran to the flag-

Flinders Arrested Bt Du Caen. 59

staff, hauled down the ensign, and rehoisted it with the union in the upper canton. This symbolical expression of contempt for the Bridgwater, and of confidence in the success of our voyage, I did not see without lively emotion."

Flinders safely reached Port Jackson on the 6th of September. He returned in the only vessel he could obtain for his purpose — a small leaky schooner, the Cumberland, of twenty-nine tons burden — accompanied by two trading vessels, on the 6th of October ; and was received by his crew with frantic cheers of joy, although his brother, Lieutenant Flinders, after hearing that the rescue-ships were in sight, "calmly continued his calculations of lunar observations until they came to anchor."

In his absence the sailors had planted the reef with pumpkins, oats, and maize, which were sprouting above the sand flourishingly ; and Flinders expresses his regret that he had not " palm cocoa-nuts to plant, of which he thought ten thousand might be usefully set in these seas, as warning-marks and food for shipwrecked mariners, as they will flourish within the spray of the sea."

It is evident that Matthew Flinders in this instance, as in many others, displayed the stuff of which a colonial governor should be made. There have been very few among Australian governors who would have thought of the cocoa-nuts, especially at such a moment; still less would they have inspired their men with the same spirit : witness the military colony in Northern Australia, where the soldiers were half starved, and, in the midst of good soil, had not a vegetable.

In the miserable Cumberland, Flinders, intent on laying the result of his researches before the Admiralty, set out on a voyage of sixteen thousand miles to England. Every man of his crew, except his clerk, volunteered to share the danger and accompany him ; but the leaky state of his craft compelled him soon to seek shelter at the nearest port, and he put into the Mauritius, relying upon his passport. This would have been a sufficient protection had the government of the island been in the hands of a gentleman and man of honour ; but the governor was one Du Caen, a low, malignant, envious, insolent wretch, who, to the infinite disgust of many of his countrymen and companions in arms, availed himself of the misfortune which had thrown Flinders into his power to vent his spite on a nation he detested.

Du Caen seized the Cumberland, took possession of the charts, journals, and log-books, and detained Captain Flinders for six years, during which period, in spite of the representations of the French

60 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Admiral Linois, and of many of the most respectable colonists, he treated him with every kind of cruelty and indignity; and, after evading repeated orders for his release, dismissed him as uncere- £'.. moniously as he had seized him, detaining, however, one log-book, which Flinders was never able to recover. In the meantime appeared an account of Captain Baudin's voyages — the Captain Baudin who had received at Port Jackson every kind of attention and information. In this work, accompanied by an atlas, the discoveries of Flinders and Bass were appropriated wholesale, and renamed.

Baudin had made about fifty leagues of discovery, and claimed nine hundred leagues, part of which had been surveyed by the Dutch a century before his time.

Flinders reached England in 1810, broken in health, but his spirit of duty unimpaired. Under the regulations of the service the time he had passed in unjust imprisonment could not count in his professional employment. At length he petitioned the Prince Regent for promotion, as an act of grace ; but that genial patron of embroiderers and tailors refused his prayer.

He devoted the last days of his broken health and spirits to preparing his book and maps for the press — an admirable work, which has been the foundation of every subsequent exploration and colonization in Australia ; and died on the 14th of July, 1814, on the very day his "Account of a Voyage to Terra Australis" was published.*

We have devoted thus much space to an imperfect record of the labours of Flinders and Bass, as an act of justice towards two men

While these pages were passing through the hands of the reader for the press, a native of Lincoln, he wrote to a relative and obtained in answer the following interesting particulars : —

" Lincoln, 30th June, 1863.

u The mother of Mr. George Bass lived with them (the Calder family) fourteen years, and died with them. Her son and only child, George Bass, was born at Asworthy, near Sleaford, where his father had a farm, and died when he was a boy. The widow and son afterwards went to reside at Boston. From his boyhood he showed a strong Inclination for a seafaring life, to which his widowed mother was much opposed. He was apprenticed to Mr. Francis, a surgeon at Boston; and at the end of his apprenticeship walked the hospitals and took his diploma with honour. But his inclination for the sea being unsubdued, according to a promise she had made, she yielded to his wish, and sank a considerable sum in fitting him out and buying a share in a ship, which was totally lost. She also lost a great deal of money by the breaking of a bank ; but her intimate friend Colonel Gardiner, on hearing of it, insisted upon allowing her an annuity for life. She was a fine noble-minded woman, of no ordinary intellect.

" Her son wrote her long letters containing full accounts of his discoveries. These came into the possession of Miss Calder on the death of Mrs. Bass. A short time ago she thought to take A peep at the letters, went to the old box, but they were gone.

M The last time his mother heard of him he was in the straits of China. She expected him many years, thinking that he might be taken prisoner ; but at last gave up all hopes, thinking that he had been wrecked and drowned. He had only been married three months when he sailed away never to return. His widow is dead."

By a singular coincidence, within a few days after receiving this letter, the author met with niece of Flinders, in humble circumstances, applying for a passage to Australia at Mrs. ChiaholnVa.

Bligh Of The Bounty. 61

whose labours profit, but whose merits are scarcely known to thousands of the educated among Australian colonists. There is scarcely a petty town in France in which a monument has not been erected to some hero of the hour — sometimes a poet or historian, more often a successful soldier ; but even privateers and pirates have been so honoured. Some Lincolnshire patriot might spare enough to give a tablet to Flinders and Bass in Donnington Church.

Chapter Vi.

GOVERNOR BLIGH. 1806 to 1809.

BLIGH OF THE BOUNTY— HIS BRUTALITY— M'ARTHUR— FOUNDER OF AUSTRALIAN WOOL TRADE— BLIGH ATTEMPTS TO CRUSH M'ARTHUR— REVOLUTION— ARREST OF GOVERNOR— HE IS SUPERSEDED— RESULTS OF REVOLT.

CAPTAIN" BLIGH appears to have received his appointment as Governor of New South Wales as a reward for his gallant conduct in successfully conducting an open boat, with eighteen companions in misfortune, scantily provided with food and water, 3,618 miles, to the Island of Timor, without the loss of a single man, after being cast adrift by the mutineers of the Bounty. No man could be more unfit for such an office. But governors are appointed for the oddest reasons : sometimes because they are distinguished soldiers or sailors ; sometimes because they have written a timely book or pamphlet ; often because they are related to some great personage, and, being in debt, want an opportunity for saving money : but, no matter for what cause, or by what influence, a governor is appointed ; the most important quality of all, the temper of the candidate, is seldom taken into account; and yet in the governor of a colony no talents can compensate for a violent or spiteful temper.

Bligh had a very difficult task to perform : almost the only unconvicted colonists were the military and civil officers, and their relatives, who formed a sort of Venetian oligarchy of government and trade, and who, beside enjoying the lion's share of grants of land and use of labour, had been accustomed to share with previous governors, at a price arbitrarily imposed upon the importer, the cargoes of vessels as they arrived, and enjoy the profits derived from distributing articles

62 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

in demand among the unprivileged settlers at a monopoly tariff. Spirits formed a principal part of these cargoes, and it became the interest of every civil and military officer in the colony that the settlers, free and bond, should drink as much spirits as possible. Bligh brought out instructions to put down this traffic. Hence his immediate unpopularity. But he was a specimen of the naval captain now happily nearly extinct — violent in temper, coarse in language, hating the military, and despising civilians. To those of the humblest class who cringed before him he could be generous of public land and public money ; but to those who dared resist, or even in the slightest degree question, his authority, he was implacable.

At an earlier period in the career of the colony no one would have ventured to question his acts, however tyrannical; but in 1806 the character of the settlement was slowly changing.

A few respectable free settlers had arrived under Governor King. They found profitable employment in growing produce for the use of the government by the help of convicts, whom the government also fed and clothed — a very safe speculation. All the officials were, as already observed, more or less engaged in barter ; but some of the New South Wales Corps had quitted the military service, in order to betake themselves exclusively to agriculture and commerce. Among these was John M'Arthur, formerly a lieutenant in that regiment, a man of farseeing views, great energy, great intelligence, and indomitable courage.

M'Arthur observed the improvement produced by the climate of New South Wales in the texture of the hairy Indian sheep, and appreciated the value of the district called the Cow Pastures, on which the produce of the lost herd of cattle were found feeding. In 1793 he purchased eight fine-wooled sheep which had been sent out by the Dutch Government to the Cape, and re-exported to Sydney, as the Dutch farmers preferred their own fat-tailed breed.

His purchase subjected him to much ridicule among his brother colonists, who thought it more profitable to grow wheat or pigs for sale at the commissariat stores.

In 1803, in consequence of grievances of which he had to complain at the hands of the colonial authorities, M'Arthur visited England, and there not only obtained permission to purchase a few pure Spanish merinos from the flock of George III., at a time when the exportation of the merino from Spain was a capital crime, and the breed was only to be procured by royal favour, but produced such an effect on the Privy Council, before whom he was examined, on his wool project*, that he carried out to the colony on his return an order for a grant of

M'AETHUB and THE GOLDEN flsbce. 63

ten thousand acres. This grant, he selected on the banks of the Cowpasture River, for he appreciated the discrimination of the lost herd which had there fattened and increased while the colonists starved. This spot has since become famous as " Camden," where the first pure merinos were bred and the first vineyards planted in New South Wales. To Camden, perhaps, future generations of grateful Australians will make pilgrimages. For not greater services the Greeks made of Jason a demi-god. No doubt the Golden Fleece was shorn from a merino ram.

Soon after Bligh landed, Captain King introduced him to M 'Arthur, who invited the new governor to visit Camden and inspect his flocks, the result of the crosses from the King's merinos. The answer was a refusal, in the language of the forecastle, expressive of Bligh 's contempt for all such occupations. This was characteristic of the man : when the mother and uncle of young Heywood (a boy midshipman on board the Bounty, who received a free ]>pardon and afterwards rose to distinction in the navy) entreated his aid in obtaining mercy for one whose only crime had been not forcing his way through and springing into the overladen boat, he answered in a few lines, " I very much regret that so much baseness formed the character of a young man I had a real regard for, and I hope to hear that his friends can bear his loss without much

64 The Three Colonie8 Of Australia.

It would be unnecessary to dwell upon Bligh's numerous acts of cruelty and tyranny, were it not that his government was one of the great epochs in the history of New South Wales. The results of his despotism turned the attention of the English public to the resources of the colony, and the defeat of his crowning act of oppression enabled M' Arthur to change the destinies of Australia, and make it, instead of a mere gaol, the finest emigration field in the world.

A little anecdote related by Wentworth, culled from hundreds floating in the colony at that period (1816), illustrates a form of government and a state of society strangely at variance with our notions of the rights of Englishmen. Governor Bligh, having heard from his cowkeeper that the servant of an officer of the staff had made some impertinent remarks because disappointed of the customary supply of milk for his master, on the following morning sent for the dissatisfied delinquent. Wondering and trembling, he was ushered into the presence of his excellency, was received with a condescending smile, and told that, as the chief constable's house was on his way home, the governor had merely sent for him to save a dragoon the trouble of going there with a letter. The poor fellow, his mind relieved, respectfully received the missive, delivered it, was immediately tied to the triangles, and rewarded with twenty-five lashes from a cat-o'-nine tails.

After a career of two years, during which the person and property of every class of the community were at the mercy of his temper for the day, Governor Bligh proceeded with arbitrary illegality to summon, arrest, and try Mr. M' Arthur, on a frivolous charge of infringing the customs laws, hatched up for the purpose of wreaking his longsmouldering spite.

M'Arthur having refused to notice an illegal summons, the Advocate- General Atkins arrested him, lodged him in prison, and proceeded to try him in a court over which he himself presided, with the assistance of six officers of the New South Wales Corps. This Atkins had been appointed by private interest in England, had no knowledge of law, and was described in a private despatch to the Secretary of State as " to inebriety, the ridicule of the community, pronouncing sentences of death in moments of intoxication, his knowledge of law insignificant, and subject to private inclination."

To supply his deficiency of legal knowledge he took for his councillor and secretary a convict attorney of the name of Crossley, translated for forgery.

With the help of this miscreant Atkins prepared a monster indictment, charging Arthur with a series of offences — from contempt of

Persecution Of M &#x27;Arthur — Revolt Of The Troops. 65

court up to high treason. Arthur protested against being tried by a man who was at once judge, juror, and prosecutor, beside having a private quarrel of some years' standing with the prisoner. The judgeadvocate refused to receive the protest, and actually threatened to commit him for words spoken in his own defence. Fortunately for the fate of the colony, the six officers, who, with the advocate-general, formed the court, sided with the prisoner. They admitted him to bail, and repeatedly, in the most respectful terms, addressed the governor, praying him to supersede Atkins and appoint an impartial advocate-general. Bligh refused, — perhaps he had no power to adopt that step ; but he could have put an end to proceedings, which ought never to have been commenced, by entering a noils prosequi. But it was his object to crush M' Arthur, so he persisted; and, when he found the six officers of the New South Wales Corps equally firm in protecting him, he proposed to arrest and imprison the six officers on a charge of high treason. At this stage of the proceedings the patience of the colony was exhausted. On the 26th of January, 1806, Major Johnson, lieutenant-governor, commanding the New South Wales Corps, who had been prevented by severe illness from attending to the repeated summonses of the governor, rode into town. He was surrounded by his friends and brother officers, who represented to him the madly tyrannous course which the governor was bent upon pursuing, and urged him to place the governor under arrest.

In order to support him in taking this extreme step, the following memorial was signed by every respectable settler then in the town of Sydney : —

" Sir, — The present alarming state of the colony, in which every man's property, liberty, and life are endangered, induces us most earnestly to implore you instantly to place Governor Bligh under arrest, and to assume the command of the colony. We pledge ourselves at a moment of less agitation to come forward to support the measure with our fortunes and our lives.*'

Immediately after the presentation of this address, the drums of the New South Wales Regiment beat to arms, the troops formed in the barrack square, and then marched, with Major Johnson at their head — bayonets fixed, colours flying, and band playing — toward Government House, which they surrounded. Mrs. Putland (afterwards married to General O'Connell, commander of the forces in New South Wales), the widowed daughter of the governor, courageously endeavoured to resist the entrance of the insurgent officers through the Government gate: failing in that, she tried to conceal her father under a bed, whence, after an anxious search, he was dragged, and conducted,

B

66 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

without personal injury, to the presence of Major Johnson, who immediately placed him in custody and assumed the command of the colony. Thus ended the first act of this bloodless revolution — the 1688 of New South Wales.

Cowardice has been imputed to Bligh for concealing himself, but without reason. He was neither king nor even commander to awe the troops with his presence ; and any man may be excused for flying from an infuriated regiment ; above all a man like Bligh, conscious that there was scarcely an individual in the assemblage which surrounded Government House whom he had not injured or insulted.

Major Johnson transmitted to the Secretary of State a full account of the events which had forced upon him the government of the colony. Lieut.-Governor Foveaux, arriving from England ignorant of the insurrection, superseded Major Johnson, and was himself superseded by Lieutenant-Colonel Paterson, who arrived from Van Diemen's Land on the 1st July, 1809; by him Governor Bligh's arrest was continued until the 4th February, when the colonel agreed to put him in possession of his ship, the Porpoise, on condition that he should embark on the 20th, and proceed to England without touching at any part of the territory of New South Wales, and not return until he should have received the instructions of his Majesty's ministers. Released from arrest, Bligh treated engagements entered into under duress as void, and lingered on the coast for some time % in hopes of provoking a movement in his favour. He afterwards repaired to Van Diemen's Land, where he was at first treated with much attention, but on communications arriving from the lieutenant-governor at Sydney was constrained to remain on board his ship.

It is easy to imagine the sensation created in the king's cabinet when? they learned that the gaol colony of Botany Bay had imitated our forefathers of 1688, and, after sending a tyrant unscathed packing, had continued the government of the colony with a new governor and new officials, without bloodshed or plunder.

Vigorous measures were decided on, and an able man was selected to execute them.

Lachlan Macquarie, lieut.-colonel of the 73d Regiment, was appointed governor, and sent out with instructions to reinstate Captain Bligh in that office, and, after the expiration of twenty-four hours, to resume his own authority — to declare void all appointments, grants of land, and processes of law which had taken place between the arrest of Governor Bligh and his own arrival ; and further, to send home Major Johnson in close arrest, to be tried for his rebellion. At the same time

Thb Re8Ult8 Op The Revolt. 67

the 73rd, Colonel Macquarie's regiment, was sent out to relieve the New South Wales Corps, which was disbanded, the privates being, however, permitted to volunteer into the 73rd. These orders were obeyed.

Major Johnson was tried at Chelsea Hospital on the 11th May, 1811, found guilty 5th June, and sentenced to be cashiered. His conduct was clearly illegal and revolutionary, but it saved the colony. He made that a peaceable revolution which would otherwise have flamed into a wild riot, how ending, with the fearful materials present there, it is impossible to foretell.

He returned to the colony, and lived many years on his farm at Annandale, near Bathurst district, much respected. We have not been able to learn whether the signers of the memorial ever attempted to compensate him for the ruin of his own professional prospects. The gratitude of a mob, well dressed or ill dressed, is as vain a thing as the gratitude of a prince.

Bligh became an admiral, but was never again called into active service; the slight sentence, considering the offence, passed upon Johnson was a stigma he carried to his grave ; he died in 1817. Had he succeeded in his conspiracy to ruin M'Arthur the progress of the colony would have been retarded for years. Up to 1845, wool of the breed introduced and improved by the persevering experience of Arthur formed the only certain staple export of Australia. Without fine-woolled sheep Australia must have remained dependent for subsistence on the commissariat expenditure, and would perhaps, in a fit of economy, have been abandoned,, in favour of some penitentiary plan or island prison nearer home.

Since the time of Bligh there have been colonial governors as violent in temper, as tyrannical in disposition, but their powers have been limited not only by law, but by public opinion, the influence of a free press, and the effects of a ready communication with Europe.

Without a free press or a public to restrain him, out of sight and hearing of a British Parliament, had Bligh confined his tyrannies to the humbler classes he might have lived honoured and prosperous, while his victim sank brokenhearted, or died under the lash, as hundreds have on the shores of Port Jackson and Paramatta; but he ventured to attack a gentleman, the comrade of soldiers, a man, too, of courage, eloquence, and determination, and the unjust governor fell*

e 2

70 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

price, with the privilege of brewing beer, "in consideration of his useful and humane conduct in saving the lives and much of the property of sufferers by repeated floods of the Hawkesbury, as well as of his general demeanour."

Macquarie, within two months after his arrival, created Thompson a magistrate, and repeatedly invited him and other emancipists of similar success and conduct to dine at Government House, in spite of the remonstrances of the free inhabitants, of the officers of the 43rd Regiment, which succeeded the 73rd, and of hints from the Colonial Office. No doubt in New South Wales many a prisoner was induced to persevere in sober industry by the sight of an ex-prisoner and publican riding in his carriage to dine at Government House ; but in England the effect could scarcely have been beneficial as a restraint on idle apprentices and incipient pickpockets. Such reports interleaved in the Newgate Calendar, and other light reading of the felonry of Britain, must have tended to diminish the vague horrors that previously hung round Botany Bay,

Governor Macquarie commenced by employing the convict labourers not required by settlers in making roads, and erecting and repairing public buildings. On the first harvest after his arrival, to the horror of the martinets, he permitted the privates of the 73rd Regiment to hire themselves out as reapers, to be paid in grain or money, the price of wheat at that time being £1 3s. 6d. a bushel. At the same time he patronized amusements which the high prices of provisions did not prevent the wealthier classes from establishing. The New South Wales Gazette of October contains an account of three days' racing, conducted in Newmarket style, followed by an ordinary and two balls, the principal prize, a lady's cup, being " presented to the winner by Mrs. Macquarie." The whole proceedings are related in a style which would leave nothing to be desired in the Little Pedlington Gazette. For instance, " the subscribers' ball, on Tuesday and Thursday night, was honoured with the presence of his excellency the governor and his lady, his honour the lieutenant-governor and lady, the judgeadvocate and lady, the magistrates and other officers, civil and military, and all the beauty and fashion of the colony. The business of the meeting could not fail of diffusing a glow of satisfaction — the celebration of the first liberal amusement instituted in the colony in the

presence of its patron and founder." A supper followed the ball :

" After the cloth was removed the rosy deity asserted his pre-eminence, and, with the zealous aid of Momus and Apollo, chased pale Cynthia down into the Western World ; the blazing orb of day announced his

FIVE MEW TOWNSHIPS FOUHDBD BT If ACQUABIB.

near approach, and the god of the chariot reluctantly forsook his company: Bacchus drooped his head, Momus could no longer animate. The bom vivanti no longer relishing the tired deities left them to themselves '."

In the first year of his government, Maoquarie undertook a tour through all the known districts of the colony, and continued the practice annually during his reign ; on his return, by a general order he censured the settlers for the little attention they had paid to domestic comfort or good farming, in buildings for the residence of themselves and shelter of their cattle ; offered cattle, sheep, and goats from the government herds, to be paid for in grain, with eighteen months' credit ; and announced that he had marked out for settlement the five new townships of Richmond, Pitt, WUberforce, and Castlereagh, out of reach of floods of the Hawkesbury and Nepcan, in which grants would be awarded to deserving applicants, on condition that they erected dwellings according to plans supplied, and other measures of a similar practical character.

In the December of the same year, the first brick church, St. Pbil'p's, was consecrated (on Christmas-day) by the Beverend Samuel Mareden, a name from that time forward constantly occupying

72 The Three Colonies Of Australia*

a conspicuous place in the annals of the colony, as clergyman, magistrate, landowner, and stockbreeder. For instance, his next appearance in the Sydney Gazette is, in conjunction with two other gentlemen, advertising a reward of one pound sterling, or a gallon of spirits, for every skin of a native dog, an animal which was then, and has been ever since, the scourge of flockowners.

In 1812 a committee of the House of Commons, appointed to examine the state of the colony of New South Wales, after examining a number of witnesses, including the ex-Governors King and Bligh, printed a report, from which it appears that the population amounted to 10,454, distributed in the following proportions : — The Sydney district, 6,158; Paramatta, 1,807; Hawkesbury, 2,389; Newcastle, 100: of these 5,513 were men, and 2,200 women ; military 1,100 ; of the remainder, one-fourth to one-fifth was actually bond ; the rest being free or freed by servitude or pardon. In addition, 1,321 were living in Van Diemen's Land, and 177 in Norfolk Island, but orders had been sent out to compel the voluntary settlers, who had adhered to that island after the government establishment had been removed, to withdraw.

The settlements of New South Wales were bounded on the west by the Blue Mountains, " beyond which no one has been able to penetrate the country ; some have with difficulty been as far as one hundred miles from the coast, but beyond sixty miles it appears to be nowhere practicable for agricultural purposes ; beyond Port Stephen and Port Jervis these settlements will not be capable of extension; of the land within the boundaries one half is absolutely barren. The ground in actual cultivation was 21,000 acres, and 74,000 were held in pasture. The stock, in the hands chiefly of the settlers, was considerable, but it was still necessary to continue the importation of salt provisions.

" The currency of the colony was in government paper and copper money, but barter was the principal medium of sale ; and wheat and cattle had been recognised by the court of justice as legal tenders in payment of debts.

" The exportations of the colony consisted principally of whale oil, seal skins, coals, and wool. The iron ore, of which there was abundance, had not been worked. The trade in skins and coal was limited by the monopoly of the East India Company. Sheep not sufficiently numerous to make wool an article of large exportation. The culture of hemp had been less attended to than might have been expected. An illegal trade in sandal-wood had at times been carried on with the South Sea Islands and China. Mercantile speculation had been discouraged by impolitic regulations.

The Fib8T Jud6E And Paid Magistrates Appointed. 73

" For many years a maximum price was imposed by the governor upon all imported merchandise, often too low to afford a fair profit to the trader ; at this price the whole cargo was distributed amongst the civil and military officers of the settlement, who alone had liberty to purchase; and articles of the first necessity were afterwards retailed by them, at an enormous profit, to the poorer settlers. The imposition of a maximum price on imported articles, and on the price of grain and butcher's meat, had been discontinued, and the attempt to limit the price of labour had failed." The trade in spirits was reported as a great difficulty.

The defects of the system of criminal jurisdiction by court-martial, and civil jurisdiction without legal assistance or juries, are described; and the report states, that the governor, uncontrolled by any council, had power to pardon all offences, except treason and murder ; to impose customs duties, to grant lands, and to issue colonial regulations ; and for the breach of these regulations to inflict a punishment of 500 lashes and a fine of £100.

The committee recommended that a council should be given to the governor. With regard to grants of land, they reported that, according to evidence, a retiring governor had granted 1,000 acres to his successor, who had returned the compliment by a similar grant immediately after being installed in office.

Free settlers latterly had not been permitted to emigrate to New South Wales without giving proof that they were possessed of a certain capital. On their arrival they usually received a grant of land in proportion to their means.

" On the arrival of Governor Bligh, two-thirds of the children annually born in the colony were illegitimate."

This report, which also entered at considerable length into the treatment of convicts, directed a little of public attention to the antipodean colony, and the result was to induce the government to appoint a judge, with two magistrates chosen in rotation, who composed a supreme court in civil and criminal cases; and in Van Diemen's Land, as well as New South Wales, a fifty-pound civil court, with appeal, was formed, with the judge-advocate as sole judge.

This was the first step toward meliorating the absolute despotism under which the free settlers had hitherto lived. Measures were also taken for removing the restrictions on commerce with Van Diemen's Land, and abolishing trade monopolies : but Governor Macquarie's protests against the interference or assistance of a council prevailed, and he was enabled to pursue his plans with that concentrated vigour which is the one advantage of an enlightened despotism.

74 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

To enumerate all the public works which, with no mean amount of skill, and at great cost to the parent country, Governor Macquarie executed, would be neither useful nor amusing. It is sufficient to state, that while he erected many substantial if not elegant buildings, in the town of Sydney, he took care, by well-devised roads, to render available all the cultivable land, and all the pastures to be found within as much of the territory under his command as had been explored. The settlers imbibed his spirit of progress, and imitated his energy ; flocks and herds increased to a great extent, although the sheep were for the greater part of an inferior breed, a mixture of the hairy Bengal and heavy-tailed Cape, whose wool was worthless for export. But Arthur, whose efforts had been neglected and repressed by previous governors, was steadily pursuing his great idea of naturalizing the " noble race," or Spanish merino, on the plains of Australia. In December, 1812, the Sydney Gazette reports that ten rams of the merino breed, lately sold by auction from the flocks of John Arthur, Esq., produced upwards of 200 guineas ; and that " several coats made entirely of the wool of New South Wales are now in this country, and are of most excellent quality." In 1852 a whole fleet of ships were required to convey the wool of Australia to the manufacturers of Yorkshire.

In 1813 occurred one of those droughts, the one drawback on what would otherwise be a course of unvarying prosperity, which are periodical in Australia. On this occasion it was not only the crops that suffered ; the numerous flocks and herds were unable to find sufficient pasturage on plains which, when first discovered, were overspread with luxuriant herbage many feet in height. Necessity forced upon the colonists the idea of again searching for a passage across the Blue Mountains.

The attempt had been unsuccessfully made by several early colonists; amongst others, by the brave Surgeon Bass.

The last and successful effort was made by three gentlemen whose names are still well known in the colony — William Wentworth, son of the D'Arcy Wentworth who took an active part in the deposition of Governor Bligh, one of the earliest free colonists, himself destined in various ways to occupy a distinguished place in the annals of the colony ; Lieutenant Lawson, afterwards one of the greatest land and stock owners ; and Gregory Blaxland, one of the first members of the Colonial Legislative Council of New South Wales.

With incredible toil and hardships, they effected a passage across a chain of mountains clothed with dense timber and brushwood, and inter-

Discovert Of Batuubat Plain&#x27;S.

7fi

sected by a succession of ravines, which presented extraordinary difficulties, not so much from their height, u from their precipitous character. At the foot of the opposite side of the mountains, an easy journey led to Bathunt Plains, the finest pasture country the colonists had yet seen, far exceeding even the famous Cow Pastures on the Nepean. It is to this country, the discovery of Messrs. Went worth and Lawson, that the golddiggers are now streaming in thousands, but not clambering up precipices, sliding down ravines, and cutting paths through impenetrable brushwood, like the early pioneers, but easily travelling, and grumbling as they go, at the ill-kept condition of a macadamized road which has been conducted with admirable engineering skill in a series of ascending and descending gradients, over which even loaded drays can travel with ease.

Within fifteen months from the discovery of the first pass over the Blue Mountains, Governor Macquarje caused a practicable road to bo made. He never lost any time in planning and executing such works. Some governors would have occupied as much time in preparing a despatch as he did in completing the work. Many settlers, without waiting for the road, contrived to transfer portions of their live stock to the new pastoral £1 Dorado. Iu April, 1815, the governor himself,

76 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

with Mrs. Macquarie, accompanied by his principal officers and Mr. Lewin, painter and naturalist, set out on a progress to view what he called " his last conquest."

The results of this progress, made two months before the battle of Waterloo, are recorded in the following extracts from a " General Order :" certainly one of the most curious documents of the kind ever published.

macquarie's journey across the blue mountains.

"The commencement of the ascent from Emu Plains, through a very handsome open forest of lofty trees for twelve miles, was much more practicable and easy than was expected. At a further distance of four miles a sudden change is perceived in the appearance of the timber and quality of the soil, the former becoming stunted, and the latter barren and rocky. Here the country became altogether mountainous and extremely rugged. From henceforward to the twentysixth mile is a succession of steep and rugged hills, some so abrupt as to deny a passage altogether ; but at this place an extensive plain is arrived at, which constitutes the summit of the western mountains, and from thence a most extensive and beautiful prospect presents itself on all sides to the eye. On the south-west side of this table land (query, King's Table Land) the mountain terminates in an abrupt precipice of immense depth. At the bottom (the governor does not mention how they got to the bottom) is seen an immense glen twenty-four miles in length, terminating as abruptly as the others, bounded on the further side by mountains of great magnitude, to which the governor gave the name of Prince Regent's Glen. Proceeding hence to the thirtythird mile, on the top of a hill, an opening presents itself on the southwest side of the glen, from whence a view is obtained of mountains rising beyond mountains with stupendous masses of rock in the foreground, in a circular or amphitheatrical form. The road continues from hence, for the space of seventeen miles, on the ridge of the mountain which forms one side of Prince Regent's Glen, and there suddenly terminates in a perpendicular precipice of 676 feet. Down this Mr. Cox had constructed a road to which the governor gave the name of Cox's Pass, and to the ridge, Mount York.* On descending the pass, the first pasture land and soil fit for cultivation appeared, watered by two rivulets running east and west, and joining, forming Cox's River, which takes its course through Prince Regent's Glen, and empties itself

Mount Tork road has wince been abandoned in favour of an easy descent by Mount Victoria, executed by Sir Thomas Mitchell.

MACO.UAKIK'8 JOUJUfET. 77

into the River Nepean. Three miles hence the expedition of Messrs. Blaxland, Wentworth, and Lawson terminated. A range of very lofty hills and narrow valleys, alternately, form the part of the country from Cox's River for a distance of sixteen miles, until Fish River is reached. " Passing on, the country continues hilly, but affords good pasturage, gradually improving to Sidmouth Valley, distant eight miles from the pass of Fish Rtver. The land level, and the first met, unencumbered with timber, forms a valley north-west and south-east between hills of easy ascent, thinly covered with timber. Leaving the valley, the country again becomes hilly ; thirteen miles brought the party to Campbell River, where an extensive view opened of gently rising hills and fertile plains. In the pools of Campbell's River, that very curious animal the paradox, or water mole, was seen in great numbers.* The

Fish River, which forms a junction with the Campbell River a few miles to the northward, has two fertile plains named O'ConneU's and Macquarie's Plains. Seven miles from the bridge over Campbell River, Bathurst Plains open to the view, presenting a rich part of champaign country of eleven miles in length, bounded on both sides by very

It !i hot extinct In that put of the colon*.

78 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

beautiful hills thinly wooded. The Macquarie River, which is formed of a junction of the Campbell and Five Rivers, takes a winding course through the plains, which can easily be traced from the highlands by the verdure of the trees on the banks, which are the only trees throughout the extent of the plains. The level and clean surface (marked in plough ridges) gives them very much the appearance of lands in a state of cultivation."

On the south bank of the Macquarie, the governor encamped for a week, occupying his time in making excursions in different directions through the country on both sides the river ; and on Sunday, 7th May, 1815, fixed on a site suitable for the erection of a town at some future period, to which he gave the name of " Bathurst."

This discovery, due to the courageous perseverance of the three gentlemen before named, and rendered available by the wise energy of Macquarie, combined with the fine-woolled sheep of Arthur, prepared and assured the fortunes of these great colonies of Australia, and laid the foundation of an empire on the sweepings of our gaols. Macquarie was vain, hopeful, ambitious, and not unjustly proud of what, in his despatches to Earl Bathurst, he called "his discovery f but, his utmost expectation only extended to supporting a considerable but isolated population by pastoral and agricultural pursuits. He expressly stated, in his curious general order, that " The difficulties which present themselves in the journey from hence (Sydney) are certainly great and inevitable; those persons who may be inclined to become permanent settlers will probably content themselves with visiting the capital rarely, and of course will have them seldom to encounter."

What would have been his pride and admiration could he have foreseen that, within a few miles of the plains of pasture land which have realized to the first settlers hundreds of thousands of pounds in wool, gold lay in heaps for gathering ; and that within the lifetime of Wentworth, the explorer, an unbroken army of gold adventurers would crowd the highway from Sydney to the " City of the Plains," and in one year double the exports and the consuming powers of the colony !

The road to Bathurst Plains, executed in an incredibly short period, under the direction of Governor Macquarie, was materially improved by succeeding governors, and especially by the surveyor-general, Sir Thomas Mitchell, the Cook of Australian inland discovery. Sir Thomas Mitchell effected works second only in importance and merit of design and execution to the Simplon Pass over the Alps. It is un-

Newcastle, On The River Hunter. 79

fortunate that he was not permitted to carry out other public works which he suggested at a period when the barracks and gaols were filled with idle convicts.

Amongst other improvements, the road was diverted from Mount York, where the drivers were in the habit of cutting down and attaching part of a tree to their drays, to Mount "Victoria.

Under Macquarie, in addition to the Bathurst, the Argyle district, one of the best agricultural and pastoral districts on the road, of which Goulburn is the centre, was discovered ; as also Port Macquarie, afterwards a penal settlement, at the mouth of the River Hastings, leading to a fertile district, as yet, in consequence of the price of land and labour, unoccupied to its full extent. Mr. Oxley, the surveyorgeneral, traced the Rivers Lachlan and Macquarie to the west of the Blue Mountains, where they disappear in a swamp in dry seasons, and in seasons of extraordinary rain form an inland sea. The governor also formed one penal settlement on the fertile soil of Emu Plains, and another in the coal district at the mouth of the River Hunter, not improperly named Newcastle. He materially improved the aspect of Sydney by laying it out on a new plan, and gave encouragement to every useful enterprise.

He was wise enough to see the importance and did his best to create a class of small farmers, who, tilling the ground with their own hands, would be independent of hired labour, and assist in protecting the colony against the effects of a dearth of corn. With this view, he gave grants of thirty acres each to emancipated convicts. Unfortunately, he did not accompany this wise measure with an importation of female population. Among the gossiping libels against the yeomanry class current among the squatocracy is a statement that Macquarie's settlers sold all their farms for rum. This statement was investigated by Mrs. Chisholm ; she, found a great number of the settlers in the Hawkesbury voting for members of council on their original grants. That under the horrid single-man system many should have flown to rum for consolation is not extraordinary. The old saw says —

" Without a wife, " A farmer's is a dreary life."

Very little could be expected from a population of which not one in five could obtain an honest helpmate, and which knew little of clergymen except as sellers of rum and dispensers of lashes. The duty of educating the masses had hardly begun to make way even in the mother country, and thus it was only the inoculation of whatever good there was in the colony, and the facility of getting an honest living,

80 The Thrbi Colonies Of Australia.

that prevented the colonists of Macquarie's time from becoming a nation of robbers and murderers.

The ignorant and the vicious were turned loose in New South Wales with the lash and the gallows for those who were found out, but with independence for those who were industrious. The result showed how human nature can run clear where not pressed down by poverty or compressed in towns.

The Rum Hospital was a specimen of the tone of morality during the early years of New South Wales. It was built by three gentlemen, under a contract with the governor, which gave them a monopoly of the sale and importation of rum for a certain number of years. The workmen were, as much as possible, paid in rum, and public-houses were multiplied to an extent exceeding the proportion in the lowest and poorest haunts of Great Britain.

Many individuals, profiting by the enormous government expenditure, became wealthy; and all the sober, and many who were not sober, of the free or freed population were prosperous. It became manifestly better policy to live by work or trade than by robbery.

Of churches there were two, and these barely filled ; of the few clergymen the majority were occupied as magistrates, in awarding lashes to refractory servants, in farming, in breeding stock, and dealing in anything that would bring a profit. When New South Wales was considered worthy of an archdeacon, one honourable exception, the much-loved Parson Cowper,* was passed over and neglected, according to the rule of the day, in favour of an ex-wine-merchant. The Roman Catholics, amounting to some thousands, were not allowed to have the comfort of a priest of their own religion.

Considering that the Roman Catholic cannot, like the Protestant, retire to any solitude and there relieve his mind by prayer and confession to God, — that he deems the intervention of the priest, especially on his deathbed, essential to his salvation, — it is not extraordinary that the Irish part of the prisoner-population should have been turbulent and desperate; they felt themselves condemned to misery in thb world, and perdition in the next — dying "unhousel'd, disappointed, unanerd."

The tone of society in the towns was horrible : no educated or honourable class ; no church worthy of the name ; no schools except for the wealthy, and these chiefly taught by convicts ; slave-masters who sold rum; slaves who drank it; an autocrat surrounded by

A ton of the Rev. Mr. Cotrper is one of the most respectable and Influential men in the colony, and a valuable member of the Legislative Council.

First Judge — Commission Of Inquiry. 81

parasites, whose fortunes he could make by a stroke of his pen ; — except military honour, and the virtue cherished by a few who lived apart, there was as little virtue and honour as freedom in this wretched, prosperous colony.

From the foundation of New South Wales to the end of Governor Macquarie's administration, about 400,000 acres of land were granted to private individuals. Of these, in course of time, many town lots have become of enormous value, and some of the country land ; but much was barren, and not worth cultivation when better land was rendered accessible by roads.

In 1817, the first judge, Mr. Field, arrived ; a branch of the Bible Society was established ; and a Roman Catholic priest, Father O'Flynn, landed and spent some time in the colony, but, not having been duly authorized by the home government, he was compelled to return. Bigotry was in full bloom before Christianity had taken root.

In 1819 arrived a commissioner of inquiry, John Thomas Bigge, Esq., and his secretary, Thomas Hobbs Scott, Esq. He remained until February, 1821, having collected a body of evidence, which was afterwards printed for the use of the House of Commons, and contains many curious stories. The publication of this report had a considerable effect in directing the attention of the British public to the resources of Australia, and eventually caused the influx of a superior class of emigrants. But it was not until Governor Darling's time that the demand for convict labourers, on terms then in force, began to exceed the supply. Colonists, chiefly the Scotchmen, discovered the advantage of agricultural pursuits in a colony in which, with a grant of land, they became entitled to rations for twelve months for themselves and their wives, and convict labourers at the rate of one for each thirty acres, who were also rationed by the government for the space of eighteen months. The inquiry by Mr. Commissioner Bigge was partly owing to the representations made and a work published by Mr. William Wentworth, during a visit paid to England for the purpose of being called to the bar.

Among other subjects that came under the notice of the commissioner was the ecclesiastical government of New South Wales. The report of Mr. Bigge recommended the appointment of an archdeacon. Mr. Scott, the secretary, lost no time in taking orders, and in 1825 reappeared in the colony as Archdeacon Scott.

In the year that the royal commissioner quitted the colony a Wesleyan chapel was opened, and the foundation-stone of a Roman Catholio cathedral was laid by the governor, at the request of Father Therry, —

p

82 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

good Father Therry, — who shared with Parson Cowper the honour, the respect, the affection, of the poor colonists, and of the outcast prisoner population, whom they so faithfully tended. Goldsmith's picture may stand for either of them : —

u Unskilful he to fawn or seek for power,

But in his duty prompt to every call,

He watched, he wept, he prayed, he felt for all.

At his control Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul, Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise, And his last faltering accents whispered praise."

In 1822 Governor Macquarie embarked for England, after a longer and more successful administration than any governor in the Australian colonies has hitherto enjoyed. He found New South Wales a gaol, and he left it a colony ; he found Sydney a village, and he left it a city ; he found a population of idle prisoners, paupers, and paid officials, and he left a large free community, thriving on the produce of flocks and the labour of convicts.

Chapter Vih.

Governor Brisbane.

OVERNOR BRISBANE AND GOVERNOR DARLING— CHARTER OF JUSTICE GRANTED— EXECUTIVE COUNCIL APPOINTED— DISCOVERIES OF BRISBANE RIVER— PAN- DORAS PASS — OVERLAND ROUTE TO PORT PHILLIP — BRISBANE SUDDENLY SUPERSEDED BY DARLING— THE LAND BOARD— CASE OF SUDDS AND THOMPSON.

MACQUARIE was succeeded by Sir Thomas Brisbane. His term, undistinguished by remarkable actions on his part, was full of events of importance to a colony which was fast acquiring a population and could no longer be controlled by a purely military despotism. From the day of Macquarie's departure a struggle commenced between the people and the government which has not yet ended, and will not end until the Australians acquire complete rights of self-government and self-taxation.

Under any circumstances Sir Thomas Brisbane's task would have been difficult. The fortunes made in the colony had attracted a class of emigrants not prepared to submit to a despotic system which the

Governor Brisbane And The Presbyterians.

prisoner part of the population could not, and the officials and settlers living on the government were not inclined to resist.

Succeeding to the absolute powers of Macquarie, three years after landing, in 1824, the Legislative, or rather Executive Council, against the check of which his imperious predecessor had protested, was established. The first chief justice, the first attorney-general, a solicitorgeneral, who was also a commissioner of the Court of Requests, a master in chancery, and colonial treasurer, arrived in the colony. Trial by jury took place in the first Court of Quarter Sessions ; liberty of the press was conceded ; and the Australian, the first colonial newspaper independent of government aid, was published by Mr. Wentworth and Dr. Wardell, and was followed by two other journals.

While on this side of the globe we were deckiming and subscribing for the liberties of Greeks, Spaniards, and South Americans, at the antipodes our countrymen were struggling for trial by jury and " unlicensed " printing.

Commercial liberty yet remained to be gained. The East India Company claimed the exclusive right of trading in the Indian seas, and repeatedly asserted this right by confiscating vessels loaded with rice and sugar for Port Jackson. In 1824 the captain of a man-of-war actually seized the ship Almorah, with a valuable cargo of tea and rice, at anchor in Sydney Cove, and sent her in charge of his lieutenant a prize to Calcutta.

Major-General Sir Thomas Brisbane, K.C.B., had acquired a high reputation, both as a soldier in the Peninsula, and as a man of science. The first observatory in Australia was erected under his auspices. But his government, which only lasted four years, was unpopular, and the political concessions made rendered further concessions inevitable. To this fire was added the fuel of grievances which went home to the pockets of almost all the settlers and traders, and an insult which deeply offended a powerful, united, and intelligent religious community — the Scotch Presbyterians.

The Presbyterians applied in 1823 for assistance to build a Presbyterian church in Sydney, and referred pointedly to the support afforded the Roman " Catholics." The tone of the application appears not to have pleased either Sir Thomas or his secretary, and he returned a bitter reply, of which the following is the concluding paragraph. The style is eminently characteristic of colonial secretaries and governors : —

" When, therefore, the Presbyterians of the colony shall have advanced by private donations in the erection of a temple worthy of religion ; when in the choice of their teachers they shall have dis-

p 2

84 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

covered a judgment equal to that which has presided at the selection of the Roman Catholic clergymen ; when they shall have practised what they propose, ' To instruct the people to fear God and honour the King ;' when, by endeavouring to ' keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace ' in a colony requiring it more than all others, they shall have shown through their lives the influence of the holy religion they profess, then assuredly will the colonial executive step forward to extend its countenance and support to those who are following the Presbyterian creed."

The governor, it is said, acted under the advice of his secretary, a gentleman of the old Tory school. The Scotch gentlemen applied to the home government, when the governor received a severe reprimand, and the Presbyterians the aid they required.

Sir Thomas Brisbane's financial measures were equally unfortunate, yet there is no reason to question the purity of his motives.

It had been usual under previous governors to purchase the surplus grain from farmers at the current price of the day. The colonial government was almost the only purchaser, and to government the corn-growers looked for a certain share of their profits. Among the smaller settlers, the only cash they received in the course of the year was from the commissariat. This was the latter phase of a system which began with rationing the whole community, and gave liberty to prisoners who undertook to support themselves, which, in its second stage, willingly provided a free and emancipated settler with land and prisoner labour, and purchased the produce of land so tilled, to feed the prisoners whom the settlers could not employ.

Sir Thomas Brisbane, who arrived with Commissioner Bigge's report hanging over him, adopted the ordinary contract system, and invited tenders for the quantity required at the lowest price. The small farmers, unused to calculate the effects of open competition, rushed forward to the stores with such eagerness that wheat fell from 10s. and 7s. 6d. a bushel to 3s. 9d. Abstractedly he was right, practically he was wrong ; — so serious a change required care and time.

About the same time the governor established a colonial currency which raised the pound sterling twenty-five per cent., and proceeded to pay government debts in colonial money to parties who had contracted debts in sterling currency ; — a revival of the system of depreciating the circulating medium obsolete in England, but still practised by continental monarchs.

The colonists, seeing the price at which wheat was transferred to the government stores, took it for granted that the harvest had been

Governor Darling. 85

redundant, proceeded to feed pigs, and otherwise expended the unsold proceeds of their harvest. As the season advanced it was discovered that the harvest, so far from being plentiful, was deficient. Wheat rose to £1 4s. a bushel. Those who had sold cheap had to buy at a high price. The tampering with the currency added to the severity of the crisis. A great flood swept away the finest crops on the Hawkesbury. A famine followed : the government, by proclamation, required that cabbage stalks should not be rooted up. A large body of small farmers became so insolvent that their farms were sold to pay their debts, and passed into the hands of money-lenders and grogshop-keepers.

The discontent of the colonists reacted on the home government, and Sir Thomas Brisbane was recalled on the 1st December, 1825.

Four very important discoveries were made during his administration. In 1823, the Maneroo Plains, situated between two and three thousand feet above the level of the sea, separated from Twofold Bay by a lofty range of mountains, over which there is now a dray-track, were explored by Captain Currie, R.N., who named them Brisbano Downs, but they have since reverted to their native name. In the same year, Mr. Oxley, the surveyor-general, by order of Sir T. Brisbane, explored Moreton Bay, and discovered the navigable River Brisbane, leading to the fine semi-tropical country now fully occupied by squatters, but capable of supporting a large agricultural population.

In the following year Messrs. Hovell and Hume made their overland journey to Port Phillip ; and, in 1825, Mr. Allan Cunningham, one of the most enterprising and accomplished of Australian explorers, discovered Pandora's Pass, a cleft than which the Alps offer nothing more wild, more imposing, or more picturesque, affording the only practicable road from the Upper Hunter to the pastoral uplands of Liverpool Plains.

Lieu tenant-General Sir Ralph Darling, K.C.B., succeeded Governor Brisbane ; the colony during an interregnum of eighteen days having been in the hands of Colonel (afterwards General) Stewart, of Bathurst, an honour which formed one of the boasts of the gallant officer and standing jokes of the district for the remainder of his life.

Governor Darling.

Sir Ralph Darling arrived in December, 1825 ; his administration lasted six years, and was singularly and deservedly unpopular. He was a man of forms and precedents, of the true red-tape school — neat,

86 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

exact, punctual, industrious, arbitrary, spiteful, commonplace. He laboured hard to reduce into order the confusion he found in the public offices of the colony, and substituted a system which became quite as corrupt and more dilatory. It was like changing from the court of a Turkish cadi to the Court of Chancery. He obstinately evaded the control intended to be imposed upon him by the secret official and nominee council, and perpetrated an act of tyranny which has no parallel in English history since the time of Charles I. and the Star Chamber. The red-tape tendencies of Governor Darling were shown in his management of the waste lands of the colony.

In the last year of Governor Brisbane, New South Wales, in common with South American mines, Greek and Spanish loans, and a crowd of other bubble speculations, which seem to be decennially necessary to the commercial existence of Englishmen, became the subject of the operations of a great company, incorporated by charter and by act of Parliament, with a directorate including the best men of the city of London, a capital of a million pounds, a grant of a million acres, and various other privileges and pre-emptions, of which a monopoly of the working and sale of coal eventually proved the most profitable to the shareholders and offensive to the colonists.

Under Governor Darling, the agents of this Australian Agricultural Company selected, took possession, and commenced operations on their grant.

A retrospect of the plans and prospects in 1825 will perhaps afford the best landmark of the progress of the colony from the time when the whole community depended for salvation from famine on one chip, and that ship driven by adverse gales out of Sydney Heads away to sea.

The Australian Agricultural Company.

The directors of the Australian Agricultural Company, in their original prospectus, represent New South Wales as well calculated for the growth of " timber, wheat, tobacco, hemp, flax, and fruits, amongst which are the olive, grape, fig, mulberry, guava, almond, peach, citron, and orange." They derived their information chiefly from the reports of Mr. Commissioner Bigge ; and from the same source rested great hopes of profit —

" 1st, On the growth of fine merino wool.

" 2ndly, From the breeding of cattle and other live stock, and the raising corn, tobacco, &c, for the supply of persons resident in the colony.

The Australian Agricultural Company. 87

" 3rdly 9 From the production, at a more distant time, of wine, olive oil, hemp, flax, silk, opium, &c, as articles of export to Great Britain.

" 4thty, From a progressive advance in the value of land, as it becomes improved ; and by an increased population."

The grant of land was made on the ground that the colony would derive advantage from the importation of so large a capital, invested in cattle, horses, and sheep of the Cheviot breeds ; in the cultivation of the produce of Southern Europe ; and that the mother country would be saved the cost of maintaining a certain number of convicts.

At that period it was still so much an object with the government to relieve itself of the cost of the maintenance of criminals, that it was agreed that the company should be relieved of quit rent, on condition of their employing a certain number of prisoners. But, from the period of the grant to the Australian Agricultural Company, the value of convict labour rose so rapidly, that they never were able to obtain the stipulated number of servants ; and in 1830 we find the editor of the Sydney Monitor proposing that convicts should be sold on arrival to the highest bidder, and anticipating that they would realize, in lots of two hundred, £100 a year each for five or ten years !

In the course of the correspondence with this company, the Secretary of State for the Colonies announced that in future, " instead of giving grants of land free, lands were to be put up to sale, according to a valuation of the surveyor-general, similar, in many respects, to the system adopted in the United States of America."

This course had been suggested by Mr. Commissioner Bigge, with a price of 10s. an acre for lands near towns, and 5s. an acre in the country.

It so happened that the example of the Australian Company infected many members of Parliament and other persons of influence, who hastened to obtain grants which cost the minister nothing, and appeared to the grantors of immense value — a delusion on both sides. The precedent became most embarrassing to the government, while many of the huge blocks were of very little money value to the absentees. Instead of adopting the simple American system of survey and sale at a moderate price, a plan of grants was adopted admirable in theory, but too open to favouritism to work well.

As to the Australian Agricultural Company, their proceedings created, in the then state of the colony, a financial revolution. They sent out from England, as companies always do, a numerous staff; cargoes of implements and breeding stock on a most costly scale ; purchased ewes and heifers so largely that the price was raised one, and even two

88 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

hundred per cent, throughout the colony. The company, with a "long pocket," was a universal purchaser, and sellers were never wanting as long as they had any money to invest.

A reaction of course followed, as it always does follow extravagant expectations of pecuniary profit. The colony, nevertheless, derived advantage from the introduction of the company's capital and superior stock in sheep, horses, and cattle. The grand ideas of vineyards, olive oil, opium, silkworm cultivation, and orange groves, which formed applauded passages in speeches in the House of Commons and the court-room of the company, were never extended beyond the resident manager's or commissioner's gardens.

Unfortunately the beneficial influences were neutralized by the coal monopoly, which not only handed over a large tract of coal seams to the superior machinery and active capital of the company, but actually precluded the colonists from working, on any terms, coal which might happen to be found under their estates.

These doings seem monstrous. They were at that period ordinary transactions, in which honourable men and liberal politicians took a share without shame. In the same perverse spirit of monopoly, the authorities and merchants at Sydney, until 1826, compelled every ship to enter and break bulk at Sydney before calling at the ports of Van Diemen's Land. Monopoly was then as much an article of faith with statesmen as free trade is at present.

Under Governor Darling emigration from England of persons of moderate capital increased. Unfortunately a vicious system was established in the surveyor's office, for the benefit of favoured or feeing parties, by which surveys of waste land were kept secret from the uninitiated. In 1830 the author of a letter of advice to emigrants recommends " every settler to bring out an order from the secretary of state to be allowed to inspect charts and maps in the surveyor's office ;" and adds, "From being denied such inspection, emigrants wander about the interior of the colony at great expense, but to little purpose." Reform makes slow progress in the Colonial Office. In 1848 there existed secret choice reserves near the town of Melbourne, which, by the open sesame of a letter from Earl Grey, were, after being long retained, handed over to a German colony.

Darling ruled the convicts with a rod of iron. The times of the " first fleeters," the irresponsible flogger, and the short allowance of coarse food were revived. A penal settlement was formed at Moreton Bay, and there, it is commonly affirmed, the prisoners were so badly treated that they committed murder in order to be sent for trial to Sydney

*Ir8T Legislative Council Meets. 89

At the same time the county magistrates were empowered to award any number of lashes for insolence, idleness, or other indefinite offences. As it was not lawful for a man to flog his own assigned servants, he exchanged compliments with a neighbour. Considering the class of persons who were then frequently selected for magistrates in the colonies, it may easily be conceived to what brutal excesses such irresponsible authority led.

But year by year the civilizing elements of society made way. At one time, in 1826, we find a dispensary opened : in the following year a great public meeting is held, with the sheriff in the chair, to petition the King and both Houses of Parliament for the civil rights of trial by jury, and a House of Assembly ; and the next year a general post-office throughout the colony, and an Australian jockey club, are established. The editor of a newspaper is found guilty of libel, and two gentlemen fight a bloodless duel. A dispensary, a post-office, an action for libel, and a duel ! — the banes and antidotes of civilized society.

. The two last years of Governor Darling present events and contrasts still more remarkable.

A Legislative Council, being a step in advance of the Executive Council established by charter of 1828, held its first meeting in 1829. This was the check against which Governor Macquarie so earnestly and naively protested. The council consisted of the Archdeacon (now Bishop) Broughton, who superseded Mr. Scott, the Commander of the Forces, the Chief Justice, Attorney-General, and Colonial Treasurer, Alexander M'Clean, afterwards (at eighty years of age) the first speaker of the first Australian Legislative Assembly, and four members selected by the governor.

The proceedings of this council were secret, under an oath administered to that intent ; and the governor had an absolute veto. The majority were officials, totally unacquainted with the colony; and, looking at the minority in which, in the open Legislative Assembly, the nominees of the government were constantly found, it is not extraordinary that this council gave no manner of satisfaction to the colony. Yet it must be owned that in 1829 New South Wales did not possess the materials for representative institutions.

The first act of the council was to establish trial by jury in civil cases.

In the following year, on the 31st March, 1831, the first steam-boat in Australia was launched ; two other steam-boats came into use within a few months. Close after the steam-boat followed Dr. Lang, from Scotland, the first Australian agitator, a Presbyterian O'Connell, who,

90 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

having professed and printed every shade of political opinions, has recently avowed his preference for a republic, and his hope that he " shall yet see the British flag trailed in the dust."

Decidedly, in 1831, Australia was making progress.

In October General Darling resigned his government, and was succeeded by General Sir Richard Bourke.

The history of General Darling's administration reads more like that of one of Napoleon's pro-consuls than that of an Englishman reigning over Englishmen.

The case of Sudds and Thompson is an instance which stands out in the history of the colony as a sort of landmark of the termination of the Algerine system of government, affording a singular example of the state of society in which such an outrage on law, justice, and constitutional rights could be not only done but defended.

The story is worth relating, if it were only to show what deeds may be done and defended in the same age by the same race that expended millions in redeeming negro slaves, and in efforts to convert aboriginal cannibals.

Sudds and Thompson were two private soldiers in the 57th Regiment, doing duty in New South Wales in 1825, the second year of Sir Ralph Darling's reign. Thompson was a well-behaved man, who had saved some money ; Sudds was a loose character. They both wished to remain in the colony.

In New South Wales they saw men who had arrived as convicts settled on snug farms, at the head of good shops, and even wealthy merchants and stockowners. As to procure their discharge was out of the question, Sudds, the scamp, suggested to Thompson that they should qualify themselves for the good fortune of convicts, and procure their discharge by becoming felons.

Accordingly they went together to the shop of a Sydney tradesman and openly stole a piece of cloth, were, as they intended, caught, tried, convicted, and sentenced to be transported to one of the auxiliary penal settlements for seven years.

In the course of the trial the object of the crime was clearly elicited. It became evident that the discipline of the troops required to keep guard over the large convict population would be seriously endangered if the commission of a crime enabled a soldier to obtain the superior food, condition, and prospects enjoyed by a criminal. Accordingly, Sir Ralph Darling issued an order under which the two soldiers, who had been tried and convicted, were taken from the hands of the

Case Of Sudds And Thompson. 91

civil power, and condemned to work in chains on the roads of the colony for the full term of their sentence, after which they were to return to service in the ranks.

On an appointed day the garrison of Sydney were assembled and formed in a hollow square. The culprits were brought out, their uniforms stripped off and replaced by the convict dress, iron-spiked collars and heavy chains, made expressly for the purpose by order of the governor, were rivetted to their necks and legs, and then they were drummed out of the regiment, and marched back to gaol to the tune of The Rogue's March." Sudds, who was in bad health at the time of his sentence from an affection of the liver, overcome with shame, grief, and disappointment — oppressed by his chains, and exhausted by the heat of the sun on the day of the exposure in the barrack square — died in a few days. Thompson became insane.

A great outcry was raised in the colony : the opposition paper attacked, the official paper defended, the conduct of the governor. The colony became divided into two parties ; until the end of his administration, Sir Ralph Darling, whose whole system was a compound of military despotism and bureaucracy, was pertinaciously worried by a section which included some of the best and some of the worst men in the colony : combining together for the extension of the liberties of the colony, they found in the Sudds and Thompson case the inestimable benefit of a grievance.

It would be unjust to consider Sir Ralph Darling's sentence by the light of public opinion in England. He was governor of a colony in which more than half the community were slaves and criminals ; he had to punish and to arrest the progress of a dangerous crime ; but as the representative of the sovereign, by ex post facto decree, he exercised powers which no sovereign has exercised since the time of Henry VIII., and violated one of the cardinal principles of the British constitution, — rejudging and aggravating the punishment of men who had already been judged.

At the present day it is, as we before observed, only as an historical landmark that it is right to recal attention to a transaction which can never be repeated in British dominions, although we may find precedents in the decrees of a president of the French republic, and decisions of Califomian committees of vigilance, where the absence of all evidence and acquittal by legal tribunals have not saved the victims of a mob, or a despot, from condign punishment.

During General Darling's government further successful explorations of the interior were made, by private individuals and

92 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

officials. Among the latter were Major (now Sir. Thomas) Mitchell, Mr. Allan Cunningham, Mr. Oxley, and Captain Sturt, the most fortunate of all.

In his second expedition, in 1829, Captain Sturt embarked with a party in a boat on the Morrumbidgee (which receives the waters of the Macquarie, the Lachlan, and Darling), until he came to its junction with the Murray, an apparently noble stream. Pursuing his voyage, in spite of many impediments, hardships, and dangers, from rocks, snags, sandbanks, and hostile savages, he reached the Lake Alexandrina, and discovered the future province of South Australia. This lake is a shallow sheet of water, sixty miles in length and forty miles in breadth, which interposes between the sea and the river, thus unfortunately presenting an impassable obstacle to ocean communication.

The hopes excited by the discovery of this picturesque river have hitherto not been realized. Although broad, deep, and bordered by rich land for many score miles, the perpetual recurrence of shallows limits the draught of water to two feet, at which steamers cannot be profitably navigated.

Captain Sturt, having made this important discovery, returned by reascending the river.

Having unfortunately become blind, in consideration of these and other services rendered to South Australia, the new Legislative Council of that colony have recently voted him a pension of £500 — an act of liberality for which no precedent is to be found in the proceedings of the other settlements.

Chapter Ix.

Governor Bourke.

SIR RICHARD BOURKE — RELIGIOUS EQUALITY ESTABLISHED BY CHURCH AND SCHOOL ACT— REGULATIONS FOR ASSIGNMENT OF CONVICTS — STEP TOWARD ABOLISHING TRANSPORTATION— SQUATTING REGULATIONS SYSTEMATIZED— SUMMARY OF CHANGES IN LAND SYSTEM FROM 1788 TO 1831— ORIGIN OP WAKEFIELD'S COLONIZATION BUBBLES— FOUNDATION OF NEW COLONIES OF PORT PHILLIP, SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

MAJOR-GENERAL SIR RICHARD BOURKE, K.C.B., became Governor of New South Wales in December, 1831, and retired in November, 1837. He was, without question, the ablest man who has at yet occupied that office ; equal in zeal, energy, and plain common sense to Macquarie ; superior in the liberality, humanity, and statesmanlike far-sightedness of his views. With wise self-reliance he resisted the blandishments of the official clique who have been the curse of all our colonies, and the opposition of the faction of white slave-drivers, who looked upon the colony as a farm to be administered for their sole benefit. He had courage, too, of a rare quality, for he dared to differ from his chief, the Secretary of State for the Colonies, on a vital point of administration — the land question : his recorded objections to the Wakefield system are remarkable for their prophetic wisdom.

He was, and his memory still is, deservedly popular among the bumble, or the wealthy sons of the once humble settlers, — a rare merit, and not a qualification for favour at the Colonial Office.

The six years of his reign w r ere crowded with measures and events of the utmost importance in the history of New South Wales.

1. The discussions of the Legislative Council became public, and the estimates were regularly submitted and discussed.

2. The Church and School Corporation (which had become a gross job) was abolished, and religious equality established by an act of the Legislative Council.

3. An attempt was made to introduce the Irish national school system (which the bigots defeated).

4. Free grants of land were abolished, and sale by auction at a minimum price substituted.

94 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

5. The despatch was received from Lord Glenelg, and steps were adopted, which, in 1840, finally abolished transportation to New South Wales.

6. The squatting system was legalized and systematized on a plan which has since produced nearly £60,000 per annum.

7. Rules for regulating the number of convict servants to which each settler should be entitled (without favour), and the number of lashes which should be inflicted on a convict servant by a single magistrate, were framed and promulgated.

8. Port Phillip was settled from Van Diemen's Land and South Australia by colonists from England.

The powers of the council imposed on the Governor of New South Wales in the last year of Sir Thomas Brisbane's administration were, under Sir Ralph Darling, almost nominal : not only were its deliberations secret and its dissent powerless, but Governor Darling systematically and illegally exercised authority in the only matter entrusted to the council — the distribution of the revenues. Towards the close of his administration he introduced a bill indemnifying himself and legalizing his illegal assumptions.

Sir Richard Bourke, on the contrary, earnestly co-operated in raising the character of the council, treated the non-official members with the utmost respect, and endeavoured to give the council, as far as possible, the tone and functions of a representative assembly, a course directly the reverse of his successor, Sir George Gipps. Both were able, but the one was a frank and generous, the other an astute and jealous man.

It is very much to be regretted that Governor Bourke had not been permitted to govern with as little interference from secretaries of state as Governor Macquarie, and to remain long enough to initiate the partly elective council which fell into the unhappy hands of his successor.

Bourke s Church and School Act

The " Church and School Incorporation," under which one-seventh of the crown lands was devoted to the support of episcopalian churches and schools, had not worked well, and in 1833 it was dissolved by an order of the king in council. The expenses of management had been very large, the receipts very small, and the results, in the extension of religion and education, insignificant.

In the same year Sir Richard Bourke addressed a despatch, dated 30th September, in wliich he propounded principles of religious equality

The Church And School Act. 95

which were afterwards carried into effect by an act of the Legislative Council. This despatch has had a very important influence on the religious and educational institutions of the colony, and displayed principles much in advance of the traditions of the colonial government.

After stating that the followers of the Church of England were most numerous ; that one-fifth of the population was Roman Catholic ; that the members of the Church of Scotland were less numerous, but among the most respectable, consisting almost entirely of free emigrants; that the Mimm.1 charge for the Church of England amounted to £11,542 10s. ; for the Church of Scotland to £600 ; and for Roman Catholic chaplains and chapels to £1,500 ; while Protestant dissenters of several denominations, who had formed congregations, " received no support from government beyond some small grants of land for sites of chapels ;" that the Church of England possessed seven churches of stone or brick in or within fortv miles of Svdnev, two in more remote districts, and several less permanent buildings in various places ; the Church of Scotland one respectable building in Sydney, and three temporary buildings in country districts, the one church having been built by subscription, aided by a loan from government of £520 ; the Boman Catholics one handsome church, towards which the government had, at various times, granted sums amounting to £1,200; that the chaplains of the Church of England were provided with glebes of forty acres each, and with houses or lodging-money ; that the magnitude of the sums annually granted to the Church of England in New South Wales were a subject of general complaint, and had been the origin of a public meeting and petition numerously signed, praying for a reduction, — Governor Bourke proceeded to observe, that " in a new country, to which persons of all religious are invited to resort, it will be impossible to establish a dominant and endowed church without much hostility, and great improbability of its becoming permanent; if, on the contrary, support were given, as required, to every one of the three grand divisions of Christians indifferently, and the management of the temporalities of their churches left to themselves, the public treasury might in time be relieved of a considerable charge, and, what is of more importance, the people would become more attached to their respective churches, and be more willing to listen to the voice of their respective pastors/'

He then proceeded to sketch out the plan afterwards carried out by the act which will presently be quoted, and recommended that New South Wales should created into a separate diocese, instead of being included in that of Bengal.

96 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

From the same despatch it appears that the schools which had been established under the Church and School Corporation consisted of a male orphan school, in which 133 boys were boarded and taught at an annual expense of £1,300, and a female orphan school, in which 174 girls cost £1,500 annually, exclusive of supplies from lands cultivated for the use of the schools.

At Paramatta there was a boarding-school for the wealthier classes, who paid £28 each for boarders, and £10 for day scholars, the head master, a clergyman, receiving £100 a year and the rent of a house.

There were thirty-five primary schools in various parts of the colony, in which 1,248 children were taught, at an expense of £2,756. In all these schools the catechism of the Church of England was part of the instruction.

The Church of Scotland had received a loan of £3,500 toward the erection of the Scotch college founded by Dr. Lang ; and £800 had been granted to the Roman Catholic schools.

The governor stated that the disproportionate assistance for education was a subject of very general complaint, and expressed an opinion,' " that schools on the Irish system, in which Christians of all creeds are received, where approved extracts from Scripture are read, but no religious instruction is given by the master or mistress, such being imparted one day in the week by ministers of different religions attending at the school to instruct their respective flocks, would be most suitable to the condition of the colony. It would be necessary that the government took the lead in their institution, erecting schoolhouscs, appointing wellqualified teachers at liberal salaries." In like manner infant schools should be established in the towns. And he adds, " / may without fear of contradiction assert, that in no part of the world is the general education of the people a more sacred or necessary duty of the government than in New South Wales."

Unfortunatolv Sir Richard Bourke's successor was so anxious to work out his own abstract theories of legislation, and so busy in battling with the colonists, that he had little time to attend to education.

In 1836 the Legislative Council passed an act, under which, whenever £300 had been raised by private contributions toward the building of a church or chapel, the governor, with the advice of his Executive Council, might issue from the colonial treasury, in aid of the subscribers, any sum not exceeding £1,000.

And for minister of church or chapel with 100 adult attendants, £100 per annum. If 200 adults, £150 per annum. If 500 adults, £200 per annum.

Sales Of Land. 97

Under special circumstances the governor and council could grant a salary of £100 per annum where the congregation amounted to less than 100.

Where there was no place of worship, £100 might be granted from the colonial treasury if £50 a year were raised by private contributions. Under this act £3,000 a year was divided between the Church of England, the Church of Scotland, and the Church of Rome, and recently the Wesleyan Methodists shared part of the grant.

In his attempt to introduce an improved system of education Sir Richard Bourke was defeated by religious jealousies, but the despatches and act quoted will remain monuments of his patriotism and statesmanship.

The two great events of General Bourke's government were the abolition of the assignment system, and the substitution of sales by auction, at a minimum upset price, for free grants of land.

The Pastoral System and the Sale of Land.

Scarcely second in importance to the discussions on the Church and School Act are the still-continuing contests on the land question, in which Governor Bourke again displayed his foresight and legislative capacity.

By a despatch dated February, 1831, the colonial secretary instructed the Governors of New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land to discontinue the grants, and substitute sale by auction at a minimum upset price of 5s. an acre, without any of the privileges in assigned servants which had been annexed to sales at the same rate by Governor Brisbane. And in 1835 Governor Bourke carried through the Legislative Council the act to restrain unauthorized occupation (7. W. IV. No. 4), on which the squatting system is founded ; and in the following year he commenced issuing the licences under which two-thirds of the stock of New South Wales and Victoria are now pastured. He did not then contemplate obtaining more than sufficient funds to defray the expenses of the necessary staff, crown land commissioners, and police. There he was much mistaken.

Before the appointment of crown land commissioners it was common for great settlers to " eat out," as they called it, any small settler, by sending sheep to devour all the pasture for miles round his hut. It took some years to convince the old magnates that they could no longer do as they did in the old days of white slavery and irresponsible government.

98 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

By these two measures the character of Australian colonization was completely changed. Their effects will be described in the next chapter. Here however it may be convenient to review the successive systems by which land had been alienated in New South Wales up to the time of Bourke.

Up to 1831 a variety of systems had been adopted, of which the following is an abstract : —

The Land System from 1788 to 1831.

From the foundation of the colony, until 1824, the regulations for the disposal of land were left entirely in the hands of the governor for the time being. Land was in the early days of the colony bestowed on any man, bond or free, who could undertake to support himself; as the colony progressed in wealth and population, certain situations became valuable, and were eagerly sought by parties of influence ; but large portions were held, especially as pastures, under free licences of occupation, which were granted to encourage the explorations by settlers.

Sir Thomas Brisbane granted 180,000 acres at a yearly quit rent of 2s. per 100 acres. He sold, between December, 1824, and 19th May, 1825, 369,050 acres at 5s. an acre, giving a long credit, with in addition a quit rent of 2s. per 100 acres ; and he also granted in two years, between 1823 and 1825, 573,000 acres at 15s. annual quit rent per 100 acres. But it must be noted that all these grants and purchases were accompanied by an allowance of a certain number of convicts per 30 acres to clear and till them, and that these convicts, as well as the settler and his wife, were rationed for a limited period at the expense of the government.

During and previous to Macquarie's time, the settler frequently obtained with his grant the use of a government gang, who cut down, burned, rolled, and cleared the timber from lots which no one would have attempted to clear and cultivate with hired labour. The great object of the governors down to the time of Darling was to lighten the expenses of the commissariat in feeding convict prisoners.

The system founded on such simple aims, in spite of a crowd of abuses, answered admirably in one point of view : it colonized and cultivated the country ; and if it had been accompanied by a large importation of wives for the settlers, and measures for reforming, educating, and christianizing the colonists, considering the slight offences for which transportation was awarded between 1788 and 1825, it would have provided New South Wales with a population well suited to assist and

Regulations Fob The Bale Of Land. 99

a malgam ate with free labouring emigrants, when the time came for abolishing transportation, and giving up the land which convicts had pioneered to the use of a free population.

For instance, in 1822, the Hunter River district was in a state of nature, and in 1827, for a distance of 150 miles along the river, half a million acres had been surveyed, granted, and sold to settlers, whose capital was calculated at from four to five hundred thousand pounds, and whose stock included 25,000 horned cattle, and 80,000 fine-woolled sheep. Thirty miles of excellent road had been constructed by the government with convict labour between the Hunter River* and Sydney, and the remainder of the route was in course of execution, while the improvements, buildings, fences, and cultivation, were all effected by assigned servants, whom the government fed and clothed for the first eighteen months. Nothing but convict labour could have done so much in five years.

In 1824 the Secretary of State for the Colonies issued regulations far the disposal of land in New South Wales, of which the following is an abstract: —

u 1. A division of the whole territory into counties, hundreds, and parishes, is in progress. When that division shall be completed, each parish will comprise an area of 25 square miles. A valuation will be made of the lands throughout the colony, and an average price will be struck for each parish.

" 2. All the lands in the colony not hitherto granted, and not appropriatedfor public purposes, will be put up for sale at the average price thus fixed.

"3. All persons proposing to purchase lands must transmit a written application to the governor, in a certain prescribed form, which will be delivered at the surveyor-general's office to all parties applying, on payment of a fee of two shillings and sixpence.

u 4. The purchase-money must be made by four quarterly instalments. A discount of 10 per cent, will be allowed for ready-money payments.

" 5. The largest quantity of land which will be sold to any individual, 89,600 acres. The land will generally be put up in lots of three square miles or 1,920 acres.

" 7. Any purchaser who, within ten years of his purchase, shall by the employment and maintenance of convicts have relieved the public from a charge equal to ten times the purchase-money, will have the

In consequence of the facilities of steam navigation to the River Hunter, and the barrenneai of this land route, it hat been abandoned.

G 2

100 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

money returned, but without interest. Each convict employed for twelve montJis will be computed as £16 saved to the public"

Persons desirous of becoming grantees without purchase might obtain land on satisfying the governor that they had the power and intention of expending in the cultivation of the land a capital equal to half the estimated value of it.

On grants of not less than 320 acres, and not more than 2,560 acres, subject to a quit rent of 5 per cent, per annum on the estimated value, redeemable within the first twenty-five years at twenty years' purchase, with a credit for one-fifth part of the sums the grantee might have saved by employing convicts, no quit rent was required for the first seven years. But the grantee was subject to forfeiture of his grant if unable to prove to the satisfaction of the surveyor-general that he had expended a capital equal to one-half its value.

It is evident that detailed regulations as to expenditure of capital could never be enforced. In practice, quit rents fell in arrear and could not be recovered. Thousands of acres granted turned out and remain valueless.

In September, 1826, Sir Ralph Darling created a land board, composed of the colonial secretary, the civil engineers, and the auditorgeneral of accounts* which issued a set of regulations worthy, for their thorough absurdity and impracticability, of their bureaucratic descendants, the South Australian commissioners, and the New Zealand Company directors.

Persons desirous of obtaining land were (1) to apply to the colonial secretary for a form to be filled up and submitted to the governor, who (2), if satisfied of the character and respectability " of the applicant, directed the colonial secretary to supply him with a letter (3) to the land board, in order that they might carefully investigate the stock articles of husbandry, &c, and cash, forming part of his capital. On the land board reporting (4) to the governor satisfactorily as to capital, the governor furnished the applicant (5) with a letter to the surveyorgeneral, who (6) was to give him authority to proceed in search of land! When he had made his selection he had to apprise the surveyorgeneral (7), who twice a month was to report (8) to the governor such applications ; and, if approved (9) by the governor, the applicant received written authority (10) to take possession of the land until his Majesty's pleasure should be known or the grant made out. Terms as to quit rents the same as the first set of regulations ; viz., 5s. per cent, after seven years ; grants to be in square miles ; one square mile, 640 acres, for each £500 of capital, to the extent of four square miles.

Sales Of Land. 101

'Land selected for purchase, not granted, to be valued by the commissioners, put up for sale, and sold by sealed tender, not under a price fixed by commissioners. Personal residence, or residence of a free man as servant or deputy, required on purchases and grants.

These regulations of Sir Ralph Darling were marked by every official vice — unnecessary forms, expense, and uncertainty, inquisitorial investigation, bribery and corruption among the subordinates in the various offices; in feet, everything that could be done, was done to disgust decent, unpolished, unlearned settlers. They were adopted by the Colonial Office in 1827, and had the effect of rendering the business of obtaining and granting: land one series of jobs. The home government always reserved to itself the right of making grants, and exercised it in a most baneful manner.

One effect, unintentional on the part of the authors of these cumbrous arrangements for obtaining grants of land, was to encourage unlicensed squatting in districts unsurveyed, and at that period allowed to remain in " healthy neglect." So the live stock increased in spite of the forms of the " land board."

Up to 1820, the last year of Macquarie's- government, 400,000 acres passed into the hands of private individuals ; in 1828, 2,524,880 acres had been granted or sold by Brisbane and Darling ; making in all 2,906,346 acres. But these acres cannot for useful purposes be compared with European acreage, except in Connemara, where square miles may be bought at 5s. an acre, and are dear at the money.

After the endless delays and forms of the Darling dynasty, the change in 1831 to sale by auction was a great boon to the colony, although the large size of the lots (640 acres) excluded corn-cultivating settlers of fifty acres ; and the putting up to auction of land occupied and improved under expectation of grants caused many cases of individual hardship among the humbler classes.

In every point of view it is most unfortunate that the American system, which had been so far followed, has not been strictly adhered to ; that is to say, surveys always in advance of sales, lots from 80 acres upwards, surveyors' maps always open free of charge, without favour, and land at a dollar an acre.

In 1831 it was further decided that part of the funds derived from the sale of lands should be applied to defraying the passages of free emigrants on the bounty system ; that is, by paying to importers a certain sum per head for men, women, and children, if approved by a colonial board.

102 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

The following is the result of the first five yean of open land sales, at 5s. an acre for country land : —

Emigrants, men, women. Tears. 4. a, d. and children. d. a. d.

t

In 1836, land sales at Port Phillip being included, produced a total of £132,396.

In 1835 two events occurred which materially affected the colonizing fortunes of Australia. A party of stockowners from Van Diemen's Land, where the accessible pastures had been nearly all appropriated, crossed Bass's Straits, and established themselves on the shores of Port Phillip Bay, on the River Yarra Tarra ; about the same time squatters gradually extended their pastures overland, and whalers settled at Portland Bay; and before the government of New South Wales, within which the unpeopled territory was included under Governor Phillip's commission, acknowledged their existence, many thousand sheep and cattle were feeding over the finest plains that had yet been discovered in the vicinity of a natural port. And these " unauthorized squatters," as they were called in a despatch, poured into the new land with such rapidity that the home government was very unwillingly obliged to sanction the measures which had been taken by Governor Bourke.

This spontaneous colonization brought into the market, under the new system, a vast quantity of accessible land, of a very superior quality for both agricultural and pastoral purposes.

At the same time that the Tasmanians were swarming across Bass's Straits, and the pastors of New South Wales were marching overland with their flocks to this and other new lands of promise, in England a commission had been issued, an act of Parliament obtained, and a charter granted, for colonizing South Australia, an unexplored tract of land, traversed by a river which the adventurous Sturt had descended and ascended, and given the name of South Australia.

The history of the rise, the fall, and the revival of that now great and flourishing colony will be found in its proper place ; but we

A considerable number of acrei were sold by Brisbane and Darling on credit, and paid 1b theae years.

i

Effect Of Speculation. 103

must refer to it here only to show how the speculation of the South Australian Company affected the progress of New South Wales and Port Phillip.

The South Australian adventurers were a camaraderie,* who, although ridiculously ignorant of the practical arts of colonization, as they afterwards proved to the sorrow and ruin of thousands, were adepts of the first water in the arts of puff publicity and parliamentary canvass. They knew how to get up a company, float paragraphs, gather great public meetings, fascinate and cram the ablest writers of the press, agitate Parliament, pack a committee, manufacture a case, and bamboozle the public.

Canals and South American mines had been exhausted; railways were not yet sufficiently advanced, and yet too much advanced to form the subject of speculation; colonization was a new theme; the ignorance of the public made it an admirable one in the hands of a skilful charlatan like Edward Gibbon Wakefield, the John Law of colonization.

The large fortunes realized in Australia — the stories of convicts with thirty and forty thousand pounds a year — the visits of a few of the heepowning plutocracy — the flattering accounts of travellers — attracted attention to New South Wales, at a time when, under the influence of the dire calculations of Malthus, and the evil results of the old poor-law system of unlimited out-door relief, the well-to-do English world was oppressed by the nightmare of a surplus pauper population devouring the landholder and fundholder, and reducing the land to one vast potatofed poorhouse.

But there were drawbacks in the unsavoury name of Botany Bay, and the pickpocket character of its population ; in the fearful amount of crime reported by colonial judges ; and, worst of all, in a tariff of wages daily rising, which were exacted by free emigrants for their services, in spite of the anti-wages combination of the old white slaveowning colonists.

In 1829 an aristocratic adventurer had, with the assistance of a Sydney money-lender, endeavoured to retrieve his fortune by obtaining a grant of land, and conducting an army of helpless gentlemen and ladies, with still more helpless clodhoppers, to the banks of the Swan River, in North-Western Australia, where with the worst possible arrangements the worst possible colonists found themselves planted in the most remote corner of an unexplored continent, on a dangerous port, on barren sand with poisonous pastures, and thickets full of hostile savages — land so barren, and pastures so poisonous, that the exertions

See If. Scribe's comedy of" La Camaraderie

104 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

of nearly half a century, with large assistance from public funds, have not yet enabled Western Australia to pay the expenses of government, or the cost of imports. Port Phillip had more sheep in one year after the first white party landed from Van Diemen's Land than Western Australia in five-and-twenty years.

The increase of sheep depends not on the terms on which land is sold, but on the condition in which grass grows. If pastures are plentiful, so are sheep ; if scanty, poisonous, or wanting in water, they perish as surely as a Wakefieldite colony unpuffed. On the success of New South Wales, and the failure of Swan River, the South Australian scheme was floated.

Give us, said the projectors to the legislature and the speculative public, the territory we mark on the map ; the right of imposing a sufficient price on the land, and of applying it to the importation of labour ; and we will render labour cheap by the exclusion of labourers from the possession of land, concentrate society, introduce agriculture as scientific as that of Great Britain, in addition to the productions of Spain and Italy, and reap all the profits that have been reaped in New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land without the taint of convict labour, or " the dispersion of the semi-barbarous squatter ;" and we will produce a state of society so prosperous and so charming, that the neighbouring cheap-priced convict colonies shall hasten to follow our example.

As they desired so it was granted to them, and under " South Australia" we may read how bands of youths and maidens, and old men who had not gained wisdom with their grey hairs, went singing in triumph to sit down in a sandy plain and spend two years in gambling for town lots and village lots, with their own and with borrowed paper money ; and how they sank into a slough of despondency, and were only saved by resorting to the people and pursuits they had been taught to despise.

But to New South Wales two results arrived through the exertions of the South Australian interest, an interest much more successful in its parliamentary tactics than in its colonizing operations.

First, the sudden abolition of the assignment system and transportation — a righteous act, most rashly performed to the injury of this country and the criminals, to the ruin of Yan Diemen's Land, and the great eventful gain but temporary loss of New South Wales. Secondly, the raising of the price of land from 5s. to £1, and foundation of a grievance the effects of which, in a moral, social, and political point of view, are far too serious to be easily or rapidly calculated.

Price Of Land. 105

It came about in this manner.

When the land of New South Wales was thrown open for sale in unlimited quantities, at a minimum of os. an acre, all who had occupied superior land, with or without licence, sought to purchase their occupations ; many rounded off their grants, and took in large slices of barren land for uniformity, for pasture, or for water. Others, who had had neither influence, nor patience, nor time to wade through the dreary forma of the bureaucrats and martinets under Governor Darling, indulged in freehold as soon as it became a mere matter of money. During the first years, from 1831 to 1836, the assignment system was a great encouragement to purchase land, because with convict labour and a commissariat purchaser, and a roadmaking government, it pays to cultivate agricultural land.

The discovery of Port Phillip brought into the market a greater quantity of good land close to a port than had ever been for sale before. The example of the South Australian land speculators was also infectious, and land speculation, town lots, streets, squares, villages, became the

The news of the avidity with which colonists and absentees purchased wild land, which the government imagined it had been giving away for many years, soon reached the eyes and ears, and inflamed the palms, of the colonial officials.

None are more slow to spend, or greedy to grasp, than officials. Excellent, admirable, generous men in private life seem tainted by official contact. No sooner docs a nobleman or gentleman become invested with an official responsibility than he conducts the business of the nation in a peddling, greedy spirit, which would ruin an English estate, and has ruined many Irish ones. He grasps all, and gives nothing.

Recommend to the lords of the Admiralty or the Woods and Forests the erection of something — a dam, a sluice, a breakwater — that, costing £1,000, will reclaim twenty thousand fat acres, and " my lords have to inform you that they have no funds for such a purpose;" but be so ill advised as to execute works giving value to a whole neighbourhood, and then ask my lords to sell a piece of before valueless mud flat, especially if my lords' influence in Parliament be needed, and the mud becomes, in official eyes, so much solid gold.

In Australian land the Colonial Office thought that it had discovered an exhaustless treasure which could be sold in any quantity, and at any price they chose to fix ; just as in 1845, when all the British world was mad on railways, because one or two lines paid £10 per cent.,

106 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

there were parties who believed that the national debt might be paid off by the government purchasing up all railways — a dream unexecuted, and since dispelled by a universal average dividend of 3£ per cent.

Sir Richard Bourke was one of the few official personages who had the wisdom to comprehend the true uses of colonial land, to appreciate the value of the small farmer as well as the great flockowner, to remain undazzled by overflowing of a treasury filled by the madness of speculating land purchasers, and the courage to dissent from the crotchets of the colonial ministers to which his successor so obsequiously assented.

His despatches, which we disinter from the voluminous blue books which form the obscure records of the legislative progress of Australia, teem with proofs of his wise conciliatory spirit and sound far-seeing views on questions which at this hour would threaten the connection between the colonies and the mother country, if we were still afflicted of Greys and Stanleys for our colonial ministers, and Gipps* and Darlings for colonial governors.

In 1834 the Earl of Aberdeen, infected by Mr. Gibbon Wakefield's crotchets and fallacious evidence on the banefulness of dispersion and the possibility of enforced concentration, addressed a despatch to the Governor of New South Wales, in reference to the efforts then made to colonize Port Phillip, to the effect "that it was not desirable to allow the population to become more scattered than it then was." (At that time the squatting was in its infancy, and not one-third of the country since occupied had been explored.) Sir Richard Bourke replied in a despatch dated 10th October, 1838 : it would have been well if our Colonial Office had studied and understood the full force of the warning : —

" Admitting, as every reasonable person must, that a certain degree of concentration is necessary for the advancement of wealth and civilization, and that it enables government to become at once more efficient and more economical, I cannot avoid perceiving the peculiarities which in this colony render it impolitic, and even impossible, to restrain dispersion within limits that would be expedient elsewhere. The wool oi New South Wales forms at present its chief wealth. The proprietors of thousands of acres find it necessary, equally with the poorer settlers, to send large flocks beyond the boundaries of location, to preserve them in health throughout the year. The colonists must otherwise restrain the increase, or endeavour to raise artificial food for their stock. Whilst nature presents all around an unlimited supply of wholesome pasture, either course would seem a perverse rejection of the bounty of Providence. Independently of these powerful reasons for allowing dispersion,

Squatters. 107

it is not to be disguised that government is unable to prevent it. The question I beg leave to submit is simply this : How may government turn to the best advantage a state of things which it cannot wholly interdict ? It may, I would suggest, be found practicable by means of the sale of land in situations peculiarly advantageous, however distant from other locations, and by establishing townships and ports, and facilitating the intercourse between remote and more settled districts of this vast territory, to provide centres of civilization and government, and thus gradually extend the power of social order to the most distant parts of the wilderness."

Oh, that such words of wisdom had sunk deep into the ears of our legislators, and proved antidotes to the charlatan, swindling tricks of those who mapped out and sold, on a flat-paper plan, barren sands, forest-covered precipitous hills, and rocky, shingly shores !

But, besides home theorists, Governor Bourke had to contend with colonial monopolists in the shape of great land and flock owners, who, forgetting their own or their fathers' original insignificance, grudged every acre and every herd of flock that fell into the hands of hardworking men ; for they thought and said then, what many of the same class think, although they do not dare to say it now, that it was the duty of working men to work, and not aspire to independence.

The governor saw through the selfishness of those who considered the colony their patrimony, and was not led away by a cry against the poor men who fed small flocks or a few cattle on wild land. His judicious measures, although less equitably carried out than he planned them, recently produced a revenue of upwards of £60,000 a year. Ho observes (18th December, 1835) : —

" Another cause to which Judge Burton attributes the prevalence of crime in this colony is the occupation of waste lands by improper persons. The persons to whom Mr. Burton alludes, familiarly called 'squatters, 9 are the objects of great animosity on the part of the wealthier SetUers. It must bo confessed they arc only following in the steps of all the most influential and unexceptionable colonists, whose sheep and cattle stations are everywhere to be found side by side with the obnoxious squatter, and held by no better title. I trust I shall be able to devise some measure that may moderate the evil complained of, without putting a weapon into the hands of selfishness and oppression. # ." And again, in September, 1836 : —

" There is a natural disposition on the part of the wealthy stockholders to exaggerate the offences of the poorer classes of intruders upon crown lands, and an equal unwillingness to suit themselves to such

108 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

restraints as are essential to the due and impartial regulation of this species of occupancy. Of the former disposition I have had ample proof in the result of an inquiry lately instituted as to the number of ticket-ofleave holders in unauthorized occupation of crown land. The dishonest practices of this class of persons in such occupation had been represented as one of the principal evils which required a remedy. I have, however, discovered from the returns of the magistrates, which I called for, that not more than twenty to thirty ticket-of-leave holders occupy crown lands throughout the whole colony, and of these a great proportion are reported to be particularly honest and industrious."

Our next quotation is from a despatch of General Bourke's, dated September, 1837, on the price of land question.

The South Australian theorists had already begun to find some difficulty in carrying out their concentrating schemes. They applied, in the person of one of their commissioners (Colonel Torrens), to have the price of land in the neighbouring colonies raised to the South Australian level — a most impudent demand, considering the terms on which they first asked to be allowed to try their experiment.

They began by saying, our principles of colonization are so superior that we only ask leave to try them, convinced that other colonies will be but too happy to follow our example. But, when they had obtained permission to cut off their own tails, they next demanded, as an act of justice, that neighbouring colonies should be compelled to decaudilize themselves. They particularly objected to the pastoral advantages of Port Phillip, where land was being sold by auction at an upset price of 5s. an acre.

The result of this application to prop up the bubble price of land in South Australia, by affixing the same price to land in Port Phillip and New South Wales, was a despatch from Lord Glenelg to Governor Bourke, authorizing him to raise the upset price of land if he thought fit. Sir Richard Bourke had the courage not to take the official hint, and gave reasons in detail for adhering to a minimum of 5s. an acre for country land, which the experience of the last fifteen years has amply justified and confirmed : —

"Whatever minimum is fixed there will be found instances in which land acquired at that price without opposition will prove a cheap bargain ; but such is not often the case. Land even of very inferior quality, happening to possess a peculiar value to the individual purchasing in consequence of its proximity to his other property, finds a sale solely on that account, cannot be considered as cheaply obtained, even at the minimum price. The cases in which land

Bales Of Land. 109

is sold without opposition, from ignorance of its marketable value on the part of the public, or from the secret agreement or friendly forbearance of those otherwise interested in bidding against each other, must diminish yet more and more as the colony advances in wealth and population ; nor are such accidents, even if they were more numerous, deserving of much consideration. It is upon general tendencies and results thai aft questions of public policy are to be decided.

" The lands now in the market form a surplus, in many cases a refute, consisting of lands which in past years were not saleable at any price, and were not sought after even as free grants.

" By deciding to dispose of them at 5s. an acre, it by no means follows that they will be sold at a higher rate. The result may be to retain them for an indefinite time unsold, a result more certain in consequence of the alternative at the settler's command of wandering over the vast tracts of the interior. A facility for acquiring land at a low price is the safest check to this practice. The wealthiest colonists are continually balancing between the opposite motives presented by the cheapness of (then) unauthorized occupation on the one hand, and the desire of adding to their permanent property on the other. The influence of the latter motive must be weakened in proportion to the augmentation of the upset price.

u Itis possible that the augmentation of the minimum price would have the injurious effect of checking the immigration of persons possessed of smaU capital, desirous of establishing themselves upon land of their own"

We shall hereafter show that all Sir Richard Bourke's predictions were realized. To this hour, in the midst of settled districts, large tracts of land remain the haunt of wild dogs and vermin, which are no more likely to be worth £1 an acre in twenty years to come than they were twenty years ago.

Sir Richard Bourke seems to have been tho only governor, with the exception of Macquarie, who had no free population to act on, thoroughly impressed with the importance of encouraging and protecting, against the prejudices and oppressions of the great settlers, a class of agricultural yeomanry. Since his time, especially under Sir George Gipps, every possible impediment has been thrown in the way of those becoming possessed of freehold farms, who were not rich enough to be great flockowners, but not willing to be mere servants.

The Assignment System.

Another very important event under Sir Richard Bourke was the move toward abolition of assignment, which had previously given settlers

110 Thb Three Colokib8 Of Australia.

servants for both domestic and field work at the mere cost of clothing and maintenance. He was directed to discontinue the assignment of convicts by a despatch from Lord Glenelg, dated 26th May, 1837, which took effect in 1840.

In answer to inquiries contained in that despatch, Sir Richard Bourke stated that from four to five thousand convicts might be profitably employed on public works in the colony, under the control of military officers and non-commissioned officers. He observes, with his usual good sense, " If the abolition of (the assignment of convicts) be resolved on, it should without doubt be gradual, as the sudden interruption of the accustomed supply of labour would produce much distress."

The system was suddenly discontinued during the administration of Governor Bourke' s successor. Great distress among the colonists did ensue, and there can be no question that tenfold more crime was created and perpetuated by the gang system, which under Lord Glenelg*s orders superseded the assignment, than had ever existed in the colony previously.

Undoubtedly the time had arrived when the colony was sufficiently productive and attractive to secure a stream of free emigration. The assignment or white-slave system cannot go on together with immigration of free labourers. The two systems will not work together. The best class of emigrants of any rank, but especially labourers, will not resort to a convict colony. The masters of convicts do not know how to treat free men. In New South Wales it took some years to teach them.

It was not extraordinary that an excess of crime arose. In a population so constituted as that of New South Wales during the existence of the convict system, with such imperfect discipline, such an inequality of sexes, such absence of means for regularly training and educating the rising generation, it is not the amount of native felonry that astonishes us, but that it was not universal. God scattered seeds of virtue in the land which the statesmen and saints of the home country forgot, while all their care and cost were spent on barbarous tribes of cannibals, on Hindoos and negroes. The unbaptized child of the white convict grew up with no more training or teaching than the savage he displaced.

The abolition of the assignment system and of transportation to New South Wales, the result of the selfish conspiracy of a party of laudjobbers, was effected in a hasty ill-considered manner, by the enthusiastic exertions of a number of excellent men, who were overpowered by a "case" cooked in a manner then new to the House of Commons, but now perfectly understood. A change that should have been effected

RETIREMENT OF SIR R. BOURKE. Ill

gradually was made hastily, to the serious pecuniary injury, and eventual benefit, of New South Wales and Port Phillip, but to the ruin, social and financial, of Van Diemen's Land, on which alone was poured the stream of felonry previously distributed over New South Wales.

But this is one of the questions environed in so much difficulty that the government of the day were not specially to be blamed. After fifty years' neglect they were forced by active public opinion to do something. Not knowing how to dilute or deodorize the open drains of human crime which they had been sending through New South Wales for that period, after a series of vain experiments, they ended by turning Van Diemen's Land into one vast overflowing cesspool, ten thousand times more noxious than the evil it was intended to cure.

When Sir Richard Bourke retired — deeply regretted by all the colony, except a small section of prison-flogging magistrates and officials of the true colonial school — New South Wales had attained the highest state of prosperity ; Port Jackson was crowded with shipping bringing free labourers and capitalists, the banks overflowing with money, and the whole population full of the happiest excitement.

The discussions of the Council, although still secret and irresponsible, had assumed a real character, and prepared the way for representative institutions. Restrictions placed upon the summary conviction of prisoners by magistrates, and preparations for the abolition of the assignment system, concurrently with the introduction of free emigrants, by funds derived from the sale of lands, had laid the foundation of a free colony. The colonization of Port Phillip and South Australia by emigrants of a superior class had done much towards directing the attention of this country to an island which had previously been only considered a receptacle for criminals ; while the discovery of vast tracts of fine land in the interior, with an overland communication between the three districts, greatly stimulated the increase of live stock, the growth of wool, and the general value of Australian exports. Australians began to tliink they could walk alone without the aid of convict labour, and the money of the commissariat.

The great event of Sir Richard Bourke's government was the land mania, which, acting and reacting from colony to colony, drove some of the soundest heads to acts of the wildest folly, in which the wealthiest families were involved in ruin, and from the effects of which Australia was eventually relieved by the perpetual increase of flocks and herds feeding on boundless pastures, and tended by the emigrants whom the funds derived from the land mania helped to introduce. He was succeeded by Sir George Gipps.

Chapter X.

GOVERNOR GIPP& 1838 to 1846.

EARLY DISPUTE8 WITH THE COLONISTS— THE REVENUE— PASTORAL INTEREST- LAND SALES-CROWN PATRONAGE — EMIGRATION — LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL BECOMES ELECTIVE— COMMITTEES APPOINTED— THEIR REPORTS— CASE OF THE INSOLVENT REGISTRAR— PROTHOXOTARY— MADHOUSE KEEPER.

THE appointment of Sir George Gipps was, at the same time, most creditable to the government and unfortunate for the colony. He was, when an officer of engineers quartered in Canada at the time of the rebellion, appointed secretary to a commission with Lord Gosford, and then wrote and published an ingenious plan for educating colonies to the use of representative institutions, by establishing a kind of municipal government, under the name of District Councils.

At a time when the colony had advanced from the Algerine rule of Phillip, Macquarie, and Darling, to enjoy the externals of a free state ; a legislative council, no longer secret, although not elective ; courts of law regularly constituted ; trial by jury for political offences ; the right of unlicensed printing; and the liberty, freely exercised, of assembling to discuss political questions — at a time when all the fiery intellect of the colony was burning to acquire the rights of representation and taxation which they had forfeited by becoming colonists, — Sir George Gipps arrived, determined to govern on high prerogative principles; to carry out the determined plans of his master's and his own preconceived views, however distasteful or unsuitable to the colonies. He was a man whose really great abilities were neutralized by a violent, jealous, over-bearing temper. Inflated with pride, he assumed to unite the characters of sovereign and prime minister, to be the chief of the legislative and of the executive. In the one capacity he framed, introduced, and pressed on his pre-conceived schemes, supporting them with vigorous eloquence of tongue and pen ; in the other, he treated opposition, or even that fair discussion which a British minister would expect and invite, as so much personal insult, almost as high treason. Like a true despot, every political opponent was in his eyes a rebel. He was a vain man, too, and could not endure that any measure likely to be creditable to the author, or of benefit to the colony, should originate with other than himself.

Government Of Sib George Gipp8. 113

Ev3 breeds evil. In proportion as the governor was insolent and despotic, the opposition became unreasonable, factious, virulent.

The temper of a statesman dealing with colonial affairs, is even of more importance than his talents.

The obstinacy of George III. and the insolence of Wedderburne cost us the Americas, a load of debt, an ocean of blood and guilt.

If ever — which heaven forbid — Australia should rise up and violently sever her connection with the British crown, the origin of so dire a calamity may be distinctly traced to the manner in which, with the high approval of Earl Grey, Sir George Gipps insulted and coerced the colonists — forcing, with threats and blows, his legislative shoes on their unwilling feet — shoes of the best Downing-street manufacture, of very handsome shape and capital workmanship, everything in fact but a good fit. One pair crushed the toes, the other pinched the instep, the third cut the heel; but of what consequence arc the cuts, the corns, the blisters of a colonist, so long as the Downing-street manufacturer and his foreman are satisfied with their own work ?

" I think I hear a little bird that sings, The people will be wiser by and by."

Yet Sir George Gipps was not without noble as well as brilliant qualities. His hands were clean ; in a different sphere, matched and subdued by the even competition of English public life, he might have done himself honour and the state service ; but his was a temperament ill-suited for the exercise of powers so absolute as those of a colonial governor — powers which he had acquired without any tedious probation. At one stride he passed from a subordinate military rank to the government of a great province of wealthy and discontented men, having in his hands authority which could make or mar a whole class or a whole district.

Had Sir George Gipps been a man of less mark, or a governor of less power, his faults and foibles should have been buried in his grave ; but as he sowed Cadmian seeds of which we may yet have to reap the harvest in armed men, the errors of the man form a part, a most important part, of the history of Australia.

Sir George Gipps was sworn in on the 2d February, 1838.

In 1838 New South Wales, which was supposed, when he was summoned to assume the government, to be in the highest state of prosperity, was already beginning to feel symptoms of the reaction consequent on hasty legislation and over-speculation.

The increasing free population was, not without ample reason, dis-

H

114 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

satisfied with the form of government, and with the manner in which the Colonial Office in England exercised what, in a sort of mockery, are called the rights of the crown.

It is a curious circumstance that under either Whig or Tory government every obnoxious regulation, every discreditable piece of patronage which the colonial minister claims to exercise, is put forward under cover of the sacred rights of the crown.

An ungracious refusal to bestow on some deserving object, at the request of the Colonial Legislature, a few acres of the nation's worthless land, — an insistence in appointing to some office, at an extravagant salary, some English protege", — are both defended on the plea of " asserting the rights of the crown."

The secret Executive Council, which under Sir Richard Bourke had been converted into a Legislative Council, composed of the salaried officers of the local government, with the addition of an equal number of colonists nominated by the governor, had already nurtured enough of the spirit of independence to occasionally dissent from the views of the home government or the governor.

But Governor Bourke took a colonial view of colonial subjects, and, although he was compelled to enforce some jobbing of colonial money, he maintained amicable relations with his council.

Sir George Gipps adopted a different course. Nothing could exceed the contempt with which he treated colonial opinions, or the implicit obedience with which he carried out the views of the Colonial Secretary of State.

From a host of disputes on every possible question, we select four which are still matters of contention between the colonies and the mother country : —

First, as to the manner in which the price of crown lands was

raised, lowered, fixed, unfixed, and raised again. Secondly, as to the employment of the revenues derived from

the sale and lease of crown lands. Thirdly, as to the extent to which the colonists were taxed for paying expenses consequent on the transportation system, by the cost of gaols, police, &c. Fourthly, on the manner in which the home government exercised the patronage of the crown — by passing over colonial claims, — by appointing unfit persons to exercise responsible offices, and by fixing unreasonable salaries on easy appointments. These four grievances were discussed on one or more distinct cases.

Revenub And Expenditure. 115

On all the governor took up the position of high " prerogative" in the most offensive manner, and found his conduct approved and applauded by the home government.

The Revenue.

The revenue dispute in a new shape, but on the same substantial ground, exists to this day, — a new form of the old grievance of " taxation without representation"

It commenced in 1832, when Lord Goderich, then Secretary of State for the Colonies, directed Sir Richard Bourke to submit annually to the Legislative Council an estimate of the exjwnditure proposed to be charged on the colonial revenues. This estimate, if passed by the council, was to be embodied in an ordinance, and forwarded to the home government for his Majesty's approval. If rejected, the majority were to be requested to furnish their estimate, and the two were to be forwarded for " his Majesty's approval." With this illusory control, the non-official but nominee members and the colonists were obliged to be content. It was not of much use to object to an estimate that had to travel round the world ; and, although they sometimes protested against any particularly scandalous job, their protests were received, and — laid up with other dusty papers.

At that period the administrative powers of the governor had been so far clipped, without addition to the legislative powers of the colonies, that he could scarcely erect a pair of stocks without first reporting to Downing-street, with plan and estimate. No wonder that almost all the non-official party in the colony were republicans.

In 1835 the expence of maintaining the police establishment and gaols was made a colonial charge. Every non-official and two official members of the council protested against this heavy burden, on the ground that these cxjwnses were largely increased by the presence of all the transported felonry of Great Britain, either as prisoners or freecU men. To this it was answered, that the colony had had the benefit of their work. However, as a per contra, the surplus of the fund derived from the sale or lease of crown land was allowed to be taken to assist the colonial revenues, after defraying the expenses of emigration. The terms of this arrangement or contract, as the colonists assert, are to be found in despatches with enclosures from Mr. Spring Rice, and from Lord Glenelg, dated respectively 15th November, 1834, and 10th July,

It is not now worth while to quote or discuss them. The truth seems to be, that, while the returns from the land revenue were trifling,

H 2

116 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

the officers of the crown did not care to have the spending of them, having admitted that it was "just and reasonable that the revenues should be applied wholly and exclusively for the benefit of the colony." But, when the land revenues rose to hundreds of thousands of pounds annually, the question assumed a different aspect in the eyes of a young but accomplished bureaucrat like Sir George Gipps.

Sir Richard Bourke, after receiving the despatches in question, believed that the Legislative Council had the complete control of the )and revenue. He seems to have been always anxious to extend the legislative powers of the colonies.

Sir George Gipps commenced what may be called, to use a slang term of modern politics, his reactionary course of policy, by repudiating the assumed contract, in the extract from a despatch, dated November, 1838, which alone affords a complete key to the favour in which he was held at the Colonial Office, and the detestation in which he was held in the colony : —

"It is asserted in the colony that the right to appropriate this revenue was conceded to the governor and council by a despatch, &c, and that this right was recognised by Sir Richard Bourke.

" Notwithstanding the strength of these expressions, I must say that I very much doubt whether, by the Treasury letter of the 24th September, 1834, it was intended to give up unreservedly, and for ever, the right to select the objects on which the crown revenue (viz., from colonial land) should be expended ; and I therefore, whenever occasion required, maintained, during the last session of the council, that the crown has still power to do so — -feeling that, if wrong in this opinion, I could easily set myself right with the council ; but, if I committed an error the other way, J might involve myself in difficulties from which there would he no escape"

And he proceeds with great ingenuity to " get up a case" to enable the Colonial Office at home to shear the colonists of the trifling powers recently conceded to them.

This was a very pretty quarrel to begin with, and the governor lost no opportunity of improving it.

Whether the contract existed or not, it is quite clear that the powers claimed and exercised by the governor and the colonial secretary, in the much-abused name of the sovereign, amounted to revolting despotism under a caricature of free discussion.

The colonists were expected to defray the cost of their own government, with all the addition of police and gaol expenses incident to a .periodical inoculation of British-grown felonry, and, with the sham of

William Wentworth. 117

a Legislative Council and financial discussions, all sources of revenue, except additional taxation, being removed from their control.

As to the crown or waste lands, the price, the management, the expenditure of the funds arising from them in emigration, were settled by English commissioners ; the surplus was appropriated by the Crown.

The custom-house tariff and the rules for levying it were settled and the officers appointed by the English custom-house.

As to the funds raised by local taxation, the Colonial Secretary, in the name of the crown, created offices, fixed fines, salaries, and appointed officers, without the slightest regard to the wants or wishes of the colonists.

The grievance with respect to the appropriation of the land revenues became more unbearable in consequence of the orders and acts of the home government in respect to the land question, which were in direct opposition to the feelings and interests of the colonists.

In 1842, a representative character was given to the Legislative Council, by introducing into it twenty-four elective members.

It was with this body, while the colony was in a state of insolvency, that Governor Gipps's battles commenced, and were carried on with an acerbity on both sides which did not breed a rebellion, because the materials in the shape of coercive powers had not been conceded to the governor*

The new council lost no time in investigating the grievances of the colony, and soon collected a most formidable list, although the most oppressed class of all, the small settlers, were entirely unrepresented.

The revenues, the price of crown lands, the assessments on the pastoral proprietors, the abuses in the exercise of crown patronage, successively attracted the attention of the opposition, vigorously led by William Wentworth, a gentleman of brilliant talents and great oratorical powers, whose influence was unfortunately impaired by a violent temper and want of taste, the necessary result of a provincial education among men vastly inferior in intellect, and long exclusion from a legitimate exercise of his powers.

Without the evidence extracted by these Legislative Councils of New South Wales it would be impossible to credit that a government at home professed to be formed on " reform" and " retrenchment could perpetrate and maintain powers so oppressive and jobs so corrupt.

But jobbery and despotism seem incident to all coqwrate bodies which have the control of sea-divided territories. It w:is impossible to imagine anything worse than the administration of the Colonial Office

118 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

until the New Zealand Company, composed entirely of pure colonial reformers, was established, and showed in perfection what a colonizing Robert Macaire could do with a large capital, a directorate of credulous capitalists, and an array of still more credulous colonists.

The First Parliament of Australia.

The first Legislative Council, which contained twenty-four elected representatives, in addition to the nominees and official members, met for the first time, for the despatch of business, on Thursday, August 3, 1843, and was opened by Sir George Gipps, in the following speech, which it may be interesting to compare with those delivered by the respective governors of the three colonies, at the first opening of the assemblies with more extended powers, in 1851 : —

u Gentlemen of the Legislative Council

" The time has at length arrived which has, for many years, been anxiously looked forward to by us all ; and I have this day the pleasure to meet, for the first time, the Legislative Council of New South Wales, enlarged as it has been under the statute recently passed by the Imperial Parliament for the government of the colony. I congratulate you very sincerely on the introduction of popular representation into our constitution, and I heartily welcome to this chamber the first representatives of the people.

" The period, gentlemen, at which you enter on your functions, is one of acknowledged difficulty, and it is therefore more grateful to me to have my own labours and responsibilities lightened by your co-operation and assistance.

" I shall most readily concur with you in any measures which may be calculated to develop the resources of the colony, by calling into action the energies of the people, taking care, however, that we proceed on sure principles, and not overlooking the great truths, that the enterprise of individuals is ever most active, when left as far as possible unshackled by legislative enactment, and that industry and economy are the only sure foundations of wealth. Great as undoubtedly are the embarrassments under which numbers, even of the most respectable, of our fellow-subjects in the colony are now labouring, it is consolatory to me to think, that grievous though they be to individuals, they are not of a nature permanently to injure us as a community; that, on the contrary, they may be looked on as forming one of those alterations in the progress of human events which occur in all countries, and perhaps most frequently in those whose general prosperity is the greatest.

" Nor should we, gentlemen, enter upon the labours of this session, without making our grateful acknowledgments to Almighty God for the many blessings he has showered down upon us. Our embarrassments may be the effect of our own errors — but it is to His bounty and goodness we are indebted, that the fruits of the earth, as well as the productions of industry, abound throughout the land. If, in addition to the monetary confusion which has grown out of our excessive speculations, it had pleased the Almighty further to chastise us with drought or scarcity, the condition of New South Wales, and more particularly that of the labouring classes of its population, might have been lamentable indeed. As it

Speech Of Sir George G1Ppb. 119

is I do not doubt that, by frugality and prudence, we may overcome all our difficulties ; and, I am nappy to say, there is nothing in what more immediately concerns the government, to lessen in any degree the confidence which I feel in the stability of the country. Cheapness and plenty cannot be permanent impediments to the advancement of any community.

"I shall immediately cause to be laid before you numerous public documents of much importance, and some projects for amendment in the law. Amongst these latter will be the draft of an act for the establishment of a General Registry, and of one to regulate the office of sheriff. I shall also have to direct your attention to the state of the law. under which the Savings* Bank of the colony is established : the propriety will, I think, be readily admitted of placing the credit of this most useful institution beyond the reach of doubt.

u I shall speedily cause the estimates for the year 1844 to be brought under your consideration, and take advantage of that occasion to make a clear exposition of the financial state of the colony.

u The despatch from the Secretary of State, No. 181, of the 5th September, 1842, b a document of such importance, that I think it ought to appear on the record of your proceedings, and accordingly I shall lay it before you, notwithstanding it has been already printed by order of the late council.

" In this despatch, the views are explained of her Majesty's Government in respect to the Act of Parliament under the provisions of which I now meet you for the first time in this chamber.

u The benevolent intentions of her Majesty, her Majesty's advisers, and of the British Parliament, are so well set forth in the words of the noble Secretary of State, that I feel I should only weaken the effect they are calculated to produce upon you were I at any length to comment on them, or make to them additions of my own. I cannot, however, gentlemen, on this my first occasion of addressing you, avoid adverting to the peculiar constitution which has been given to your body — or to the fact, that to you singly have been confided by the Imperial Parliament the powers which, in some of the older colonies of Great Britain are divided between two separate bodies.

"The council, gentlemen, is composed of three elements, or three different classes of persons — the representatives of the people — the official servants of her Majesty, and of gentlemen of independence — the unofficial nominees of the Crown.

u Let it not be said or supposed that these three classes of persons have, or ought to have, separate interests to support — still less that they have opposing interests, or any interest whatever, save that of the public good. Let there be no rivalry between them, save which shall in courtesy excel the other, and which of them devote itself most heartily to the service of their common country."

After the delivery of this speech the council adjourned until two o'clock, when the opposition commenced without delay its longbrooded operations, as shown in " Votes and Proceedings " : —

" Motion made and question put, ' That an humble address bo presented to his excellency the governor, returning thanks to his excellency for his speech to the council. '

" Moved as an amendment that the word ' humble* be expunged ; passed."

120 Th3 Three Colonies Of Australia.

The following case, gathered from the reports of the committees of the Legislative Council appointed to inquire into certain gross cases of embezzlement and mismanagement, affords one example of the " patronage grievance," of the sort of persons selected for colonial office, the nature of the powers they assumed on the strength of holding a home instead of a colonial appointment, and the manner in which they performed their duties.

The Defaulting Registrar.

In 1841 the Registrar of the Supreme Court became a defaulter ; in the following year he took the benefit of the Insolvent Act, and eventually paid a dividend of sixpence in the pound.

The committee which investigated his case, with the view of obtaining redress from the home government for the sufferers by the malversation of their appointed, reported, that the first registrar, Colonel Galway Mills, was a decayed gentleman, with no knowledge of business, and who, therefore, left what there was to be done to other officers. On his death the governor and council recommended that the office, in the then state of the colony not needed, should be abolished ; but, before receiving or without attending to this recommendation, the defaulter in

question, Mr. M , was appointed. His antecedents were not more

encouraging than those of Colonel Mills. In 1811 he had executed a deed of assignment of all his property for the benefit of his creditors ; and in 1823, after returning from an eight years' residence on the Continent, had taken the benefit of the Insolvent Act ; in 1828 had been appointed chief justice of Nova Scotia, and had been permitted to exchange the appointment for that of registrar of the Supreme Court of New South Wales, with the duty of collecting the effects of intestates, and, according to his own account, the privilege of investing the money for his own benefit pending its distribution.

On arrival at the colony he took up a high position ; that part of his duty which related to registering deeds of grants of crown land he entirely neglected and suffered to fall into an arrear, which eventually involved great numbers of the humbler class in litigation and ruin. But the collection of the estates of intestates he entered on as zealously as any wrecker on the spoils of storms. The presence of near relatives was no protection for the moneys of the deceased ; in defiance of son, brother, or father, he grasped all the estate, invested it in his own name, for his own benefit, and from 1828 to 1838 kept neither daybook, cash-book, nor ledger, but one account at his banker's, rendered

Defalcation Of The Registrar. 121

no statement for audit to any one, and paid over what balance, if any, to the next of kin of intestates when and how he pleased.

In 1838 the judges made rules of court requiring the registrar to pass his accounts and pay the balance into the savings' bank.

The great man remonstrated against these rules in a most indignant tone, " as threatening to take from him a source of legitimate income, on the faith of which he immigrated to the colony," and intimated that, u unless he was permitted to retain and make use of the money himself, lie would use no exertions to obtain it."

At this audit he reported himself to be in possession of £1,989 17s. OJd., but the court, after argument, found £3,085 18s. 2d. due, compelled him to pay it into court, and, in spite of violent resistance, in which he was supported by one of the official legal advisors of the governor, had a set of rules of court sanctioned by the governor in council, under which the registrar was bound to account regularly and pay in the proceeds of every intestate estate within a certain fixed time (three months from the period of the intestacy) ; the injured registrar all the time protesting that " the judges wore reflecting on his honour by calling for accounts, and depriving him of the legitimate profits to be derived from the employment of other men's money, which had induced him to settle in the colony."

The judges being firm, and supported by the council, the registrar then resorted to fraud, and in the course of two years became possessed of £9,000. When no longer able to conceal his appropriations, he announced his insolvency in a debonnair yet dignified manner — a condescending, much-injured style — which could only come from a colonial official.

The sufferers by this embezzlement petitioned for compensation from the home government. The correspondence with the appropriator is extremely rich and racy. Throughout he appears to consider himself deeply injured. The home government rejected the prayers of the petitioners.

The 'Patronage of the Law Courts.

The next case is illustrative of the confidence with which colonial secretaries set aside colonial recommendations ; the avidity with which they embrace opportunities of patronage ; the indifference with which they increase salaries ; and the admirable skill with which certain governors imbibe the principles of the chiefs.

The judge, Chief Justice Dowling, finding it needful to recommend that certain offices included in the charter of justice should be filled

122 THS three colonies of Australia.

up, and especially that of prothonotary, at a salary of £800 per annum, for which he recommends one Mr. John Grover, late chief clerk, " who, from his long services, indefatigable industry, and experience, is admirably qualified for the office ;" the Governor Gipps, the late captain of engineers, enters into a correspondence, as was his custom, with the judges, in which he instructs them how to manage the business of their courts, and save £50 a year.

The judges demur, and show the governor that he knows nothing about the matter.

The question is referred to the colonial secretary, Lord Stanley, who settles the question in King Stork fashion, without a moment's loss of time. He does not appoint the gentleman recommended by the judges ; in other respects he follows the recommendations of the governor, and sends out two new officers, one at £1,000 a year, and the other at £850 ; creating a third for appointment, at £650, by the governor ; at a blow saddling the colony with increased salaries to the extent of £400 a year, on the ground that in England competent persons could not be induced to accept these offices for less. An early act of one of these gentlemen was to set at defiance the local legislature on a matter of salary, while the other was a ruined, aged, brokendown attorney.

We have only to imagine, in order to understand colonial feeling on these subjects, the case of the town council of Liverpool applying for a Stipendiary magistrate, stating their willingness to pay a salary of £800, and suggesting a particularly well-qualified gentleman to fill it, and their receiving a total stranger, with orders to pay him £200 more than they had offered. It seems the rule with all officials appointed from England to treat with the greatest contempt the colonists who pay them.

The Lunatic Asylum,

An inquiry into the management of the Colonial Lunatic Asylum brought out facts equally characteristic of the independence and irresponsibility of all officials, up to the time that the elected members of the Legislative Council began to exercise their privilege of inquiry. Again, in 1846, a select committee of the Legislative Council investigated the condition of Tarban Creek, the only lunatic asylum in New South Wales. In the course of this inquiry it appeared that the head keeper and his wife, the matron, in consequence of having received their appointment direct from the Secretary of State, had habitually resisted all attempts to control or even investigate the performance of

State Of The Lunatic Asylum. 123

their duties, by the visiting magistrates or colonially-appointed physician. Lunatics are sufficiently neglected and abused even to this hour in England, but it is only in a colony that a sort of turnkey for lunatics would presume to set the dignity of his office against both magistrates and medical men.

The visiting magistrate " had occasion to refer to the governor for definite instructions in consequence of the superintendent considering that he was interfering." " My authority is repudiated by Mr. Digby ; he says I have no right to interfere ; although he gives me every information in his power, he does so in courtesy, protesting against any right to interfere."

The committee found " no books or registers such as ought to be kept in a public establishment, no record of cases, no written statement of the appearance of any patient at the time of his admission, or of the progress of the disease, or of the treatment, medical and moral."

" The medical officer is not in his proper position." According to evidence, " He gets all his information from me (the keeper) as to the particulars of the case and form of insanity." The same witness stated, that in going round with the doctor, if he suggests any alteration in their moral treatment, and it appears to him (the kcejKjr) an improvement, he acts upon it ; but that if he does not approve of it he does not yield to him. For instance, he might recommend that restraint should be taken oft' a patient, but if, from a better knowledge of the party, he might not deem it advisable, he should refuse to do so."

We quote this passage because it so perfectly illustrates the manner in which colonists and colonial interests are treated.

It is quite evident that the merits of this worthy officer of the order of the strait jacket were not duly acknowledged. He ought to have been a colonial governor or a colonial secretary. Colonists are treated like the Tarban Creek lunatics : they do not know what is good for them — neither do their doctors, their representatives. The governor is the man ; he is responsible to no one ; and, although the doctor stated the Legislative Council may recommend removing restraint, he knows better.

With these examples we leave the subject of official responsibility, and return to the three great questions which agitated the colony during the whole administration of Sir George Gipps, and which still continue to excite the interest and apprehension of all who look ahead —

" The Land," and " Emigration," and " Taxation without Representation."

124 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

The Land Question.

In August, 1838, Lord Glenelg, who had become infected with the Wakefield theory, instructed Sir George Gipps to substitute 12s. for 5s. as the upset price of ordinary land, observing, " If you should observe that the extension of the population should still proceed with a rapidity beyond what is desirable, and that the want of labour still continues to be seriously felt, you will take measures for checking the sale of land even at 12s."

It is thus evident that at this time the Colonial Office believed that dispersion might be checked and labour cheapened by putting a high price on land, — a fallacy which has long since been exploded.

Between 1838 and 1842 Sir George Gipps experimented by repeatedly raising and lowering the price of land. In 1840 and 1841, so far from the increased price of land having checked, it had stimulated dispersion, while labour was alternately dearer than ever, and unemployed.

It was under these circumstances that an effort was made to prop up the insolvent colony of South Australia, by passing, in 1841, an imperial act which fixed the minimum price of land in the Australian colonies at £1 an acre.

At the period that the elective Legislative Council commenced its labours in 1843, the dissatisfaction of the colonists with the fixed minimum price of £1 an acre had become universal.

The wealthy parties who had expected their free grants, and their purchases at 5s. an acre, to be augmented in value by the increased price, were disappointed ; the speculators who, following the example of the South Australians, had purchased large lots in the hope of realizing large profits, by laying out proper towns and villages, were either insolvent or encumbered with tracts of useless waste land, unsaleable and unprofitable. The class of small settlers were deeply discontented with the impediments thrown in the way of purchasing small farms in good agricultural districts ; while the great pastoral proprietors, who were also most of them landowners in the settled districts, were worried — no other word will express the policy of Sir George Gipps — by regulations and restrictions imposed, repealed, and reimposed in a most arbitrary manner, with the view of compelling the purchase of occupation at the ruinous price of £1 an acre.

In the insolvent crisis which followed the land mania of 1837-8-9, live stock was absolutely valueless ; cattle were allowed to rove wild unnumbered on the hills, and sheep which had cost 30s. a piece were

Committees On The Land System. 125

unsaleable at Is. 6d. ; when it occurred to an ingenious gentleman that an animal whom it would not pay to watch and feed, and whose flesh was worth nothing, might be worth something as tallow. He tried the experiment, and, after some difficulties of a mechanical nature had been overcome, he succeeded in establishing a minimum value on live stock according to the market price of tallow. Flocks and herds became at the worst " good to boil" for so much ; and this is now one of the staple trades of the colony.

The boiling-down process suggested a caricature on the struggle between the rebellious squatters, who would not buy land, and the Wakefieldite governor, who was determined that they should. Sir George Gipps, with some of his principal abettors, was represented superintending the operation of a huge cauldron, in which bearded squatters were floating like shrimps, with a huge ladle inscribed " £1 an Acre:** he scoops out a few wretches, and observes, "After all they won't concentrate

In the same year that the new council met, Lord Stanley's despatch accompanying the act of Parliament which gave legislative fixity to the land system, which had previously rested on orders in council, arrived in the colony, and damped the expectations of those who had hoped the failure of this panacea in promoting concentration, regulating wages, and encouraging cultivation, would induce the home government to consult a little more the wishes and interests of actual colonists. Land sales had ceased, the fund for emigration purposes was exhausted, and the pastoral interest found their fortunes already seriously injured by the depreciation of their stock, and threatened with ruin by the personal hostility of a governor aided by irresponsible advisers.

Under these circumstances, the first of four committees of the Legislative Council held its sittings, examined witnesses, and made its report. In 1843, 1844, 1845, 1847, and 1848, committees have investigated and reported always in the same sense, always with an increasing volume of evidence against this vain attempt to regulate wages, protect capital, and force concentration.

The committee of 1843 on " the crown land sales" examined, amongst others, Sir Thomas Mitchell, the celebrated Australian explorer, and engineer of the Bat hurst road over Mount Victoria, one of the M'Arthurs, and several landed and pastoral proprietors. They reported that " the act of Parliament under their consideration cannot but be injurious in its operation — that it is calculated to prevent emi-

In the despatches of all the Colonial Secretaries, from Lord denelR to Earl Grey, wc find Instructions which show that they were under the delusion that pastoral dispersion could be restrained by a high price of land.

126 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

gration (of small capitalists), to withdraw capital, and to prevent the permanent occupancy of ike toU"

In 1844 a "select committee on grievances connected with land in the colony" examined twenty-six witnesses, and received answers to a printed circular of questions from one hundred and twenty-two justices of the peace.

The attention of the committee was directed, among other subjects, to the minimum price of land, and to the attempts to harass the squatter, not being a purchaser of land, by rendering his tenure of crown lands as uncertain and onerous as possible.

All the witnesses who were asked the question (except Air. Deas Thompson, the Colonial Secretary, who declined, on the ground of his official character, to give an answer), and all the replies to the circulars, except three, expressed decided opinions against the measure which raised the minimum price of crown land from 5s. to £1 ; all justly taking it for granted that at £1 an acre the purchase of pastoral lands impossible, claimed fixity of tenure by lease, and right of preption for the squatter. The latter was the grand point with the squatters ; that gained, their interest in the land question, except in promoting sales to create an emigration fund, ceased.

"The opinions of the three dissentients from the report of the committee exhibit very exactly the feelings of the small class, resident chiefly in Fort Phillip and South Australia, who advocate the high price of land.

These three gentlemen are —

John Fitzgerald Leslie Foster, of Leslie Park, Melbourne ; Peter Arthur, of Arthurton, Melbourne ; John Moore Airey, of Geelong.

Mr. Foster says very candidly, " I look on the price of one pound as not too much for agricultural land, and as a prohibition on the purchase of mere pastoral land. Being both a landholder and a settler, I would, in both characters, regret to see any reduction in the price, as it would not only reduce the value of my (purchased) land, but, by rendering it easier for others to purchase my (rented) runs, would diminish the permanent interest I now hold in them.*'

Mr. Moore thought " the country destined, from its physical character, to become an aristocratic one ;" that " the class of emigrants really beneficial to the country, English country gentlemen with some property, but with large families and limited means, would not be deterred by £1 an acre ; that a class of small but independent farmers will never be

Dehakds Of The Squatters. 127

generally adapted to the country ; that it will eventually fall into the bands of a landed aristocracy, who, possessing the frontages to water convenient to the residence of tenants, will possess capital sufficient to guard them against the vicissitudes of the seasons, as well as means to cultivate the interior to advantage."

Mr. Peter M' Arthur (no relation to the Arthur of Camden) M arrived in the colony in 1834, specially introduced to the favour and protection of the governor by the Secretary of State." He recommends that " the governor should have the power to grant twelve thousand eight hundred acres to respectable parties of station and education and capital, and of habits worthy of being imitated by the humbler class ;" one thousand acres to be purchased at £1 an acre, payable by instalments in ten years ; the remaining eleven thousand eight hundred to be held on a perpetual quit rent of £12 per annum.

These three gentlemen evidently considered that imperial and colonial interests were bound up in the encouragement of their class, in the protection of their interests, and the keeping down of aspiring yeomanry.

The report of this committee on crown-land grievances was the foundation of a fierce agitation on the part of the pastoral interests for the suppression of the obnoxious regulations as to the pastoral occupations, and for fixity of tenure. In this agitation, which was also directed against the £1 acre minimum, the whole colony joined. Public meetings were held in every part of New South Wales ; petitions and memorials addressed to the home government were signed, sent to England, and placed in the hands of political men of influence ; and influential organs of the English press were enlisted in defence of the great pastoral interest.

The governor stood firm ; determined to make war on the squatters,

determined to maintain the obnoxious £1 an acre, and to carry out

the spirit of the act which imposed it, by throwing, as he was instructed,

all possible obstacles in the way of men of small capital investing their

savings in land ; and he was supported not only by the British Colonial

Office, but by the consciousness that, if the squatters succeeded in their

demands, millions of acres, including land admirably adapted for

settlements and agriculture, would be handed over to them for ever at a

nominal rent.

But the colonial public, seeing the injustice of endeavouring to

harass the squatters to their ruin by forcing them to purchase their

holdings, lent them a moral support which enabled them, after some

jean 9 battling, to obtain a virtual fixity of tenure, a result similar to the

copartnership of the giant and the dwarf in Goldsmith's story. The

128 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

squatters gained all and more than all they could have hoped by ordinances promulgated in 1847, after the retirement of Sir George Gipps ; they obtained leases, the right of pre-emption for 320 acres or more at a fixed price of £1 an acre without auction, thus enabling them to secure the finest spot on each run, compensation for improvements at the termination of a lease : their rent was calculated on the capabilities of each run for carrying stock, and on a poll tax which, by being fixed at the minimum rent of 4,000 sheep or 600 headtrf cattle, effectually protected them from the competition of the class of small settlers whom Sir Richard Bourke described as the objects of so much jealousy and unjust persecution by the great pastoral proprietors.

The results of this compromise, which ended a fierce battle, to be renewed at no distant period, are admirably summed up in the report of a " select committee of the Legislative Council" in 1847, over which Robert Lowe, Esq., late fellow and tutor of University College, Oxon, then a practising barrister in the courts of New South Wales, presided Chairman.*

But the maladministration of the crown lands was not, and is not, the only cause for the chronic discontent of the colonists, a discontent fostered by the perverse tenacity and insolent defiance of colonial opinions with which a series of colonial secretaries adhered to chamber theories, for the management of an Anglo-Saxon race at the antipodes.

In 1844 a select committee of the Legislative Council investigated and reported on " grievances unconnected with land." The principal of these grievances remains unredressed to this hour.

They complain of being saddled with taxation for a civil list which they were not empowered to discuss, to the extent of £81,000. By the act of 1850 this civil list has been increased to £150,000 a year.

Of the total failure of the " district councils," which created municipalities where the sparse population render popular election and local taxation impossible, and which placed in the hands of the governors the nomination of an officer with powers of local taxation.

Of the want of a " responsible government," the governor being, in fact, merely a subordinate officer of the Colonial Secretary of State for the time being; and the governor's official advisers in a position which made them practically as independent of the Legislative Council as if they had been merely his private friends. Thus, so long as the governor and his official advisers satisfied the home authorities, the colonists were without a remedy for any illegality

Mr. Lowe haa since returned to England, has taken an actiro and fa— part In colonial questions! and become M.P. for Kidderminster.

Six Grievances. 129

committed by the colonial government, however flagrant. As an instance of the working of the system, the report cites £127,000 applied to various illegal (not fraudulent) purposes by the governor, in the course if seven years; and specially "a sum of £15,189 lis. 5£d., expended jy the governor, in excess of the appropriations for certain authorized services, and a sum of £30,743 15s. which was not only expended by his excellency, without any authority of the Legislative Council, but a large portion of it was applied, by the governor's mere fiat, to the payment of debentures and other purposes to which the ordinary revenue was not applicable by law. 7 '

Thus, in New South Wales, the liberty of talking and taxing themselves was the only liberty allowed the local parliament : they might vote supplies, protest against illegal acts, and, u having protested/' as Lord Ellcnborough said to Hone, u go about their business."

A fourth grievance was the expensein police, gaols, and judicial expenditure imposed the colonists by New South Wales being made the receptacle for the felons of England, after it had ceased to derive the profits of the assignment system, and the violation of the (alleged) compact by which, under Sir Richard Bourke, in return for assuming this expense, which had, previous to his time, paid by the home government, the surplus land revenues and other casual revenues of the crown were ceded to the colonial treasuries.

Under this head the committee claimed the repayment of £831,742 3s. 7d., and for the future an annual payment towards police, gaols, and courts of assize of £74,105 Gs. 8d.

Fifthly, they desired that having claims of any description against the local government should, by act, be enabled to have a public officer as nominal defendant.

Sixthly, they claimed that the judges of the Supreme Court should be placed in the same position as to tenure of office and security of salary as belonged to the mother country , and not suspended by the fiat and removed by the report of the governor.

These grievances, so distinctly set forth and vigorously protested against in 1844, had already been the subject of contest with the governor in the first session of the Legislative Council, when the representative members asserted their privileges by cutting down the estimates, and refusing to vote the sums required for police and judicial expenses, in addition to the civil list of £81,000.

But it would be impossible within any reasonable space to detail the series of overt acts which characterized the sedition-breeding policy of Sir George Gipps.

130 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Session after session it was a game at cross purposes and crooked answers between the representatives of the colonists, the governor, and his patrons in Downing-street. For instance, the colonists propose to reduce the salaries of certain colonial custom-house officers ; in the next session of the British Parliament, it is presumed at the instigation of Governor Gipps, the Colonial Secretary passes a special act taking that department from the control of the newly-created colonial Parliament.

The colonists propose to spend £9,000 of their own money in building a lighthouse in Bass's Straits ; they are informed that they must first consult the home government on its situation — a matter of two years' delay.

The colonists pass an act establishing mortgage and register for mortgages on wool; the Colonial Secretary of State disallows the act as repugnant to the laws of England, without consulting the colonists, and is soon compelled to retrace his steps.

Eventually, after long delay and great loss of property, the home government is obliged to yield and sanction a most valuable colonial institution.

The colonists examine and unanimously protest against the land system established by the Imperial Parliament, and still more unanimously against the ordinances affecting pastoral occupation ; the Secretary of State, without waiting for the arrival of memorials and petitions which, as Sir George Gipps admitted, expressed the almost unanimous opinions of the colonists, hastens to pen in a despatch "his determination to uphold the land system, and perfect approval of the arbitrary powers exercised by the governor against the squatting interest."

There, again, the home government was afterwards compelled to retreat.

A bill is introduced into the British Parliament for establishing a new system of pastoral occupation — the ex-governor is consulted — the Legislative Council arc left in ignorance of the provisions of the bill. In fact, the records of the Legislative Council are largely occupied with discussions between the governor and the elected members on every possible subject, the governor constantly adopting a line of defiance, always treating the opposition as if it were rebellion. On the one side were the colonists, on the other the governor, backed by the home government, and concentrating in his own person all power and patronage, supported by the official members, and the nominees, who were plainly instructed that, unless prepared to support the governor, "right or wrong," if a governor could be wrong, they must resign.

Change In Character Of Emigration. 131

The ability and integrity of the Colonial Secretaries of State during the administration of Sir George Gipps, and of Sir George himself, are indisputable ; but then they insisted on knowing whether shoes fitted or not better than the people who wore, and insisted, too, that they should wear them. Fortunately the prosperity of the colony did not entirely depend on the crotchets of a colonial minister, or of a governor, although both could, and did, seriously retard its progress.

While the Legislative Council were contesting, inch by inch, the "elementary rights of Englishmen," the grass was growing, the sheep were breeding, the stockmen were exploring new pastures, and the frugal industry of settlers was replacing and increasing the capital lost by wild speculations.

Before Sir George Gipps retired, in 1846, he was able to announce that the revenue exceeded the expenditure, and the exports the while the glut of labour which followed his arrival had been succeeded by a demand which the squatters termed a dearth.

Chapter Xi. Emigration.

EFFECTS OF CESSATION' OF GRANTS OF LAND -CREDIT DUE TO SOl'TH AUSTRALIAN COMMISSIONERS— ANXIETY OF SCATTERS TO IUJIXG DOWN WARES— THEIR ALPHA AND OMEGA, TO BREED SHEEP AND GROW WOOL— SEVEN COMMITTEES OF LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL— THE CONTRAST— ltoYD— CAMl'HELL.

WHEN grants of land ceased altogether, and were superseded by sales, the character of emigration to Australia, and even the motives which directed it, were materially changed. To Australia, previous to 1831, in small numbers, proceeded the same class of persons who by thousands have resorted, during the last ten years, to Canada, and, above all, to the western states of America — families with capital varying from fifty to five hundred pounds, intent on living on land of their own.

The distance, and the then little known capabilities, of Australia would, twenty vears ago, have made it, under anv circumstances, a difficult task to direct towards its shores a similar stream of colonists ; but the new system of so raising the price? and the quantity of land, sold so as to discourage the purchases of all but the wealth v, and of devoting

132 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

the proceeds to the importation of able-bodied labourers for their use, altered the whole character of the free colonization. The new system was not without merits as a temporary expedient, adopted in order to supply, as rapidly as possible, the demand for shepherd servants occasioned by the abolition of the assignment system, and to people the shores of the newly-settled districts in Port Phillip and South Australia. But as a permanent measure the moral and social defects were, and are, very serious.

By the emigration land fund system the parent state is relieved of a certain amount of (surplus?) labour without expense, and the colonies are supplied with the same, in proportion to the amount received for the purchase or rent of land. According to the principles of the system, those who are rich enough to purchase or rent land (the minimum of rent being 4,000 sheep) have a right to dictate what manner of labour shall be supplied for the money. The sort of labourers who suit the employers of labour are not often those who would contribute most to the intelligence and education of a colony. For a long series of years the Australian flockowners* beau-ideal of an emigrant was an able-bodied single man from an agricultural county — humble, ignorant, and strong.

The South Australian commissioners exhibited one halfpennyworth of sense amid gallons of nonsense and jobbery by introducing the system of pair* of both sexes. This was the one good feature in their system.

The Australian squatters, and all persons more or less in communication with, and able to influence, the home government, like our own agricultural and the American manufacturing interest, held two very strong opinions — first, that their pursuit was the only calling of any consequence to the State ; and, secondly, that it could not be protected too much. They always wanted labour, and it could not be too cheap.

We find them constantly desiring to bring down wages to a level which, if reached, would have very soon put a stop to all emigration, for it would have been lower than in England, and that was not worth crossing the sea to earn. We find them constantly desiring to dictate what class of labourers they would have, and that class specially in reference to sheep. We find them depreciating, not untruthfully perhaps, but untruly, the character of the Australian soil and of the Australian agricultural settlers. To them the Alpha and Omega of the Australian colonies was — breed sheep, to grow wool and tallow.

They succeeded to a certain point. Even when claiming a return to a low price of land, many desired to keep up the size of lots, so as to exclude small farmers from freehold.

RESULTS OF PAUPER EMIGRATION. 13,'t

The result we now see. For fifteen years the agents of the colony and the emigration commissioners have been recruiting and sending out emigrant recruits. Their most successful operations have been conducted in times of distress in the homo labour market. The fund in the early period of the system down to 1839, when all the colonists were madly engaged in nodding at the government continental land sales, was sufficient to pay the passages out of fifty thousand emigrants. For a time the market was apparently glutted, but the increase of stock, and the judicious measures introduced by Caroline Chisholm, the only individual who has ever brought practical talent of the first order to hear on colonization, soon absorbed them. Soon arose an demand for labour. The land fund was dried up ; the sales few and far between, except in the copper-mining colony of South Australia ; but by degrees the rents from pastoral occupations of crown lands became so large that security was found for an emigration debt, to which was added, from time to time, the produce of sales of town and suburban, and, as the population increased, occasionally of special lots of rural, land. But it occurred more than once that when labour was needed in the colony there were no funds, and, when funds were forwarded to England, that the commissioners found a difficulty in collecting suitable emigrants.

Indeed, until the discovery of the gold-fields, very few, except the utterly destitute among the labouring classes, turned their attention to Australia.

The regulations of the emigration commissioners, as prescribed to them by the pastoral interest, excluded families as much as possible, and so virtually it became the office of the commissioners to transmit "pairs of paupers."

Thus all classes were taught to look on a free passage to Australia as a sort of pauper relief; and the aristocratic representatives, although often discontented with their bad bargains supplied by the commissioners, were always anxious not to have emigrants who would be " too independent." Thus, although the emigration land system had tho effect of rapidly transplanting many thousand pauper souls, it has also had the effect of discouraging the emigration of the working class alnivo the condition of paupers, just as a lax poor-law increases pauperism, and of excluding those in whom the domestic affections and social virtues were strongest.

The large number who emigrated under the auspices of the emigration commissioners were isolated units, who could seldom read or write, or, if they could, were unable to find any easy means of com-

134 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

municating with their friends, of transmitting money, or paying the passage of a parent, a wife, or a child.

The true interest of a parent state, in regard to such prolific lifesustaining colonies as the Australian, is to promote colonization by industrious families of all classes : their calling is of no consequence, so long as they are able and willing to support themselves.

But it has been the policy of our government to maintain a pauperizing system for the mere purpose of supplying pastoral proprietors with hired servants.

There is a very close connection between the various degrees of the labouring classes, and that is a suicidal course of colonization which gathers up only the poorest and least respectable, and offers inducements to those inclined to emigrate to affect pauperism, if they do not endure it.

There is no more reason why a public fund should pay the passages of emigrants than that it should find work or provisions. Committees on emigration were appointed by the Legislative Council in 1839, when the bounty system was in operation, in 1842, in 1843, and in 1845 ; and in 1843 and 1844 committees on the " distressed labourers" of Sydney collected important evidence bearing on the same subject. It is worthy of remark that in these, as in committees appointed by the British Parliament, witnesses have seldom been called from among the respectable mechanics and labourers, who are most interested in emigration, and best acquainted with the emigrating cksses.

The committee of 1839 reported that emigrants were being introduced at the rate of 12,500 souls a year, at a cost of about £17 per adult, expressed a decided preference for bounty over government emigrants, and recommended a loan to be raised on the security of the land fund, and devoted to emigration a bounty at £19 a head for adults only, excluding children, and very humbly prayed that the crown would devote the land fund, which they calculated at not less than £150,000 a year, to emigration purposes. It is curious to remark that the committee object to the introduction of emigrants over forty years of age. The government emigration agent had invited emigrants of fifty years of age. The gold discoveries have recently enlightened the pastoral interests to the value of parents of even sixty years of age.

In 1842 the committee repeat their preference for the bounty system, announcing that in the preceding twelve months 23,000 emigrants had been introduced, and the cessation of emigration, in consequence of the falling off of the land fund, to an extent unexpected by the home government. They gently hint at the propriety of a reduction

of the price of land to 5s. an acre. The tone of the document is that of a respectable nominee council.

The committee of 1843 represented the wealthy squatting class, and the majority took an entirely colonial and pastoral view of the labour question. They wanted shepherds as quickly and as cheaply as possible, and nothing else. No seven-shilling a week farmer — no cottage-destroying landlord — no unlimited manufacturer — no woman-employing coal-worker — could have taken a narrower view of the question.

There is unfortunately in all of us a fund of selfishness which, when unchecked by public opinion or political opposition, is apt to grow into injustice and tyranny. In private life many of the squatters were excellent, generous, hospitable men ; but one large proportion had been accustomed to convict servants, who cost nothing beyond their board and lodging, and another consisted of young bachelors of capital, who arrived in the colony to make a fortune, intent on returning to the old country as soon as it was made.

The one despised and the other were indifferent to the opinions of the working classes. Both dreamed of naturalizing in Australia the miserable wages of the southern counties of England and tho highland counties of Scotland.

To resist the aggressions of Sir George Gipps on the pastoral interest tho squatters formed themselves into a protective association, and by an easy process the association, founded to resist unjust confiscation and taxation, branched off into a combination for permanently lowering the wages of the colony. At the head of this association was the late Mr. Benjamin Boyd. Mr. Boyd arrived with the express purpose of making investments at the time (1841) that the colony was in a general state of insolvency, or, as he expressed it, " in a gam." A yacht of the Royal Squadron, an apparently unlimited capital, an imposing personal appearance, fluent oratory, and a fair share of commercial acuteness, acquired on the Stock Exchange, at once and deservedly placed him at the head of the squatocracy. His aim was the possession of a million sheep : he was the chief of the hundred thousand sheepmen, with whom he combined to obtain fixity of tenure for their sheep pastures, to put down small settlers, and to reduce wages.

At the period we are describing, from 1841 to 1844, the colonial labour market presented the most curious contradictions. The bounty agents were pouring in a crowd of most unsalable persons, who, once landed, were soon left to shift for themselves. Among the mer-

136 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

chants of the town of Sydney distress prevailed, consequent on the cessation of building and other works, and wages were depressed to a rate before unknown, and newly-arrived immigrants were astonished at the low wages offered, so different to the flaming representations of the crimps by whom they had been collected. But in the country districts, and especially in the bush, where sheep and cattle were breeding, while their proprietors were going through the insolvent process, wages were maintained; and the anomaly was presented of large bodies of men being employed at the expense of government, at high wages, on a sham labour test, while flocks were wanting shepherds in the interior. Several causes supported this anomaly: 1st, There was no government machinery for distributing newly-arrived emigrants; 2nd, the preference of the squatters for single men left families on the hands of the government; 3rd, the squatters' club were not sorry to see the government embarrassed by the presence of a large body of unemployed labourers in Sydney ; 4th, the dishonest conduct of certain masters in withholding or unfairly deducting wages promised had given the bush a bad name ; 5th, many of the emigrants were of a class who, having left parish aid behind, liked to keep close to government rations and wages. All were engaged, as far as their shortsighted views would permit, in killing the golden goose of colonization.

Mr. Boyd's evidence before the immigration committee of 1843 affords, when read with the notes we can supply, a fair specimen of the haughty, gentlemanly, selfish class he represented.

He had then been eighteen months in the colony, and was employing two hundred shepherds and stockmen, besides artificers. He was building a town and port at Twofold Bay ; had two steam-boats, and a schooner yacht, the Wanderer. He had devised the scheme of saving labour, by putting three thousand sheep instead of eight hundred under the charge of one shepherd.

He despairs of the prosperity of the colony " unless the wages of a shepherd could be brought to £10 a year, or about 3s. lOd. a week, with meat and flour, without tea and sugar." The two last had been previously universally allowed ; but he expressed his intention of doing away with them, "being of very questionable utility and necessity, although such is the waste and extravagance here that 8 lbs. of tea and 90 lbs. of sugar are consumed per head." He states, further, that he "had no difficulty in engaging shepherds at £10 with these rations, but much difficulty in getting men engaged at these low wages forwarded to stations, as they were generally picked up on the road." " Any money advanced towards travelling expenses was usually sjwnt

Tub Two Kinds Of Colonists. 137

in public-houses;" and it is his decided opinion that "more than £10 a year only does harm to shepherds, by sending them to'publiehouses."

Mr. Boyd also mentioned how he had kindly given a free passage to Twofold Bay, distant COO miles from Sydney, to one hundred labourers out of employ. He did not mention that, on their arriving there, those who refused to accept £10 wages were refused a passage back for less than £5 ; and that, while a few strong men walked baek over the mountains, those who remained created such a feeling in the country that Mr. Boyd could not venture to visit his stations until the time of the year when the police magistrate, with a guard of policemen, took his annual round.

Fortunately all squatters were not like the Boyd elan, and the productiveness of the land defeated the combination : had it been otherwise, a very few years would have produced a servile war of men against masters.

From the clan Boyd proceeded stories founded on fact, and dressed to suit a purpose, about allotments of land sold for quarts of rum, champagne drunk in buckets by shearers and shepherds, who insisted on having pickles with their (mcasled ?) pork.

Another order of men, chiefly permanent colonists, residing on their own property, were represented by Mr. Charles Campbell as employing from fifty to sixty shepherds and watchmen. " He had been obliged, by the pressure of the times, to reduce his old sen-ants to £18 for shepherds and £16 for watchmen, and had not found them so reluctant to accept the reduction as he expected. He would hardly like to see wages lower." He thought a great oversight had been committed by settlers in neglecting to form villages on their estates. He says, " Many of those who now complain of want of employment in Sydney might have been comfortably settled up the coiuitry in small villages, containing from ten to twelve men, heads of families, in various callings. In the present state of tilings we employ, at sheepshearing and reaping, men who wander through the country, from one place to another, in quest of occasional employment. Many of these are handy clever fellows, but unmarried, and of irregular and dissolute habits. All these men earn is frequently spent in the first public-houses they come to after leaving tho, station where they have been employed. If, instead of employing men of this class, the flockmasters and landholders had invited married emigrants to settle in small villages, by allowing them land at a low rent, and not attempting to monopolize their labour, permitting them to choose

138 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

their own employer in the neighbourhood, we should have our reaping, mowing, and shearing done at a cheaper rate ; and the emigrants, by means of the money made during the busy season, added to their earnings, would maintain their families well, and their children, from not being scattered, might have opportunities of learning to read and write, and of receiving religious instruction. Many would in a few years become small farmers — first as tenants, then as landholders, and, in either capacity, would increase the demand for labour."

This was sound sense in Charles Campbell, as contrasted with the sound selfishness of Benjamin Boyd ; but although afterwards enforced and illustrated with a large collection of facts gathered by the one great colonial reformer produced by Australia, yet 1851 found the pastoral interests as ill provided with permanent labour as 1843. The selfish maxims of Mr. Boyd's Bent's sheep club prevailed after the ruin and death of the founders. The successful efforts to retain sheepwalks as walks only to encourage the growth of sheep, and discourage the rearing of children, found Australia, when the golden revolution broke out, largely dependent on wandering shepherds, bound by no ties, either moral or local, social or domestic, to the district, in the land of which they had no share. Even at this hour shortsighted successors to the Boyd policy are contemplating the forging of legal bonds to retain the unwilling services of cheap shepherds, hired in Europe — anything rather than give up a share in their land monopoly, although it is melting from their grasp.

But while the governor, well backed by the Colonial Office, was deep in the contest which killed him and deceived thousands — while the bounty crimps were pouring in their miscellaneous collections to work or saunter, or, if women, walk the streets — while the squatters, losing sight of the just half of their claim, were factiously obstructing all government, and ready to ruin the bodies and souls of shepherds to save wool — one individual appeared, unencumbered with colonizing theories, undebased by any mercenary objects, laborious in collecting facts, diffident in expressing new opinions, prepared to learn, willing to teach, and anxious to be useful to all conditions of men — Caroline Chisholm, the greatest, the only practical reformer and worker in colonization of the age, who will be remembered and blessed by thousands, following their flocks and cultivating their farms in Australia, when the names of the land-jobbers and charlatans of the " sufficientprice school, " the false " protectionists of colonial capital," are forgotten.

CHAPTER XII. CAROLINE CHISnOLM.

NEGLECTED STATE OF EMIGRANTS— SHE FOUNDS THE "HOME"— TRAVELS THROUGH THE BUSH— DISTRIBUTES SERVANTS AND WIVES— HER BOOK— COLLECTS VOLUN- TARY INFORMATION.

MRS. CAROLINE CHTSHOLM arrived in Sydney in 1830, with her children and husband. Captain Archibald Chisholm, of the Madras army, who had been making a tour of the Australian colonies daring a limited sick leave. On returning to India he decided to leave his family in New South Wales.

Soon after their arrival, during the first crash of insolvency of 1839, some Highland emigrants, who spoke no English and had large families, found difficulty in obtaining employment. A little money lent them by Captain Chisholm to purchase tools, and a little useful advice, set them up as woodcutters, and they prospered ; and, having seen the neglected state of the bounty emigrants, he pointed them out to his wife as fit objects for her charitable zeal and energy. There is a wonderful freemasonry among the poor, and by degrees Mrs. Chisholm's rooms were crowded by emigrants seeking advice. But it was the unprotected position of female and often friendless emigrants that most awakened her warm sympathies. She commenced her xrork in the literal sense of the term, by at the same time gathering information and acquiring the confidence of the working classes.

At that period she found young women who had emigrated nominally under the care of friends, but really under that of strangers, at the instigation of the bounty agent, without home, some lodged in tents with companions of indifferent character, others wandering friendless through the streets of Sydney ; many who, having been collected in rural districts, knew more of cows and pigs than housework, if engaged in town, soon lost their situations when superseded by more accomplished servants from ships which arrived daily.

Some of these poor creatures slept in retired nooks out in the public gardens and in the rocks, rather than face the contamination of the streets. The total of respectable females unemployed in Sydney at one time in 1840-1 accumulated to six hundred.

There were other and more serious evils attendant on emigration,

140 The Three Colonies Of Au8Tralia.

as then conducted, than the condition of the emigrants on landing. A considerable number of females of notoriously bad character were sent out in the bounty ships for whom bounty was never claimed ; the Emigration Board sat in Sydney merely to apportion the bounty ; the utmost punishment they could inflict was to stop the passage-money due to the agents. So long as the emigrants were delivered in good health, and within the standard, there was neither tribunal nor even organized opinion which could be brought to bear on any of the parties connected with the mercantile transaction. If duly invoiced, the bill for the live lumber was paid, while damaged goods were rejected. In some ships the immigrants were deprived of their fair share of provisions, insulted and assaulted by the crew, even by the officers, and otherwise abused. In others unrestrained intercourse took place between the officers, the crew, and the female passengers. In more than one instance the captain or surgeon selected pretty emigrants for companions during the voyage, and even during their stay in Sydney.

On arrival in harbour, not only were single gentlemen allowed to choose housekeepers on board, but notorious brothel-keepers regularly visited the emigrant-ships. The captain and surgeon could not know them, and had no power to impede them if they did. There was no government officer on board to superintend the contracts or protect the emigrants ; and thus, while women fell into the hands of seducers and harlots, there were a certain number of keen hands, with whom few in the colony would deal without a lawyer, who skimmed the cream of the labour from the ship on terms of very sharp practice.

All these things oozed out in England among the emigrating classes, and made, and continued to make, long after they were to a great extent remedied, emigration very unpopular, but no one cared or dared to take up the obnoxious and ungenteel position of the emigrants' friend in Sydney.

The colonists had not then learned that the cheapest and most powerful mode of colonizing is to make the working colonists content.

Mrs. Chisholm had courage and foresight. She began by appealing to tho press and to private individuals on behalf of the poor destitute girl immigrants. At first she met with much discouragement, a few civil speeches — no assistance.

The most imperious section of the employer class saw no advantage from the protection of the employed. The officials foresaw more work, some supervision, and no increase of pay. The Roman Catholics, as soon as they found it was to be a universal, or, to use the Irish term, a " godless," scheme of practical philanthropy, and not sectarian and proselytizing, opposed it vehemently. A dignitary of that church wrote

Mrs. Chisiiolm&#x27;S Appeal. 141

a letter to a newspaper, in which he termed Mrs. Chisholm a lady labouring under amiable delusions. At the same time the Protestants raised the cry of "No Popery !"

But she pressed on her plan of a "Home," and when almost defeated was nerved to determination by the sight of a Highland beauty, " poor Flora," whom she had last known a happy, hopeful girl* drunken, despairing, contemplating, and hastening to commit, suicide.

She offered to devote her time gratuitously to a u Home of Protection," and to endeavour to procure situations for the emigrant girls, unengaged and out of place, in the country, — an offer wluch was eventually accepted, after "she had given an undertaking and an understanding not to put the government to any excuse." On obtaining this concession she issued the following circular, which will give an example of that practical business talent to which she owes her success, not less than to her genuine philanthropy and many-sided talents : —

44 JAMiiaos-sTUEKr, Syd.vkt, Octolter 2l$t, 1841.

u Sir, — I am endeavouring to establish a ' Home for Female Immigrants,' and have little doubt but funds will soon be raised to enable me to accomplish this; and, as my first object is to facilitate their obtaining employment in the country, I shall feel obliged if you will favour my intention (should you approve of the same) by giving me the information I require regarding your district; and any suggestion you may think useful will be considered a favour.

"1st. Whether girls who at home have merely been accustomed to milk cows, wash, and the common household work about a farm, would readily get places? at what wages? and how many do you think would in the course of the next two years be required.

" 2nd. Good servants, such as housemaids and cooks, the rate of wages ? and the probable number required for the same period?

" 3rd. Married couples with small families, say two or three children, ditto.

"4th. Could employment and protection be found for boys and girls from seven to fourteen years of age ?

"5th. Have you had opportunities of observing if the young women can save any part of their wages? for they are generally of opinion that nothing can be saved in the country, every article of wearing apparel being so much dearer than in town.

"Cth. What would be the cheapest and best way of conveying the young women to vour district?

" I have to observe that the servants will be classed according to their qualifications, and distributed fairly, so that those who are absent will have an eijuul chance of getting a good servant with those who are present.* Subscribers of will have servants selected and sent to them without any trouble; it will, however, be necessary that an order should be sent to cover the expense of their conveyance.

"I require, by donations, to raise what will furnish a house; and, by subscriptions, I expect to support the institution. 1 am of opinion that, when families in the interior can get servants sent them, we shall not hear of young

142 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

women suffering distress and losing character for want of a situation. I shall feel obliged if you will favour me with a reply by the 10th of November next.

" I have taken the liberty to annex a subscription list, and I shall feel obliged if you would leave it in the hands of some person to receive subscriptions, and acquaint me with the name, that it may appear in the papers."

It was in reply to one of these circulars that the Rev. Henry Styles, of Windsor, the chaplain to the Bishop of Australia, an honest opponent, wrote : — " I fully appreciate the zeal and charity in your endeavours to establish the Home for Female Immigrants.' My only reason for declining to co-operate in a design which at first sight appears so entirely laudable is, that it is natural to suppose that an institution established by a lady who is a devoted member of the Catholic Church, which renders allegiance to Rome, should prove rather an instrument for augmenting the numbers of that communion, than merely what its name imports — a home for all destitute female immigrants, without respect to their religious professions. The result would be, that the immigrants in your ' Home ' would be advised, restrained, and protected by the clergy of the Church of Rome." After thus expressing himself, the reverend gentleman replied minutely to every question in the circular.

Mrs. Chisholm's answer to this plain and proper letter produced a second letter from Mr. Styles, in which he said, "Your frank and straightforward avowal of the objects you aim at, and the means you will use for their attainment, disarm suspicion. The assurance in your note that you will not be led by the agents of any ecclesiastical party, but that you will pursue steadily the good of the whole of the emigrants who may come under your care, referring in matters of religion to their respective clergy and teachers, induces mo to offer you very cordially whatever support I am able to afford. I beg to enclose £2 as a donation."

Eleven years have elapsed since this correspondence took place. Proselytism and propagandism are not to be done in a corner ; for every day during that period Mrs. Chisholm has almost lived in public, yet no case of misuse of her influence has ever been brought against her, or any open charge, except by that unhappy ex-Presbyterian, Dr. Lang, whose admirable talents, neutralized by envy, jealousy, and reckless mendacity, have chequered every year of his life by actions for libel and defamation. But from time to time whispers are circulated by those who, professing a love of civil and religious liberty, exhibit sentiments more in accordance with those of the men who burned Wiclift* and Servetus than the nineteenth century and the atmosphere of England.

The government building appropriated to the " Home " consisted of

Efforts Of Mrs. Chi8Holm. 143

a low wooden barrack fourteen feet square. Mrs. Chisholm found it needful for the protection of the characters of the girls to sleep on the premises. A store-room seven feet square, without a fireplace, and infested with rats, was cleared out for her accommodation ; there she dwelt, eating, drinking, and sleeping, on the kindness of a prisoner employed in the adjoining government printing-office for a kettle of hot water for tea, her only luxury ; and there she laid the foundation of a system to which thousands owe their happiness in this world and the world to come — saved from temptation to viee, and put on the road to industrious independence ; a system which, if fairly carried out, would save and civilize a great empire from the pollution of nomadic money-earning and unsocial profusion — from the ride of a plutocracy and the horrors of a servile war.

Following the example of our greatest philosophers in every branch of science, Mrs. Chisholm was as careful and eager to collect facts as slow to publish grave conclusions. If she claimed publicity it was not to propound a complicated theory, but to attack some flagrant abuse.

The first party of girls collected within the "Home" amounted to ninety, whom Mrs. Chisholm protected from open insult, covert seduction, and the evil influence of black sheep, inevitably admitted at times, while seeking to obtain them employment. The difficulties were great, the annoyances most wearying. The girls were many of them ignorant and awkward, others too pretty, and others again too proud and idle to work ; but she never gave tficm up while there was hope and a good heart.

She says in her first pamphlet, "If I had entered the office expecting grateful thanks from all, I should have seen in a week my folly ; but, having a very fair knowledge of human nature. I was aware that to be able to do a good I must be prepared to encounter certain disagreeables. I did iuot start expecting to please all, but intending to be just and fair towards all."

As for the mistresses, she told them in print, — probably the first time so wholesome a truth had been so plainly stated, — that "the assignment system of convict servants had spoiled them a little — it will take some time to teach them," she observes, " that they have lost a little or, in fact, that they must and forbear ;" "an English servant would not like the ration and lock-up si/stnn, and would expect domestic comforts not common in Svdnev" — "maiiv of the mistresses are apt to take the law into their own hands.*'

These statements were unpleasant to make and unpopular; but

144 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

they worked a cure, which if not effected would have damaged the character of the colony in the home country.

The general public, as distinguished from official class, when

they understood the nature of the plans Mrs. Chisholm was engaged

upon, responded very liberally to her appeal for assistance. But before

they gained confidence in her plans the " Home" became crowded with

a number of girls more fit for rough country work than town service.

There was no machinery extant for distributing them : she determined

to avail herself of the information supplied in answers to her circulars,

and to send them into the country. The first dray that came to the

door was sent away empty : frightened with foolish 'board-ship stories

of blacks and bushrangers, not one girl would go. A second attempt,

the first failure having been kept a secret, was successful. Mrs.

Chisholm at her own risk and expense took a party up the Hunter

River district by steam-boat : the enterprise was considered so Quixotish

by her friends that, as she sat on deck in the centre of her troop of

girls, no one of her acquaintance dared to expose himself to the ridicule

of owning acquaintance by offering any refreshment.

The enterprise succeeded, the girls were well placed in the families of often humble but always respectable married people, and competent committees were induced to undertake the charge of " Branch Homes" in the interior. The bush journeys were repeated with parties of young women, varying from sixteen to thirty, who were conveyed to Campbell Town, Maitland, Liverpool, Paramatta, Cross Roads, and Port Macquarie — Yass, Gundegai, Murrumbidgee, Goulburn, and Bathurst — where she went from farm to farm, scrutinizing the characters of the residents before she trusted them with " her children."

The settlers came forward nobly, and supplied provisions, horses, and drays ; the inns universally refused payment for Mrs. Chisholm's personal accommodation ; and the coaches, a most costly conveyance in Australia, carried her sick women and children free. Mr. William Bradley, a gentleman born in the colony, a of the Legislative Council, gave an unlimited credit to draw for anything for the use of the emigrants — of which she was not obliged to avail herself, so liberally did the colonists of the interior come forward.

Very soon the fathers, brothers, sons, and husbands claimed the same care, and asked to be permitted to form part of her parties. Her journeys became longer and her armies larger : 147 souls left Sydney, which increased on the road to 240, in one party, in drays and on foot, Mrs. Chisholm leading the way on horseback. She established a registry-olfice for servants, where names could be inscribed and agree-

Provides For Two Thousand Emigrants.

ments effected on fair terras gratuitously : she drew up and printed ' a fair agreement, of which the master took one, the servant one, and one wa filed. The result of this registration was to extinguish litigation far as regards servants engaged at the " Home." Out of many thousands only two were litigated. Tet in the course of her experience, before she stirred in the matter, and for want of agreement* and speedy justice, fifty-one eases occurred up to 1K43 of wages unjustly detained or taxed. For the first time the emigrant found a " friend."

The abuse of power by captains, and the immorality of the inferior sort of surgeons, at that time engaged in the Australian trade, were checked by a prosecution which she compelled the governor to institute against parties who had driven a girl mad by their violence.

When Sir George Gijips, hesitating, said, as officials will say, "A government prosecution is a very serious matter," she answered, " I am ready to prosecute : / have the necessary evidence, and, if it be a risk whether / or these men shall go to prison, I am ready to stand the risk." That trial established a precedent and checked the abuse.

146 The Three Colonie8 Of Australia.

By the end of 1842 Mrs. Chisholm had succeeded in placing comfortably two thousand emigrants of both sexes, and then, when slowly recovering from the effects of a serious illness brought on by her exertions, she published the remarkable letter or report to which we have before alluded.*

It is a collection of notes and memoranda, interspersed with pithy remarks and pathetic and comic sketches from real life, — a valuable contribution to the art of colonization, and a literary curiosity. It was an outspoken book ; it did not mince matters — as, for instance, in the following passage, which went far to kill the bounty system, and so, although people were shocked, the evil was abated : — " One girl, long known at Liverpool as the Countess, arrived per ship ; the last time I saw her was on a Sunday ; she had evidently started in the morning, with an intention to look interesting at either St. James's or St. Mary's, for her book was in her hand ; but she had taken a glass by the way, and was so far aware of her state that she retired to the domain. I saw her fall twice. Now people express their astonishment ' that English girls are not sent out/ We will suppose that some Liverpool families are meditating this step, and, in their anxiety to obtain all information, they learn that the Countess is missing — has left for Australia (by a bounty ship). They condemn all for one — they shrink with horror from sending their daughters where the Countess is received — they are strangers to all on board, therefore all suffer for one — I wish particularly to call attention to the injustice done to girls of good character by a case of association, and not a solitary one like the one I have stated. Again, in Sydney, the character of the Countess is known in less than two hours, and th girls of good character in the same ship suffer."

In this " Countess " story was the germ of one great feature of Mrs. Chisholm's Family Colonization Society — protection for single girls.

In the same effective manner the letter exposes all the tricks practised on the Bounty Board and on the government agents. The following illustrates a class still plentiful : —

" One girl, having health and strength, had refused five situations; at last I thought I had suited her. She was to live in a settler's family, and teach five children to read and write : she was not required to wash the children ; but, as the good and thrifty woman kept no servants, she was to wash her own clothes (or pay for the same out of her wages), make her own bed, and clean her own room : the good woman also said, she would teach her anything she knew, but ask her to do nothing. I thought there could be no objection to thb ; but when I told her, once a week she must scour her own room (the best in the house) — when I

" Female Emigration considered in a Brief Account of the Sydney Emigrants' Home, by the Secretary, Sydney James Tegg, 1842.*'

The Do-Nothings — Shah Governesses. 147

said this she burst into a passionate flood of tears ; the degradation was more than she could bear I thought it then my duty to refuse her the benefit of the Home. In less than three months from this this victim of false pride was tiring

with ; anything rather than work : I have since regretted that I did not

give her one more trial.

"The ' Do-nothings.' This name will surprise some and offend others, but in the end will do good ; and I really do not know any one useful thing they can do. E was entered as a governess ; I was glad of this, for I had then, as I hare now, several applications for governesses, in the country: she was a pretty girl too ; and I know when pretty girls have no money — no friends — Sydney is a rery bad place. There is nothing so unpleasant as to question a young lady as to her competency. She could teach music, French, drawing, &c. &c; she was satisfied with the salary, and her testimonials were first-rate. ( You say you can teach music?' 'Yes ma'am.' 'You thoroughly understand it?' 'Most certainly.' ' One of your pupils is nine years of age, how long do you think it will take her to get through Cramer's Instruction Book ?' A pause. ' Perhaps you have not seen it ?' 'No, ma'am, but I was very quick myself — I have a good car for music' ' What book did you study from ?' 'I learnt singing and music at the same time.' ' Tell me the name of the first piece you played?' 'Cherry Ripe.' 'The second?' 'Home, sweet Home.' 'The third?' ' We're a' nodding.' I said no more about music. I gave her a sum in addition; and she made sixteen pounds Ave, eighteen pounds four. Now this girl, I afterwards ascertained, at home, bad lived in a family as nursemaid, and washed the clothes of five children every week : but she was a pretty girl — something of a favourite at sea. The captain was very anxious about her ; had taken her in Ins own boat, to the North-shore, to try and get her a good place; he devoted seren hours to this work of charity. Nor did his zeal rest here — the following day he took her to Paramatta ; they returned to the ship, and this girl was kept four days in it, after the other girls left. When he called at my office he was astonished, horrified, that I knew the detail ; said, Sydney was a scandalising place ; that his feelings were those of a father. However, I received the girl the same evening, and removed her the following day very far from his parental influence."

"But for another specimen ; and really, out of fifty, I am at a loss how to

select ; but I will give . She was another of the wo uld-be governesses ; but

her Tiews were more humble — for the nursery. Now, she could neither read, write, nor spell, correctly. 'Can you wash your own clothes?* 'Never did such a thing in my life.' 'Can you make a dress 'No.' 'Cook?' 'No.' ' What can you do ?' ' Why, ma'am, I could look after servants ; I could direct them ; I should make an excellent housekeeper.' ' You are certain ?' ' Yes, or I would not say so.' ' Do you know the quantity of the different ingredients wanted for a beaf-steak pie — for that dish — and a rice pudding for this ?' ' Oh, no, ma'am, that's not what I mean ; I'd see that the servants did it.' ' But there might be great waste, and you not know it ; besides all, or nearly all, the servants sent to this colony require teaching* Nothing but my faith in Providence that there must be a place for everybody enabled me to bear with this infliction ; and yet, if I turned them out, I knew their fate. But it was trying to my patience every morning to be up and breakfasted, and in my office first. I never had but one in the Home of this class that fairly made her own bed ; they could

smooth them over and night after night get into them."

J 2

148 The Three C0L0Nie8 Of Au8Tralia.

The following is in a more serious strain : —

" I may here remark, that in going my evening rounds in the rear of the establishment I never met with any impertinence. And after I had been three months or so in office, on going out, I saw a large party of men at the corner of the Domain-gate, evidently trying to conceal two girls : I knew one of them, the other was a stranger. 'Have you any relations in the colony?' 'No.* 1 Then come with me.' She was a young girl, not more than fifteen; she refused, and went into the Domain. I sent the other into the Home, and followed her : in a few minutes she returned with me, and I found myself suddenly surrounded by men. I felt, I must acknowledge, in that lonely place, very uncomfortable, but my fears were groundless ; they came to apologise, to express their regret at the great annoyance they had given me, and promised me never again to go near the place. ' We never knew you until to-night; we thought you were well paid for looking after the immigrant girls; but when we saw you follow the strip of a girl — and we have been talking to this man, and he says you don't get a penny, and that all you do is for the girls' good, — we do say, that that man is not a man who gives you trouble ; — good night, ma'am.' I never saw but one of these men afterwards, and he came on a mission of mercy, to tell me of a girl that he thought would be advised, and kept from ruin ; he was in terror lest he should be found out. ' I should be jeered at, past bearing ; but somehow it lay on my mind — I ought to tell you.' This girl is now well married ; and she may thank this poor man that she, under Providence, escaped the pit dug for her."

This strange little book concludes with the following recommendation : —

" I am now going to give advice, and am really at a loss how and where to begin. 'Tis a delicate — an ungracious task ; this I know from experience.

Perhaps the very thing I am going to advise, has determined to do ; and if

this is the case, I dread the perverseness of human nature : for I have more than once heard a person say, ' Now I meant to do the very thing you tell me; but if 1 do it now it will look like taking your advice — and to be advised by a lady! Pshaw ! nonsense — the idea is ridiculous, and I won't do it.' Now an ' I won't' from a gentleman is just as troublesome a thing to manage as an ' I will' from a lady — how must I proceed? By the bye, I recollect having read, that enlightened men of all ages have looked upon advisers as friends, and have said that ' shreds of knowledge may be picked up from ploughboys, and patches from old women are worth preserving :' this encourages me to begin ; and as this is a very ceremonious colony, where a breach of etiquette would be a serious offence, I will commence with his excellency the governor. I therefore, with every feeling of respect, beg to suggest to his excellency the governor, that he should promise protection and shelter to all female emigrants sent to this colony, until situations are provided for them. I also most earnestly entreat and implore that no more engagements may be allowed on board ship. As soon as an immigrant ship arrives, the board should assemble, and the immigrants be fairly drafted to the District Homes, giving a fair and proportionate share to Sydney. The gentleman whose duty it is to draft the immigrants according to orders received must have the confidence of the people ; he must be a person of honourable integrity,

Hints On Emigrant Homes. 149

and alike proof against a lady's entreaties and a gentleman's censure. Those immigrants that are intended for Port Macquarie, Moreton Bay, Maitland, Wollongong, Manning River, &c., should be received per steamers and small crafts from the ship. Those intended for Sydney, Liverpool, Campbell-town, Goulborn, Bathurst, &c, should be sent to the place intended for their reception, and I hope Grose's Farm will be appropriated for this purpose : this would be very convenient for drays. I also beg to curtail the privileges of the board : they must not be allowed to select servants for themselves or their friends, even though they chance to be members of the Bent-street Club.* All who want servants must go to the Registry-office for them ; let all have a fair chance : this appendage to the agent's office I hope your excellency will sanction. The district Homes cannot be kept open without one, and I do hope your excellency will give them all the aid in your power. Any government buildings that are unoccupied cannot be better employed ; and I also hope you will lend tents f reefy, I think you must acknowledge that I have not asked for half what your excellency expected: mj moderation will, I hope, induce you to grant all."

"I now beg to call the attention of the gentlemen of the interior to the necessity of establishing Homes. The expense of a Home in the country is very trifling : if there should be no government buildings available, a few tents and a small cottage will suffice. Food is cheap and plentiful — a sack of flour from one, a bag of potatoes from another, a basket of cabbages, and a few pumpkins, go a great way, and all would help the Home — a few sheep too, a welcome gift ; and what gentleman is there that would not give one or two in the year ? The amount of the ten days' rations you could fairly claim. Sending the immigrants np in large numbers would make conveyance cheap : you would establish such rules as met the wants of your district. A Home well looked after will be a saving to you of time, trouble, and expense. You become familiar with the people; jon know their characters; you can influence them for their good. If a man forfeits his word, and flies from his agreement, his conduct is reported to the committee; his character is known in the district. I see no other plan by which you can get a /air supply of servants : if you go on in the old way, you must take what the people of Sydney refuse. Wealthy men can afford to spend their time in Sydney; and before you can hear, in the country, of a ship's arrival in Sydney, the single men, the shepherds you want, will be on their way to J. P.'s or members of council."

The appendix contains answers to a circular from ten magistrates and clergymen, stating that " not one of the girls sent through Mrs. Chisholm's name had lost character as regarded honesty or morality" and a letter to the " Sydney Immigration Board," with hints not without value, even in 1852.

" The present mode of selecting immigrants must be faulty, as it allows so many bad bargains to creep in. I have heard that this evil is to be remedied by getting the parochial clergy of England to select emigrants for you. The idea amuses me, that you should suppose you can get people to do for you what you ought to do for yourselves' 9

Mr. Benjamin Boyd'i Club of Squatters— the aristocracy of wool.

150 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

" There are poor rates in the mother country, and to suppose that die clergy and magistrates will send you their best, and keep their worst, is to give them credit for an extraordinary share of kindness." And again, after some comic pictures of pauper-hard-bargains, who were " too sick to work, but not sick enough for the hospital," she says — referring to the fall in wages that took place between the time when the crimps published their glowing placards, and the arrival of the ship in the colony : —

"From the opening of the office I had the confidence of the immigrants." (This is the secret of successful colonization which none of our squatter and capitalist or church colonizing societies have yet learned. S.S.) " In a short time they requested me to fix the wages they should accept. Disappointed, as many of them were, in their expectations, they never doubted my endeavours to serve them.

"Feeling the responsibility and confidence, I exerted myself to obtain, as far as was possible, an accurate knowledge of what rate of wages the fiockmasters could pay their shepherds.

"I first inquired of the wealthy men whose flocks cover the mountains, and whose cattle crowd the valleys. These agreed on £15 and £16 per annum as the most that could be paid. These gentlemen said they acted on principle, and did not care for the money.

" I then inquired of those respectable, but less wealthy, settlers who have one sheep and one cattle station, and live retired at a convenient distance from both. They thought from £18 to £20 a year, the latter doubtful. I went lastly to the third class, who, having two stations, instead of employing servants only, live always at one or the other — farm their own farms, in fact. These could afford to pay £20 — never wanted, or wished, to see wages less. #

" There is nothing perhaps that injures a colony more than giving the working population a bad character. Respectable people of capital get alarmed. Yet many charges have been brought against servants which I consider unjust."

This plain speaking and unusual style of colonial publication — hard truths without acidity — did its work. A considerable reform was introduced. Government protection was granted to friendless young women ; an agent appointed to superintend and witness the agreements with men on board ship ; and the colonial press, when furnished with the materials, did good service to immigration reform. The whole cost to government of the guarding and distribution of the emigrants was little more than £100. The other expenses were borne by Mrs. Chisholm and the friends whom her honest, clear-sighted policy had made among persons of all politics and various religious views.

Ih Fav0Ub Of Settling Poor Men On Land. 151

In 1843, before a committee of the Legislative Council, which was appointed to consider the condition of the " distressed labourers," and especially of three hundred parties with large families whom, in the depressed condition of the colony, the settlers could not afford to engage, Mrs. Chisholm took another step forward. She proposed, and entered into, the details of a plan which, at a very trifling expense, would have placed these three hundred families in a self-supporting position on land, instead of continuing to receive 3s. a day for nominal labour on government works.

Sir George Gipps's instructions precluded him from granting or leasing of crown land for this valuable, or any other, purpose, except feeding sheep. As he expressed it, " he was sent out to carry out the Wakefield system," and could turn neither to the right nor to the left. Nevertheless, on private property, on clearing leases, Mrs. Chisholm succeeded in placing some families of mechanics.

In the course of her examination it appears that the government bad then expended £2,500 in casual relief. For £1,000 she considered the whole distress could be extinguished, and the people not only removed, but placed where they could do some good for themselves. " The distress will increase unless proper measures are taken, but if they are promptly taken it will not be very serious." There are several " trades mentioned in the list that are not required ; for instance, I have only had two applications for shoemakers ; for tailors four. The number stated to be unemployed is forty-seven. About twenty months ago forty tailors came to me out of employ. The flockmastcrs refused to take tlum as shepherds. With a great deal of trouble I scattered them through different parts of the country as domestic servants, and in other capacities ; and it is remarkable that nearly all thus scattered have been able to find work at their own trade. With respect to tradesmen and labourers with large families there is no way in which they could provide for their families so well as

" My first arrangement would be to select from fifty families one who was a good judge of land, and one of the women, as women would require to know what kind of a place they were going to, whether the children would be comfortable, &c. I should also require two or three good bush hands (prisoners) from Hyde-park Barracks. With these, as soon as arrived on land, I would set to work to clear half an acre, in order that the people might see what could be done in a given time. There must be some tents provided until more substantial buildings could be erected. One allotment must be set apart as a family allot-

152 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

ment, to be first cleared and cultivated, to supply food for the whole community. Then the land must be divided and apportioned to the different families. A schoolmaster will go with the party, to have land rent free. The parents of the children have agreed to pay for the education of their children, the terms settled by me. One day's labour per quarter for each child, and for the whole family 1 cwt. of potatoes and one bushel of wheat.

"I have worked this plan on a small scale for the last three years, where there has been a large family. The eldest girl has, in some instances, gone to service, and given up a portion of her earnings to support them. Upwards of one hundred small settlers have thus received assistance from their relatives. Many have half or a third share in a dray.

" I should advise limiting these people to twenty acres, with a lease of not less than ten or fifteen years. On a less term the tenant works for the proprietor. # The plan is before you to accept or reject. All I ask is that, if you approve it, you will let me work it out my own way. Appoint the government immigration agent treasurer, and two gentlemen to examine and control the expenditure. You will bear in mind, in forming an opinion of my statements, that mine is not a plan of to-day. The working it out will be attended with much trouble and responsibility to me ; at the same time, I am certain the people will work with me. The distress will be removed, and those persons toko are now suffering in Sydney will, if my plan is carried out, within three years, become the employers of labour"

At this last sentence one of the committee allowed his fears of the bugaboo — ever present to the imagination of the Australian capitalist — to escape him, a terror carefully nourished by the Colonial Office, and guarded against with endless folds of red tape of the true Wakefield hue. He exclaimed, " I am afraid we should find that these people, becoming employers of labour, would do us mischief!"

Not a word, not a thought of the benefit conferred upon three hundred destitute families, converted from costly paupers to independent peasant proprietors, but only terror lest they should become so well off as to give wages at £20 a year instead of £16.

Mrs. Chisholm answered, " I do not think so, but rather that you would be able to obtain in the children of these people, brought up in sober, industrious, and frugal habits, a most valuable description of labourers : this class of persons prefer sending their children at a certain age (and for a limited period) into service with respectable families. ,,

Mrs. Chisholm's plan was rejected, and she was left to work it out as

Statistics Of Distress Of 1844. 153

weD as she could with private assistance on the land of a speculator ; and to go on laboriously registering agreements and distributing emigrants from farm to farm, as wo shall presently describe.

The committee in their report recorded " their grateful sense of the valuable services of a lady to whose benevolent exertions on behalf of the unemployed, as well as of free emigrants of the humbler classes generally, this colony is under the highest obligations, Mrs .Chisholm, whose name is so well known for her disinterested and untiring exertions." The chairman of the committee was the notorious Dr. Lang. In August, 1844, the distress amongst the labourers and mechanics of Sydney had not ceased. A committee was reappointed to consider it. There was a great clamour in favour of undertaking bridges, roads, and other public works, with public money. The mob and officials were favourable to the scheme. The government immigration agent was examined before this committee. "His knowledge," he states, "of the immigrants who arrived in past years was merely general, of the present year tolerably accurate ;" " had no knowledge of the number of destitute families then in Sydney ;" had no detailed information, but thought a certain detailed statement delivered in by a former witness exaggerated. This was a gentleman paid for his services, who, according to colonial custom, considered it his duty to perform his strictly office duties, and think and know no more, — a very natural view, considering the ill reward that any zeal obtains, except zeal for the views of the Colonial Secretary of State.

Mrs. Chisholm, being called before this committee, produced a complete statistical statement, exhibiting the numbers, ages, sexes, characters, and trades of the unemployed (in all 2,034 souls), the number of weeks and average number per man they had been unemployed. These tables show some curious particulars : 59 carpenters and 25 joiners, 10 butlers and 10 coachmen and grooms, 15 cabinetmakers, 26 brickmakers, 10 quarry men and 19 bricklayers, 2 surgeons, 2 hairdressers, and 1 tailor ; 244 farm labourers — in all 572. " The large number of children made it difficult to provide for many of these families." " The system of relieving distress has now been in operation for a year; toe have been consuming capital, we can only remove distress by producing it" " Last year I settled some families on land, and, considering the many difficulties tlirown in my way, they have succeeded remarkably well on private land. I wished to try the system of leasing, in order to see whether the people were industrious, and could subsist on land ; and I have satisfied myself that, although any gentleman would lose a large fortune if he were to commence as a

154 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

farmer, where the family are all workers an industrious man cannot do better than get on land. The great difficulty with me has been that I have never had an opportunity of putting a sufficient number of people together ; and where they are only a few they have no team, no set of tools, and there is a constant struggle ; yet they do succeed."

Now, this in a few words is the true art of colonization. Locate poor men on waste land in England or Ireland and they sink under the multiplicity of money payments or debts, having to compete with a fund of cheap labour, and inferior land against superior land and skilled cultivation. Locate the same men in a colony and they rise buoyed up by a surrounding dear labour market, which enables them to barter their chief possession, labour, for seeds, tools, stock, or whatever they may need ; a virgin soil, and the absence of money payments for rent or taxes, and of competition of agricultural skill, compensating for the want of capital and rural experience. Thus, a day's labour from time to time with a neighbouring farmer will buy a yoke of bullocks, a dray, a quarter of wheat or maize, and assist both. In England and Ireland a poor man clings to land in hopes of making more than bare wages by extra toil ; in a colony a man desires land to keep his family together, even at some sacrifice of money wages. In old countries the little freehold must be divided with sons and sons-in-law ; in a colony the full-fledged brood can always, if idle " protective" laws do not impede, go further afield, and find a new site for a nest. So argued in other words Mrs. Chisholm ; and many a flockowner, now contemplating his flocks spreading wildly unshephcrded over his run, and the deserted huts of his single men shepherds on their way to the diggings, wishes he had followed Mrs. Chisholm's advice, and encouraged children as well as sheep.

Not being able to induce the governor and the influential colonists to go heartily into her land-colonizing plans, she continued to employ herself in dispersing the people through the interior; and in teaching the government and the colonists, by example, how the colonial part of colonization should be conducted.

She worked hard for six years, warmly supported by some of the first among the colonists, the Wentworths, M'Arthurs, Bradleys, Fitzgeralds, Suttors, and Dr. Nicholson, the present speaker of the Legislative Council, and by the unanimous confidence of the working classes, but subject to much obstruction and annoyance in official quarters.

Sir George Gipps, who was capable of noble sentiments when his evil temper or home instructions did not override them, took a public opportunity of expressing his sense of the merit and utility of her plans,

Thb Governor Allows Mrs. Chisholm To Frank Letters. 155

saying* " I think it right to make this public acknowledgment, having formerly thrown cold water upon them."

A characteristic anecdote is circulated in the colony in reference to the privilege of franking letters which Sir George had given the Emigration Missionary.

A few days after the permission had been granted, the governor sent for Mrs. Chisholm in a great hurry. She found him in one of his fits of excitement, the table covered with her own letters.

" Mrs. Chisholm/' he exclaimed, " when I gave you the privilege of franking, I presumed you would address yourself to the magistrates, the clergy, and the principal settlers; but who, pray, are these John Varelys and Dick Hogans, and other people, of whom I have never heard since I have been in the colony ?"

" I£ she replied," " I had required to know the opinions of those respectable gentlemen on the subject of the demand for labour, and the rate of wages they could aft'ord, I need not have written; I can turn to half a dozen blue books and find there " shepherds always wanting and wages always too high" ; besides, to have answered me they must have gone to their overseers, and then answered me vaguely. I want to know, as nearly as possible, what number of labourers each district can absorb, and of what class and what wages. If your Excellency will wait until I get my answers, you will admit that I have applied to men humble but intelligent, and able to afford exactly the information I require."

Sir George Gipps was satisfied with the explanation, and still more with the replies of the bush settlers ; so the sub-officials were on this occasion discomfited.

By Mrs. Chisholm's exertions, applied to the elastic resources of Australia, before 1845 the distress of 2,000 souls was so far removed that some parties were ready in a few years to assert, forgetting that a detailed list was on record, that it had never existed ; and in 1845, as Mrs. Chisholm, in her evidence the committee of 1844, prophesied, the demand for labour was more vigorous than ever, and has never since been checked, even for a moment ; on the contrary, the supply has always been under the demand, both in quantity and quality.

It was while making forced marches at the head of armies of emigrants, as far as 300 miles into the far interior, sometimes sleeping at the stations of wealthy settlers, sometimes in the huts of poor emigrants or prisoners ; sometimes camping out in the bush, teaching the timid, awkward peasantry of England, Scotland, and Ireland, Protestants and Roman Catholics, Orangemen and Repealers, how to

The Three Colonies Of Australia.

it" ; comforting the women, nursing the children, putting down any discontented or forward spirits among the men ; now taking a few weary children into her covered tandem-cart ; now mounting on horseback and gallopping over a short cut through the lulls to meet her weary caravan, with supper foraged from the hospitable settlers ; — it was in the midst of marches in which she managed the discipline, the route, the commissariat, the hospital, and the billetting, all herself, with such aides-de-camp as each army to furnish, that she commenced another great work subsidiary to colonization, the " Voluntary Statements of the People of New South Wales," for the use of the home country. These were statements in answer to the series of printed questions, taken down in the words of the informant, of which we shall give some examples at the end of this chapter.

They were written down in all manner of dwellings, but chiefly among the humbler, in cottages and bark huts, on the roadside, on the top of a hat, in the field, on a plough, in the forest, on the first log of a frugal bush servant's first freehold.

There were nearly eight hundred of these statements from natives

Applications Fob Wiyb8. 157

of almost every county of the United Kingdom, from emigrants, from " old hands," and from ticket-of-leave men.

They proved incontestibly that Australia was a country in which any industrious man could thrive ; that there was ample verge and room enough for millions ; that land which squatters then and now assert to be only fit for sheep posture would support yeomanry in comfort and independence. They laid bare much injustice, exhibited in a striking — the demand and necessity for an increased female population, and presented a more perfect, truthful, and valuable picture of bush Ufa, painted by servants and settlers, than had ever been drawn in travellers' tales or parliamentary blue books.

It was in consequence of the habit of collecting these statements tint she was able to tell the committee of the House of Lords in 1847 : —

u I never returned from a journey to the interior without gaining Inform ation which would enable me to provide for a second number ; and it was frequently unnecessary to go into a district more than once ; then I knew the character of the people and the sort of servants that would suit them, and it enabled me to advise people when they called at my residence to say, ' You go to such a place and I can guarantee yon employment/ My first object was always to get one female emigrant placed : having succeeded in getting one female servant in a neighbourhood, I would leave the feeling to spread among this class. These girls eventually married best, for the parents were thankful if their aon married her.

" One of the most serious impediments to transacting business of hiring servants in the country were the applications for wives. Shepherds left their sheep and would come for miles for this purpose, with their certificates of good character, and of money deposited in the savings banks, and list of their stock and even bank notes. I had more than forty applications of this kind in two years. One man, according to a note in my register-book, who came down to Sydney for a wife, was very anxious to know ' when we should have a new governor who would attend to matters of consequence like that.'"

The governor took a different view of the subject, for when, in the early days of the " Home Protection," it was suggested to him that many of the forlorn girls if sent into the interior would marry well, " His excellency drew himself up to his full height, and exclaimed indignantly, ' What, Mrs. Chisholm ! is it my business to find wives for bush servants V "

He might have done worse.

In 1845 Mrs. Chisholin was examined before a committee of the

158 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Legislative Council, on the best means of promoting immigration, the whole distress having been absorbed, and the demand for labour become urgent. She then produced a few of the " Voluntary Statements."

And in the same year she published a " Prospectus of a Work to be entitled 'Voluntary Information from the People of New South Wales, respecting the Social Condition of the Middle and Working Classes in the Colony/ with the view of furnishing the labourer, the mechanic, and the capitalist with trustworthy information, and pointing out obstructions to immigration that ought to be eradicated." She writes : —

" Few persons, if any, are more intimately acquainted with the actual condition of the working classes than I am. Silence, therefore, would be culpable. The servant in Sydney, the shepherd, and the small settler in the bush are known to me — I have visited their homes and witnessed their trials and deprivations — I have the satisfaction of laying before the public proofs of their importance as a body and their merits as individuals: their virtues far exceed their failings — their language may be rude, but their hearts are kind and true.

" To improve the condition of these people is my object, to break up the bachelor stations my design, happy homes my reward.

" To supply flockmasters with shepherds is a good work, to supply those shepherds with wives a better.

" To give the shepherd a good wife is to make a gloomy, miserable hut a cheerful, contented home ; to introduce married families into the interior is to make squatters' stations fit abodes for Christian men.

" If I meet with the co-operation I expect, it is my intention to submit to her Majesty's commissioners of emigration a plan for female immigration, which will secure the young women the protection which they so essentially require on the passage and on their arrival. If protection is extended to the helpless, — if Britain's moral banner is to be unfurled in the far interior — civilization and religion will advance until the spires of the churches guide the traveller from hamlet to hamlet, and shepherds' huts become the homes of happy, virtuous men and

" I feel that a judicious circulation of these statements will promote the best interests in the colony.

" Personal interest in the labour market I have none. I hope to enjoy the proud satisfaction of laying before the British public several thousand proofs of the good character and persevering energy of her Majesty's subjects in New South Wales."

In the following year, 1846, Mrs. Chisholm left the colony with her family for England, charged with missions from the humbler classes : —

Address On Her Leaving The Colony. 159

Firstly, From a number of freed prisoners, who had been promised by the government that, if well conducted, their wives and children should be sent to join them. This promise had been forgotten. A return made to the Legislative Council showed the claimants at several hundreds.

Secondly, From successful emigrants, who desired to pay the passages of their wives, parents, and other near relatives.

Thirdly, From parents who, to comply with the regulations of the emigration commissioners, had left young children beyond the standard number to the care of poor relatives or the parish.

In the first and last cases, armed with those facts and proofs, without which she never makes a claim, Mrs. Chisholm succeeded. The other formed the foundation of the Family Colonization Loan Society.

Before sailing for England a committee, which included eight members of the Legislative Council, magistrates, landholders, and others of all shades of opinion, raised a subscription for a testimonial, and presented an address, in which they say : —

" We beg to offer you, on the occasion of your departure from this colony, the expression of our thanks for your active and zealous exertions on behalf of the emigrant population during the last seven years. In establishing emigrants 1 homes, in establishing great numbers of the emigrant population in the interior as servants and occupiers of small farms, your exertions have proved of signal advantage to the community.

" In the large collection of statistical facts ' and voluntary information/ derived from the labouring classes, you have accumulated materials for establishing the great advantages which New South Wales possesses as a favourable field for the emigration of British settlers."

In the course of her reply, Mrs. Chisholm said : —

u It is my intention, if supported by your co-operation, to attempt more than I hate hitherto performed."

During the six years and eight months which she spent in Australia, Mrs. Chisholm, without wealth or rank, or any support except what her earnest philanthropy gradually acquired, provided for eleven thousand souls.

Yet, since her sojourn in England, she has redeemed her pledge, and done much more. She has, with less than two thousand pounds, between 1850 and 1852, personally sent out more than one thousand emigrants of the best class, and has advised, corresponded with, or otherwise assisted twenty thousand.

We have devoted thus much space to the colonizing career of

160 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Caroline Chisholm, because with her exertions the colonization of the interior commenced. Before her time, emigrants were merely shovelled out on the shores, like so much live stock, to find their own way to market—to service, to marriage, to sin, or death.

She first taught the Australian squatters that property had its duties as well as its rights. She tapped the springs of spontaneous selfsupporting emigration, and showed how closely the extension of national power was connected with social and domestic virtues.

There is scarcely a line of her works or her evidence that may not be studied with advantage to those who are interested in colonization as a 'civilizing, cultivating, Christianizing instrument of practical power, because teeming with valuable facta and the sound conclusions of a sagacious mind.

Pictures of Australian Settlers.

The following additional extracts from Mrs. Chisholm's collection of "Voluntary Statements" will throw some light on the value of her labours and the prospects of the labouring people, either working or on land.

These statements were written on paper which contained the following particulars — the name of the party, the country from which he came, and the part of New South Wales in whicli he was living ; and then the following questions : —

1. When did you arrive ? 2. What money had you on landing? 3. How long were you without employment ? 4. What wages did you receive? 6. How long did you remain in service ? 6. How much money had you when you commenced ? 7. How many sheep have you ? 8. How many cattle ? 9. Have you a dairy ? 10. Have you land on lease ; how much ? 11. How much ground do you cultivate ? 12. Do you work on your farm yourself ? 13. How many of your own family are able to work ? 14. What number of labourers do you employ? 15. What wages do you give? 16. Could you employ more labourers? 17. What wages can you afford to give men? 18. And also to women? 19. What do you value your property at, including land, chattels, and cattle ? 20. What has been the amount of the highest wages you received in your own country ? 21. Also the lowest ? 22. What was your employment at home ? 23. What country did you come from ? 24. The names of the townships you were employed in? 26. What do you pay for wheat per bushel ; flour per lb., tea, sugar, rent? 26. Education of your children ? 27. Do you subscribe to any public institutions ? 28. Can you read ? 29. Can you write]? 30. Have you any relations you wish to get out ? 31. Where do they live ? 32. Does your wife render you any assistance besides attending to your home and family ? 33. Are you a subscriber to any newspaper ? 34. Have you any books ? 35. How much butter do you make ? 36. Do you cure beef for sale ; how much ?

The Powder Bot That Fought With Nel80N. 161

Oat of this prosaic list of questions some wonderful touches of poetry were cited from time to time : —

William Faulkner The Sailor.

"I am one of the seventeen smugglers taken at ; two of our

party were hung at Flushing (Brock and Powell), on the Dutch coast ; we were taken by the Dutch on suspicion, and given up to the English consul ; we dealt in gin all over England, but we did nothing worse; my father and brothers were in the navy; my father was carpenter in a 32-gun frigate (Blanch). I was in the same ship with Nelson, on board the Victory, and when he fell I was near him, about twelve feet from him; 1 was a powder-boy, and I heard Nelson tell Captain Thomas Hardy, ' Bring the ship to an anchor ;' and he said he would not, Collingwood being his senior. You may say when we lost him we lost the whole of our pride. I may say, and there was great sorrow there. 1 was also on

board the frigate at the taking of Flushing, Captain J. Keen commander;

also at the taking of Copenhagan ; also at two islands up the Straights — that's where the 3rd Buffs got their facings turned. Captain Hardy will recollect me. And I also sailed with his brother Temple in the Swift ; there I received a pension of £12 a year from the Swift share. I received three wounds. This pension I lost when convicted, but I hope by the charitable intercession of Captain Thomas Hardy to recover it. Have never been in any trouble in this country. On arriving in this colony I was assigned to a man named Painter — remained there until my cousin, Lieutenant William Edmonston, pilot of Sydney harbour, made friends for me; he got me a berth in the government brig; there I received 32s. per month; remained four years in her; then engaged as fisherman to Sir Thomas Brisbane; after then went as master of a vessel on the coast — remained fifteen months; then came up this river as trader ; took a farm from Mr. Smith, bushinan, for twenty years ; rent 150 bushels of wheat per year. I now rent 12 acres of land, and work it myself ; the rent is £5 a year ; I make a comfortable living ; have plenty to eat and drink ; wc use about half a pound of tea a week, but buy it by the chest. I have been married 21 years last May; I married Hester Clarke, per Brothers. She was schoolmistress in Newgate.

The Wife. — " Mrs. Fry will remember me; I used to do needlework for Mrs. Fisher, little caps; she was an English lady. 1 wish to be remembered to Mrs. Fry; she is a nice lady, I have not forgotten her, and send her a calabash* grown .on my own ground. My relations live at Limehouse, about two miles from the Tower ; my brother's name is John Pusit; he is a cabinetmaker; my father was a weaver, and was for forty years employed by Madam Turner, Duke's-shore, Limehouse ; all my relations live there; I have three cousins there, watermen, all ply at Duke's-shore, London, near the Tower; I have seventeen brothers* and sisters there ; my mother is 104 years of ago when I heard from her ; tomorrow is my birthday ; I am 53 years of age. My brothers live near St. Catherine Dock ; my mother kept a public-house, sign 'Cleopatra;' have never heard from my friends for fourteen years; I lived in St. Catherine's parish; was born 5th October, 171/2. Mrs. Fry made me a present when I left of one pound of lump sugar, half a pound of tea each ; she gave me some patchwork.

This present of a calabash will bo found mentioned in the life of Mrs. Fry, but the editors forgot to statu that it cuiuo tlirouh the inquiries aud by the hands of Mrs. Chisholm.

K

162 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

William F. — " I think it's one of the finest countries in the world for a poor man. I have been right round the world ; this is the best for a poor man. A man can feed his pork, rear his poultry, and it is his own fault if he don't do well. I ought to have been the richest man in the colony.

" I hare gathered plenty, danced and sung it away; then began again. Soon got plenty. I have ten acres of wheat in, have two cows, one pig, twenty laying hens. When I sell my wheat I buy tea, sugar, clothes for the year. No matter what happens here, a man has only to begin again — that the fact I assure. If I had not a farthing I would not lay down.

" The wife states she has never wanted for food since in the country."

A Ticket-Of-Leave Man, Wiseman Ferry, Hawkesbury River.

" By trade I am a shoemaker; was assigned to Mr. M — M'C — , Toongabbie; he sent me to Bathurst and the Mudgee River, in the district of Mudgee; when there, at Bendigong, some armed bushrangers were about; there was a woman in my master's house in charge of the store, and I was in my hut working at my trade, when she came to me; her name was A — W — : she said, 'There are three armed men demand the key.' ' What am I to do,' said I, 'A — ? I am a lifer in the colony ; it will be death or freedom with me.' So when I goes up I sees three men, and before I got up one man fired, whether at me I know not; I had no arms; I got up close to him, and felled him with my fist, and seized his firearms (this was not the man that had fired, but the nearest to me); it was raining very hard, and I presented the piece I had seized, and said, ' Ground your arms, or I will shoot you! ' This they did, for they knew me in earnest. I marched them in the kitchen, and, just as I got them inside, two policemen came up; the policemen taken them into Mudgee, and I accompanied them with a black fellow ; their names (this was in 1842, 18th March) were Dolly Busky, a Frenchman, and William Rowlings; one of these was a new chum, and got a mitigation of four years. I got nothing but my ticket about three years sooner than I should, but I did expect my conditional pardon. The men I taken were two brothers of the name of Dolan, and a man named Brian ; they were tried at Bathurst, and got fifteen years each.

" When a government man before this, I was the instigation of getting three captured; the soldiers of the 28th promised me to get my liberty, but they got the reward, and never spoke for me. One of these was a notorious character, John Macquire, Joe Basley, and William Harding, Major Messington, and Serjeant Harries ; one of these men were killed, another wounded ; they were shot asleep with thirteen stands of arms. Besides this, in Captain S — 's son's establishment I captured one man. I am in the police, a strong man; could once lift 800 weight with my hands."

A Wife&#x27;S Statement.

" We have one team of bullocks, and a dray ; my husband is gone to Windsor to purchase a plough; we live on the banks of the Lower Hawkesbury, and keep a boat. We send our crops to Sydney by water; we are charged 4d. per bushel.

"Ten acres, rent £9 per year; landlord Dr. Nicholson, M.C.; the soil is very good (the land is not stumped); cannot speak to the quantity of wheat per acre; the crops look well, as this is our first year on this farm; we formerly rented one from his Grace the Archbishop of Sydney. There was about twelve acres, and for which we paid £16.

How Small Farmers Live In Australia. 163

" The girl that is old enough helps me; one daughter is married to a stockkeeper. Wages £20.

u We employ one man, wages 6s. per week; he boards and lodges with the

u In harvest time, I have twelve pigs and three up fattening; this year I have killed for my family use two bullocks; four pigs; they weighed about 1501bs. each; twenty -two ducks, four dozen of fowls, not counting young things; eggs we use as we want for the family, and I sell about ten or twelve dozen a week. Fowls thirteen-pence per pair; eggs pay well ; the neighbours are civil and obliging; when one man's short of rent or flour we help each other. There is good fish in the river, and it does not take much trouble to catch them.

" I sold my wheat at 4s. per bushel.

" I paid in August last £2 2s. 6d. for half a chest of tea and £1 2s. Od. the ewt. for sugar. 1 usually buy half a chest of tea and one bag of sugar at a time ; quarter cwt. of soap. I buy tea twice a year, and sugar three times.*'

After taking down the statements, Mrs. Chisliolm often added her own notes, as in the following on three old prisoners at Webb's Creek : —

"This poor man is a widower, his wife has not been long dead, and never did I see grief so stamped upon a poor man's countenance ; he was very kind to his partner during a long illness, had a doctor twice to see her ; he has a dread of bachelorism; he has visited his solitary neighbours over the river, and knows what a bachelor's life is. May my sons escape the calamity that prevails at Webb's Creek. All fastidious bachelors in search of imaginary beings should visit Webb's Creek, and see the comforts of single blessedness. I could not sleep all night for the sound of their miserable voices, their black chins, their brown shirts. A man would be happier with a very shrew than left to mate with his own shadow."

A Bachelor Settlement.

u Avery snug hut, ascent to it steep ; the house sheltered by a rock; we were scarce in the house before the frying-pan was put on the fire ; here we had fried eggs and bacon, cold boiled pork, tea, and damper : the bacon here was the best cured of any I have tasted in the colony. There is a good pigyard; here are the pigs, bachelor Hale's sole care (p. ; he gets up at night to feed, then goes out by day to gather thistles for them. When we left here, Whitaker brought a dozen of eggs to the boat as a present for me. How comfortable old people can live on a bit of land ; what ingenious contrivances poor homes are to keep human beings poor and miserable!

"Four large sacks of flour, three casks of meat, a great abundance of provisions, and a very considerable number of pigs ; but my attention was so taken up in examining the government monastery that I forgot to enter the numbers. At this desolate spot there were evident signs that men seldom voluntarily live alone. There was the tomb of Henry Hale's bush wife, 'a gin's grave ;' it was neatly paled in and painted ; never did I witness such misery in the midst of plenty. What frightful evils are the results of checking population !"

K 2

CHAPTER Xm.

Sir Charles Fitzroy.

RETROSPECT OF SIR GEORGE GIPPS'S GOVERNMENT — CONTEST ON DISTRICT COUNCILS— SIR CHARLES FITZROTS ADMINISTRATION— THE SQUATTERS OBTAIN FIXITY OF TENURE— FUTILE ATTEMPT TO REINTRODUCE CONVICTS.

IN July, 1846, Sir George Gipps retired from the government of New South Wales, and departed for England, worn out in body and mind by the excitement of perpetual contests with colonists as unscrupulous in their attacks as he was obstinate and haughty in maintaining his opinions and position. It was a war to the knife on both sides. The last measure he presented to the Legislative Council (a bill to renew the border police) was rejected, and an address voted, by a large majority, after two nights' debate, which was virtually a vote of censure on his government.

A few examples will illustrate the peculiarities of his government : — He disallowed the cost of curing a black aborigine of an infectious disorder, on the ground " that there were no funds legitimately applicable for that purpose ;" but he spared no expense to discover, try, and hang, if possible, those gentlemen who had slain blacks in self-defence, after he had withdrawn the police, for which they paid a special tax.

In the same spirit he threatened to withdraw the pasturing licence of any man whose shepherd lived with a black concubine, blacks being the only females within hundreds of miles ; but he towered with indignation when it was suggested that it was his duty to provide the shepherds with wives.

Having found officials, who had been elected members of the council, voting against him, he issued an order that, " On questions deemed of importance by the representative of her Majesty, persons who hold office during her Majesty's pleasure, and who may at the same time be members of the Legislative Council, are not at liberty to oppose, in their latter capacity, the government which it is their duty in the former capacity to serve."

A return made to the Legislative Council affords a series of examples of the arbitrary manner in which he exercised the power vested in him, as governor, of raising and reducing the price of land. In many instances he acted in defiance of the recommendation of the surveyors and local authorities. He believed in no one but himself.

C0Nte8T On District Councils Bill. 165

M Land at Ulawarra was sold at 12s. and £1, raised to £10, not sold, then offered at auction at £1, and being the refuse still remained unsold.

" In a second district land raised to £10 was reduced to £2. In a third, after an increase to £10 and £100, the lots were reduced to £2 an acre. In a third £100 upset was obliged to be reduced to £10 an acre. A fourth and fifth district present equally striking instances of the governor's ill success as a land valuer."

Perhaps, next to the contest with the squatters, the hardest struggle took place upon the District Council Bill.

District councils, as we have already stated, were created at the suggestion of Sir George Gipps, he became Governor of New South Wales, by the 47th section of the 5th and 6th Victoria, c. 79, with the view of raising local taxes, to be expended, under local control, for local objects, such as roads, bridges, schools, &c.

Under this clause the inhabitants of each district were empowered to elect a council, and, if they neglected to elect, the governor had power to appoint a council, which should decide on the sum required for a year for the district. Half such sum was to be contributed from the colonial treasury, and the other half to Ik> levied on the property in the district. If no local treasurer was elected the colonial treasurer had to issue his warrant, and sell up as much of the property of the district as would raise the requisite sum.

It was a very pretty paper scheme, which met the high approval of English statesmen of the first order. In England it would even now be a great improvement on the present mode of levying county rates, but in pastoral colonies, like those of Australia, it was hopelessly impracticable.

In the first place, there is no population sufficiently dense to work such a system ; and, in the second place, there is no ready money to pay the taxes.

Wages are high, consumption is large, and by taxes on consumption, levied at the ports, a considerable revenue may be raised, but by direct taxation very little. The colonists have, or rather had — for it is impossible to say what changes a gold currency may effect — sheep and cattle, which they exchanged, in meat, wool, and tallow, for what they needed in tea, sugar, tobacco, and clothing, but very little money.

When Sir George Gipps attempted to introduce his district councils ho found the colonists unprepared to pay five or ten pounds per annum for roads over which they never travelled, and bridges a hundred miles from their farms, and, indignant at finding their property at the mercy

166 The Three Colonies Of Australia..

of the colonial treasurer, the irresponsible officer of the governor, the colonists determined to resist the district council scheme. The governor was determined to enforce it. It was his darling child ; he had conceived it while looking out from his study on the dense population of a different state of society, and he was not the man to be beaten by circumstances. Like Sieyes and the Abbe 1 , other celebrated manufacturers of constitutions and governing machines, he was blind and deaf to all facts which militated against his theories, and was prepared that everybody should suffer so long as he maintained his character as a legislator. Thus he answered a deputation of the Legislative Council, and other influential colonists, who waited on him to point out the practical difficulties in the way of executing his district council scheme: "Whether it ruins the colony or not, an act of Parliament must, and shall be, carried out."

On this question the battle began. The inhabitants, except in one district, neglected to elect committees. The governor appointed them. Then came the question of levying, after assessing, a rate. A flaw was discovered in the act of Parliament. It was decided that the word "levy" did not empower the council to distrain. The governor applied to the Legislative Council for an act to amend the flaw. The Legislative Council refused to help him. He was thrown back on the powers vested in the colonial treasurer ; the " Algerine clause," as it was called in the colony, he threatened, but he dared not put in force. The struggle was carried on for years. The governor was supported by the approval of the home authorities; but the passive resistance of the colonists was too much for him. At length, in 1846, Earl Grey called for a report from the principal officials in New South Wales and Port Phillip, including Mr. Deas Thomson and Mr. Latrobe, and they reported in a manner which effectually, and for ever, shelved Sir George Gipps's district councils.

During an administration of eight years, distinguished by unusual official and literary aptitude, Sir George Gipps succeeded in earning the warm approbation of the Downing-street chiefs, and the detestation of the members of every colonial class and interest, except his immediate dependents. The squatocracy, the mercantile, and the settler class were equally opposed to him. Yet even with the same political and economical views, erroneous and baneful as many of them were, with much less talent, but with a more conciliatory temper, he might have been a happy, a popular, and a really useful governor. The value, as well as the popularity, of a colonial governor depends so much more on the manner in which he conciliates and advises the people under his

Government Of Qipps And Fitzrot. 167

charge, than on the manner in which he pens a despatch or draws up a speech from the vice-throne.

We have dwelt on his unhappy career — unhappy for himself and for the colony under his charge — to show what manner of policy was approved and rewarded by the Colonial Office of Earl Grey, and why discontent has been for many years chronic in New South Wales.

His administration will always be considered one of the most important epochs in the history of New South Wales, and indeed of Australia, associated as it is with the permanent infliction of the £1 an acre monopoly, the consequent triumph of the great pastoral over the freehold interest, the development of the wonderful pastoral resources of Australia, the abolition of assignment and transportation of criminals, the rise of a free population, the introduction of the elective element into the legislature, the commencement of a legitimate parliamentary struggle for the establishment of a responsible government, and a crowd of events of great local but minor national importance. All these date back to the period during which Sir George Gipps reigned and governed too, and contested every possible question with the Legislative Council, with the judges, with the crown land commissioners, with the clergy of all denominations, with squatters, with settlers, with every one who dared to have any other opinion than the opinion of the governor, except the Secretary of State for the Colonies.

Sir Charles Fitzroy.

Sir Charles Fitzroy, a younger son of the Grafton family, and a brother-in-law of the Duke of Richmond, who had previously been Lieut.-Governor of Prince Edward Island, and Governor of Antigua and the Virgin Islands, in the West Indies, succeeded Sir George Gipps, in 1846, and has retained the office, with increased dignity as governor-general, under the recent " Australian Reform Bill," up to the present time.

His administration personally affords no room for observation. He appears to have no opinions, a very conciliatory manner, and to be only anxious to allow the colonists as much liberty of legislation as his instructions will permit. He is contented to drive his own four-in-hand while his official advisers manage the colonists. And perhaps, until it is found possible to select as Governor of Australia some man of superior intellectual attainments and refined tastes, as well as common sense, conciliatory manners, and official aptitude, — some one, in fact, who would teach the wealthy young colonists that, according to modern English notions, more is needed than a large income, a polished exterior, and a fashion-

168 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

able tailor, to make a gentleman — there cannot be a better governor than the sporting, ball-giving, George the Fourth style of Fitzroy.

Tet Governor Fitzroy has had his difficulties, as the following anecdote will show : — Soon after his arrival there came from England a Mr. Miles, a worn-out man about town, in personal appearance very much in the style of Charles Dickens's Turveytop Senior, "so celebrated for his deportment," who represented himself as the natural son of one of the royal family, and certainly did bring letters from the home government entitling him to the first good thing that should be vacant. This is the system, and, although in theory the colonial minister seldom fills up colonial appointments himself, he sends out parties with letters which give them precedence over colonial claims.

Accordingly, very soon Mr. Miles was appointed commissioner of the Sydney police, an office similar to that held by Sir Richard Mayne in London, but requiring even more acuteness and activity, because subordinate officers are less to be depended on in a colony than in an old country, being more independent, and also because Sydney has the benefit of the doubly-convicted, long-practised felonry that escapes from Van Diemen's Land. Unfortunately, Earl Grey's protege" was in such a state of health that he could neither ride nor walk ; so he professed to look after his men by riding about in a cab. This farce might have endured a long time if something had not occurred in the financial accounts of the chief of the police — one into which the governor was obliged to order an investigation by two other officials ; and, although colonial officials hold together wherever it is possible, the report was cautious, but decidedly unfavourable. Still he was not dismissed.

But an independent member of the Legislative Council, when the salary of the head of the police came on for discussion, said, " Here is a man who cannot walk, and cannot ride, and cannot keep his hands out of a money-box ; surely there can be no need of an office wliich such a man can fill. I move to strike out the salary." After two attempts he succeeded, upon which Mr. Miles went again to the governor, pressed his claims, and was appointed chief stipendiary magistrate for the city of Sydney. But, in the following session, the same M.C. was ready to urge that the man who had been branded as unworthy and incapable of executing the inferior office in the police could not be fit for the superior post of chief magistrate. So the salary was struck out a second time. Then, a third time, went this unfortunate old man to ask

for another place ; but on that occasion he failed. " No, by !" said

Sir Charles, " I really cannot give you anything more ; for, if we go on in this way, the Legislative Council won't leave me anything to give away."

The Squatters Obtain Fixity Of Tenure. 169

However, the governor presented him with £250 out of a fund at his disposal, and put down a like sum to be voted by the Legislative Council, which, however, they rejected.

The increase in exports and imports, in revenue from the live stock of pastoral proprietors, and in demand for pastoral and agricultural labour, which in 1846 had obliterated all traces of the distress of 1841, 1843, and 1844, has gone on continuously from that date to the present time.

In March, 1847, ordinances were issued by the Queen in council, under the provisions of an act passed in the previous year (9 and 10 Vict., cap. 104), which gave the squatters, who had previously been mere tenants at will, leases for eight or fourteen years, with rights of pre-emption and compensation, which will be found fully detailed under the proper head.

These ordinances were made the subject of very just and severe criticisms in the report of a committee of the Legislative Council, which sat in 1847, over which Robert Lowe, Esq., presided, a report which exhausts the whole question of waste lands, a question as important to the colonists as that of the corn laws to the people of this country.

By this act, and these ordinances, Earl Grey retained the obnoxious high-priced land monopoly, although all hopes of obtaining sales of land, concentration, or moderate wages had ceased ; but he abandoned the contest which had for so many years been so stoutly carried on by Sir George Gipps against the pastoral interests, and yielded more than they had ever hoped — a complete monopoly of waste lands, not immediately adjoining townships, on such terms that, in the first place, the £1 an acre has become a perpetual protection, and, secondly, a money qualification, which cuts down the objects of their ancient jealousy — the small stockowners — by making it imperative to pay a tax on not less than four thousand sheep, or six hundred head of cattle, however far short of that number the flock or herd of a settler may fall.

Fortunately, the executive government in both New South Wales and Port Phillip exercised largely the powers given by the act, of extending the boundaries within which pastoral leases could not be claimed.

Three other events which occurred between 1846 and 1850 were — the attempt to reintroduce convicts into Australia, the consequent formation of the anti-convict league, the long struggle to obtain steam communication, and the passing of the act of Parliament which gave representative assemblies to the "Three Colonies," separated Port Phillip, under the name of Victoria, from New South Wales. The substance of this act, which forms the constitution of the three

170 The Three Colonies Of Austbalia.

colonies, will be given in its proper place. It is sufficient to observe here, that aa it reserved to the crown, that is the colonial minister, the control of the land fund, and retained and increased the schedules or civil list, before described as the subject of fierce contention between the first Legislative Council and Sir George Oipns, it was in the highest degree unsatisfactory to New South Wales.

On the transportation question Earl Grey was defeated, and compelled to withdraw the obnoxious order in council which retained New South Wales and Port Phillip among the provinces to which criminals might be transported. But he persisted in making Van Piemen's Land an overflowing cesspool of felonry.

In the midst of the first session of the new Colonial Parliaments, all political contests, internal and external, were cast into the shade by the gold discoveries : land question, convict question, taxation question, all were absorbed by the digging up of gold, over which flocks and herds had long been carelessly driven. The year 1850 found New South Wales with 200,000 free people, an export of £2,899,600, an import of £2,078,300, and 7,000,000 sheep. A surplus revenue and an annual demand for labour — nominal freedom of self-government, actual restriction from legislation on every vital interest — who can say in what condition, social and political, I860 will find the felon colony of 1788 1

Chapter Xiv.

Victoria, Or Port Phillip.

Sketch Of The Rise Of A Colony Founded By Colonists With Sheep,

Without An Act Of Parliament.

SEVENTEEN years ago Victoria, or Port Phillip, was a desert, barely known to Europeans except by the reports of wandering shore parties of whalers and sealers. In the year 1852 between seventy and eighty thousand inhabitants, six millions of fine-woolled sheep, a city furnished with all the comforts and luxuries of civilized life, two thriving ports crowded with ships, steam-boats, and coasters, farms, gardens, and vineyards, attested the colonizing vigour of the English race, the advantages of its soil and climate, and, not least, of administrative and legislative neglect ; for Port Phillip has attained all its solid prosperity without the aid of colonizing companies or acts of parliament, or governors or regiments, or any of the complicated machinery with which sham colonies are bolstered up, and real colonies are so often encumbered.

A small band of experienced colonists, a succession of flocks and herds from the opposite coast, a magistrate, a few policemen and customs officers, then a sort of deputy governor under the modest name of superintendent — these were found sufficient for building up the most flourishing dependency of the British crown, without calling on the home country for a single shilling.

The history of Port Phillip is singularly barren of incident, and may be comprised in a very few pages, while volumes might be filled with the moving accidents which have chequered the career of colonies which have not attained, and are not likely to attain, one-tenth of its wealth and importance as a field for British labour and capital.

In 1798 Bass, in the course of his whale-boat expedition, visited Western Port, one of the harbours of Victoria. In 1802 Flinders sailed into Port Phillip Bay, having been preceded ten weeks previously by Lieutenant John Murray, of the Lady Nelson.

In 1803 Colonel Collins was sent from England with a small force and a party of convicts to found a settlement in Port Phillip. He arrived in 1804, and took up a very injudicious position on the

172 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

southern shore of the bay, where the beach was unfavourable for landing, and there was no fresh water. It is evident, from a narrative published by one of the party, that from the first Collins had no earnest desire to form a settlement at Port Phillip : he had heard glowing accounts of the beauty and fertility of the opposite shores of Van Diemen's Land, and, after a very cursory survey, he decided on removing thither. In the course of a walk round the bay, undertaken by the officers of the ship, a fast-flowing stream was discovered, and at one moment the hopes of the seamen were excited by the sight of the sparkling sand, which they took for gold; but of course, observes the narrator, it was only mica.* At the present day we cannot be so sure that it was mica.

During their encampment on the shores of Port Phillip three of the convicts escaped into the interior : one of them was William Buckley, a native of Macclesfield, who had been a grenadier, served under the Duke of York in Flanders, and had been transported for striking his superior officer.

Previous to the arrival of Collins, Mr. Charles Grimes, the surveyorgeneral of the colony, had completed the marine survey of Flinders by making an outline of the harbour, where he reported the existence of the river now known as the Yarra Yarra, or " ever-flowing water."

In 1824 Messrs. Hume and Hovell, two stockowners of New South Wales, made an expedition to explore new pastures, and, travelling from near Lake George four hundred miles, in the course of which they traversed the flanks of the Australian Alps, and crossed three rivers, which they named the Hume, the Ovens, and the Goulburn, emerged on shores which they imagined to be those of Western Port, but there is now little doubt that they had really reached the western arm of Port Phillip Bay, near the site of the port of Geelong. In looking at a map of the Melbourne district a spot will be found marked Mount Disappointment, about thirty miles from Melbourne. It was this hill that the weary travellers climbed, calculating that from its summit they would behold the sea. They were right in the direction, and a long line of coast and a stretch of the finest sheep plains lay in a line before them ; but, unfortunately, lofty broad bored trees hid everything from their longing eyes, and they descended sad and disheartened.

It would seem as if there had been a spell over this fortunate land which guarded its wealth from the discovery of a series of explorers, from Cook to Hovell and Hume.

"Lieutenant Tuckers Voyage in H. M. S. Calcutta, to found a Settlement in Bass's Straits 1803-4."

Settlement Op Pobt Phillip.

Mr. Hovoll was afterwards employed by the government to form a settlement at Western Port, which was, however, soon abandoned ; and the fine pastoral district traversed in the course of his journey with Mr. Hume excited little attention, in consequence of the discovery, about the same time, of Brisbane Downs, which were more accessible from the previously occupied districts.

In 1834 Messrs. Henty, engaged in the whaling trade at Launceston, in Van Diemen's Land, formed a branch establishment at Portland Bay, and soon afterwards imported a few sheep and cattle to feed on the splendid pastures which there, unlike the other districts of Australia, carpetted the shores almost to the water's edge ; and, in the same year, other flockowners from Van Dicmen's Land crossed the straits to Port

Phillip.

Already the Tasmanians had found the pastures of their island, covered as the greater portion of it is by inaccessible mountains and forests of gigantic timber, too limited for the annual increase of their flocks. The reports of the pastoral resources of the opposite shore became a constant subject of discussion, and in April, 1835, a party of settlers formed themselves into an association,* for the purpose of taking possession of an estate in Port Phillip ; but, before they could execute their project, Mr. John Batman, a blacksmith, born in New South Wales, but then visiting Van Diemen 's Land, secretly set sail from Launccston, accompanied by a party of tame blacks from the neighbourhood of Sydney, landed in the middle of Slay, and, through lib native interpreter, entered into an arrangement with the Port Phillip

Tba UMdUlon consuls! of ileum. 8, ioJ S. Jftduon, Furkner, Mmr, Etuu, ud Lucjr-

174 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

aborigines for the purchase of some of their land, returned to Van Diemen's Land, and, again crossing the straits with a store of goods, induced the savages to put their marks to a deed prepared by a Tasmanian lawyer, which purported to transfer a large tract of land, altogether about half a million acres, in consideration of certain blankets and tomahawks. This transaction, like all similar purchases from hunting tribes, was mere child's play. The aborigines of Australia have no idea of cultivation, and consequently no idea of possession of land or anything else. They accepted Batman's blankets, tobacco, flour, tomahawks, &c., and only understood that by that payment he became their ally.

Batman selected the site of his future manor-house at Indented Head. Thence he soon beheld the approach of the ships of the association whom, by his rapid proceedings, he had forestalled in the honour of founding the future Victoria.

It is said, we know not with what truth, that he mounted his horse, and, galloping down to the beach, warned them off his estate. Perhaps, in 1950, a young Victorian painter may assemble crowds in the Melbourne National Gallery, to see " Batman warning the intruders from Port Phillip Bay."

Some of the party, awed by his legal threats, retired inland, and set their flocks to feed on land they eventually acquired. Mr. John Pascoe Fawkner, a name still well known in Victoria, with more obstinacy and less good fortune, took up a position on the northern banks of the Yarra, overlooking the spot where a natural ledge divided the salt tide from the fresh river at the ebb, above a natural basin, which has since, by the aid of masonry, been converted into a port for the city of Melbourne, open to vessels and steamers of two hundred tons.

Batman had previously addressed a letter to Colonel Arthur, the Governor of Van Diemen's Land, in which he informed him of his proceedings ; described the country he had explored in glowing but not exaggerated terms; and requested the support of his excellency in his schemes of colonization, and for the civilization of the natives. Colonel Arthur transmitted copies of Batman's letter, and all the documents connected with his alleged purchase from the natives, to the Colonial Office ; expressed his decided opinion that the settlement of Port Phillip would form a useful outlet for the settlers of Van Diemen's Land ; and that Mr. Batman, "whose conduct had been marked by humanity as well as enterprise," was deserving of a grant of land, although his purchase, as he had already informed him, was clearly illegal.

Lord Aberdeen, and his successor, Lord Glenelg, followed the

A Convict Chief Of The Aborigines. 175

unfortunate course which has almost invariably been adopted by our colonial ministers. They began by saying no, and in a very short period were obliged to say yes — to acknowledge a fact !

Lord Aberdeen in December, 1834, and Lord Glenelg in July, 1835, wrote elaborate' despatches, the one against the occupation of Twofold Bay, the outlet to Brisbane Downs, or Maneroo, as it is now called, on the borders of Port Phillip, as recommended by Sir Richard Bourke, and the other against the occupation of Port Phillip, as recommended by Colonel Arthur, objecting to measures "the consequence of which would be to spread over a still further extent of country a population which it was the object of the land regulations to concentrate," and declining, on the ground of "expense to the mother country, and danger to the natives and settlers/' to sanction the proceedings of Batman and his associates.

But before the despatches were unsealed the thing was done. Mother Partington's mop was not more powerful to stop the Atlantic than paper proclamations to arrest the march of Australian settlers with sheep and lambs in sight of " fresh fields and pastures new."

On the one hand, shepherds and stockmen were spreading overland, following their flock from pasture to pasture toward Port Phillip ; on the other, a Port Phillip fever seized the Tasmanians, and they crowded across the straits, like the patriarchs of old, with tents and all their woolly possessions.

" We went down," says a lady, then a little child, " to see the six adventurers embark for Port Phillip, with the same feelings as if it had been Cortez or Pizarro ; but very soon there was the same universal rush for Port Phillip that there is now for the gold-diggings."

It was while one of these early parties was landing from boats near the future site of Melbourne that they saw, amid a tribe of natives sitting under a tree, with all the arms and tokens of a chief, a man of large limbs and gigantic stature, tighter-coloured than his companions, as well as could be distinguished through tan, paint, and dirt. He stared hard at the strangers, and seemed muttering to himself; then, rising, he approached, and addressed them in a strange jargon, in which a few words of English were distinguishable. It was Buckley, one of the convicts who had escaped from the party of Colonel Collins, and, after seventeen years' sojourning with the aborigines, again found himself among his countrymen.

He had forgotten his native tongue, and had assumed all the habits of his savage companions, among whom he was a chief by virtue of his superior stature and strength. He at once joined the colonists,

176 Ths Three Colonies 07 Australia.

gradually re-acquired the English tongue, and exercised very useful influence over his late subjects. The governor of Van Diemen's Land granted him a free pardon, and, as it was disagreeable to him to remain in the scene of his savage life, he became a constable in Van Diemen's Land.

But either some original infirmity, or long 'absence from civilized social life, had impaired his intellect, and ho rarely and unwillingly conversed on the events of his extraordinary career.

When, in June, 1836, a magistrate, Mr. Stewart, despatched by Sir Richard Bourke, arrived to assert her Majesty's rights and to announce the invalidity of all purchases from the aborigines, he found the country already occupied, and the work of colonization steadily proceeding. Nearly two hundred men had arrived from Van Diemen's Laud, and were settled around the estuary of Port Phillip ; 35,000 sheep, under the charge of strong armed parties, with a number of horned cattle and horses, were spread for many miles over the site of the present Ballarat gold fields, each party seeking to appropriate as large a run as possible.

History Op Port Phillip. 177

Until very recently, on the station of Messrs. Jackson, at Saltwater River, was to be seen one of the great bells, mounted on a lofty frame, wliich used to be rung from station to station to summon assistance when an attack from the blacks was anticipated.

In the same year Sir Thomas Mitchell, the Cook of Australian inland exploration, re-explored and surveyed the overland route from New South Wales, part of which had been traversed by Messrs. Hovell and Hume, and described the fine plains of Victoria, to which he gave the name of Australia Felix, " the better to distinguish it from the parched deserts of the interior country, where we had wandered so unprofitably, and so long."* He then discovered and named Mount Byng, the liill since become world-famous as Mount Alexander.

The publication of this report in the Colonial and English papers, and afterwards of Sir T. Mitchell's travels, fanned up the flame of the Port Phillip fever, and very soon, along the overland route, pool after pool was drunk dry by the thousands of stock marching on to the promised land.

In April, 1837, Sir Richard Bourke visited the new colony, and gave directions for laying out the town of Melbourne on two hills, East and West Hill, sloping down to the banks of the River Yarra. In June the first land sale took place, and speculation commenced, and did not cease until it ended in wide-spread insolvency in 1841 and 1842.

The steady course of depending on their increase of flocks and herds was abandoned ; every one went into town and country lots ; village sites were laid out in all directions, some of which remain projects or miserable hamlets to this hour. Emigrants crowded in from all parts of Great Britain. At Hobson's Bay, the entrance to the Yarra, more than one hundred three-masted ships were to be seen at anchor at one time. Labour rose to an enormous price; brickmakers earned 8s. a day ; the common four-pound loaf was sold for 3s. 6d. ; and mere huts were let at the rate of £100 a year. Meantime, fortunately, the living pastoral treasures of Australia came pouring in, and increased and multiplied on the fine downs and grass-covered hills, while some wise, hard-working settlers devoted themselves to agriculture.

During this period the Port Phillip district was nominally under the government of the central authority at Sydney, but in reality the people governed themselves, with the help of a magistrate and a few policemen, while a neighbouring colony of the same date was enjoying all the costly magnificence of elaborate government machinery.

Mitchell's Australia Felix."

178 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

In 1839 C. J. La Trobe, Esq., the present governor, was appointed superintendent of Port Phillip district, with an authority little more than nominal, as the surveys, post-office, customs, &c, were managed by subordinates responsible to the chief departments at Sydney ; and even up to 1839 the sales of rural land took place at Sydney.

.This centralization of authority in a distant city, having different interests, and the appropriation of funds derived from Port Phillip land sales to emigration into Sydney district, were long subjects of grievance on which, as they have been redressed, it is not necessary to dwell.

When representative institutions were conceded to New South Wales, six representatives were apportioned to the Port Phillip district; but it was soon found impossible to find that number of colonists able and willing to live for six months of the year six hundred miles away from their estates ; and for several sessions before 1850 the Port Phillippians virtually declined to elect representatives.

In 1841 an administrative division took place between the two provinces; the land funds, part of which had been unfairly appropriated for the emigration purposes by New South Wales, were surrendered ; and, in spite of the efforts of a very influential party in New South Wales, Port Phillip acquired a separate existence. At the same time the separation is so recent, that the account of the history, and of religious, educational, and legal institutions, of New South Wales, during the last ten years, equally applies to Victoria.

In 1842 Melbourne obtained a municipal corporation, under 5 and 6 Victoria, cap. 76. Victoria has, however, never been a penal colony, although long and still suffering from the overflowing of the felonry poured into Van Diemen's Laud.

It would not serve any useful purpose to record the struggles of Port Phillip to obtain an independent existence, now that the question has been finally settled.

The general quality of the soil in Port Phillip has given the settlers an advantage over land purchasers in less fertile districts of Australia, and the absence of an expensive local government has enabled the colonists to escape a local debt like that which so long weighed down South Australia.

In feet, the brief history of Port Phillip proves how much more safely, successfully, and inexpensively colonies may be planted by colonists, than by enthusiastic amateurs and speculating companies.

In 1852 the assembling of the first Legislative Council of Victoria marked the commencement of a new era of independence and crowned by the golden discoveries at Ballarat and Mount Alexander.

Chapter Xv.

South Australia.

BEAU BRUMMEL AND GIBBON WAKEFIELD — ORIGIN OF SOUTH AUSTRALIAN SCHEME— PROGRESS OF NEGOTIATION— ACT OBTAINED— CAPTAIN HINDMARSH GOVERNOR— RECALLED— COLONEL GAWLER APPOINTED-THE SOUTH AUSTRA- LIAN COMMISSIONERS— THEIR MUDDLING MANAGEMENT.

LORD AXVANLEY*used to tell a story of Brummel, whose cool and solemn assurance might have made him, had he lived in 1840, a king of railways, or a director of a colonizing company — that once, when stopping at a country inn, ascending the stairs, he met the Beau's valet descending with an armful of crumpled clean cravats. " Pray," he inquired, " what are those ?" " These, my lord," replied the valet, " are my master's failures." When the Beau emigrated to Calais, amongst other creditors, he owed an enormous bill to his laundress.

South Australia was the first, as Canterbury, in New Zealand, is the last, of Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield's colonizing failures — failures which have been tried at the expense of every class of capitalist, from a Republican banker to a Puseyite peer. But, his credit being now exhausted, it seems as if he would end his days without a good fit, thus sharing the fate of other unfortunate philosophers and financiers, like Law, Owen, Cabet, and Louis Blanc, with this difference, that those gentlemen all sacrificed something to their theories ; they lost fortune, or character, or country ; but Mr. Wakefield, while his disciples have suffered in purse and in person, has contrived to patch up a character originally much damaged, and build a living, if not a fortune, out of a series of bubbles.

When under the government of Sir Thomas Brisbane the advantages which New South Wales offered to emigrants began to be whispered about England, — when from time to time persons returned home with great wealth, acquired by feeding sheep, under the care of white slave shepherds, and selling grain and beef to feed the troops and gaols of New South Wales, — a pressure was put upon the government for the purpose of obtaining grants of land which became extremely troublesome.

One of the last large grants was that to the Australian Agricultural Company of one million acres of pastoral and agricultural land, with two thousand acres of minerals and a monopoly of the coal-mines of Autralia, made in 1824; and in July, 1825, the directors report that " his Majesty's government have determined in future, instead of giving free

180 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

grants of land, to put it up for sale according to a system similar in many respects to that adopted in the United States of America — an arrangement which will necessarily give an increased value to land in the colony."

In the mean time the colony of the Swan River had been founded, at a spot on principles and by persons which ensured its failure.

The continued prosperity of New South Wales counterbalanced the

damp which the failure of Swan River would have cast upon any

enterprise nearer home, and no sooner did the state of the money market show signs of that periodical boiling-over point which, in

England, always results in some wild speculation, than several colonizing

schemes were launched.

Had common sense ruled the consultations of our statesmen and philanthropists, they would not have allowed their anti-republican prejudices to have prevented them from studying and imitating the admirable system by which, for half a century, with trifling modifications, the vast territories of the United States have been colonized, cities have been founded, harbours constructed, railroads made, and canals cut.

Under this system the territories for sale are surveyed in advance, a map containing the land for sale is open to every intending purchaser, there are no reserves except for special stated public purposes, while parties settling beyond the bounds of surveyed land do so at their own risk, and have no power to inflict on the parent state heavy expenses in armies or officials. They arc expected to govern and protect themselves, and to retire or purchase when the government surveyor makes his appearance. No doubt the American system has its defects, but, taken as a whole, it is the best which has ever been devised for employing a large emigrant population and conquering and subduing the earth, at the least possible public expense.

But in 1829 a great sensation was produced in the literary and political world by the appearance of a small book or pamphlet, entitled " A Letter from Sydney, the Principal Town of Australasia, edited by Robert Gouger,"* which was soon known to be the production of Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield. Out of this little book grew the colonization of South Australia and New Zealand.

The real author, on the strength of information communicated to liim by two relatives, unsuccessful colonists in Van Diemen's Land and New South Wales, propounded, in clear, lively, homely, yet eloquent style, a new theory of colonization.

AH that we know of Uobert Gouger Is, that he was a Dissenter, of Republican opinions, who erred some time in the French National Guard during the Revolution of July, 1880. He afterwards became secretary of the South Australian Society, and eventually Colonial Secretary in South Australia.

Mr. E. 6. Wakefield. 181

There are descriptive passages in the " Letter from Sydney," such as the pictures of the Italian girl, the Australian girl, and the journey from Alexandria to Genoa, so beautiful, so true, so real, that one cannot help regretting, both for the sake of his own reputation and his numerous colonizing victims, that Gibbon Wakefield had not become a writer of novels and travels, instead of puffs, paragraphs, and pamphlets in praise of model colonies. But Mr. Wakefield had not only the charm of " style," he was energetic, tenacious, indefatigable, unscrupulous ; he possessed a wonderful talent for literary agitation, which, when employed by tailors or blacking-manufacturers, goes by a more vulgar name; a Protean adaptiveness, which has made him successively the bosom adviser of Republicans, Radicals, Whig peers, Conservatives, and Low Church and High Church bishops. Beginning with Gouger, he has obtained the patronage of a Grote, a Molesworth, an Archbishop Whately, and a Bishop Wilberforce. Lords Glenelg and Lord Stanley, Aberdeen and Grey, have been more or less his pupils, while, so late as 1850, he led captive to Canterbury colony a crowd of educated victims. He has shaken a ministry, founded and distributed the patronage of at least two colonies, and almost thrown a third into rebellion. At one time he had secured the advocacy of nearly all the daily and weekly press, and of every economical writer of any literary celebrity. But, with all these extraordinary advantages, the results of his advice have been invariably disastrous. The disciples of his theories only continue his disciples as long as they remain in this country ; no sooner do they become colonists than they renounce him and all his works.

Gibbon Wakefield has neither candour, nor truth, nor humility. Like the Bourbons, he forgets nothing, and learns nothing. In 1849 he published a thick book of 500 pages, called " The Art of Colonization," which, so far as regards the land question, is merely an amplification, in a feeble and diffuse style, of the theories so fervidly propounded in 1829. No one, on reading this bulky work, would imagine that the writer had had twenty years' experience, during which he had directed the colonization, on varying plans, of South Australia, Wellington, Nelson, and New Plymouth ; besides planning half a dozen others in Port Cooper, the Chatham Islands, New Caledonia, and Vancouver's Island. Still less would any reader conceive that in these colonies no one of the cardinal results promised by the Wakefield theory had been realized.

The " Letter from Sydney," by far the most brilliant of his works on colonization, which is now out of print, contains so good

182 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

a statement of the origin of a system which is more likely than any other cause to drive the Australian colonies to premature independence, and it has had such an important influence upon those colonies, that the following brief abstract of its contents will not be out of place.

The writer represents himself to be an English gentleman of large fortune and refined tastes, who has emigrated under the idea that an estate of twenty thousand acres in Australia would procure the same comforts, income, and consideration that an estate of a thousand acres would in England. He says : — " I have got 20,000 acres for a mere trifle, and I imagined that a domain of that extent would be very valuable. In this I was wholly mistaken. As my estate cost next to nothing, so it is worth next to notliing. The trees on my property, if growing in any part of England, would be worth at least £150,000. The best thing that could hajypen to me would be the annihilation of all this natural produce ; but the cost of destroying it would be at least £15,000." He then goes on to enumerate mines of iron and coal which would make him " a peer in England," but which are valueless for want of labour or roads. " I did not, you know, intend to become a farmer. Having fortune enough for all my wants, I proposed to get a large domain, to build a good house, to keep enough land in my own hands for pleasure grounds, park, and game preserves, and to let the rest, after erecting farmhouses in suitable spots. My mansions, park, preserves, and tenants, were all a mere dream. There is no such class as a tenantry in this country, where every man who has capital to cultivate a farm can have one of his own." He then graphically describes the miseries of a solitary life to a man accustomed to the elegant luxuries of civilized life. His " own man " leaves him, and invests his savings in a small farm. He imports labourers and mechanics from England, and they leave him without repaying the cost of their passage. He observes to a friend, " Were you a broken farmer, or a poor lieutenant, I should say, come here by all means; you cannot be placed more unhappily than at present, and you may gain by the change. But / am advising a man of independent fortune, who prefers his library even to the beauties of nature, and to whom intellectual society is necessary for his peace of mind. I thought at one time of establishing a dairy ; but my cows were as wild as hyanas, and almost as wicked. I had no dairy woman, no churns, no anything that was wanted ; and, above all, I wanted ifulustry, skill, economy, and taste, for any such pursuits, or, at least, a drudge of a wife to supply those wants." He then paints an amusing (not

Wakefield's cause and remedy. 183

entirely untrue, but exaggerated) picture of the want of intellectual society in a colonial town.

Having, then, come to the conclusion that the colony would fall into total barbarism so soon as the convict assignment system, then in full force, should be abolished, leaving the colonists dependent on free labour, he proceeds to state the cause of these miseries —

" Fons et origo malorum."

The whole evil, according to this unfortunate gentleman of fortune, lies in cheap land, which produces dear labour, by drawing labourers into landowners, and by promoting dispersion — by deterring men from renting land, as they prefer freehold. Dear labour obstructs improvements in agriculture, in public works, in arts, in science. There being no tenants and few servants, there is no easy, refined, intellectual class : mere mechanics, labourers, and even common farmers and poor lieutenants, are the only persons who enjoy colonial life. With cheap land and dear labour colonists could get the advantage of the presence of such emigrants as the letter-writer.

The remedy propounded in 1829, repeated with equal confidence in 1849, is to make land so dear that labourers shall not be able to obtain possession of land " too soon " — to affix to all colonial land what Mr. Wakefield calls in another work a " hired labour price" And further, that the money for which the land sold should be devoted to the importation of the redundant labour of the mother country — an importation which he advises should be conducted mith a view to the greatest benefit of the capitalist, — that is to say, it should consist entirely of young married couples under five and twenty years of age, unencumbered by children or parents. Family colonization had no charms for Gibbon Wakefield.

Thus supplied with ample cargoes of healthy young labourers of both sexes, debarred by a sufficient price from becoming freeholders, the writer of the letter from Sydney " promises that the capitalists shall find ample profitable employment for their capital, shall concentrate and carry on model farming, and cultivate all the arts and sciences."

But there is one important question which he anticipates, and answers thus : —

" It becomes clear that the object we have in view may be attained by fixing some considerable price on waste land. Still, how is the proper price to be ascertained ? Frankly, I confess I do not know. I believe that it could be determined only by experience." This was in 1829. Twenty years later, in 1849, after having experimented on New South Wales, and on three colonies in New Zealand, and provided

184 The These Colonies Of Australia.

fop all his relations in snug colonial berths, he says, " It is here that I have been frequently and tauntingly required to mention what I deem the sufficient price; but I have hitherto avoided falling into the trap which that demand upon me really is. I could do that certainly for some colony with which I am particularly well acquainted, but I should do so doubtingly and with hesitation, for the elements of calculation are so many and so complicated, in their various relations to each other, that in depending on them exclusively there would be liability to error."

We may observe that this caution in naming price only extended to books and pamphlets, as Mr. Wakefield never hesitated to assure those who bought lots of land in his model colonies that they would enjoy all the advantages it was presumed a sufficient price would confer. Therefore, of course, the colonizing purchasers, seeing Mr. Wakefield in constant communication with one of the managers of the colony, took it for granted that 12s., or 20s., or 30s., or £3, according to the colony, was the sufficient price.

In 1829 this charming little work, with its really ingenious theory and really desirable aims, — good wages, large profits, and complete civilization, — took the active world by storm, and no sooner was the serious business of carrying the Reform Bill completed, than a society was formed for carrying it into practical effect.

The extraordinary success with which this theory was received at home, although opposed by every intelligent colonist, may be traced to the skilful manner in which it combined the interests and conciliated the prejudices of the legislative and middle as well as the executive class. The capitalist for the first time saw himself painted as an injured victim, and presented with a new field for ample profits ; the ratepayer was charmed at the idea of getting rid of an unlimited number of paupers ; the educated gentleman hoped to live on his £20,000 with all the state, dignity, and luxury, physical and intellectual, that a landed estate of £100,000 confers in England or Scotland. The adventurous of the middle class dwelt on the charms of distinction which would be to them in a new colony, while to ardent politicians and essayists, who in 1830 were for the most part deeply dissatisfied with all our ancient institutions, the idea of becoming founders and modellers of a model commonwealth was truly delightful. Even the government was eventually conciliated by the prospect of additional patronage which a new colony presented.

In 1831 Major Bacon, a fellow-soldier in the Spanish Legion with

♦ " Art of Colonisation/' p. 348.

Negotiations For Charters. 185

Colonel Wakefield, brother to the theorist, appears to have opened negotiations at the Colonial Office, then under Lord Godcrich, for establishing a chartered colony in some part of Australia ; and in 1832 these negotiations had so far progressed that a provisional committee of the South Australian Land Company had been formed, with Colonel Torrens, one of the proprietors of the Globe newspaper, as its chairman, with a proposed capital af £50,000.

In a letter dated 9th July, 1832, Colonel Torrens transmitted a draft of the charter suggested by his committee, and drawn under the instructions of Mr. Wakefield. On perusing this draft Lord Godcrich curtly closed the negotiation, on the ground that " it would virtually transfer to the company the sovereignty of a vast unexplored territory ; that it would encroach upon the limits of the existing colonies of New South Wales and Western Australia ; that the charter would invest the company with powers of legislation, of erecting courts, of appointing judges, of raising and commanding militia; that all the powers of the company, involving in their practical effects the sovereign dominion of the whole territory, would be transferred to a popular assembly, which would be to erect within the British monarchy a government purely republican ; and that the company would be receivers of large sums of money, for the due application of which they do not propose to give any specific security."

When the promoters offered to modify their plan they were informed " that the views entertained by the proposed company are not sufficiently precise and determined to lead his lordship to apprehend that any advantage will arise from continuing a correspondence that has for some time been going on/'

In 1833 another association was formed, and the chairman, W. W. Whitmore, Esq., M.P., opened negotiations with the present Earl of Derby, then Under Secretary for the Colonies. He proposed to found a colony on the site where it was eventually planted, to sell land at 5s. an acre (" this will ensure the concentration of settlers in proportion to the price at which land is sold"), and devote the proceeds to the conveyance of young pauper labourers of both sexes in equal numbers. The company to have a million acres at 5s. an acre. " On this land they will perform such works as they may deem expedient, with a view to attract population thereto, while government will sell in an entirely unimproved state the land not purchased by the company to any individuals desirous of purchasing it."

This association, which contemplated fame and patronage rather than profit, included G. Grote, the . eminent historian of Greece ;

186 The Thbee Colonies Of Australia.

William Hutt, afterwards Governor of Western Australia; Henry Bulwer, since an Ambassador and K.C.B. ; Colonel Torrens ; H. G. Ward, once the Radical proprietor of the Weekly Chronicle, Secretary of the Admiralty, and since Governor of the Ionian Islands and K.C.B. ; Joseph Parkes, of Birmingham political union notoriety, since anchored in a snug semi-sinecure ; J. A. Roebuck ; Sir William Molesworth; Benjamin Hawes, since Colonial Under Secretary; and Edward Strutt, since Chief Commissioner of Railways.

This negotiation also failed. Mr. Gibbon Wakefield's charter was not approved. The Colonial Secretary, amongst other objections, perceived " that the whole active legislative power over the colony is to, be taken from the crown and placed in the hands of commissioners, not removable except for positive misconduct or neglect ; not responsible, either to the colonists or to the government at home, for the measures they may propose; and not personally interested in the success of the undertaking they are to conduct."

While, therefore, approving of the plan of colonization suggested as regarded the disposal of land, Mr. Secretary Stanley insisted that the government of the colony should be left in the hands of the crown until such time as it was able to govern itself.*

After receiving this communication the South Australian Association decided to continue their operations for the of forming a crown colony, as there was no hope of the government permitting the foundation of a chartered colony, provided that, by act of Parliament, provision were made for the permanent establishment of the mode of disposing of waste land, and of the purchase-money of such land, devised bv Mr. Edward Gibbon Wakefield. In New South Wales the system had been introduced by order in council alone.

Before the negotiation concluded Mr. Stanley resigned. Mr. Spring Rice (now Lord Monteagle) became Secretary for the Colonies. Under his administration an act was passed, in the session of 1834, substantially embodying the terms agreed upon with Mr. Stanley, by which the present province of South Australia was established, the minimum price of land fixed at 12s. an acre, and the business of colonization was placed in the hands of a body of commissioners.

Lord Aberdeen having become Secretary for the Colonies, eight commissioners were selected from the members of the South Australian Association, and gazetted May, 1835, Colonel Torrens being appointed chairman, because, as he stated in his letter of application,

Letter from John LiTcvre, Ksq., to W. W. Whltmore, Esq., M.P., dated Downlnjc-rtrect, 17th March, 1834.

Appointment Op Governor Hixdmarsh. 187

he had " more knowledge of the object and principles of the proposed colony than any of the other gentlemen willing to act."

It is important to note that, although the Colonial Office refused to permit the foundation of a chartered colony, in which the government and responsibility would have been in the hands of the colonizers, from first to last the personal friends and pupils of Mr. Wakefield had the sole control of every arrangement, and the selection of every officer, and that every step was taken under the advice of Mr. Gibbon Wakefield, who was a constant attendant at the rooms of the association in the Adelphi.

The commissioners first offered the post of governor to the present distinguished General (then Colonel) Charles James Napier ; but on on being refused a small body of troops as pob'ce, and power to draw on the British government for money in case of need, he declined the dangerous honour, observing, with wise prescience, "while sufficient security exists for the supply of labour in the colony, and even forces that supply, there does not appear to be any security that the supply of capital will be sufficient to employ that labour." Thus South Australia lost an active governor, and India obtained a great general. Of two governors subsequently appointed, one was compelled to overdraw £400,000, and the next obtained a company of soldiers in lieu of an expensive police. The commissioners then selected as governor Captain Hindmarsh, R.N., a distinguished naval officer, now Sir John Hindmarsh, Governor of Heligoland, and Colonel Light, as chief officer of the survey department ; Mr. Fisher, as resident commissioner ; Mr. Robert Gouger, the editor of the " Letter from Sydney," and secretary of the South Australian Association, as colonial secretary — in all seventeen appointments, including two attorneys, and an unsuccessful merchant, who had been found useful to the commission in selling land and raising money. The parties selected seem to have been studiously chosen for their innocence of all colonial, all official, and all agricultural experience. With the exception of the governor, the appointments were jobs of the grossest character.

While the political steps for founding the model colony were progressing, means for agitating the public mind in favour of emigration, on the new principle, to the unknown territory selected by the South Australian Association had not been neglected.

The theory propounded in the " Letter from Sydney " had been repeated and enlarged upon in a work called " England and America," and in a multitude of pamphlets, reviews in newspapers, speeches, and lectures. The active world began to believe that a political philosopher's stone had been invented.

188 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

There never was anything to equal the activity and success with which the new theory of colonization was carried out. A newspaper, the South Australian Gazette, was published in London, with the view of being transplanted to the new colony as soon as a hut could be found for its reception ; while the most influential daily and weekly organs re-echoed the statements and conclusions which received the admiring assent of all parties. Anything in the shape of opposition, or even doubtful criticism, from persons of colonial experience, was greeted with the utmost degree of scorn and contempt. They were hissed down, unheard, as the most stupid or jealously envious of mortals. The friends of Mr. Wakefield's theory have, from the first, taken it for granted that nothing but the basest motives could induce any one to hesitate in accepting their panacea for colonial ills, and they had the same advantage in attacking the Colonial Office that a quack like Morison or Holloway has in ridiculing a venerable, high-charging, pill-and-potion, bleed-and-blister practitioner of the old bag-wig school.

After having triumphantly and truly expatiated on the deaths and diseases produced by the jog-trot practice of the home-bred Colonial Office practitioners, Mr. Wakefield came forward in a gilded chariot and, while the press beat the drums and sounded the trumpets, and a tail of M.P.'s cried "Hear, hear!" exclaimed in an impressive voice, " Here, buy my book ! you will find an infallible recipe for the constitution of a self-supporting colony." Of course the public, which knew as little of colonization as of physic, believed the noisy, uncontradicted quack.

A small book, published in 1834, entitled "The New British Province of South Australia, with an Account of the Principles, Objects, Plan, and Prospects of the Colony," one of scores of the same tendency which appeared about the same time, is a favourable and temperate specimen of the ingenious literary agitation which Mr. Wakefield perfected if he did not invent.

This work, adorned with maps, a picture of a bay, with palmtrees and an emu, commences with an extract from one of Archbishop Whately's speeches, which now sounds excessively absurd, but which was then received with enthusiasm : — " A colony so founded would fairly represent English society : every new comer would have his own class to fall into, and to whatever class he belonged he would find its relation to the others, and the support derived from the others much the same as in the parent country. There would be little more revolting to the feelings of an emigrant than if he had merely shifted his

Absurd Anticipations. 189

residence from Sussex to Cumberland or Devonshire." And then, after devoting many pages to disparaging all other colonies and systems of colonization, and promising a supply of labour and a state of refinement equal to that of an old colony, a considerable space is devoted to a description of the proposed country, particularly " Kangaroo Island," and its resources, with a list of probable exports. Seldom have more errors been propagated in so few pages, in so formal, so positive, and so pompous a manner. Out of five pages of tabulated exports only one, " wool," has been obtained, and that, not as promised, in greater, but in less quantities than in the older colonies. The means of communication promised by the seacoast, the Lake Alexandrina, and the River Murray, remain unused to this hour, and Kangaroo Island is still a solitary waste.

A day in Adelaide at any time, from the founding of the city down to the time when the last ship left the port, would show how absurdly the following premises have been falsified : —

" The price of land will take out the labourers free of cost to their employer, and will enable him to retain their services. It will be the first colony combining plenty of labour and plenty of land." " The large produce of industry, divided in the shape of high profits and high wages, will not only make living high, but will cause the interest of money to be high, and will thus enable persons owning money, without engaging in any work, to obtain much larger and more effective incomes than their property yields in England; and will furnish a demand for such persons as surveyors, architects, engineers, clerks, teachers, lawyers, and clergymen."

These were the inducements held out with eminent success to tempt men most unfit for the toil of early colonization to emigrate to a colony which was to be founded, not by slow degrees, but complete. The land was to be sold in England, at such a fixed price as would, by preventing labourers from becoming landowners "too soon," preserve a " hired labour price," and secure high profits on good wages. The proceeds of the land sold were to be applied to supplying labourers with free passages, and thus a complete section of all the ranks and classes composing the parent state was to be transplanted, full grown, to the antipodes. An actual colonist having written to one of the members of the South Australian Association, " I believe your association aims at benefiting the miserable portion of the population, and I incline to think you have taken up a theory ; nevertheless, I believe they are going to commit an act of insanity, and to prove a memorable scourge to those people who shall have the misfortune to emigrate

190 The Three Colonies Of Au8Tralia.

under their auspices ; some knowledge of the probable nature of the undertaking can be had, but I find it has been despised — Quern Deus vult perdere priusdementat'" — the suggestions accompanying this letter were treated as a piece of " the spirit of colonial rivalry arising from the fact that every owner of colonial land has a deep personal interest in preventing the formation of a rival establishment, which must divert the stream of Anglo-Australian emigration away from the degraded and corrupt penal colonies."

In the same spirit, at a great public meeting held at Exeter Hall, in July, 1834, to promote the projected colony, it was almost impossible for parties supposed to dissent from the opinions of the colonizers to obtain a hearing.

To add to the public excitement on a subject on which the public was profoundly ignorant, Colonel Torrens and other friends of the scheme traversed the country, lecturing, and proclaiming the merits of the new system and new province with all the enthusiasm of apostles ; while the zeal of agents appointed in every populous district was stimulated by a handsome commission on every lot of colonial land sold. In due time these exertions produced an effect upon the public mind, which burst out in full force when the first favourable accounts were received from the colony.

In the commencement the commissioners found difficulty in selling the quantity of land and raising a sufficient amount of a loan of £200,000, at £10 per cent., authorized by the government. But eventually these difficulties were overcome by the active assistance of Mr. G. F. Angas, and Mr. John Wright, the once eminent afterwards notorious banker of Co vent Garden.

Mr. Angas resigned his post as commissioner, and formed the South Australian Company, which commenced operations by purchasing a large quantity of land from the commissioners with certain special privileges. A sum of £30,000 completed the preliminary financial operations, and the first part of the colonizing career of South Australia commenced.

Governor Hindmarsh.

The South Australian Company, which had obtained special privileges in consideration of their large and early purchase, lost no time in sending out a pioneer expedition, with emigrants and officers, to make preparations for carrying on every kind of pursuit considered likely to profitable in a colony — farming, sheep-feeding, banking, building, and whaling. We may mention here that after an experience

Adelaide, Port And City. 191

of eleven years the company have found reason to subside into the humble, but more profitable, position of absentee landholders and land jobbers.

Colonel Light was despatched by the Commissioners in March, 1836, with a surveying staff and a few emigrants, and when he arrived at the appointed rendezvous in Nepean Bay, on the 19th August, he found three vessels of the South Australian Company, which had brought a body of emigrants who were settled on Kangaroo Island ; and in November the Africaine arrived with the Colonial Secretary, a banking association, and a newspaper.

In July Captain Hindmarsh, the governor, sailed in the Buffalo, a vessel of war, with a number of emigrants.

All this was done before the commissioners had received any report as to the suitability of the district selected for supporting emigrants. Kangaroo Island, which had figured largely in prospectuses and speeches, was found to be unfit for colonization, after time and money had been wasted by emigrants and the company in building and clearing.

Colonel Light landed in the Gulf of St. Vincent, and after a survey fixed upon the site of the present city of Adelaide for the capital, and the present Port Adelaide for its harbour. It was then a narrow, rather shallow creek, about as wide as the Thames at Richmond, leading out of St. Vincent's Gulf, a moderately safe roadstead. The landing was in a mangrove swamp, seven miles from the intended capital. Wharves, deep dredging, a solid road, and other improvements have now given the province a good harbour, not inconveniently distant from the capital, to which it will be soon united by a railway. But at that period, when only vessels of some 300 tons could enter, and when passengers with their goods had to travel seven miles through a mangrove swamp, the inconvenience and exposure were serious in the extreme.

Governor Hindmarsh arrived on 28th of December, 1836, read his commission under a gum-tree, in the presence of about two hundred emigrants and officials, and then, looking round, felt extremely dissatisfied with the selection made by the resident commissioner and the surveyor-general.

That he should have been dissatisfied with a selection which placed the capital in a picturesque but hot valley far from a port, and without the use of a navigable river, and that he should as a sailor have been forcibly impressed with the fearful cost of landing and conveying cargoes to the interior from such a harbour, is not extraordinary ; nevertheless, experience has proved that the site was as good as any that could have been chosen, and art has corrected the defects of nature.

192 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Governor Hindmarsh attempted to change the site of Adelaide. Differences of a serious character arose between him and the resident commissioner : the colony became divided into two parties, one of which supported the governor and the other the resident commissioner. Both parties were greatly to blame. Lord Glenelg settled the question by acceding to the request of the commissioners and recalling Captain Hindmarsh. In the sequel the site of the capital to which Captain Hindmarsh had objected was retained, and almost all the officials, from whom he had experienced most vexatious and insolent opposition, were found either incompetent or corrupt, and dismissed by his successor.*

To replace Captain Hindmarsh the commissioners recommended and secured the appointment of Lieut.-Colonel George Gawler.

At the same time that Colonel Gawler was appointed governor he was also made resident commissioner, vice Mr. Fisher, dismissed, and thus united in his own person all the administrative powers of the colony.

The South Australian Commissioners&#x27; Management,

From 1838 To 1841.

In order to obtain money to commence operations, before the colony had been surveyed or even settled, the commissioners issued " preliminary orders" as a bonus to the first purchasers and colonists, at £72 12s. each, which entitled the purchaser to select, in a rotation settled by lottery, 120 acres of country land, and one acre in the intended capital of the intended colony. This capital city, before discovery or survey, was settled by the commissioners to consist of twelve hundred acres, or nearly nine square miles, a space sufficient to accommodate the population of Westminster, or even of Paris. As soon as the capital, Adelaide, had been selected and mapped, the holders of preliminary orders, forming the first body of colonists, selected their sections, and the whole surplus was put up for auction

The most serious evils that bcfel the South Australian colonists arose from the precipitancy with which emigrants were sent out, before the surveyor-general had reported whether the country was fit for settlement, and before any preparation had made, by roads, wharves, barracks, conveyances, surveys, and importation of live stock, for employing feeding emigrants. But It seems part of the system to care rather for producing a sensation of doing business in Kngland than for the welfare of the emigrants. The same error was committed at Wellington, In New Zealand, where, with a shipload of colonists going they knew not where, Colonel Wakefield was obliged to fix on Wellington, *here a fine harbour is shut out by inaccessible mountains from the adjoining country, and even expensive military roads have not yet opened out land enough to feed the town population ; and two secondary settlements at Wanganui, distant 100 miles, and New Plymouth were formed hi order to complete the original sales of land. On a second occasion Kelson was chosen without proper survey, where, in order to find land enough, two thousand colonists are obliged to spread over 160 miles of coast. Even in founding Canterbury, Mr. Wake- Held had influence enough to persuade the directors to send out, at an enormous useless extra expense, a fleet of four large ships half filled, to the great inconvenience of the first colonists, in order to make a sensation in the English newspapers. The expedient failed.

The Pig-In-A-Poke System Of Land Sales. 193

to the colonists " as a reward for their enterprise/' and sold at an average rate of £2 per acre. Thus, more than ten times the space that ever has been, or in this generation is ever likely to be, required was turned into and perpetually dedicated to building land. From that moment the great object of the first colonists became to puff, magnify, and sell to future colonists their building land in Adelaide. No crop was so profitable as land left in a state of nature, but called and sold for a street.

The first operation having been performed, by which the future site of what was intended to be a great city had been transferred into the hands of a few persons, chiefly consisting of the friends of the commissioners and the officials of the South Australian Company, the next was to sell as much land as possible in England, by giving English purchasers a decided advantage over those who intending to emigrate declined to buy a pig in a poke.

Accordingly land orders were issued at £80 each, which entitled the holder to select eighty acres of country land in the order dictated by the date of payment. Thus, when any particularly desirable plot of land was brought into the market, a speculation arose to discover and purchase the oldest " order " in the colony. A class of Adelaide brokers arose who dealt in and professed to put a value on these "scrip," according to their respective dates. Sometimes an emigrant who had been months in the colony would be superseded by the holder of the land order of an absentee sent at the latest moment by ship letter. It was a foreshadowing of the railway staging of 1846, and a revival of the famous days of the South-sea Bubble. On one occasion the bupposed discovery of a lead-mine, under an eighty-acre section, sent up the earliest-dated order to a premium of £500. After all there was no lead-mine. But the lucky purchaser, being in command of the market, made use of a later order, and reserved his £500 prize for future use.

After five days of the week had been consumed by those who purchased " land orders " in England in selecting the best sections, on the sixth the colonizing emigrant who had preferred seeing before investing, or the frugal labourer who had saved enough to work for himself on his own land, was allowed to take his pick of the refuse. Such parties were required to send in a sealed tender. A person tendering for several adjoining sections had the preference over a person tendering for a single section. Thus, in every way, the cultivating colonist was discouraged, and land-jobbing speculation invited.

That no element of confusion might be wanting in the land arrangements of the model colony, the commissioners devised, and

M

194 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

Mr. Wakefield approved, the "special survey system," which enabled them to raise large sums of money, by offering special privileges to capitalists, and it proved most effective in England. Under this system a capitalist was entitled to have 15,000 acres surveyed in any part of the province, on condition that he purchased not less than 4,000 acres at £1 an acre. In South Australia, as in New South Wales, there is a great scarcity of water, and good cultivable land lies only in patches surrounded by other land which is, at best, only fit for pasture. By judicious management the purchaser of a special survey could command all the water, and all the pastoral advantages of 15,000 acres, by purchasing 4,000 ; the remainder, 11,000 acres, being useless to any one else, fell naturally in his occupation, at an average of 5s. 4d. an acre. To increase the mischief, purchasers of special surveys were permitted to establish secondary towns, in addition to Adelaide, which was twenty times too large for the population; while the staff of surveyors were continually interrupted in their regular work, to the great injury of cultivating emigrants, in order to make these special surveys, at an expense often exceeding the total value of the purchase-money.

In a very short time all the good land in the neighbourhood of Adelaide was monopolized by the absentee capitalists and proprietors of the South Australian Company, one of whom alone had the misfortune to thus invest sixty thousand pounds.

In a word, the whole system discouraged the proper pursuits of colonists, and propagated a spirit of land-jobbing, which, by its apparent profits, very soon infected the neighbouring colonies, and bewildered and deceived the merchants, the legislature, and the colonial department of Great Britain.

At an epoch in the existence of an infant state, when the first settlers ought to consist of a few gardeners, a few shepherds, a few maize-growers, and a few mechanics, with half a dozen men of superior attainments and energy, and when a village with a wharf is all the town they need, South Australia had nine square miles of building land, a bank, two newspapers, and a population of speculative gentlemen ; while paragraphs carefully culled from the colonial press circulated as accompaniments to flaming advertisements in the English newspajwrs, lectures and speeches of zealous disciples of Wakefield, and well-paid agents of the South Australian interest, combined to raise the colonizing speculations and movements in England and Scotland to fever pitch about the time that Colonel Gawler anchored in St. Vincent's Gulf.

Chapter Xvi.

Colonel Gawler&#x27;S Government.

INJUSTICE TO GOVERNOR G A WLER — FALLACIOUS CALCULATIONS— THE STREET MANUFACTURE IN ADELAIDE— A CONTRAST— COURT OF GOVERNOR GAWLER— THE OVERLANDERS— THE CRISIS— A RIVAL COLONY— THE BUBBLE BURSTS.

COLONEL GAWLER arrived in South Australia on the 13th October, 1838, and was recalled in May, 1841.

Under his administration the colony attained the highest state of external prosperity, the population quadrupled, the port was filled with ships bringing imports and emigrants ; public buildings, shops, mansions, warehouses, and paved roads were constructed on land which four years previously had been an uninhabited desert, wharves and roads on a swampy creek which was converted into a convenient port ; ornamental gardens were laid out, farms were cultivated, live stock introduced by tens of thousands, a large amount of English capital invested, the interior explored, and the whole colony rendered more familiarly and favourably known to the intellectual portion of the British community than any other colony ; and under Colonel Gawler the land sales ceased, labour could find no employment, capital and labour emigrated, insolvency was universal, and the colony, loaded with public and private debt, collapsed almost as rapidly as it had risen.

The powerful party whose pecuniary interests and personal pride, as colonizing philosophers, are alike interested in upholding the system on which South Australia was founded, have long been in the habit of attributing the rise of that colony to the merits of their system, and its fall to the extravagance of Colonel Gawler's, and they have generally passed uncontradicted, because actual colonists are ill represented in Parliament and the press, and it has not been worth the while of the public, which endured the speeches of Mr. Aglionby or read the caustic colonizing essays of the Spectator, to dive into blue books or examine colonial evidence for the truth.

A very slight examination of the history of South Australia will show that it was not what is called the extravagance of Colonel Gawler which caused those sales of land, that export of emigrants, that speculation in building lots and houses which was taken to be prosperity. If a million sterling had been at the disposal of the governor at the time when, to speak commercially, the colonial government stopped

m 2

196 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

payment, the mania for land-buying might have been continued some time longer, but it must have stopped sooner or later, just as the railway-scrip mania came to an end, because the purchasers and sellers were producing nothing ; and no amount of imported population and capital could have made the colony produce enough to pay for its consumption until time had been given to raise some staple article saleable in a foreign market. Wool cannot be produced, like calico or cloth, by steam power ; for agricultural produce there was, and is, no foreign demand worth mentioning; the existence of mineral wealth was not suspected. When Colonel Gawler resigned his office into the hands of his successor, South Australia was in debt about £400,000, on account of the colonial government ; the private debts of the colonists to English merchants were probably as much more. The utmost extent of excess in Colonel Gawler's expenditure was £20,000, or 5 per cent, on the expences. We have thought it right to devote some space to the history of the rise and fall of this speculation, the first authentic and complete statement that has ever been published, because, from time to time, efforts are made to repeat the South Australian colonization scheme on new ground.

It always takes a considerable time to inoculate the English people with new ideas. About the time that Captain Hindmarsh was recalled and Colonel Gawler sailed, the fruits of skilful agitation began to be reaped by the South Australian commissioners. No unfavourable accounts of the new colony were allowed to appear in any organ of influence ; flourishing reports of the beauty, the fertility, and the commercial importance of the new city were industriously circulated. Colonel Torrens, in lectures he condescended to deliver, stated, and believed, that the situation of the city of Adelaide would give it the same importance with respect to the valley of the Murray that New Orleans held with respect to the valley of the Mississippi. The Murray in 1851 had not yet been navigated by anything beyond a whale-boat, and a range of lofty mountains divides it from Adelaide ! An influential agent in the South Australian interest not only produced a magnificentlycoloured plan of the new city, divided into streets and squares, but, by a further stroke of imagination, anchored a 400-ton ship in the Torrens, opposite Government House — the River Torrens being a chain of pools in which the most desperate suicide would ordinarily have difficulty in drowning himself, and across which a child may generally step dryshod.

Thus land was sold and emigrants were shipped off before the commissioners had time to receive further accounts from their new and trusted governor and commissioner.

Fallacious Calculations Of The Commissioners. 197

The statements made in a despatch written by Colonel Gawler, immediately after his arrival, show that, if Colonel Gawler had been less zealous to carry out the views of the commissioners and more cautious about his own personal interests, he would have at once brought the progress of colonization to a stand-still, strictly followed his written instructions, and retired with his private fortune uninjured to his own profession.

Under the original plan of the colony the commissioners had calculated that an annual sum of £10,000, over and above any revenue to be derived from customs or local taxation, would be sufficient to defray all the expenses of South Australia. This calculation was mere guesswork, or rather founded on what they hoped to be able to raise, and not on the necessities of the case. In order to make it fit they fixed on an arbitrary number of officials at arbitrary salaries, and left altogether out of consideration the nature of a country in which dispersion is essential to existence, and the cost of subsistence in a country in which every pound of meat and flour had to be imported, in which there were neither navigable rivers nor roads, nor wild animals of such a size and in such number as to be a resource of any importance for food.

Colonel Gawler being an amiable, enthusiastic, simple-minded, yet ambitious man, was dazzled with the idea of becoming the founder of a great civilized, self-supporting community. He accepted the theories of Mr. Wakefield as solemn, immutable truths, and the calculations of the bubble-blowing commissioners as the emanations of the highest financial ability. He placed confidence in the private assurances of the commissioners, and was most bitterly and cruelly deceived.

He found the treasury empty — the accounts in confusion. Twelve thousand pounds, being two thousand pounds more than the whole amount authorized to be drawn for in England in the year, had been drawn in the first six months ; a large expense was required for the support of emigrants sick of fever and dysentery ; provisions, wages, and house rent were enormously high ; custom-houses, police-stations, a gaol, and offices for transaction of public business were urgently required ; a police establishment, at colonial wages, in the absence of a military force, was indispensable ; the commissioners in their calculations had omitted to provide for a postmaster, a sheriff, or a gaoler; the surveys were seriously in arrear ; the head of the staff and all his attendants had resigned ; the late resident commissioner and accountant-general, the colonial treasurer, and several other officers were found insubordinate, irregular in their accounts, and grossly inefficient ; it was necessary to

198 The Three Colokie8 Of Australia.

supersede two of them peremptorily — almost immediately ; all officials were dissatisfied with low salaries in the face of the high prices of provisions, house rent, &c. ; Governor Gawler himself, with Mrs. Crawler, his children, private secretary, and servants, was compelled to occupy a small hut and expend £1,800 a year on a salary of £800. With this imperfect machinery, and an empty treasury, a population of some four or five thousand, not concentrated, according to the impracticable theories of the commissioners, on ten square miles, engaged in reproducing English agriculture, but partly encamped on the site of the city of Adelaide, and partly dispersed in pastoral pursuits over a tract of country 100 miles long by 40 miles broad, had to be governed, customs dues and debts had to be levied, criminals imprisoned, and aborigines repressed.

As to the prospects of the colony, and character of pursuits of the colonists, the inspector of the Australasian Bank at Sydney wrote in October, 1838, about the time Governor Gawler landed : —

" I venture to express my fears that the price received for the sale of land will be found insufficient to pay for the transplantation and government of emigrants ; and, unless funds be provided by the British government, it will be impossible to provide for the administration of police and law. There appears also to have been a great want of experience and decision in directing the energies of the colonists to that source from which alone they can hope to rise to wealth or prevent themselves from sinking into poverty, until an article of export be produced in considerable quantity; as otherwise the funds of the colonists must be expended in paying for articles of import and luxuries considered as necessaries of life. Wool is the only article of export that can be produced, and on this subject the colonists seem as supine as they have been eager to purchase town allotments and build houses, giving the place what seems to me a false appearance of commercial prosperity. Had it been left to me, I should have delayed establishing a branch bank until I could be sure there were at least 100,000 sheep in the settlement, and that provision was made for the efficient administration of the law." #

The new governor, full of colonizing enthusiasm and innocent of colonial or commercial experience, was dazzled and deceived by the building activity which had excited the serious apprehensions of the experienced bank manager. He found a large of educated, apparently intelligent, men, who had encamped on the site of the city

Report of House of Commons on South Australia, 1841, p. 146.

The Street Manufacture In Adelaide. 199

of Adelaide, all hopeful, active, speculating, dealing with each other and with each party of newly-arrived emigrants, full of magnificent plans for every sort of investment, in markets, warehouses, arcades, ship-building, and whaling. A bit of painted board nailed to a tree created a Wakefield, a Torrens, an Angas, or Whitmore street. All the notabilities of the South Australian interest were thus immortalized. Each speculator having so large a space to deal with endeavoured to draw the tide of trade or fashion into his own locality, and thus, instead of one compact village, as near as possible to the port, tents, wooden huts, pise* huts, wooden houses imported from England, shops of wood, brick, and stone, and elegant cottages of gentility, surrounded by iron rails, were scattered over a vast park of 1,130 acres.

Those who had not been able to secure town lots at prices to their mind had proceeded into the suburbs, where at one time, with the aid of surveyors' pegged lines, not less than thirty villages were founded, for sale to those who could not afford to give the city price ; others were building mansions, laying out pleasure grounds, and even contemplating deer parks. The climate was delightful, the soil of the valley of the Torrens fertile, and emigrants of capital poured in, burning to commence realizing the golden dreams they had been enjoying during a four months' voyage.

Colonel Gawler was carried away by the stream. The very confusion in which he found public business, the inefficiency of all the officers selected by the commissioners, the backward state of the surveys, were to a certain extent an encouragement; because he sanguinely contemplated that, if so much had been done under no system, or the worst possible system of administration when no accounts were kept, when the governor and the resident commissioner held rival public meetings, and the colonial secretary and colonial treasurer fought in the streets ; how much more might be done under an orderly, regular government, such as he lost no time in establishing.

He proceeded to supersede the incompetent officials, to bring all the government business into a regular form, to press on the surveys, and to make proper arrangements for the reception of the emigrants into barracks, and the numerous sick of ship fever and dysentery into an hospital. In order to obtain a revenue from customs dues, to keep down illicit distillation, and protect the public from criminals, it was necessary, as Colonel Napier had foreseen, to raise a police. As labourers were worth from 10s. to 15s. a day, and indifferent horses cost £50 each, this was an expensive affair ; but by giving a tasteful uniform, and making the appointment rather honourable, he succeeded in

200 THE THREE COLOJTCES OF ArSTRAIXU

obtaining a highly respectable body of men, including some poor gentlemen, at 5s. a day.

The port on his arrival was a narrow swamp, through which, for seven miles, emigrants dragged their luggage and merchandise. Under his arrangements a road was constructed, and wharves and warehouses erected. He built a government-house of no extravagant pretensions, but which, nevertheless, cost, from the price of labour and materials, £20,000 ; and he also built custom-houses, police-stations, and other public buildings which were indispensable for transacting public business. He expended a large sum in protecting and endeavouring to civilize the aborigines. He contributed to two expeditions which were unsuccessfully made by Mr. Eyre in search of tracts of fertile country. To every charitable claim his purse was always open ; while his hospitalities, although rather of a serious complexion, from his peculiar religious opinions, were on a liberal scale.

The result of his measures was to give an extraordinary impetus to the apparent prosperity of the colony. The brilliant reports of public and private buildings in progress, building land sold at £500 and even £1 ,000 an acre, of balls, fetes, pic-nics, horticultural shows, dexterously reproduced in England, tempted men of fortune to emigrate, capitalists to invest, and merchants and manufacturers to forward goods of all kinds on credit. Port Adelaide was crowded with shipping, which discharged living and dead cargoes, and departed in ballast. When 14,000 colonists had arrived, in the fourth year after the foundation, scarcely a vestige of an export had been produced. The land sales and the custom-house receipts rose to enormous amounts.

In the midst of a career of infatuation, by which some half dozen money lenders realized fortunes and hundreds were totally ruined, there were men of considerable fortune who endeavoured to realize the Utopia they had been taught to dream in England, and introduce the comforts and the scientific cultivation of an English country gentleman, as sketched in Mr. Wakefield's letter from Sydney.

They purchased what in English eyes appeared considerable tracts of land ; they loaded ships with furniture, with curious, useless agricultural implements, with live stock of choice breeds ; they brought domestic servants, labourers, and even tenants, and landed intent on making the " desert blossom like the rose." But they were bitterly undeceived. Not one of the promises of South Australian colonizers was realized.

The example of one gentleman, whose name it would be cruel to mention, will exemplify the case of scores of his class, although less

Two Colonists — A Contrast. 201

wealthy, who sank and died without notice in other colonies, or in

England. Mr. B possessed an English estate which brought him in

about £1,000 a year : fascinated by Mr. Gibbon Wakefield's writings, he sold his estate, and landed in South Australia with an extensive land order, built a house of no great size or comfort at a vast expense, fenced in a farm, and began to cultivate ; but the cheap labour promised in the commissioners' pamphlets was no more forthcoming than the roads. He soon found that he was sowing shillings to reap halfpence. After spending a great deal of capital he gave up farming in disgust, and went to live in Adelaide : there, thrown constantly among the company of speculators, having a considerable balance at his banker's, he was inclined to do as everybody did, and speculate. He lost everything, at middle age returned home with his family penniless, and, after living a few years dependent on the bounty of his relations, died broken-hearted, a victim of the "sufficient-price" delusion.

Among the successful there were scarcely any of the headworking, white-handed class, but a number of hard-working, frugal men, who, landing without a penny, accumulated enough by labour to purchase a good eighty-acre section, and there, by growing vegetables and wheat, rearing pigs and poultry, with the help of their wives and families, throve steadily, and made money, in spite of the system which was intended to retain them for an indefinite time as labourers at some three shillings a day. These people often derived considerable advantage from sections of land adjoining their own being the property of absentees. On these sections they were able to pasture their live stock without expense. Where labourers could not afford to buy a whole section they clubbed together and divided one ; for free men will have land whenever agriculture is the only manufacture ; and no protective laws can prevent them.

It was these cottier farmers and a few sheep squatters who saved the colony from being totally abandoned when the inevitable crisis came.

A Scotch gentleman of ancient lineage and no fortune, in every respect the converse of Mr. B., afforded a striking instance of what may be done in a colony by industrious hard work, with the help of a large family, without that capital which, according to theorists, it is indispensable that a landowner should possess. He arrived in the colony very early, the owner of a single eighty-acre section, with twelve children, one half of whom were stout, well-grown lads and lasses : his whole property consisted of a little furniture, a few Highland implements, a gun or two, a very little ready money, and several

202 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

barrels of oatmeal and biscuit. His section had been selected for him previous to his arrival. It lay on the other side of a steep range of hills, over which no road had then been made, ten miles from the town. He lost no time and spent no money in refreshing or relaxing in Adelaide ; he found oat a fellow-countryman who lent him a team of oxen, dragged his goods over the hills to his land, and encamped the first night on the ground, under a few blankets and canvas spread on the brush. The next day, and from day to day, the family worked at cutting trees ; there was timber plenty for building a house. This house, situated on the slope of a hill, consisted of one long, low, wooden room, surrounded by a dry ditch to drain off the rain, and divided into partitions by blankets. The river lay below : any water needed was fetched in a bucket by one of the young ladies. A garden, in wluch all manner of vegetables, including tobacco, and water melons soon grew, was laid almost as soon as the house ; an early investment was made in poultry ; the poultry required no other food than the grasshoppers and grass-seeds on the waste land round. Until the poultry gave a crop of eggs and chickens, the guns of the lads supplied plenty of quail, ducks, and parrots. In due time a crop of maize, of wheat, and of oats, was got in. Before the barrels of oatmeal were exhausted, eggs, chickens, potatoes, kale, and maize, afforded ample sustenance, and something to send to market. Labour cost nothing, fuel nothing, rent nothing, keeping up appearances nothing ; no one dressed on week days in broadcloth, except the head of the house. First a few goats, and then a cow, eventually a fair herd of stock, were accumulated. Butter and vegetables found their way to Adelaide ; and, while the kid-glove gentry were ruining themselves, the bare-legged boys of the Highland gentleman were independent, if not rich. The daughters, who were pretty, proud, and useful, have married well. In another generation families like this will be among the wealthiest in the colony.

Now, it is certain that every shilling taken from industrious settlers like this Scotch family, under pretence of supplying labour, was money very unprofitably invested, as it would have fructified more rapidly in their own hard hands.

A lady who landed at Port Adelaide a few months after the governor, in a MS. letter describes the then " dreary appearance of the shores ; the anchoring of the ship in the narrow creek where, as far as the eye could reach, a mangrove swamp extended ; disembarking from a small boat into the arms of long shoremen upon a damp mudbank, under a persecuting assault of niusquitoes." On this mudbank lay

Court Of Governor Gawler. 203

heaps of goods of all descriptions, half covered with sand and saturated with salt water, broken chests of tea and barrels of flour, cases of hardware, furniture of all kinds, pianos and empty plate-chests, ploughs, and thrashing-machines. A little further, at the commencement of the " muddy track which led to Adelaide, bullock-drays stood ready to hire for conveying our baggage. The lowest charge for a load was £10. All along the side of the track were strewn baggage and broken conveyances, abandoned in despair by their owners." " We stopped at a small public-house to get a little refreshment. For a cup of tea, with brown sugar, bread, and oily butter full of insects, we paid 4s. 6d. each. The butter seemed spread with a thumb."

" Our troubles partly vanished when we reached the beautiful site of Adelaide, where it almost seemed as if a large party of ladies and gentlemen playing at gipsying had encamped. This was the third removal of some who had pitched tents on Kangaroo Island, then built huts in Holdfast Bay, and finally taken up their abode in the city of Adelaide. Several times, before drawing up before the highly ornamented wooden summer-house, bright green, small, and hot as an oven, which had been engaged for us, our carriage had like to have been upset over stumps and logs. Every one we met seemed in the highest spirits ; and it was more like a walk in Kensington Gardens than in a colony scarcely two years old."

This bit of contemporary description affords a key to much that is singular and contradictory in the early accounts of the foundation of South Australia. Nat Lee, the mad poet, sings, " There is a joy in madness that none but madmen know ; " and there was a charm about the gipsy encampment of Adelaide, with its wild speculation, perpetual excitement, liberal hospitality and charity, constant succession of new faces, splendid luxuries, and curious shifts, to which the survivors look back with the feelings of a mariner to the months he spent with jolly companions on a desert island, with plenty of turtles and plenty of rum puncheons — the difference being, that in the one case the shipwreck preceded, and in the other followed, the jollification.

Governor Gawler held a little court, which was graced by the magnificent uniforms of the officers of the volunteer corps, a corps which consisted of some two dozen officers, from a cornet to a brigade-major, and four or five privates. There were courtiers and ladies in plumes and great airs ; there were fashionable, and exclusives held to be the crime de la crime ; there was an aristocracy composed of the principal officials ; there were balls given, to be invited to which great manoeuvres were practised. It was a life like that of one of the little gambling

204 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

courts and watering-places of Germany, with more heartiness, in consequence of the constant arrival of friends and victims from England. The town lots of Adelaide formed the great rouge-et-noir table. The climate rendered out-of-door life delightful, the imaginary streets swarmed with well-dressed crowds; so much really good society, so many fashionable men, had never before been found in a colony; every one fancied himself the hero of a great enterprise, and enjoyed all the pleasures of gambling, while dreaming that he was helping to found an empire.

In the morning the men dashed about on horses, dog-carts, barouches, and four-in-hands, which cost fabulous sums, in search of eligible sections and sites for villages. In the evenings grand dinners were given in tents and huts, where champagne, hock, burgundy, and every luxury that could be preserved in a tin case abounded ; fashionable dance music and the songs of Rossini and Donizetti resounded from the cottages of the "great world;" and at cock-crow beaux in beards and white waistcoats, " half savage, half soft," might be met picking their way, in the thinnest, shiniest boots, through the dust or mud of a projected highway or arcade. There was scandal written and spoken, political intrigue ; a court party and an opposition, with each a newspaper ; and every body flattered every body else that building, dining, dancing, drinking, writing, and speechifying was " doing the heroic work of colonization."

Young men of spirit were not satisfied to retire into the bush and look after a flock of silly sheep while it was possible to buy a section of land at £1 an acre, give it a fine name as a village site, sell the same thing, at £10 an acre, for a bill the bank would discount, and live in style at the Southern Cross Hotel ; for when a man had made such a speculation he could not, and did not, do less than invite a party of new-made friends to celebrate his good fortune by a dinner, a ball, or a pic-nic, with a few cases of champagne imported by the merchant on credit.

At this period a romantic air was infused into the simplest transactions. For instance, in the old colony exploring expeditions luui been undertaken either by a government surveyor, who marched out from some remote station without any special demonstration, or by a squatter who, with a friend or two, a stockman, and perhaps a couple of black boys, all on horseback, set out as quickly as possible to find new pastures for his stock. In South Australia they managed things very differently. Mr. V. Eyre having undertaken to explore the interior of the province, on the day appointed for

The Overlanders. 205

his setting out a grand entertainment was given, over which the governor presided, at the close of an affecting speech a band of young ladies clothed in white garments marched up the room, and presented, amid the cheers of the men and the sobs of the women, a banner which they had worked, to be planted on the limits of his proposed discovery.

Mr. Eyre's journey, and a second expedition, proved the hopeless barrenness of a great part of the province. He afterwards became lieutenant-governor of the small settlement of Nelson, in New Zealand.

It is rather curious that two gallant but unsuccessful exploring expeditions, that of Mr. Eyre and that of Lieutenant (now Sir George) Grey, should have led to the appointment of two governors.

During the administration of Colonel Gawler important assistance was afforded to the colonists by the arrival of the overlanders, who, led by love of adventure and hope of gain, found their way from the bush of New South Wales and Port Phillip, across inhospitable deserts, over precipitous hills, through dense forests, rivers, and swamps, and, in spite of tribes of fiercely hostile savages, brought flocks of sheep and " mobs" of cattle and horses to the South Australians, at a time when butchers' meat was rising to famine price, when a good pair of bullocks could earn £60 a week in working from the port to the city, and horses which had arrived from Van Diemen's Land, after a long voyage of alternate calms and adverse winds, mere skeletons covered with sores, were sold as a favour at £100 each.

The overlanders saved the colony from total abandonment during the first crash of insolvency. The strength of Australia is in her pastures : sheep to the Australian before the discovery of copper and gold were what the pine-tree was to the Highland laird, who on his death-bed said to his son, "Jock, be aye putting in a tree : it will be growing while ye are sleeping." The natural pastures and the climate grow the wool, and men, women, or children can be shepherds who have neither strength to fell timber, nor power or skill to plough, to sow, or to thrash. Besides, a pack of wool is always worth cash, while a bushel of wheat in Australia may be worth 10s. one year and nothing the next ; and in the worst of times ewes go on breeding and increasing, wethers boil down for tallow, while a field allowed to go out of cultivation under an Australian climate, after devouring all the capital spent on reclamation, very soon becomes as much waste as before the plough turned the first furrow. The overlanders who brought these invaluable animals were many of them

206 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

men of education : the enormous profits reaped by the first parties, in spite of the loss of both men and beasts by drought and skirmishes with the blacks, made the overland route a favourite adventure with the young bushmen. They brought with them, as well as live stock, " old hands," who taught the cockneys how to fell a tree and make a fence, and sometimes gave the Gawler police a good deal of trouble.

The gentlemen overlanders affected a banditti style of hair and costume. They rode blood, or half-bred Arab horses, wore broadbrimmed sombreros trimmed with fur and eagle plumes, scarlet flannel shirts, broad belts filled with pistols, knives, tomahawks, tremendous beards and moustachios. They generally encamped and let their stock refresh about 100 miles from Adelaide, and then rode on to strike a bargain with their anxious customers. Before the journey became a matter of course, the arrival of a band of these brown, bearded, banditti-looking gentlemen created quite a sensation — something like the arrival of a party of successful buccaneers in a quiet seaport, with a cargo to sell, in old Dampier's time.

In a few days the stock was sold ; the overland garments were exchanged for the most picturesque and fashionable costume which the best Hindley-street tailor " from Bond-street" could supply ; and then, with hair combed, brushed, oiled, and gracefully arranged after Raphael or Vandyke, the overlander proceeded to spend freely the money he had so hardly gained, and, as one of the lions of the place, to cast into the shade the pert, smooth, political economists and model colonists fresh from the Adelphi.

New arrivals from England fortunate enough to be admitted to the delightful evening parties given by a lady of the " highest ton," the leader of the Adelaidean fashion, were astonished when, to fill up basso in an Italian piece, she called on a huge man with brown hands, brown face, and a flowing beard, magnificently attired, in whom they recognised the individual they had met the day before in a torn flannel jersey, with a short black pipe in his mouth.

The overlanders included every rank, from the emancipist to the first-class Oxford man. By the end of 1840 they had introduced nearly 50,000 sheep into the new colony, and taught the wiser of the colonists the necessity of looking to pastoral pursuits for the safe investment of capital.

The trade of turning wild land worth a few shillings an acre into building sections, to be sold at from four or five pounds to one thousand pounds an acre, by the simple expedient of a few pegs and coloured plan, was too good to be monopolized by South Australia. The

The Effects Op The Rival New Zealand Colony. 207

government and private speculators followed the ingenious example in New South Wales and Port Phillip, while in England a dozen foolish or fraudulent schemes were started under the patronage of names as respectable as those who patronized the South American mines of 1 824, and the railway delusion of 1845, for colonizing New Zealand, the Chatham Islands, New Caledonia, the Falkland Islands, and other countries having the inestimable advantage of being very distant and almost unknown, all to be divided into town, suburban, and country lots, to be sold in England at a " sufficient price."

The competition of these new bubbles, home and colonial, diverted the attention of intending colonists from South Australia, where the high price of town lots left but small margin for profits or premiums. Besides, in those epochs of speculative frenzy which periodically recur in England and Scotland, unknown schemes have a certain advantage. About the end of the second year of Colonel Gawler's administration, the resources of South Australia as an investment for capital were partly known, while, as nothing was known about the resources of New Zealand, not even whether there was any available land there at all, it became an excellent and fashionable subject for speculation.

Colonel Gawler piteously complains in some of his despatches of the misrepresentations of rival colonists, and of parties who, after a very partial inspection of the port and coast, had departed, exclaiming, " All is barren !" But the fact was, that the capitalists who had landed found no advantageous opening for the investment of capital, town lots had been driven up to an enormous premium, the cultivation of land did not pay, and has never paid, the employer of labour on a large scale in any new country. Wool-growing and other pastoral pursuits were more profitable in Port Phillip and the new districts of New South Wales ; besides, under the puffing forcing system, enough land, supposing it all fertile, had been sold to support a population of 200,000. The population of the colony was 15,000, of which 8,000 were settled in Adelaide, gambling with each other. As for the labourers, they were partly employed in waiting and working for the white-handed emigrants who had come out under Mr. Wakefield's advice " to labour with their heads, not with their hands," and who, therefore, required more work done for them than old-fashioned colonists, who were not ashamed to mend their own tools or carry their own packages, and partly in executing works for the government and for the South Australian Company. A considerable number were in the hospital, and others were working at such sham labour tests as drawing fallen timber from the park, to be used for fuel in the government office*.

208 The Three Colonies Australia.

It had been found impracticable then, as in all subsequent attempts, to carry out the scheme of obtaining recruits for free passages, " exclusively of young married couples not exceeding twenty-four years of age.*' The labouring classes have their feelings and affections as keenly in regard to family ties as their superiors in fortune and education ; they are not to be draughted out, as the Wakefield theory proposes, like sheep or cattle ; and the parties charged with supplying the quota of labourers required for the ships, so recklessly despatched to South Australia, completed the number by a per centage who became, from age, feebleness, or unfitness for colonial labour, almost immediately chargeable on the government. All who were shipped, if able to work, claimed under their shipping order a minimum of 5s. a day.

When more houses had been built than could be let — when the capital, of which a large portion was exported for the importation of labour which it was impossible to employ profitably, began to grow scarce — the price of land orders fell and the rate of wages. Then the frugal labourers began to retire from hired service, to settle down on purchased sections, and combine to purchase sections of 80 ,acres, to be divided, to the extreme disgust of the hired-labour and sufficient-price theorists.

In England the large draughts of the governor, in conjunction with the falling off of land sales, had driven the commissioners to endeavour without success to negotiate the remainder of the loan authorized by their two acts of Parliament, and then to apply for assistance to the Treasury, which was in the first instance granted to a limited extent.

In the colony Colonel Gawler was travelling on a declivity, and could not arrest his course. When he found the commissioners could no longer meet his bills he drew upon the Treasury for the expenses of government. The first bills were met ; but eventually a series of draughts, to the amount of £69,000, were dishonoured.

The commissioners, who had been perfectly content with Colonel Gawler as long as the public continued to purchase land, fell upon him like a herd on a stricken deer, repudiated acts to which they had given tacit approval, and tried to throw the failure due to their absurd plan and improvident conduct on "the governor's extravagance." He was recalled abruptly, and left to hear of tfce dishonour of his bills by a circuitous private source. The commissioners themselves were soon after ignominiously dismissed.

When the news of the dishonour of the governor's bills reached the colony the bubble burst, land became immediately unsaleable, an insolvency all but universal followed, from which the banks, from early

Governor Gret Succeeds Governor Gawler. 209

private intelligence, were able to protect themselves. The chief sufferers were English merchants, shippers, and manufacturers. The chief speculators had long been trading on fictitious capital. A certain number of colonists of fortune were reduced to absolute beggary. A rapid emigration of capital and labour took place. Many labourers were thrown on the government for support. The price of food, rent, and wages fell rapidly. Adelaide became almost a deserted village. The only persons busy were officials whom the commissioners had forgotten to appoint, viz., the sheriff and his officers, engaged in proceeding against beggared debtors, and the judge of the Insolvent Court, by whom they were rapidly whitewashed.

Colonel Gawler retired after having sacrificed a considerable private fortune to his faith in an impracticable system, and became the scapegoat for the criminal absurdities of the colonizing theorists in London. But his hospitality, his charity, his truthfulness, his genuine kindness of heart, rendered him respected and beloved in South Australia, especially among the humbler classes, or those who were humble in his time.

He was succeeded by Captain (now Sir George) Grey, who, happening to be in London at the time Colonel Gawler was recalled, and able to afford the Colonial Office some information about this pantomime colony, received and accepted the ungrateful office of governor.

From that day it has been the endeavour of the theorists and their orators to charge to the extravagance of the ruined ex-governor the inevitable result of an attempt to plant a colony without the preparations dictated by common prudence, to regulate the flow of capital and labour, and raise a revenue and commercial profits from the application of capital and labour to unproductive works. The commissioners sent ship loads of colonists where! had they been wise, they would have sent sheep.

N

Chapter Xvh.

Governor Grey.

REACTION — PROCEEDINGS IN ENGLAND— CASE COOKED FOR THE HOUSE OF COMMONS— ACTS OF PARLIAMENT — STATISTICS OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA — DIS. COVERY OF THE COPPER MINES.

WHEN Colonel Gawler retired, land became unsaleable, emigrants ceased to arrive, and of those who were in the colony a large per centage re-emigrated to colonies where there was more live stock and fewer town lots. The population of Adelaide diminished in twelve months to the extent of four thousand souls. The price of everything fell fifty per cent. ; whole streets of Messrs. Gouger's and Stephens's cottages stood empty ; the South Australian merchants who had paid their English creditors in the Insolvent Court, ceased to be trusted with speculative shipments ; the police horses were turned to graze upon the garden constructed at much expense by Colonel Gawler on the banks of the Torrens ; Government House, late the scene of vice-royal entertainments, was closed ; the little world of Adelaide recovered its senses and lost some of its conceit ; and the sober and industrious were able to survey and take stock of the true position of the colony.

The raw materials of colonization had been provided, a road had been constructed from the port, and some toward the interior had been marked out and made practicable. Land suitable for cultivation had been discovered, surveyed, and handed over to land purchasers, who had now no temptation to stay in town, if they meant to remain in the colony ; labourers were willing to take reasonable wages, or ready to set to work for themselves with hearty good will ; and, what was most satisfactory of all, live stock by importation, by overland, and by natural increase, afforded an ample supply of meat at reasonable prices, and a certain and increasing quantity of wool and tallow for exportation. Impoverished gentry were now happy to fall back, from imported fresh salmon or ducks and green peas in tin cases, at fifty per cent, above the Piccadilly tariff, upon native poultry, at almost nominal prices. During the land mania geese imported from Van Diemen's land sold at 12s. 6d. each, fowls 5s. a head, and everything else in proportion. In 1842, country people used to drive a cart filled with live poultry, fowls,

Ca8E Cooked Fob The House Of Commons. 211

ducks, geese, turkeys, in fair condition, covered over with a sheet, and sell the whole lot at from fourteen to sixteen shillings.

Under the bountiful, genial climate of South Australia actual want was unknown, and industry produced immediate results.

Governor Grey's task was easy. The famine or speculative prices of labour and provisions had fallen to reasonable rates, the emigration of paupers had ceased, and with the immigration the cost of maintaining the infirm, the sick, and the lazy. The unhired were set to work at such bare wages as induced them to seek private employers as soon as possible ; the surveys were carried on steadily without pressure, and without exorbitant expenses for stores and hire of drays ; and the police expenses were partly superseded by the arrival of a company of soldiers granted to Governor Grey, although indignantly refused to Sir Charles Napier. With these reductions of expenditure, and power to draw upon the home government for a limited sum, Governor Grey was still unable, in homely phrase, to make both ends meet ; but the colony survived and vegetated in a sort of obscurity, which contrasted painfully with the brilliancy of its early, brief, blooming, hothouse

career.

In the mean time the model colonists were not idle in England.

On the 7th July, 1840, the colonization commissioners for South

Australia brought under the notice of the Colonial Secretary (Lord

J. Russell) the embarrassed state of the finances of the colony, and in

August they reported that the revenue of the colony did not much

exceed £20,000 per annum, and the current expenditure had risen to

£140,000. Under these circumstances the Secretary of State, by

letter dated 5th November, 1840, undertook to guarantee a loan of

£120,000 to be raised by the commissioners, but negotiations to raise

this loan failed.

In the same year the original commissioners were dismissed.

In February, 1841, a select committee of the House of Commons was appointed to consider the South Australian acts, and the actual condition of the colony of South Australia. The inquiry lasted until the 10th June. A long array of witnesses were called on behalf of the Colonial Office and the South Australian interest. Personal and documentary evidence proved in the clearest manner that the Colonial Office had given every reasonable assistance to the commissioners, and were in no manner responsible for the blunders of the commissioners or the commissioners' agents. The South Australian interest, including nonresident purchasers of vast tracts of land, and Mr. Gibbon Wakefield and his disciples, were examined at great length, but not a single

214 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

in the case of special surveys of 20,000 acres, was imposed on all the Australian colonies, including Van Diemen's Land. It is this act against which the colonists, who were never consulted, have not ceased to protest. By the other act South Australia was transferred from the management of commissioners to the Colonial Office, and its debts were arranged in the following manner: — The whole debt amounted to £405,433 ; of this, £155,000, which had been granted by Parliament in 1841 for passing exigencies, was made a free gift; £45,936, of which £17,646 had been incurred by Governor Grey in maintaining unemployed emigrants, was to be paid by the Treasury, and the remainder was converted into debentures, partly guaranteed by the government and partly charged on the colonial revenues.

It mav be convenient to state here that the renewed sales of land after the discovery of copper-mines paid off the greater part of these debts, with interest, between 1845 and 1849, with the exception of the £155,000. About £50,000 still remains due.

On the passing of this act South Australia sank into obscurity, and, in spite of the vigorous efforts of the South Australian Company, which found itself in possession of large tracts of land that could neither be sold nor let to rent-paying tenants, ceased to attract the attention of emigrants.

Great bankers and capitalists who had been induced to purchase lots of land wrote them out in their books as value nil. So late as 1850 there were parties in the city of London who had forgotten that thev held some thousand acres in South Australia until reminded by an application to purchase from returned colonists. In very rare cases has the investment in rural land at £1 an acre turned out profitable.

Dover, the quietest and least enterprising of towns, contributed by

public subscription in 1837-38 one emigrant to South Australia.

The fortunate man no sooner arrived, with nothing to lose, than carried away by enthusiasm and the persuasions of the Colonial Secretary, Gouger, he became the purchaser of a thousand acres of land, and boldly drew upon two of the gentlemen who had charitably sent him out, advising them of the favour he had done tliem, and promising to remit in due course the title deeds. The good Doverians, on the arrival of the tremendous bill, held a consultation, learned the total ruin that would fall on the drawer if it were returned protested, wishing, too, not to have the one Dover emigrant disgraced, and perhaps a little dazzled by the brilliant reports of fortunes daily realized in Australian laud, made a round robin of £100 apiece, met the bill, in

Statistics Of Colonizing Experiment.

due course received the Grant, and from that time forward never heard a word of the emigrant or the land.

The following figures will show the results of this self-supporting, sufficient-price colony : —

REVENUE AND EXPENDITURE. In 1840, Government Expenditure, £169,966 ; Revenue, £30,199 lis. Id.

1841, do. 104,471 do. 26,720 15s. lid.

1842, do. 64,444 do. 22,074 4s. 6d.

1843, do. 29,842 do. 24,142 Is. 2d.

STATISTICAL 8UMMABY OF SEVEN TEAB8 OF THE SOUTH AUSTRALIA* COMMISSION.

South Australian Act, 4 and 5 Wm. IV., cap. 95, Royal Assent 1834

Commissioners Gazetted 5th May, 1835

Colonel Light and Surveying Staff March, 1836

Governor Ilindmarsh and first party of Emigrants sailed . . 30th July, 1836

Governor Gawler 1838

Area of Adelaide, 4 J miles N.E. to S.W., 4 miles N.W. to S.E., 700 acres,

432 acres. Population 8,000 1839

Port opened 17th May, 1840

Governor Gawler recalled 1841

Emigrants Landed.

Acres.

£

d.

Land sold

at

w

n

n

w

Tear.

Shipping 1839—190 Ships; tonnage— 40,000.

ACRES IN CULTIVATION. No. of Proprietors.

Acres.

In 1844 the sheep of South Australia were about . 400,000

„ Cattle 30,000

„ Horses 2,000

In 1840, writs from South Australian sheriff's office . . 154

Thus it appears that, between 1837 and 1840, 15,000 inhabitants,

216 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

who were importing provisions at the rate c& £200,000 per amram, only cultivated 2,000 acres ; but in three yean after they had abandoned land-gambling, and lost all credit in the English market, they had 28,000 acres in cultivation, of which 23,000 were in wheat, and the number of landed proprietors had nearly doubled. But the result of this industry proved that, although much misery would have been saved the colony had agriculture occupied the colonists instead of landgambling, still that agriculture could not be carried on there with a profit with hired labour in a colony, for in 1843-4 wheat fell to 3s. and even 2s. 6cL a bushel, with wages at least 3s. a day ; while Van Diemen's Land, with better soil and climate for wheat-growing, and cheaper labour, could not afford to grow wheat for less than 4s. or 5s. a bushel. In fact, the South Australians found themselves in possession of 200,000 bushels of wheat which was absolutely unsaleable, although of admirable quality. And in June, 1845, after exporting 200,000 bushels, chiefly sold at a loss, a surplus of 156,000 bushels remained.

Of wool there were only 5,000 bales to export in 1843. Port Phillip, colonized with sheep and shepherds at the time that model colonists were forwarded to Port Adelaide in thousands, exported 9,000 bales in 1841 ; and in 1843 enjoyed exports to the amount of £307,000, without a shilling of debt, against South Australian exports of £46,000, and £400,000 debt.

In 1843 the results of the monstrous system on which South Australia was colonized began to disappear. The ruined capitalists were forgotten, and so were the debts due to the home government and home cmlitors. Those who had been able to weather the storm of insolvency and keep a few sheep had retired towards the interior : there dispersed they were able to live cheaply, to carry on their business with little hired labour, and to look forward with confidence to annual income from the clip of wool, and annual increase of wealth by the natural increase of their flocks.

Thus, in 1843, South Australia, formed with so much preparation, the subject of so much printing, colonized by a superior class, forced forward by an enormous expenditure of public and private capital, instead of presenting a picture of a contented population, divided into capitalists and labourers, engaged in scientific agriculture, owed all its exports to dispersion after the manner of neighbouring colonies, whose " barbarous manners" had been so much contemned, and presented a picture of cottier farmers, vegetating in obscurity, content to live with few comforts, without rent or taxes. Some lived comfortably

Discovrby 07 The Bubra Bubra. 217

on land the property of absentees, many more as tenants not paying any rent, whom the landlords were glad to retain in order to keep their land in condition. The tenants of the South Australian Company were in this state.

Looking back at the condition of South Australia after it had ceased to attract the importation of capital, there can be no doubt that if it had been as far from the old ports of the colonies as Swan River, and out of reach of the expeditions of overlanders, it would have sunk even to a lower ebb than Western Australia.

When land-jobbing had been exhausted, and all the schemes hatched in England for employing capital had been tried and found wanting, an accident revealed to the colonists the existence of a treasure which even the sanguine and poetical promoters of the colony had never suspected or suggested. They had placed coals, marble, slate, and precious stones among the probable exports ; but copper and lead had not entered into their calculations.

In 1841 a little lead ore was discovered and sent to England. In 1843 Mr. Dutton, the brother of a gentleman of some means, but who had himself been compelled by the general depression to accept the situation of sheep overseer, accidently discovered, and, in partnership with Captain Bagot, became the purchaser of, the eighty-acre section which included the Kapunda mine. Other mines were subsequently discovered, to which, wherever of any importance, a description will be given in the chapter devoted to the present resources of the colony ; but the great event, the turning-point of the fortunes of South Australia, was the discovery of the Burra Burra mine, which has alone furnished for the last five years more than four-fifths of South Australian exports.

The discovery of the Kapunda set all the colony hunting for mineral outcrops ; the residue of the land-jobbers took up the geologist's hammer ; but, by a singular fortune, the investigations of Mr. Mengs, a practised geologist, were fruitless, while a mine of wealth was turned up by the wheel of a bullock-dray.

In 1845 the existence of a remarkable and promising outcrop on the Burra hills, became well known in the colony : rumours on the subject had been afloat in 1840. In order to secure the whole district without the unlimited competition, application was made to the governor for a special survey of 20,000 acres. At the same time a party of speculators arrived from Sydney, intent on securing the great prize if possible. The survey was ordered ; a day and hour were fixed for the payment of the £20,000; the governor decided not to

218 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

accept bills of the local bank, or anything but cash. Cash in 1845 was a very scarce commodity in Adelaide, although corn was plentiful, and pride as rampant, and with as little reason, as in any decayed watering-place in England. The retailers, and all not within a certain indescribable line, were dubbed the snobs; the officials and selfelected aristocracy the nobs.

To raise the £20,000, a union between the nobs and snobs became indispensable ; but even that was not enough, for there was scarcely so much gold in the possession of all the colonists, and the Sydney speculators were waiting ready to bear off the prize. On the last day for payment a hunt for gold was commenced by half a dozen men of good credit. Cash-boxes in hand, they traversed the streets and suburbs of Adelaide, offering with ample security, a handsome premium for sovereigns. On that day many secret hoards were dug out, husbands learned that prudent wives had unknown stores, and old women were even tempted to draw their £1 or £2 from the recesses of old stockings. Almost at the last minute the money was collected, counted, and paid, and the richest copper-mine in the world rewarded the long suffering of the South Australians, and awakened all their old gambling spirit.

The purchase effected, the class spirit which forms so absurd an element in the English character, broke out, and a division of the 20,000 acres was decided on. The toss up of a coin gave the " snobs" the first choice : they took 10,000 acres, which they gave a native name, the Burra Burra. The nobs named their 10,000 acres the Princess Royal. The outcroppings on the hills of the Princess Royal were magnificent ; nevertheless in 1850 their £50 scrip was not saleable at £12.

The history of this mine is the history of the commercial progress of South Australia. Farms, land sales, emigration, wharves, warehouses, projected railways, imports, rents, wages, have all rested on the yield of the Burra Burra.

The government was vested in the governor and commander-inchief, assisted by an executive and legislative council, composed of the governor, the colonial secretary, the advocate-general, the surveyorgeneral, and the assistant commissioner, to whom were subsequently added four nominees from among the non-official colonists.

Of the progress of South Australia since the discovery of mines and the dissolution of the South Australian Company, we shall speak in our descriptive chapter.

Part Ii.

Emigration.

!

CHAPTER XVni.

Why Emigrate— Who Should Emigrate.

EMIGRATION, except to half-starved paupers, is not a luxury, as some ignorantly assert, but a severe remedy which may be adopted, not without due consideration, for certain severe afflictions. There is only one kind of emigration that flows on steadily and succeeds — that is the emigration of those who emigrate to work with hands or head, or both, because they see positive or comparative beggary before them in their native country. Emigration to Australia affords a fine climate, an unlimited field for hard-handed labour, opportunities for the judicious investment of capital in pastoral pursuits, and change of scene. The climate is an attraction to invalids who cannot afford to live idle in the south of Europe. The change of scene enables those who have lost fortune or character or confidence at home to start again with a fair field if no favour ; but it should never be forgotten that poverty, real or comparative, is the great, and ought to be the great, recruiter for emigrant ships.

It is a gross deception to represent to an intending emigrant that there is some other country more pleasant to live in than his own. The soil, the sun, the fruit, the flowers, the horn, the corn, whether it be of Norway or of Naples, are good enough for a native, if he can get enough of them ; but if he cannot, if he finds himself slipping down the hill of fortune, or struggling against some intolerable personal or local association, it is ridiculous for him to be over nice in making a transplantation — he must be content with a balance of advantages. The climate of Northern New Zealand is brilliant and exhilarating, peaches are cheap and delicious in Australia, but sensible people do not emigrate to enjoy bright skies or eat ice-cold peaches. When we dwell upon the genial climate, the fruitful soil, the rich crops, the countless cattle, the mineral wealth in gold, copper, and precious stones of Australia, we cite them not to induce men to emigrate who have snug estates or incomes from the three per cents., or promising openings in professions or trades, but to show what compensations may be expected for the want of convenient shops, morning papers, good roads, gas and water companies, agreeable society, and all the luxuries created in Europe by centuries of progressive civilization. A bush hut is not to be compared to the Euston

222 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Hotel ; but to enter the latter a man must have a well-filled purse, while the former is generally open to gentle or simple, with thanks for coming and gossipping the latest news. A man who has fasted and ridden hard for twelve hours enjoys the plainest dinner ; a tramp over deep heath-covered moors on a hot August day gives an amazing relish to a cup of cold water ; and so a hard landlord, a grinding creditor, a chancery suit, a bankrupt executor, a false sweetheart, or any other real calamity, prepares a colonist for passing through the ordeal, mental or physical, which must be endured before he can be contentedly and successfully rooted in a colonial soil.

Toung men of respectable parentage and education, but restless disposition, are now frequently sent to one of the colonies instead of to sea. The Robinson Crusoes of the nineteenth century tempt the bush instead of the ocean. Some of them would fail whatever they attempted ; at any rate, pastoral pursuits are more suitable than the axe or the plough of the backwoods of America.

A farmer would often do better to land in a colony with £50 and four children than to go scrambling on in perpetual fear of the landagent and the tax-gatherer. In Australia the farmer will only have to do what he has been accustomed to do all his life. The scene may be new, the occupation will be the same ; the pipe will be there if not the mug of beer ; he may have few neighbours, but he will have no poor rates ; no market ordinary, but no rent day ; not so snug a house the first year, but it will be his own ; if his daughters leave their piano behind they will have a better chance of a husband ; and, although his sons may lose good shooting and hunting, they can easily be provided with farms.

Then, again, there are tradesmen who, in years of commercial pressure, see ruin advancing upon them, eating up first their capital and then their credit, with scarcely a chance of escape. Men who live in huge shops in leading thoroughfares — obliged to make a great display of plate glass, gas, and goods — obliged to keep up a large staff of assistants and support a numerous family ; who find custom falling off and bad debts increasing; stock left on hand as unfashionable, consequently valueless ; health failing, children increasing and requiring expenses for education, and yet they can scarcely diminish one important item of expense. Dinners may be cut down, wine and amusements forbidden, the seaside visit, so necessary for the health of a life passed in work and gas light, discontinued, children taken from school, and friendly interchange of visits declined. But in a panic year, when the funds fall to 75, and the best stock is unsaleable, these economies

The Battle Of Life Illustrated. 223

are mere drops in the ocean. The chance customers contract their purchases, the regular customers take long credit, the daily receipts do not pay the expenses. In the face of all this the rent must be paid ; the Queen's taxes, the poor rates daily increasing, and police, gas, and water rates, and shopmen's wages and acceptances must be met to the hour. Economizing or procrastinating affords no substantial relief. The unhappy man who has to struggle on against such a current of misfortune has no hope except in turning the tide. The preservation of his commercial credit is as dear to him as the honour of a soldier. That gone, not mental nor imaginary evils, but actual positive beggary, stare him in the face ; perhaps a crowd of helpless, half-educated children, dependent for bread on a bankrupt father, past the age for beginning the battle of life again among those who have seen his rise and fall. To such, if they have courage to remove while yet a surplus remains, the Australian colonies offer a country where money is dear, food cheap, the absolutely indispensable outgoings small, and where children, instead of being a source of expense, are capable of at least earning a livelihood.

To illustrate what we mean we quote the following as a bit of actual autobiography of a man better qualified than most shopkeepers for a colonial career : — " Self thirty-nine years of age ; employed since sixteen behind a retail counter in hardware trade ; been accustomed to early rising, gardening, or farming before breakfast, having had a little land in occupation, with a couple of cows and a few pigs. Have made many a day's work of eighteen hours long, and yet am not able to make the provision I should wish for my children, of whom I have eight, four boys and four girls, with every probability of more, the eldest being a boy thirteen years of age, and the youngest one year and a half. My wife, thirty-five years of age, has not very good health, from want of more fresh air, being a farmer's daughter ; never lived in town until married. She can bake, brew, cook, and take the manage* ment of a dairy, and make dresses as well as any dressmaker, boys 9 clothes as well as any tailor. Yet after being in business fifteen years, and lived economically, I find myself barely able to make two ends meet; and the question arises, what chances I shall have of being able to give my children the means of getting an honest living when of the age to leave home. I can use almost any kind of tools, although, of course, not so well as skilled workmen in their trades ; but can dig, or mow, or reap, or trim hedges, or do rough carpentering, and do a Kttle in working various kinds of metals."

This bit of real life gives a just idea of a sort of people who waste

224 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

years in this country which would be more profitably spent in a thriving colony.

But there are others equally discontented and more prone to think of emigrating, who are very unlikely to succeed, unless they emigrate very young, or go through an apprenticeship which few have patience to end lire.

Gentlefolks, to use an old-fashioned and expressive word, with little money and much pride, are the least likely to succeed as emigrants, because, while they have not the working powers which are always in demand in a colony, they seldom have courage enough to accept the advantages a colonial life offers in economy of externals : although poverty drives them from Europe, they cling to European prejudices, and continually sacrifice their independence to a short struggle to maintain appearances. They spend money which had more wisely been reserved for investment or mortgage on the purchase of land and cattle.

People may be as foolish, as extravagant, and as miserable in Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide, as in Paris, Bath, or Cheltenham, If poverty compels well-educated white-handed people to sail sixteen thousand miles, the sooner they begin to take advantage of the change, by exchanging broadcloth for fustian, without caring for what Mrs. Grundy will say, the better.

But genteel paupers, do-nothings, are essentially cowardly, mean, and grasping ; they will beg, they will borrow and not repay, they will sneer and scandalize those who do work, but work themselves they will not.

Two instances have come within the personal knowledge of the writer in which families by birth and education, of the higher class, who have been sent out to two colonies by the charitable subscriptions of friends and strangers, have expended the greater part of the charity moneys in extravagant, unsuitable outfits, have refused to mess and associate with fellow-passengers of unquestionable respectability, and made enemies of colonists who could have rendered them services they soon had reason to ask for most humbly. In too many instances young ladies, after disdaining honest industry in a colony, have fallen to utter shame! So much by way of warning.

Yet there is, no doubt, a very numerous class of the "whitehanded" who would marvellously increase their mental comfort, or at least decrease their mental anxieties, if they could resign themselves to sacrifice the present for the future, and abandon the luxuries of Europe for the rude independence of a life on the borders of the bush, emulating

British Continental Absentees. 225

as nearly as possible the course pursued by the Highland gentlemen described in p. 201 of " South Australia."

That is to say, the class who now vegetate in the cheap towns of the Continent — fathers with limited means and large families ; young widows with a string of girls, narrow jointures, and small portions ; superannuated sub-officials, whose children absorb their whole pensions in an expensive, useless kind of education.

Such people resort to the Continent tempted by economy, cheap accomplishments, and a more genial climate than foggy England : they form small colonies of grumbling Britons in France, Belgium, and Germany, and raise a race of sons and daughters which is neither British nor foreign, but a union of the worst qualities of both — frivolous, pleasure-devoted, sulky, and supercilious.

The sons cultivate moustachios, wear odd shooting-jackets, frequent cafes, wait for commissions in the army or navy, or appointments under government, which never come, because the wrong party is always in power ; they speak several languages with more or less skill, and are unfit, by habits, feelings, and acquirements, for the ordinary pursuits of Englishmen of the same means.

As for the girls, they are more interesting and more to be pitied ; for they cannot enlist for soldiers, or turn cab-drivers or billiardmarkers, like their brothers. They learn how to sing, dance divinely, to play on all manner of instruments, to make their own frocks, millinery, and soup maigre, to save sous, to dress dowdily in the morning and divinely in the evening at balls and concerts, to dream of great matches, know the Peerage and the Almanach de Gotha by heart, to be discontented with their lot, and unfit for the wives of poor men, or struggling men, or for any useful employment.

When such parents return to England, forced by revolutions or family affairs, after an absence of ten or fifteen years, they are often surrounded by a family of handsome boys and girls, so educated that each requires the whole fortune that must eventually be divided into eight or ten portions; they return to find themselves forgotten by every useful friend.

The fight for success is always hard enough for the well-trained : in these days of keen competition it is almost hopeless for those whose persons are as foreign to their parents and friends as their habits.

Now, if the heads of such families had had courage and selfsacrifice enough to emigrate, — if they had planted themselves, while their children were yet young and tractable, out of the sight of tho prying eyes of colonial gossip-mongers, avoiding speculations for which

226 The Three Colonies Of Australia,

their previous habits unfitted them, — they would have been able to economize by eating, drinking, and dressing as they could afford, instead of in imitation of their neighbours, — 4hey would have given their children a colonial education and colonial experience, which would have Btood them instead of many hundreds of pounds of fortune. And the girls, if prepared to be useful, need not, as in Europe, pass their lives in hunting for husbands.

Among not the least advantages of colonial life are the facilities for cutting down expenditure in the safest way ; that is to say, by cutting off luxuries. In a colony a well-born, well-bred gentleman may wear a plain shooting suit the year round, and patch it if necessary ; give a real helping hand to his groom, his gardener, his stockman, or his shepherd, without losing his self-respect. He may begin in a rudely but comfortably furnished hut, and allow his savings to accumulate and his boys to grow useful, and gradually increase his comforts. But in Europe the tailor alone makes a fearful inroad on a moderate income. The furnishing of a small, genteel house, where the sons aspire to professions, would stock and absorb the income for three years of a snug Australian station (farm).

Philosophers may preach as they please, but in this civilized country of ours it is very difficult to pursue a liberal profession successfully in a seedy coat and a pair of patched boots. The large practice of a professional man is commonly accompanied by a large house and large debts.

In a word, to gentlemen with moderate incomes and large families, if they arc prudent enough to live within their means, and if their sons and daughters are wise enough or young enough to get their own living, the rural life of Australia affords peace, inde]>endence, and prosperity.

But, to secure these inestimable advantages for their children, the parents must be content to endure those privations which, physical sufferings apart, are incidental to an obscure provincial existence. As to the mere boarding and lodging, — as to the houses, the furniture, the food, — our three great Australian colonies are now so far advanced that even in the bush a man may live as comfortably as ho could in South Wales or Connemara before steam-boats or railroads came into use, and in the settled districts as comfortably, nay, as luxuriously, as in any provincial town of England or Scotland. The intellectual luxuries and influences of Europe in either case are wanting, and the loss must be endured and supplied by cultivating internal and home resources ! To the indebted and pauperized in any country there are few luxuries, and no pleasures of any kind.

An Oxford Student&#x27;S Dream. 227

Having said thus much for the benefit of fathers of large families, for which they do not know how to provide, and for those who, having been reduced from a large revenue to bare maintenance, naturally dislike to appear threadbare and poverty-stricken among their wealthy friends or relations, it is right to warn young gentlemen of education and refined tastes, large or moderate fortune, from being induced to settle in any colony by the romantic reasoning of the crimps of systematic colonization, who conjure up a phantasmagoria of " Greek colonies and sacred fires," " model farms," " churches," " schools," " cheap labour," " respectable tenants," " parks," " manors," " vast estates secured for a mere trifle," and take advantage of the excitement to sell their dupes lots of wild land, unseen and inaccessible, at the antipodes.

Colonization in the present day is as heroic in its immediate results as cultivating a farm or curing a fever, and that is saying enough. When a man becomes a colonist he should look on his undertaking in the same calm, business-like style as if he were taking a lease of 500 acres in the Lothians or Lincolnshire, or purchasing a share in a surgeon's practice. There are great things to be done in a colony by force of energetic example ; but the practical part comes first, the poetry follows, or ought to follow, with a long interval. There is only one coarse word that expresses the stuff which was talked, spoken, and preached, to induce victims to buy land in Canterbury colony, and by this time the colonists have discovered the meaning of that word.

The following is a letter from one of those young gentlemen who, being by tastes and habits totally unsuited for the rude reality of a colonial life, have occasionally been bewildered and seduced by the eloquence of a bishop, or a bishop designate, into doing a very foolish thing : —

" I am a member of one of our two great universities, aged twentyone. I have had the best of educations ; but the poor fate of many highly-educated men in England, with other stronger reasons, have fixed in me a determination to emigrate. I can command about £1,000, have not very good health, and am totally ignorant of agricultural pursuits, my pursuits having been hitherto purely literary. My idea is to employ a year or two in gaining some little knowledge of farming, and then to go out and settle down on a partly-cleared farm. One of my friends who had taken high university honours had a good government appointment, good interest, and was rapidly rising ; recently gave up everything and went to the colony of N. P., with nothing but his education, his native energy, and perhaps the same capital that I have."

o

228 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

The writer of this letter was a student, fond of books, fond of society, who had conceived a student's idea of a colonist's life, between which and the reality there is the greatest possible difference. He was not one of those hardy fellows of whom plenty are to be found in the universities, as well or better able to work with their hands as their brains — famous boatmen, untireable pedestrians, capital horsemen, full of animal spirits like old B. of New College, who was always at work in the country, and always at mischief in town, who felled trees and accepted bills with equal facility. He was essentially a student. The following are the more salient paragraphs of our answer : —

" If you can plough, not for an hour but a day — if you can fell wood, harness horses and bullocks, and much else that the farmer seldom does himself in England — you may do for a colony, for you must do these things there : labour is dear in all colonies, so small capitalists who wish to work by head, not hand, are eaten up by it. The price that pays the labourer will not pay the one who hires his labour. The mechanic, the farm labourer, the shopkeeper, who emigrate from a land of low wages, heavy taxes, and many privations, find themselves in clover, where what they need is cheap, and the thews and sinews, the bodily strength they have to dispose of, are dear ; but a gentleman to whom daily bread has always come as a matter of course, who has emigrated without pressure, meets his first miseries in a colony, all is strange, hard, and uncomfortable to him : he has nothing to dispose of but his literature, which is not needed, and his money, and that buys him less than ever it bought him before. This is especially the case in an agricultural settlement, where so much labour is required."

It is the pastoral character of Australia which renders it more suitable for " white-handed" emigrants than purely agricultural colonies. No gentleman can make a living in a colony who depends for his profits on the daily labour of hired ploughmen, hoers, and delvers.

There is another point to be considered. Half the success of an agricultural colonist consists in buying and selling well. University men do not know much of bargains or the lower branches of arithmetic. Wages, seed, tools, fencing, and stock will all cost the highest price ; and produce will be sold the lowest price, by a gentleman who is a new colonist and not a farmer. The profits of an agricultural farm turn on trifles : he must not only sell wheat, but butter by the pounds, pigs and fowls at so much each. The white-handed class would starve while a keen north-countryman would, on the same crops and stock, make a fortune. "Native energy" will carry a man through a hard day's

Colonizing Clerks. 229

march in a drought, or to the crown of a breach, or in the van of a charge of cavalry, but it will do very little towards overcoming the petty retail difficulties of a colony.

We remember an instance of two young gentlemen of admirable pluck and small capital, who were so unfortunate as to settle in New Brunswick, and used to display a great deal of energy in felling loads of fuel in winter ; they then put four horses to a sledge, and carried their load at full speed over the hard snow into Fredericton. Arrived there, they repaired to an hotel to refresh, and left their man to sell the wood, in competition with wary, working farmers, who brought in the same quantity with one old horse, and sold it themselves. In a very short time the energetic young gentlemen saw the end of their capital, and returned home worse off than they started.

The difficulties in the way of successful emigration by half-pay officers, young gentlemen who have failed to obtain commissions, by romantic graduates or under-graduates of Oxford and Cambridge, provided with capital of from £500 to £1,000, prevail still more strongly in the case of all clerks and men much above thirty years of age, who have passed the best part of their lives in sedentary pursuits, their muscles untrained to exercise, and their minds cramped by daily intercourse with a respectable, monotonous, peaceful circle of friends. Such men often " babble of green fields ; " but the only fields they will walk over, if they are wise, are the old daisy-covered pastures of their native country, within reach of an omnibus or a railway station. Such men transplant much worse than idle gentlemen accustomed to travel and to enjoy field sports.

The following are instances in point : —

" I have for many years filled the confining, irksome task of clerk in a public office. Twenty years of toil, a stinted salary, just enable me to keep myself and family (I have three children) in what is called a 'respectable way.' As I now write I look out upon the glorious sunshine, I can see green trees and blue skies, and I ask myself will not a day come (and I am now scarcely forty years of age) when I shall be free to enjoy all these blessings, to squat all day in some genial, fardistant clime, instead of squatting all day on a three-legged stool in a closely-heated room ? 1 have about £1,500 : I know nothing of mechanics or agriculture, but dearly I should love a few acres of land, my cottage, ray garden, peace, and contentment. With such a sum is this practicable or visionary ? All I know is of the office of a clerk — clerkly."

There might have been something peculiar in the character of this

o 2

230 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

inquirer which would have enabled him to bear the change of scene; society, and pursuits; but the chances are ten to one that even if he had succeeded in making a good investment in a colony, and the chances, with his habits and ignorance of business, were greatly against him, he would have been miserable, discontented, hungering for the fleshpots of Egypt, his hot roll and water-cresses at breakfast, his Timet, his rubber of whist, and occasional visit to the theatre or concert.

In thus warning the middle-aged and sedentary from being lured by discontent and imagination to " jump out of the frying-pan into the fire," we have been dealing with the case of voluntary emigrants, of parties certain of food, raiment, and a decent roof for themselves and their children if they stayed at home, but inclined by various reasons, more or less solid, to try to join the prosperous tide of a new colony.

For such there is no better motto than Sam Slick's : " First be sure you're right — then go ahead."

But it not unfrequently happens that in all ranks of society among the white-handed, from the clerk to the ruined Irish landlord's son, there are individuals who have no choice but to leave their country or become paupers, who have nothing and know very little. To such we can only say that, whereas in America they can, if without funds, only become axemen or diggers of canals, or some other hard and menial employment, in Australia they need not starve, because they may become shepherds — an occupation which requires little mental or bodily strength ; and it is better for a gentleman to be a shepherd than to starve. The occupation of a shepherd will be described in a future chapter.

Here, for instance, is the case of a man whose position would be actually improved by exchanging the clerk's pen for the shepherd's crook, if they used crooks in Australia, but they do not : —

"I am thirty-one years old, married, with five daughters; my means of support £90 per annum, arising from a little copying for a solicitor and a small shop. I am considered a bit of a jack-of-all-trades : I have health, strength, and perseverance, but no capital. I feel I may labour on here for life without any improvement in my position, and without being able to lay by anything for my young family."

To bring up a family and keep up the expected from a shopkeeper on ninety pounds a year, earned by work and profits, must have been a perpetually anxious struggle ; but in Australia this man, with his wife, as shepherd and hutkeeper, would have received something like £30 a year money wages, a hut, and rations of meat, flour, and tea : a very few pounds would have found them in clothes. His jack-of-alltrades talent, useless in England, would have furnished his hut com-

Action Thb First Ore At Requi8Ite Of A C0L0Ni8V. 231

fortably, fenced in a garden, and perhaps earned him some additional wages. His children would soon have been useful in looking after poultry and pigeons, and weeding and sowing the garden. His wages accumulating might have been invested in stock when he had acquired colonial experience ; and his daughters would have obtained in due time high wages in the service of respectable married settlers. From such beginnings many men in the colonies have attained great wealth ; at any rate, a life of care would, in a shepherd's hut, be exchanged for a life of ample comfort and future independence well worth the sacrifice in solitude and rude plenty.

To ensure a colonist the greatest chance of success he should commence his career young ; if not young, he should have some real urgent cause beyond a restless disposition for leaving his native land ; and young or middle aged, single or married, with ample or with moderate capital, he should spend at least a year in the colony before he ventures to risk all his funds in any one investment.

Colonial success depends on a certain union of physical and mental activity which it is impossible to describe.

" Action is the first great requisite of a colonist : to be able to do anything, to need the least possible assistance, to have a talent for making shift and being contented — these are golden talents. With a young man the tone of mind is more important than his previous pursuits. I have known men of an active, energetic disposition, with a rich flow of animal spirits, who, although bred up in luxury and refinement, succeeded better than old-fashioned farmers, who were always hankering after the market ordinaries of old England."

One of the best colonists without capital we ever knew was a man who had been educated at a great public school and taken a respectable degree at Oxford. No man could work harder at any work, no man could lead and control labouring men better ; with him, if anything difficult was to be done, it was not " aUez mes enfans," but " allons mes enfans;" and he was a capital hand at a swop or a bargain. Unfortunately the same defect which had made him a beggar and an exile kept him down. Money, earned, begged, or borrowed, burned holes in his pocket.

" Discontented dispositions had better stay at home, and so had all stars of society, wits, diners-out, the leading lights of literary institutions and provincial debating societies. Strong literary tastes are not an advantage in the bush, although it is an admirable resource to enjoy reading where books are to be had, and to refresh the mind by recalling

" Sidneys AnstraUui Handbook" (oat 0/ print).

232 The Three Coi45Ie8 Of Australia.

past reading where they are not ; but to be always longing for what is out of reach — for society, newspapers, new books, or to be dreaming' and grumbling, when you should be riding after cattle, or closely superintending the important operation of sheep-shearhig — is ft terrible

drawback."

High scientific acquirements have no proper place in a colony. A gentleman arrived in England in 1850, after many years' residence in a colony, with what he imagined was a valuable mechanical improvement ; and so it was, but it had been discovered in his absence, and be had lost ten years' communication with men of his own class, which he will never be able to recover, although his abilities are of the first order.

In material progress, daily communication with men of kindred pursuits is indispensable: a genius, after an exile of ten years, might find himself rivalled in current knowledge by a mere journeyman.

Dreamers of dreams, inventors of ingenious schemes, requiring for their success the labour and the money of other people, had better stay at home.

The wealth of a colonist lies in work : in a virgin soil, in a thinlypeopled country, he can make work stand him in the stead of the ready money daily needed in an old country.

Without economy and sobriety the emigrant of small or indeed of any means has little chance of success.

Drunkenness too often ruins the labouring man, while educated colonists not unfrequently waste in show or useless luxuries, with the view of keeping up their claims to gentility, money which would have returned profits invested on land or stock, on which there would have been no difficulty in reclaiming the sword and reviving the coat of arms.*

Among the colonial failures who return to England to abuse the colony, the colonists, and everything connected with colonization, in addition to the unfit classes already enumerated, are the " fast men," younger sons of noble families, for whom no permanent place can be found in army, navy, or public offices; elder sons of wealthy manufacturers ashamed of their fathers, men expelled from the universities, billiard-playing barristers, sporting surgeons — in a word, a per centage of the best-dressed frequenters of night-houses in the London season, who are sent out by their friends as a last resource, in hopes of getting rid of them with capitals varying from £100 to £3,000. These stars of fashion renew in Australian cities the dissipations of London and Paris, and either die of delirium tremens or return home taggarcd. Some never quit the hotel they honour on landing until they have the

Sternc'H story of the French noble reclaiming his sword.

The Place For The Unruly. 233

last shilling; others purchase large sheep establishments and leave everything to hired servants, while they run a short race of extravagance with the colonial plutocracy — the men of four thousand a year.

On the other hand, among successful colonists are men who, ruined in Europe by accident, or by want of experience, or temporary imprudence, or by the vanity of their wives, or by incapability of saying " no" to friends or tradesmen, finding no temptations and few expenses in the bush, and being naturally industrious, put their hearts and souls into their new pursuits, and make the capital saved from the wreck fructify a hundredfold.

" Then again, among both gentlemen and labouring men there are impetuous, ardent dispositions, with a grain too much of the original savage in their nature for European life, overflowing with animal spirits, with a strong taste for amusement, not indolent, but periodically idle, combative, with more benevolence than reverence, who cannot bear control, who love a row, who will work for themselves, but in their own way only. Such characters suit neither the army nor the navy, make rebellious schoolboys, insolent apprentices, and unruly clerks. They are constantly in trouble in old countries, daily offending some respectable prejudice, or exhausting their superfluous energies in some incorrect manner. Such men, unless protected by great fortunes or great connections, never get on : they are constantly quarrelling with their superior officers or their employers, thrashing policemen, and getting fined by magistrates."

Take, for instance, the Marquis of W , in his early days ;

before the Norwegian watchman and marriage had tamed him ; if, with the same temperament that made him fight and ride and drive like a madman, he had been born a peasant, he would certainly have been made the scapegrace of the village. Move him a little higher up in the social scale, and what doctor, lawyer, or moderately beneficed clergyman could have stood the cost of his eccentricities and extravagances ? But then, on the other hand, what a splendid colonist he would have made — what a man for an exploring expedition ! His ninety thousand a year gave him margin enough to reform ; but it was really a pity he was not born a poor peer, and driven to emigration. He would not have taken to storekeeping. In the bush such rebels of civilization work oft' their hot blood in clearing scrub, galloping after cattle, pacifying blacks, and other hard, needful, pioneering struggles, and, whether as masters or men, there is room for their slap-dash and generous honesty, and allowance for their foibles. Where there are no hedges you cannot break bounds !

234 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Thus independence on a farm may he secured by the very qualities that would have led to the treadmill or the hulks in England, to the honours of Captain Rock in Ireland.

As the easiest means of explaining our meaning, we give the following sketch from the life of a " Colonist Spoiled " : —

" Jack Bruft" stands better than six feet high, lean and wiry Scotch greyhound, with a thin hatchet face, lined and corded by wrinkles, attired in the gent style, with a blue bag in his hand and a cheap cigar in his mouth —

" He was just such a man as you'd say at first sight, You'd much sooner dine or shake hands with than fight.'*

In addressing a superior his style is prepossessing ; to an inferior he displays the perflation of insolence. He holds a clerk's place in the city, certain AVatcrfordian propensities having converted him from master into man, and his attention to his duties is most exemplary. His private conversation is chiefly composed of recitals of his feats of strength and prowess, or reminiscences of his former grandeur, for Jack, as a coachman once observed to us of a labourer breaking stones, has worn boots in his day. He generally has a turn up once a month with some cabman, conductor, or unyielding fellow -passenger ; and, being a hardy, powerful fellow, with the science of a public school education, he seldom gets the worst of it, unless at the police-office. Jack lives in a smart, small, scantily-furnished cottage, with a pretty, sickly wife, and half a dozen small children, and one, or rather a monthlv series of, maids of all work.

"Anything more gloomy than his prospects, with such temper, such a family, such pretensions, and such a source of income, it is impossible to conceive. Yet the man, disagreeable as he is, has good and useful qualities and qualifications, if they were only properly developed, for which they need transplantation.

%i Two years ago the parallelogram behind his cottage was covered with the coarse turf of a neglected pasture; it is now a productive and beautiful garden ; for early and late, at five o'clock on summer mornings, far on to midnight on moonlight nights, and all the year round when light would allow, before and after office hours, Jack worked away with the power of a navigator and the art of an experienced gardener. He hires no assistance, but can boast, not without reason, of the best seakale, the largest and earliest cucumbers, and the finest peas in the neighbourhood. Then, again, he is a capital carpenter. He has fitted up the back kitchen for a shop, where chairs and tables

The Jack Of All Trades. 235

are mended, and children's toys made. His talents do not halt at gardening and carpentering. When on a certain Christmas-day the fifth maiden in four months departed without beat of drum, because she ' would not stay to be sword at,' Jack, his wife being ill in bed with her sixth, cooked the dinner, made the gruel, and put the children to bed with a skill which left nothing to be desired. Now, Jack BrufTs misfortune lies in the circumstance of his parents having tried to make a gentleman of him; his follies have made him a clerk, without his having the gifts fitted for either position. As a colonist he would have gone ahead; the time he has expended on a few roods of garden would have reclaimed a farm ; the money sunk in keeping up a shabbygenteel appearance would have stocked it, his children would have grown brown and fat on Indian corn and water melons, and the eldest hope, at seven years of age, would have paid all his expenses by looking after the ducks.

" Jack, whose limbs were meant to bear something heavier than a blue bag, would have found profitable occupation in building and furnishing his hut, and fencing in his garden and paddocks, while his culinary talents, acquired as fag at a great school, would have found ample scope while rendering him independent of hutkeepers.

" There are a good many Jack Bruffs to be found in Great Britain. Wise fathers will despatch them to the colonies !"

As emigration is likely to become almost as much a career for the many-son'd of the middle class as the learned professions, or the army and navy, it would be as well if fathers gave the selected adventurers a suitable education. Expensive experience has too often proved that the mere act of despatching a youth to a popular colony, with a magnificent outfit, armoury of guns, and a heavy credit on a colonial bank, is not sufficient to ensure a father from having his well-meaning boy returned on his hands beggared and useless.

All the learning, all the accomplishments, all the sciences, from hydrostatics to self-defence, will be of little avail, although coupled with the best letters of introduction, and the most ample capital, if the intended colonist have not a certain independent, self-relying, selfdenying tone of mind, which cannot be inculcated too early.

Sons of well-educated emigrants land in Australia so nursed, so coddled, that they land men in station and children in mind, strong in body but helpless in their many wants.

Fathers not unfrequently treat a young man who is about to be left to his own resources with the same misplaced care that they have been exerting all his previous life.

236 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

They select the district, purchase his outfit, conduct him to the

port, place him in the hands of the captain as if he were a baby, and

leave him on board ship, in full confidence that, on landing, some friend* m

friend to whom he has taken a vague, third-hand letter of introduction,

will continue the same care.

Probably the young gentleman has never before been trusted with £5 at a time, has been carefully educated at home, or under the care of a clergyman who " takes a limited number of pupils," has never been consulted even about a tailor's bill, and has been taught a$ a duty to rely on any one except himself.

Excellent fathers, from over prudence and love of power, are apt to fall into this error. The victim of paternal solicitude lands on a foreign shore decked for sacrifice, intoxicated by the idea of being master of, to him, an endless treasure, and falls a prey to folly or knavery on the first possible opportunity.

The kind of education, founded on early responsibility, which makes our naval officers the first in the world will make a boy at seventeen years of age a better colonist than a petted darling of twenty-one.

To illustrate our meaning, let any one notice, in walking through the streets of London, the ragged urchins from seven to nine years old who are to be found congregated on door-steps in charge of babies almost as large as themselves, and hanging about corner-posts, ready for anything. Talk to one of these Flibbertigibbets, and you will find that, although perhaps he can neither read nor write (more shame to our country that it should be so ! ), he can thread his way through the crowded streets without the slightest fear for himself or his living burden. He knows when to run, when to stand still, and make cab or dray wait for him ; he is well acquainted with the price current of provisions, from baked potatoes to red herrings ; he is not to be done out of a single nut less than the tariff of the day for his penny ; he is ready at the shortest notice to convey a message to the most distant part of the metropolis, understands an answer, and can give as graphic a description of the sender as any Australian black fellow ; when rewarded with an unaccustomed half-crown he knows where to invest it to the greatest advantage in some article of second-hand clothing ; he has a sharp eye for bits of brass, iron, or other gutter waste and stray ; he is always game to take his own part with any fellow of his inches, has a slang answer ready for a " peeler," and does not mind a cut ljchind when he wants a ride ; in a word, he has the perfect use of his natural faculties.

Compare this self-educated young vagabond with your own nice,

Educating Por A Colonist. 237

clean, quiet little gentleman who can read, repeat pretty poems by rote, and write a letter in round hand to his rich uncle. He runs to his nurse if the old clothesman looks at him ; bellows if he finds himself round a corner out of sight for two minutes of his little brothers and sisters ; and as to the value of money, only knows that sixpence will buy something sweet. The one is an infant, the other is a little man ; the one is only fit for a nursery, the other is well worth his salt in a colony. Seven years later your nice little gentleman will require to be clothed and fed and taken care of.

We do not mean that you are to turn your intended colonist into the street — to let him go dirty and ragged and ignorant — but it would save you and him a world of future care and anxiety if from a very early age you were to make your boy understand the value of time, labour, money, the advantage of observing carefully, describing correctly, and learning something useful on every favourable occasion. A boy intended for a colony should at thirteen be trusted with a fixed allowance, and permitted to buy his own clothes and spend " the balance as he pleases : you will learn his character, he will learn experience. To learn swimming it is necessary to go into the water. If you give him a pony, insist on his grooming it himself; if he has the right turn of mind for a colonist he will soon, without prompting, take a lesson from the country blacksmith and saddler. At an early age, if you have an important message to send a hundred miles, make him the messenger. To make him fare harder than the rest of your family would only do harm ; but in holiday time encourage long excursions alone or with a companion of similar age, through the rural districts of England, Scotland, or Ireland, and let him learn how much is to be seen by travelling cheaply, with a knapsack or fishing-rod."

When a boy of fifteen can lay out a five-pound note on useful matters to the best advantage, and not feel that the balance burns a hole in his pocket — when he does not fear to travel alone from London to Geneva — when he can cook his own dinner, mend his own trousers, and black his own boots — when he has learned to think and feel that he must depend on himself, and not on accidents of fortune, friends, and fathers for success — he is in a fair way to succeed as a colonist, whether seventeen or seven and twenty. Courage, caution, decisive energy, and independence — these are qualities that, grafted on honourable and virtous principles, will, with moderate industry and moderate abilities, succeed where brilliant talents, weighed down by timid, indecisive effeminacy, would often fail. But as a calm temperament should be chosen for the church, a glutton at hard work for the bar, and a keen

J-S? THE THiZX C0L05IES OF

rzK for az: art:rr>?y. tbere a scamp despised of schoolmasters and iz.-i rVari rj .xcury JTadoes. whik makes famous emimz*z± : for. as :Lry say x: Ox&cd. - Fldt La* is

Osr o'-'wrirl : -:a necessary of s*:ce active cause to make a mir. of ciM'il-e ar* ox erected as an er~ : grant, apply with peculiar force

to skilled rvi ; rAr : .s md rrad-fsziec who have parsed their lives engaged in **rden:ary ir?u::s :- ns. :r.-ir rr.ir.ds. perhaps their hands, active, their bodies urraedsi hardy exercise, in the receipt of good wages, in the erjovmeiit of a \ariecv of eorLrts and luxuries, of the value of which thev ha*e idra ur.::I :hrv have i-.*t thvni.

.Such ek-c. Living: irtaini a & c;:'. .cable p-sinon by the exercise of superior skill in yiea eaLLir.g> as oa".:e:7.:akers, watchmakers, engineers, smiths. wraer-l-:-ac t-uiMer*. ani ther trades called into existence hv our hixMy-civilizf.-d <ate. live in o.-rfortable houses well supplied with gas and water, walk to thtir work over well-paved, well-cleaned street*, wi.rk in the same iieijLhourhoi-i year after year, enjoy at their favourite tavern, .i.-iiee-house. or literary institution, conversation and the daily papers a? much as the loungers in a West-end club — they take no thought for the provisions of the inonvw : the butcher, the baker, the £green:grocer. are ail close at hand. reai.lv to supply at a moment's notice the largest or smallest quantities vt' the best quality. Ii.deed. with less appearance to keep up, they have as many sources of enjoyment as the families of pn'fei"iial men.

If some freak or fancy induces one of this clas* to emigrate to a risinir colonial town, he very soon rinds that he has made a chance verv much for the worse, unless he ha* a lanre familv to provide for.

His extraordinary skill is unappreciated : in nine casts out of ton a clever, make-shift liotcher can earn as much money as the finished London, Birmingham, or Glasgow wnrkman. To succeed he must Income a jark of several trades : the skilleil coach-spring maker condescend to shoe horses sometimes, or le idle. He has few town taxc* to pay ; but would willingly pay the English taritV to have firm road** instead of a foot of mud in winter ami dust in summer to walk on, to get a water-tap instead of buying that indispensable fluid by the bucket, and gas-litrhts instead of bavins to grojx? his way at night through unfinished streets. for societv, he has none: the nobs who are for the most jwirt awful snobs, are above him, and lie has nothing in common with the bullock-driving community. He misses his club, his coffee-house, his newspaper ; while his wife grieves for the

Skilled Mechanics. 239

shops, especially the greengrocer's. The first class of mechanics care no more than a guardsman for that rude plenty which occupies so prominent a place in the letters of agricultural emigrants.

There is another important point which skilled mechanics must not overlook in the Australian colonies — the demand in skilled trades is very limited. Printers and watchmakers are said to be much needed, when in a particular locality half a dozen would more than fill up vacancies, and any excess would reduce wages.

Of course it is easier to set up as a master in a colony than at home ; and some trades, such as a blacksmith, wheelwright, or carpenter, may advantageously set their sons, from seven years old and upwards, to look after a little stock, or cultivate land. Compositors should have enough literary power, and that is not much, to be able to report for, and to edit, a country colonial paper. New districts, demanding a little gazette to advertise cattle lost, stolen, and impounded, stores for sale, and land auctions, are constantly arising.

Gardeners of great horticultural skill will generally earn no better wages than an ordinary journeyman, although gardening in vegetables is one of the best trades going ; and so too great agricultural skill is not in demand.

While a sufficient knowledge of engineering to construct dams, tanks, bridges, and other similar works, may prove profitable, the openings for a civil engineer are few and uncertain.

There are, finally, two colonial maxims which every intending emigrant should understand.

The man of capital should always spend at least twelve months in acquiring colonial experience before making any investment except at common interest, or loan on undeniable security.

The man of no capital, no matter what his position and education, must be prepared to take a place as shepherd, unless he can turn ploughman.

Sailors, watermen, and other half sailors will find an opening in a constantly increasing coasting trade. Boatbuilding and shipbuilding are carried on extensively in all the Australian ports ; and the recent mineral discoveries will double and treble the seaborne commerce.

Sawyers*

A pair of sawyers are sure of an early engagement ; if they do not find work on landing they must set out for the interior, and will soon find a job which will enable them to buy a couple of horses and travel

Taken by permission from the " Guide to Port Stephens," which was prepared for the author by A. Harris, a sawyer, and author of "Conricts and Settlers."

240 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

about comfortably. In some cases a single man (topman) takes the job alone, the settler finding a man who can or cannot saw. To work colonial timber to advantage requires some experience in selection. In the bush the settler draws the logs to the pit and fetches home the sawed stuff with his own team. The sawyer will either lodge with the settler, or set up a sort of shanty, according to the quantity of work to be done. Good workmen rarely set into any but the best timber trees, with two or three logs in the tree, perhaps sixty feet without knot or limb, two feet six inches or three feet in diameter, sound, or nearly so. Stringy bark, the best gums, and Australian mahoganies, out as well as old oak in England.

Near the towns where there is sawing machinery, about 6s. per hundred feet may be obtained ; in the bush 10s. 6d. One thousand feet a week the emigrant mechanic considers a fair thing. All sorts of stuff are paid for at the same rate. Boards and planks are measured by superficial and all scantling by running measure, joists superficial ; so that the work, between measurement and price, is about twice as good as in England. The topman should never be without a good sevenfoot cast-steel plate.

Carpenters.

Carpenters ought to be able to do rough country work, as well as house work. The best employment is to be found in the interior, as the seaports are generally well supplied with residents, and the most timid from emigrant ships.

Settlers on new farms or stations, especially since it has become more the custom to make homes in the bush comfortable, can find work for a long time for a carpenter. They generally hire for from six to twelve months at so mucli wages, with or without rations, according to the distance from a township. The settlers generally find all tools. The wood is usually worked green, but works even in that state much harder than deal. The same man will have to build and roof a house, make much of the furniture and fittings, contract for fences and niilking-yards, all of wood.

Tailors.

The plan of purchasing ready-made clothing restricts the demand for tailors, who are also a trade which generally migrates in shoals. In the towns there is constant employment for a limited number of firstrate hands. But inferior hands, married, with not more than one child under seven, may, at the worst, take places as shepherds, and will be able to gather a little business, which, in addition to their wages and

Artizans. 241

rations, will give them a very good income, if they can be content with the sort of retired life.

In Mrs. Chisholm's evidence before the committee of the Legislative Council of New South Wales, in 1844, she states " that about forty tailors were in Sydney out of work. I managed with great difficulty to get them placed in the interior as shepherds, and they have since all found employment in their trade."

The same result may be expected in the other settlements of Australia ; but, although the change would be comfortable for the serfs of slop tailors, the Bond-street coatmaker would find himself very unhappy in such a transplantation.

Tanners and Curriers.

Parchment-makers, tanners, and curriers, are always combined. A working hand with a small capital, say £200, may set up with advantage in the interior on a little land with a few stock. Hides and skins may be bought at a nominal price, and leather sells very dear. The blackwattle, a common tree, supplies good bark for tanning, and the process is rough and ready.

A parchment-maker would, if able to follow any other trade, be able to assist in superseding a considerable importation, by using up the almost valueless skins of the countless sheep slain annually for the butcher and the tallow-merchant.

Shoemakers.

The article in demand is a strong boot: shoes are not much worn in the bush. Some workmen hire on large stations by the month, others take situations as hutkeepers, and work when they would otherwise be wasting their time. Some tan their own leather. It is one of the best and safest trades. For fine work the demand in towns is limited, and liable to be depressed by the importation of emigrants' and ready-made goods.

The blacksmith in a good country district, or a bush road, finds constant work in forging chains, bullock-bows, making and repairing ploughs, axles, wheel-tires, and, since the gold discoveries, picks, spades, shovels, &c; and, now that gold-digging has become a staple trade, every gold-creek will support half a dozen workmen in repairing drays and shoeing horses. For a man with a family, including a boy big enough to help him, and a little money to lay out in a few acres of land to grow enough for his own use, it is a first-rate calling.

Wheelwrights.

The wheelwright and blacksmith often go together. The chief

242 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

work lies in making and repairing drays which are large, rough, strong

vehicles like brewers' drays in England, with often a pole instead of

shafts. Waggons are only used near towns when roads have been

made. The Australian wheelwright, if needful, goes into the bush,

and, after cutting down and rough-shaping a stick of timber to bis

mind, harnesses an old ox, and, drawing it home, makes it up at once.

In all the preceding occupations in the colonies, a ready jack-of-all-trades

sort of ability is more profitable than exquisite finish. The file,

the glass-scrapcr, and the sand-paper are little used — an axe and an

adze often supersede the plane — a great deal of wood is split instead

of sawed.

Brickmakers.

A good clay for bricks is found in many parts of Australia. In

towns, as soon as the resident population recover from the first effects

of the gold fever, they must prepare houses for the influx of emigrants.

Brickmaking will pay well to two or three steady, sober partners in

rising townships. There are plenty of them, but generally a dissipated,

self-impoverished set in the colonies. The work is dry, and liquid

poison cheap.

/Stonemasons.

Both in towns and in the bush stone is preferred to brick where it ran be had. Many sheepmasters are superseding their wooden woolsheds by stone. The stone of the colonies generally works well, some excellently. But the mason ought to be able, if necessary, to quarry, cut, and set. The work is chiefly done by the job or piece.

Sat Idlers ami Harness makers.

The saddlery and harness are chiefly imported into the country ; the blacksmith provides what is needed for bullock-drays. Altogether there was nothing to tempt a good journeyman to emigrate, unless he had other reasons, but the recent gold discoveries have created a new demand, and more than doubled that for the trades enumerated.

Miners,

Miners, whether of coal, copper, or lead, or tin-streamers, will, independently of gold, find a steady demand for their labour. The Cornish tin-streamers will make good wages at gold-washing where men of less skill would see nothing but dirt.

Of numerous other trades it is unnecessary to speak in detail : all must be comprised under the general term labourers.

Tutors — Professors of JIusic.

Australia is not sufficiently advanced in refined civilization to ofter much profitable employment for more professors of literature or aceoni-

Governesses — Children. 243

plishments than those who are already connected with the colonies by correspondence or relationship. Scholarship of the highest order without rank and wealth is little esteemed, and in few cases appreciated. In that respect Australia is a century behind the United States.

Reading, writing, arithmetic, land-surveying, and other practical arts, may earn a living — for a rough sort of man, a Yorkshire schoolmaster for instance, of that useful class who teach in a free school, and are partly paid by a piece of land — but nothing but failing health should tempt a poor scholar to such illiterate regions.

Governesses.

Governesses are not required in Australia. Their chances of employment are very slight, the remuneration very moderate, and their situation, unless provided with such introductions as will at once place them under the roof of some respectable family, will be both unpleasant and dangerous.

Young women of the class employed in the national schools of England and Ireland, able to impart a plain English education, and prepared to take situations with settlers in the interior, where they would have to wash and dress the children as well as teach them, will generally marry well. But for the higher class of accomplishments there is no demand worth crossing the seas to meet.

Children.

It is the healthy climate and usefulness of children that render Australia so desirable an emigration field for all who feel oppressed in this country by the cares of an increasing family. For instance, a respectable country tradesman's wife writes, " They are all worth money to us here. Little Charles (aged seven) and Mary look after the ducks, and see them to and from a waterhole a quarter of a mile off, morning and evening, weed the garden, and sort the potatoes ; Robert (aged ten) has a situation near us at £8 a year, and his board ; Fanny nurses the baby ; Jane helps me to wash, by which I make easily £1 a week ; and Edward goes with his father with the dray ; Betsy is in service, she gets £16 a year, and lets us have £12 of it, but she is going to be married to a young man, a blacksmith. Edward could have £25 a year with rations, but he makes more with the dray."

With a large family of children, even although some be very young, a comfortable living may be raised out of a few acres of land which would ruin the man who had to hire labour. Young children can be profitably employed in various little matters connected with farming and gardening, and the elder can always be sent to service to earn ready money.

p

244 The Tiiree Colonies Op Australia.

By this division of labour many a good colonial farm has been reclaimed and stocked with the savings of sons and daughters in service.

It is the unlimited demand for unskilled labour at high wages which, by rendering the accumulation of small capital possible, constitutes the great advantage of Australian over any attempt at home or even colonization.

It is in vain to establish a collection of destitute families upon the best waste land in England, or Ireland, or Spain, or indeed any country whore unskilled labour is cheap, because the colonists have no means of purchasing the food needful until crops are ripe, and the stock and tools indispensable for profitable cultivation. But in Australia or America, with a barrel of salt meat and a sack of flour, the father of a large family hoes a crop of " ninety-day corn " into the ground, and sets his children to work to clear, to build, and to fence, with that confidence which a bank credit gives a richer man, because he knows that his neighbours will happy to hire him, or any number of his children, at ample money wages.

The calculation of an experienced settler puts the lowest value of nine children, nine years of age, at £120. The probability is that they would earn £200 ; and be worth, divided, part at service, and the younger part working for their parents, £300 a year.

The advocates of home colonies overlook this important element of colonial success.*

M&#x27;Key, A Ijigiilander, County Op Bathur8T.

a I arrived in the ship Bathurst ; brought a wife and seven children ; four of those are married well ; their husbands have plenty stock, and good homes, and to Highlanders too. They could not have married so well at home; it was not likely. Why, one is as well off as any person I left in the place I came from. I am making a very fair living; indeed, there is no doubt but we shall do well; have about 140 head of cattle, twenty horses, and stock in trade worth sixty pounds ; we are well enough off. Now, just now, two of my sons are in Sydney with their own drays ; now as one sure thing, and say no more, we are better off than we could have been at home; besides, being better off, it's sure enough my children may grow a step in society, and get above what they could have been at home.

" As a token, every one there knows me. I was blacksmith for twenty years to the Laird of Coll. I want to do all the good I can to my countrymen.

Wifr's Statement. — " We were received in the Immigration Barracks. My next-door neighbour, Shaftesbury, Wiltshire, was Ann Heron; my brother,

In 1KT1 the author was asked to assist in founding a colony of Irish on a very fertile unpeopled tract near Seville, in Spain. He declined, because convinced that, unless surrounded by a market for labour, at high wages, no pauper colony could succeed, although single Individuals of great energy occasionally make money ou reclaiming good land In low condition.

Examples Of Success Of Large Families. 245

William D , lives there ; also John D , and three sisters, named

Joanna, Harriet, and Mary. We have five children; my husband is a farm labourer ; he gets twenty pounds a year ; ten pounds of flour, ten pounds of meat, weekly ; the milk of one cow ; a cottage with four rooms, and a good garden, and a piece of ground, in which we grow corn and millet ; have two pigs, eight cows; no, seven cows; I would be sorry to mislead you; one is only an heifer. I don't know the number of poultry ; we have butter, milk, and eggs for our own use in plenty ; bacon too, plenty for the family ; we sell a few eggs ; we can save a little money ; we have not saved so much as £70 yet ; we want for nothing ; one of my young children gets two shillings a week now ; sometimes, if I like, I work in Mr. M'Arthur's wool-shed; have now been five weeks working there; sometimes in the vineyard at the same rate. I am better off than when I was at home ; my husband got nine shillings a week, and had to find everything ; there is a vast difference in having rations, house, firewood, garden, and corn, besides wages ; we change the cow twice a year ; this we are allowed. I cannot tell you the difference we find; and, now that the children are getting up, it will be still more benefit to us ; besides, we are not looked down upon, as poor folks working for their living are at home."

Edmund Prendergast, Penrith, County Of Cumberland,

New South Wales.

" I came out 28th September, 1839, in the ship Amelia Thomson ; brought a wife and one child with me ; left one, for when I got the children to the port I was charged £Q. I went to the port, and was never told of this charge until my family were there; my child's name is Sarah; she is home with my mother, a widow. I have a farm of 260 acres for seven years ; the rent of 160 acres is two shillings and sixpence per acre, the remainder one shilling per acre. I am bound to clear twenty acres in the 100 ; I have twenty-six now cleared ; have a set of bullocks, dray, and all farming utensils ; sixteen milch cows, also some young stock. I worked very hard for what I have got. I kept three years and a half in service, but, having four young children, I was obliged to look to the land to feed them ; two of my children go to school ; we all feed well, and well clothed for our station. I have eighty bushels of wheat, and 200 bushels of barley, and twenty-six acres under crop. I consider I am a good deal better off than at home. I might toil every day of my life at home, and never be the owner of sixteen cows, to say nothing else ; we live a good deal better here, better clothes ; and I find this a healthy country, never been a day on the bed since I was here, but, in consequence of labour being so dear, I am obliged to work harder than at home. I am well known." — {From " Voluntary Statement*")

Labourers.

It is to the labouring man accustomed to work from his earliest childhood, but unskilled in any special employment, strong, able, willing, — if married to a good wife of his own sort so much the better,— that the Australian colonies offer a career unequalled by any country in the world. In old countries the unskilled are almost always in excess

p 2

246 The Tiirer Colonies Of Australia.

of the demand, while the skilled are often under it. The unskilled are the first to feel the effects of commercial or agricultural depression ; the unskilled are the first to feel the pinching miseries of a strike ; the unskilled are the class which employers dislike to lose, yet grumble to support. Tliroughout the length and breadth of the agricultural districts you can scarcely meet with a farmer who will allow that there are too many labourers in his parish, or one who does not grumble at the amount of poor-rates. The fact is, that they think that men out of work keep down the wages and the demands of the men who are in work — a very short-sighted mode of reasoning.

A not ovcrstrong labourer may soon learn to be a capital shepherd. On landing at any of the Australian ports he is at once under the protection of a government officer ; he has no risks to encounter from the conspiracy of swindlers, as in the ports of the United States ; there is no fear of his baggage being carried away, or himself misdirected to dens of thieves under the name of lodging-houses ; he has no journey of thousands of miles to undertake in search of work ; he has no long hard winter to fear ; he has no probation of fever to undergo, or insults on the score of his nationality to endure. He has reached a land where his services are always in demand — where he is surrounded by men who have risen to independence, and even wealth, from a position as humble as his own. All this was true before the golden fleece of the merino had been rivalled by golden sands.

For our generation there can be no considerable diminution in the value of labour in Australia. The wages of a labouring man before the gold discoveries varied from £16 to £25 per annum, with rations, consisting of 121bs. of meat, lOlbs. of flour, Jib. of tea, £lb. of sugar, with a hut. For married couples engaged in the care of sheep, £9 may added as the value of the wife's services in cooking for her husband and another man : if able and needed to undertake dairy work or housework at the head station, £50 for tlio two will be willingly paid.

These wages are independent of the permanent effect of the gold discoveries, which have given a new demand for labour, in addition to that aftbrded by increasing flocks and herds, and the great work required in flourishing colonies, where so little improvement has been effected, and where the prudent and industrious, constantly rising to the surface as employers of labour, and capitalists, leave room for the influx of immigrants.

"Whenever wages fall below a certain (before the gold-fields it used to be £10), a great draught is taken out of the labour market

The Valub Of Unskilled Labour Ik Australia. 247

in the person of the frugal, who, when earning less than a certain sum, decide to take the long-contemplated step of going on their own hands.

The ruined gentleman, the bankrupt tradesman, the clerk, and the shopman, have to learn the habit of labour before they can easily follow the current pursuits of a colony ; but an intelligent agricultural labourer, the man who can read and write, who has lived among live stock all his life, who can plough, and delve, and sow, and do all field work, may begin the day after landing the career which, within three or five years, will lead him to independence. The fare is not coarse to him, and it is plentiful. The hut is rude enough ; in the bush usually a mere shed, inferior to the shippen of well-bred cows ; but wood costs nothing, tools are to be had from the employer, and an ingenious man will soon make his home extremely comfortable. Wise masters prefer married shepherds ; indeed, all Australian employers of labour will now be obliged to attend to the comforts of their labourers if they wish to keep them. Land is of no value in the bush, and the shepherd will generally have an opportunity of making a garden, in which he can grow with little labour a good collection of vegetables and fruits.

The first savings may be laid out in poultry, pigs, and a good mare or two. Clothes in such a climate will cost a mere trifle; and the children as they grow up will acquire an amount of colonial experience more valuable than many hundred pounds.

Mr. Leslie Foster, in his pamphlet on Port Pliillip, mentions five persons who within ten years had risen from manual labour to the possession of £30,000 ; but a better view of ordinary rural life may be gathered from some of the MS. statements collected by Mrs. Chisholm, of which several have already been quoted. Although these statements were obtained in New South Wales, they apply to the other colonies.

" John Henry Macdonald, in Hunter's River district, had 50 acres of land of his own, 300 cattle, 16 horses* 20 pigs, 28 geese, 100 fowls, pigeons, and bees. He worked on his farm himself, and had 28 acres in crop every year, getting about 16 bushels of wheat or 50 of maize per acre. He employed one labourer all the year round, and required more at harvest. Used one chest of tea at £5 10s., and 3 cwt. of sugar, every year. This man's cottage contained a pembroke table, a handsome bed, ornamental corner cupboard, couch, fender with brass top, good chimney-glass and ornaments, floor-cloth — altogether a good specimen of English taste, with shelves of crockery and glass."

George Godry, of Barragorang : — " Had nothing when I married eight

248 The Three Colonies Of Australia*

years ago, only our clothes and one cow ; we went to a farm in service in June and left in March. The only friend we met was Mr. Wild : be gave us twelve months' credit for wheat, tea, and sugar. My children will be told of it, — we were obliged to sell our first pig to buy clothes. I used to carry 20 lbs. of butter twenty-five miles over the mountains, and carry my rations back — 70 lbs. weight; it was very hard work. Now, mind you, I have horses to sell, I milk 20 cows, and make 25 to 30 lbs. of butter a week, and send it to market about once a month ; cultivate 20 acres of ground for our own use, and get 20 bushels of wheat to the acre, 40 of barley ; feed pigs with what we don't use. When wheat is 5s. it pays to take over the mountain. .

" Wo use about a chest and a half of tea, 5 cwt. of sugar, six bullocks, besides butter and bacon, in the year, and 60 lbs. of soap.

" A working man, if he is saving, must do well ; I could hire one myself at £20 with rations. I gave £2 to a midwife, and £2 for christening my children."

This man's hut was neatly furnished with articles chiefly of home manufacture. A long log by the side of the fire was carved into the shape of a couch ; a piece of bark neatly fitted formed a carpet. In the bedroom, off the long room in which we sat, were a cask of flour, a chest of tea, and a set of harness hanging on the wall.*

Statement of M. B.> from North Wales.

New South Walks.

" We began the world without either money or stock; we turned into the bush and worked for them. I think it was seven years before we got comfortable. We have twelve children ; two of them are married ; our youngest child is twelve months old. We have plenty now, thank God : thirty head of cattle, six good horses, and 235 acres of land, all my own. At the auction the rich men went in a string to bid against me. I was ill in bed, and they knew it, so it may be said they bid against my wife and little children ; but a neighbour was there, and he was sorry the youngsters should lose the benefit of my hard industry, so he stood my friend, although they ran up the land I had cleared from 12s. to £1 5s. 6d. an aero. We have bought every inch by hard labour. Next February (1847) we shall pay the last of the loan : we do not allow ourselves sugar with our tea, except on Sundays, until we have done that. We use two chests of tea in a year ; when we want meat

Barragorang is a long narrow valley In the county of Camden, compressed between the Blue Mountains and the Merrigong, which can only be reached by ono steep descent, for many year* only accessible to foot passengers and unloaded beasts. The River Warragamba traverses it, its basin leaving a narrow border of rich soil, covered with luxuriant verdure. Mountains rise up round In walls so perpendicular that they shut out both the morning and evening sun.

Letters From Emigrant Labourers. 249

we kill a bullock (and salt it) ; we have about 20 pigs, 60 fowls, 20 geese, 27 ducks; we keep a teacher for our children — we clothe him, feed him, and give him a trifle now and then. This country is a good deal better for getting an honest living than where I came from, New Town, North Wales."

These " Statements" are fully borne out by the following extracts: —

"Letters from labouring emigrants in Port Phillip and South Australia which appeared in our Journal' # in 1848, printed from the originals. We give only such paragraphs as are of permanent value, omitting rates of wages and other fluctuating quotations. The spelling of very illiterate individuals has been corrected, but no other change made.

From an Essex Man, South Australia.]

" It is a beautiful country : both me and my wife is very fond of it. The larger the family the better a man may do — plenty of work and plenty of money for doing it. I am getting 30s. a week, Sarah is living with a lady, Henry is with a butcher, my wife earns a good deal with her needle ; so what with their wages and mine we are very well off. If a woman goes out to wash she gets 3s. 6d. and her living. You never see such a thing as a beggar calling at any one's door here, nor a person going to a butcher's for a bit of liver or a sheep's head. They give the blacks the beasts' heads and shanks of beef, what I should have been glad of in England ; but now I can get the best parts."

" Dry Cbbek, near Adelaide.

" William is a fine boy, and drives a team of bullocks anywhere. I have a young man lives with us ; I give him 14s. and his board; William and he go to the mines with two bullock-teams with six bullocks each, and are gone a fortnight ; they bring home copper ore, that pays twelve pounds. I have also taken a contract from government for one thousand yards of broken stones to go down on the new post road, at 13s. per cubic yard ; I can take down four yards a day. Look at one thousand yards which I shall complete in twelve months, £665 ! Now, I wish you were all here, for I could give you all a good job — Henry, Thomas, Joseph, and Fanny's brother — for I have four bullock-teams, and have bought a section of land, eighty acres, for which I paid £80 ; and we have cows, calves, and plenty of fat pigs in the sty, and a good horse to ride on when I choose, and many things beside.

" The way to prove it is to come and see — there is plenty of work

" Sidney's Emigrant Journal." f P. 268, Sidney's Emigrant Journal.'*

250 Tub Three Colonies Of Australia.

for you to do. We often think of you when we are going to meals, whether you have anything to eat or not. I have killed a fat oalf just before I finished this letter ; we wish some of you were here to sit down along with us to-morrow, for we think it is but little veal that any of you get in old England ; but do let us beg of you to come out ; here is plenty of everything the heart can wish for, both temporal and spiritual. Do not think that we live in a heathen land, for the Lord is found here as well as there ; if we seek him from our heart we are sure to find him wherever we are ; — so no more at present — and if we never meet again in this world let us hope to meet in the next ; so good bye — God bless you all — amen, amen ! " #

Port Phillip. — From a Herefordshire Labourer, " I and my companion engaged to go into the bush about fifteen miles from Melbourne ; a neighbour of our new master undertook to convey us on his bullock-team. This man emigrated from England about eight years since, and now rents about five hundred acres of pasture. He is a carpenter, and occasionally works at his trade ; he sometimes drives his bullock-team into town himself with timber and other things ; he keeps milking-cows and sheep ; his house has the appearance of peace and plenty.

" The general appearance of the country is truly delightful : here is no complaint of want of work or want of food, and work is well paid for here. I wish to persuade you and Jane to come out here ; the voyage is a mere nothing. Provisions are cheap ; the only dear article is butter. My companion gets £26 a year, besides rations, because he can undertake sowing. There were married persons with large families on board, upwards of sixty years of age, who had to pay £9 to £14 each for their passage ; but that is soon made up in a colony. Our employers have no pride although they are worth a deal of money. The major will sometimes come out and work an hour or so at a time ; servants are so scarce that his wife and daughters do the work of the house."

In all these letters, although the prevailing topic is the increase of physical comfort, it is impossible not to be gratified with the improved moral tone, which is the result of independence and hope. It is not the mere wages, it is the great opening to a superior grade of society that changes the very nature of the most torpid English peasant, if he has sufficient education or natural undeveloped energy not to be content with mere beef and bread.

The writer emigrated in 1811 without meant.

Those Who Wast Work. 251

But they are not all prize labourers who meet the golden stores of Australia (doubly golden in golden sands and golden fleece). We have some graphic pictures of the idleness of conceit and the indolence of pauperism in Mrs. Chisholm's pictures of some of the objects, male and female, who came under her hands while managing the Registry Office and Immigrant Home in Sydney, in 1842-5, when the bounty system was in full force.

The first are what she calls " the black-riband gentry," whose stock consists of a yard and a half of black riband with an eyeglass or silvertopped dressing-case key round their necks, a good suit of clothes, with perhaps a pound or two. Some of these know nothing, but set up for clerks or tutors ; others, accustomed to hard work and hard fare all their lives, think that transplantation entitles them to set up at once for idle gentlemen. One of these, in answer to the question, " What situation do you want ?" " Oh, m-a-am, I'm in no particular hurry ; I have some very good letters ; I have one for the attorney-general, and I expect he will offer me clerkship of the Bench ; I am told it is a very fair thing to begin with." Another told me he expected to be made a " country magistrate."

" These people seem to be manufactured on board ship : by a deal of impudence and blarney, they push themselves into a little consequence. Finger-rings are much worn by this class, and if they can meet a cheap signet-ring they are delighted.

The wife of one of these told me that her heart was nearly broken by her husband's crank ways ; that at home he was obliged to work hard for 9s. a week, and keep his family out of the same. " He can plough, ma'am, and delve, and do all kinds of work, but he seems to think the government will make him something out of the common way. I know, ma'am, he'd be the death of me if he knew I told you he was a poor man at home."

The following morning I sent for him, and told him that I had a situation to suit him, — " A.n overseer at a bachelor's station ; you will have £25 a year, and full rations for yourself, wife, and three children."

"What should I have to do?"

" Work ; there are sixty cows and two men on the station — these you must look after — and there is a small farm and garden ; as the latter is near a township the vegetables sell well ; you are allowed what you require for your own family ; your principal work will be in the garden and on the farm ; you can plough, I should say ; judging by your hands, you have worked hard, and will find this place easy."

" Yes, ma'am, I can p-1-o-ug-h, but I don't intend in this country :

252 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

I don't think I would mind taking a situation as head superintendent.

" The settlers seldom engage for that a newly-arrived immigrant — they require a man of colonial experience, whom they raise from their working overseers."

" Do you intend to take the situation ? "

" Certainly not."

This man had received about £3 a few days before he left home for some election services, and a passenger had presented him with a cast-off suit of clothing : the line clothes and the money did him harm. It is almost impossible to serve such a man if he has two shillings in his pocket.

Next after these fine gentlemen come the confirmed pauper* f just the class we always find parishes and country gentlemen so anxious to get rid of at public or colonial expense, and, if that can't be done, even willing to pay part of the passage-money.

These are the hard bargains of unions. We never yet found guardians or parish officers willing to part with a good man. But even paupers, — confirmed paupers, — may be turned to account if they can be pushed out where there is no chance between famine and work.

u Paupers. — Here is a specimen of one of your bad bargains, who, having been a burden on Ihe parish all his life, had been fortunate enough to have his passage paid to give him an opportunity of eating government rations.

" He never appeared in the office until he had been three months in the colony ; nor would he then, but that he was struck off rations, and turned out of the tents; he then came to me, looking as idle, miserable, and wretched as he could make himself : —

"Pauper. If you please, ma'am, I want relief.

" Myself. What relief ?

" P. I am turned out, and I have four children, and nothing to eat.

" M. Where are you going to stay?

" P. With a shipmate.

" M. Come to me every morning at seven, and I will give you rations for your family until you get work.

"P. Oh, ma'am, I can't get work!

" M. I will find you work in two days.

"P. Thank you ! Heaven bless you I but I am not well enough to work. I was thinking of going to the hospital; but I am a little afraid of the doctors here not understanding my complaint.

M. What is it?

"P. It's called a compleracation.

" M. Dr. Harnett would cure you in a week.

" P. Would he though, really ? you see, ma'am, I am very weak.

"M. Very?

" P. Very; I require something strength'ing.

A Pauper Obliged To Work. £53

" M. Dr. H. has great faith in blisters; they are said to be the best things in your complaint.

"P. Ah! but I could not bear them: you see, ma'am, they would throw me into a fever — that is the worst of my complaint, what does me good one way, does me harm another.

" M. But with low diet there would be no fear of a fever. I will write you a note to Dr.

" P. Why, no, ma'am ; I will wait a day or two, thank you. Are there any parishes in this town?

"M. Several

"P. Will you please to tell me where the parish officer lives?

" M. There are no parish officers.

" P. Do you say so, ma'am ? (A long pause.) Where is there a vestry?

for you see, ma'am, I'll never be able to do without a little relief. Have you a benevolent society here?

"Jf. Yes.

" P. Do they give relief ?

M. Yes.

"P. Will you please to give me an order?

u M. You are not old enough by twenty years.

"P, Oh, ma'am, cannot you do something for me? Do you not know any kind people who will help me with a trifle?

" After trying his patience for some time longer, I gave him two days' provision for his family, and told him I would try and find an easy place for him. A few days after he came, and renewed his demands in the following manner : —

" P. If you would only give me six shillings for a pair of shoes.

" M. I will the day you are engaged. Now, here is a little coffee for you, and here is a needle, cotton, and thimble for your wife, to mend your coat ; you must come to me to-morrow, at nine, and I will give you a waistcoat and shirt.

" I then spoke to him about a shepherd's life ; told him of the flocks that belonged to men who came here without a sixpence. I gave him a sheet of paper and pencil, and told him to go home and calculate what he could save in five years. I was glad to observe his step was quickened : the following morning he was punctual. I had a new loaf, quite hot, some tea, sugar, a beefsteak, a few pounds of potatoes — these were in a basket,

" M. That's fine beef, John — it is for your breakfast.

u P. Do you say so, ma'am? Well, I am lucky.

" M. You will get a good place to-day. Now, here is sixpence; go and get shaved and your hair cut; and here is twopence — you are obliged to buy water here ; and, as soon as you come back, you can take the basket, for I have something else for you yet.

" In less than half an hour he returned, quite another man ; and, as I reminded him of my promise to give him the six shillings, he went off in high spirits; and at half-past ten John Baldwin sat in the office as a candidate for work. Though the improvement was very great, still he had an idle look: I therefore sent to Thorp's for one of their cheap neckerchiefs, and I must confess I never laid out one shilling and three pence better. The office was crowded, when Number Five entered; in a loud voice he talked of the dreadful times; cheap labour; still he wanted a few shepherds; but he was on the look out for

254 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

a bargain — a cheap bargain. I could perceive John riew him attentiTcly, and then cast a wistful eye at the money that lay on the office desk. At last, Number Five praised John for his apparent anxiety for work: he Masked at the compliment; and, as I saw it was likely to be a bargain, I went into aj room (whether it was that I felt guilty of using a little starchy or my dread of the ridiculous, that made me retreat to where I could see and hear without being obserred). My success pleased me, for I was certain Number Fire would make John earn hi* wages; and I, at the same time, knew he had half a lawyer to deal with. I returned to the office, entered the agreement at £18 per annum — m man and his wife for £18 ! I could see Number Five was delighted; so was I, for methought what a change, what a blessing for his family, that he has come to a country where we have no home for the idle: what an advantage to his children! This man has been now some months with his master, and if he turns out well I shall be bound to acknowledge that, even grinders may do good. I may also remark, with reference to these idlers, that when the men in barracks were ordered by the immigration agent to work in the domain, nine came to me very sick — Would I give them a ticket to Mr. M'Lean, to say they were unable to work? ' No; but I will to the doctor.'

" They were not quite ill enough for that, and went accordingly to work."

Even harder than men it is to deal with the silly women, who, either having or pretending to have pretensions to gentility, venture out to colonies where they are not needed unless they are prepared to wash or iron, or act as servants, and wait for a good time coming.

From the before quoted records (published in Sydney only) which apply equally to all colonies we take the following effective extract : —

44 1 had one very beautiful girl ; she could read and write well, was of an amiable temper, and willing to take advice : I provided her with a situation; she was returned to me solely on account of her good looks. I was at a loss what to do with her ; I was afraid to allow her to go out for exercise, and was obliged to limither to church on a Sunday. She was the daughter of a lieutenant who had spent twenty-four years in the service of his country : having a large family and limited means, he sent one of his treasures here : Providence, however, provided for her in an unexpected manner. A very respectable woman, a settler's wife, waited on me for advice ; she was one of those sensible, shrewd women that help to keep a home together. She told me she had five boys and a girl, none of whom could read or write, and that she wanted a teacher. ' My eldest boy, Jack, ma'am, is as fine a young man as you would wish to see, only he is too wild : he is past learning ; but the others are willing enough.' At this time I had three of these helpless creatures I wished to provide for ; I told the worthy woman that was so good-tempered that

she would suit her best, if she did not mind her being handsome. ' Has she any bounce about her?' 'None.' I went into the room with her; as her eye

rested on there was a look of satisfaction, followed directly by one of deep

thought and reflection. There was something so intelligent in her countenance I became curious ; she left the room ; returned to the office, when she said, 111 see you again at five o'clock, ma'am ; but don't let the girl engage, any how : a thought has come into my head, I must think over, 9 At five she came. 'Now,

Disadvantage Of Bkautt. 255

Mrs. , I would like to tell you my plan—' Do you see,' says I, 'if any gal

would keep a man at home, it would be the creature I saw this morning : now/ says I, 'tho' Jack's not taken to drink, yet he's uncommonly fond of company, and is for going to every horse-race he hears of ; and I expect, some time, hell make a very foolish match, wi' some one more ignorant than he is :' yet, ma'am, tho' he can neither read or write, he's uncommonly 'cute. Now, I think, if I take

home, shell tempt him to stay at home ; and then, when I see he's taken,

and his heart is touched, I shall call him one side — bounce a bit, and say, ' 111 haye no fine ladies living wi' me.' This opposition win make him more determined ; then, in a day or two, I'll cry a bit about it — he's kind-hearted, and can't stand that : then he come coaxing me, and 111 consent, and talk over the old man ; and the clergyman shall settle everything, and it will be a good

thing for us all, ma'am.' I consented to arrange with , who should be ready

the next day : she was engaged as a teacher for one year, salary £16.

" I may here remark, that pretty girls, no matter what their qualifications or characters were, it was difficult to dispose of them ; they are not, it appears liked as servants, though they are preferred as wives.'

n

Chapter Xix.

Outfit And Passage.

THREE MODES OF EMIGRATION : PAUPER EMIGRATION, ASSOCIATED EMIGRATION, FAMILY COLONIZATION, CABIN EMIGRATION—PREPARATIONS FOR VOYAGE— OUTFIT— CHOICE OF SHIP— LLOYD'S REGISTER — DIETARY — MEASUREMENT — EXTRA STORES-SEA SICKNESS.

THERE are three modes of emigration, and three classes in ships, which we take in the order of number — government or pauper emigration, associated or group emigration, and isolated emigration ; so there are also cabin passengers, and second and third class passengers : between second and third there is little difference, except in name. Cabin passengers are not protected by law* They must depend entirely on the character of the brokers, the honour of the captain, and on the nature of the agreement into which they enter. There are brokers and shipowners, like other tradesmen, on whom the fullest reliance may be placed ; there are others who do not think honesty the best policy. Many instances have occurred in which parties on going on board have found the cabins they had engaged in the possession of others; and complaints of the provisions, reasonable and unreasonable, are of daily occurrence. The rapid, constant communication now opening with

256 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Australia will soon make it a matter of course to provide satisfactory accommodation for cabin passengers. We expect this class will follow the course of passengers to America, and be conveyed almost entirely by the steamers.

Sailing-ships will then have to depend on £20 passengers, and below £20 on all persons who take what, under various flattering names, amounts to a steerage ]>assage in the eyes of the captain of the ship. There can no question that the best ships are those which carry only one class of passengers, where they have the full range of the vessel for exorcise, and where, although they have to wait upon themselves, they are, at any rate, of as much consequence as any other passengers. Where ships are divided into first class, second class, and tliird class, the second and third class often come badly off. In the first place, although by the Passengers' Act a ship is restricted in the number of jwssengers that it can carry by the tons register and cubic feet (two tons and fourteen cubic feet to each passenger), it does not say how the space shall In? divided ; so that such inferior passengers often find that a lion's share of the space, as well as of the light and air, cooking power, and room for exercise, has been monopolized by the cabin passengers. They are left to the enjoyment of a bunk, big enough to turn in at night, with second-hand atmosphere when the hatches arc down, meals when the cook has nothing else to do, and two or three yards for exercise.

The " jxicking " system lias been carried to perfection in Liverpool, where it commenced in the American ships carrying helpless Irish, who were packed on open shelves, like hounds in a kennel, but less clean, airy, and comfortable. In many of these Australian ships decency is as little attended to as comfort. Curtains have recently, under the pressure of public opinion, been hung up before the berths. Until public attention was called to the fact, married men and women in government ships used to undress, sleep, and dress before each other, and private ships followed the same example. In the arrangement of water-closets, for sexes, equally flagrant inattention to comfort and decency was and is displayed.

We have recently seen in the ship of a respectable firm the of a second-class single passenger divided from that of a married couple by a partition three feet high, with an open space of eighteen inches. This was an example of a very common case. If any representation as to the want of space and ventilation be made to a London broker, the answer is, " Look at the Liverpool ships."

In the quality of provisions served out a few days after the ships

Defects Of The Passenger Act. 257

are clear of English ports the abuses in quantity and quality are equally flagrant.

It is true there is a government inspection, and all that the law permits to protect the emigrant is done in the port of London by that excellent and indefatigable officer, Captain Lean, the government emigration agent. But he cannot inspect all the provisions of a ship, and he has no power to enforce ventilation and many other regulations which he would if he could.

These heavy charges will be met by a loud cry of indignation, that we have written more than we are prepared to prove, with names and dates, and much more flagrant cases than any referred to. It is necessary that some one should speak out on whom "no interest can be brought to bear," as merchants do not care, and others do not dare, to protest against iniquities daily practised on helpless emigrants. In the session of 1851 a committee of the House of Commons was appointed " to inquire into the working of the Passengers' Act, and to report whether any and what further protection is required by emigrants during the passage, or at the port of embarkation."

The Right Honourable Sidney Herbert was chairman of this committee ; one of the honestest men who has ever taken up the question of emigration; with talents, too, above the average, rank and large fortune, but who, for want of a dash of audacity, or in consequence of a sort of moral timidity, — a respect for the opinion of respectable shams, — does not always venture to follow his own judgment, and do and say what he knows to be right, without caring what the gossiping Mrs. Grundys of the great little world will say.

The committee collected an important and most disgusting body of evidence on the abuses practised in emigrant ships. As to remedies, they were less successful ; the chairman could, but did not call the right witnesses. At any rate, a useful bill for amending the Passengers' Act was prepared, and improved by the notes of a very competent person known to the author.

" It would," said a Liverpool sliipowner, " have played the very deuce with us ; but we brought our interest to bear, and now we don't care twopence for it."

Since the passing of the Amended Passengers' Act, large ships have been sent out to Australia full of passengers, with whole rows of berths without light or any provision for ventilation except through the hatchways, which are closed in storms.

Thirty or forty ships have been sent to sea with cargoes of patent

238 the thus couxm OF AUVnULIA.

fuel and small eoaL which are both subject to spontaneous combustion;

and patent fuel produces fever.

Government emigration is conducted by Commiaskmera, who expend the money received for the sale and rent of wfld land in Australia in sending out the class of emigrants who are most agreeable to the squatters. Ignorant, humble, able-bodied young agricultural labourers, with* as few children as possible, and as many single men as possible, were onee the favourite qualifications ; but the attraction of the gold-diggings has changed the prayer of the pastoral interest, and they now beg for aged parents with long families. The golden magnet has at length awakened the selfish to the advantage of domestic virtues and familv colonization.

If it were likely that these land funds would much longer be entrusted to government commissioners, there are several questions which would be worth asking, as, for instance, whether it would not be as well that some financial statement were made in advance, at the beginning of each session, by the House of Commons' representative of the Colonial Office, specifying what sum had been spent in the past year, what numWr of emigrants had been sent, and from what districts, and at what cost per head for passage, and for expenses of management and collection, and what sum was in hand, with other such particulars as Chancellors of Exchequer and Commissioners of Poor Law* are in the habit of making. At present a neat printed rejiort furnishes everything but useful information, and the result is dissatisfaction among the emigrating classes, and in the colony. It is a fact that, until the gold discover}' offered an irresistible temptation, it was found easier to fill ships with working men who paid their parades, than to collect emigrants to accept the government free lassagc. The forms were insulting and the process degrading, the passage arrangements not fit for modest women.

It might also be well to inquire whether the interests of the mother country and the colony would not be better served by encouraging the emigration of an intelligent, educated class of labourers, who would as soon as possible become cultivators of the soil, than of mere agricultural machines ? — whether the clas who rented the pastures of Australia had any right to dictate how that rent should be expended ?

But it cannot be long needful to discuss these points. The management of the fund derived from the sale and rent of land in the three colonies must shortly be given up to the control of their respective legislative councils. These councils will soon find that there is no longer any need to import pairs of pauper labourers. Australia

Colonizing Companies A Failure. 259

now holds out sufficient rewards to induce the working class of this country to emigrate on their own resources, as the Irish do to America. The land fund may be much more profitably spent on internal improvements, roads, bridges, tanks, railway guarantees.

The moment that pauper emigration is abolished free emigration will increase; for free passages have the same depressing effect on voluntary efforts that indiscriminate outdoor relief had on wages. Causes to which we will presently allude are operating to instruct the emigrating classes in the nature of accommodation they have a right to demand on board ship; but some more powerful instrument than isolated emigration will be needed to assist the emigrating classes to remove in labouring armies to the land of high wages. That instrument will be found in association, which has built canals and railways, and done millions of work in England which is supposed in other countries to require the strength of autocratic finance, and which now nourishes many hundred working-class benefit societies. Colonizing companies have been thoroughly tried, and have proved total failures. If they were ever useful they are now out of date. However vigorously they start they end in bankruptcy, or sink into mere absentee land-jobbing companies. If any are ever again permitted their term of power should be limited to four or five years. Wisdom in Europe is often a folly in a colony ; and the great authority of the London world of art, science, literature, and politics, finds himself lost in the bush, where perhaps his gardener proves the better man.

To put emigration, as required by the pace of the day, on a workmanlike and statesmanlike footing, not only ability and colonial experience were needed, but sympathy with the emigrating classes. All schemes of emigration have hitherto been based either on the idea of getting rid of troublesome people, or on providing capitalists with cheap servants. To people Australia as rapidly as it needs to be peopled colonization must be planned for the benefit of the colonists themselves. All industrious persons willing and able to work must be permitted to go. Two sentences express the foundation of a sound system of emigration — " association," and " family colonization."

The class, and it will exist in all ages and in all ranks, who ostracised Aristides, because tired of hearing him called the Just, will here have to endure a few more words on the work done by Caroline Chisholm. But it would be as easy to honestly record prison reform without mentioning Howard, or negro emancipation without Clarkson and Wilberforce, as to say anything useful about coloniza-

Q

260 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

tion without mentioning the name of the lady who has worked dayafter day for the last thirteen years.

In 1850 Mrs. Chisholm, who arrived in England in 1847, founded the Family Colonization Loan Society, which encouraged the working men to pay for passages to Australia by a small loan; and which established a superior style of accommodation for third-class passengers.

Mrs. Chisholm and her husband, Captain Chisholm, did all the work. A few noblemen and gentlemen subscribed not quite two thousand pounds, with which upwards of one thousand emigrants have been sent out, who undertook to repay the loans, and thus assist other friends and relations. To work out the plan Captain Chisholm separated himself from his family, and went out to Australia to receive instalments and assist in the union of families. During the panic which fell upon merchants and manufacturers in the spring of 1852, lest all the Australian flocks should be lost for want of shepherds, and no wool come home for Yorkshire, the leading Australian merchants subscribed a sum of money and joined the original society. But the magnitude of the operation of small instalments, and the disappearance of the wool freight, slackened their zeal ; and the only result of the amalgamation was, that the society ceased either to send out ships or receive instalments.

The result was fortunate. Australian emigration no longer requires the aid of charitable societies. But the rules prepared by the experience of Mrs. Chisholm afford a model for the imitation of those who desire to emigrate together, or for trades or benefit societies who think it better rather to lend money to fellow-workmen to emigrate than support them in idleness here.

Associations for family colonization loan societies will eventually prove the best kinds of benefit societies for working men.

Family colonization may be carried out in any town, with or without a loan ; but, now that wages are so high and certain in Australia, working men can afford to lend to working men without asking charity from any one.

Abstract Op Rules For Ship Board.

The advantages may be classed under independence, increased

comfort during voyage, and domestic happiness.

" Arrangements for the Voyage. — Having arranged to go out in a specified vessel, and the day of her sailing fixed, the emigrants are all divided into family groups, containing twelve adults, who can take their meals together during the passage. The object of this arrangement is that friends and relatives may unite and aid each other in their common emigration, and induce a social intimacy

Family Colonization — On Board Ship. 261

among strangers previous to embarkation. Families and individuals who cannot meet with persons wishing to emigrate from their own locality have thus an opportunity of meeting desirable associates, and mutually forming a group advantageous both to their present and future views. Friendless females and orphan girls are introduced to families, and placed under their special guardianship.

" Cabins. — Enclosed cabins are furnished to each family, of a size according to the number of individuals. One enclosed cabin is allotted to seven single females. The arrangement of the cabins is such as to provide for perfect order, decorum, and morality.

"Matronly Duties. — These duties were performed (gratuitously) by six females of an appropriate age, selected by Mrs. Chisholm. They undertake the duty of seeing that all the young females are in their sleeping apartments at a proper hour.

" Amusements. — Arrangements are made for amusements on board ; and parents of mature age are requested, for the sake of the young, to be present on such occasions, so that there may be mirth without danger, and amusement without remorse.

" Personal Comfort. — Much personal comfort arises from all the passengers being on a footing of equality. There is no classification, and all possess the privilege of walking on the poop. When preparing their meals, also, the passengers are not disturbed by cabin or intermediate passengers, as none other than the society's emigrants are allowed a passage in the same ship.

u Ship Regulations. — The following extracts from the ' Rules and Regulations' enforced on board all the society's vessels show that every attention was paid to the morality, health, comfort, and safety of the passengers. These regulations are all carried out under the superintendence of the surgeon : —

" f The groups choose six persons from their body, called the group committee, whose duty it is to preserve order on the lower deck, and see that deck kept clean ; to attend during the issue of provisions, to see that each mess has the proper allowance ; and to keep a register of the brands on the various casks of provisions, that they may know they are consuming the provisions put on board for their use.

" ' All complaints to be made to the surgeon, through the medium of the group committees, in order that he may apply to the captain.

" ' The emigrants prepare their food for cooking, and take it to and receive it from the cook appointed in the emigrants' service. This duty should always be done by a man from each mess. It is not proper for respectable females to go forward amongst the ship's crew.

" ' As ventilation and cleanliness are essential to the health and well-being of every person on board, it is earnestly recommended that the bedding, &c, from the several berths be brought on deck twice in each week, aired, and the berths well cleaned.'

" Bedding. — Passengers must provide themselves with bedding : the size of mattress for a double-bed place, 3 ft. by 6 ft. ; for a single berth, 2 ft. by 6 ft Feather beds are on no account permitted.

" Security for the Emigrants 9 Comfort and Health. — In order that the passengers may be amply secured against their health being impaired by the overcrowding, ten per cent, is added to the space allowed by the Passengers ' Act. In addition to a vastly increased space, the passengers are accommodated with a washhouse upon deck. No wine, beer, or spirits, are allowed to be sold to th

262 The Thbee C0L05Des Of Australia.

emigrants; and sharing on crossing the fine, burning tar-bamls, or throwing water orer the emigrants (as has been customary , is strictly prohibited.

u To prerent waste, parties not drawing the quantity to which they are entitled receive the quantity due to them on leaving the ship. This reserve will be useful to them if they go up the country, or until they hare permanent employment.

u All the groups are provided with printed receipts for their weekly rations, and aUo for medical comforts, should they be required. Scales, weights, and measures, are put on board."

The above abstract will give an idea of the advantage of associated over isolated emigration. " Family colonization" and the loan plan have been imitated by Sir Charles Trevelyan in his Highland emigration plan, without acknowledgment. But he induced the government to give free passages to his emigrants, which under the circumstances they were justified in doing, although contrary to all the printed rules and principles of the Emigration Commissioners. There is no reason why the Commissioners should not alter their rules and improve. The complaint is that they pretend never to change, and are always changing.

Outfit.

The following paper on outfit appeared in " Household Words," and contains a summary of useful information : —

" Preparations for Voyage.

" The first general rule is to take as much money, and as little of a useless or cumbrous nature, as possible. This rule especially applies to purchases. Those who are leaving a well-furnished house or shop will <lo well to review their possessions and select a number of useful articles which are not large, not heavy, and not worth much to sell. In travelling to a strange place, porterage, wharfage, and warehouse room are very expensive. At Sydney the ship goes up to the wharf; at Port Phillip there is a steam voyage from Hobson's Bay, at an extra expense, up the Yarra ; and at Adelaide there are seven miles of land carting from the port to the town to be paid for.

u The common practice of an intending emigrant is to discard all lie has, and set out with a bran-new stock of everything. The reverse is the tatter plan — ' Begin by mustering what you have got, and see how much will do.' A single man should be in light marching order, and should endeavour to take no more clothes than he could, at a pinch, make up in a bundle and carry, groaning, on his back for a mile.

" A family should take no cumbrous furniture, no pianos, no mangles, unless proceeding to settle near friends in a seaport of the colonies, where labour has become too dear to pay for making chairs and tables.

Outfit And &#x27;Board Ship Clothing. 263

A chair that folds up flat may be useful for ' mamma,' so may a light metal bedstead ; knives and forks, pewter plates, and teapots will be useful on the voyage, and in town or bush ; so will plated articles, and many little household things that weigh little, take up no great room, and sell for nothing at an auction.

" Beware of ingenious costly cabin fittings ; consult some experienced sea-going friend ; half the articles that look tempting in a show-room are useless at sea. It is well for a family party to have just enough to enable them to enter the first suitable empty house in Melbourne or Sydney, and commence housekeeping at once, with a trunk for a seat and a tea-chest for a table. But persons going to the interior should remember that carriage is dear at all times. Three pounds were paid in December for half a horseload, for thirty miles, to the Shoalhaven diggings, over a mountain track.

" Every party of not less than four should take a small three-pole tent, such as Edgington makes. A workman may take his tools — a digger a navvy's spade, a pick, and a heavy crowbar ; but cradles and carts, and all the heavy paraphernalia recommended in ironmongers' lists, are better bought in the colony, to which first-rate merchants are largely shipping from the advices of their own correspondents. Half such outfits will be found useless, and half the remainder unserviceable. Clothes are nearly as cheap in the colonies as in England. They should be selected with a view to very cold as well as warm weather. The mining districts are subject to snow, sleet, and torrents of rain. A large loose coat of the best pilot cloth, made after the fashion of a soldier's great-coat down to the heels, with a large waterproof cape, loose sleeves, and capacious pockets inside, is a capital travelling companion. For bush travelling a full-sized blanket is indispensable.

" On board ship any old trousers, if warm or light enough, according to the weather, will do. Shoes without heels on board. In the colonies good strong Wellington boots, of the best materials, and not too tight. Waterproof boots are a mistake ; the water comes in at the top, and stays there until let out by a hole. In the bush, and at the diggings, woollen jerseys, blue or red, are the wear, and blue striped shirts, where woollen is not worn. In the chief towns of Australia gentlemen dress exactly as they do in England, allowing for the difference of climate, and, except boots, the prices are about the same. Both woollen and cotton stockings are needed. Hats can be bought in the colony cheap enough ; two caps, one to be blown away, will be sufficient for the voyage. The following is the lowest scale of outfit required by the government commissioners from free passengers : —

~j?A rsz ran or

Twi iAiSO

Tw comctae saxtz

- And thy ropc-lj each wizrxnt. in recent for die d ep o sit ro j-vct-.I*. whh i inarm**. t:-Ls?r. blankets. exHmterpane,. eu iife. f-:-rk. and d~-.kirg-g.gg.

- In F ir v closets were provided with cistern*. pmp*. and tat**, in whi?n. with marine soap, the emigrants can wish tk*ir oI'.cL* heinz This saves each emigrant at kast thirty hilling's :n ocrd: — tor tw.> of stockings wi!L for example, do for thf; voyage* — and :? should be universally adopted, as an extra aLiiling* a Lea- 1 on th* rAssage-mouey would pay the shipowner, and be ctaap to the emigrants. Each passenger is also required to provide a matt tr.rv.-v ft bv six feet for a double bed, and two feet bv six feet for a ingle b*d. and the following articles : —

Enxf* and fork Half a Bath brick

Tab!* ar.d tea spoon* Two sheet* of sandpaper

M-°.aI plate Two coarse can rag aprons

Ho- A pot Hammer

Wat*- r -'an Leathern *trap*. with buckle, to secure WanLiri:?-tja*iii the beds neatly on deck, when re-

Two cabbairf-n'-ts quired to be aired

On* ';rubtjin-bruh Three pounds of marine soap. Half a gallon of sand

all of which, except the and, Bath brick, and scrubbing-brush, will bo requisite for every steerage or intermediate passenger in private ship. The hammer and tack*, with a few yards of list, are most useful. It niu.-t lie reinemWed that at sea everything not made fast with cords or nail rolls about.

" Luggage .should be divided thus : First — Not Wanted on Voyage: and marked in large letters, packed in sound water-tight cases or barreK Second — Wanted on Voyage ; so marked, and will be hauled on d'-k, for which cording or handle is needful, about once every fortnight. Third — For Use in Cabin or Berth ; for this last purpose a bag of leather, or two small boxes easily lifted, will be found most convenient.

" As to ships and stores, wc may state that good ships sail from all

Extract From Lloyd&#x27;S Register Of Shipping. 265

our ports, and bad ones. First see that the ship is classed in Lloyd's Register A 1.

" We abridge the following from Lloyd's Register/ a mysterious volume, which is issued annually to subscribers only, and posted up in

London from month to month : —

" ' First Class. — A 1 is a title granted to ships built in the best manner, and kept in a state of complete efficiency. To retain the title they must be surveyed at certain fixed periods. N.B. The " Lloyd's Register" of the year contains the name of every seaworthy vessel, and is in the possession of every respectable ship and insurance broker.

" ' M f printed in red, and commonly called the red-diphthong, is granted to such ships as shall be found, on survey, to be of a superior description, being fit for the safe conveyance of dry and perishable goods to and from all parts of the . world. To claim this distinction, the ship must undergo a special survey by two surveyors, to be appointed by Lloyd's Committee.

" ' JE in black ink, without the asterisk, is inferior to the preceding. N.B. The government emigration commissioners never take up any vessel classed below the red diphthong.

" ' Second Class. — E designates ships, on survey, found unfit for carrying dry cargoes, but perfectly fit for the conveyance on any voyage of cargoes not in their nature subject to sea damage.

" ' Third Class. — I. Ships, on survey, fit for conveyance on short voyages (not out of Europe) of cargoes in their nature not subject to sea damage.'

" There are not less than one thousand four hundred ships in Lloyd's Register 1 which have no character assigned to them.

" There is no especial advantage in a very large ship over a moderate size — say from five hundred to seven hundred tons register — if there be a height of not less than six feet between decks, seven feet being better. Ships are sometimes advertised so many tons burden, instead of register ; this is a mere clap-trap deception. Tons burden refer to cargoes of coal, or ore packed in bulk ; tons register are the measurement affecting live freight. The next point is ventilation. Taking a berth in a ship to Australia is like taking apartments with no exit for four months. No man would consent to live for four months in a room without a window, and without a chimney for the escape of foul air. Many fine ships go to sea with passengers whose berths have no windows ; that is to say, in sea language, scuttles opening upon them, and no air-pipes, so that, when the hatchways are shut down in rough weather, the passengers stand the risk of being, if not quite stifled, half poisoned.

" By a very simple contrivance, at a trifling expense, pipes may be, and are in some ships, arranged to bring in the pure air, and carry off the foul air, of two hundred souls, eating, drinking, and sleeping 'down stairs,' as ladies call the 'tween decks. Attention to this point is essen-

rZZ TST3ZK rruSZZ* OF .kCSTXAllA.

rial : v.- >.*al:ii f Tassesr*. "ni: specially thac of joanst children: mi : 'ir. LI-lti it - .- zrrAZ r-i.-vnc: :... emigration. Shipg carrying ';l:tH* r:ri 12.1 i clier til .'arr -ir*? :ioe health v tor intermediate ".u--!:: -r*. t? "r -v --i : y 11 ittv "i- ist yar in Adelaide of a shipload

- A "v:.-ii r .r'aa:* Vcile will be tonnI hands for 'i r iir t!:* 5, -::~r"-.- f -vir.-r. T":.>t "-rcw rm"-viiI bv washirsr oat iz.* ir.i. _i: : v.az "y L x:r.. -r">-r. xar-r is scarce. Fathers of :1i:l.- 7...:!i;:: j "".LTvri.r..- r hilirriiniusc take care or ::>.-y will j*-c c!y !:aj:' r riAr-zr nr.' cs :V r wins toys and cirl*. ar.: -a.T.:- -r;i t :" r siz>.- rt rri* c :f price. In the tropic*

r.a=i-r r' : :.i> 1: "v'-.j : :. sul 77-ci Li.co.q and Plymouth,

r t!r.-r :!.- .vi-i .r -a "in: izd :h* scale .'t" provisions

m - a.

7.r.: r :' Vii'J-.j L; . TVr i:-- iir.: " :j_ri jialloweil each

La

It ;, I.-— ..r.ti.i 1 . :" r I:i. i*s#;r.rvr* that a certain sjuv [a.— -r : .-n h- hi* j-a-.:.'- r.ni> all vicar, almost tilled up with .vMiMonal :-:i 1 .'iii'* wln.n i "ii InaipJ.

r.ot couiforraMe, and cuupletely separated from the passengers, the

Hints For Sea Voyagb. 267

passengers, especially those intermediate and steerage, will suffer in more ways than one. The cooking arrangements ought to be in proportion to the number of the passengers.

The quality and supply of water and the number of water-closets are most important points.

With respect to provisions, the scale of the Family Colonization Society is a good guide for intermediate and steerage passengers. Cabin passengers should have a written agreement. Indeed, in all cases, a distinct written agreement, leaving nothing to be understood, would save a world of disputes and disappointments.

Cabin passengers who take live sea stock will find ducks stand a voyage better than fowls. Fowls intended for sea should be cooped a week or ten days previously, and the most mopy ones draughted out : all cockerels and no hens are best. In any case poultry require a great deal more attention than they usually get, and especially more water, and to be kept clean.

It does no harm to inquire who the surgeon is ; very often a mere boy or a scamp is engaged at the last moment.

The comfort of the passengers depends greatly on the character and temper of the captain ; but on that point, unless from the report of friends who have gone before, it is impossible to obtain any reliable evidence. The man who is most amiable in port is often a perfect brute at sea.

But, brute or no, unless in very extreme cases, it is neither proper nor prudent to resist the authority of the captain, who is, and ought to be, for the safety of the ship under his charge, an autocrat at sea.

Many persons lay out elaborate plans of study to be executed on a voyage ; few have resolution enough to execute them ; too many spend their whole time in eating, drinking, smoking, card-playing, and scandalizing. To warn against such idle waste of time would be useless. A number of one-volume double-columned editions of standard works will often be gradually digested at sea by even the most frivolous skimmer of novels and romances. Having useful books at hand and nothing to do often leads to a course of study.

Passengers' baggage should be divided into three parts: one including a good bag of leather or carpet for use in cabin ; another for use on voyage, which will go into the hold and be brought up occasionally ; and the third to be stowed away until the end of the voyage.

Very large chests are inconvenient to get on shore, and to convey up the country. Most emigrants of any means encumber themselves with too much baggage.

270 Toe Three Colonies Of Australia.

externals of his birth or education to the last: with Barnaby Badge's raven they exclaim, whenever an economical maxim presents itself " Never say die !" and so out of the poor scrapings of his fortune they make him take a cabin passage. They give him introductions to the most genteel people, they lead him to put up at the most fashionable hotels, and sjteiid a small fortune in paying and receiving visits.

This line of conduct often leaves the victim of gentility stranded, without a shilling, obliged to beg, or borrow, or sponge ; but then he never can lie reproached, if he should afterwards attain a wealthy ]>osition, with having come out as a "steerage paaenger" — a direful reproach, although one which may be borne with considerable equanimity by a man who owes no one a shilling, who has never borrowed or in the colony, and can show a fair number of stock, and a respectable credit at his banker's.

Poor men, however genteel as cabin passengers, find themselves led into a great deal of exjMMise by wealthy cuddy companions, and on landing have great difficulty in breaking off the acquaintance, and in refusing invitations to dinner parties and pic-nics ; so that what with cards, cigars, extra champagne on board, with a visit perchance to Rio or the Cape, the fivc-hundred-pound man finds a great hole in the foundation of his fortune before he has left the smoke of the first colonial behind him.

Our advice about passage-money, about lodgings, and about dress, is to betfin as you mean to go on. Never mind what any one may say : if you have? to stay in a town, and very little money, take such an empty room or cottage as you can afford, and make shift with your ship furniture — as many have done within our knowledge. A gentleman by birth, education, and profession, walked up the street of the port until he saw an empty cottage to his mind, hired it, and then returned for his baggage and family, without even having entered an inn.

In a strange place a bank credit for twenty pounds is worth much more than any number of polite speeches or even dinner invitations.

These words are particularly directed to ladies, mothers of families, whose pride often leads to the fall of their dearest hopes.

Unless well prepared with instructions how to act, and one real useful letter of introduction to some person who will take the trouble to sympathise with the economy essential to large families, with very little money, the expenses of landing and the first week are often enormous. There arc hotels in the colonies as expensive as those of St. Jaincs's-street or Bond-street, and to such the great Australian merchant usually recommends his friends.

The Ad Fob Labours Kb.

A labouring man should not lose an hour in applying to the committee or registry-office for work, according to his capabilities, or in shouldering his blanket knapsack fashion, and starting for the diggings.

A mechanic will have no difficulty in ascertaining what opening there is for him in his trade within a day or two — if the port, whether Sydney, Melbourne, Oeelong, or Adelaide, be overstocked ; he should ascertain whether it is more advisable to proceed inland or coastwise.

The unskilled labourers — and with them must be classed all gentlemen without money — clerks, and every one who has not a trade at his fingers' ends — have two pursuits open to them in New South Wales and Victoria, and in South Australia one — gold-digging and shepherding.

On gold-digging no advice need be given ; none would be taken ; it suits a strong family accustomed to draining marshes, cutting sewers, or railroad work well.

The shepherd, or intending shepherd, should take for choice, even at a pound or two less wages, a master of known good character, who is married, and living at his own head station, and periodically visiting his flocks. As to what a shepherd's life is like, the following letter will show:—

272 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Shepherd's Life.

" I have a great horror of a bachelor's station, but quite the reverse where the proprietor resides with his wife and family. I never enjoyed myself more than when visiting some of the latter stations. Single men grumble — well they may — at the dreariness of the occupation ; but married men have happy homes to return to at the close of the day.

" The shepherd's wife has a neat hut rent free, wood, water, and food found ; she receives about £9 a year for cooking for her husband and another, who will frequently be a near relative. The occupation of a shepherd is light and healthy ; he can save at least 60 per cent, of his wages, and in a few years can save enough to set up on his own account. Wages are paid in cash, and can be deposited in stock or in the savings bank. Higher wages may be made in towns, but the expense of dress, &c, often more than counterbalances the difference ; and the great bargains they are tempted to buy generally end in placing them in a very inferior position to those who go into the interior and remain as servants, until they have saved money, and gained that practical knowledge of agriculture and pastoral pursuits which is necessary to final success." — Letter from Mrs. Chisholm to the Author.

There is a great difference between Australian squatters : some are perfectly selfish, and indifferent to every consideration except the quality and price of wool and tallow ; others, and these are increasing in number, like to see their runs tended by married men, and spare no pains to provide comfortable accommodation for their servants.

It is an immense advantage to be located where the ground and water admit of a good garden being cultivated, and where the master permits his men, in addition to pigs and poultry, to run a few heifers and a mare or two.

A written agreement specifying the wages, when to commence and when payable, the amount of rations for man, wife, and family, and other points ought to be obtained ; two copies to be made saves many disputes.

The man must generally walk up to the interior, but the wife and children may get a cast in a dray. December is the best season for travelling, as then the wool is coming down, and there are plenty of opportunities of getting back ; but in the month of October, previous to sheep-shearing, wages are at the highest.

A poor man with a large family of young children, if able to plough or accustomed to gardening, and possessed of enough means to get through one year, will often do well when unable, in consequence of his large family, to go into the interior, by hiring a piece of good

Advice Fob Cottagers. 273

wild land on a clearing lease for not less than twenty-one years, or fourteen years with a purchasing clause, at not more than £1 an acre for the first year.

Long before the gold was discovered, the Bathurst district used to be a favourite spot for small settlers, on clearing leases ; and now in Port Phillip, and wherever a thriving township commences, or golddigging begins, the same course may be pursued.

Advice for Cottagers.

" These men" (the Bathurst cottage farmers) " would set up on wild land, with a dray and team of bullocks, and, as their sons grew up, knocked a pretty fair living out of the land." Such a man, with the help of one stout son, woulcj " commence by clearing a few acres, but not stump them ; merely saw down the trees about two or three feet from the butt, the first year ; this done, and the timber chopped up, he ploughs it, puts in his wheat, gets a hut up, and a fence round his wheat. The next year, if possible, he gets a garden fenced in, ploughed and dug up, which supplies him with potatoes, onions, cabbage, pumpkins,' water-melons. The climate in the neighbourhood of the Cannobile Mountains (Bathurst) is very like that of the south of England, not so severe in winter, and hotter in the summer. The ninety-day corn grows well. I found plenty wild fowls, ducks, geese, turkeys, and pigs, which they fattened on thick sour milk, hardening them afterwards with Indian corn. Some had four or five cows employed, which they and their children watched all day, to prevent them from straying. They rear calves and milk the cow at the same time ; but it generally takes three cows to fill one bucket in this way. The ordinary fare of these small settlers is damper (an unleavened cake), boiled salt beef, vegetables, and tea. When they get their crops of wheat and hay they sell it, and this supplies them with money for tea, sugar, tobacco, and clothing. So they live very comfortably without care, and without making a fortune, and can provide for their children easily."

The small farmer or agricultural labourer with very little money, but obliged, by the necessity of keeping his family together, to go on land, instead of hiring out for a year or two, to acquire colonial experience, must follow the preceding example, try to obtain fifteen or twenty acres, of which part should be deep rich soil, close to a creek, river, or water-hole, and build his hut as near as possible, but out of reach of the highest floods, on a hillock or slope.

Journal of a Bushman MS.

274 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

It will be difficult to put this up without advice, if not assistance, from an old colonist. It may be made either in the shape of a threepoled tent, roofs and walk of slabs, or bark, which the blacks will strip off, or a square hut.

A ditch will be required on the higher side to carry off the rain.

Such a hut may be fitted with berths, as on board ship. The chimney must be of stone or clay. After a time this hut will become the detached kitchen of a better dwelling.

At the same time, where possible, it is much better to take service for twelve months, and learn the colonial customs and contrivances.

The next step will be to clear five acres, by felling the trees, and burning them off. During the burning process, take care to dress the wife and children, who will be helping, in woollen ; many serious accidents occur in burning off. A bullock must be hired or brought to draw off great trunks that will not burn. But a man accustomed to cattle will buy a young bullock and train him. A townsman could not do this. Or an old bullock not fit for long journeys may be bought cheap.

The five acres cleared may be divided into two acres of wheat, one and a half of maize, of the kind called ninety-day corn, and half an acre for potatoes, if the district be suitable. The Chilian or Peruvian potato will thrive where the English seed will fail. The best acre nearest water should be reserved for a garden, which, under certain circumstances, may be cheaply irrigated. On this acre, yams, melons, pumpkins, cucumbers, vegetable marrow, potatoes, onions, and other vegetables enougli to support a large family, may be grown. In due time a quarter of an acre should be laid down for a vineyard, and a quarter of an acre for tobacco. Tobacco and vines may be managed by a man's young family after the hard work of trenching has been done. The latter is to the poor man the cash produce which wool is to the rich man.

At as early a period as possible, two or three cows should be purchased of the quietest breeds ; for it is useless to take land without a run for two or three heads. Butter, if any work, whether gold-digging, or wood-sawing, or building, is going on in the neighbourhood, pays well ; so does cheese ; while milk and curds come in for fattening pigs and poultry. We are now attempting to direct, as well as we can, the humblest class of emigrants.

The cows must be of a quiet breed : those who cannot afford to buy cows sometimes rear heifer calves, which have the advantage of being pets of the family, and not the she-devils common in Australian milking-yards.

Ploughing And Hoeing. 275

If the settler can maintain his family the first year, he will go on cultivating every year more of a saleable produce, and accumulating by increase cattle, until able to muster a herd, and arrange for part of a run, which he may send to a distance under charge of one of the family.

To describe every process would be impossible ; but the following hints may be found useful, and will, at any rate, give an idea of the work to be done : —

Ploughing and Hoeing.

Those who do not know how to fell a tree must learn in the colony. No step can be taken without learning.

Ploughing is a very difficult operation on half-cleared land. What with stumps, roots, and stones, the team must be stopped every few minutes, and oxen will not always stop for a stranger. An iron plough does not answer in such cases : it is soon broken, and cannot be repaired like a wooden one. The plough must be light enough to be lifted over any obstacles.

Ploughing used to cost to hire £1 an acre.

The poor man will often do as well, or even better, by hoeing in his crop. The hoe goes deeper than the plough, and cleans the land better ; besides, it loosens the soil without turning it up so much as the plough, which in hot seasons injures by abstracting moisture.

Sow enough, and cover well in.

Getting in a crop is always a difficulty, and now an increasing difficulty, in all the colonies of Australia. In South Australia a reapingmachine has been invented which nips off the ears of wheat, after which the straw is burned off or ploughed in. The American reapingmachine is a much more complete invention, but whether the cost will prevent its introduction generally remains to be seen. The Australian harvest moon is splendid, and neighbours give each other a hand late into midnight, resting during the noontide heat.

Within reach of the gold-diggings wheat will bear a price that will afford good implements. Some landowning squatters find it cheaper to purchase it from their tenants instead of growing it.

Maize, or Indian corn, is plucked as it grows ripe. The cobs are thrown in heaps between the rows until the day's gathering is done, and then carried away.

The stalks are cut up with a hoe or machette for food for cattle and pigs. Two or three pigs should be kept for every two acres of wheat or maize.

R

276 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Maize is an invaluable crop to the struggling settler. A hole in the ground made with the hoe, four or five grains dropped, the span of the hoe's handle measured off, and another hole, and so on ; and that is all that is needful to get a first rough crop. It may be cooked green, and eaten in a dozen different modes: all kinds of cattle like it- Cucumbers and water-melons may be grown between the six-feet space of the rows.

Thrashing.

Thrashing is conducted in every manner in Australia, from the primitive style of treading out with oxen and mares, to the most improved thrashing-machine. But although we earnestly warn settlers from spending too much money on improvements when they first begin on the land, and recommend them to be content with getting in a good crop and buying some good stock, it should also be a rule to let no year pass, and no idle month or week or day, without mlring some improvement, either internal or external. One of the first should be a thrashing-floor of split stuff, placed and laid down on round joists, if better cannot be got.

A steel mill will be needed, fixed to a deep sunk post. Water power is not to be had.

The following letter to the author may afford well-grounded encouragement to many who cannot make way in this country : —

&quot;Small Farms In Australia.

"No man must go upon land expecting to get on without work. For a settler to thrive he must labour. A very intelligent class of young men have made inquiries of me regarding this settlement who have never done a day's work here, and are too proud to commence in this country, but seem to think that they would shake off this feeling in Australia, and make, with a hundred pounds or two, a fortune. It is a melancholy fact, that old habits and feelings of this kind cling to a man with stubborn tenacity. A long sea voyage and a warm climate seldom do much for this class of men — unfortunately, their renovation of character is rarely accomplished till they have suffered much — until their last sixpence is expended — their last coat sold. Necessity is a stern master, but a safe and wonderful reformer of the evils of the present system of training young men for the colonies. I repeat that, to do well on a farm, a man must, with axe on his shoulder, be ready for work. Small capitalists, who have never been accustomed

" While green it becomes by boiling a delicious vegetable for the table — when ripe it to capable, before it is ground, of being prepared for food in a great variety of ways. In no form in America is it ever taken cold; it is never baked in large quantities, or in the shape of loaves. Indian corn is always best unmixed with any other description of flour; but eggs, butter, milk, and sugar are added to give it richness of flavour. To my palate it was never so sweet as when prepared in the simplest manner with water and a little salt. The dough thus formed being made into a roll, the size of a soda-water bottle without the neck, is enveloped in wood ashes, being first covered with leaves, then covering it with ashes, and eaten hot The ' hoe-cake' Ls mado in the same manner, but toasted."— Mackay's " Western World.**

Bush Partnership. 277

to labour, should not buy land, but put their cash in the bank, engage in a sheepfarm, where the occupation would not be of the same laborious character that it must be in a farm, and where they may, with prudence, become men of property, if they will only commence at the beginning.

" In answer to the oft-repeated question — ' Would it not be an advantage to enter into partnership with my neighbour ? " my reply is, Let no present advantage induce you to enter hurriedly into an arrangement of this kind. What I would particularly recommend to new settlers is ' Bush Partnership.' Let two friends or neighbours agree to work together, until three acres are cropped, dividing the work, the expense, and the produce — this partnership will grow apace ; I have made numerous bush agreements of this kind. One settler's wife was an excellent milker ; her next-door neighbour could not manage a cow. An agreement was made, much to the advantage of both : Settler A. was to bail up and milk B.'s cows — while B., in return, agreed to give one hour's instruction daily, in reading and writing, to B.'S children.

" C. was an excellent gardener, but not equal to D. at sawing ; D. agreed to take C.'s place at the saw, while he worked in D.'s garden. A., B., C, D. were neighbours. A. had a large family but little money — they agreed to buy a bullock and water-cart for their domestic use — B., C, D. found the money, A. agreeing that his son should take charge of the bullock and go for the water for twelve months, a3 his amount of the contribution. At the close of the year, B., C, D. had horses ; the bullock and dray were valued ; they drew lots who should take it at the price named ; it was A.'s draw, but he had no money ; B., C, D. were glad to agree that A.'s son should give them labour as payment. I was present the day the son had paid the first day's labour. B., C, D. said, ' It has done us all good, and A. has behaved so punctual, the boy has worked so well — never been any excuse.' The four farmers talked the matter over, shook hands, wished the boy luck, and the same evening entered into a bush agreement respecting the joint management of their cows.

" I never knew any quarrel or bad feeling result from these partnerships ; on the contrary, I believe them calculated to promote much neighbourly goodwill ; but, in the association of a large number of strangers for an indefinite period, I have no confidence.

"Much has been said against agriculture as a profitable pursuit in New South Wales ; those squatters who wish to keep the land for their sheep say farming won't pay ; but — although it may not pay the large absentee capitalists — from my own personal experience, in hundreds of cases, I know that it does pay the working farmer. I have seen English, Irish, and Scotch improve their circumstances by getting on a farm, and I have evidence to prove it from the people ; — true, my experience has been chiefly confined to the working man ; and I never visited their farms or saw them without observing some proof of improved circumstances. I am, therefore, quite certain that any man of industrious habits can do well on a farm, improve his condition, and rear his children in respectability, as many hundred voluntary statements collected by me will prove.

w Yours very truly,

" Carolikk Chisholm."

Building and Fencing.

Where a man has the money it will be found cheaper to contract

r 2

278 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

for a hut than to spend time in learning how to work the Australian timber, which at first is very awkward, even to an experienced European carpenter. The best woods for slabs are box, stringy bark, or iron bark. Posts for the framing are taken off round trees. Instead of sawing, splitting answers with most Australian trees ; even those for flooring, the logs are often first split and then planed smooth.

To make a good fence of split stuff will be a great economy in the end. The batts should be charred, sunk two feet six inches in the ground, the earth rammed solidly round — five good broad rails, large mortices, and tap the rails well.

Tobacco Ctdtivation.

Sow the seed, the best you can get, in very light rich soil, well cleared of stones, in a warm spot : keep it moist, and shaded from the blaze of midday as well as the frosts of night, until the plants are well up. Loosen the soil well to which it is to be transplanted, at four feet distance each way, and get it as near garden-soil texture as possible. Prepare half an acre if you can spare the time. When the plants are strong enough transplant them on a rainy day, and shade them with shingles or pieces of bark during the heat of noon. When they show twelve leaves, clear off all the dying ones below and break out the heart above, leaving five or six intermediate leaves. They will immediately throw out shoots or suckers from the bases of the leaves. Keep all these cleared away, that the whole vegetation and juice may go to the leaves left. When the leaves turn mottled ,with golden or yellowish patches, cut the plants — the ripest — each evening, about an hour before sundown, and let them lie on the ground awhile, so as to become flabby. In this state they will not break. You must have a small barked structure ready to hang them up in on lines in rows, just hitching the top leaf over the line. Here they will dry ; and as much of the external air as possible must be kept out during the process. Some wet day, after they are all quite dry, and are flabby with the moisture of the atmosphere, strip off the leaves and throw them all in a heap, pressed together as close as possible. Let them lie a couple of days, and then turn them ; and again and again so, till you can smell that they are good strong tobacco. Any of your neighbours will then tell you how to stem, fig, and press it. Press it, if you can, in a square box ; and, if your finances permit, keep it thus pressed several months. At that period it will be so good that you ought to get, from any general dealer, Is. per pound for it. Off half an acre, which an intelligent boy eight years of age could easily look after in the

Vineyards And Wine. 279

suckering season, you ought to get 7 cwt., which should yield £20 to £30 clear of the expense of curing and carriage.

In America the tobacco is chiefly dried in the fields, then closely packed in hogsheads for manufacture. Tobacco is the most valuable crop of a small settler, if he will take the needful pains*

Vineyards and Winemaking, Orange Groves, Mulberries, Silkworms.

The cultivation of the wine-producing grape has made so much progress in Australia within the last twenty years, that we may confidently look forward to the time when home-made wine will be as common in Australia as home-brewed beer was in England before the malt-tax threw a monopoly into the hands of a few great brewers.

The first successful experiment of which we have any record was made by John Arthur, at Camden, the nursery of the finewoolled sheep, on which the power and glory of Australia has been founded.

Certain Greek prisoners, transported for piracy from the Ionian Islands, were assigned to Mr. M' Arthur, and employed by him in cultivating a vineyard after the Greek manner*. When these men were removed at the expiration of their sentence, the proprietor of Camden engaged a number of German famines to replace them, whom he tempted by high wages to migrate from the banks of the Rhine. Other wealthy settlers followed the example of this enterprising gentleman, and many hundred species of wine-bearing grapes have been introduced into the colony. Wine has not become a profitable article of produce, but a ready sale has been found for any quantity among the labouring classes at 5s. a gallon, and with the best effects. Men who have been previously slaves to spirit-drinking, on going to work at a vineyard, have sobered down to two bottles of Australian wine daily, to the infinite benefit of their health and finances. Winebearing grapes are to be found in ' most colonial gardens ; and although, whether from want of skill in cultivation or manufacture, or from want of age, we cannot say that we have ever tasted any Australian wine really comparable to the first-class ordinary wines of France or Germany, there is every reason to expect an annually increasing quantity of a wholesome, palatable liquor.

We have met individuals who claimed to have drank Australian wine equal to sound Medoc and St. Julien, to Reichenberger and Moselle ; but these were Australian patriots.

Looking at the trifling difference of freight between the voyage from Australia and from the wine countries to India, and looking at

280 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

the low wages and hereditary skill which prevail in the European wine districts, we cannot say that we expect to see in our time a very considerable export trade, but we may expect to see many thousand settlers sitting literally under the shadow of their own vine and their own fig-tree, and manufacturing for personal consumption a million instead of the hundred thousand gallons which were considered such a triumph in 1850.

Every Australian with a garden will find it pleasant and profitable to have a quarter of an acre of vineyard, from which, if the climate and season suit, he will manufacture a wholesome, cheerful, but not inebriating liquor. The chief expense of the vine is labour ; but of that labour the greater part can be performed by women and children, after the first serious trenching has been performed. Several wine associations exist in New South Wales and South Australia, which meet annually to compare notes, read papers, taste wines, and give prizes ; and from their reports a fund of valuable information may be obtained.

Champagne, a peculiar kind of Claret, Sauterne, and a good deal of Hock, have been manufactured in Australia ; and more than five hundred varieties of vine have been cultivated with success. But, to produce first-class wine, not only suitable soil and climate are required, but skilful labourers and great attention. Even the manufacture of the casks is an art requiring more labour than can always be had on remunerative terms in a colony; but perhaps machinery lately patented may get over this difficulty.

The slopes and gentle declivities of hills, if sheltered, are in almost all countries found to yield the finest wine. On the Rhine the small proprietors so value situation that they go to the trouble of carrying up baskets of earth to terraces formed in peculiarly favourable situations. Alluvial flats on the banks of rivers often give grapes in quantity at the expense of quality. Mr. Suttor especially recommends that Australian vineyards should be sheltered from the strong west winds and hot winds by fences and hedges.

The soil of a vineyard for manufacturing wine should be dry, strong, porous; if mixed with sand and gravel, with a proportion of light vegetable mould, so much the better. The presence of sandstone or freestone, if not in too great projwrtions, is no detriment; but it should be broken to pieces, and well mixed with the earth. A volcanic country is favourable to the growth of vines. On wet, cold clay soils notliing good can be produced.

It is not necessary, as in most parts of France and Germany, to

A List Of Grapes. 281

choose a specially sunny aspect, as the long sunny days and long summers of the vine-growing districts of Australia are amply sufficient to bring the grapes to maturity. Indeed, care must be taken that they are not scorched.

The varieties recommended by Mr. Suttor are : —

The Muscats, all varieties.

The Gouais, a good bearer in the colony, and good wine grape.

The blue Portugal and Oporto grape.

The Madeira.

The Burgundy.

The Chassalas blanch, used for making Champagne.

The Claret grape of Margaux.

The Carmenet.

The three last were sent by order of the late Louis Philippe to the Botanical Gardens at Kew, and thence forwarded to Sydney.

An advertisement in a Port Phillip paper, a few years ago, announced five hundred varieties of vine cuttings for sale. So that there is no need of the trouble of importation. Indeed, every kind of seed and plant is to be found in the Australian nurseries.

Planting.

Cuttings should be procured in June, and planted in August or September. The gathering will take place in February, but Mr. Suttor recommends that the practice of Spain be followed, and several gatherings made as the fruit ripens. To make the best wine, the grape should be almost as ripe as raisins. All stalks and bad berries rejected. To make common, all the branches should go into the tubs at once.

Cutting or pruning the vines in the colonies should commence in May and end in June.

We have not given any directions for cultivation, because that must be studied as an art, and would require a volume of directions. Wo have confined our notes to the variations required by the colonial latitude.

The Hunter's River district, and a large part of the country extending over the county of Gloucester, have been pronounced by Leuchardt and Strzelecki essentially a wine country, and there are situations in South Australia equally favourable as regards soil and climate. Wine has also been produced in Port Phillip in gardens, and by the German settlers.

It would be useless to repeat the very elaborate calculations of expenses which have been drawn up by experienced colonists, because,

282 The Three Colonies Of Au8Tralia.

as ninety per cent, of these expenses consists of labour, and no one can tell what wages will be in any given year in the colonies, all such calculations must at present be fallacious.

Mr. Suttor, one of the oldest colonists, one who has been a benefactor to the land of his adoption in more ways than one, not least by showing how profitable it is to secure the respect, attachment, and fidelity of bush servants, by treating them as if they were Christian men, and not as more serfs or machines, has always taken a great interest in the introduction of useful fruit-bearing trees and shrubs. He has the oldest and finest orangery at his seat ten miles from Sydney. He published a work on vine cultivation in 1847, including a translation from the useful portions of the French works of Mons. Jullien,* which may be consulted with advantage.

Mr. Suttor considers that the greater portion of the crime of the colony originates in spirit-drinking, so that the winegrower may add to other enjoyments from his operations the satisfaction of feeling that he is helping to render the future Australian race as sober as the natives of Southern Europe, or the more energetic Anglo-Saxons of the eastern states of America, f

But in the case of vine cultivation, as of every other pursuit, we would especially warn the intending colonist against eitber going to any expense in tools, machinery, or even fixing his mind on any special investment.

On moral and social grounds, it is often very advantageous for the father of a family to keep a large family at home, and employed. A vineyard may often afford profitable employment. On the Rhine, in the spring of the year, three generations may be seen at work, from the grandmother to the toddling grandchild ; and although the gold discoveries will permanently raise the average value of labour, and so far impede speculations and improvements by capitalists, it will also stimulate the demand for every kind of home produce ; among which " good wine will need no bush."

A vineyard yields no returns for three years. Valuable direction* for cultivation and manufacture will be found in tbe reports of the vine societies and horticultural associations of New Soutb Wales and South Australia. Five thousand vines, cultivated after tbe goosebembush fashion in rows, may be planted on one acre of ground, and will yield 5G0 gallons of wine, or five pipes. But a more beautiful appear-

"The Culture of the Grape Vine and the Orange in Australia and New Zealand, bj Gw Suttor, K.L.S. London : Smith and Elder."

f In the eastern shite* of the United States absolute temperance has npeneded the dranto habits of the lust century.

j

Orange Groves. 283

ance may be produced by training them over trees in the Italian fashion in festoons, or over a walk in lofty frames. What a picture such an avenue might present, all green and purple and golden with pendent bunches, and alive with thieving, brilliant-plumaged birds, lories, parroquets, and cockatoos!

Casks.

Mr. Suttor believes that the eucalypti, especially one known on the Blue Mountains as the " mountain ash/' would make hoops and staves for wine-casks.

Vinegar.

To make vinegar, pour into a strong barrel several quarts of good boiling vinegar ; let it remain eight days, placing the barrel in a mild, equable temperature. It must then be racked, and replaced by the sour wine, putting in a glass of boiling milk. By agitating this mixture, you obtain a pale vinegar that preserves all the aroma, which it would lose by distillation.

Oranges.

Mr. Suttor considers the Spanish lemon the best stock for working the orange on in the Australian colonies. He does not believe in the story of producing blood-red oranges by grafting on the pomegranate.

Mr. Suttor's celebrated orangery, which is one of the sights in the neighbourhood of Sydney, was commenced, in 1801, with three plants brought by Colonel Paterson, lieutenant-governor, from Salvador in 1799.

Orange trees, and all the citrus genus sufficiently hardy to grow in semitropical climates, require a sheltered situation, rather dry, strong soil, on a gentle slope. They do not like the sea breeze, or a sandy, porous soil. A rich mould on the surface, with a deep, tenacious subsoil, into which the roots can penetrate, well trenched previous to planting, will be found most suitable. The oranges and lemons, if suited in soil and situation, — and they are fastidious, — will rise to the height of twenty-five feet. The fruits require near twelve months to ripen.

Oranges may be propagated by layers, by seeds, by cuttings, by budding on the seedling and other stocks.

The long warm summers of Australia suit the orange. The upper roots should be covered with litter and neat's dung, and channels made to lead the rain to them. The ground should be kept clean, and well worked in the winter season. Care must be taken not to break or injure the tree in gathering the fruit. The Americans had an ingenious

284 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

machine, a jointed pole, a net, and fork, for gathering fruit, in the Great Exhibition.

Mr. Suttor has trees in his orangery fifty years old, thirty feet high, which are not yet at full bearing ; and one tree has produced one hundred dozen oranges, some of the fruit being ripe all the year round. Oranges may be cultivated from lat. 38 down to 23, and will be, when the golden fruit of the earth produces its rational results.

The Mulberry and Silkworm.

Experiments have proved that the silkworm thrives and produces a first-rate article in Australia, and the mulberry, its proper food, can be raised in any quantity. There are circumstances under which it may answer the purpose of the small settler to employ the younger branches of his family in tending silkworms, for the purpose of selling the cocoons to the wholesale " reeler."

The following directions are abridged from a report prepared by Mr. Buezville, for the use of a committee of Sydney merchants, in 1848, and published in the Sydnef Morning Herald. The number of respectable emigrants who will desire to keep their families near them, and live near enough to the settled districts to afford the advantages of religious and educational training, is increasing, and some of these may, if their means from other sources is sufficient, desire to experiment in growing an article produced as a matter of trade by almost every country of Europe except our own and the Scandinavian kingdoms : —

" A primary consideration should be to cultivate a variety of the tree calculated to produce silk which should command the home market.

" For the next two years it will not be possible, in the present state of the mulberry -tree in the neighbourhood of Sydney, to produce more than two crops in the year.

" In Italy, 14£ lbs. of wild mulberry leaves produce 1£ lb. cocoon, while it requires 20f lbs. of the leaves of the grafted mulberry to produce the same quantity. Also, that 7£ lbs. cocoons, proceeding from silkworms fed on the wild mulberry, gave about 14 ounces of exceedingly fine silk ; whilst generally the same weight of silkworms, managed in exactly a similar manner, but fed with leaves of the grafted mulberry, only yields 11 or 12 ounces of silk.

" These facts strongly argue that the leaf of the wild mulberry, compared to the leaf of the grafted mulberry, yields, at equal weight, a greater portion of nutritious and resinous substance, and less of the fibrous substance.

Mulberry Orotes. 285

" The wild ungrafted mulberry-tree is longer lived than the grafted tree.

" Plantations of mulberry trees should be so arranged as to give a dear space round the root of the tree of at least four feet of otherwise uncultivated ground. About 750 to 800 trees could be advantageously planted in an acre of ground as a plantation; or they might be arranged as boundaries.

" A cultivated tree will produce more nutritive matter to the worm than one left to shoot forth its suckers from the roots, and make more stems than one from the same root.

" The most desirable mode of cultivating the Morus alba is as a standard. Not allowing branches to shoot out until it has attained a height of four feet at least. These trees admit of being stripped twice at least every year, and pollarded every second year. By this method the trees may not produce in the first year so much leaf, but as the tree increases in age it will give leaf both in larger quantities and superior quality to that produced from an uncultivated tree.

" If the insects are well managed, 1 lb. of sorted mulberry leaves will produce 1 ounce cocoons. In a climate such as that of Sydney it is anticipated that 1 lb. sorted leaves would produce I£ ounce cocoons.

" A well-cultivated mulberry-tree, when at maturity, will produce 30 lbs. leaves at a crop.

" It might become a consideration with small proprietors or tenants how far they would cultivate the white mulberry for the sale of the leaf alone. It would realize probably 2s. Qd. to 5s. per cwt. Suppose four crops in the year, equal to about from 2s. &d. to 5s. per tree, or £8 6s. Sd. to £16 13*. 4td. per acre,

" Suppose landed proprietors, as in Italy, were to grow mulberrytrees to supply tenants with the leaf to rear silkworms upon, the tenant finding the labour for attention to the insects and gathering the leaves, and the landlord providing the leaf and the necessary ground whereon to grow the leaf, and the landlord and tenant dividing the cocoons when brought to maturity ; then, irrespective of the profit on the cocoon, the calculation would stand thus —

the amount per acre which the landlord would receive as rent for the occupation of his ground alone, and the tenant would be reaping an advantage by his family, otherwise unproductive, who could attend to and rear the insects,"

286 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Plantations.

The following are the chief directions given for proceeding with plantations in Australia. We give them somewhat fully, from a conviction that the cultivation of the mulberry-tree will become very general at an early period. In fact, the prospects of tmaU settler*, from the several avocations of the silk trade, appear to us to be much superior to those arising from those connected with the vine.

Soil and Site. — Sheltered situations and deep soils are to be chosen. If the surface be only moderately fertile, anything better than a mere sand-bed, it cannot be too deep or too completely permeable to water. The free passage of water to a considerable depth (the above case alone excepted) is the most important condition toward the ultimate success of a plantation, or orchard. Fertility may be imparted artificially, but facility of drainage to the desired depth cannot be. Therefore, a soil is to be chosen in which there is no obstacle, such as rock or a strong tenacious clay, to impede the free passage of the water to a considerable depth, a score or two feet even, and the downward progress of the roots. If the subsoil be a mere bed of rubble stones or gravel, it is of no consequence, provided there be a fair depth of good loamy soil above. Of course the deeper and more fertile the surface soil the better. The mulberry and fig flourish best in a sandy soil, but it must be deep. The apple and the orange require a soil of greater consistency, especially the latter, which also prefers plenty of manure.

Preparation of the Soil. — It will generally prove, at the end of four or five years, the most economical process to have trenched the land to a good depth. The progress of trees in a properly-prepared soil is much more rapid than in a soil not so prepared. At the very least, the trenching should be to a depth of two feet ; if three, the labour will be remunerated in proportion. In trenching, the soil is not to be broken too fine, so as again to set into a solid immediately. In the state recommended, land retains more moisture in dry "weather, and drains better in wet seasons. In dee]) loose soils, where there is no danger of a lodgment of water, trenching is of less consequence than elsewhere. In such soils the trees may be planted by merely o]>ening holes, more or less wide and deep, according to the size of the roots. Unless in a soil naturally very loose and friable, these holes ought to be fivQ or six feet wide, and at least two feet deep. But great care must be taken, where the subsoil is solid and tenacious, to guard against rain-water gathering, and being retained at the bottom of the hole ; a drain led off from the bottom of the hole to a lower surface will effect tills. But if no such means present itself, in a stiff subsoil, let the holes

Mulberry Groves — How To Plant. 287

be wide, rather than deep, giving the roots facility for spreading sideways. After the hole has been opened, the soil should be returned until you are about to plant.

Preparing the Holes and the Plants. — Early planting always succeeds better than later. Do not attempt it when the ground is very wet and heavy, after much rain ; but it should be moist. If the land, however, be very dry, which will sometimes happen at the best season for planting, it will be best to open the holes for the trees the day before you plant ; and, having placed the soil from them in one or two heaps, pour a few gallons of water upon them, having first formed a basin on the top of each heap to receive it. The next day, just before you plant, mix the wetted soil with the dry, both that within the hole and that which was thrown out, by turning it two or three times with the hoe or spade. Plant none but well-rooted vigorous plants. A small or badly-rooted tree rarely flourishes ; at all events, a year or two in growth is sure to be lost, before they come to maturity, by using such plants. Omit no precautions and efforts to get the trees of the best sorts, and take care that they are the sorts you want ; otherwise, when they come to bear, you may find yourself subjected to great disappointment. It is also far better to pay something more for strong healthy trees, where you have good assurance of their being what they are called, than to plant those which cost less at first, and turn out to be anything but what you want. If the plants you intend to use have grown near at hand, have them taken up, if possible, with every root, and preserve the roots from the drying effects of the sun and wind, until you can get them into their destined places. If your plants come from a distance, they will scarcely fail, in this climate, to have suffered more or less during the transit : much, however, may be done to prevent injury by careful packing. It is a good plan to freshen their roots by soaking in water, for several hours, before planting : doing so will also render the roots more pliable, and less likely to break. Their heads also should be well cut back, if it were not done on taking up. The practice is serviceable to greater or less extent, whenever trees are removed in a warm climate.

Planting. — Every hole should be made large enough to receive the roots without cramping or twisting them round. As much of the soil should be returned into each hole as will form a flattened cone in the centre, at such a depth below the edge as will, when the tree is placed upon it, bring its collar (the point where the root and stem join) as nearly as may be level with the surface. If there be much depth of very loose earth under the plant, some allowance must be made for settling. Spread

288 Thb Thbhe Oolohdu Of Au8Tbalia.

the roots out by hand, very carefully, all round upon the surface of the cone ; if you have it, scatter two or three spadefuls of well-decomposed manure, lightly, just over the roots ; it will greatly promote the formation of young fibres. But do not give more than this small quantity, unless in planting orange-trees : it does harm in too great profusion. Add the remainder of the soil, not throwing it in roughly, but as lightly as it can be placed, care being taken to hold the stem in an upright position whilst the hole is being filled up, and to lift it up once or twice during the operation to bed the roots thoroughly in the loose soiL If you have water at hand do not, according to common practice, press the soil down with the feet ; but form the surface into a small basin of twothirds the diameter of the hole, and laying in all round the stem a quantity of rushes or hay, of thickness sufficient to break the force of the water, pour in four, six, or eight buckets of water, according to the dryness of the soil and the extent of the roots. The more rapidly the quantities of water succeed each other the better; the quantity itself must be determined by the state of the soil ; if it be in a moist state naturally, the action of a very small quantity of water will sufficiently settle it down ; otherwise a larger quantity must be used, as it is desirable to have the whole of the soil moistened at once. Repeated waterings are to be avoided, and rain may come not sufficiently early. Well watered in this way at once, the tree may endure a drought of months' duration without injury. A few hours after planting, or, at all events, before the wetted surface begins to dry, throw some dry earth over it to prevent the watered surface from caking and cracking into fissures ; and, at a convenient opportunity, level the surface around the stem, observing that, in a climate subject to drought, it is not advisable to leave the ground about the stem of the tree higher than it is around, but if anything the reverse. The best season for planting deciduous trees is as soon as possible after the fall of the leaf. Evergreens, such as the orange and loquat, succeed best by being planted in early spring or in autumn ; in either case it is a prudent precaution to cut them well back when they are taken up, and to remove almost all their leaves, especially if they are to be convoyed far. An evergreen tree planted in this climate, with its branches and leaves entire, runs a great risk of perisliing before the roots can strike sufficiently to support it. If you could be sure that the air would continue for some time saturated with moisture, the removal of any large portion of the leaves would be improper ; so long as the leaves can absorb moisture from the atmosphere they will continue fresh, and contribute to the early growth of the root. But in the climate of Australia the atmosphere may, at the

Vegetable Productions In Australia. 289

time of transplanting, be loaded with moisture, and in a day or two be in a state of dryness unknown in England. The system of leaves then becomes positively injurious, the moisture from the stem and roots being exhausted to supply the loss from such an extent of evaporating surface; whilst the leaves themselves wither, leaving the plant in a worse condition than it would have been in had they been removed with the greater part of the young shoots at the time of taking up. The only exception is in the case of resinous cone-bearing trees. In planting out evergreens or other plants from pots, which may be done with success at almost any season, there is another danger to be guarded against. A plant growing in a pot has almost always a very considerable quantity of roots in proportion to the soil it occupies. In dry weather this little mass of earth will become so dry by the mere absorption of the plant alone as to require being well moistened every day ; if the watering be neglected for a single day, the soil becomes so dry that the water refuses to penetrate. The surface may look moist after a watering, but yet the water may have escaped by the sides and bottom of the pot, without having reached more than a very little way into the body of earth.

List of Vegetable Productions Flourishing in Australian Climate.

Almonds flourish remarkably in Australia, ripening in February.

Apples, in all the cooler parts of the colony.

Apricot-tree, chiefly as a standard, produces abundantly everywhere.

Asparagus grows well on all soils.

Artichokes grow very large, and of very fine flavour.

Banana, on the seacoast; flourishes at Port Stephen, but requires a sheltered situation.

Beans, beet, broccoli, all grow more luxuriantly than in England.

Celery and cucumber; these two vegetables flourish anywhere throughout the colony, the most arid districts excepted. The latter is often sown between the rows of maize.

Cherry, chestnut, currant ; the two former succeed best ; the latter runs too much to wood, except on high grounds.

Cotton flourishes highly under cultivation. A wild species is found growing very luxuriantly in some parts : will not pay as produce.

Cabbages grow well throughout the colony, and are found very hardy.

Carrots, suited to the climate, but not so productive.

Figs grow throughout the colony, with no further attention than that of planting, producing two crops per year. The fruit is of the

290 The Thbbb Colonies Of Australia.

finest flavour, abundant in quantity, and presses well. It is expected to become an article of export.

Gooseberries grow, but not encouragingly, except cm the higher grounds.

Grapes, of every variety, are now produced in great plenty; and wine and brandy are becoming valuable exports, 150,000 gallons having been sent out in 1851.

Herbs ; the common culinary herbs grow well ; so also does watercress in the proper situations, together with garden-cress, lettuce, Ac

Hop : this plant is now growing with a rapidity and luxuriance unknown in Europe ; the flavour is excellent ; the latest accounts from Ulawara speak of its success on the brush lands of that district in the highest terms.

Loquats flourish well in gardens.

Lemons flourish remarkably, either as hedgerow bushes or standards. They have long been a very common tree in the colony : some orchards have even become worn out for some years, through neglect, after having arrived at perfection.

Mulberries are now becoming a most important article of plantation produce, as will be noticed in connection with silk. It is found that the tree flourishes everywhere throughout the colony.

Melons ; this rich fruit is produced in the greatest abundance, even in the hottest parts, with no further attention than that of depositing the seeds in the ground under the open sky. Melons sometimes reach 20 lbs. and 24 lbs. in weight, and sell at from 6d. to 2s. each. About the more populous and long-settled districts their price is smallest, for scarcely any little cultivator neglects to throw in a few clusters of seed amongst his corn.

Mushrooms plentiful in South Australia; not so much so in the elder colony. The traveller, however, is sometimes surprised by coming on a damp morning upon some solitary spot, especially where horses frequent, and finding thousands, in their various stages, rising before him.

Maize and millet flourish luxuriantly in all ordinary seasons. There is generally a double crop to be brought in by the settler. The " for'ard corn," as it is called, is planted early, on land especially devoted to it for the year ; the " late corn," or " stubble corn," as it is also called, is maize planted, after the wheat is reaped, amidst its stubble, sometimes without even burning the stubble. A single furrow is struck with the plough, or a single hole made with the hoe, and the seed just cast in and covered up. The stubble crop is of course not so good as the crop of " for'ard corn."

Plants That Flourish In Australia. 291

Olive grows in all the milder districts. It is considered to be a tree of great promise. The attention of the colonists has lately been turned to the commercial value of the tree for the sake of its oil.

Orange ; near Paramatta there are some very valuable plantations, furnishing large quantities of fruit to the Sydney market. An original owner and planter (a Mr. Mobbs) is said to have made a very considerable fortune from fruit in the course of a few years.

Onions grow very well wherever the ground affords an average quantity of moisture. About the Hawkesbury, and in Illawarra and the Curryjong, some splendid beds are often to be met with ; as also at Bathurst, and in various parts of the new country.

Peas grow freely and produce abundantly throughout the colony.

Peach, chiefly met with as a standard. Its yield is immense ; so also is the comparative size of the fruit. The little settlers make intoxicating liquors (cider, brandy) from the produce of their peach-orchards ; many bring home whole drayloads together of the ripe windfalls to feed their pigs.

Potatoes grow freely throughout the colony ; but not so well in the middle and northern districts as they do in the southern and interior. The Hawkesbury, Bathurst, Argyle, Illawarra produce this vegetable in perfection ; and the potato disease, which has made such havoc elsewhere, is unknown.

Pineapples, pomegranates, plantains, pears, plums, all flourish in various localities : parsnips grow well enough in the less arid soils.

Quince is met with flourishing wherever it has been planted ; but that is by no means extensively.

Rhubarb grows to an enormous size in the parts suitable to it.

Radishes, ditto.

Raspberries, on the hilly southern districts, are produced freely.

Strawberries, ditto.

Spinach, seakale, sweet potatoes, grow well on the soils and in the situations suitable to them.

Tobacco grows very well throughout the colony. It is a plant which requires, however, good soil and a sufficiency of moisture, as well as a tolerably genial climate. All the seacoast brushes, and all the interior alluvial soil on the river-banks, and the sides of the mountains where brushes originally grew, are most suitable.

Turnip ; abundant during winter and spring in favourable situations, but very little cultivated. No field cultivation.

Walnut ; but lately introduced ; growing luxuriantly, but does not appear suited for all localities.

292 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

. Wheat ; no finer wheat is grown in the world than some produced in Australia : samples shown at Mark-lane lately have been pronounced equal to any ever seen. Generally it is very good. It is a grain, however, which requires to be looked after to save it from the attacks of insects after ripening.

Yams ; this very fine and productive vegetable requires good soil, but is well worth any such charge upon the cultivator's means and care.

Tools and Implements for a New Farm.

Common Australian falling-axe (forged only in the colony). — Mem : If the settler mean to work himself, with one labourer, he will need, of course, two axes ; if with two labourers, three axes, and so on. They must be hated and ground in the settlement. Heavy poll on at least one ; each handle of different length ; each axeman will find out his own.

Morticing axe ; two rather than one in all cases, for they are very apt to get spoiled.

Auger, £ inch, 1 inch, 1£ inch.

Cross-cut saw, 6 feet plate at least ; 7 feet better. Square teeth.

Files for ditto, at least half a dozen ; and saw set.

Maul, or, as termed in some parts of England, beetle. The rings will be forget! by the smith at the settlement ; the labourer must be able to put them on. Each man that works at splitting requires a maul. A few small iron wedges : make the blacksmith jag the edges so that, once in the wood, they will not come out again.

Set of splitting wedges. Generally, half a dozen go to one set. Only one set is required.

Broad axe.

Adze. — Mem. All tools that require grinding may be ground at the settlement.

Spades for digging post holes — a peculiar sort ; to be purchased at the company's stores. Also common spades.

Spud and pick ; to be procured from blacksmith.

Hoes. These also are a purely colonial article, 12 inches in the blade, strongly supported on the back, and with thoroughly substantial eye. The smallest settler should have at least four.

With these tools and implements a crop may be got in ; without them, not, unless in a very blundering makeshift manner.

The larger settler will require all the above ; he will also require many more, but how many, and what, will depend entirely on the extent of his operations.

Purchase Of Land. 293

Furnishing a Bush Hut,

The following are what a bachelor shepherd has to make shift with: —

Bedding, which he must find himself. A hide stretched loosely over four posts driven in the ground makes an excellent bed, or couch.

Iron pots for meat. Cask for salting meat.

Tin quart pots for tea. Tables and stools, home made.

Fryingpan. Backets, at least a couple.

Tin dishes. patches, or tinder-box, flint, and

Knives — pocket are generally used. steel.

Stores for Farm,

Flour or wheat. The wheat involves a steel mill and sieves. Meat, either salted and conveyed to the farm, or purchased standing and slaughtered.

Tea. Sugar. Tobacco.

Coffee. Salt. Soap.

All these are indispensable, and required for the weekly rations of men. Each settler must adapt his further stock of stores to his circumstances. Large settlers will require slop clothing for their men ; little settlers will not. As a rule, do not ask the shopkeeper himself what goods you ought to give him an order for.

Chapter Xxi.

HOW TO BUT OR LEASE LAND FROM THE CROWN— SHEEP RUNS— THE SHEPHERD'S LIFE— HUT KEEPER— LAMBING— SHEEP WASHING— SHEARING— PURCHASE OF SHEEP— DISEASES OF SHEEP— CATTLE AND BULLOCK TEAMS— DAIRY— STOCK- MEN— BRANDING CATTLE— HORSE BREEDING— RIDING IN AUSTRALIA.

LAND in New South Wales and Victoria (Port Phillip), and South Australia, is divided into town, suburban, and country lots, and sold by auction. Country land is put up at a minimum price of £1 an acre, and, after having been once submitted to competition, may be sold by private contract at the minimum price. The lots of country land "were formerly large — seldom less than 640 acres, except in South Australia, where they were 80 acres ; but in 1851 instructions were sent out from the Colonial Office to survey and sell small lots of 30 and 50 acres in New South Wales. This order, so contrary to the previous policy of the home government, was brought about by the

294 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

almost total cessation of country sales, and the necessity of making some attempt to fix the colonists to the soil.

In New South Wales, and in Victoria, special surveys of twenty thousand acres may be obtained, at the fixed price of £20,000, without competition ; and such an investment gives the purchaser a pre-emptive right and the privileges of pasture over 40,000 acres more. This system of special surveys, which is in every respect most mischievous, has been abolished in South Australia ever since the discovery of the Burra copper-mine, and it may be expected that the gold discoveries will lead to its suspension in the elder colonies.

In New South Wales and Victoria there is also a system of government reserves, which are a fruitful source of jobbery and discontent.

The intending land purchaser is continually told after selecting an eligible location — " that is, a government reserve ;" and a government reserve it continues, until some favoured purchaser, well recommended from the home government, or otherwise, appears.

For instance, for many years, within ten miles of Melbourne, in the midst of land sold there remained two very eligible lots of fine agricultural land, of about 1,300 acres.

In 1849 the King of Prussia sent out two parties of German emigrants, well recommended to the governor, Mr. Latrobe ; the representative of the Kins: of Prussia, armed with a letter from Earl Grev. was permitted to search the archives of the surveyor-general's office, and select, at the minimum price of £1 an acre, the two reserves which had been improved in value by the labour of unpatronized colonists. In the very same year applications from associations of English mechanics to buy land in Port Phillip in block were contemptuously rejected.

But the whole system of land sales will no doubt shortly come under the revision of the representative assemblies of Australia, and important alterations may be anticipated, as colonists take a very different view of the question of colonial land from colonial ministers, who are also English landlords, owning land which has been cultivated for nigh one thousand years.

Squatters* runs beyond the proclaimed districts may be leased for fourteen years ; within those districts they are held from year to year.

Sheep Runs.

The original rent for a run estimated to feed 4,000 sheep, or 640 cattle, is not less than £10, and £2 10s. per annum for every additional 1,000 sheep it will carry over 4,000, and also an annual poll-tax of Id. for every lamb, 3d. for every beast, and 6d. for every horse : calves,

Sheep And Shepherds. 295

foals, and lambs not counted until six months old. The value of a run is fixed by arbitration between the crown and the lessee.

During the continuance of the lease no part of the run can be sold to any other than the lessee, and he may purchase during its continuance any portion not less than 160 acres, at £1 an acre.

This is the law ; but technical difficulties of detail have prevented any considerable number of leases from being granted. With such a lease of a good run, including some good agricultural land, a settler might build a comfortable house, fence in the alluvial flats for grain and gardens, improve and feed stock for thirteen years and ten months, and at the end of that time purchase one or more of the choicest lots, which may, by improvements and advance of population, be worth double the fixed price, while the capital laid out on live stock for that period will have paid much better than if originally invested on land.

Practically there are no runs to be obtained on these terms by a newly-arrived colonist ; all the available land in the three colonies has been occupied, except in districts so distant from a seaport that it will not pay to bring down wool from them. Therefore the intending squatter must buy a run with his sheep or cattle ; that is, pay a sum of money for tenant right. This proceeding is not recognised by the law of the colony, but it is permitted. It is arranged by an enhanced price for the stock on the run.

Squatters venture to erect buildings and make improvements to the

extent of many thousand pounds, as well as give large sums for leave to

occupy tracts of country under the crown, as tenants at will, at an

annual rent.

The Shepherd.

Any man can make a shepherd who can be content edith a life in a desert far from towns and shops, and with no other companions than his wife, his children, his fellow-shepherd, and his family, for two flocks are hurdled near together every night, although they are driven in opposite directions in the day. A flock numbers from five hundred to eight hundred, according as the country is more or less open.

The shepherd should have quick eyes and sharp hearing : he rises just before sunrise, puts his quart pot on the fire, or his wife does, fries some beef or mutton, and makes a breakfast that would be a capital dinner for most agricultural labourers, and after lighting his pipe sallies forth with his dog to let the sheep out of the fold.

He follows the sheep all day, just keeping them in sight and no more, letting them go wherever they please, except into thick scrubs. When they try to go into these places, he heads them back by walking

296 The Three Colonies Of Au8Tralia.

round them ; or if they are old sheep he whistles shrilly, and they face round like soldiers, but if they are lambs he has to send his dog, who very soon rounds them all up on the open groundfc

About noon time he heads them toward water, where the sheep, for nearly nine months in the year after drinking, camp ; that is to say, lie still in the shade, with their heads turned toward one another, chewing the cud. As evening closes in he turns his flock toward home, so as to arrive at the hut just as the sun dips the horizon. Many sheep turn home of themselves at the proper hour. He will generally have one of his children with him, if any are old enough ; the rest will run out to meet him, and he will see from afar off the light and smoke of the fire cooking his supper, — a welcome sight.

If the weather is fine and dry the sheep are put within hurdles, which should be shifted to a clean dry spot every other day ; if it is wet weather they are generally camped out, and watched on the slope of a hill, with a fire above them, toward which they will all draw.

As soon as sheep get into the fold they lie down and chew the cud, never getting up till morning unless disturbed.

If the shepherd has a hutkeeper, or a son, or son-in-law, able to watch the sheep, his work is done for the day, and he can look after his garden, or otherwise amuse himself.

His supper should be a good roast leg of mutton, with a Yorkshire pudding under it, tea, damper, pumpkins, potatoes, onions, cucumbers, and water melons, which every shepherd will have in his own garden if he is not a lazy fellow. If the night is fine, and the dogs good, no special watching will be needed until near midnight, when a watchman must take his seat in his box beside the sheep, where he often falls asleep with his pipe in his mouth. But if it be a windy, rainy night he must keep walking round with a wooden mallet in his hand, to see that the hurdles are firm and not blown down, and to set the dogs on any rascally dingoe that may be prowling about.

Every other morning the hurdles should be shifted, which takes about two hours : any country girl could do it.

The shepherd generally counts his flock once a week, not oftener, if he has confidence that they are all right, as the operation knocks them alxmt and disturbs them. As long as the shepherd does not count them he is answerable for all losses, unless he reports them, and shows (before a magistrate) that the loss was unavoidable — as that it arose from native dogs rustling them, &c.

Married shepherds whose wives act as hutkeepers will generally contrive to take a long sleep at noon, and have the sheep watched by

Native Dog.

some part of their family, so as to be able to do the night work in turns with the other shepherd. By such arrangement a wife gets wages and rations for cooking for her own husband.

The curse of floclcowners and shepherds is the native dog, an animal in form and colour much resembling a gigantic fox, but partaking more of the wolfish development. This creature, although so cowardly that it flies even from the sheep when first they are driven into a new district untrodden by white men, inflicts fearful ravages on flocks, as well as the young of cattle and horses.

It will rush through a flock while the shepherd has neglectfully fallen asleep, or wandered from his duty, biting right and left, inflict fatal wounds, and drive others into thickets from which many arc never recovered.

If the folds round which these creatures constantly prowl are not carefully watched by men or dogs, they will endeavour to penetrate or gnaw through the hurdles : fortunately they rarely attempt to overleap them.

It is the business of a hutkeeper to watch the sheep at night ; but, where one of the wives acts as the hutkeeper, the shepherds must arrange for the watching between them.

While following the sheep the shepherd can amuse himself with

r w v

298 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

hunting kangaroo rats, and other small game; or shooting parrots, pigeons, or quails — all excellent eating, or opossums, which none but blacks can eat, yet valuable for their skins.

It will be seen from this uncoloured picture of a shepherd's life that the monotony and solitude may well be endured by any working man with a family for a few years, because it affords a good income, with no hard work, and the means of accumulating a capital which will enable an industrious man to embark in some more agreeable occupation on his own account. Clothes will cost very little ; and if he can make boots, or his wife shirts or trousers, a good sale will be found among the bush servants within twenty miles.

The best sheep land is generally barren of all but grass and gumtrees, but a spot for a garden can always be found. In India, with a rope of green hide passed over the fork of a tree, bullock's skin sewed into a bag, and an old bullock to work it which would not be worth 20s. in the bush of Australia, the Hindoo peasant contrives to raise water from pools, and obtain magnificent crops by a simple plan of irrigation. The same thing might be done at the side of many Australian waterholes.

Lambing is the busiest period for the shepherd, and requires some experience : a new hand should never undertake anything but a dry flock if he can help it. Lambing generally commences and ends in September, the first spring month. A flock of 1,000 ewes is then divided into two parts, — those that have lambed with the ewes and lambs, and those that are going to lamb. The ewes with lamb should be carefully separated every morning, and those that are weakly left about the hut in charge of the hut keeper.

Young maiden ewes are very troublesome : sometimes they will not take to their lambs ; and various modes must be tried, such as rubbing the lamb with salt, placing them both in a pen only just large enough to hold them, and starving the ewe.

Then there are the eagle hawks, which can carry off a lamb a day old in their claws, and the crows, which pick out the lambs' eyes, to be guarded against; beside the prowling, sneaking, native dogs; so that shepherds and hutkeepers have enough to do in September.

The next anxious time is the washing and shearing, which commence about the 15th of October, by which time the lambs are pretty strong.

The contrivances for washing are endless: some make a spout to pour a stream on the sheep's backs; but this is said to injure the animals. Some have even tried warm water ; others have used hundred-

KHEEFWiSHING AND S11EAKINO.

weights of soda to soften the water. A simple but approved method is the following : —

Sheqnoathiiu/ and Shearing. Select, if possible, running water ; run large logs into the bed of a stream or pool, leaving the ends to project like the shafts of a cart, and make three divisions in the water ; erect a pen on the bank large enough to hold the whole flock, with a small pen close to the bank to hold fifty ; out of the fifty the shepherd catches sheep after sheep, and pitches them in until division No. 1 is fall ; when they are well soaked, a man standing in the water passes a sheep's head under the pole to the men in No. 2, where other men begin washing, commencing at the neck, and pressing the wool between their hands in layers all the way down their back, and repeating the operation again and again ; the sheep is then passed to division No. 3, where the overseer or master usually takes them in hand, to see that the work has been perfectly done, for on the completeness of this operation the price of the wool may be affected several pence per pound. After having passed these three divisions each sheep is usually made to swim across to the opposite side of the river, where a shepherd awaits them, and drives them slowly,

300 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

and carefully avoiding all dust, to clean ground. If it is fine weather they will be fit to be shorn four or five days after washing.

Shearing.

Shearing, washing, and pressing are generally performed by men who travel about from station to station looking for employment. These men were formerly employed for the rest of the year in fencing, building, or bullock-driving: the gold-diggings will absorb many of them. At all times shearing commands excellent wages for quick hands; it is paid for by the score. Many a one never clipped a sheep before he landed in the colony. A Port Phillip squatter assures us that some of his best shearers had been London tailors who emigrated after a strike. One man will shear from three to six score in a day.

A catching-pen, commencing with the large pen where the flock is gathered, runs the length of the shearing-shed. Each man seizes a sheep ; but as sheep have so great a variety of fleece that a man can shear two of one sort in the time he can one of another, and as they are paid by the score, there is a great competition to get hold of the best sheep in every pen ; and if there is one with a particularly tough fleece he gets left till the last, every one manoeuvring not to have him.

The fleece having been taken off in one piece, it is picked up by a boy, a black fellow, or a woman, and put upon a wire table, where the master or superintendent stands, shaken, folded, and sorted — fine wether fleeces, ewes, and rams separate. After sorting it is pressed in bales, which average 250 lbs. each.

An excellent screw for pressing wool, invented by — Bigge, Esq., of Moreton Bay, was made by Messrs. Holpzaffell, of Charing-cross.

Shearing-sheds are either temporary bark sheds, put up by men with only one, two, or three thousand sheep, or they are permanent erections of wood or stone. Within the last few years stone wool-sheds have been erected by those whose establishments could bear the expense.

A shed which cost £300 in New South Wales was 80 feet long and 20 feet broad ; the roof of bark ; the sides of slabs let into a grooved sleeper ; 20 feet was closed in, with the exception of door and window, in which the wool was packed and pressed ; the other 00 feet were open all down the eastern side. Opposite the open division were three large and one small yard. Inside this open space were several bins for sorting wool, and two tables made up of bird-cage wire, on which the fleeces were shaken and tied up.

The profit of sheep depends greatly on careful washing, shearing,

Purchase Op Sheep. 301

sorting, pressing, and collecting every scrap of wool, after obtaining the best breeds, the best pastures, and the most careful shepherds. Starting with exactly the same advantages as to capital, sheep, and runs, one man in the same space of time, who attends to every minute detail himself, and knows how to conciliate his men, will make a fortune, and another will be totally ruined.

The change and choice of rams is a very important point to be studied in the country ; but nothing should induce an intending settler, who is going out without knowing where or with whom he will commence sheepfeeding, to invest money in rams, German, French, or Spanish merinos. Thousands of pounds have been lost in this way. Unsuitable animals have been purchased at enormous fancy prices. Deaths on the voyage, and the cost of guarding and keeping the survivors, have often brought up the total cost of a single ram to the value of a large flock. A ram quite good enough for ordinary purposes may be bought for 50s. # in the colony ; and, when a man has raised his flock to twenty thousand ewes, it is quite time enough to think of importing fancy stock.

We speak strongly and decidedly by way of warning, because advice of a directly contrary tendency was issued forth in a handbook which was at one time the oracle of our most fashionable colonizers. The author of the " Handbook to New Zealand" (Mr. E. J. Wakefield) recommends colonists to purchase certain rams, the property of one Count Gersdorf, at £50 each. The recommendation had previously been repeated from the same quarter in various channels connected with New Zealand House, and fleeces of the said rams were hung up as baits for the human sheep who used to be shorn there.

Shortly after the appearance of this handbook, Mr. Bigge, of Morcton Bay, an experienced squatter, an excellent judge of sheep, and a good German scholar, went over to Saxony to buy rams. He purchased a lot from the most eminent breeders, who are as well known there as the Duke of Richmond or Sir John Villiers Shelley as Southdown breeders here. The highest price he gave for a very superior animal for Australian purposes was £20. A dozen capital rams stood him about £12 each, landed in London. As for Count Gersdorf, his name was unknown as a sheepbreeder among the celebrities. So much for the disinterested advice of Mr. Edward Jerningham Wakefield, which, if followed, would as surely ruin individuals as his father's principles have ruined colonies.

Messrs. M' Arthur, of Camden, advertised In November, 1851, picked merino nuns from their flocks (and there are none better) at .30a. and 60s. each, with a discount of £10 per cent, on purchases over £50.

302 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

This same handbook recommends the following outfit, which we quote to warn and protest against such " blind guides" : — " Saddlery, harness, whips, spurs, a pack-saddle or two, cart harness and gig harness, a Durham bull, two Saxony rams and four ewes, two stallions (one blood and one Clydesdale), a terrier, Newfoundland, boarhound, bloodhound, Scotch decrhound, a sheep-dog, iron gates, fences, guards for young trees, double-barrelled gun, holster, pocket pistols, good rifle, sabre, infantry sword, sheath-knife, boar-spears, agricultural implements, turnip-cutter, draining tools and tiles, horse-drill, liquid manure engine, thrashing-machine, cornet-a-piston, cricket apparatus."

With what disgust must the poor dupes who, believing in this handbook and the Wakefield art of colonization, have hastened to realize the dream conjured up by this list of toys and luxuries, muster them up rotting and rusting in the harbour of Lyttelton or the plains of Canterbury? The name of Wakefield attached to colonization prepares us always, and the Canterbury pilgrims now, for a fraud, a delusion, a snare.

We do not imagine that any written directions can teach an emigrant how to manage a sheep-run in Australia, but we have entered into these as into other details in order to afford as perfect a picture as possible of one important phase of an Australian colonist's existence.

Anxious, dull, monotonous, as are the duties of a flockowner, sheep are, after all, the one cash-producing stock of Australia, if shepherds can be had.

But perchance, while these pages are being written, the wealth and glory of the golden fleece of Australia is passing away.

The capitalist squatters — the 100,000, even the 20,000, sheepmen — must be destroyed by the spread of gold discoveries, if they do not exercise more wisdom and less selfishness than they have recently displayed in their advice to the Emigration Commissioners. It will take twenty years of active colonization to bring shepherds' wages to £16, or even £20, with rations.

Perhaps the colony will gain, although individuals will lose, by the destruction of the squatting interest — an " interest" which, containing much of education, high breeding, and enterprise, has also been marked by the selfish disregard of all the rights and interests of other classes which so strongly characterises their relative prototypes, the agricultural Protectionists at home.

Sheep Leases.

It has been suggested that a remedy may be found for the rate of wages and the dearth of shepherds, under the competition of the gold-

Sheep Leases And Stations. 303

diggings, which promises to leave the best flocks to the mercy of the native dogs, the blacks, and the chances of the wilderness, in a system of sheep leases.

A good shepherd, with a family of sons, two or three grown up, and enough money saved to carry him through the year, could afford to pay rent in wool, as shown in the following calculation by the author of " Twelve Years in Australia in 1850," which we do not, however, guarantee; but the principle is right, and may be extensively acted on: —

u Scheme of Lease. — Two thousand sheep of the best class are worth £500. A proprietor might lease them to a competent shepherd with a large family of boys, and take a mortgage over them under the special colonial law. The father would act as watchman, and his sons as shepherds ; so he would hare nothing to pay for labour, and would be able to keep his boys and girls all at home. He would grow his own wheat, and would have nothing to pay except for tea, sugar, extra expenses for shearing, and carriage down to port. At lOd. per pound, the wool would be worth £166 13s. 4d. The shepherd could take the increase, and afford to pay £100 a year, which would be 20 per cent., and undertake to deliver the same number of sound ewes at the end of the time agreed.

" Of course, this is an arrangement which could only be entered into where there was a certain degree of previous confidence between the parties."

Our young colonist must not follow the example of a very dashing

gentleman, who brought letters to the governor and all the notables,

at the end of a month of fetes and feastings bought ten thousand

sheep, and when he had paid for them discovered that he had forgotten,

under the advice of the merchant whose sheep (mortgaged) he bought,

to secure a run for them ; so the sheep soon ate their heads off. This

is one example of the bargains to be had at the tables of Australian

merchants.

Sheep Station.

A good sheep station includes a superintendent's hut and a store, a detached kitchen, men's huts, & wool-shed, with wool-press and yards; a milk-yard, milking-pail, and gallows for slaughtering bullocks ; woolpress, horse paddock ; a paddock for wheat, maize, oaten hay, potatoes, and other vegetables ; a barn, corn and horse sheds, and steel mills, one or more.

The store contains not only the provisions, such as flour, tea, sugar, &c., for six or twelve months, but slop clothing and other necessaries, for sale to the men.

We do not venture to give the cost of these bush improvements because, the materials being on the ground growing, the cost will depend on the rate of wages at the time, and the distance the timber has to be drawn.

304 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

They may either be executed by contract, or by men hired at wages. The master will save by taking a turn himself at the work; but, without harshness or haughtiness, it is necessary to keep bush servants, especially old hands, at a certain distance, especially in leisure hours. It does not do to drink with your men, or to treat them, unless on a journey.

The Scab.

The prevention of scab and the extirpation of scab in the native dog, almost entirely occupied the attention of the first Legislative Councils of New South Wales. The first is a scourge which has ruined hundreds, perhaps thousands. It is virulently infectious, and may be transmitted, not only by actual contact, but by clean sheep passing over ground where an infected flock has passed. For this reason, sheep once sent to a large town should never be allowed to return to their old run, but sold at any sacrifice ; for in going they must pass over the scabs of so many foul sheep sent to be boiled down that they are not to be trusted. Once infected, and the character of the flock is gone : no one will purchase your ewes or rams, however fine the breed.

The master sees the sheep scratching, but will not allow himself to believe that the fatal curse has fallen upon his property. If he takes the trouble to examine the part affected, ten to one he pronounces it to be grass-seed, which much resembles incipient scab. Pooh! pooh !" he exclaims, "these sheep never were diseased; it is impossible!*' although the careless, sleepy, or revengeful shepherd has allowed the sheep to pass over foul ground. But very soon the ulcer comes out, so that there is no mistake ; and the question is, whether to fatten and boil down the rest, or try to cure them.

The following recipe cured a large flock which had been given up as hopeless, but the application required the constant attention of the overseer : —

First make a table of some stout old bark, raised a little at the upper end ; then make a hut in the following manner. Make a wooden frame three long and two feet wide, drive four legs into the ground of the same dimensions, nail the frame to them ; then take a wet bullock's hide, place it over the frame, and press it down until it touches the ground ; nail the hide to the frame, cut off the superfluous pieces round the edges, and you have a capital waterproof tub, if there are no holes in the hide.

Fill an iron pot of sixteen or thirty-two gallons with water, put it on the fire and for every gallon, throw in an ounce of arsenic: boil, and stir with a long stick for twenty minutes.

Diseases Of Sheep. 305

At the end of that time it is fit for use as soon as cool. The sheep must be carefully but not over shorn. Seize one, turn him on his rump, tie three of his legs, then dip him up to his ears in the tub, keep him in a few seconds until he is thoroughly wet, then let two men whip him on the table close at hand, and with a couple of horsebrushes, dipped in the tub and soft soap, rub him gently, but thoroughly all over.

Two men, with a third to attend to the pot, catch, and tie well, will dress about one hundred a day in this manner.

As soon as the sheep are dressed they ought to be placed on a clean run, four or five miles from the shed where they were dressed. If these directions are carried out to the letter they will be attended with perfect success, but not if the flock are kept on the infected run until all are dressed ; it will probably fail. If the weather is fine, and there is no rain, you will not lose above five per cent. ; but some will die in the tub. You must not scarify them at all, or they will be certain to die.

For lambs which are only slightly infected three quarters of an ounce of corrosive sublimate to the gallon of water is sufficient.

But, after all, the cheapest way is to make them fat and boil them down, for on a good run scabby sheep get as fat as clean ones.

The foot rot, and also the catarrh, may often be stopped and cured by changing the run. No man can tell what will make a good sheep run by mere sight : there are districts which appeared admirable when first discovered, but which on trial proved productive of catarrh, of foot rot, and even poisonous, although no poison plant could be detected.

The scab may also be detected in sheep after they have been shorn, if they are fed on green grass.

Before purchasing a run it is advisable to ascertain from old hands, who must be conciliated, whether there is water in dry seasons, taking in at least seven years, and whether any, and what, proportion is flooded.

Buy sheep at three and four years old, not a day older, according to the marks ; a sheep is four until five ; ewes with lambs at their side are sure not to be barren ; but with ewes buy as many wethers as will serve for your own eating for two years ; so you will save the expense, the trouble, and the risk of disease, of buying them from your neighbour. Pay a competent and safe person to examine and mouth every sheep, and see he does it. See that — 1, their udders are sound ; 2, no ruptures ; 3, no foot rot ; 4, eyes bright and clear, not yellow or inflamed ; 5, not too many black faces, ears, and legs. A few black sheep are useful, as marks to count by.

306 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

When satisfied, march away at onoe ; by no means stop tbe night ; you might lose one or two if the seller's shepherd wanted any to make up his number. Ten miles is a full day's journey, half starting at daylight before breakfast. Let them camp during the heat of the day, as they will have been feeding as they came along, and finish the journey by sunset. Drive the rams before the ewes, and make a bushyard to keep them in at night.

In choosing a run avoid a sandy country. Plant your huts on the northern or eastern side of the range, which will give the advantage of the morning sun for drying the folding-ground. In a hilly country the low grounds will be found the colder in winter; therefore the folds should not be pitched there. Catarrh has been attributed to folding, with show of reason, in winter, on low ground, near water.

In travelling never hurry sheep, especially with lambs at their sides. If you should have bought ewes in lamb, and they should begin to drop whilst on the road, you must stop (about six weeks) till the lambing is over. A lamb three days old can travel as well as the mother.

Cattle and Bullock Teams.

The colonist may have to purchase a bullock dray and team to convey his family and goods immediately after landing. Horse-teams answer best where roads have been made ; but in travelling over a wild country a bullock -team will draw up almost perpendicular ascents, and, in descending into creeks or gullies, drag a load out of depth where a horse would fall and break his back.

For such work a two-wheeled pole-dray is best ; yokes, bows, and chains, all capable of being made or replaced by a bush blacksmith, answer best ; on roads the shaft dray is often preferred to the pole.

A dray complete with harness and eight bullocks used to cost from £16 to £30.

But before purchasing a dray a good bullock-driver must be engaged — as rare an article as an honest competent groom in England. In capacity there are none equal to " old hands," men who have been prisoners in the old times ; they understand the bullocks and the bullocks understand them ; each bullock answers to his name, and the bullock-driver, wielding a long and formidable whip, will make them drag a heavy load over an apparently inaccessible range. Some of these men, although rude in appearance and coarse in speech, arc honest as the day, and, if properly treated, thoroughly to be relied on. At any rate a good bullock-driver is a treasure. He will examine the dray, unless you have given a wheelwright 5s. to pass his eye

The Return Of The Drat. 307

Over it, and sect that the wheels and boxes are all right ; and he will also select a team of bullocks that will all work together. Some persons have been in a fix from buying all near or all offside bullocks ; and although a good bullock-driver will make them work, if not veryold and obstinate, it is much better to see them yoked first, and drawing comfortably together.

The bullock team and dray form one of the peculiar features of Australian bush life, whether descending to the port with wool, or returning with stores.

The return of the dray is a great event in the bush, especially when the dray has carried to market the first load of the frugal settler, who, after a certain probation as servant, has emerged from the condition of servitude to be his own master and a freeholder.

Sugar, perhaps, has been long exhausted, and so have pepper and mustard; the bottom of the tea-chest can be seen, and the salt -bin is almost empty ; purchased flour may have been superseded by homegrown wheat or maize ; but the family are almost in tatters. At length, when for many days the one universal answer to the children has been, " Yes, you shall have it when the dray comes back," just as the sun is getting low, far off through the clear atmosphere, the panting longhorned heads of Blackbird and Bluebeard appearing over the crown of the dividing range, close followed by Boldface and Picball, and all the rest, the young ones set off with a scream to meet father, and soon the long procession draws up before the hut, and the happy owner forgets his weary hot days of journeying in the pleasure of unpacking his treasures, " the sweeter because paid for by the produce of his own frugal labour."

" There is the tea-chests and the sugar, and a bonnet and a shawl, and a piece of gay cotton to make gowns and dresses, jackets for the boys, and a gun, to the surprise of his wife, for ' blessed if he don't mean to have a shot at the game laws hisself !'"

With a good dray, properly loaded, and a tent, a new colonist, with even a large family, need not be afraid of " bushing it w at a pinch. He should on no account allow any spirits to be taken on the dray. As Job Thorley says, " Mister Teetotal is good at sea and in the bush."

A person in a small way should have a written engagement with his bullock-driver, not only to drive, but to make himself generally useful, and help to put up any necessary buildings, yards, hurdles, &c.

The timber of Australia is so different from that of Europe that English workmen are very helpless until instructed by bush hands.

T

308 The Three C0L0Nie8 Of Australia.

The first South Australian colonists could not even pot up a fence until the ovcrlandors and Tasmanians taught them how.

To know if timber will split well, cut off a piece of bark of about three inches square ; if the grain runs in straight lines, or is very curly, it will generally split well, but if it runs zigzaggy it will not.

In taking an exploring journey on horseback through the bush, which every intending colonist should make if he can spare the time and money, the services of a good bush servant, such as a stockman, are almost indispensable. He can find the horses in the morning after they have been hobbled out to feed, and will understand the meaning of such a direction as this : " Go straight ahead, right aback of this hut, over that there ridge ; when you get over the ridge, follow the gully until you come to an iron bark range ; keep at the foot of the range till you see a plain ; cross the plain, and then you'll see to the creek ; follow it down, and you'll come to the old soldier's hut."

Such a chart would often save a man twenty or thirty miles, but no man but a bush man could travel without a compass by the sun. A bushman has a kind of instinctive knowledge of what is the right way, and as soon as he gets on a creek he knows pretty well, by certain local signs, which way to look for a hut.

Cattle and Dairy.

There are a number of points requiring careful consideration before deciding on purchasing a cattle-run, which it is impossible to explain in any written treatise ; but it will be well to notice one or two, in order to protect the young capitalist from the after-dinner seductions, in the way of tremendous bargains, which lurk round the hospitable table of Australian merchants, and to show why we so earnestly recommend a preliminary probation of at least twelve months, spent in the service of a squatter, or in travelling through the bush, before becoming a stockowner.

In the first place, the intending purchaser should ascertain whether the " run," supposing the situation as regards markets convenient and sufficiently supplied with grass and water at all seasons, will make cattle fat. There are runs which might do very well for sheep, or which, at one time of the year, are covered with very fair pasture, but which will never fatten an ox ; and, as the cliicf and lasting profit rests on the tallow of a herd, that would be an essential question, of the fact that in Australia lean cattle are worth next to nothing.

Secondly, whether runs have any natural boundaries, because a share of pasture in open plains, where neither "rivers, nor marshes, nor

Cattle And Stockmen. 309

rocky impassable ranges form natural fences, will put the owner to a great deal of extra expense, and deteriorate the value of his cattle, by rendering it extremely difficult for him to collect or muster them, unless with a great number of servants.

A run becomes of much greater value when it is so fenced in that the cattle can be easily driven into corners and handled. The more frequently they are handled the more tame they will be.

Thirdly, the character of the cattle should be inquired into. Thousands of cattle constantly pass under the hammer of the auctioneer in the chief towns of Australia that have never been mustered all together within the memory of man. They are sold without warranty, to be collected by the purchaser at his own risk. The greater number can be got in just as soon and as easily as a herd of Highland red deer.

Bargains of all kinds are especially to be avoided by the new comer in Australia, for cattle bargains are nearly as dangerous as sheep.

Cattle are less profitable than sheep, the returns come in more slowly, and the increase is less rapid ; but with a good breed on a good run the returns are more certain, and the anxieties much less : they are not subject to so many diseases, the calves suffer less from the ravages of the native dog and eagle hawk, and a few horsemen are able to look after a great number. A thousand head may be managed by two or three young men. The owner, with his sons, may and should, unless rich enough to keep an overseer, take an active part himself. The chief wealth of cattle at present is their tallow ; gold digging has given a value to beef in certain regions.

Strange cattle purchased and brought upon a run must be followed, or colonially tailed, by two or more men on horseback for six months.

The pursuits of an Australian stockman carry one back to Scythian times, or Tartar countries, except that he dwells in a wooden hut instead of a tent. But he lives on horseback, and all his hopes and ambitions are centred in cattle. He neither ploughs nor sows, and despises those who do ; his food is beef, and his pride is in his horse ; above all, he scorns a "crawling shepherd."

These horsemen or stockmen equal in their feats Arabs, Hungarians, Persians, Tartars, or South American guachos. Their horses, trained to the work, turn on either hind or fore feet, halt at full speed, leap cracks in the earth and fallen trees, ascend and descend steep rocky hills in a most extraordinary manner.

Armed with whips peculiar to the colony, composed of a crop or handle of about eighteen inches, and a lash like that of a hunting-

T 2

310 The Three Colo-Vies Of Australia.

whip, but nearly twice as long and heavy, the stockman rides round the strange cattle all day, at such a distance as not to disturb them, but keeping them in sight, and to prevent any unruly individual from straying away back to their old quarters ; for cattle have very extraordinary local attachment, and liave beei known to head back forty, fifty, and even two hundred miles.

At sundown the cattle must be driven into the stockvard for the night.

After a certain period has elapsed, horned stock may be allowed to run alone, both day and night ; but the careful stockman, for the first year or two, musters them daily on what is called the camping-ground.

The camp is usually a place shaded with trees, near water, to which a certain number of the cattle resort daily during the heat of the day, to rest and chew the cud. Camps are also formed by the propensity cattle have to assemble round a dead calf, or any other dead body. Every herd has a certain number of camps to which leaders of the cattle adhere, so that an experienced stockman always knows to what "camp* to look for particular beasts. On first settling on a run, it is advisable to ride round at noon and drive in and flog severely any beasts found out of camp. By steadily pursuing this system the whole herd are taught to rush into camp the moment the stockman cracks his whip, so that ho is always able to muster any particular lot.

Careless stockowners who neglect these rules lose many head, and have to waste much time and horseflesh in chasing those they want to sell or kill.

Toward evening as the sun goes oft' the cattle feed away in " mobs" of fifty or one hundred in summer, and eight or ten in winter, the same lot always keeping together.

Branding Cattle.

Once a year a grand muster takes place for the purpose of branding and castrating the young calves and colts, and ascertaining how the stock stands as to condition and number. This used to be the great event of the year on many stations.

" You invite all your neighbours within thirty or forty miles. They generally assemble the night before with their horses and dogs. Yon provide shakedowns, kill a heifer or two for fresh meat, and set an unlimited quantity of tea before them. No grog — that is too dear in the bush, beside other reasons on the score of temperance. Jolly circles are formed, all smoking short black dodeens round the fires, drinking

The bnnhman, brother of the author.

Driving Cattle To Camp. 311

tea, telling tales of cattle (not sheep, all stockmen abhor the name) and bushrangers. At daybreak, after a most substantial breakfast, the horses being got up and saddled, the whole party, often twenty or thirty horsemen and about one hundred dogs, start into the bush. All the cattle they can find are driven into the camping-ground by twelve o'clock. In a good season (if the herd is quiet), when feed is plentiful, every head will be swept off the run by that hour ; but when cattle are wild and grass scarce they must be got in by degrees, some of the party tailing them all the time ; and this will occasionally occupy weeks.

" All the cattle being on the camp, the tug of war commences. They resist being driven into the yard, knowing, by experience, how they are knocked about when they get there. The horsemen ride at them with their formidable stockwhips, the dogs bite their heels and hang on to their tails, and, what with the bellowing, barking, holloing, and swearing, the riot may be heard miles off by any stray traveller riding over the silent plains and through the open forests. Every now and then a beast or calf bursts out of the herd, and tries to head back to the bush. One or two horsemen are after them as quick as thought ; their dogs follow. Many bullocks are so quick in this country that if they get a little start it will take a good horseman to overtake them. The men ride like madmen, taking the fallen logs and great creeks in the ground in their stride ; their hats off, hanging by the string on their backs; their long hair and beards strewn on their shoulders, mixed with the gaudy fluttering handkerchiefs, in which a stockman delights.

" As soon as the beast is pressed, he doubles sharp like a hare, but a good stockman and a good stockhorse doubles just as quick round like a top. Some horses seem to spin at will on their hind or fore legs, like the loose leg of a compass round the fixed one. Crack goes the horseman's whip, as loud as a pocket pistol, drawing blood at every stroke. The beast doubles and doubles again, never turning until the horse is close alongside. Wild cattle will often gore a horse in these encounters. I knew a man who had two horses killed under him in this way by Blackman's cattle, near the Barwen. At last, tired out, the bullock is glad to make the best of his way back to the fold, his hide all covered with foam and blood, his eyes glaring, and his tongue hanging out. Some cattle break out like this fifty times between the camp and the yard, and to see a dozen horsemen after half a score of beasts at best pace is a very lively scene."

In purchasing a herd of cattle it will be found advantageous to

312 The Three C0L0Nte8 Of Australia.

engage the stockman who has been accustomed to the run, and knows each beast and its haunts: such a one can go and get in cattle in a few hours, that would take a stranger days, riding your horses to death without success.

In the same way bullocks will do twice as much work for the man they know as a stranger.

Half the success of a squatter depends on knowing how to treat his servants ; that is to say, justly, fairly, kindly, liberally, but firmly, and not too familiarly.

Dairy.

It does not answer to attempt to combine agriculture on a large scale with stock, unless the establishment consists of several relatives able each to take his department ; but it is well on every establishment to have a few quiet cows for the use of the house, enough to haw plenty of milk, butter, and cheese.

The savage, barren, barbarous style of living once usual among squatters of large fortune is happily growing out of date. Such men were bachelors of good connections in England and Scotland, who invested a large capital in stock under the charge of unmarried servants, chiefly old hands ; and they were content to live like their own servants in miserable huts, on salt beef, flour, and tea, imported from Sydney, because they had no idea of making a home of the colony, but were only intent on making a fortune, to be spent in the mother country, and were satisfied witli the relaxation of a month's annual debauch, when they went to town to sell their wool and buy their stores.

This class were even so far carried away by their love of stock, and fear of the encroachments of the small corn-growing settler, that they came to look upon the cultivation of the land as something low, vulgar, and degrading. Agriculturists were to them what Bailie Xicol Jarvie and his brother weaver-bodies were to Rob Roy Maegregor and his brother caterans. By degrees they taught themselves to believe that the whole territory was only fit to feed cattle and grow wool. And many a squatter purchased flour when he could have grown corn more cheaply. But, then, if he had grown corn he might have drawn unwelcome attention to the resources of the large district he held at a peppercorn rent.

We trust the days of this insolent and selfish class are numbered, and that we shall have no more well-born, well-moneyed vagabonds encamping on the land, with the view of re-emigrating with their spoils at the earliest possible opportunity, to poison the ears of the

Management Of Dairy. 313

home government with tales of the barrenness of the land, and the idle improvidence of the labourers whom they wish to exclude from its possession.

For the future we may expect fewer colossal fortunes and more settlers. Nothing but love and pride in well-tilled land can counterbalance the attraction held forth to the bone and sinew of colonization by gold-fields.

Settlers in the true sense of the term — families who have left the home country, determined to found a home in Australia — should lose no opportunity, consistent with their circumstances, in making that home comfortable.

Next to a garden a dairy is almost an indispensable luxury. A dairy should be cool, airy, clean, and well supplied with water. Although wooden bowls are in almost universal use in the colony, they are so difficult to keep clean in this climate that metal and earthenware are much to be preferred, if to be had.

At the same time dairying operations on a liberal scale will only pay near a large community, or with easy means of carriage. In one district butter will realize 3s. 6d. per lb., and in another 8d.

In the bush the milkers are generally cows with a calf. The calves get the milk all day, and are penned up away at night. The cows are milked in the morning, but a little milk is left for the calves ; and often a calf is allowed to have a suck between times where a young heifer is inclined to hold her milk.

Under this plan of management each calf has a name, and comes out when called ; but it makes milking a very long operation, and one man cannot milk more than ten or twelve cows in a morning.

It is advisable to break in as many cows as possible to be milked out of a herd, as it tames them very much ; while calves brought up in the way above described are likely, if of a quiet breed, and not allowed to run wild, to remain quiet.

The following is the operation of breaking in a young heifer that has not received a good, original education : —

The "quiet" cows, having all been milked, are left in the yard with their calves by their sides, the young heifers with them, but their calves separated and penned up. Two men then enter the yard with a long hide rope (or lasso) and roping-stick ; with this they throw the rope over the heifer's horns, pass the end round a post near the "bail with one turn, and then, hauling and driving, bring her up to the post, where her head is fixed in the " bail," a sort of pillory in which she can move her head up and down, but not out or sideways. Her near hind

314 The Three Colonies Op Au8Tralia.

leg is then tied to a post with a leg-rope, her calf is let out, and the heifer is milked. When this operation has been repeated a few times, heifers of a good sort will go up to the bail at the word of command.

A few large lumps of rock-salt for the cattle to lick at the milkingyard will very much promote their health and make them willing to come up.

In consequence of the difference of yield and the calf system, it will take two hundred bush cows to supply a dairy which fifty would support in England.

The man of small capital, after milking, must mount his horse and put all his cattle together on the run, and see every head on the camping-grounds, before he comes home, while his wife and family are hard at work in the dairy churning or salting down butter, or making cheese. This, varied by working in the garden, or taking a team to get in a few loads of firewood, may occupy each day of a small farmer for years.

Pigs and poultry hang round a dairy, and fatten on the skim-milk and whey without trouble. If there are any men at work near, few things pay better than bacon and ham.

It is essential for the safety and comfort of every settler to have one or more horses close at hand ready, without searching, to be saddled and used at a moment's notice, if anything should happen to the sheep or cattle. Many a valuable flock has been destroyed, and many a herd lost, while men have been finding and catching their horses.

A man of moderate means must always buy a mixed herd, containing a fair proportion of bullocks pretty well forward, for, if he start with cows only, it will be nearly three years before he has anything to sell. There is a colonial story of a young gentleman who, landing with the best introductions, was a few months afterwards seen on his way to Darling Downs with a herd consisting of fifty bulls.

It is calculated that bullocks averaging 800 lbs. lose about 100 lbs. in a journey of three hundred miles.

Port Phillip is a better cattle country than South Australia, and sends a good deal of beef across the river Murray on four legs.

The cattle in bush reacquire in many respects the habits of their wild progenitors. Such is the habit of camping, and such, too, the manner in which, like the wild cattle at Chilli ngham Park in Northumberland, they march in single file to water, the bulls leading ; so too, when threatened, they take advantage of the inequalities of the ground, and steal off in the hollows unperceived, the bulls, if attacked by dogs, bringing up the rear.

Horse Breeding. 315

The settler of small means will frequently, if respectable, be able to get stock to take care of as shares ; indeed, the high rates of wages now ruling will extend this system, and do much for industrious farmers with little capital but large families.

Horse*.

Horses must be purchased with the same precautions, and pastured in the same way, as cattle. They require the same kind of country, but are even more liable to break bounds. Two horsemen can look after a thousand head, although there are few now who keep up so large a stud. The stallions are generally run with the mares, and the herd becomes divided into small mobs of eight or ten each, headed by a horse ; but it does not do to turn an English horse loose in this manner. Horse breeding makes very slow returns, but with moderate care and judgment are a safe investment.

The best breeds are either thoroughbred mares of English descent, crossed by Arab stallions, or Clydesdale or other cart breeds, for the road. ' Where roads have been constructed, horses are generally preferred to oxen for draught, and we consider Clydesdale preferable to Suffolk Punch or black Lincolnshire. Races take place in regular English style in almost every township. At the Homebush Park Races, near Sydney, on the third day five races were run, the smallest number of horses starting being five, and the greatest number fifteen ; ten started for the second race. The sport is conducted by the Jockey Club Rules.

The demand for the Indian market makes a considerable figure in the newspapers, but cannot be relied on, as it varies and depends on many contingencies.

It is not worth while to breed inferior horse stock at all ; at the same time it will not pay a beginner to go to excessive expense for his stallions. In Australia, as in Europe, to breed half-bred horses on a large scale is a hazardous speculation ; with the best sires and dams no one can tell how they will turn out ; but a good Arab put to a good thoroughbred, or two good Clydesdales, will produce a fair proportion of useful, and a per centage of first-rate, animals. The best blood horses may do for the Indian market ; the next in quality for sale to arrivals ; the worst will make stockmen's horses, although for going after cattle a cobby horse that will turn on a cabbage-leaf is preferred.

The horse liked for India is about fifteen hands to fifteen hands one inch high, well topped, showy, compact, and well on his haunches- — bays And greys preferred. Cart horses should be active, quick steppers.

To keep up good horse stock judgment must be exercised, not only about the sires and the. dams, but* in drafting out inferior animals

316 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

annually to be sold at any price ; some pains should be taken with the more promising colts. Many a lot of good horses are ruined by one bad stallion allowed to grow up with them. The superiority of the English horse is much owing to the general practice of castration.

Half the Australian horses are starved at one time or another during their colthood by the occurrence of a dry season, and hence' they grow up undersized, ragged, ill-shaped. Those who wish to have superior horse stock should take the trouble to put into the ground a quantity of oats, barley, and maize to be stored for such contingencies. Where the land is good the expense of raising a few hundred quarters of grain will be trifling, for six hundred bushels of barley have been obtained from thirty acres, by merely ploughing in the seed and then treading down with a flock of sheep. The Australian horses are often fed on maize, which is easy to cultivate and to store.

Most Australian horses are badly broken ; indeed, they are not broken at all, but only bullied into a semi-savage state, ill to mount, kicking, rearing, and buck-jumping when mounted. If it is determined to breed horses, it is as well to feed them and breed them carefully. Horses are as fond of salt as cattle, and it may be used as one mode of taming them. A really fine, well-broken lot of animals will always fetch a fair price in the ports, and are now likely to be more valuable than ever ; but, as a general rule, a dozen good mares will be as much as most small settlers will find profitable ; and a dozen good, well-bred, well-fed, well-broken colts will pay better than a hundred of the brutes which are sold under the hammer for £3 a piece, and not cheap then. Yet Australia, with its fine, dry climate and high class of pastures, affords as good breeding-ground as any in the world. Horses were quoted at auctions in Sydney at £3 unbroken to £25 for superior animals in 1851, before the discovery of the "diggings."

The powers of endurance of the Australian horse are very extraordinary. A relative of the author has ridden 150 miles in two days, and brought his horse in fresh, and on another occasion 350 miles in ten days.

It must be observed that, although the colonial horse is nearly, if not quite, as swift as the European racer on the turf, these long journeys are usually performed at a foot pace, walking about five miles an hour from sunrise until towards noon, then baiting at a hut or camping down for a couple of hours, and then making play again at the same steady pace until sunset, when, if unable to make a station, the traveller fastens his nag's forelegs together with " hobbles" which he carries with him strapped to his saddle, alongside his blanket, tea, flour-bags, and quart

Biding In Australia. 317

pot, and turns him out to pick up his living until morning, and so pursues his journey from day to day, without needing corn or grooming. But on these journeys both horses and oxen give a great deal of trouble occasionally by wandering back to their old quarters.

A really good horse is one of the indispensable luxuries of bush life, which every man can have if he likes. A shepherd who is a good judge, or has a friend to choose for him, will often invest part of his savings in a blood mare, which his master ought not to object to being fed on his run, although he might prohibit sheep. This mare the shepherd finds convenient for riding anywhere on his own business, while she brings him an annual foal, and these foals, when got by a good sire, often turn out extremely valuable ; for, being handled and ridden by the shepherd's children from a very early age, they become good-tempered and docile. It is a good plan to get a nice hack into trim previous to visiting the port of your district. The sale may pay all your travelling expenses. It is very much the custom in Australia for friends and patrons to give young children presents of stock, such as ewes, heifers, and mares. These, growing up and increasing, being fed on the share system, often amount to a very respectable marriage portion for a young lass. In this way a small settler's daughter will sometimes have half a dozen mares.

All ages and both sexes in the bush are great on horseback. Tou may meet a father who was a labourer in England riding to church on Sundays a distance of twenty miles, carrying the baby before him to be christened, and followed or surrounded by boys and girls from six years old and upwards, mounted on their own long-tailed colts. There is a great difference between stumbling tired along a road on foot and riding a good horse ; and this is one of the differences which the frugal working man experiences in Australia.

There is something very romantic in the appearance of a troop of mares, headed by the snorting, thick-mancd, master stallion, who has beaten oft" all competitors, as they wheel, start, gallop, and pause to stare on the brow of a hill ; and many a youthful heart beats high at the idea of a gallop striding on a blood horse across the undulating plains of Australia, cheering on the hounds, pursuing the bounding forester or flying doe, or trying the best blood of the colony against* an emu, that might well contend against the sons of old Eclipse, or rattling down steep rocky ranges after a troop of horses as wild as ever careered round the naked Mazeppa ; but, to own the honest truth, without the pressure produced by res angusta domi — without the charms of locality incident to family ties, a wife and colonial-born children,

318 THB THBBB OOMWttS OF AUSTRALIA.

and the feeling that you .and yours are doing somet hi ng towards " conquering, subduing, and civilizing'' an important portion of Oodfs earth — these Australian sports are a poor substitute lor the luxuries of civilized Europe; and one hour with the Heythrop or "Beaufort," Pytchley or Cheshire, is worth all the kangaroo or emu hunting that ever took place since the discovery of the colony.

But then, again, there is a difference. We who are bom horsemen all know that there is an abstract pleasure in riding a fine horse, whether at full speed or a foot pace, whether in a desert or in a field of two hundred pink coats : there is something indescribably delicious in the pulse-exciting motion. How many a man who must walk in England can afford to ride a three-hundred guinea hack in Australia ; and the love of pace, that makes a man a rare stockman in the colony, may carry him, if ill-estate, in England, straight to the insolvent court.

In Gipps's Land, and some of the mountain districts of New South Wales, there are small mobs of horses as wild as any in the Ukraine or South America.

The recommendation not to import European merinos equally applies to stallions and short-horn bulls. Such speculations should be left to old colonists, who know how and where to place them. The colonial papers are full of advertisements of imported and colonial stock horses. Of the latter the Tasmanian, as race horses, are considered the best.

After having thus rapidly touched upon the occupations and cares of a bush life, it may be well to proceed to give a description of the colonies in which these pursuits are followed with little variation.

Part Iii.

Descriptive.

I&#x27;

t

r

Chapter Xxh.

A Glance At The Extent, Form, Soil, Climate, Rivers, And Productions

Of Australia.

AUSTRALIA is the largest island in the world, so large that it is more correctly described as an island-continent, situated between the 10th and 45th degrees of south latitude, and the 112th and 154th degrees of longitude east from Greenwich. It may be said to be nearly three thousand miles from west to east, and two thousand miles from north to south, of a nearly square form, were it not for the deep indentation formed by the great Gulf of Carpenteria. But this superficial extent, which is sometimes compared with that of other continents, affords no true index to the area really available, or ever likely to be available, for colonization. A great portion of the interior is more hopelessly barren and impassable than the deserts of Africa, being in dry weather a hollow basin of sand, in rainy seasons a vast shallow inland sea, alternately and rapidly swelled by tropical torrents, and dried up by the tropical sun.

Comparisons are frequently instituted between the relative areas and populations of Europe and Australia ; but nothing can be more fallacious or dishonest.

The resources of Australia have been as yet barely discovered ; a century of active colonization can scarcely develop them to their fullest extent. Even without the appliances of science and combined labour a vast population may be subsisted in comfort ; but, without some change more extensive and material than it is possible to foresee, there can be no such dense multitudes concentrated in Australia as are found in the more civilized states of Europe, and as may be found at some future period in North America. The absence of great rivers and the means of forming inland water communication, and the quality of a great proportion of the soil, settle this point.

The surface of this island is depressed in the centre, bounded by an almost continuous range of hills and plateaux, which, varying in height from one to six thousand feet above the level of the sea, in some places approach the coast and present lofty, inaccessible cliffs to the ocean, — as, for instance, the heads of Port Jackson, — and in others tend

322 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

toward the interior of the country, at a distance of from twenty to eighty miles ; but, these elevations being all of an undulating, not a precipitous, character, no part of the country can be considered strictly alpine.

The features of the country on the exterior and interior of this range differ so much as present the results of climates usually found much further apart, especially on the eastern coast, where between the mountains and the sea, as, for instance, at Ulawarra, Port Macquarie, And Moreton Bay, the vegetation partakes to a great extent of a tropical character ; and on the rich debris washed down from the hills we find forests of towering palms and various species of gum-trees (Eucalypti), the surface of the ground beneath clothed with dense and impervious underwood, composed of dwarf trees, shrubs, and treeferns, festooned with creepers and parasitic plants, from the size of a convolvulus and vine to the cable of a man-of-war. These dense forests, through which exploring travellers liave been obliged to cut their way inland at the rate of not more than a mile or two a day, are interspersed with open glades or meadow reaches, admirably adapted for pasturing cattle, to which the colonists have given the name of appletree flats, from the fancied resemblance between the apple-trees of Europe and those (Angophorae) with which these glades are thinly dotted.

Within the ranges, on the other hand, are found immense open downs and grassy plains, divided by rocky and round-backed ranges of hills, and interspersed by open forest without undergrowth and detached belts of gum trees (Eucalypti acacia*), presenting a park-like appearance, which, advancing towards the interior, are succeeded either by marshes, or sandy and stony deserts, perfectly sterile and uninhabitable, except by a few reptiles and birds which prey upon them.

The rivers of Australia are few in number, and insignificant in a navigable point of view. The one series, rising from the seaside of the mountain range, flow deviously until they reach the coast, seldom affording a navigable stream more than twenty miles inland, usually rushing down with such rapidity during the rainy season as to fill up their seamouths with a bar which excludes all except boats of slight draught of water. The other series, falling toward the interior, are lost in quicksands, marshes, or shallow lakes ; after a course varying from a score to many hundred miles of zigzag current, now flowing with a full, deep stream, and then suddenly diminishing to a depth of a few inches, or even totally and suddenly disappearing.

The Dutch colonists in South Africa have terms by which they express the exact value of flowing water, whether perpetual or intermittent, whether a mere rivulet or a deep stream; but there are no

Rivebs And Pools. 323

words invented in the English language which convey a correct idea of Australian waters. The two terms most in use are creek and river, the former being an arm or branch of the latter. But an Australian river, even when marked by an imposing coloured line on a map, giving according to proportion an idea of a Khine, a Danube, or a Thames, is generally a chain of pools, varying in dimension from a few yards to a league in diameter, which are, with a few grand exceptions, according to their respective depth and proximity to mountains, reduced to an absolute or comparative state of mud in dry seasons, or united into a deep, still stream, or roaring torrent, after a few hours of tropical rain.

The brother of the writer rode down, on an exploring expedition during a season of drought, with a fellow-squatter, in search of fresh pastures, and discovered the River Barwen, flowing bank high, as broad as the Thames at Richmond, winding along plains which, as far as the eye could reach, were covered with rich grass higher than the necks of their horses. As they rode along, ground pigeons, grass parroquets, and quails rose up in thousands; and from time to time flocks of emus thundered past, while kangaroos bounded swiftly away, and from the river rose clouds of waterfowl. There seemed game enough to feed an army, and grass enough for tens of thousands of live stock. Yet he lived to see within a few years the grassy plain burned to a sandy desert, and the great river shrink to a chain of shallow pools, in which it was difficult to find water enough for a hundred oxen.

The deep pools, called colonially " waterholes," and the winding course pursued by all the Australian rivers, economize the supply during the long droughts, and at the same time distribute it over a considerable part of the country. Thus the Hawkesbury, one of the earliest rivers navigated by the settlers, is not more than thirty-five miles in a direct line from Windsor, where it is navigable to Broken Bay, and where it flows into the sea ; but its tortuous route is one hundred and forty miles, and higher up its windings are still more remarkably circuitous; while the Murray, the greatest river of Australia, rising on the western flank of the Australian alps, after a much longer course, in which it receives the waters of the Ovens, the Darling, and the Murrumbidgee, by which name it is known for part of its course, ends in the broad shallow lake of Alexandrina, in South Australia.

Until the later explorations of Mitchell and Leuchardt hopes were confidently entertained of discovering an inland sea, and a great navigable river, flowing to the northward ; but these hopes are now exploded, and it is certain that on land conveyance the chief Australian communications must depend.

324 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

A great diversity of climate prevails m Australia, varying with the latitude and the height from the sea. Van Diemen's Land, with its more isolated and more southern position, enjoys more rain and the irrigation of many streams. In certain districts of Australia, especially between the 25th and 35th degree of latitude, the thermometer frequently rises to 110°, 120°, and even 130° in the shade, while hot winds sweep over the country from the sterile, burning plains of the interior. This great heat is unaccompanied by night-dews ; and droughts of many months' duration occur at uncertain intervals, and are of uncertain extent, during which rivers and waterholes are dried up. The settlers who have not yet imitated the costly construction of tanks and aqueducts, or even the more simple and successful contrivances adopted in peninsular India and in Asia Minor for collecting and husl?anding rain and spring water, suffer dreadful straits. The pastures become parched deserts — the sheep eat the grass to the roots — the waterholes are poisoned by the bodies of cattle suffocated in sloughs when struggling for drink, and thousands of stock of all kinds perish either before moving or while on the road to districts which the drought has not affected. It is during these droughts that almost all the great discoveries of new pastures have been made by enterprising stockowners and their servants.

But after a time, which no man, white or native, can calculate, rains fall in torrents, grass springs up abundantly, " and the plains, on which but lately not a blade of herbage was to be seen, and over which the stillness of desolation reigned, become green with luxuriant vegetation." The rivers and creeks till with marvellous rapidity; a roaring tiood rushes down the lately drv bed of a stream, overflows the banks, and carries all that impedes its progress in white foam before it. On such occasions the Hawkesburv lias risen ninet v-five feet in a few hours; and in 1851, in the Maneroo district, the sites of townships recently laid out for sale by the srovernment surveyor were converted into deep lakes, and a whole camp of aborigines were drowned.

The ravages of the drought and Hood are quickly replaced in a climate so favourable to the increase of live stock, and in a very short time the losses and the dangers are forgotten. These afflictions were of a more serious character in the early years of the first colony, when but a comparatively limited part had explored. At present plenty in one colony or one district counterbalances the droughts or floods of another.

At a height of two or three thousand feet above the level of the sea a temperate, and even cold, region is to be found, where the

Boil Of Australia. 325

vegetables, fruits, and grain of Northern Europe flourish, and the settler or traveller finds the necessity of warm clothing, and the comfort of blazing fires.

But in all the varieties of temperature found in Australia the climate is, with the exception of the burning plains of the interior, congenial to Europeans : even the tropical regions of the coast are free from those fevers which decimate white men visiting the Indian seas and the African coast.

The soil of Australia varies even more than its climate. Of the whole extent a very large proportion is hopelessly barren, but still enough remains capable of supporting a very numerous, and in some districts a dense, population. There are no data for calculating with such a degree of accuracy as would be useful the proportions of available land in the occupied districts. It will be safe to assume that two-thirds of the land worth occupying is only, and will only be, fit for pastoral purposes, and can no more be profitably cultivated than the limestone hills and moors of Wales, Derbyshire, Yorkshire, and Gloucestershire, or the Highlands of Scotland.

Of land fit for agricultural purposes, and sufficiently clear of trees to be put under plough at a reasonable expenditure of labour, there is enough to support a population to be counted by millions, but continually intersected by barren ranges and forests of scrub, which can never be of any value except for firewood.

On the coast to the northward, between Port Macquarie and Moreton Bay, are vast tracts of well-watered land, on which the soil is excellently adapted for various crops, but so covered with heavy timber that nothing less than the old system of convict-clearing gangs, or of free grants to clearing parties, will bring them into cultivation in this generation, although well placed for water conveyance to the seaport towns. On the other hand, in Port Phillip there are plains on which the plough might be driven for one hundred miles in a straight line, turning up a furrow of rich mould along the whole tract ; and the other two colonies can present similar instances, although not to the same extent, or so near the seacoast.

The soil of Australia presents as many anomalies as its configuration and its animal and vegetable productions.

In other parts of the world the most fertile tracts are generally found near the mouths of rivers ; in Australia the greatest fertility usually commences where the navigation ceases. In Europe the valleys will generally be found full of rich soil ; in Australia some of the richest mould is to be found on the tops of hills. The low hills formed

u

326 THB THBil OOLOMIEfc Of AtmiULIA*

on the banks of riven above the navigable waters are often unequalled in richness, while the valleys are eo mp os e i of a soft day, producing a rich coarse herbage, very fit for pasturing homed cattle, but unsuitable for cultivation.

The neighbourhood of the first settlement, west and south-west of Sydney, is chiefly composed of sandstone and unproductive days; the first good land was found in patches on the River Hawkesbury; and on the alluvial flats formed by the overflowing fresh-water riven the richest cultivable land is to be found. Works for draining or irrigating can only be attempted where damming a valley or draining a high-lying marsh can produce a great effect at a moderate expense. For half a century the progress of colonisation in Australia has rested on its pastoral resources, which are of the very first order, in soil, in climate, and in arrangement of territory.

From the level of the sea to the summit of the highest mountains pastures are to be found extending for hundreds of miles, now undulating smoothly and almost imperceptibly, then extending in broad flat plains, or a succession of round-backed hills, broken with rocky ranges, and ending in deep gullies. Over these the flockmaster may, if needful, drive his flocks for days, nay, for weeks, without meeting any serious interruption to his progress, or without failure of the pasture on which sheep thrive.

The districts which, from their dampness and rankness of the vegetation, would be unsuitable for sheep, are available for cattle, which in certain regions, in default of grass, find good feed on the tender branches of a species of primrose.

Agriculture has hitherto been but rudely pursued in Australia, with rare exceptions. To gentlemen of capital it is not, and is not likely to become, a profitable pursuit ; for this reason, a prejudice against the agricultural capabilities of the colonies has been entertained and sedulously encouraged among the pastoral interest, who, dreading the prospect of a class of yeomanry which might encroach on their sheepwalks, can with difficulty be induced to admit that there is any fertile soil to be found, — a prejudice which must always be taken into consideration in estimating the value of colonial evidence on such subjects. Certain it is that ignorant cultivators have successfully cropped farms on the Hawkesbury, the Hunter, the Macquarie, year after year, without manure, and without any sensible diminution in the returns. As to quality of grain, the wheat of South Australia, Port Phillip, and Van Diemen's Land imported into this country has been pronounced equal to any, for weight, size, and flavour, ever exhibited in Mark-lane.

Chapter Xxhi. Port Jackson— The Sydney District.

CUMBERLAND AND CAMDEN COUNTIES — HUNTER'S RIVER AND MAITLAND — PORT STEPHENS— PORT MACQUARIE— MORETON BAY— THE DUGONO— WIDE BAY —THE BUNYA-BUNYA— DR. LEICHARDT— THE BRONZE-WINGED PIGEON.

PORT JACKSON is the fittest centre from which to take a survey of the settled and inhabitable districts in Australia ; being not only the finest harbour and the port of the greatest Australian city, but the inlet and outlet for commerce; having the wealthiest and most dense population in the whole island.

The usual course to Sydney for sailing-vessels is through Bass's Straits, and in fair weather, with a favourable wind, ships frequently pass sufficiently near the shores to afford an agreeable but very tantalizing view of the scenery.

" The shore is bold and picturesque, and the country behind, gradually rising higher and higher into swelling hills of moderate elevation, to the utmost distance the eye can reach, is covered with wide-branching, evergreen forest trees and close brushwood, exhibiting a prospect of never-failing foliage, although sadly monotonous and dull in tone as compared with the luxuriant summer foliage of Europe. Grey rocks at intervals project among these endless forests, while here and there some gigantic tree, scorched dead by the summer fires, uplifts its blasted branches above the green saplings around."

Approaching Port Jackson, the coast line consists of cliffs of a reddish hue. Where the land can be seen, shrubs and trees of strange foliage are found flourishing on a white, sandy, barren soil destitute of herbage.

The entrance to the port is marked by the north and south heads, about three quarters of a mile apart. On the southern head a stone lighthouse, bearing the often-repeated name of Macquarie, affords a revolving flame at night and a white landmark by day to the great ships from distant quarters of the globe, and to the crowd of largesailed coasters which ply between innumerable coast villages and Sydney.

Steering westerly, the great harbour, like a landlocked lake, protected by the curving projecting heads from the roll of the Pacific storms, opens out until lost in the distance, where it joins the

Cunningham.

x;2

328 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Paramatta River. The banks on either hand, varying from two to five miles in breadth, are sometimes steep and sometimes sloping, but repeatedly indented by coves and bays, which, fringed with green shrubs down to the white sandy water-margin, when bathed in golden sunlight, present dainty retreats as brilliant as Danby's Enchanted Island.

On one of the first and most romantic coves in Yaucluse the marine villa of William Wentworth is situated.

Five miles from the heads, on " Sydney Cove," stands the city of Sydney, the head-quarters of the Governor-General, the residence and episcopal city of the Bishop of Australia, and the greatest wool port in the world. The still waters, alive with steamers passing and repassing, with ships of English and American flags, and a crowd of small craft, yachts, and pleasure-boats, betoken the approach to a centre of busy commerce, even before the church spires show themselves against the sky. In this city, which has been too often described to need any detailed account here, every comfort and every luxury of Europe is to be obtained that can be purchased with money.

The entrance to Port Jackson is so safe and easy that the American surveying ships ran in at night without a pilot ; and when the inhabitants rose in the morning they found themselves under the guns of a frigate carrying the stripes and stars.

Vessels of considerable burden can unload alongside the quays.

Sydney Cove is formed by two small promontories, between which the rivulet flows which induced Governor Phillip to choose this site for his settlement, as it possessed a safe harbour, wood, and water, three essential points, although not alone sufficient to support a flourishing colony. The first harbour is of little value, unless it is the outlet to a country capable of producing some exports.

Tanks were cut for storing the water of the fresh-water stream during the summer ; but, the increase of the town having rendered this supply insufficient, water was brought from Botany Bay ; and, recently, further extensive works have been executed, by which an aqueduct is brought from Cook's River, where a dam has been built to exclude the salt water.

Along the hollow formed by the two promontories or ridges, where the native track through the woods down to the water's edge, formerly George-street, extends, and which holds in the colonial metropolis the relative ranks of the Strand and Regent-street, London, combined, there, until recently, stately plate-glass shops were to be found side by side with wooden huts.

Cumberland And Camden Counties. 329

The harbour of Port Jackson affords an almost unlimited line of deep water, along which, when needed by the extension of commerce, quays and warehouses may be erected at a very trifling expense, so great are its natural dock advantages ; many of the coves in Port Jackson are even now as much in a state of nature as when Captain Phillip first discovered it. As a central point for the commerce of the Australian seas, it is not probable that it can ever be superseded as a maritime station even by any other colonies planted in a more fertile situation, although it may be asserted that, with rare exceptions, the land for. a hundred miles round Sydney is a sandy desert. But roads y railroads, and steamers will afford Sydney the advantages of the produce of districts which have no such harbour as Port Jackson.

Cumberland and Camden were the two counties first settled. Cumberland is the most densely-populated district in Australia, and has the poorest soil ; a belt of land parallel to the sea, from twenty to forty miles in breadth, is either light sand dotted with picturesque, unprofitable scrub, or a stiff clay or ironstone, thickly covered with hard-wood timber and underwood. After passing this belt, to which the colonists confined themselves for more than ten years, with a few spirited exceptions, the soil improves a little ; that is to say, narrow tracks of a rich alluvial character are found on the banks of the rivers, but the greater proportion consists of forest on a poor impenetrable soil, wliich defies the perseverance of the most skilled agriculturist : the deeper you go the worse it is.

Camden has a moderate extent of cultivable land, including the singular district of Ulawarra, which is at once one of the most beautiful and fertile spots in the world, in regard both to the luxuriance and variety of its vegetable productions. The pastures of Camden are extensive, and were considered important until the discovery of the western and southern plains.

These are almost the only counties much named colonially ; other

parts of the colonies are chiefly known as districts, and the counties which fill up so much space on the maps are seldom named. We give

a list of them with population in another chapter.

The dryness of the counties of Camden and Cumberland, in which, in the course of the year, nearly as much rain falls as in the counties of Essex and Sussex, is greatly owing to the stiff clay of which the soil is chiefly composed, through which the rain cannot easily filter, or from which springs can with difficulty burst forth. Boring on the artesian plan has been recently adopted with success.

To describe in detail the character of each county and each dis-

330 Thb Thrkb Colonies Of Australia.

trict would be a difficulty an mtenninable, and, to the reader, a wearisome task. Many, after being charmed with the exquisitely pict ur es q ue appearance of Port Jackson and Sydney, on a very cursory inspection of the surrounding country, come to the conclusion that the whole province of New South Wales is a barren desert, only fit for feeding sheep, — a conclusion which is not more correct than to judge of the agricultural capabilities of England by Dartmoor, or of France by the "Landes."

Within the Sydney district are the towns of Paramatta, Windsor, and Liverpool ; but, in consequence of the dispersion incident to the pastoral pursuits which have hitherto formed the chief employment of Australia, there are really no towns in the European sense of the word, with the exception of the three capitals, Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide, and Geelong in Victoria, which, being the port to a rich district, is likely to rival Melbourne. The other towns with imposing names are mere villages, with a gaol, a magistrate's office, some stores, and a great many public-houses.

Taking Sydney as the starting-point, we propose to survey the general features of the settled and pastoral districts, proceeding first towards the north, and returning to Port Jackson, travelling along the coast to the other two colonies.

The three great colonies of New South Wales, Victoria, late Port Phillip, and South Australia, occupy a continuous coast line, extending from Wide Bay, in New South Wales, to Cape Adieu, in South Australia. With the exception of the small and unsuccessful colony of Western Australia, or Swan River, the remaining coast line of this island-continent is unsettled, and only inhabited by wandering savages or stray parties of whalers and sealers. Attempts have been made more than once to form settlements in Northern Australia, but they have been abandoned, and will not probably be renewed until the older colonists find the need of further extensions inland, or some coal stations are established for the numerous steamers which are now plying between England and the gold regions.

The three colonies are only divided by imaginary lines, so easy are the means of inland intercommunication. Overland journeys have been executed between all by parties driving great herds over an untracked country.

The principal ports to the north of Port Jackson are Broken Bay, the mouth of the River Hawkesbury, up which vessels of one hundred tons can proceed for four miles beyond the town of Windsor, which is one hundred and forty miles by the river, and about forty miles in a direct

hunter's river and maitland. 331

line from the coast. Broken Bay is not a safe harbour, being much exposed to the east and south-east as well as the north-west winds.

Port Hunter is the mouth of the Hunter River, which receives the waters of the Rivers Williams and Paterson. It is navigable for about thirty-five miles by waterway, and twenty-five miles in a direct line from the coast. This stream was formerly called the Coal Biver. On the bay sheltered by Nobby Island stands Newcastle, a town which owes its name of importance to the coal-fields by which it is surrounded. The soil in the neighbourhood is for the most part barren. On the opposite northern shore of the bay are East and West Maitland, the outports of the great squatting district of Liverpool Plains ; and, four miles further, Morpeth, the port of the Hunter's Biver Company. A regular steam-boat traffic in all the produce of the Hunter's Biver district is carried on between Morpeth, Maitland, Newcastle, and Sydney, from which they are distant about eighty miles, the cheapness of steam communication having led to the abandonment of the road formed at immense cost by convict labour over the mountainous barren country inland between Sydney and the Hunter's Biver.

The Hunter's Biver is subject to droughts, but otherwise one of the oldest and finest agricultural districts. Tine cultivation is carried on there successfully, on a large scale. Its tributaries, the Williams and Paterson Rivers, are both navigable for a greater distance than the Hunter, the Williams uniting at twenty miles and the Paterson at thirty-five miles from Newcastle. They give access to districts which are cooler and better supplied with rain than the Hunter.

Maitland owes its double name to the government having laid out East Maitland during the land-buying mania, with its usual infelicity, three miles up the river, at a point too shallow for steam-boats to approach ; on which shrewd speculators laid out West Maitland alongside the deep water. Thus a town of a single street, with inns for the accommodation of squatters, sprang up.

The country round is flat, sometimes flooded, and produces fine crops of wheat and Indian corn. Along the Paterson the country is undulating and fertile, surrounded by hills which attract rain, and render it better adapted for cattle than sheep. Tobacco cultivation has been successfully pursued : thriving farms occupy the banks of the rivers, which fetch a good price, either to sell or rent. Kangaroos, plentiful a few years ago, are becoming scarce ; but wild ducks may be shot on the river, and good fish caught.

In April the winter sets in and continues until September, with nights cold enough to make a fire pleasant, and sharp frost at daybreak.

332 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

In October the summer commences, and the wheat harvest in November. Then in the Hunter district the hot winds commence, blow for three days, and not unfrequently blight wheat just coming into ear : they are usually succeeded by a sharp southerly gale, accompanied by rain, which soon makes everything not actually blighted look green again. This more particularly refers to the Paterson. At Segenhoe, one of the most beautiful estates in New South Wales, which extends in romantic park-like scenery for six miles along the River Hunter, in the county of Brisbane, three years have sometimes elapsed before the fall of rain.

The Hunter River may be considered a favourable specimen of an accessible and long-settled district. The river is now not only the means of communication by the sea for the produce of its immediate territory, but also for all the wool and all the supplies interchanged by the great squatting district of New England and Liverpool Plains, to which access is obtained by a deep cleft through a spur of the Australian cordilleras, called the Liverpool Range, which bounds the Liverpool Plains in a northerly direction. A great and increasing steam communication exists between Sydney and the River Hunter.

Port Stephens is a large estuary fifteen miles in length and contracted to about a mile in breadth in the centre, into which the Rivers Karnah and Myall flow. The Karuah is navigable for twelve miles only for small craft to Booral, a village built by the Australian Agricultural Company. The valley of the Karuah, in the county of Gloucester, is chiefly in the possession of the Australian Agricultural Company, and pronounced by Count Strzelecki one of the finest agricultural districts in the colony. The company in England were desirous of opening it to colonization, as they found farming and stockfeeding at the distance of sixteen thousand miles an unprofitable pursuit ; but their resident servants threw so many obstacles in the way that the project failed, and within one hundred miles of Sydney colonization is checked by a monopolist oasis.

On this estate some of the rarest birds of Australia are found. The wonga wonga pigeon (Leucosarcia picata) is a large bird, with white flesh, excellent eating, with handsome black-patched plumage, which spends most of its time upon the ground, " feeding upon the seeds of stones of the fallen fruits of the towering trees under whose shade it dwells, seldom exposing itself to the rays of the sun, or seeking the open parts of the forest, whence when disturbed it rises with a loud fluttering, like a pheasant. Its flight is not of long duration, being merely employed to remove it to a sufficient distance to avoid detection

Port Stephens.

by again descending to the ground or mounting the branch of a tree. It is a species which bears confinement well." The accompanying engraving, as well as all our illustrations from natural history, are copied by permission from Mr. Gould's splendid work on Australia. In Port Stephens harbour, at certain times of the year, the aborigines may be seen fishing and disporting in their canoes, harmless, but in their habits as uncivilized as when their ancestors were seen by Cook and Dampier.

The park-b'ke scenery, the neatness of the cottages provided by the company for their servants, the richness of the vegetation, and the fertility of gardens full of the choicest fruits and flowers, render this one of the counties which the traveller who can afford the time should visit, as it affords a pleasing contrast to the dry, barren country round Sydney, in the county of Cumberland.

From Booral the Australian Company have an overland communication with their stations on Liverpool Plains, but they ship most of their wool at the Hunter.

In the orchards of the Australian Agricultural Company at Port Stephens, Count Strzcleckj mentions that he saw an example of the extensive range which the beautiful climate of New South Wales embraces in its isothermal lines— the English oak flourishing by the aide of the banana, which again was surrounded by vines, lemons, and orange-trees of luxurious growth. "To the southward of Port Stephens are a series of thriving farms spreading along the Goulburo, Pages, Hunter, Paterson, and Williams Rivers, which (

334 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

agricultural district of 2,000 square miles in extent. The excellent harbour of Newcastle, good water and tolerable roads, a coal-mine, a soil well adapted for wheat, barley, turnips, the vine, and European fruits, and a situation most favourable to the application of irrigation, render this district one of the richest and most important in the colony."

And Captain Stokes, in " The Voyage of the Beagle," says, " A change took place in the features of this portion of the eastern coast : a number of conical hills, from four to six hundred feet in height, presented themselves. Two very remarkable headlands, Wacaba and Tomare, constitute the entrance points of Port Stephens. The sea face of Tomare is a high line of cliffs.

" On the side of a hill, two miles and a half within the narrowest part of the harbour, is Tahlee, the residence of the superintendent. It stands on the crest of a steep grassy slope, over which are scattered numerous small bushy lemon-trees, the deep verdure of their foliage, interspersed with golden fruit, contrasting charmingly with the light green carpet from which they spring.

" At the foot of this declivity a screen of trees, rising to a considerable height, almost shuts out the view of the water, though breaks here and there allow small patches to be seen.

" I ascended to Booral, twelve miles up the River Karuah, where all goods are landed for the company's stations. The treasurer resides there in a charming cottage almost covered with roses and honey suckles. About two miles within the entrance the river winds between liigh and steep banks, densely covered with creepers, acacias, and other vegetation of a tropical character, hanging in festoons, the ends floating in the water.

" We were as much delighted as surprised with the richness of the vegetation, when compared with its dry, parched appearance at Sydney — another of the striking characteristics of Australia. ,,

The next harbour after leaving Port Stephens is Port Macquarie, wluch is the outlet of the Rivers Hastings and Wilson.

Port Macquarie is a bar harbour, into wluch vessels drawing more than nine feet water cannot safely enter, but there is a good anchorage outside. The River Hastings cannot be ascended for more than ten miles by vessels of any burden ; but from the mountains where it rises it flows in a full although not deep stream for fifty miles, traversing an undulating district, chiefly open forest.

Port Macquarie was first founded as a penal settlement. It is the commencement of a fertile semi-tropical district, extending to Moreton

Port Macquarie. 335

Bay, which was deservedly exciting attention until the gold discoveries drew enterprise and the stream of emigration in another direction.

The following striking picture is from the work of a gentleman who was the first to draw public attention to this fine district* : —

" On entering the surf of the bar of Port Macquarie, immediately beyond the last breaker, the mirror-like surface of the river extends in a long reach, whilst, on the left, dark serpentine rocks protect the smooth round eminence, covered with green sward, and crowned by a signal-post, fire-beacon, and windmill. A little further on is the town, built on a gentle rise, the tall, square church tower rising conspicuously in the highest part. A grove of magnificent trees encircles the port, whilst, turning to the west and north-west, appears a wide extent of forest country, the windings of the valley among the mountain ranges through which the River Wilson flows ; Mount Caoulapatamba being sufficiently near to enable one to distinguish every tree on its grassy declivities."

The soil of the country in the county of Cumberland round Sydney appears barren, the vegetation harsh and dismal, but " on the coast of Port Macquarie dense thickets of cabbage-palms and myrtle-trees extend down the rocky declivities, even within reach of the spray, and every unwooded patch is covered with grass, while the lofty forest rising luxuriantly close to the sea presents a striking contrast to the stunted Banksia thickets and desiccated scrubs on the sandstone round Sydney. The mountains approaching near the coast collect vapours from the sea, and cause frequent rains ; in summer heavy thunderstorms mitigate the heat."

The River Hastings was discovered by Mr. Oxley, a late surveyorgeneral, on the report of two shipwrecked mariners whom he rescued on the coast.

It has been calculated that there are twelve million fertile acres well watered by small streams. The dividing range of mountains rises upwards of six thousand feet ; on the other side lie the Liverpool Plains, one of the finest sheep districts in the colony. A road has been made across the mountains for bringing down wool to Port Macquarie.

Shoal Bay, the next harbour, is the embouchure of the River Clarence, navigable for steamers for more than fifty miles, flowing through a rich and fertile country : large boats have ascended as far as ninety miles. It was surveyed and made public in 1839 by a private expedition under the charge of S. Perry, Esq., deputy surveyor-general, but had previously been discovered and settled by a party of cedar-

Port Macquarie to Moreton Bay, lint explored and tnrreyed by Clement Hodgkineon."

336 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

cutters. The average width is from 450 to 600 yards, with a depth of from six to twenty feet water, the banks from ten to twenty-five feet above high-water mark.

It is right to mention that this district and the immediate plains lying between Richmond River, forty miles north of Shoal Bay, and as far north as Wide Bay, are all taken up and stocked under squatting licences. The soil is rich and the water advantages superior, but the climate more hot and less healthy than the plains on the other side of the way.

"The country available for grazing at this river is of excellent quality, generally level, and affords greater facilities for shipping wool than at Port Macquarie."

The next port and centre and site of the capital of all this district is Moreton Bay, into which flows the Brisbane River, discovered by Mr. Oxley, on an exploring expedition, in December, 1823. He reported that " when examining Moreton Bay we had the satisfaction to find the tide sweeping up a considerable inlet between the first mangrove island and the mainland. A few hours ended our anxiety : the water became perfectly fresh, and no diminution had taken place in the size of the river after passing Sea Reach. The scenery was peculiarly beautiful ; the country along the banks alternately hilly and level, but not flooded ; the soil of the finest description of good brush land, on which grew timber of great magnitude, some of a description quite unknown to us, amongst others a magnificent species of pine.* Up to this point the river was navigable for vessels not drawing more than sixteen feet water. The tide rose about five feet, being the same as at the entrance. We proceeded about thirty miles further, no diminution having taken place in either the depth or the breadth of the river, except in one place, for the extent of thirty yards, where a ridge of detached rocks extended across the river, not having more than twelve feet upon them at high water.

" From this period to Termination Hill the river continued nearly of uniform size. The tide ascends daily fifty miles up the mouth of the Brisbane. The country on either side is of very superior description, and equally well adapted for cultivation or grazing."

On Mr. Oxley's report, which further explorations have proved to be in no degree exaggerated, a penal settlement was founded at Brisbane, and, among other experiments for employing the prisoners, sugar was cultivated, until a flood swept the machinery away. There is no doubt that the climate and soil of the Moreton Bay district, by wliich it

The pine forest* mark the commencement and the boundaries of intertropical Australia.

Moreton Bat. 337

is better known than by its parliamentary title, county of Stanley, would produce sugar and cotton ; but that those crops would be remunerative to capitalists at the present or probable price of labour in Australia is more than doubtful. Whether any tropical cultivation could be successfully carried on by families of small freeholders remains yet to be tried. At some future period, when New South Wales has the power of promoting colonization without consulting Downing-street, perhaps families of Germans of the classes who have at times settled with very little success in Brazil may be induced to try the experiment.

Moreton Bay is forty-five miles in length, and twenty in breadth, enclosed between the two islands of Stradbroke and Maitland. This harbour is rendered unsafe by numerous shoals and narrow winding passages.

Moreton Bay Island is nineteen miles in length, and four and a half in breadth. It consists of a series of sandhills, one of which is nine hundred feet in height, quite barren in an agricultural point of view, but producing a cypress which is a good furniture wood.

The River Brisbane flows into the bay about the middle of its western side, with a bar on which there are not more than eleven feet of water at flood tide. Large vessels have to anchor above five miles off, under the shelter of one of the islands.

The towns of Brisbane, North and South, are fourteen miles from the mouth of the river, and thirty-five miles from Ipswich, on the River Bremer, an inland port for shipping wool from the Moreton Bay and Clarence districts.

Steam communication is maintained between Brisbane and Ipswich, and between Moreton Bay and Sydney.

From Moreton Bay a considerable trade is carried on with Sydney, and other less-favoured settlements, especially the Moreton Bay pine (Auracaria Cunninghami), wliich is of the same quality as the Norfolk Island pine, as well as wool and tallow, the staples of the country.

In the bay and on the coast the aborigines eagerly pursue the dugong, a species of small whale, generally known to the colonists as the sea-pig. The head of the dugong is small in proportion to his body, and is most singularly shaped. The upper lip is very thick, and flattened at the extremity. It is to this queer looking snout, we presume, that the animal is indebted for the swinish cognomen by which it is ordinarily known. The dugong has a thick smooth skin, with a few hairs scattered over its surface. Its colour is bluish on the back, with a white breast and belly. In size the full grown

338 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

male has never, we believe, been found more than eighteen or twenty feet long ; but those commonly taken are much less than this.

The food of the dugong consists chiefly of marine vegetables, which it finds at the bottom of inlets, in comparatively shallow water, where it is easily captured. Its flesh resembles good beef, and is much esteemed. The oil obtained from its fat is peculiarly clear and limpid, and is free from any disagreeable smell, such as most animal oils are accompanied with. It has not yet been produced in sufficient quantities to acquire a recognised market value.

The blacks devour the carcase roasted, after expressing the oil for sale to the colonists. A perfumer in Sydney tried to convert this oil into a new mixture for the hair : unfortunately, on experiment on himself and his wife, it produced baldness instead of luxuriance ; yet its appearance is as fine as sperm.

Behind Moreton Bay, on the other side the mountain range, forming a district of high tableland and cool temperature, are the Darling Downs, a magnificent sheep country, which is also accessible from the Clarence River.

The climate of the Moreton Bay district, like nearly all the district north of Port Macquarie, is too hot for wheat, which grows luxuriantly, but is subject to blight : for sheep and cattle there is no finer country, and maize and all semi-tropical productions grow in perfection. Grapes ripen, but are too subject to frosts to make good wine.

A very short distance from the town of Brisbane the clearings end and the forest commences, now green trees, then pine, then open plains, and well-watered valleys.

The rainy season of this intertropical region has been graphically described by Mr. Mossman : — " Masses of dense scud rise up from the Pacific Ocean towards the interior, until they are checked by the southerly wind blowing over the higher, colder New England country (on the other side of the mountain ranges), and packed into a uniform mass shrouding the heavens ; a stifling sultriness succeeds, the lightning bursts forth from the lurid gloom, flash succeeds with fearful rapidity — now forked from the zenith, anon like a chain around the verge of the horizon, while the crash of thunder resounds. The floodgates of the black canopy are opened — the rain descends in torrents with a loud pattering — soon the narrow tributaries of the river are swollen, some rising as much as fifty feet in twelve hours — the surrounding plains are deluged. In the five months of rain the earth becomes saturated, the forests drip continually, while the nearly vertical sun creates a warm, humid, unhealthy atmosphere." Ophthalmia and general debility follow

Wide Bat — The Bunya-Bunya. 339

this kind of weather; but the author of the passage just quoted considers that if Indian bungalows were erected by the settlers, instead of naked English cottages, many of the ill effects of the rainy season would be avoided.

In the Moreton Bay district may be found many establishments containing all the luxuries of Europe — elegant houses, gardens, libraries, music, pictures, and wives in Parisian bonnets.

Wide Bay, beyond Moreton Bay, and the boundary of the county of Stanley, is the last port of the colony of New South Wales : it receives the waters of the Mary Fitzroy River. The land is undulating, well timbered, covered with good grass, and suited for horned stock. Within the last five years a considerable number of stations have been formed there, and the country taken up in cattle runs for more than 200 miles in the interior. Gold, too, has been found in small quantities in this district. In the 27th parallel of the Wide Bay district grows the bunya-bunya tree, a species of pine, often from seventeen to twenty feet in circumference, and upwards of one hundred feet in height, which, once in three years, yields a harvest of cones about a foot long and three quarters in diameter, containing seeds or kernels, which the natives from most distant regions triennially journey to collect, roast, and eat, afterwards enjoying the relaxation of a little fighting.

Orders have been issued by the colonial government that no stations be planted and no stock run in this bunya-bunya country, which occupies a space of about fifty miles in length by ten in breadth. It will be difficult to enforce this order.

Dr. Leichardt, one of the scientific travellers who has, wo fear, like Cunningham, Gilbert, and Kennedy, fallen a victim to his adventurous courage in an attempt to penetrate overland to Swan River, passed some time in the Moreton Bay district, preparing himself for the successful journey he afterwards made overland, in 1844, to Port Essington, in Northern Australia. In a letter addressed to Professor Owen, which is quoted in that eminent physiologist's " Report on the Extinct Mammals of Australia," read at the annual meeting of the British Association, July, 1845, and which accompanied a box of fossil bones from Darling Downs, he describes his life in terms which sound sadly and strangely affecting, now that we have so much reason to fear that, after succeeding in his first, he has perished in his second enterprise : —

" Living here as the bird lives who flies from tree to tree, — living on the kindness of a friend fond of my science, or on the hospitality of the settler and squatter, — with a little mare, I travelled more than 2,500

310 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

miles, zigzag, from Newcastle to Wide Bay, being often my own groom, cook, washerwoman, geologist, and botanist at the same tune; and I delighted in this life. When next you hear of me, it will be either that I am lost and dead, or that I have succeeded in penetrating through the interior to Port Essington."

Leichardt set out on this expedition, and left Timba, the last station on the Darling Downs, 30th September, 1844, and reached Port Essington in December of the same year. The privations he endured were terrible. Mr. Gilbert, a naturalist in the employment of Mr. Gould, fell a sacrifice to the savages. More than once the bronzewinged pigeon, flying to water, saved them from dying of thirst.

To the parties engaged in this expedition the Legislative Council voted £1,000, and £1,500 was raised by private subscription for the same purpose. Of these two sums, £1,450 were presented to Dr. Leichardt. Ho lost no time in preparing a second expedition, for the purpose of " exploring the interior of Australia, the extent of Sturt's desert, and the character of tho western and north-western coast, and to observe the gradual change in vegetation and animal life from one side of the continent to the other." This expedition set out in December, 1?4G, and was expected to occupy not less than two years and a half in reaching Swnn River. The following is the last letter ever received from him, addressed to a friend in Sydney : —

"I take the last opportunity of giving you an account of my progress. For eleven days wo travelled from Mr. Birell's station, on the Condamine, to Mr. Slat p hers ou's, on the Fkzroy Downs. Though the country was occasionally

Dr. Lbichabdt.

very difficult, jet everything went on well. My moles are in excellent order, my companions in excellent spirits. Three of my cattle are footsore, but I shall kill one of them to-night to lay in our necessary stock of dried beef.

"The Fitiroj Downs, over which we travelled for about twenty-two miles from east to west, is indeed a splendid region, and Sir Thomas Mitchell has not exaggerated their beauty in his account. The soil is pebbly and sound, richly grassed, and, to judge from the myall, of most fattening quality. I came right on Mount Abundance, and passed over a gap of it with my whole train. My latitude agreed well with Mitchell's. I fear that the absence of water on Fitkroy Downs will render this fine country to a great degree unavailable. I observe the thermometer daily at 6 and p.m., which are the only convenient hours. I have tried the wet thermometer, but I am afraid my observations will be very deficient. I shall, however, improve on them as I proceed. The only serious accident that has happened was the loss of a spade ; but we are fortunate enough to make it up on this station, where the superintendent is going to spare ns one

" Though the days are still very hot, the beautiful clear nights are cool, and

42 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

benumb the mosquitoes, which have ceased to trouble us. Myriads of flies are

the only annoyance we have.

" Seeing how much I have been favoured in my present progress, I am full of

hope that our Almighty Protector will allow me to bring my darling scheme to

a successful termination. — Your most sincere friend,

" Ludwio Leichakdt. u Mb. Macphebson'8 Station, Coooon, April 3, 1848."

In 1852 it seems hopeless ever to expect to hear of brave Leichardt.

It would be impossible in any reasonable space to convey a correct idea of the physical character of a country like Melbourne, Port Jackson, and Wide Bay, which extends over more than eight hundred miles of coast range alone. But the distinctive features of this north-eastern coast, as far as Moreton Bay, have been very clearly summed up by Mr. Clement Hodgkinson, in his before-quoted work : —

" First. Its geological formation, which, instead of being sandstone, which so generally predominates on the Hunter, consists of rocks of primitive or transition origin, such as granite, trap, ancient limestone, slates, &c., all which in Australia furnish, by their decomposition, a much more fertile surface than sandstone.

"Secondly. The mountainous nature of the country, the great altitude of the mountains exceeding six thousand feet above the level of the sea, and their proximity to the coast.

" Thirdly. The abundance of water and the proximity of navigable rivers. From Moreton Bay to Macquarie, in 270 miles of cost, there are nine rivers with bar harbours, which can be entered bv coasting vessels and small steamers, viz., the Brisbane, Tweed, Richmond, Clarence, Bellergen, Macleary, Hastings, Camden Haven, and the Manning.

" Lastly. The fitness of the rich alluvial soil, which extends in continuous narrow borders of brush land along these rivers, for tropical cultivation (if labour could be applied at not too great a cost at clearing away the brush)."

Thus it will be observed that the north and north-eastern track of New South Wales, lying between the mountains and the sea, is exempt from the aridity which characterizes a large portion of Australia.

Retracing our steps, we will now take a glance at what may be called the transmontane regions, lying parallel to the coast district just described, separated by the dividing range of the Blue Mountains, or, as it has been lately-termed, the Australian Cordilleras.

Passing the dividing range which separates the hot lower countries watered by the Brisbane and the Clarence, we reach Darling Downs (discovered by Allan Cunningham, the king's botanist, in 1830, when he travelled from Sydney to Moreton Bay by land), which are watered

P1Tzr0T Dowks To Pahdoras Pass.

by the river of the same name. These downs are part of a system of high table lands continued toward the north, where its boundaries are indefinite, by the Fitzroy Downs, discovered by Sir Thomas Mitchell in 1846, and toward the south by the New England district and the Liverpool Plains, hounded on the south by the great dividing or Liverpool Range, through which Pandora's Pass gives exit to the Hunter River ; and thus, with intervals of mountain range or desert, a series of pastoral plains run parallel with the interior of the mountain range which encircles the eastern coast of Australia, including the Goulburn, Bathurst district, the Maneroo or Brisbane Downs, and the Murray district, which flow into, if we may use the term, the province of Victoria. And in this series of pastoral plains the climate is considerably modified by their altitude above the sea. It was these plains, where fine woolled sheep increase and multiply at the least possible expense, which first gave exports and wealth to Australia. Before the shepherd and his flock, the savage and the emu gradually disappear.

Chapter Xxit. Journey From Port Jackson To Port Phillip.

BOTANY BAY— ILL A WARRA— RAILWAY TO JERVIS BAY— TWOFOLD BAY— BOYP TOWN AND EDEN— PORT PHILLIP BAY — WILLIAMS' TOWN— MELBOURNE — GEELONG— PORTLAND BAY— DIVISIONS OF VICTORIA PROVINCE— GIPPS'S LAND —DISCOVERY— THE LYRE BIRD OF GIPPS'S LAND— GRASS TREES— THE PHEA- SANTS OR MOCKING BIRDS OF AUSTRALIA.

IN traversing the coast from Port Jackson to Port Phillip there is a singular absence of good harbours. The first, Botany Bay, fourteen miles from Port Jackson, receives the waters of the George River, on which the township of Liverpool was planted by Maequarie, but has not flourished ; and the Cook's River, which has been dammed, for the purpose of affording a supply of fresh water to Sydney. Botany Bay is unsheltered, and offered indifferent accommodation for small vessels. A brass plate on the cliffs marks the spot where Captain Cook first landed ; and the stranger may drink from the well of fresh water opened by the illustrious navigator.

Between Botany Bay and Shoalhaven is Ulawarra, also known as the Five Islands, one of the most fertile and wildly beautiful districts in the world, which, from the peculiarity of its' situation, bounded by the sea for eighteen miles, running north and south, and by a mountain chain, which encircles about 150,000 acres, unites the peculiarities of both temperate and tropical climates, — a sort of Norway or Switzerland rocks, lakes, fat alluvial valleys, under a southern sun, tempered by breezes from the sea. We descend from the landward side by crossing a range of hills 1,500 feet in height, so precipitous that it is difficult for a horseman to ride down, and, without dismounting, impossible for a loaded dray.

The communication with Sydney, which it supplies with large quantities of fruit, vegetables, and agricultural produce, is chiefly carried on by coasters from the small harbour of Wollongong, a favourite resort for invalids. Here is a celebrated show-garden, where may be seen fruits antf watercress, with oranges, pomegranates, nectarines, and bananas. Here is Ulawarra Lake, too, than which it is scarcely possible to conceive anything more picturesquely beautiful, environed by rocks and tropical vegetation, peopled with bright-coloured birds.

Railway To Jervir I

At Illawarra the palm and the tree-fern flourish, and from land as fertile and cultivation as careful as that of Devonshire. A short walk may bring you to a camp of aborigines sheltering from the warm rain beneath their gunyah, the nearest approach to a hut which these poor creatures have contrived.

Jervia Bay is eighty miles from Sydney, with an entrance two miles wide, and an inner harbour three leagues in length, safe for ships of the heaviest burden, with access to ample supplies of wood and water, and presents a total change of climate. Unfortunately, this fine port is surrounded by a hopelessly barren country. It has been suggested by Mr. Balfe, an experimental Australian surveyor, that Jervis Bay should become the terminus of a railway from the Bathurst district.

A railway for wool and tallow would be a very doubtful speculation ; but recent events have laid the foundation for more important exports and imports. Perhaps by following the course of streams it would be possible to find workable gradients for a tramway on the Welsh or American plan.

The next port, Bateman's Bay, the outlet of the Clyde River, is only accessible for coasters ; but it has recently come into notice from

346 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

the discovery of the Australian gold-diggings, distant only thirty miles ; that thirty miles being over a country of so difficult a character that a party with loaded packhorses were three days in crossing it.

The last harbour in the New South Wales district is Twofold Bay, 240 miles from Sydney, on which two townships have been founded, Eden by the government, and Boyd Town by the late Benjamin Boyd, with the funds of a Scotch company which he represented. Eden has never been anything better than a project at the expense of a few foolish land speculators. Boyd Town enjoyed a brief period of factitious prosperity, when the steamers, whalers, and yacht of the , founder lay in harbour. It was at Boyd Town he appeared with almost viceroyal state, when laying the first stone of the never-lighted lighthouse ; and it was there that he landed the island cannibals whom he had purchased from their savage conquerors, with the view of reducing wages by introducing slavery into Australia, rather than encourage shepherd families upon his boundless sheep-runs.

The steep range of hills which separates Twofold Bay from the vast squatting district of Maneroo has hitherto, in spite of a road constructed at much expense by Mr. Boyd, to a great degree neutralized its advantageous position as the only harbour for large ships on a long line of coast. It is still used as a station for shore whalers, almost the only station in the colony. There has been a great falling off in the whaling operations of the Sydney merchants. The Australian whalers are for the most part of from 200 to 300 tons burthen. All on board, from the captain downwards, are paid by a share of the oil procured, which share is called, in whalemen's parlance, a " lay," and is proportioned of course to the rank and ability of the man. There is one feature of this trade in the Pacific which is not generally known, — the intercourse of those who follow it with the tribes of Polynesia. Whaling captains generally seek some of the islands for the purpose of procuring supplies of provisions, or of repairing slight damages sustained at sea ; because in the first place, they can obtain provisions there at infinitely less cost than in any of the colonial ports ; and in the second place, they find it easier by this course to keep their men together. Supplies are frequently also procured in boat, without bringing the vessel to an anchor. These supplies, consisting of pigs and fowls, with yams, cocoanuts, bread-fruit, and other productions of a similar nature, are procured by barter : calicoes, hardware, common trinkets, and other matters likely to be prized by the untutored islanders, being carried for that purpose. These articles are technically known as " trade." All the precautions which the captains can take are insufficient to prevent

Port Phillip Bay. 347

occasional desertion ; and extraordinarily numerous as are the islands of the Pacific, there is scarcely one of them which has not one or more runaway sailors domesticated among the people who inhabit it.

From Twofold Bay, passing Cape Howe, which receives the point of the imaginary line dividing the provinces of New South Wales and Victoria, no harbour presents itself until we reach Corner Inlet, within which is Alberton, on the River Albert, the capital of the fine district of Gipps's Land, unfortunately obstructed by a bar. Then follows Western Port, discovered by George Bass in his whale-boat, a port formed by two islands. Leaving Western Port, we enter the now world-famous Port Phillip, an inland sea, which receives the ships whose cargoes or passengers are destined for the towns of Melbourne and Geelong.

The entrance to Port Phillip Bay is little more than one mile and a half across. On the one hand Point Nepean, a low, sandy promontory, like a rabbit warren without rabbits, at the base of the cape : beyond rises for a thousand feet Arthur's Seat, a woody range of hills, precipitous toward the sea, with barely room for a road between its foot and the flood-tide. In the distance, on the same margin, Mount Eliza, a range of hills, with extensive outline, mark the bounds of Port Phillip Bay. On the other side the lowlands of Indented Head and Shortland Bluff present a dull scene, sprinkled with funereal shiak or " she-oak trees."

The rush of waters through the narrow canal into the Great Lake, nearly fifty miles in length by twenty-five in breadth, which forms Port Phillip, in certain states of the wind and tide, creates a foaming, stormy whirl of water not a little alarming to the inexperienced landsman. Within the bay the waters calm down, and a beautiful and picturesque scene is unrolled.

At Port Phillip Bay the great dividing range which runs parallel at varying distances from the coast from Wide Bay, penetrating New South Wales under various names (the Blue Mountains near Sydney, the Australian Alps in Gipps's Land), seems to sink into the sea across Bass's Straits, where its course is marked by a chain of islands, and reappears with the same character in Van Diemen's Land.

Thus it is that, sailing up the bay, the scenery changes : the rugged cliffs and alpine ranges of the east coast give way to undulating grassy plains, sprinkled with picturesque hills. The western arm of Port Phillip, extending about twenty miles, opens the course to Geelong. In sailing up the bay the hills around Geelong appear covered with cultivation.

346 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Ships of burden for Melbourne cast anchor in Hobson's Bay, at the mouth of the River Yarra, off Williams Town, which is built on a flat promontory, with three sides to the water. Williams Town was laid out by Sir Richard Bourke as the seaport of Fort Phillip, for which the situation affords advantages ; but the want of good drinking water has hitherto hindered it from making any progress since the years of the mania when town lots were sold there at a great price. It contains the harbour master's residence, two or three public-houses, a few butchers' shops, a clergyman's house, and a small temporary church. An aqueduct or water-pipes would soon make Williams Town an important place.

The shores of the Yarra are so even with Hobson s Bay that from the anchorage the entrance can scarcely be distinguished.

From Hobson's Bay, taking a boat for a mile, a walk or ride of a mile and a half will bring the traveller to Melbourne, but by the winding channel of the river, which is just wide and deep enough to admit the steamers which ply constantly from Sydney and Geelong, the distance is seven miles.

" Passing the junction of the Maryburrong, or Salt-water River, on Ae bank of which are beautiful villa sites, the Melbourne racecourse, and several establishments for boiling down sheep and cattle into tallow, which give out a most villanous odour, the city, of which only an indistinct glimpse was to be observed from the bay, comes in view ; the cathedral, a heavy building, without a tower or a steeple ; and the government offices, built of stone, without ornament, on the highest point of the hill." The voyage ends in a sort of pool where steamers can find room to turn round and take up a berth alongside the quay. A breakwater has been erected on the foundation of a natural ledge of rocks which effectually divides the fresh water from the salt.

Melbourne occupies two sides of a valley, East Hill and West Hill, of very fertile soil. Inferior in port accommodation and in picturesque beauty to Sydney, it has the advantage of being in the midst of productive corn-fields, gardens, vineyards, and pastures.

The principal street is a mile long, crossed at right angles by other streets of half that length : a macadamized causeway runs down the middle, leaving a strip on each side to be converted into mud in the rainy season. The footpaths for the most part are of gravel, with kerbstones. So far there is an improvement. Some years ago a traveller was shocked the day after his arrival by seeing among the casual announcements in a local paper " Another Child Drowned in the Streets of Melbourne."

The buildings present the irregularity incident to all colonial towns :

MOUNT HACEDOff, 349

occasionally great gaps of building land are to be found representing investments made eight or ten years ago by absentee speculators. The chief lion work of Melbourne is a stone bridge across the Yarra, of the same size and proportions as the centre arch of London-bridge, which cost an enormous sum.

The population was about twenty thousand in 1851 ; what it is now would be difficult to say. It is to be feared that houses will be built more rapidly than the present streets will be drained and rendered wholesome. The lower part of Melbourne is subject to sudden floods from the falling of rains and melting of snow in the range of hills in which the Yarra takes its rise. An Australian flood is " short, sharp, and decisive."

From the summit of either East or West Hill, by which the valley of Melbourne is formed, may be seen Mount Macedon, the crowning mountain of a range of the same name thirty-five miles from the city, three thousand feet in height, covered with open forests, and the richest vegetation of Australia. Thence may be viewed the richest mountain in the world, the Mount Byng of its discoverer Mitchell, the Mount

-

m

J-

WUmJSsEe&sia

%Jmm

350 The Three C0L05Ies Op Australia.

Alexander in gold-digging records. To tbe north of Mount Alexander

Mount Hope, from the summit of which the weary ejes of MhcheQ

were gladdened by all the sylvan pastoral glories of "Australia Felix.*

Fifty-four miles from Melbourne, by sea or land, with access by steamers several times in the day, is Geelong, the western arm of Pott Phillip, which " opens on the larboard hand of a vessel immediately upon clearing the shoals at the entrance of the Great Lake, standing between the miniature Bay of Corio with its picturesque green hUb and sheltered water, and the River Barwon, which flows into the Lake Connemarra."

The situation in the centre of one of the best grazing and agricultural districts, near a gold-field, will probably render it an important town. A bar at the mouth of the harbour at present restricts the entry of vessels drawing more than ten feet water; but this, it is thought, may be removed by dredging.

Should this be the case, the province of Victoria will enjoy the advantage of two excellent available ports, and have two great towns. In the other provinces there seems no probability of any rival competing with Sydney or Port Adelaide.

Forty miles from Geelong the Buninyong range forms part of the second series of mountains, after the termination of the Australian Alps. At Ballarat, one of the spurs of Buninyong. the first gold-field in Victoria was worked, in the midst of plains of unequalled fertility.

In proceeding along the coast to the point where an engineering line divides Victoria from South Australia, the whole coast line of the former, being about GOO miles, the most important harbour is found in Portland Bav, 25.5 miles from Melbourne.

Three streams, none of them navigable, fall into this bay, which is little better than a roadstead, considered especially dangerous when the south-easterly gales, which prevail during the summer months, are blowing. The government has recently been compelled to pay one pound a ton more for vessels despatched to Portland Bay than to Hobson's Bay. The north shore is low ; the western rises in bold cliffs, upwards of 150 feet.

It was at Portland Bav that one of the earliest settlements was formed by one of Messrs. Henty's whaling parties, on which the land explorers came to their great surprise, after many weeks' journey through an unknown, uninhabited country.

The Portland Bay district receives streams from the Grampians, a range running to the northward, of which Mount William, the extreme eastern point, is 4,500 feet in height. Mitchell ascended Mount

Fobtland Bat.

Abrupt, on ttie south-eastern extremity of the Grampian range, and beheld from the edge of an almost perpendicular precipice, 1,700 feet in height, vast open plains, bordered with forests and studded with lakes. " Certainly a land more favourable could not be found. Flocks might be turned out upon its hills, or the plough at once set going upon its plains. No primeval forests require to be first rooted out here, although there is as much timber as could be needed for utility or ornament." Australia Felix is one of the few regions in which the sanguine expectations of the discoverers have been realized.

It will be found on examining a map of the province of Victoria and of the Melbourne district, — and a most excellent one has been published by Mr. Ham, of Melbourne, — that it has three natural divisions. The centra] division, including Australia Felix and Mount Alexander, finds its natural port and capital in Melbourne. The western division, including Portland Bay, for want of a better harbour, finds its outlet chiefly at Qeelong. The eastern division, including Oipps's Land, finds partly an outlet at Western Fort ; but Oipps's Land must export and import through Alberton.

352 The Three Colonies Of Australia*

Victoria has many streams and rivulets, bat no rivers navigable in the European sense of the term.

Gipps's Land was discovered by Count Strzelecki, C.B., who is equally eminent as a scientific traveller and philanthropist. The honour lias been claimed by Dr. Lang for a stockman, who communicated his discovery to his employers some months before the count published his report. This is probable. Stockmen have been the first explorers of most of the finest pasture districts of Australia ; hut it is contrary to the custom and interest of squatters to make such discoveries public.

In the count's report to Sir George Gipps he says, " Seventeen miles S.S.E. from Lake Omeo, a beautiful stream, the first of the eastern waters, soon assumed the breadth of a river, and appeared to be a guide into a country hitherto unoccupied by white men. A hilly country closes the valley, narrows the river banks, and brings the explorer across the mountain ridges to an elevation whence there is a view of the sea on the distant horizon ; to the south-east an undulating country, with mountain ridges to the north-east. Approaching or receding from the river, according to the windings of its bordering hills, the descent into a noble forest is effected. A series of rich pasture valleys, prairies, and open forests, are intersected and studded with rivers, lakes, and wooded hills ; the pastures opening out and sloping towards the sea." Strzelecki describes Gipps's Land, viewed from Mount Gisborne, as resembling a semi-linear amphitheatre, walled from north-east to south-west by lofty picturesque mountain scenery, and sloping towards the south-east down to the sea.

In 1840 Strzelecki was engaged for twenty-six days in cutting his way through the scrub-covered ranges between Gipps's Land and Western Port, was obliged to abandon his packhorses, and he and his party did not escape without imminent danger both from famine and exhaustion.

In 1844 Mr. Haydon, with a party of twelve able-bodied men, including black native police, was instructed by the government to open up a practicable route for cattle from Western Port to Gipps's Land. He lias published a very interesting account of his expedition, with some spirited illustrations. lie was engaged thirty days in the task, and he, too, very nearly perished in the scrub ; yet he considered himself well repaid for the famine and fatigue he had endured " by the sight of the fine plains — Barneys Plains of the map — beyond the Glengarry." The good country lies upwards of fifty miles from the government township of Victoria, founded on the Albert River.

Toe Lire Bird Of Oipps&#x27;S Land. 353

It is the opinion of Mr. Haydon that the greater part of the scrub country through which he travelled would be capable of cultivation if cleared. This scrubby tract is nowhere found in Victoria except between Gipps'a Land and Western Port

It was while performing this journey that he had an opportunity of closely examining the shy and curious lyre bird (Memora tvperba), which is peculiar to Australia, and only found on the south-eastern coast. The settlers sometimes called it a pheasant, but it is in reality one of the thrush family. The lyre bird is so extremely shy that even the enthusiastic researches of Mr. Gould did not enable him to ascertain satisfactorily its breeding habits and the number of its eggs.

" I was awakened," writes Mr. Haydon, " at sunrise by the singing of numerous pheasants. These are the mocking-birds of Australia, imitating all sounds that are heard in the bush in great perfection ; they

354 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

are about the size of a (small) fowl, of a dirty brown colour, approaching to black in some parts ; their greatest attraction consists in the graceful tail of the cock bird, which is something like a lyre. But little is known of their habits, for it is seldom they are found near the dwellings of civilized man.

" Hearing one scratching in the scrub close to the dray, I crawled out, gun in hand, intending to provide a fresh meal for breakfast. The sun, having just risen, inclined it to commence its morning song ; but the natural note (bleu bleu) was almost lost among the multitude of imitative sounds through which it ran — croaking like a crow, then screaming like a cockatoo, chattering like a parrot, and howling like the native dog — until a stranger might have fancied that he was in the midst of them all. Creeping cautiously round a point of scrub, I came in view of a large cock bird, strutting round in a circle, scratching up the leaves and mould with his formidable claws, while feeding upon a small leech which is the torment of travellers, and spreading open his beauteous tail to catch the rays of the sun as it broke through the dense forest. As I raised my gun, a piece went off within six feet of me : it was one of the black police who had blown the bird's head off that had been amusing me for more than an hour."

These birds when disturbed never rise high, but run off into the densest scrub, scarcely allowing a sportsman time to raise his piece before they are out of Ids reach. Even the aborigines, who are so skilful in creeping up to game of all kinds, seldom kill more than three brace in a day. Their song is not often heard during rain, or when the sun is obscured. "The nest is about three feet in circumference, and one foot deep, having an orifice on one side : they lay but one egg, of slate colour with black spots. The female is a very unattractive bird, having but a poor tail, nothing like the male."

Gipps's Land, with its boundary of snow-capped precipitous mountains, its fine plains, many lakes, and temperate climate, may be considered as one of the several contrasts of soil, climate, and vegetation, of which Darling Downs, Moreton Bay, Illawarra, and Bathurst, each afford different examples — variations which deserve more minute examinations than we can afford space to give, but which may be studied in the travels of Mitchell, Sturt, Leichardt, and Strzelecki.

In the last stage of Mr. Haydon's expedition he passed some hours over grass-tree plains, which, although picturesque, present a very dismal idea to the settler, as where they grow, — and they are found throughout the coast range of the three colonies, — the district may be pronounced barren, except to the botanist.

Grabs Trees — South Australia.

"The grass (Xanthorhoea) trees are from two to four feet, the crown of the leaves about four feet, and the flower-stem rising out of the midst of the fibre-like foliage from four to six feet."

Chapter Xxv. South Australia.

SOUTH AUSTRALIA— MOUNT LOFTT-MOUNT BARKER— CITY OP ADELAIDE— THE RIVERS MURP.UMDIDGEE AND MURRAY— NAVIGATION OF THE MURRAY— CAL

DESCRIPTION OF ADELAIDE— MINES OF COPPER. LEAD, SILVER, AND GOLD— THE RURRA HUH HA— STATISTICS OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

THE River Glenelg, flowing into the sea, marks the natural boundary between the province of Victoria and that of South Australia, thence embracing a seaboard of about fifteen hundred miles, into which no river navigable by vessels of burden flows, and only two ports have, as yet, been found capable of safely accommodating ships of burden. As

356 The Three C0L0Nie8 Op Australia.

a compensation, inland journeys may be performed with little obstruction, on horseback or by drays, for hundreds of miles.

The first important indentation into the line of the coast is Encounter Bay ; but there are coasting ports at Bivoli Bay and Guichen Bay, at which wool has been shipped. Hopes were once confidently entertained of finding an entrance from the sea to the Biver Murray, but it has unfortunately proved that this, the noblest stream in Australia, ends in the Lake Alexandrina, and is divided from the ocean by a barrier of land and a surf-beaten sea margin.

On rounding Cape Jervis, which forms the apex of the county of Hindmarsh, which is for the most part occupied by industrious settlers, although the promontory itself is rather barren, and only known for its shore whale-fishery, Eingscote Harbour and Nepean Bay, on the opposite shores of Kangaroo Island, appear excellent harbours, and one of them well supplied with water. Unfortunately they lead to nothing. The buildings erected by the South Australian Company in 1837 were permitted to fall into decay. Recently a few stock stations have been taken up on the island, and about one hundred persons are resident there.

The, kangaroos, so numerous in Flinders' time, and the emus have disappeared ; and even the large white eagles that stooped upon his men, mistaking them for kangaroos, have become rare.

Entering St. Vincent's Gulf, and passing Holdfast Bay, where Governor Hindmarsh disembarked, and Mrs. Hindmarsh 's piano was floated ashore through the surf, — for it is no harbour at all, but a dangerous open roadstead, — passing a number of seaside villages, Port Adelaide is reached, which, by dint of dredging and with the advantage of quays, has become a safe and convenient harbour, and, with the aid of the intended railroad, will afford the city of Adelaide nearly as much convenience as if it had been planted on a navigable river, or on a deep harbour; that was impossible, since no site exists in South Australia combining a good harbour, agricultural land, and fresh water. No other port presents itself in St. Vincent's Gulf, unless we except Port Wakefield, to which vessels from Swansea with cargoes of coal for smelting copper have recently been consigned. It has been proposed to construct a tramway between this port and the Burra Burra mines, and an attempt would have been made to execute this project if the gold-diggings had not temporarily withdrawn all English speculation from South Australia.

The whole sea face of York Peninsula and Spencer's Gulf is unfavourable to the formation of a port and town, until we arrive at

Mount Loptt — Mount Barker — City Of Adelaide, 357

Port Lincoln, on the western arm of Spencer's Gulf, where a natural harbour could receive the largest squadron that ever went to sea, — a landlocked estuary, protected at its mouth by Boston Island, with three arms or bays, Spalding Cove, Port Lincoln proper, and Boston Bay. But these harbours, viewed with so much admiration by seamen, are silent ; no busy population labours on the shores, a few scattered flocks and herds are all that the mainland supports ; and the allotments, which were competed for so eagerly in the years of land mania, are left to nature and a few wandering cattle.

On entering Port Lincoln, a white obelisk on the summit of a hill, erected to the memory of Flinders, on the spot whence he viewed the future province of Australia, by Sir John Franklin, who was one of his officers, proves that a sailor had a better sense of what was due from the countrymen of a great man than the colonists who have so largely benefited by his laborious investigations.

To pursue the coast line of the province of Victoria to 132° of £. longitude, where it ends in a desert, would be useless, as no rivers or harbours break the line of, for the most part, the uninhabited coast.

Equally vain would it be to state, as foolish South Australian advocates who do not know the value of truth frequently do, that South Australia contains an area of 300,000 square miles, or nearly twenty millions of acres, without adding that a very large proportion of this vast space is occupied by stony deserts and lakes of mud. Nevertheless, enough of land remains admirably fertile and well watered to support a large population, much larger than is likely to occupy it for a long series of years. In the most inhospitable regions, copper, lead, silver, and iron have been found ; and there is no reason to doubt that gold will eventually be discovered.

The district in a north-westerly direction, between Port Lincoln and Streaky Bay, has been but imperfectly explored, and, with the exception of a few detached squatters' stations, settlement has not extended beyond the peninsula formed between the River Murray and St. Vincent's jGulf, the furthest inland township being founded by the Burra Burra mine, ninety miles from the capital.

South Australia is intersected by three mountain ranges, Mount Lofty, Mount Barker, and Wakefield.

The Mount Lofty range runs from north-west, and, after attaining a height of about 2,000 feet, twelve miles east of Adelaide, falls to the south-west, terminating in low clifla on the seashore near Ockaparinga.

358 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

From these hills, Adelaide, in the valley of the Torrens, presents a scene, a green oasis in the midst of a bed of sand running like a riband along the sea by which it has been upheaved.

Capital farms occupy the foot of Mount Lofty, with a sure market in Adelaide. A steep road leads across the hills or mountains ; on the other side rich but not extensive valleys are found ; in one of these, twenty-four miles from Adelaide, is Hansdorf, one of three German settlements to which South Australia owes much in vine culture and sheep management. Beyond, parallel with Mount Lofty, is the Mount Barker range, the summit being 800 feet above the level of the surrounding country, which is about 1,600 feet above the level of the sea. The summit forms table land, on which there are some good cattle and sheep stations. This is the range which divides the waters that flow on the one side into the Murray and Lake Alexandrina, and on the other into Spencer's Gulf.

To the north of Adelaide a long tract of level, well-watered country extends, which, at about one hundred miles distance, opens into a series of high open downs.

The River Torrens, which formed so prominent a feature in early puffs and pictures of the colony, is not a river at all, but, like many of the misnamed rivers of Australia, simply a watercourse, which during the rainy season rushes along furiously, ending in a marsh ; but when the rains cease the " river " becomes a mere chain of pools, unreplenished with mountain springs, which shrink daily with the heat, like a farmyard rain-filled pond, such as are common on the wolds of Lincolnshire. Colonel Light saw the Torrens when full of water, and that and the beauty of the valley decided his choice. Fortunately water is to be obtained in Adelaide by sinking wells, at a very moderate expense ; and the same advantage is found on farms, and in the slopes of the neighbouring hills. But in this instance of the Torrens, as in many others, the injudicious puffs of speculators reacted and threw undeserved discredit on the solid advantages of a very fine colony.

The river of South Australia is the Murray, which, rising in the Australian Alps, where its sources were discovered by Count Strzelecki near Mount Kosciusko, in Victoria, receives the waters of the Murrumbidgee, the Lachlan, and the Darling, and presents, at certain times of the year, so full and flowing a stream that the early colonists expected to draw down its waters the commerce of the squatting districts of Gass and Albury, in New South Wales ; for they calculated that the cheapness of an unbroken water communication would draw away the dray traffic, wluch was then, and is now, carried to Sydney. But the

The Rivers Murrumbidgee And Murray. 359

uncertain supply of water, and other obstacles in rocks and snags, have so far, indefinitely, adjourned this project.

The Murrumbidgee rises in the dividing range of mountains in the Maneroo district, two hundred and fifty miles S.W. of the city of Sydney, flows for five hundred miles, until it unites with the Lachlan at a point where the brave Sturt took a boat and descended to the sea in thirty-six days, when he discovered South Australia, returning in forty days — thus earning the title of the father of South Australia.

The early course of the Murrumbidgee is between hills steeply sloping, covered with herbage and creeping vines, down to the water's edge. " As I sat in a boat," writes a lady to the author, " I could see above me small, very small, cattle, in single file, now lost in the foliage, now reappearing, as, by zigzag well-worn paths, they descended to the water to drink. So lofty and steep were the cliffs that I fancied they would fall down upon me. At length they made their appearance at the edge of the stream, drinking beneath bowers of overhanging creepers — a huge bull and a mob of portly cows."

The space encircled between this river and the Murray (the Murray was formerly named the Hume by its discoverers, Hovel and Hume) is one of the fine squatting-grounds of New South Wales. Higher up the stream the hills disappear, and long alluvial fiats succeed. The Murrumbidgee spreads and loses some of its waters in the marshes of the Lachlan.

It is the peculiar character of the Murray and of the Darling and Murrumbidgee to flow hundreds of miles without receiving any tributaries.

The navigation of the River Murray has been the subject of a commission appointed by Sir Henry Young, the present Governor of South Australia ; and, although the financial calculations of the commission have been questioned by a committee of the South Australian Legislative Council, it is presumed their facts may be relied on. They are quoted from the abstract of a gentleman (Mr. White) who was endeavouring to obtain steamers to open the navigation of this river : —

" In August, 1850, the Legislative Council of that province voted ' £4,000 to be equally divided between the two first iron steamers of not less than fortyhorse power, and not exceeding two feet draught of water when loaded, that shall successfully navigate the waters of the River Murray from the Goolwa to the junction of the Darling, computed to be about five hundred and fifty-one miles.'

"1st. The natural seamouth of the Murray cannot be entered, owing to the - great surf that is constantly breaking on the Encounter Bay coast, and consequently any vessels intended to navigate the river would hare to be constructed on the shores of the Lake Alexandrina.

w 2

360 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

" 2nd. This lake, into which the river empties itself prerions to its passage to the sea, is about thirty miles long by ten broad, and from six to eighteen fathoms deep, and fresh water is found about the middle.

" 3rd. The river preserves an uniform width of about three hundred yards to the junction of the Darling, which latter river is about one hundred yards wide, and the width of the Murray is not materially altered onwards to the junction of the Murrumbidgee and the Lachlan. The soundings that have been made from the Lake to the Darling, in the months of September and October, give an average depth of two fathoms, or rather, this may be said to be the shallowest.

" The Murray is subject, like all the other streams in the country, to annual floods. It begins to rise towards the end of June, and continues rising until the end of January, generally from ten to twelve feet.

" The only impediments that occur are in the shape of snags or fallen trees, which in some places would have to be removed; but for this the assistance of the natives could be obtained, and up to the junction of the Darling they present no serious obstacle. This point being the limit of the province, the river beyond has not been surveyed; but from those who have descended it so far as the town of Albury (a distance of only three hundred and sixty miles from Sydney) it has been ascertained that, before steam-vessels of the smallest size could navigate it, the snags would have to be removed, though a canoe, drawing eleven inches of water, went the entire distance at a time when the river was lower than has been known within the memory of the ' white man.' From a point in the channel of the Goolwa, which is a stream issuing from the lake, and also one of the mouths of the Murray, it is proposed to lay down a railroad of seven miles in length to a point in Encounter Bay where a safe anchorage may be effected. In the event of any unforeseen difficulties occurring in the construction of Port Elliot, it would be necessary to make a road from Morundee to the city of Adelaide (a distance of about sixty miles), which road would pass through some of the richest districts of South Australia.

" With reference to the country of the Lower Murray, the estimate of the traffic is about 2,000 tons annually, made up of ores from the mines, green, dairy, and other produce.

" On either side of the river to the Darling there are extensive cattle -runs, all of which are taken up.

" Proceeding up the river from this point, we enter upon the province of Victoria, and the extensive sheep-runs of the Lachlan, the Lower Darling, and the Murrumbidgee, which in June, 1850, according to the New South Wales statistical and other authentic accounts, were stocked by 1,155,774 sheep, 306,861 horned cattle, 10,093 horses, and 1,872 pigs. There is in Australia an annual increase of 40 per cent, on sheep, and 25 per cent, on cattle. According to the commissioners' report, the increase by the close of 1852, allowing for sales, &c, will have amounted to, say, 2,500,000 sheep, 500,000 cattle, the former yielding about 3,384 tons wool, washed and unwashed; and if a quarter of the annual increase were boiled down, say 250,000 sheep, averaging 28 lbs. tallow, 3,125 tons ; and 31,000 cattle, averaging 154 lbs. tallow, 2,130 tons. Total annual freights, 8,603 tons, independent of hides, skins, and other matters, at present thrown aside on account of the great cost of transport.

"For return cargo it is estimated that no less than 5,000 rations would offer, say 1,450 tons, with at least an equal quantity of slops, iron, paling, and other goods, say 200 tons. The produce from those remote districts is at

Calculation For Steam Traffic.

presort conveyed to Melbourne and Geelong in bullock -drays, travelling about ten miles a day, occupying many weeks m its transit to the port"

To this statement it right to add, that, in our opinion, speculations involving so trifling an amount of capital at a couple of small iron steam-boats, should be undertaken and managed by colonists or the provincial government, and would be, if worth doing at alL

The navigation of the Hurray is an enterprise, if feasible, within the means of a party of colonists, although the clearing of the river is a national and provincial work, to which this country might be called upon to contribute ; but the leu absentees have to do with small colonial speculations the better for their finances and the credit of the colony.

In the Murray scrub, — a beautiful but barren belt of shrubs and plants from fifteen to twenty miles in breadth, which runs parallel to the river for many miles between Lake Alexandrina and the Great Bend in lat. 34 8., — a great number of the rare birds and animals of Australia are to

The Three Colonies Of Australia.

be seen ; amongst others, the leipoa, or mound-building bird, improperly named by the colonists the wild turkey, is found in great numbers ; and the satin, or bower bird, which builds a bower for its mate so curiously arched and adorned with shells and shining stones that when Mr. Gould first discovered one he took it for the playground of some aboriginal child. The leipoa, which was first brought before the attention of the scientific world by Mr. Gould, realizes the ancient table of the ostrich, and buries its eggs, to be hatched by the fermentation of a mound of decomposed leaves and earth.

Mr. Gould observes in his great work, from which all bur objects of natural history have been, by permission, copied : —

" This family of birds ( TaUegaila, Leipoa, and Megapodhu) form part of a great family of birds inhabiting Australia, New Guinea, the Celebes, and the Philippine Islands, whose habits and economy diner from those of every other group of birds which now exists upon the surface of our globe. In their structure they are most nearly allied to the GaUinaae, while in some of their actions and in their mode of flight they much resemble theRaUidm: the small size of their brain, coupled with the extraordinary means employed for the incubation of their eggs, indicates an extremely low degree of organization. Three species inhabiting Australia, viz., Leipoa ocellatta, Tattegalla, and Megapodixu tumulus, although referable to distinct genera, have many habits in common, particularly in their mode of incubation, each and all depositing their eggs in mounds of earth and leaves, which, becoming heated either by fermentation of the vegetable matter or by the sun's rays, form a kind of natural hatch-

TBS MOUNB-BCILBma BIRD.

ing apparatus, from which the young at length emerge, fully feathered, capable of sustaining life by their own unaided efforts."

The male bird of the leipoa (according to a letter to Mr. Gould from Sir George Grey, the present Governor of New Zealand) weighs about four pounds and a half; they never fly if they can help it, and roost on trees at night. The mounds are from twelve to thirteen feet in circumference at the base, and from two to throe feet in height. To construct the mound a nearly circular hole of about eighteen inches in diameter is scratched in the ground to the depth of seven or eight inches, and filled with dead leaves, dead grass, and similar materials ; over this layer a mound of sand, mixed with dry grass, &c, is thrown ; and, finally, the whole assumes the form of a dome. 'When an egg is to be deposited, the top is laid open, and a hole scraped in the centre to withia two or three inches of the bottom of the layer of dead leaves ; the egg is placed in the sand just at the edge of the hole, in a vertical position, with the smaller end downwards ; the sand is then thrown in again until the mound assumes its original form. " Egg after egg is thus deposited up to eight, arranged on the same plane in a circle, with

364 The Three Colonies 07 Australia.

a few inches of sand between each. The cock assists the hen in opening and covering up the mound. The native name on the Murray River is marrah-ko; in Western Australia the name of the bird is ngow — ngowcer meaning a tuft of feathers."

The megapodius of which we give an engraving wis found by Mr. John M'Gillivray, during a survey of Endeavour Straits, to construct a much larger mound, 2-4 feet in its utmost height, and 150 feet in circumference at the base.

South Australia has been divided into counties, which are more recognised as distinctive boundaries than in the other colonies, where the first colonization was effected by sheep.

These counties are eleven in number, viz. : — 1. Adelaide; 2. Hindmarsh; 3. Gawler; 4. Light; 5. Sturt; 6. Eyre; 7. Stanley; 8. Flinders; 9. Russell; 10. Robe; 11. Grey.

The county of Adelaide is that in which cultivation is most extensively carried on, the other districts being chiefly occupied for grazing, as the difficulty of getting crops to market prevents sellers from raising more than for their own consumption. But in every favourable situation vineyards are making great progress.

Port Adelaide has a population of 2,000, who find occupation in the extensive movements of a large export and import trade. The primitive appearance of the Mangrove Creek through which the disconsolate first colonists waded has disappeared.

A road of seven miles, through sterile sandy ground, leads to the city, which is traversed by conveyances of all kinds, from the heavy drag to the omnibus and smart dog-cart. Crossing the Torrens by a wooden bridge, one of four, which is occasionally swept away by the torrents, after performing a sinecure duty for many months, the city of Adelaide appears in the midst of trees, often full of the most rare and curious birds, which migrate periodically from the colder to the hotter climates, in a warm, pretty, and dusty valley. Adelaide, although very unlike a city according to European notions, presents a much more pleasing appearance than Melbourne, which is crowded into a narrow valley, without squares, park, or boulevard. In the park lands surrounding and intersecting the straggling streets of the former, which are as picturesque as Wiesbaden or Cheltenham, although less finished, Colonel Gawler encouraged the blacks to camp by frequent feasts of flour and mutton, and there strangers had an opportunity of seeing, sometimes to their amusement, oftencr to their surprise, their peculiar customs, habits, and sports. Many pretty cottages are to be found in the suburbs as neat and highly finished as in England.

The Park Round Adelaide. 365

South Adelaide is considered the commercial quarter of the town, and contains the principal streets, one of which is 130 feet wide, and Government House, in the centre of a domain of ten acres.

Hindley-street is the Regent-street of Adelaide, and has the distinction of being paved. For want of this luxury of civilization, coupled with the nature of the soil, Adelaide is terribly afflicted with dust, at all times a nuisance, which is indeed common to all Australian towns. Sydney has at certain times of the year its brickfielders. In addition to the park lands, which occupy a breadth of half a mile round the two divisions of the city, a cemetery and a racecourse are among its out-ofdoor ornaments.

In the surrounding suburbs many pretty villages have been founded, both inland and on the shore. The system of selling land regularly in eighty-acre lots has in some degree neutralized the disadvantage of the large absentee proprietorships and the special surveys, which have monopolized so much of the limited extent of agricultural land.

There is one point in which the South Australians possess an unquestionable superiority over the other two colonies, and that is their local literature. With the exception of the Sydney Morning Herald, which is the Times of the southern hemisphere, the newspapers and periodicals are very superior in style of getting up and in matter to those of New South Wales and Port Phillip.

This superiority is especially marked in the South Australian Almanacs, which contain a fund of useful information on the statistics, the agriculture, the horticulture, and the mining progress of the colony.

Before the check occasioned by the gold discoveries, sheep stations had been formed as far north as Mount Brown, toward the Darling, near the eastern boundary. The whole of York Peninsula had been occupied, and, in the country westward of Spencer's Gulf, flockmasters had penetrated to Anxious Bay, on the Australian Bight ; and town* ships had been founded at Rivoli Bay, in the county of Grey, and Guichen Bay, in the county of Robe, whence a coasting trade had been opened.

Ever since 1843 South Australia has been a corn-exporting country, although with great fluctuations : in that year 38,480 bushels were exported ; in the following year the quantity increased to 132,000 bushels ; but the low price, 2s. 9d. a bushel, reduced the cultivation by ten thousand acres. In 1845 the price continued low, and cultivation was further reduced ; but high prices at the end of the year increased cultivation to 36,000 acres in 1847. And thus, according to price,

Of Australia.

cultivation ebbed and flowed, constantly making more progress as small settlers became landholders, and became more steady. As a general rule it may be asserted that miners are situated in barren districts, and obliged to draw their grain and* vegetables from some considerable distance. The system of eighty-acre lots enables colonists of the cultivating class to plant themselves upon land in the most convenient distance for supplying the mines. These same cottage farmers also derived great advantage from contracts for conveying ore from the mine to the port, and coals and wood to the smelting establishments, in their bullock-drays.

In 1850 the whole original scheme of the colony had disappeared : cultivation was entirely in the hands of the working classes ; the capitalists and educated were engaged either as squatters, in commerce, or in mining speculations. The remains of the old ideas were only to be found in a little grandiloquent speech making, and, better still, in some very beautiful gardens. There were a few fortunate purchasers of town lots in the main streets who made and retained very handsome fortunes.

Mining speculations were carried to a length as extreme as in Cornwall itself. Yet in all the numerous works on South Australia it is difficult to discover, for it is never plainly stated, that only one public mine, the Burra Burra, ever paid a dividend. The Kapunda has never been

Mines Of Copper, Lead, Silver, And Oold.

in the market, having been retained by Captain Bagot, Mr. Dutton, and a few friends. It is extremely rich in yield, but, the ground being tender, the expenses in propping it up are great, as timber is scarce and labour dear.

In Cornwall there are always a certain number of mines for sale to strangers. It was the same in South Australia, Mines were manufactured for the benefit of green emigrants. Por this reason the recent crisis, in which the emigration of many thousands destroyed all fictitious credit, will do good, by directing the attention of South Australians to the true resources of their noble province.

In 1850 not less than thirty-nine mining schemes, in various stages of progress, were before the British and South Australian public, none of which paid a dividend. Most of them depended on English capital for their working, and nearly all, according to colonial accounts, only required a little more money to become most flourishing. The following mines were all at a discount before the gold discoveries stopped the working of all but those which were really solid undertakings : —

The Wheal Qawler silver-lead mine was opened in 1841, being the first mine worked in the province. After being abandoned it was reopened by a company without success, although with " good

368 The Thbee Colonies Of Australia.

prospects," in 1850. Then, among other non-paying mines, there are the Adelaide Mining Company, near Montacute, with a capital of £1,000 ; the Australian Mining Company, with an English capital of £400,000, and a special survey of Reedy Creek, forty-six miles from Adelaide, other lots at Tunghillo and at Kapunda, founded in 1845 — the outlay has been enormous — no dividends; the Barossa Mining Company, with a capital of £30,000, formed in England, with a view of prosecuting mineral explorations on the property of G. T. Angas, Esq.; the Glen Ormond, another English company, with a capital of £30,000, founded in 1845 ; the Port Lincoln, with a capital of £10,000 ; the Mount Remarkable, with a capital of £25,000, in 1846 ; the North Kapunda, a capital of £22,200, in 1846 ; the Paringa, capital £20,000, in 1845 ; the Port Lincoln, capital £4,000,in 1848 ; the Princess Royal, capital £20,000, in 1845 : this was the unlucky half of the Burra.

There were two gold companies established in 1846, the workings of one of which were suspended in 1850, " pending an anticipated sale of the sett in England."

Two conclusions may be drawn from an examination of the reports of these mines — first, that South Australia is extremely rich in minerals ; and secondly, that parties who do not understand mining should be cautious in taking the advice of South Australian friends as to mining investments.

The following statement of the results of the Burra Burra mine will show that the South Australians have some reasonable excuse for the gambling mining spirit with which they are afflicted, and which succeeded to the town-lot roulette of 1839-40 : —

The Burra proprietary divided their purchase into 2,464 shares of £5 each, with liberty to increase their capital to £20,000, which they have since done.

In the first year, from 29th September, 1845, to 29th September, 1846, at a cost of £16,624, they raised 7,200 tons of ore. As the depth of the workings increased a great improvement in the quality of the ore took place ; instead of the blue carbonate, the red oxide, malachite, and the richest description of ore became predominant. The highest price realized for the first 800 tons was £31 9s., and the lowest £10 16s., per ton. At a considerable distance from the principal workings eighty tons of blue and green carbonate of copper were raised in the month of March, 1847.

In the months of June and July, 1847, the first and second dividends of fifty shillings each per share were paid to the shareholders. These dividends were paid out of the net proceeds of 2,959 tons of ore, amounting to £35,678, out of which also were paid the expenses of the

Progress Of Burra Mine — Smelting Works. 369

association, including the cost of producing the 2,959 tons of ore, amounting to £15,926, leaving an undivided balance of £7,584. During the six months ending 30th September, 1847, 7,264 tons were raised within that period of a superior quality. During the six months ending the 31st March, 1848, 6,068 tons were raised. The large raising of the whole year, amounting to 13,533 tons, was produced from within the limits of the twenty-fathom level. All the ore discovered below that to the thirty fathoms was left for future raising, there being plenty of good ore-ground above the twenty-fathom level to employ the miners for some time to come.

The wages and cost of working the mine, including timber, fixed machinery, tools, &c, amounted to £74,030, and the cartage of the ore to £44,803.

In this year £83,106 was realized, out of which the expenses of working the mine and carting the ore were paid, but three further dividends were declared. By March, 1848, the original £5 shares had advanced up to £150 ; a sixth and seventh dividend of £10 each, in June and September, raised the prices to £200 and £210 for cash. A fall afterwards took place in consequence of the depreciation of the value of copper in Europe. But an important discovery was made of a valuable lode in the thirty-fathom level leading from Kingston to Graham's shaft. The lode was cut four fathoms below the water level, was solid, and from ten to eleven feet wide, composed of a compact green carbonate or malachite, producing upwards of 40 per cent, of copper. The lode was described as clearly defined, in easy working order, and dipping well into the mine.

In the half year ending the 30th September, 1848, 10,163 tons were raised, making a sum total for the ore raised during the first three years' working of the mine of 33,386 tons, equal to upwards of 10,000 tons of fine copper ore (at £70 per ton), £700,000. The cost of the mine for the year ending the 30th of September, 1848, was £81,491 ; of the cartage of ore, £31,445.

In the latter part of 1848 the miners struck for higher wages. The workings of the mine were suspended from November until February, 1849. In March the miners resumed work.

Further important discoveries were made — one of a lode in the thirty-fathom level, south-west from Graham's shaft, consisting of red oxide and malachite in great abundance ; and the other of a lode two fathoms wide, yielding malachite of high produce. Only two pitches were set on these lodes, and twelve men at work at them in the first week produced eighty tons of the richest ores.

370 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

On the 5th of September, 1849, an eighth dividend of £5 per share wad declared. In the year 1850 the £10 quarterly dividends were regularly paid. Two steam-engines of 35-horse power each, one for crushing the ore and the other for drawing from the shafts, arrived ; and the directors ordered seventy fathom of fifteen-inch pumps to replace the eleven-inch lifts then in work, and a pumping-engine of 300-horse power.

The quantity of ore raised in the year ending September, 1850, was 18,692 tons. Since that period the returns have experienced a temporary check from the emigration to the gold-diggings, and shares have fallen to £50.

Smelting Works.

The copper ore raised in the South Australian mines has been principally sent to Swansea. As there is a considerable demand for copper in India and China, it became an object to refine the ore in South Australia. With this view several copper-smelting companies were established, but hitherto with moderate success, in consequence of the scarcity of fuel, although an immense capital has been sunk. Coal has not yet been discovered ; therefore the smelters were dependent on wood or imported coal. A large forest is soon consumed, according to experience in Norway, by the demands of a smelting establishment. The most extensive smelting works, late the property of Messrs. Schneider, have unfortunately been planted close to the Burra mine, where wood is scarce, and where four tons of coal must be carted up for every ton of ore. The proper site would have been at or near a port.

These, then, have been the especial occupations and investments of South Australian colonists. Pastoral pursuits are followed as in the other two colonies. The number of sheep grazing is about one-sixth that of Port Phillip district. Fat cattle are driven over from Portland Bay to Rivoli Bay for South Australian consumption.

The remarks on pastoral pursuits apply to all the three colonies.

South Australia is at present under a cloud, but the depression can be but temporary. Sucli a mine as the Burra must be worked, and the colony will profit, even although the dividends of the original shareholders be reduced one half, and wages of miners doubled. A genial sun, a fertile soil, a healthy climate, with English colonists, sheep, cattle, and pastures, cannot but produce good fruits, although the grand dreams of " empire " of newly-fledged legislators may scarcely be realized.

Statistics of South Australia in 1850, the Fifteenth Tear of its Settlement.

The following abstract of elaborate official statistical tables will show the condition of South Australia previous to the gold crisis : —

Price Of Land Affects Emigration. 371

The exports of the year ending April, 1850, amounted to £453,668 12s. Of this sum £11,212 was in wheat, £20,279 in flour, £63,729 in copper in ingots, £211,361 in copper ore, £8,188 in tallow, and £113,259 in wool.

These are the staple exports of South Australia.

The imports for the same period were £887,423, part of the excess arising from imports of railway, mining, and other productive investments. In the same year 64,728 J acres were in cultivation — wheat, 41,807 acres; potatoes, 1,780; gardens, 1,370; vineyards, 282; hay, 13,000.

The population was 63,900, of which 7,000 were Germans.

Live Stock :— Cattle, 100,000; sheep, 1,200,000 ; horses, 6,000. It may be convenient here to state, by way of comparison, the statistics of the sister colonies : —

New South Wales. Victoria, late Port Phillip.

Population, 200,000 78,000

Imports, £1,670,300 £744,226

Exports, £1,990,900 £1,041,796

Sheep, 7,026,000 6,033,000

Cattle, 1,300,100 346,662

Horses, 111,200 16,743

The effect of the gold discoveries was to drain off fifteen thousand of the South Australian population to the gold-fields, and to bring all except the paying mining speculations to a stand-still. But the legislature having rapidly passed an act by which gold, duly stamped, became a legal tender at the government land sales, and the governor having at the same time made, by a few bridges and wells sunk, a practicable road to Mount Alexander diggings, and established an escort, by the last advices a new profitable commerce was springing up. Successful South Australian diggers have thus had inducements held out to them to invest the produce of their labour in farms in their own province. The time has come when the £1 an acre tells against South Australia seriously in competition with the other provinces. Where a man can earn £1 a day the price of land does not affect him. But there are hundreds of respectable families who do not want to take their children to dig gold, and will not and cannot go to service, who would be glad to purchase land to till with their own hands, if they had the means. The £1 an acre set against the cost of the voyage renders an investment in South Australian land impossible. There are capital colonists who have large families, small means, and yet are not prepared to become "hewers of wood and drawers of water."

Chapter Xxvl

Religion— Education— Law.

FOUNDATION OF BISHOPRICS— THE VOLUNTARY SYSTEM IN SC Y V I C IES T— CHPRCH SCHOOLS— NATION AL SCHOOL SYSTEM— COLONIAL EDUCATION— NORMAL SCHOOL OF SYDNEY— -ORDER FOR A SCHOOLMASTER*— HOW EXECTJTED-COCRTS OF LAW.

IX South Australia a bishopric was founded by the munificence of Miss Burdett Coutts, and this led to the appointment of a bishop of Melbourne, and perhaps to the creation of the second bishopric in New South Wales, the diocese of Newcastle, which extends to the northward, the residence being at Morpeth.

By an act of the Legislative Council of South Australia, passed 3rd of August, 1847, for promoting the building of Christian churches and chapels, public money was issued, under the sanction of the governor and Executive Council, in proportion to the amount of private contributions — the grants in aid of building to range from £50 to £150, and toward the stipends of clergy and ministers from £50 to £200 a year. One fourth of the sittings in places of worship so assisted to be free.

The assistance in New South Wales and Port Phillip is, at present, regulated by the act passed by Sir Richard Bourke, described at P. 90.

The Congrcgationalists and Baptists have always refused to receive aid from the state ; and there exists in the three colonies, especially in South Australia, a party opposed to all state assistance to religion. We will add that in our opinion, although religion and education may be sustained in towns with a large floating population by the voluntary system, the inhabitants of the interior, without government assistance, will remain to a great extent in a state of practical heathendom altogether, without the advantage of religious rites and ordinances. The state of life in the bush is, or ought to be, patriarchal : churches are an impossibility. Every father must be the pastor of his family. To establish the voluntary system is to decree that the long lines of rivers shall never be visited and comforted by the presence of a minister of religion.

It is a pity that a few thousands cannot be tithed from the vast sums spent on hopeless missions to the heathen for the support of itinerant missionaries to our emigrant countrymen — missionaries not disdaining to be also schoolmasters. The collection of bibles in manv

Education. 373

languages in the Great Exhibition was a fine and impressive sight ; but still it is a pity that men of piety, rank, wealth, and influence, do not pursue rather the positive and possible than the impossible, and begin by taking care that every child in the bush of Australia shall have and know how to read a bible before sending missionaries to perish in Patagonia, or attempting an impossible Churcfc of England Utopia in Canterbury, New Zealand.

Up to 1836 education was as much neglected in Australia as in England, until the period that Lord Brougham commenced the agitation compromised by the establishment of the miscalled national schools. A large proportion of the population consisted of adult convicts, who arrived as ignorant as vicious.

In 1836 Sir Richard Bourke carried through the Legislative Council, at the same time that the church and school lands were surrendered, a measure for founding schools throughout the colony, on the plan of Lord Stanley's (now Earl of Derby's) Irish National school system. But the opposition on the part of the Bishop of Australia, who had just then arrived from England with his new dignity, was so hot and effective that the local act remained a dead letter, and the moderate per centage of education afforded to the working classes was distributed through denominational or sectarian schools, aided by colonial funds, one half of the colony being of the Church of England, one fourth Roman Catholics, and the rest dissenters of various denominations. The result was to leave many country districts without schools, and to establish two or three to educate forty or fifty scholars. At Camden there were three schools, none of which had more than twenty scholars.

In 1844 a committee of the Legislative Council was appointed to investigate the subject of colonial education on the motion of Robert Lowe, Esq., of which he became chairman. This committee reported strongly in favour of the Irish national system, observing, "There are about 25,676 children between the ages of four and fourteen years : of these only 7,642 receive instruction in public schools, and 4,865 in private ones, leaving about 13,000 who, as far as the committee can learn, receive no education at all. The expense of education is about £1 a head. This deficient education is partly attributable to the ignorance, dissolute habits, and avarice of too many parents, and partly to the want of good schoolmasters and school-books, but a far greater proportion of the evil has arisen from the strictly denominational character of the public schools.

"The very essence of a denominational system is to leave the

374 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

majority uneducated, in order thoroughly to imbue the minority with peculiar tenets. The natural result is that where one school is founded two will arise, not because they are wanted, but because it is feared that proselytes will be made. It is a system impossible to be carried out in a thinly-inhabited country, and, being exclusively in the hands of the clergy, it places the. state in the awkward dilemma of either supplying money, whose expenditure it is not permitted to regulate, or of interfering between the clergy and their superiors."

The committee further recommended the formation of a board, to be appointed by the governor, consisting of persons favourable to the plan, and possessing the confidence of the different denominations, " with a salaried secretary ."

The Lord Bishop of Australia and the Roman Catholic Archbishop were both examined before this committee ; both were strongly opposed to the Irish system of educating different denominations in one school, and expressed their adherence to the denominational system. The Bishop of Australia would countenance no schools in which the dogmas of the Church of England were not taught ; the Roman Catholic Archbishop, in like manner, insisted on having Roman Catholic schools for the members of his church.

They are both excellent, charitable, and pious men; but either was evidently prepared, if he had the power, to enforce the dogmatic teaching of his own church in all the schools, and to leave those who did not agree with them without any teaching, moral or educational.

They were not satisfied with a compromise system, by which the duties of truth, chastity, honesty, charity, forgiveness of enemies, and thankfulness to God, should be inculcated, with reading, writing, and arithmetic, unless the questions of the number of sacraments and the right line of apostolic succession were also expounded according to the views of each ; and, sooner than either would give way, they were

The two following instances will show how far sectarian zeal will cany excellent and educated men. There is not in all Australia a more pious and actively charitable man than the Rev. Robert Allwood. A remarkable instance of his benevolence is mentioned in Mrs, Chlsholro's report of the " Emigrants' Home" in 1844. Mr. Allwood says, " I could not sanction any system in which the Church of England catechism was not taught." " In thinly-peopled districts, where it is Impossible to find schoolmasters for each denomination, and where some concession is necessary to each, in order to get education for all, do you not think the Scriptures might be read by all Protestants, the Roman Catholic children being exempted, this education being supplemented by Sunday schools?" A. "I would not approve of it." On the other hand, the Roman Catholic Archbishop Polding considered "religious and moral instruction in a very low state in England," which may, perhaps, be true ; but In another part of his evidence, which is too long to quote, he leaves it to be inferred that the state of education at Rome, as regards the humblest classes, is in a most satisfactory state, that "a large proportion of the public revenues is given to education," and that u the Papal government is extremely anxious that all should have the means of education." Archbishop Polding must have examined the English In courts and alleys, and looked at the Romans through the windows of a cardinal's carriage.

Basl Gbbt And The Schoolmaster. 375

content to leave infant minds to gather all their learning from the blasphemy of the streets.

The vigorous opposition of these two prelates, and others of their mind, aided by many who, really worshipping nothing, except what the Americans rather profanely call the " Almighty Dollar," yet loved a party cry, temporarily suspended the carrying out of the recommendations of this report.

But the Stanley National system of instruction is the only system possible in a colony where the divers religions were so evenly balanced, and made and is making progress. In the districts where denominational schools were in existence in 1844 they are still maintained, but in new districts Lord Stanley's system is introduced. Port Phillip, as regards schools, has until recently been under the control of the Sydney Legislative Council. In South Australia the voluntary system, aided by grants from the colonial treasury, prevails.

In pursuance of the recommendations of Mr. Lowe's committee, a board has been formed on the principle of the Irish Board of Education ; and a normal school for training teachers on the Irish system has been established.

Throughout the " three colonies" great anxiety prevails among all classes for the extension of education, and a willingness to bear taxation for that purpose.

The normal school of Sydney affords one of the many comical anecdotes afloat illustrating the mode in which officials in England attend to colonial affairs.

In consequence of the suggestion of Mr. Lowe's committee, after the heat of the educational question had toned down, application was made to the Colonial Office for a master acquainted with the Irish school system, and capable of taking charge of a normal school for the instruction of masters in that system. For nearly four years the Colonial Office slept on the application : at the end of that time, by some chance, the " order for a schoolmaster " turned up. Earl Grey, it ispresumed after some inquiries, selected a Mr. Wilson. Mr. Wilson received a letter desiring him to call on Earl Grey, in Downing-street* He went, was congratulated, favoured with a little of the good advice of which great men keep a stock for the benefit #f thesmall, and then handed over to Mr. Benjamin Hawes, the kte Under- Secretary for the Colonies, who in due course handed him over to Mr. Gairdner, the chief clerk, who transferred him to a stylish young gentleman, name unknown, who stood with his back to the fire, and a pot

of stout in his right hand, and delivered himself something in the fol-

376 The Thus Colonies Of Australia.

lowing strain: — "Well, you're appointed to this berth in Australia? Consider yourself lucky ; you'll make your fortune. Now, these colonial fellows are in a deuce of a hurry, so you must lose no time. Let me see the shipping list. Ah ! here's a ship sails on Friday for Adelaide. This is Monday — you must go on Friday — your passage will be paid, and all right."

Mr. Wilson remonstrated on the shortness of the time, but it was of no use: the colonists were in a "deuce of a hurry." He suggested that Adelaide was a considerable distance from Sydney. The objection was pooh-poohed — knowledge of colonial geography is not an indispensable qualification for colonial office. Poor Mr. Wilson was hurried off by the ship to Adelaide with such speed that his wife is said to have died on the voyage, from the excitement and fatigue of packing. Arrived at Adelaide, he had to wait nearly a month for a conveyance to Sydney. Arrived in Sydney, and installed in his office, he was questioned as to the latest improvements in the Irish national system. He knew nothing about it, had never heard of it, had never seen any of the books, he had been master of an excellent Church of England school. So, after four years' delay, in desperate haste, the Colonial Office had sent off the wrong man, to the wrong place !

In justice to Mr. Wilson it is right to add, that, being a clever and conscientious man, he applied himself to the study of the Irish schoolbooks, and has performed the duties of his office with credit to himself und advantage to the colony.

In South Australia, by an act of the Legislative Council, passed in August, 1847, the governor is authorized to appoint a board of education, who shall have power, under his sanction, to make regulations for giving effect to the ordinance. No aid to be given to schoolhouses. The salaries issued to teachers will be in proportion to the children taught, not less than twenty, between six and sixteen years of age, £20 being the lowest and £40 the highest sum. The governor to appoint visitors and inspectors. The reports to be laid before the Legislative Council, and one public examination to take place yearly. The boards, previous to the introduction of an elective Legislative Council, consisted of the judge of the Supreme Court, the advocate general, the colonial chaplain, a dissenting minister, and a layman.

The Legal system of the Three Colonies is essentially the same ; and an account of that in force in New South Wales will be sufficient to convey an idea of the manner and nature of law proceedings in all the Australian courts.

Courts Of Law And Bquity, 377

The Supreme Court of New South Wales consists of a chief and two puisne judges, who exercise the powers of the three Courts of Queen's Bench, Common Pleas, and Exchequer at Westminster, and have criminal jurisdiction. They go on circuit twice a year to Bathurst, Goulburn, Maitland, and Brisbane.

In common law the " new rules" of pleading are in force.

One judge sits in equity (by delegation) with the powers of a vicechancellor, and there is an appeal from his decision to the Supreme Court.

The proceedings are by bill and answer. The equity rules of 1841 are in force ; but in 1849 a reform was introduced, by which the proceedings for obtaining a rule nisi in a common law court, by affidavit, and a defence by affidavit were, in a variety of instances, substituted for the tedious complication of the old chancery system.

The Supreme Court also exercises, in the person of one of the judges appointed for the purpose, those functions as regards the validity of testamentary dispositions, letters of administration, &c., which in England are performed by the Ecclesiastical Courts ; but no court exists for deciding on questions of divorce, alimony, &c.

The Master in Equity presides over an Admiralty Court.

The Supreme Court exercises jurisdiction in bankruptcy and insolvency. One of the judges presides, exercising powers similar to the commissioners in England, with an appeal to the Supreme Court.

Estates of insolvents are vested in official assignees.

A person can be made a bankrupt or insolvent either by petition of creditors or by his own petition.

A Court of Conscience, presided over by a single commissioner, who decides, not according to law or evidence, but according " to equity and good conscience," tike the courts which have been superseded in England by our County Courts, is held for the metropolitan county of Cumberland in Sydney, and one for the metropolitan county of Bourke in Melbourne, which has jurisdiction up to £30.

The magistrates, paid and unpaid, in the other districts have jurisdiction up to £10 absolutely, and up to £30 by mutual consent in cases of simple debt, but not in actions for damages or disputed rights to land, &c.

Under the enactments of the "Masters and Servants" Act, two magistrates can decide on disputes as to wages and service : they can commit a servant refusing to perform his written agreement, and levy a distress on the property of a master or his agent if wages are unpaid.

The division of barrister and attorney is maintained in the colonies.

English barristers and Scotch advocates are admitted at once to practise.

The judges appoint a board of examiners, and admit any man of

Thk Thbze Colonies Of Australia.

good character to practise as a barrister, after passing an examination in classics, mathematics, and law.

Attorneys and writers to the signet are admitted to practise of course.

Persons who have served their articles and not passed in England may be admitted in the colony. The result is, that parties who have been or would have been rejected in England, in consequence of tainted character, are able to practise in New South Wales.

Three important law reforms are due to the exertions of Robert Low, Esq., now member for Kidderminster, during the time he was a member of the Legislative Council, and practised at the bar in Sydney.

The substitution in 1849 in the Colonial Equity Court cf the common law proceedings on application for a rule nisi instead of the tedious delays of bill and answer, which is of great value in such cases, as where executors, trustees, or partners hold money in their hands claimed by plaintiffs.

The abolition of imprisonment for debt on final process.

In a country like Australia, where property is chiefly in live stock, and servants are not to be depended on, to commit a man to prison virtually amounted to destroying all his property.

And arrangements for admitting to the bar without proceeding to England gentlemen able to pass an examination in classics, mathematics, and law, before examiners appointed by the judges. The sons of Australian gentlemen, for want of friends accustomed to the state of society in the universities, are usually ruined.

In South Australia there is a Supreme Court, composed of one judge, who also presides in the Vice- Admiralty Court, a commissioner in the Insolvent Court, and three police magistrates.

Chapter Xxvu.

Rumours Op Oold Discovert — Certainty — Sketch Of Histobt— Old

;D — EDWARD IIARGREAVES POINTS OUT GOLD FIELDS— COBKB- E WITH VF.ll NO R-STUTC II BURT— PROCLAMATION ISSUED— FIRST GOLD COMMISSIONS APPOINTED-JOHN HARDY'S DESCRIPTION OF SUMMER- HILL CREEK— PREACHING AT THE DIGGINGS.

IN the month of April, 1851, New South Wales and Port Phflfip were enjoying on unexampled condition of financial and commercial prosperity, the demand for labour was steadily increasing, and in the elder colony several manufactures and copper-mines were affording new investments for colonial capital. The leading colonial journal was amusing its readers with calculations of the period when all the pastoral land of the colonj would be overstocked with sheep and cattle.

380 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

The politicians had three grievances — the continuance of transportation, the delay in establishing a steam post, and the shortcomings of the new constitution, which had increased the fixed taxes without giving any real additional legislative power to the colonists.

In the midst of this satisfactory state of affairs, "through the Exchange of Sydney a horrid rumour ran " that a great gold-field had been found near Bathurst.

Very soon small " nuggets " — the word is Californian — arrived in the city, and were handed about as curiosities. Thereupon a few score pedestrians, chiefly of the humblest class, set out to walk to Bathurst, 140 miles.

By the 2nd May there was no longer any doubt about the diggings ; crowds of all ranks streamed across the Blue Mountains; the governor's proclamation gave official currency to the dazzling fact; the gold fever commenced.

When whispers and rumours had grown into a great fact, every body wondered that the discovery had not been made before, as it had been so often prophesied by various individuals, none of whom seem to have had, like Mr. Hargreaves, sufficient confidence in their own judgment to travel to the district, and put a spade into the ground.

The history of the gold discoveries in Australia lies in a very short compass, but is worth telling. It illustrates many curious things.

The first written reference to the existence of gold in Australia is to be found in a despatch (not published at the time) addressed by Sir George Gipps, 2nd of September, 1840, to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, in which he encloses a report from Count Strzelecki, mentioning under gold " an auriferous sulphuret of iron, partly decomposed, yielding a very small quantity of gold, although not enough to repay extraction," which he found in the Vale of Clwdd. It was known to a few that an old shepherd of the name of Macgregor was in the habit of annually selling small parcels of gold to jewellers ; but those who watched him could discover nothing, and the common belief was that he sold the produce of robberies which had been melted up to destroy suspicion. The Rev. D. Mackenzie, in his " Gold-digger," states that this old man has recently acknowledged that he obtained his gold from a place called Mitchell's Creek, beyond Wellington Valley, about 200 miles west of Sydney.

The Rev. W. B. Clarke, one of the colonial chaplains, and a geologist of considerable acquirements, has claimed in the colonial press the honour of having unsuccessfully directed attention to the goldbearing regions of Bathurst. In consequence of this claim, Sir

382 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

Roderick Murchison, one of the most distinguished members of the geological and other scientific societies, read a paper before the Geological Society, in which he states that having, between 1841 and 1843, published descriptions of the auriferous phenomena of the Ural Mountains, in 1844, before the Royal Geographical Society, he compared the eastern chain of Australia with the Ural Mountains. In 1846, a year before the Californian discovery, he addressed the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall, recommending unemployed Cornish tin-miners to emigrate to New South Wales, and dig for gold in the debris and drift of what he termed the " Australian Cordillera," in which he had recently heard that gold had been discovered in small quantities, and in which he anticipated, from the similarity with the Ural Mountains, that it would certainly be found in abundance.

After these opinions had been made public, persons resident in Sydney and Adelaide sought for and found specimens of gold, which they transmitted to Sir Roderick, who thereupon wrote to Earl Grey, the minister of the colonies, in November, 1848, stating the grounds for his confident expectation that gold would be found in large quantities, and suggesting precautionary measures. Earl Grey never answered this letter, and neither took measures nor sent out private instructions to prepare the governor for the realization of the predictions of the man of science. As he afterwards explained, he thought it better that the people should stick to wool-growing. This seems no reason for keeping his own governor in the dark.

The first printed notice by Mr. Clarke appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald in 1847, in which, following in Sir Roderick Miirchisons footsteps, he compares Australia with the Ural.

In 1848 a Mr. Smith, engaged in iron-works near Berrima,* waited upon Mr. Deas Thomson, the colonial secretary, produced a lump of gold imbedded in quartz, which he said he had found, and offered, on receipt of £800, to discover the locality. On reference to the governor, a verbal answer was returned that, if Mr. Smith chose to trust to the liberality of the government, he might rely on being rewarded in proportion to the value of the alleged discovery. The government suspected that the lump of gold came from California, " and were afraid of agitating the public mind by ordering geological investigations." Nothing more has been heard of Mr. Smith.

On the 3d April, 1851, Mr. Edward Hargreaves addressed a letter to the colonial secretary, after several interviews, in which he said that, if the government would award him £500 as a compensation, he would

Berrima, In the county of Camden, eighty-one miles from Sydney.

Harokeaye8 Points Out Thb Gold-Fields. &#x27;383

point out localities where gold was to be found, and leave it to the generosity of the government to make him an additional reward commensurate with the benefit likely to accrue to the government.

It seems that Mr. Hargreaves, while in California, was struck with the similarity between the richest diggings of that country and a district in the Bathurst country which he had travelled over fifteen years previously ; and on his return to Sydney made an exploring expedition of two months, which realized his expectations.

The same answer was returned to Mr. Hargreaves as to Mr. Smith. He was satisfied, and on the 30th April wrote, naming Lewes Ponds and Summerhill Creeks, and Macquarie River, in the district ot Bathurst and Wellington, as the districts where gold would be found.

A copy of this letter was, by the governor's directions, forwarded to the colonial geologist, Mr. Stutchbury, with whom Mr. Hargreaves was put in communication. Mr. Stutchbury was appointed by Earl Grey to this position in the colony, through a recommendation of Sir Henry de la Beche, and of his geological attainments there can be no question; but almost all these home appointments are unlucky. There was a story floating in Bathurst that the government geologist was dissatisfied with his "prospecting" duties; "for it tired him to walk, and pained him to ride/' No doubt by this time he is a practised bushman.

Messrs. Hargreaves and Stutchbury set out on their journey. On the 8th of May a Mr. Green, a crown /somniissioner, writes in great alarm from Bathurst that " a Mr. Hargreaves has been employing people to dig for gold on the Summerhill Creek, who have found several ounces;" and suggests "that some stringent measure be adopted to prevent the labouring classes from leaving their employments to search on the crown lands."

On the 13th of May Mr. Green writes again, in still more alarm : — "A piece of gold valued at £30 had been brought in, and he feared that any future regulations would be set at defiance."

Having frequently in the course of this work had occasion to point out the mistakes and misdeeds of the local colonial government, it is only common justice to say that the line of conduct adopted by Sir Charles Fitzroy and his council on the occurrence of the gold crisis reflects upon them the highest credit.

A few dates will show how rapidly gold-gathering grew into an important pursuit, stimulating agriculture, and overshadowing the pastoral interest.

May 14th. Mr. Stutchbury reports that he "had seen sufficient to prove the existence of grain gold."

19th. Mr. Stutchbury report* " that many peraotM with merely a tin dub have obtained one or two ounces a day. Four hundred ptraona at work, occupying about a mile of the Summerhill Creek, fear that great confusion wiD arise in consequence of people up claims."

22nd- A proclamation was issued declaring the rights of the crown to gold found in it* natural place of deposit within the territory of New South Wale*.

23rd. John Richard Hardy, Esq., chief magistrate of Paramatta, was appointed the first gold commissioner, with instructions to organize a mounted police of ten men ; to issue licences to gold-diggers, at the rate of 30s. a month ; to receive in payment gold obtained by amalgamation at £2 8s. per ounce, and at £3 4s. per ounce for gold

First Sold Commissioner Appointed.

obtained by washing. And, to preserve the peace and put down outrage and violence, with this view he was further instructed to co-operate with the local police, and to swear in special constables from the licensed diggers.

Same date. Thomas Icely, Esq., M.C., of Coombing, near Bathurst, where gold was discovered in 1849, appeared before the Executive Council, and gave an account of his visit to the gold-field on the 15th May. He saw one hundred and eleven persons actually at work — double that number going and coming — all successful who worked steadily — the country poor and unfit for agricultural or pastoral purposes, though the licence fee of thirty shillings would be collected without difficulty, apprehended great danger to residents on their own property, from the number of persons who might be expected to pass the district from the neighbouring colonies, feared that his own and all other stores would be pillaged.

25th. Mr. Stutchburyreportedthatgold-diggershadincreasedtoone thousand, that lumps had been found varying in weight from one ounce

386 The Thbeb Colonies Of Australia.

to four pounds, that the larger pieces were generally got out of fissures in the rock, " clay slate," which forms the bed of the river, dipped to the north-east at various angles, the fissile edges presenting jagged edges, which had opened under the influence of the atmosphere, " the smaller grain gold being procured by washing the alluvial soil resting upon and filling in the clewage joints of the slate ;" that " gold was also found in the planks of the ranges, proving that it had originated in the mountains.*

He observes : — " The workings at present are conducted in the most wasteful .manner, from the cupidity and ignorance of the people, which cannot be remedied until some officer is appointed acquainted with the proper mode of working, with power to enforce it. The best thing that could happen would be a severe flood, which would fill the diggings, and oblige them to begin, de novo, under proper restrictions."

Such is the constant hankering of government officials to teach and regulate commercial enterprise.

Mr. Stutchbury further reported that gold had been found in Argyle, on the Abercrombie River, in the creeks running north and south of the Connobola Mountains, such as Oakey Creek, the whole length of the Macquarie from Bathurst to Wellington.

Creek is a colonial term applied to a minor branch or tributary of

a river. These creeks seldom run more than three months in the year.

About this time a considerable number of respectable persons were

seized with terror, lest the whole framework of society should become

disorganized, and anarchy and violence become chronic.

When the existence of gold was first ascertained there were flockowners who disapproved of the course pursued by the governor in raising gold-digging to the condition of a regular industrial pursuit, and recommended " that martial law should be proclaimed, and all gold-digging peremptorily prohibited, in order that the ordinary industrial pursuits of the country should not be interfered urith ; " that is to say, some of the same order who have always patronized vagabond bachelor shepherds, and opposed the establishment of wives, families, and small farms in the interior, were ready to risk a civil war rather than endanger their wool crops.

But, fortunately, the governor, being a soldier, had no taste for spilling the blood of his countrymen in a " futile attempt to stop the influx of the tide."

Provincial Inspector Scott, of the police, reports from Bathurst that the distance thence to Bathurst is forty miles, over a clear and denned but mountainous road, fit for the passage of drays.

Preaching At The Dioqihqs.

" The diggings are in a creek situated within'steep hills, varying in height, with nat from ten to twenty yards in width. Large pieces of rock have to he removed, the slate formation shattered with a pick, and the earth to be washed. The solid pieces of gold are found underneath and between the rocks and slate, and the small portions are produced from the washing of the earth in cradles. Thought that the deposits of the creek would be exhausted soon — that any mechanics in full work would commit an act of insanity to resign their situations in search of gold ; that on Sabbath all parties left off work, and the Rev. Mr. Chapman, a Wesley au minister, preached to a large congregation. Further, Mr. Scott anticipated difficulty in preserving the peace, unless prompt and energetic measures were adopted, vie : — To swear in all respectable persons as special constables, and permit them to be armed. To grant licences to other classes (not respectable), and take their arms away to be locked up in Bathurat Court House."

From the letters of the provincial inspector of the tame date,

388 The Three Coloxtes Of Australia.

reporting the preparations that be had made to assist the gold missioner, in case of the anticipated resistance, it is evident that no ordinary degree of alarm was generally experienced.

But, fortunately, the colonists of Australia proved themselves more orderly and sensible than the police and other timid individuals had imagined ; and in Mr. Hardy, the first gold commissioner, the governor had selected a man of excellent judgment, temper, and cool courage, who was determined to let the industrious miners have fair play, and equally determined to enforce his lawful authority. His papers are all models of strong common sense.

For instance, when called before the Executive Council to be informed of his appointment, he states, " that he does not consider that he should have any difficulty in enforcing an observance of any reasonable regulations, if twelve mounted men on whom he could depend were attached to him, all being soldiers who have but a short time longer to serve to entitle them to claim their discharge with. pensions." He does not desire to associate civilians with soldiers. His confidence was not misplaced.

June 2nd. Mr. Hardy arrived on Summerhill with eight extra police, lent by Major Wentworth, found not the least desire to resist the government regulations, and did not keep the extra force on the ground half an hour. An arrangement to intercept all new arrivals, by sending them to unoccupied ground, prevented confusion.

On June 8th, four hundred and forty-six licences had been issued ; to two or three hundred new arrivals he had given a few days to pay ; quiet and good order prevailed ; " in one instance alone was there an inclination to disregard my decision. A tall, strong man, a butcher at Bathurst, who had been in the habit of beginning to work wherever he saw promises of lumps of gold, trusting to his strength to keep down opposition, began to work on another man's opening. I told him to desist ; but, as soon as I turned my back, he began again, saying he would work where he liked in spite of any one. I turned back immediately, and as I went up to him he dropped his pick and snatched up a spade as if to strike at me. I instantly collared hira, put him in handcuffs, and marched him off the ground, declaring my intention of sending him to Bathurst gaoL I sent up to my camp, with orders for a policeman to get ready to take him in, and continued my walk. On my return, in about an hour, the man was very penitent, begged to be let off, which I did : he has been working quietly ever since, and the neighbourhood has been relieved of a very unpleasant man. I have mentioned this to show how easily such a population may be managed. There is no occasion for any increase of force here."

Licences Issued Gold Found At Ihb Tuson.

This is important evidence. There is no question that, if convicts from Van Dicmen's Land could have been kept out of the gold-fields, there never would have been any dangerous disturbances.

June 9. The government geologist reported the existence of gold in the Turon, and other branches of the River Macquarie ; and Mr. Hard/, anxious that there should be no accumulation of diggers, posted up notices of the new discoveries.

For this measure, as tending to stimulate gold-digging, for giving time to new arrivals to pay for their licences, and for not swearing in special constables, he was called to account by the Executive Council.

The advantage of dispersing the daily-arriving armies of diggers, by giving them actual intelligence instead of mere rumours for a guide, would seem obvious to any one except those Mother Partingtons of legislation who still hoped to mop back the tide which had set in from other employments towards the gold-field.

June 11. Mr. Hardy writes, "All anxiety as to the payment of the licence fee is at end. I give parties who profess themselves unable

390 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

to pay at the onset a few days. But it is well understood, and invariably acted on, that no man works more than a few days without a licence ; and it is partly from this known circumstance that so many leave after a week's fruitless labour. This is, after all, of a good tendency. Universally successful diggers would leave the colony in a bad position. The return to their former employments adds greatly to the general benefit.

" With respect to special constables, I do not think I need be under any apprehension of any opposition to the payment of licences. It was necessary on two occasions to break the cradles, and march the owners off the ground, not on account of any refusal to pay the licence fee, but because the parties had worked the four or five days I had given them to determine whether they were able to pay or not, and still professed their inability to pay, and refused to take up their cradles and remove. In such cases, and indeed in all cases, instant and determined action is necessary t and disregard of possible consequences the safest policy. Some days ago several persons were working on Mr. Lane's land, and on the application of Mr. Rudder, who was in charge of the ground, I ordered them off. Half an hour after I found one set of men still at work, and, though alone, and two miles away from my men, I did not hesitate to kick the cradle into the stream, and take the owner a prisoner into the town. If I had thought it necessary to call upon Mr. Rudder, and those who were with him, instead of acting as I did, I should not have succeeded better ; I probably should not have succeeded at all ; and the probability is, that on the many occasions when I am necessarily alone, and in remote places, I might meet with defiance, as one who could do nothing unless his police were with him. I can rely on myself; I have the most perfect reliance on the men, one and all, that the government has given me ; but I could never rely on special constables, however respectable : the more respectable the more unfit under the peculiar circumstances. At elections, and temporary and local disturbances, special constables are, I have no doubt, sufficient for the emergency ; but the bands of unknown and homeless men, which compose the greater part of this population, and who readily recognise me and my men in the performance of our duty, would laugh at what they call amateur constables, and would proceed from laughing to injuring, in the many opportunities that would offer ; and these circumstances will readily present themselves to the minds of those who might be required to act as special constables ; they would be a proscribed class."

The same good sense and firmness characterize Mr. Hardy's answer

Discovert Of A Hundredweight Of Gold. 391

to the deputation of diggers who came up to present a petition and some resolutions for the reduction of the licence fee from thirty shillings a month to seven shillings and sixpence : — " I informed the deputation that I should advise the government not to lower the licence fee, and I informed them of my reasons for so doing, as follows : — It was well ascertained that about eight hundred persons earned on an average £1 per diem ; that about six or seven hundred earned from three to four or five shillings a day ; that about three hundred earned nothing ; that the first mentioned eight hundred were able, industrious, and persevering men, working in the numerous favourable localities on the creek ; that the second six or seven hundred were men who worked some time less than a week without judgment, and who had not the energy, strength, and bodily powers to be successful ; that the last-mentioned three hundred were men who did not work at all, but, after looking about for a day or two, went off in disgust ; consequently, that to the eight hundred successful diggers the thirty-shilling fee was positively nothing, seeing that any man could live well on nine shillings a week ; that the remainder — the partially and totally unsuccessful — would be much better employed in their past avocations. That the government had to consider the general interests of the community, and not those of the diggers alone, and that those general interests would not be advanced by encouraging all the labouring hands of the colony to be employed in gold-digging."

In July the rush to the diggings had somewhat moderated, when the discovery of a hundredweight of gold revived and stimulated the excitement to a degree which affected all classes of society ; and, after that discovery, crowds of gentlemen repaired to the diggings. This great prize having been raised by a gentleman, Dr. Kerr, who had not taken out a licence, the gold commissioner, in the exercise of his duty, seized it, in order to assert the rights of the crown. By an equitable arrangement it was afterwards given up, a precedent having thus been established, on payment of a royalty of ten per cent. : —

" In the first week of July an educated aboriginal, formerly attached to the Wellington mission, and who has been in the service of W. J. Kerr, Esq., of Walla wa, about seven years, returned home to his employer with the intelligence that he had discovered a large mass of gold amongst a heap of quartz upon the run whilst tending his sheep. He had amused himself by exploring the country adjacent to his employer's land, and his attention was first called to the lucky spot by observing a speck of some glittering yellow substance upon the surface of a block of the quartz, upon which he applied his tomahawk, and broke

t2

392 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

off a portion. At that moment the splendid prize stood revealed to his sight. His first care was to start off home and disclose his discovery to his master, to whom he presented whatever gold might be procured from it. As may be supposed, little time was lost by the worthy doctor. Quick as horseflesh would carry him he was on the ground, and in a very short period the three blocks of quartz, containing the hundredweight of gold, were released from the bed where, charged with unknown wealth, they had rested perhaps for thousands of years, awaiting the hand of civilized man to disturb them.

" The largest of the blocks was about a foot in diameter, and weighed 75 lbs. gross. Out of this piece 60 lbs. of pure gold was taken. Before separation it was beautifully encased in quartz. The other two were something smaller. The auriferous mass weighed as nearly as could be guessed from two to three hundredweight. Not being able to move it conveniently, Dr. Kerr broke the pieces into small fragments, and herein committed a very grand error. As specimens the glittering blocks would have been invaluable. Nothing yet known of would have borne comparison, or, if any, the comparison would have been in our favour. From the description given by him, as seen in their original state, the world has seen nothing like them yet.

" The heaviest of the two large pieces presented an appearance not unlike a honeycomb or sponge, and consisted of particles of a crystalline form, as did nearly the whole of the gold. The second larger piece was smoother, and the particles more condensed, and seemed as if it had been acted upon by water. The remainder was broken into lumps of from two to three pounds and downwards, and were remarkably free from quartz or earthy matter.

" In the place where this mass of treasure was found, quartz blocks formed an isolated heap, and were distant about one hundred yards from a quartz vein which stretches up the ridge from the Murroo Creek. The locality is the commencement of an undulating tableland, very fertile, and is contiguous to a never-failing supply of water in the above-named creek. It is distant about fifty-three miles from Bathurst, eighteen from Mudgee, thirty from Wellington, and eighteen to the nearest point of the Macquarie River, and is within about eight miles of Dr. Kerr's head station. The neighbouring country has been pretty well explored since the discovery, but, with the exception of dust, no further indication has been found.

" In return for his very valuable services, Dr. Kerr has presented the black fellow and his brother with two flocks of sheep, two saddle horses, and a quantity of rations, and supplied them with a team of

Mb. Hardy&#x27;S First Report On The Turon. 393

bullocks to plough some land in which they are about to sow a crop of maize and potatoes. One of the brothers, mounted on a serviceable roadster, accompanied the party into town, and appeared not a little proud of his share in the transaction."

Dr. Kerr, the fortunate finder of this lump of gold, is mentioned in one of the Voluntary Statements from which we have several times quoted as an excellent, kind master. His brother-in-law, Mr. Suttor, of Brucedale, is a son of the introducer of orange-groves, also one of the most deservedly popular men in the colony.

Dr. Kerr's great prize revived the " sacred rage for gold" among the whole population, and Sydney seemed about to be deserted. New discoveries in various directions were made, among which the Turon and the Araluen diggings still continue the most profitable, after being steadily worked for nearly six months.

The following is Mr. Hardy's first report on the Turon, which subsequent experience has fully confirmed :—

" The Turon gold-field is of the most satisfactory nature, and places the settled and profitable nature of gold-digging beyond question.

" The geological nature of the Turon country, its physical conformation, and the description of gold found there, are all totally different from the same at Summerhill Creek. Summerhill Creek is narrow, confined between high ranges, with a fall so great as to make the rush of water in time of flood immensely great ; and you cannot ride one hundred yards along the stream, so broken and narrow and difficult is the watercourse; and the hills are mica-slate, intersected in every direction with broad and well-defined quartz veins. On the other hand, the Turon River runs through a valley of some miles in width ; that is to say, the wall of ranges that bounds one side is some miles distant from the wall of ranges that bounds it on the other, though there are plenty of intermediate ranges breaking up the general run of the valley.

" Then the Turon hills are twice the height of the Summerhill ditto. They are formed of mica-slate (without much mica), and no quartz veins whatever. I walked nine miles down the river and back, and, with the exception of slight and ill-defined indications, saw no quartz veins. As might be expected, therefore, from the width of the valley, the bed of the Turon is broad, level, not tortuous, compared with Summerhill Creek, presenting few of those abrupt elbows so frequent in the former. In short, that river rolls on in time of flood (which rises about twelve feet) in a comparatively uninterrupted stream, over a smooth bed, along which, for miles, where the water is low, as at present, drays can travel with great ease.

394 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

"In Summerhill Creek the gold is always large in the grain, often massive, seldom thin and scaly. At the Turon the gold for the nine miles I have carefully investigated is precisely the gold enclosed. Then the Summerhill Creek has its barren straight reaches, and its profitable slopes; whereas in the whole course of the Turon (for that nine miles I have mentioned) the production of gold appeara to be as regular as wheat in a sown field. No sloping elbows ; no narrow long gorges. I found several parties whom I knew at Summerhill at work several miles apart on the Turon. They had tried up and down (for that nine miles, and a few miles further down), in hopes of getting into the coarse gold of Summerhill ; but the result was always the same. It does not matter where, in the bed of the creek or the impending banks, you work : any steady working men can earn ten shillings a day with the utmost regularity. I found a settler named Schofield one hundred yards from his own door. He had been working at Summerhill, and said that he had left it only because what he was now getting was at his own door, and as much as he wanted, though he had averaged 30s. a day at Summermil. He told me of his trials in various parts, and of his invariable success. He had just come to his work from dinner when I came up to his cradle, and showed me the proceeds of the morning's work in a pannakin, got by one cradle and himself and two men. It was exactly one quarter of an ounce, and I gave him 16s. for it. He gave me and I weighed the proceeds of their work for the previous (4) four days, and it was exactly two ounces. I found exactly the same result from two other parties in other parts of the creek, whom I knew at Summerhill, and who had come to the Turon because they resided near at hand. In short, from the top of the bank across the whole bed of the river (from fifty to one hundred yards wide), and from the whole of that nine miles at least, the result is as absolutely to be depended upon as weekly wages, and 5,000 workers would be nothing in that space. You must, however, observe that Schofield and his mates, and the other persons whom I knew, were steady hard-working men, who began at sunrise, and, with the interval of an hour for breakfast and an hour for dinner, kept steadily on till sundown. I hear from Mr. Richards and from others of a larger production of an ounce a day by various people, but I disbelieve such accounts. The men from whom I gather my conclusion are steady regular workers, accustomed to the business. However, the true yield to the industrious and able, as I have stated above, is by far the most satisfactory condition I have yet met with, and leads me to believe that, in connection

Comparison Of Two Gold-Fields. 395

with the production of similar gold down the Macquarie, and in other streams within forty miles of Bathurst, the production of gold may be termed illimitable.

" I wish to call your attention also to another plain deduction from the facts I have above stated. In Summerhill Creek, with its numerous quartz veins, and its broken bed and narrow, tortuous course, giving rise to eddies and their results in slopes and precipices, the gold is massive in its general character; the dust of that quarter being exceedingly coarse compared with the Turon. In the Turon nine miles, with its regular, wide, unbroken bed and banks, its straighter course, and its absence of quartz veins, the gold is exceedingly fine. I most confidently believe that the said Turon gold is the production chiefly of the upper and unexplored and broken sources of the Turon; that there, too, will be found the narrower steeper country, and the multitudinous quartz veins ; there, too, the coarse gold detached from its neighbouring matrix, too heavy to be carried with the lighter particles with every flood towards the Macquarie."

From the end of May we are indebted to the correspondents of the Sydney papers for many striking descriptions of the diggers and the diggings. The journey to Bathurst was easily performed by mailcoach or on horseback. Arrived at Bathurst, the explorer found himself in the midst of a rich pastoral and agricultural district, in which every fertile valley had a small colony of settlers, ready to supply flour, meal, milk, and butter, at reasonable charges.

The Bathurst district consists of elevated tableland, intersected by barren ridges, watered by a series of Australian rivers flowing from the Aumatolas Mountains, most of which have been found to be auriferous.

The gold-diggers, instead of settling in a wilderness infested by grizzly bears and savage Indians, like California, found themselves in a district where a market was only needed to call into cultivation thousands of acres of capital land — at Frederick's Valley, a gold placer of extraordinary richness, belonging to Mr. Wentworth ; at Summerhill Farms, at King's Plains, Pretty Plains, Emu Swamp, and the Cornish Settlement, where the crops in the severest droughts never failed.

The Summerhill diggings, which are now nearly exhausted, and the style of life which prevails throughout the interior of Australia, are well depicted in the following sketch by a correspondent of the Sydney Morning Herald : —

" Monday, June 2. — In the morning the ice was thick upon the water in the dishes outside, and the ground covered with hoar frosty as it always is here in fine weather at this season ; hot days and frosty nights.

396 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

" To an unscientific eye the gold country (Bathurst district) consists of a mass, not of ranges, but apparently of points of ranges, thrown together without any regular arrangement, but dovetailing into one another like the teeth of two saws placed close together, face to face ; these teeth again being cut into smaller pieces by narrow precipitous gullies, many of them nearly as deep as the main creek itself. Small creeks twist and twine down these narrow gullies, which have a sudden bend every half-dozen yards, into the Summerhill or main creek, which twists and twines like the others, but on a larger scale. The banks of the gullies are precipitous on both sides, but in the main creek there are alternate bluffs and low points, the teeth of the saw sloping gently down, diminishing in height as they do in width, till they come to a point overhung on the opposite side by a high bluff or precipice, which forms the inside of the nick of the opposite saw ; and, as we stood upon the edge of the cliff, we looked down nearly two hundred feet over and along each side of the opposite point, dotted with tents and gunyas of bark or branches, each with its fire in front, sending the blue smoke up into the clear frosty morning air; some under the noble swamp oaks at the water's edge, others behind and under the box and gum trees which towered one above another till the rising branch was merged in the main ridge behind. The point was occupied by about fifteen parties cutting straight into the hill ; and, as we looked down upon their busy movements, digging, carrying earth, and working the cradles at the edge of the water, with the noise of the pick, the sound of voices, and the washing of the shingle in the iron boxes of the cradles, I could scarcely believe that two months ago this was a quiet secluded gully in a far-out cattle run, where a solitary stockkeeper or black fellow on the hunt were all that ever broke the solitude of nature. On saying so to Scotch Harry, he said that he had stock-kept there for nearly twenty years, and when he came there were flocks of kangaroos ; these were driven off by the cattle, and now they were as completely driven off by the gold-diggers. 'Little enough the first occupiers thought of gold,' I remarked. 'Yes,' answered Scotch Harry, ' and it would be well for some of these fellows if they thought as little ;' and he told us of two who had gone mad already — one a shepherd, in the neighbourhood, found a piece while poking about his run, and came to him making a great mystery about the place, till he could find no more, when he took him to it, but it was a chance piece, and not accompanied by five or six more, as is usually the case ; the fellow, however, was not satisfied, and continued searching about, till, from excitement and anxiety, he went mad ; the other was a man who,

A Picture Of The Gold Camp. 397

after starving for two days, found 5 lbs. weight, fainted repeatedly, and is now in confinement. Kerr said that two months ago hardly a traveller passed his house in a week, now they were in crowds every hour ; his children never thought there were so many people in the world before, and wondered what it all meant ; he could hardly believe it himself. We did not find our dray, but heard of it close at hand, and sat down to look about us. Drays and parties of men were arriving every few minutes, many of whom gave a cheer as if they saw fortune in their hand when they looked down upon the workers in the bed of the creek below ; some were putting up tents and gunyas, and some working, but all busy and all in good humour, barring the men who were constantly leaving, and looked sufficiently disgusted. We were a good deal puzzled how to get our baggage carried to Messrs. Roach and Barrington's, as it would take us at least two days to carry seven hundredweight over two miles of such ridges, or down the bed of the creek, cut up as it is in every direction ; but, just as the last rays of the sun were leaving the top of the ridge, a party of nine native warriors, in their new government blankets, painted, and armed with spears and boomerangs, came winding down the bank. As they passed through our camp, I asked the foremost if they would carry our baggage, to which they at once agreed, and camped with us.

" We were all astir at daylight, and found the water frozen in the bucket, and the top of our blankets quite wet within the tent. The loads were adjusted, and the blacks, with the two men, started under the guidance of the company, and returned about noon by a short cut, we remaining to erect the tent. On loading them again, one fellow complained that a pot of beef hurt his head, so I gave him a roll of brown paper, but soon found my mistake, as not a man would move without the same, so that when I came to the last there was not a scrap left ; he had only bedding to carry, and I explained to him that no pad was necessary, but he drew himself up and asked if I thought him a fool ; ' Another one black fellow hab it/ He was evidently in earnest, and would have left his load there and then, had I not clapped a calling-card on his shaggy bullet head, and he went off quite proud ; we gave them one shilling each and their rations, which is high pay for a black. Many return at once, without giving it one minute's trial. I saw one party arrive, six respectable-looking hardworking men, all well provided with tools, clothes, and provisions. As I stood eonversing with one of them, who was putting the things together to move to their tent, a parcel unrolled, and a Bible and Prayer-book fell out. He looked up, and said they should not forget these even for

I Colonies Op Australia.

gold, to which I assented, with the remark that men would get none the less gold for minding them."

Our illustrations of the Turon are engraved from sketches taken by Mr. Balcombe, a relative, we believe, of the Mrs. Balcombe who

wrote some interesting memorials of Napoleon at St. Helena. He was himself a gold-digger, with his brother, who died at the diggings.

Their portraits are given in the two figures removing goods to new ground across the mountains.

,

The Turon. 399

The Turon, which, like many Australian names, was scarcely known beyond its immediate neighbourhood before the gold discoveries, rises in the county of Roxburgh, near Cullen Cullen, and flows, like the Summerhill Creek, into the Macquarie. On its banks Sofala has been founded. Here it was that the art of cradling gold and washing gold was learned by thousands who have since removed to Mount Alexander and other districts.

In the first instance gold was so carelessly washed that little boys made a living of as much as £3 or £6 a week by rewashing the refuse or " tailings" that flowed from the cradles of the men. The process will be found more minutely described in an account of a journey to Ballarat.

The gold-fields of the Turon include river-bed claims and dry diggings.

In the river-bed claims it is the object to clear a deep hole of water, and then wash the mud and sand which have been carried there in the course of ages ; partly washed to the hand of the miner by the torrents of nature. " In dry diggings" the earth after being raised must be carefully broken up and washed.

Fortunate diggers come from time to time upon lumps or " nuggets "of various sizes, which once excited great attention and curious comparison between those found in quartz, in clay, in alluvial mould ; but now in the auction-rooms of Sydney and Melbourne they excite no more attention unless of rare beauty than so much copper or lead.

The immediate result of the rush to the Bathurst gold-fields was to supply the district with labour at reasonable rates. A traveller observes : — " We were much struck by the difference between their ideas of the mines and those of men at a greater distance. To the latter the gold country is a place with pieces of gold ready to be picked up without trouble, and they start off, trusting to find food somehow, and quarters somewhere, as they have done hitherto in the bush ; but to these men here it is an open box forest, with severe frosts every night, sleet and snow for weeks at a time, without any accommodations whatever, or rations, unless paid for in hard money, at three times the usual price : if they turn out, they exchange their comfortable warm hut and regular meals for cold and hunger at once, so that there is no room for the imagination to work. And though they all intend to give it a trial when they get their discharge, and their wages to fit them out, they expressed the greatest astonishment at the folly of the men they saw passing every day, totally unprovided : they looked upon them as literally mad."

The Three Colonies Op Australia.

Amid the sounds of rejoicing from those who for the first time found themselves amply repaid for every week's hard work in solid gold, there were of course many failures. There were thousands who cum np to dig for gold who had never dug a rood of garden in their lives,

and never slept out of the house. To a working man who had been accustomed to toil for weekly wages it was nothing to dig all the week, and if one hole or spot did not suit to go on and try another. Hard work is second nature to such ; but among gentlemen, clerks,

List Of Diggers Outfit.

shopmen, city mechanics, there were many who easily broke down, worn out by the labour, by the exposure to night air, change of living, and bad luck. At least fifty per cent, of the adventurers are obliged to retire after a short probation.

A stock of clothing is indispensable of at least one good change, with boots of the best leather : half the diggers get lame from their boots growing hard with wet.

The following is the list of an outfit for four. The cradles sold in England are for the most part toys, not strong enough to bear rough work. English carts, forges, and pumps, are not worth their freight for real use : —

Tools.

One cradle

One heavy crowbar

Six picks, with one end pointed and the other square

A water-lifter

Two shovels

Two zinc buckets

Two tin milk-dishes'

One axe

Nails, tacks, cord, tomahawk, &c. &c.

Utensils.

Tarpaulin Camp oven Iron pot, kettle, quart pots, plates, &c. &c. .

Provisions Fob Vive Weeks.

Flour, 250 lbs., at 30s. a hundred . Sugar, 60 lbs., at 25s. Tea, 71 lbs., at 2s. .

Butchers' meat, 300 lbs., at 2JdL .

Sundries.

Carriage and expenses on the road, say from Sydney Licence* payable before commencing to work

£ s. d.

f 8

The following are the regulations enforced at the diggings : —

" All persons digging or searching for alluvial gold to take out a licence, the licence fee being at the rate of £1 10s. per month. All gold procured without due authority is liable to seizure, in whose possession soever it be. Persons applying for licence required to prove they are not absent from hired service. Claims to work unoccupied ground to be marked out on the following scale : —

" 1. Fifteen feet frontage to either side of a river or main creek.

402 Tiie Three Colonies Of Australia.

tt

2. Twenty feet of the bed of a tributary to a river or main creek, extending across its whole breadth.

" 3. Sixty feet of the bed of a ravine or watercourse.

" 4. Twenty feet square of tableland or river flats.

" These claims to be secured to parties only as they may continue to hold licences for the same, except in case of flood or accident. Licences liable to be cancelled on conviction of the holders of selling spirits, or of any disorderly and riotous conduct. Persons found working alluvial gold on public or private lands without a licence to pay a double licence fee. Disputes as to claims to be settled by the commissioners. Licences to dig on lands alienated from the crown to be issued only to the proprietors, or persons authorized by the proprietors, in writing, to apply for the same. The fee for such licences to be 15s. per month. Licences for draining ponds and waterholes, for the purpose of obtaining alluvial gold, to be obtainable on paying as many licence fees as shall be proportioned to the area of the waterhole — calculating twenty-five feet square for every licence. Reservoirs and dams for the purpose of washing gold to be constructed on the permission of the commissioners. Owners of claims employing labourers, and paying licence fees for them, allowed to transfer such licences to other labourers. All persons searching for matrix gold, by working auriferous quartz veins, to pay a royalty of ten per cent, on all gold obtained to an officer appointed by the government. The party working the vein to come under a bond in the sum of £1,000 to pay such royalty ; the government officer to reside on the land, and to have access to the buildings and premises and to all books and accounts connected with the production of gold. All buildings and machinery erected on the land to be considered as additional security to the government. The claim to consist of half a mile, and in the course of the vein, with a quarter of a mile on each side of the vein reserved for building purposes, &c. The right to cut timber and to use water on the land to be granted. The claim to be forfeited by neglecting to pay the prescribed royalty; by not employing twenty persons or machinery, calculating one horse power to seven men, within six months after the application for the claim has been accepted; or by ceasing to employ that number subsequently; by the employment of unlicensed persons to work alluvial gold on the claim, or violating in any way the terms of the bond. The duration of the claims to be three years, to be extended further under instructions from her Majesty's government, if the conditions of the bond have all been fulfilled. No portion of land previously occupied and claimed for alluvial gold will be open for selection for matrix gold while it continues to be worked for the former. The royalty for working auriferous quartz on private lands to be five per cent. Persons occupying portions of the gold-field for trading purposes to pay a licence fee of £1 10s. per month."

The opening of gold-fields in the Goulburn district, another fine pastoral and agricultural country, seventy miles from Sydney and on the Shoalhaven River, followed the Turon, and every day brought some new obscure spot into temporary attention ; but nine-tenths of the reports are mere repetitions of the same coloured story. In May, 1852, the localities in New South Wales figuring for large amounts in the Sydney gold circulars were Major's Creek, Araluen, Braidwood,

Gold-Fields Of Victoria. 403

and Sofala, on the Turon. At all these new centres of population arrangements were made for the performance of religious worship by the heads of the several denominations. The Bishop of Australia, himself, dug the first posthole for a church at Sofala, raised by the voluntary contributions of the people ; and the government, by order in council, offered to the members of those societies of the religious community who were in the habit of receiving assistance a salary for such of their clergy and ministers as would proceed to the gold-diggings of £150 per annum, with an allowance for horse hire and house rent.

The next important event was the opening of the gold-fields of Victoria.

Gold was sold in small quantities to a jeweller of the name of Brentance, in 1848, which was found on the banks of the River Loddon, at the foot of the Clunes Hill, which is supposed to be of volcanic origin, and rises from a plane.

In August, after a reward had been offered for the discovery of gold in the Port Phillip district, the diggings were opened at the Clunes, whence a piece of two pounds of fine grain gold was sold. Afterwards they were successfully opened at Buninyong, a deep gorge formed by the bed of Anderson's Creek, in the heart of stringy bark ranges.

The weather was unfavourable, and the first attempt to levy licence fees at the Clunes created discontent. A different spirit from that at the Turon was displayed : the people struck their tents and retreated further into the ranges, which led to the discovery of Ballarat.

The commissioner having acted with great discretion, taken pains to conciliate, and applied his mechanical talent to constructing a better cradle, an improved feeling was created.

In September the returns were better — more nuggets — one man eight ounces in a week. Success soon brought two hundred up, and, the weather clearing, gold-gathering became one of the trades of Victoria, and licence fees, being found a protection, were paid willingly. Diggers combined to preserve order, held meetings, and settled all disputed points.

At Clunes the rock was mined — at Ballarat the soil only was washed.

In October the government escort was established, and large returns were raised daily. By the middle of the month ten thousand men were at work with 1,200 to 1,300 cradles at Ballarat. The estimated daily earnings were £10,000, very unequally distributed.

In the same month a public meeting of the Ballarat diggers was held, to adopt measures for securing a supply of water during the coming

404 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

dry season, and a subscription of one shilling a head was commenced for the purpose of damming up the waters of the creek ; the commissioner of crown lands was elected treasurer ; and any surplus was to go towards an hospital for the sick diggers.

In September the gold was found in such quantities in new fields of Mount Alexander, more properly The Forest Creek Diggings, being seven miles from that mountain, as to attract large numbers from Ballarat.

Here gold was taken up by pocket-knives from soil a few inches below the surface in such profusion that one man filled a quart pot with small nuggets in the course of the day.

A rush took place from all the other diggings to the last-found region, and in a very few days there were eight thousand at work.

In November three tons of gold lay at the commissioner's tent at Forest Creek waiting for an escort, and not less than twenty-five thousand persons were working at the spot.

On December 1st government issued a notice raising the licence fee to £3 a month ; but this move met so much resistance that it was almost immediately rescinded.

The dry weather setting in, the diggers in the course of January were reduced to 10,000 persons.

In January the new Legislative Council came to a series of resolutions adverse to the licensing system, and suggesting an export duty.

In the same month a working man found at the Forest Creek diggings the largest lump of solid gold yet discovered, weighing 27 lbs. 8oz., perfectly pure, free from quartz or other impurity, which he sold to a Melbourne dealer.

On January 27th another gold-field was discovered at two hundred and sixty miles from Melbourne, situated round Lake Omeo, at the foot of the Australian Alps, washed by the River Mitta, which takes its rise in the Snowy Mountains. These diggings were so amply supplied with water that they could only be worked in the dry seasons, which rendered most other fields valueless ; but great results have been obtained from tliis new field.

In May, 1852, the numbers at Mount Alexander were estimated at from thirty to forty thousand souls, and the state of the roads, hacked up by the constant traffic, excited fears lest in the rainy season the drays from Melbourne should be so impeded that the supplies of flour and tea would fall short.

The effeot on South Australia of the gold discoveries of the adjoining provinces was ruinous. Their copper-mines were deserted, fifteen

A Tandm Drive To Ballabat. 405

thousand souls proceeded to the diggings, almost all their coin was abstracted, insolvency became all but universal, in some districts the male population was so reduced that the women were in fear of attacks from the aborigines, the subordinate officials resigned their situations in dozens, while the falling off of the revenues rendered any increase of salary a difficult question.

Under these circumstances, on the advice of the newly-constituted Legislative Council, two measures were adopted — First, an ordinance was hurried through the Legislative Council by which gold assayed and stamped by a government officer was made a legal tender for land purchased from government, or for customs duties, and for all other payments ; bank notes of the colony being at the same time also made legal tender, under certain restrictions as to extent of issue. The main object of this measure was to induce successful South Australian gold-diggers to return to the colony with their spoils ; and in this respect it has proved, to a certain degree, effective. The second measure, of a more simple and practical nature, was still more successful. A sum of money was voted for opening up an overland route to Mount Alexander. The deputy surveyor-general, the commissioner of police, with a strong party of sappers and miners, were at once employed in clearing away obstructions, sinking wells, and otherwise in making the road practicable for drays, for a distance of four hundred miles ; and the work was so expeditiously done that by the middle of March, having commenced in February, the first gold escort from the Forest Creek diggings arrived in Adelaide. The journey was done in a light cart, with relays, in eight days. And in May £75,000 had been remitted from the diggers, of which a large portion was destined for their families.

The following sketch is condensed from a paper which appeared in the Port Phillip magazine : —

" A Tandem Drive from Melbourne to BaUarat.

" Having cleared the city we overtook the golden army of bullockdrays moving northward, surrounded by companies of men and lads : occasionally a female is seen. Four bulldogs pull one carriage, a great dog in the shafts of another, and a man pushing behind at a load of near five hundredweight.

" Presently the splendid panorama opened to view an extensive sweep of plains, encircled by mountain ranges in the remote distance. Far as the eye can reach, the pilgrimage, its line moving along the undulations, now hid, now rising into view — English and Germans, Irish and Scotch, Tasmanians.

406 Tub Three Colonies Of Australia.

" Sixteen drays at Yuille's Ford, and nearly two hundred people. It is nearly impassable, from the fresh current of yesterday's rain. But the men, tailing on to the ropes by dozens, pull both the horses and carts through. Some there are pulling, some cooking their midday meals, some unloading the drays, some moving off the ground. Over the ford, the road is delightful, the scenery charming, the land more broken, and timbered like a park. Ladidak comes in view, a beautiful ravine formed by the convergence of several hills, at the base of which the river so winds that it must bo crossed thrice.

" Where formerly was silence, only broken by the voice of the bellbird, now bullock-drays, bullocks, and bullock-drivers, are shouting, roaring, and swearing up the hill, or descending splashing through the once clear stream. On, on until the expanse of Bacchus Marsh opens, until lately a favourite meet of our hounds.

" A camp of tents has been formed by those who think it discreet to put off the crossing struggle until their beasts have had the benefit of a night's rest; loud is the ringing of bullock-bells; meanwhile an impromptu bridge of a tree has been thrown across the river, and men are crossing and recrossing like a stream of ants. A dray deep in the stream makes a complete capsize before it can be hauled through.

" Our tandem dog-cart dashes through gallantly, we reach the Peutland Hills, where another encampment has boon formed in the long

The Laughing Jackass — Ho, Ho ! Hu, Hu ! 407

ravine, we trot on slowly, the moon bright, the sky cloudless, a sharp frost nips the uplands, the campers eating, drinking, and smoking ; architects, jewellers, chemists, booksellers, tinker, tailor, and sailor, all cold but cheerful. At the next station we halt and enjoy our friend's fire and supper.

" The next morning broke bright and fresh ; the ground was white with frost; at daylight the train of pilgrims were crossing the plain — the Germans with wheelbarrows led the way. At Ballan we find the inn eaten out. A horse passes at speed bearing on his back two horsemen. We meet sulky parties of the unsuccessful returning, and see signs in small excavations of prospecting parties. The forest grows denser ; toward evening we reach the hospitable roof-tree of Lai Lai, where at daybreak all the laughing jackasses of the colony seemed to have established a representative assembly. Ha, ha, ha ! ho, ho, ho! hu, hu, hu ! ring forth in every variety of key innumerous.

" The cavalcade in motion splashes through the broad river, where one driver, in his shirt, without breeches, walks beside and urges on his horses, fearful of his dray sticking on the way. Our next point is Warren Neep, where we refresh with a draught from the delicious mineral spring. Two miles from Warren Neep the hills begin gradually to slope toward Bailarat. The forest trees are loftier and denser, but the surface soil is not so richly grassed. The road emerges on to a rich bottom of considerable extent, and the hill to the left extends upwards in such a gentle slope as to diminish the appearance of his height. Within a mile and a half of Golden Point the tents begin to peer through the trees. The Black Hill rises precipitously on the right from a creek that washes its base, and through its thick — forest covering the road is visible down which the carriers are conveying their earth.

" The bank of the creek is lined with cradles, and the washers are in full operation. Bound the base of the mountain, on the further side, at right angles with this creek, the Biver Lee flows ; and for half a mile along its bank the cradles are at work. We descend, leave the road, cross the bottom, spring over a dam, and are among the workmen. ' Bock, rock, rock ! swish, swash, swish !' such the universal sound.

" The cradle is placed lengthwise with the water. The cradleman, holding the handle in his left hand, with a stick or scraper to break the lumps of earth or stir up the contents, keeps the cradle constantly going. The waterman, standing at the head of the cradle with a ladle of any kind, keeps baling water continuously into it. A third man washes carefully into a large tin dish the deposit that has fallen through the sieves of the cradle on to the boards beneath, carries it into the

z 2

W8 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

stream, where he stands knee-deep, and, tilting the dish up under the water, and shaking its contents, the precious metal falls to the bottom, while the earth and sand are washed out by the water.

"After long washing the glittering dust is seen along the bottom edges of the dish. This residuum is carefully washed into a pannikin, dried over the fire, and bottled or packed for exportation. Meanwhile the " cradleman " and "waterman" examine the quartz stones in the upper sieve for quartz gold. Occasionally some are found with pieces of quartz adhering, the rest are thrown aside. The cradle filled, the men are at work again, and the rock, rock recommences. On the top of the hill the diggers arc hard at work ; the carriers descend the steep side, dragging a. loaded sled filled with the gold-impregnated earth, some with tin vessels on their heads, others with bags on their backs. The earth thrown down, they reascend the toilsome way ; and this is the process " from morn till dewy eve."

This Is Bai.Lauat. 409

" Returning to the road, the outer encampment this side of Golden Point became visible. A sound ia heard like the continuous beat of a thousand muffled drums, or the rushing of a mighty waterfall. As we issue from the trees the cause is beheld. From the margin of the forest a broad swamp spreads, through which the Lee runs. Over against you the broad shoulder of a bold hill is pushed out to meet its attacking waters, and round its base run the swamp waters, uniting with the river. Along this the cradles are ranged for about half a mile, on both sides of the creek and down the river, forming the letter T with the ends upturned. They are crowded so closely together as barely to permit being worked, in some places in triple file. At this distance you see some of the excavations, and the carriers swarming up and down hill with all sorts of vessels, from the bag to the wheelbarrow. The enormous ant-hive swarms like a railway cutting, where the crown of a hill is carried down to fill a valley.

" Higher up the hill's crest, along its sides, and stretching down to the swamp far away to the right and left, are the tents, thickly clustered and pitched, and, far beyond, the lofty white-barked trees form a background. Tim is Ballnrat !

410 The Three Colonies Op Australia.

" Crossing the swamp, we reach the commissioner's tent, where he is trying a depredator, who, for want of a lock-up, has been tied to a tree all through the hard night's frost.

" Troops of horses, drays, carts, and gigs, with their owners, are all around. Squatter, merchant, farmer, shopkeeper, labourer, shepherd, artisan, law, physic, and divinity, all are here. #

You meet men you have not seen for years, but they recognise you first, for even your most intimate friends are scarcely to be known in the disguise of costume, beard, and dirt. #

' Welcome to Golden Point !' ' Ah, old friend ! hardly knew you. How are you getting on V ' Did nothing for a week ; tried six holes and found no gold. My party, disheartened, left me. I formed another party ; sank eighteen feet until we came to the quartz, and dug through it, and now I have reached the blue clay. It is a capital hole ; come and see it/

" Imagine a gigantic honeycomb, in which the cells are eight feet wide and from six to twenty-five feet deep, with the partitions proportionately thin, and to follow a friend to find a hole in the very midst is dangerous work —

' Lightly tread, 'tis hollowed ground.'

"The miners move nimbly about, with barrow, pick, and bag, swarming along the narrow ledges, while below others are picking, shovelling, and heating the stove.

" ' No danger, sir ; our bank is supported by quartz. We've got to the gold at last. Made an ounce yesterday. There was a man killed yesterday three holes off; the bank fell down on liim as he was squatting down this way, picking under the bank, and squeezed him together. His mate had his head cut, and was covered up to the throat.'

"Down the shady excuse for a ladder, half the way, then a jump, and the bottom of the capital hole is gained. Nearly four feet of red sand formed the upper layer, next a strata of pipeclay, below which lie the quartz boulders ; then a formation of quartz pebbles, with sand impregnated with iron ; this penetrated, the bluish marl is reached in which the vein of gold is found.

" Down among the men washing there is nothing to be observed. The work is earnest — no time for talk.

" The commissioner has a busy time issuing licences. His tent has the mounted police on one side, and the native police on the other. The black fellows are busy tailoring ; one on the broad of his back, in the sun, with his eyes shut, chanting a monotonous aboriginal ditty.

" Three men are waiting their turn with the commissioner.

Sunday At The Diggings. 411

" ' I say, Bill, this here's rather respectable okipashum — that cove with the specs is a first-class swell in Melbourne, and there* s a lot in the same party with him. The greatest nobs are all the same as uz

snobs ! I saw Mr. from the Barwon here this morning : he

found his shepherd in a hole getting gold, an no mistake ! He comes with his brother to have a turn with the rest ; but when he saw him he looked non-pushed, and said to himself, "Well, I can't go down to this," — and I believe the fool started back ; — but come, it's our turn now.'

" The evening shadows fall, the gun from the commissioner's tent is fired, the signal for digging to cease, the fires blaze up, the men gather round them for their evening meal, their smoke floats over the trees as over a city, the sounds of labour are hushed, but are succeeded by loud voices and ringing laughter, mingled with the bells of the browsing oxen, and the dogs baying more loudly as the darkness grows more dark. A. party of gamblers are staking each a pinch of gold-dust on the turn of a copper. The native police, lithe and graceful as kangaroo-dogs, are enjoying a round of sham combat ; one black fellow attacks with a frying-pan ; the other pretends to shoot him with his knife : a painter, might study their attitudes. Hark ! to the sax-horns from the Black Hill floating to us across the valley ; close at hand the sweet melody of German hymn in chorus rises ; and then down from toward the river comes the roaring chorus of a sailor's song. The space and distance mellow in one harmonious whole all the sounds ; and as we retreat they fail upon one wearied with hard labour, like the rich hum of an English meadow in harvest time.

" A flash ! a bang ! another ! now platoon-firing, become infectious : the sounds of war mingle with and overpower the music."

Sunday at the Diggings. — " The warm day terminated in a bitter cold night, and a storm of snow and hail ushered in Sunday ; for we are 1,200 feet above the sea. On the Sabbath digging and washing gold cease; but the axe and the hammer ring continually, and the crash of falling timber booms over the hills. The miners, with what few wives are there, are building huts, mending tents, gathering firewood, and washing out their mud-stained garments.

" The men soon assume a clean and more civilized costume, form groups, compare notes, make calls. The unsuccessful wander off into remote spots, prospecting. Some start for the post-office. The tide of emigrants flows in, and men who never before dwelt out of reach of

an inn and a waiter have to learn now to camp under a tree and cook a chop without a frying-pan."

Sketch Bt An Ete-Witnes8. 413

Mount Alexander by an eye-witness : —

" Mount Alkxavdes, March 2

" I returned yesterday evening from the Forest Creek diggings, after a sojourn of some fourteen days, during which time I have employed myself in collecting such information as may prove serviceable to your readers.

" Any description of the scene which bursts upon the new comer as he descends the ranges that border the creek would be next to superfluous, for so many writers have gone before in the portraiture of your own numerous diggings that it would bo but repetition were I to delineate those of Mount Alexander. The same numerous tents, the same blazing watch-fires, the same barking of dogs and firing of guns, the same busy hum of man invading the territory hitherto given up to the beast or the savage ; all these are the same as with you — if I, perhaps, except that with us there is much more of each and every of them than there is in your colony. The Forest Creek diggings extend for a distance of some ten or twelve miles down the creek of that name, which is a tributary of the Loddon, the whole of the short ridges and gullies running down into it having proved highly auriferous, while many of the back ranges and gullies have also produced good samples of gold.

" Two miles further down the creek the tent of the commissioner is situated, forming of course the official, though not the real, centre of the diggings ; and around this, as if his very presence gave security, innumerable stores are built, while the whole space is thickly covered with tents. Just at this spot, also, Fryar's Creek joins the Forest Creek, the diggings extending some eight or ten miles, if not more, from the junction ; the road, however, crosses the ranges a little below the post-office, extending about five miles, when it comes upon the creek in the heart of the diggings. The first range, or rather ridge, below the post-office, is the celebrated Red Hill, where such large amounts of gold were collected, and at the base of which the great surface washings lay. This base is a freestone rock, with a slight slope to the east. On this lies a heavy concrete mass, principally of ironstone, while the whole of the soil to the surface is strongly impregnated with iron, giving the hill the red appearance from which its name is derived. On the top of the ridge the holes that have been sunk have seldom exceeded twenty-four or twenty feet when the rock was reached ; but at the base the rock seems to have been almost cleared, doubtless by the action of floods of the mass that must have at some time covered it, leaving it in many cases bare, and scattered the golden treasures that reposed upon it among the alluvial soil of the gully. Next to the Red Hill is the Adelaide Hill, and beyond that again the White Hill, both of which are also not unknown to fame, from the vast quantities of gold that have been drawn from their bosoms. In a narrow gully across the creek, and nearly opposite the post-office, is the cemetery of the diggings ; already there are six graves, the last having been filled so late as Thursday last.

" These were the first localities upon which digging was commenced, and yet there are still very many of the holes that are being profitably worked. From these the diggers have gradually extended themselves, till there is hardly a range or a watercourse that has not been delved into in search of the glittering dross.' This is more the case at present than at any other time, as the scarcity of water will not allow of any earth being washed but such as will produce a very large amount of gold. Water is attainable, but not in the waterholes of the

414 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

creek, every one of which is now choked up by the tailings of the cradles ; but by sinking on the flats of the creek very good water is procured at a depth of about twenty feet. This plan is now being pursued. A party sinks a well, and then cuts a hole for washing in, the cradle being placed in a convenient position ; water is then drawn up from the well, and the soil, which has been carted from the hole where it was dug, is thus washed. In all cases the stuff washed is some very choice pickings from the strata of the hole such as the experience of the miner leads him to believe may contain gold. Very many, however, who dislike the toil and expense attendant upon this process, are simply working their holes as dry diggings — nuggeting, as it is called here— putting aside such of the stuff as appears likely, and saving it for a more propitious season. Many hundreds have done this, and the advent of rain will turn out an amount of gold that will astonish the good folks of Melbourne.

" Another effect that the drought has had has been that it has dispersed the diggers in every direction over the face of the country. Gullies, creeks, hills, ridges, watercourses, and ranges, have all been ransacked and turned over, till the whole country is now pretty well known to some or other of the diggers ; and with water several spots that are known to be rich will be worked to advantage. In this search it is amusing to see the eagerness of the gold-seekers. Dozens will watch the movements of a prospector ; while the slightest rumour of a golden discovery in any particular locality will send hundreds to the spot, and will cause the ground to be parcelled out, lotted, and worked with the most astounding rapidity."

Chapter Xxvil Conclusion.

THROUGHOUT this work it has been our chief endeavour to afford information on various important subjects not to be found to the same extent in other works. We have not space, and have not attempted to digest the numerous and most interesting accounts of the gold-fields which are constantly appearing in the daily and weekly press. These accounts alone would fill a volume of description and incidents. In a picturesque point of view, the task will be much better performed by some of the several distinguished authors who are engaged in making a tour of the gold districts.

The results of the discovery to the intending colonist and colonizing statesman may be summed up in a few words and figures.

The two colonies of New South Wales and Victoria had in 1850 a population something short of a quarter of a million, which at the close of 1852 will have swelled to near three hundred thousand souls. These colonies exported in that year to the value of two millions four hundred thousand pounds sterling, of which one million six hundred thousand pounds was derived from wool, and three hundred thousand pounds from tallow. The imports amounted to two million and eighty thousand pounds, of which the greater proportion consisted of British manufactures imported in British ships.

Up to May, 1852, exactly twelve months after the first party, under the direction of Edward Hargreaves, raised gold from Summerhill Creek, gold had been exported from New South Wales and Victoria to the value of three millions six hundred thousand pounds sterling, and the value of the thon rate of production was calculated at ten millions sterling. The revenue of New South Wales for the quarter ending 31st March, 1852, had risen in round numbers to £120,000, being an excess of £30,000 over the same quarter in 1851. The revenue of Victoria for the same period to £230,000, being an increase of fully £180,000 over the same quarter of 1851.

At the same time the export of gold, which has in the first year exceeded by twelve hundred thousand pounds all the previous exports of the two gold-producing colonies, has had the effect of attracting and establishing a broad stream of self-supporting emigration. Previous to those discoveries four-fifths of the emigration to Australia consisted of

418 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

We do not share the dark anticipations which have been indulged in by the representatives of the squatting interest ; we do not expect that tens of thousands of stock will march masterless into the wilderness, and be utterly destroyed.

But it is probable that very considerable loss will be sustained by the class who have been in the habit of depending on overseers for the care of enormous sheep-runs ; on them the chief injury of gold discovery, and consequent high wages and independent labourers, will fall ; they will suffer as handloom weavers have suffered from the introduction of steam-looms, as coach proprietors and innkeepers from railways, as farmers on high-rented clay lands from free-trade prices ; but the colonies and the parent state will reap inestimable benefits in wealth, in population, in power, in civilization, and the spread of domestic virtues.

The new and respectable class of emigrants, of moderate means, who will live by the gold diggers, but not by gold-digging, will, if allowed fair play, be quite numerous enough to keep up the export of wool and tallow without aid from paupers, or convicts, or horrible heathen Chinese, whom Mr. Gibbon Wakefield proposes to introduce as slaves.

Other prophets of evil have vaticinated an entire disorganization of society, from the influx of rude, barbarous, uneducated men suddenly placed in possession of great wealth, or at enormous wages.

In New South Wales, where a well-organized society and police exist, no such evils have been realized ; in Port Phillip the outrages which have occurred have been perpetrated by the felons whom our government insists on conveying, free of cost, to Van Diemen's Land, and there setting free. #

Whole shiploads of criminals receive a ticket of leave on landing in Van Diemen's Land : as soon as their hair is grown, and they have earned or stolen thirty shillings, they proceed to the gold-fields, to compete with, insult, demoralize, and plunder the honest men who have paid their own expenses of outfit and voyage, or at any rate have arrived unqualified by crime.

If we persist in a policy so barbarously unjust to honest emigrants

mother of eighty years of age who safely reached her destination, and every ship since has contained instances equally remarkable, This wilful omission to acknowledge the source of his plan is plagiarism of the most discreditable kind. Here is a gentleman who has obtained two thousand pounds as a bonus, and K.C.B., for doing his duty in an official capacity in the Irish famine, now Becking to add new honours to his name by copying without acknowledgment the best part of the plan of a lady who has worked thirteen years, and spent a very large sum of money, without receiving any other acknowledgment than the prayers and blessings of the thousands whom she has saved from poverty and crime.

Transportation Premium On Crime. 419

and colonists, we must expect the continuance of crime and outrage until such time as the Australians are numerous enough to rise in rebellion, and send us back our governors and convicts in the same ships.

The future connection between Great Britain and her Australian provinces depends on two points — the character of the colonists despatched from this country, and the character of the legislation of the British Parliament on colonial questions.

It is not safe, to put the argument on the lowest ground, to send felons to people a gold-producing territory ; and it is not wise to assist and stimulate the emigration of that degraded class who are held most in favour by the government emigration commissioners — namely, ignorant, uneducated, servile agricultural labourers, selected for their freedom from or indifference to the ties of relationship.

A body of uneducated labourers suddenly placed in possession of large wages are likely to be brutal, debauched, violent, and rebellious. In Staffordshire, with immense wages, the uneducated iron-workers lived in a chronic state of dirt, drunkenness, and destitution.

The most desirable class of colonists are those working men who have sufficient industry and frugality to save money, or sufficient integrity to be trusted by their friends or fellow-workmen with the loan of money to pay their own passages.

Free passages, by raising the price of shipping, are a tax on those willing to pay for themselves.

Family self-paying, self-supporting colonization will form the best social and moral police for the gold-diggers. The time has then come for abolishing government emigration. It must be left, like every other great undertaking in England, to the private enterprise of the emigrating classes. All absentee companies mixing up land-jobbing and colonization are a folly or a fraud, or both.

As a counter-attraction to the gold-diggings, let the price of Australian land fifty miles from the respective capitals be reduced to the American price, 5s. an acre.

Then thousands of families who have not more than one or two hundred pounds each will be able to afford to pay their own passages — father and mother, children and grandchildren, who would not emigrate to be servants, but who will gladly go to colonize their own land, and establish " hearths and homes " round Ballarat and Mount Alexander. Pastoral pursuits will always have their fair share of attraction, but the interests of Christian civilization require that as many as possible of the people be attached to the soil. To the successful gold-digger the present price of land is nothing ; but we ought to hold

420 The Three Colonies Of Australia.

out the attraction of freeholds to English families who seek peace and independence, and not the philosopher's stone.

These changes are not to be expected from the Colonial Office: thev naturally view every object through an official medium, a sort of Downing or Park street stereoscope, which makes what is convex appear concave, and what concave, convex.

But New South Wales has demanded entire self-government : the other colonies will follow the lead, and the demand will be conceded. The people of England have no interest in denying a request which would relieve them of expense and content the colonies. And yet the grievance is no theory, but one of patent facts and hard money, far more flagrant and obvious than that which sent decent pious men to throw a cargo of tea into the harbour of Boston.

The revenue of New South Wales amounted, in 1851, to £476,692, of which £332,452 is derived from general taxation and customs, and £144,240 from sale and rent of land and gold. Out of tliis sum the colonial legislature, under its reformed shape, has the control of £258,952, and the British treasury the irresponsible expenditure of £217,740, or nearly one-half. The revenue of Victoria amounts to £928,396, of which the British treasury has the expenditure of £747,308 ; " in other words, the home government undertakes the management of £8G5,000 of our money, leaving £540,000 to be managed by ourselves." — Ed. S. M. H.

Add to this solid fact the exercise of patronage by the Colonial Office, and the irresponsible position of the official advisers of the governor — ministers whom the colonial parliament can neither change nor question — and it must be admitted that there are ample materials for colonial discontent and for colonial resistance.

But the liberal tone held by the leading politicians, both Conservative and Liberal, on colonial subjects, the discredit into which Mr. Gibbon Wakefield's party have fallen since the failure of the last of their colonizing speculations, and the rapid spread of useful information among emigrating classes, combine to assure us that, before many sessions have elapsed, Parliament will concede to these prosperous and loyal dependencies the privilege of taxing and governing themselves, with full control of the crown lands.

Appendix.

We give the following Abridgment of the Australian Colonies Government Bill, and append to it the protest of the retiring Legislative Council, which was presented to the House of Lords by the Duke of Argyle. His grace made the mistake of allowing himself to be misled by his Whig friends into defending Earl Grey and his measures, in a speech which only showed that, with all his brilliant ability, the Duke of Argyle did not understand the grievances entrusted to his advocacy : —

An Act for the better Government of her Majesty's Australian Colonies.

This act contains 38 clauses, with schedules of the salaries to be paid to certain officers. § 1, after reciting the previous acts for the government of the Australian governments, enacts that the district of Port Phillip shall form a separate colony, to be henceforth known as the colony of Victoria. After the separation ($ 2), in the colony of ?sew South Wales the Legislative Council is to consist of such a number of mem hers as the Governor and Council shall determine, of which one-third is to be appointed by her Majesty, and the remaining two-thirds to be elected by the inhabitants of the colony ; and the Governor and Council are to establish the electoral districts and

issue the necessary writs for the elections, and make regutions tor taking the polls and deciding on the validity of the returns. § 4 provides that every natural-born or naturalized subject of h*er Majesty, of the age of 21, possessing a freehold estate within the district of £100 clear value above all incumbrances or charges on it, for at least six months before the date of the writ or the last registration if a registration has been established, or occupying a dwelling-house for six months of the clear annual value of £10 or holding a licence to depasture lands within the district, or holding* a leasehold estate in the district of the yearly value of £10 of which the lease has not less than three vears to run, and on which in all cases the rates and taxes due to within three months of such election or registration have been paid, and is not attainted of treason, felony, &c, is to be entitled to vote at the election of a member of the Legislative Council.

Power is given 11) to the Governor and Legislative Council to alter the districts, and to increase the number of members, but in the of an increase a number equal to one-third of the whole is to be appointed by her Majesty.

The Governor and Legislative Council 14), when thus constituted, are authorized to make laws within the said colony, and to appropriate the whole of the revenues arising from taxes, duties, rates, &c, provided such are not repupiant to the laws of England ; but they are not to interfere with the lands to the crown, nor with the revenues arising therefrom, nor shall it be lawful to appropriate any sums of money to the public service, unless the Governor have first recommended to the Council to make such provision for the specific public service towards which such money is to be

A A

appropriated, nor shall any money be issued except under the order of the Governor directed to the treasurer ; and the revenues (§ 15) are to be charged with the costs and charges for the collection and management of the same, subject to such regulations and audits as may be directed by the Treasury Board of England. Out of the revenues (§ 17) are to be paid the sums for judicial, offici.il, and religious services, enumerated in schedules A, B, C, and D ; these sums, however, may be alteredby the Governor and Legislative Council (§ 18), subject to the consent of her Majesty.

By § 22 power is continued to district councils to make by-laws, subject to the approval of the Governor, who is to appoint the districts, fix the number and qualification of councillors, and the tune and manner of election! nominate the first councillors, make regulations for their going out of office, and to define their powers ; but the Governor and Legislative Councils (§ 24) may regulate the tolls, rates, and assessments in such districts, and may also regulate the constitution and duties of the district councillors, and the number and boundaries of the districts.

§ 27 empowers the Governor and Council to levy customs on goods imported, but no duty to be imposed on any article from one country that is not alike imposed on the same article from other countries. No duties, however (§31), are to be levied on articles imported for the supply of her Majesty's land or sea forces, nor may they grant any exemption, or impose any duty, at variance with any treaty concluded by her Majesty with any foreign power.

By § 32 power is given to the Governor and Legislative Council, subject to the assent of her Majesty, to alter the provisions of this act as to the election of members of the Legislative Councils, and the qualification of members and electors ; or to establish, instead of the Legislative Council, a Council and a House of Representatives or other Legislative Houses, and to vest in the same the powers of the Legislative Council.

The other clauses extend to all the other colonies in Australia, namely, Victoria, Van Diemen's Land, South Australia, and Western Australia, tie same rights as are given to New South Wales, with power to extend them to new colonies ; they also enable the boundaries to be altered, and provide a new Supreme Court at Victoria. The act is to commence within six weeks after a copy as been received by each governor respectively.

Schedules referred to in the foregoing act. .New South Wales is marked A, Victoria B, Van Diemen's Land C, and South Australia D.

A. B. C. D.

Governor . . . . . . £5,000 2,000 2,000 2,000

Chief Justice 2,000 1,500 1,500 1,000

Two Puisne Judges 3,000 — 1,200 — Attorney and Solicitor General, Crown )

administration of justice. . . )

Colonial Secretary , and his Department Colonial Treasurer, and his Department Auditor-General, and his Department Clerk and expenses of Executive ) Council )

Pensions

Public Worship

' 2,000 15,000

—

Appendix. 423

Remonstrance of the Select Committee of the Legislative Council against the Act of Parliament 13 and 14 Victoria, cap. 59.

We, the Legislative Council of New South Wales, in council assembled, feel it a solemn duty which we owe to ourselves, our constituents, and our posterity, before we give place to the new legislature established by the 13 and 14 Vict., cap. 59, to record our deep disappointment and dissatisfaction at the constitution conferred by that act on tne colony we represent. After the reiterated reports, resolutions, addresses, and petitions, which have proceeded from us during the whole course of our legislative career, against the schedules appended to the 5 and 6 Vict., cap. 70, and the appropriations of our ordinary revenue therein made, by the sole authority of Parliament — against the administration of our waste lands, and our territorial revenue thence arising— against the withholding of the customs department from our control — against the dispensation of the patronage of the colony by or at the nomination of the minister for the colonies — and against the veto reserved and exercised by the same minister, in the name of the crown, in all matters of local legislation ; we feel that we had a right to expect that these undoubted grievances would have been redressed by the 13 and 14 Vict., cap. 59 ; or else that power to redress them would have been conferred on the constituent bodies thereby created, with the avowed intention of establishing an authority more competent than Parliament itself to frame suitable constitutions for the whole group of the Australian colonies. These our reasonable expectations have been utterly frustrated. The schedules, instead of being abolished, have been increased. The powers of altering the appropriations in these schedules, conferred on the colonial legislature by this new enactment, limited as these powers are, have been, in effect, nullified by the subsequent instructions of the colonial minister. The exploded fallacies of the Wakefield theory are still clung to ; the pernicious Land Sales Act (5 and 6 Vict., cap. 36) is still maintained in all its integrity ; and thousands of our fellow-countrymen (in consequence of the undue price put by that mischievous and impolitic enactment upon our waste lands, in defiance of the precedents of the United States, of Canada, and the other North American colonies, and even of the neighbouring colony of the Cape of Good Hone) are annually diverted from our shores, and thus forced against their will to seek a home for themselves and their children in the backwoods of America. Nor is this all. Our territorial revenue, diminished as it is by this insane policy, is in a great measure confined to the introduction among us of people unsuited to our wants, in many instances the outpourings of the poorliouses and unions of the United Kingdom; instead of oeing applied, as it ought to be, in directing to our colony a stream of vigorous and efficient labour, calculated to elevate the character of our industrial population. The bestowal of offices among us, with but partial exceptions, is still exercised by or at the nomination of the colonial minister, and without reference to the lust and paramount claims of the colonists, as if the colony itself were but the fief of that minister. The salaries of the officers of the customs and all other departments of government mentioned in the schedules are placed beyond our control ; and the only result of this new enactment, ushered as it was into Parliament by the Prime Minister himself with so much parade, and under the pretence of conferring upon us enlarged powers of self-government, and treating us, at last, as an integral portion of the British empire, is, that all the material powers exercised for centuries by the House of Commons are still withheld from us. That our loyalty and our desire for the maintenance of proper order are so far distrusted that we are not permitted to vote our own civil list, lest it might prove inadequate to the necessities of the public service.

That our waste lands, and our territorial revenue, for which her Majesty is but a trustee, instead of being spontaneously surrendered as an equivalent for such civil li**t, is still reserved, to our great detriment, to swell the patronage and power of the ministers of the crown. That whilst in defiance of the declaratory act (18 Geo. III., cap. 12, sec. 1), which has hitherto been considered the magna charta of the representative rights of all the British plantations, a lanre amount of our public revenue is thus appropriated oy the authority of Parliament, we have not the poor consolation of seeing: that port which is applied to the payment of the salaries of our public officers distributed as it ought to be, exclusively among the settled inhabitants ; and that, as a suitable climax to this general system of misrule, our colonial legislature is not allowed to exercise the most ordinary legislation which is not subject to the veto of the colonial minister of the dav

Thus circumstanced, we feel that on the eve of this council's dissolution, and as the closing act of our legislative existence, no other course is open to us but to enter on our journals our solemn declaration, protest, and remonstrance, as well against the act of Parliament itself (13 and 14 Vict., cap. as against the instruction of the minister by which the small power of retrenchment that act confers on the colonial legislature has been thus overridden ; and to bequeath the redress of the grievances, which we have been unable to effect by constitutional means, to the Legislative Council by which we are about to be succeeded.

We, the Legislative Council of New South Wales, do accordingly hereby solemnly protest, insist, and declare as follows : —

1st. The Imperial Parliament has not, nor of right ought to have, any power to tax the people of this colony, or to appropriate any of the monevs levied by authority of the colonial legislature ; that this power can only be lawfully exercised by the same legislature ; and that the Imperial Parliament bus solemnly disclaimed this power by the 18 (ieo. III., cap. 1:2, sect. 1., which act remains unrepealed on the imperial statute book.

:2nd. That the revenue arising from the public hinds, derived as it is wholly from the value imparted to them by the labour and capital of the people of this colony, is as much their property as the ordinary revenue, and ought, therefore to be subject only to the control and appropriation of the colonial legislature.

3rd. That the customs and all other departments should be subject to the direct supervision and control of the same legislature; that it should have the appropriation of the gross revenues of the colony, from whatever source arising; and, as a necessary consequence of this authority, the regulation of the salaries of all colonial officers.

4th. That all offices of trust and emolument should be conferred only on the settled inhabitants, the office of governor alone excepted ; that this officer should be appointed and paid by the crown ; and that the whole patron-aire of the colony should bo vested in him and his Executive Council, who in its dispensation should be. wholly unfettered by any instructions from the minister for the colonies.

4th. That plenary powers of legislation should be conferred upon and exercised by the colonial legislature for the time being; and that no bills should be reserved for the signification of her Majesty's pleasure unless thev affect the prerogatives of the crown, or the general interests of the empire.

Solemnly protesting against, these wrongs, and declaring and in-istinsr upon these our undoubted rights, we leave the redress of the on and the assertion of the other to the people whom we represent, and the legislature which shall follow us.

W. 0. Went worth, Chairman. Legislative Council Chamber, Sydney, April 29, 1S,M.

Appendix. 425

Places Where Gold Has Been Found.

1. Lake Omeo, Gipps's Land.

3. Turon River, Roxburgh, New South Wales.

4. Muckewa Creek, Wellington, New South Wales.

5. Louisa Creek, Wellington, New South Wales.

6. Merco River, Wellington, New South Wales.

7. Wimburndale Creek, and various tributaries to the above streams,

Bathurst, New South Wales.

8. Frederick's Valley, Bathurst, New South Wales.

9. Abercrombie River, Georgiana, New South Wales.

10. Campbell's River, Bathurst, New South Wales.

11. Araluen River, and its various tributaries, St. Vincent, New

South Wales.

12. Mount Alexander (alias Mount " Byng"), Victoria.

Support Given To Religion By The State.

The churches which* receive State support in New South Wales, are the English, the Scotch, the Wesleyan, and the Romish. The respective amounts paid for the year 1850, were as follows: — The diocese of Sydney, £13,015 17s. 4d. ; the diocese of Newcastle, £4,028 7s. lOd. ; the Presbyterian Church, £3,378 Is. Id. ; the Wesleyan Church, £850; and the Roman Catholic Church, £8,159 0s. 9d.; in all about £30,000.

There is annually expended, for Education, £17,000 ; this sum is divided according to the census, partly among the Denominational Schools, and partly to the Board of Education.

Population Statistics Of New South Wales.

The following tables show the counties, the population, proportion of sexes, ages, and religions, in New South Wales, without Port Phillip. South Australia has lost 15,000 of its population, which are now said to be returning; and Port Phillip has probably received additions which will raise its population in 1852 to between 90,000 and 100,000 souls. The tables of ages show the increase by births, and may be compared with the census given in the chronological table for 1835 f and 1846 :—

Total In tho 2U| MastM

Total wllhin S*t-I Ilcd District ..,

iia2i,-,ii;-.:!C6l3;HS ii8HlS*5iS1ta>|]3IS B4069706W 1.1

-i ;..v> Kiisitl'-i'iim:: 1 -ii:' iciolNj .-7iuiir_v-- r

1 M2| Hi 1 IB

! Til W3, J" -

alta*

i sisj sw 21*1 sn BB sr 135 aoa

1] r.i 8 ll' H'li 13: t,i [J

8 Ijl II

6, in, lu : ui aw: in, i I gj J J j 4 is] n, ii Mj a

Jj

'j ..." "j ill. '-I

"V'jj ll'

H ... I W K

NEW SOUTH WALES CENSUS— 1851. cuMiriu> with urnuici to kelkiiox.

Name Of Division.

Belioioh.

J

z

si

£

s

g

; L

Counties.

Ms

mi

BSf

isi:

21: d'.'.i !H ft 274,

n

68! J i 618!

at

Jo

a

Ur

S

: U K

n t

Ids

"i i:

20RA 76 1J.11 21 41a ". 96* 2 j:ui: -;7 2014: 6

h

It

It It

l'j

i.vj.-, 3.S86

2S72

Bli-h

mi

W626

eat

i .;i

lUffl 1R35

Sob

m

S27

i:

ToUl Population in the twenty

:i,7!i.

m.-.i:

f'.VJI

Ism

Hkn

l.'.H

B

i..-t

Total within the Settled Districts

l.-,iii;

ii;i;

m

Ix

uni 149*

I&#x27;M

I&#x27;M

asc

r

ji

Uk

Un

Si

:ti

If

'

u

M

" ;

:ti

fj

i:

Km

X,

1Tq

a

H

u

!

"ii

K

Me

s.

"t

!

"l

;.uis:<

Us

4k:

Total in the Squatting Duiricu

.till

m

:n7

:i:ii:i

l*72i:i

LONDON: PRINTED BY PETTER. DUFF, AND CO , PLAYHOUSE YARD, BLACXFRIAR8.

i

.1

'!

ii;.

' i

r