On the 16th of November I found the thermometer was 98 deg. in the shade. Try and remember if you ever had a day in England when it was so hot, and how intolerable it must have been! Here, however, the moisture is absent, and we are able to bear the heat without much inconvenience, though the fine, white dust sometimes blows in at the open door, covering ledger, cash-book, and everything. On the 12th of December I wrote home: "The weather is frightfully hot; the ledger almost scorches my hands as I turn over the leaves." Then again, on the 23rd, I wrote that "the heat has risen to 105 deg., and even 110 deg., in the shade; yet, in consequence of the dryness and purity of the atmosphere, I bear it easily, and even go out to walk."

My favourite walk in the bush, in early summer, is towards the summit of a range of hills on the south of the township. I set out a little before sunset, when the heat of the day is well over, and the evening begins to feel deliciously cool. All is quiet; there is nothing to be heard but the occasional note of the piping-crow, and the chatter of a passing flock of paroquets. As I ascend the hill, passing an abandoned quartz-mine, even these sounds are absent, and perfect stillness prevails. From the summit an immense prospect lies before me. Six miles away to the south, across the plain, lies the town of Talbot; and beyond it the forest seems to extend to the foot of the Pyrenees, standing up blue in the distance some forty miles away. The clouds hang over the mountain summits, and slowly the monarch of day descends seemingly into a dark rift, leaving a track of golden light behind him. The greeny-blue sky above shines and glows for a few minutes longer, and then all is suffused in a soft and mournful grey. The change is almost sudden. The day is over, and night has already come on. Darkness follows daylight so suddenly that in nights when there is no moon, and it is cloudy, one has to hasten homeward, so as not to miss the track or run the risk of getting benighted in the bush.

But, when the moon is up, the nights in Australia are as brilliant as the days. The air is cool, the sky cloudless, and walking in the bush is then most delightful. The trees are gaunt and weird-like, the branches standing in bold relief against the bright moonlight. Yet all is so changed, the distant landscape is so soft and lovely, that one can scarcely believe that it is the same scene we have so often looked upon in broad daylight. It is no exaggeration to say that the Australian moonlight is so bright that one may easily read a book by it of moderately-sized type.

But Australian summer weather has also its desagremens. The worst of these is the hot north wind, of which I have already described my foretaste; though old colonists tell me that these have become much less intolerable, and occur much seldomer, since the interior of the country has been settled and comparatively cultivated. But the hot winds are still bad to bear, as I can testify. They blow from the parched lands of Central Australia, and bring with them clouds of dust and insects. I should think they must resemble the African simoom. The Melbourne people call these burning blasts the "brick-fielders." The parching wind makes one hot and feverish, and to fly to the bar for cooling drinks; but there even the glasses are hot to the touch. Your skin becomes so dry and crisp that you feel as if it would crackle off. The temperature rises to 120 deg.—a pretty tidy degree of heat! There is nothing for it but to fly within doors, shut up every cranny to keep out the hot dust, and remain in darkness.

While the hot wind lasts, the air is of a heavy copper colour. Everything looks yellow and withered. The sun appears through the dust dull red, and no bigger than the moon, just as it does on a foggy morning in London. Perhaps after an hour or two of this choking heat the hot wind, with its cloud of dust, passes away southward, and we have a deliciously cool evening, which we enjoy all the more contrasted with the afternoon's discomfort. The longest time I have known the hot wind to last was two days, but it is usually over in a few hours. The colonials say that these winds are even of use, by blowing the insect tribes out to sea; and that but for them the crops would, in summer time, be completely eaten away.

Another source of discomfort is the flies in summer. They abound everywhere. They fill the rooms, and as you pass along the streets they rise in clouds. The ceilings are sometimes black with them, and no food can be left exposed for an instant without the certainty of its being covered with them. There is one disgusting yellow-bodied blow-fly, which drops his maggots with extraordinary fecundity. The flies are also a nuisance in the bush, where veils are usually worn when driving, to prevent their annoyance. And in the swamps there are vigorous and tormenting musquitoes, as I have elsewhere described.

After the parching heat of summer, and especially after the excessive dryness occasioned by the hot winds, the whole face of the country becomes, as it were, combustible, and bush-fires have at such times burst forth apparently spontaneously, and spread with great rapidity. The "Black Thursday" of the colony, some fifteen years since, when fire covered many hundreds of miles, is still remembered with horror; but, as settlement and cultivation have extended, these sudden outbreaks of fire have become comparatively rare.

When Christmas arrives, summer is at its height. It finds us perhaps gasping with heat, sitting in our shirt-sleeves for coolness, and longing for the cool evening. Yet there are few who do not contrive to have their Christmas roast and plum-pudding, as at home. As strawberries are then in their prime and in great abundance, many hold strawberry picnics on Christmas Day; while sober church-goers enjoy them at home.

The abundance of fruits of all kinds affords one of the best proofs of the geniality of the climate. First come strawberries, followed by abundance of plums, peaches, and apricots, and afterwards by pears and apples in plenty. Our manager's garden at Maryborough is a sight worth seeing in summer time. Having a plentiful supply of water, he is able to bring his fruit to great perfection. The plum and peach trees seemed almost overburdened with their delicious loads. Through the centre of the garden is a cool green alley, shaded with a vine-covered trellis. The bunches of fast-ripening grapes are hanging on all sides, and promise an abundant crop.

Some of my pleasantest associations are connected with the January afternoons spent in the orchards about Majorca. One day a party of us drove out in search of a good fruit-garden. We went over the hill to the south, and down the long valley on the Talbot road, raising clouds of white dust as we went; then up another hill, from the summit of which, down by the banks of the creek, and almost close to the foot of Mount Greenock, we discovered the garden of which we had come in search. We descended and entered the garden, still covered with greenery, notwithstanding the tremendous heat, and there found the fruit in perfection.

Mount Greenock is one of the many volcanic hills which abound in this neighbourhood. It is almost a perfect cone, some eight or nine hundred feet high. "What a splendid prospect from the summit!" said one of my companions. "Well, let us go up—there will probably be a fine breeze on the top." "Too hot by far," was the answer. "Not at all," said I, "the thing is to be done." "Well," said my friend, "you may go if you like; but if you do, and are back in three-quarters of an hour, I'll undertake to shout fruits and drinks for the remainder of the afternoon."

A noble offer! So I immediately stripped, took one look at the steep hill above, the withered grass upon it almost glittering in the sun, and started. I was soon across the nearly-dry creek, and, beginning the ascent, I went on pretty steadily until I was within about two hundred feet of the summit, when the great heat began to tell upon me. I stopped, looked down the steep hill up which I had come, saw what a little way further comparatively I had to go, and clambered upward again. It was still a long and fatiguing pull, mostly over loose lava stones; but at last I reached the top, panting and out of breath. After such a tremendous pull as that, I do not think any one will venture to say that my lungs can be unsound.

I looked round at the magnificent view. It was indeed well worth climbing the hill to see. I first turned my eyes northward towards Majorca. There it was, with its white streak of pipeclay above it. Beyond, in the distance, lay Carisbrook, with the bald hill standing out in bold relief behind it. Nearer at hand are the mining works of several companies, with their engine-sheds surrounded by huge piles of refuse. Turning my eyes southward, I saw Talbot, about a mile off, looking quite an important place, with its numerous red-brick buildings and clusters of comfortable-looking houses. On the west, towards Maryborough, lay a wide extent of bush, clad in its never varying dark green verdure. The sky was clear, blue, and cloudless; and though the sun was in all his strength, the light breeze that played round the top of the mount made the air pleasant and exhilarating to breathe.

I shortly turned my steps down-hill, tacking and zigzagging in the descent because of the steepness. I was soon at the foot of the mount, across the brook, and seated in the garden, enjoying the fresh fruit, with an occasional draught of colonial wine.

Apropos of wine and grapes. It is anticipated by those who have had the longest experience of the climate and soil of Victoria, that it is not unlikely before long to become one of the principal wine-growing countries in the world. The vine grows luxuriantly, and the fruit reaches perfection in all parts of the colony, but more particularly in the fine district situated along the River Murray. Most of the farmers up country make their own wines for home use. It is a rough, wholesome sort of claret. But when the Germans, who are well accustomed to the culture of the vine, give the subject their attention, a much finer quality is produced. There are already several vineyard associations at work, who expect before long to export largely to England, though at present the greater part of the wine grown is consumed in the colony. A friend of mine at Melbourne has planted an extensive vineyard at Sunbury, some thirty miles north of the city, cultivated by Swiss vignerons; and, though I am no judge of wine, the Burgundy which I tasted at his table was very grateful to my inexperienced palate, and I was told that it was of very superior quality.[9]

After summer comes harvest, when the farmer gathers in the produce of his year's industry, takes stock, and counts his gains. Harvest is well over by the end of February. When I rode out to Perry's Farm, on the second day of March, I found the fields already cleared, and the grain housed. All the extra hands had gone. Only a week before, the fields had been busy with reapers, binders, and machine-men, for whom enormous meat pies had to be cooked and great joints of meat roasted,—for labouring men in Australia are accustomed to consume much larger quantities of flesh meat than at home.

The scene is now perfectly quiet. The cows are coming in to be milked, and a very fine lot they are—fifteen or more. The great stacks of straw are shining in the red sunlight, for the sun is getting low, though it is still warm. We go up to the farmhouse, having hung our horses' reins over the rail, and saunter in through the back door. Here no handing in of cards is required, for we know we are sure of being made welcome; and in Australia hospitality is boundless. We taste the grapes, which are just ripe, and wash them down with a glass of home-brewed mead. But beware of that mead! Though it looks very innocent, it is really very strong and heady.

The farmer then took us into his barn, and proudly pointed with his heavy whip to the golden grain piled up on the floor; then over his stable, to look at his horses. There we found our own nags, which had been taken in for a feed. Bringing them out, and mounting again, we rode on a little further to another farm situated on a hill-side a little higher up the valley.

The farmhouse here is a little gem of a dwelling, situated in a nice shady place, in the midst of a luxurious garden. Here, too, we dismounted and entered the house, for we knew the host—a most genial fellow, whose honest English face it was always a pleasure to see: it was so full of kindness and good humour. We took a stroll round the garden while the sun was setting, and then turned in for a cup of good tea, which "missus" had got ready for us.

One of our entertainer's greatest delights was in talking about "old times"—though they were only a year or two old after all,—yet "new chums" were always ready to sit listening to his tales open-mouthed. He had been a digger, like most of the farmers hereabout, and he told us how he was the first to find the gold at the great rush at Maryborough; how he saw the gold glistening in the gravel one day that he was out in the bush; how, for weeks, he lived quietly, but digging and gathering gold early and late, until, having made his little golden harvest, enough to buy and stock a farm, he went and gave information to the commissioner as to the find, and then what a rush of thousands of diggers there was to the ground! how streets sprang up, stores were opened, hotels were built, and at last Maryborough became the great place that it is—the thriving centre of a large mining as well as agricultural district.

In such old diggers' talk two hours had passed almost before we were aware; and then we rose to go. The horses were brought out, and we mounted and rode cautiously home, for it was now quite dark. It was a fine mild night, and we had plenty of time; so we talked and laughed our way through the bush—our voices the only sounds to be heard, except it might be the noise of a bird rising on the wing, startled from its perch by our merry laughter or the clatter of our horses' hoofs on the hard ground as we trotted along.

Another day, I drove out with one of the neighbouring farmers to his place on the other side of the Deep Creek. At this late season the bush is dried up and melancholy-looking; very different from what it is in the lovely spring time. Now the bush seems dead-alive, fast putting on its winter garb, while withered stalks of grass cover the plains. We pass the neighbourhood of a large squatter's station, the only one about here,—the run being very large, extending for a great distance over the plains. It consists of not less than 60,000 acres of purchased land and 60,000 acres of government land, on which the squatter exercises the usual rights of pasturage.

Crossing the creek by a wooden bridge, we were shortly at my friend's farm. We heard the buzzing noise of the threshing-machine in the adjoining fields. There was the engine busily at work, just as at home. Steam penetrates everywhere,—across the seas, over the mountains, and into the bush. We soon came up to the engine, where the men were at work. It was pretty severe under a hot sun, amidst clouds of dust and bits of chaff flying about from the thresher. Many of the men wore spectacles to protect their eyes from the glare of the sun's heat.

The engine was just about to stop, to allow the men to have their midday spell of rest; and they were soon at their meal of meat and cold tea. The farmer came upon some of the men smoking quite unconcernedly beside the great piles of straw; and wroth he was at their carelessness, as well he might be, for had a fire burst out, it would have destroyed straw, wheat, engine, and all. The wheat seemed of excellent quality, and the farmer was quite pleased with his crop, which is not always the case with farmers.

We afterwards went over the farm buildings, which are neat and substantial. A large stone barn has at one end of it a kitchen attached, where the men's victuals are cooked during harvest time; and, close at hand, is a comfortable stone cottage for the accommodation of the manager and his family.

After going over the farm, I had a refreshing bathe in the creek, at a convenient place; though I have heard that it is not unusual for bathers who get into a muddy water-hole to be startled by a sudden sting, and when they emerge from the water, to find half a dozen hungry leeches hanging on to their skin. For leeches are plentiful in Australia, and even form an article of considerable export to England.

We afterwards went out to Perry's harvest dance and supper, with which the gathering in of the crops is usually celebrated, as at home. The wheat had by this time all been sold and cleared out of the barn, and it was now rigged up as a ball-room. We had a good long spell of dancing, to the music of a violin and a bush piano. Perhaps you don't know what a bush piano is? It consists of a number of strings arranged on a board, tightened up and tuned, upon which the player beats with a padded hammer, bringing out sounds by no means unmusical. At all events, the bush piano served to eke out the music of our solitary violin.

After the dance there was the usual bounteous supper, with plenty to eat and drink for all; and then our horses were brought out and we rode homeward. It was the end of harvest, just the time of the year when, though the days were still warm, the nights were beginning to be cool and sharp, as they are about the beginning of October in England. One night there was a most splendid Aurora, one of the finest, it is said, that had been seen, even in Australia. A huge rose-coloured curtain seemed to be let down across half the sky, striped with bright golden colour, shaded off with a deeper yellow. Beneath the red curtain, close to the horizon, was a small semicircle of bright greenish yellow, just as if the sun were about to rise; and bright gleams of light shot up from it far into the sky, making the rose-coloured clouds glow again. The brilliancy extended upwards almost to the zenith, the stars glimmering through the darker or less bright part of the sky. Though I have mentioned "clouds," there was not a cloud to be seen; the clouds I name were really masses of brilliant light, obscuring the deep blue beyond. I feel the utter powerlessness of words to describe the magnificence of the scene.

The weather-wise people predicted a change of weather; and sure enough a change shortly followed. We had had no rain for weeks; but early on the second morning after the appearance of the Aurora, I was awakened by the noise of heavy rain falling upon our slight iron roof. I found a tremendous storm raging and the rain falling in masses. Our large iron tank was completely filled in half an hour; and, overflowing, it ran in upon our bank floor and nearly flooded us out. We had an exciting time of it, baling out the water as fast as it ran in; for somehow, the drain running underneath our boarded house had got stopped. At last the rainfall ceased and the water was got rid of, leaving everything in a state of damp—damp stools and chairs, damp sheets, damp clothes, damp books, damp paper, damp everything.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 9: The kinds of wine principally produced in the colony are Burgundy, Claret, white wine of the Sauterne kind, and a very excellent sort of still Champagne. There are now regular autumn wine sales at Melbourne and Geelong, at which large quantities are sold and good prices realised. The total quantity produced in 1870 was 629,219 gallons.]



CHAPTER XIII.

BUSH ANIMALS—BIRDS—SNAKES.

THE 'POSSUM—A NIGHT'S SPORT IN THE BUSH—MUSQUITOES—WATTLE BIRDS—THE PIPING-CROW—"MINERS"—PAROQUET-HUNTING—THE SOUTHERN CROSS—SNAKES—MARSUPIAL ANIMALS.

A favourite sport in Australia is 'possum-shooting. The Australian opossum is a marsupial quadruped, living in trees and feeding on insects, eggs, and fruits. Its body is about twenty-five inches in length, besides which it has a long prehensile tail, with which it clings to the branches of the trees in which it lives. Its skin is covered with thick fur, of a uniform smoky-black colour, tinged with chestnut, and it is very much sought after because of its warmth and beauty.

The proper time for 'possum-shooting is at night, when the moon is nearly at her full, and one can see about almost as well as in the daytime. Even Venus is so bright that, on a night when the moon was absent, I have seen her give light enough to drive by.

A well-trained dog is almost indispensable for scenting the 'possums and tracking them to their tree, beneath which he stands and gives tongue. When the dog stands and barks, you may be sure there is the "'possum up a gum-tree." I never had the good fortune to be accompanied by a well-trained dog; but only by young ones new to the sport.

We had, therefore, to find and sight our own game. This is done by looking carefully along each branch, with the tree between you and the bright moonlight; and if there be a 'possum there, you will see a little black furry-like ball, motionless in the fork of a limb. On the first night that I went out 'possum-shooting with a party of friends, we trudged a good way into the bush, and searched the trees for a long time in vain.

At length the old colonial who accompanied us, coming up to a large tree, said, "Ah! here is a likely place;" and we began carefully to spy the branches; "There he is," said the colonial, pointing to a limb where he said the 'possum was. At first I could make out nothing. But at last I spied the little round ball. He fired, and the animal fell to the ground dead.

A little further on we searched again and found another. Now it was my turn. I took steady aim at the black object between me and the moon, and fired. Looking through the smoke, I saw Joey hanging on to the branch by his tail; and in half a minute more he dropped to the ground. I found that this was one of the ring-tailed species, the top of the tail being bare for about two inches, and formed like a white ring. 'Possums of this sort use their tails for climbing, like the spider-monkey of Africa. I found I could carry my ring-tailer hanging on to my finger, even after he was quite dead.

The next 'possum fell wounded from the tree, and took to his heels, with the little dogs after him; and they settled him after a short fight. Sometimes the 'possum, after being hit, will cling a long time to the tree by his tail, with his body hanging down. Then the best and lightest climber goes up to shake him down, and he soon drops among the dogs, which are all excitement and ready to fall upon him. Occasionally he will give them a good run, and then the object is to prevent him getting up another tree.

Proceeding on our search, we found ourselves on some low swampy ground, where there were said to be abundance of 'possums. But I had no sooner entered the swamp than I was covered with musquitoes of the most ravenous character. They rose from the ground in thousands, and fastened on my "new chum" skin, from which the odour of the lime-juice had not yet departed;[10] and in a few minutes I was literally in torment, and in full retreat out of the swamp. Not even the prospect of a full bag of 'possums would tempt me again in that direction.

In all, we got seven 'possums, which is considered a very small bag. There is a practised sportsman in the town who goes out with a well-trained dog, accompanied by a horse and cart; and he is disappointed if he does not bring home quite a cart-load of fur.

When we had got done with our sport, and resolved on wending our way homewards, I had not the faintest idea where we were, or of the direction in which we were to proceed. Of course, near the town there are plenty of tracks, but here there were none; and there is such a complete sameness in the bush that I wondered that even my experienced friend should be able to guide us back. But he had no difficulty in finding the way, and we were soon tramping steadily along under the bright moonlight, the straggling gum-trees looking more gaunt and unshapely than usual,—the dry twigs crackling under our feet; and we reached the township long after midnight.

On another occasion I accompanied the Maryborough doctor into the bush to shoot wattle birds for a pie; but we did not succeed in getting a pieful. I have an idea that the gay-coloured dress of a young lady who accompanied us frightened the birds away. There were plenty of birds about, but very few of the sort we wanted—a bird as large as a pigeon, plump and tender to eat. The doctor drove us in and out among the trees, and had once nearly turned us all perforce out of the buggy, having got his wheels locked in the stump of a tree.

The speckled honey-suckers, yellow and black, chirped and gabbled up among the trees. The leather-heads, with their bare neck and ruffle of white feathers, almost like so many vultures in miniature, gave out their loud and sudden croak; then lazily flapped their wings and flew away to the next tree. Suddenly there is heard the single cry of the bell-bird, just like the ringing of a glass bell; while far off in the bush you could hear the note of the Australian magpie or piping-crow, not unlike that of a silver flute, clear, soft, and musical. The piping-crow is, indeed, a clever bird, imitating with wonderful accuracy the cries of other birds; and when tamed it is exceedingly amusing, readily learning to whistle tunes, which it does extremely well.

Another day, I went out shooting with the Presbyterian minister, an enthusiastic taxidermist, now occupied in making a very nice collection of Australian birds. We had a gay time of it in the bush that day. There were plenty of grey and black mina-birds, or "miners," as they are called here, chattering away in the trees in groups of four or five. They are a species of grakle, and are lively and intelligent birds, some of them possessing a power of imitating human speech equal to any of the parrot tribe. They are very peculiar looking, grey in the body, with a black dab on the head, and a large bright yellow wattle just behind the eye. We pass the "miners" unmolested, for the minister tells me they are "no good" if you want eating, whilst as specimens they are too common.

Then there are the tiny grey wrens, sitting about in scores,—so small that an English wren looks monstrous beside them. Across the sunlight, and away over a hollow, there flies a flock of green and yellow paroquets, screaming as they fly. The brilliant colours of their wings flash and glitter as they come from under the shadow of the trees. Now we stalk a solitary piping-crow from tree to tree; but no sooner do you get near enough to take a pot shot at him than he pipes his note, and is off. The only way of getting at him is to proceed cautiously from bush to bush; but even then, so shy a bird is he, that it is very difficult to bag him.

There is a flock of great white sulphur-crested cockatoos clustered up in a high tree. Can we get a shot? They seem to anticipate our design, for on the moment they rise and wheel overhead with elevated crests, uttering their shrill hoarse cries. These are the fellows that occasion our farmers so much trouble by eating the freshly-sown grain.

Then look! on that branch are twenty or thirty lovely little swift paroquets, with green and dark blue wings tipped with yellow. They are climbing in and out of the scant leafage, under and over the limbs of the tree, hanging on by their claws; and they only rise if they see us near enough to take a shot at them, when they take to wing screaming, and fly away in a flock.

Once, when I had gone out parrot-potting, with another young fellow almost as green as myself, we had very nearly got bushed. We had been following up a flock of Blue Mountain parrots—handsome birds—of which we wanted specimens for our collection. After some slight success, we turned our way homewards. The sun was just setting. Marking its position in the heavens, we took what we thought was the right direction. There were no tracks to guide us—no landmarks—nothing but bush. After walking for some time, and looking again at the light of the sky where the sun had gone down, we found that we had made a circuit upon our track, and were walking exactly in the opposite direction to our township. We hastily retraced our steps, for we knew that it would soon be dark, as the twilight is so short in Australia. Fortunately for us, it was a very clear night, and as the stars came brightly out we saw before us the Southern Cross high up on our left, which guided us on our way. Had it been a cloudy night, most probably we should have had to spend it in the bush; but, thanks to the Southern Cross and good legs, we at length, though late, reached our township in safety.

There are sometimes snakes met with in the bush, though I saw but few of them, and these are always ready to get out of your way. The largest fellow I saw was drawn out from under the flooring of a weather-boarded hut on the hill-side above Majorca. I was coming down early one morning from the school-house, when I stopped at the hut to speak with the occupant. It is a very tidy little place, divided into two rooms—parlour and bedroom. The parlour was pasted all over with cheap prints reminding one of home, mostly taken from 'Punch' and the 'Illustrated London News.' Photographs of old friends were also hung over the mantel-shelf. The floor was neat and clean; the little pot was simmering over the little fire, and all was getting ready for breakfast. A very pleasant picture of a thriving emigrant's home.

As I was standing outside, about to take my leave, casting my eyes on the ground, I saw beneath the bench close to the door a long brownish-grey thing lying quite still. I at once saw that it was a snake, and snatched up a billet of wood to make a blow at him; but my friend, who had more experience in such matters, held me back. "Just wait a moment," said he, "and let me get hold of him." Quick as thought he stooped down, seized firm hold of the snake by the tail, and, whirling him rapidly round his head three or four times, he dashed him against the boards of the hut and let him drop, crushing the reptile's head with his boot-heel. The snake was four feet six inches in length, and said to be of a very poisonous sort.

Snakes are much more common in the less cleared parts of the colony, and fatal snake-bites are not infrequent. The most successful method of treatment is that invented by Dr. Halford, of Melbourne, which consists in injecting a solution of ammonia into a vein dissected out and opened for the purpose. This is said at once and almost completely to destroy the effects of the poison. Since my return home I observe that Dr. Halford has been publicly rewarded for his discovery.

Kangaroo-hunting is one of the great sports of Victoria, but it was not my fortune to see a hunt of this sort. There are now very few, if any, kangaroo in this immediate neighbourhood.[11] Yet there is no lack of marsupial animals of the same character: the opossum is one of these. There is also a small kind of kangaroo, called the wallaby, which, though I have not hunted, I have eaten. And wallaby stew is by no means a bad dish: the flesh tastes very much like venison. Indeed, the marsupial animals of Australia are of almost endless variety, ranging from a very tiny animal, no bigger than our field-mouse, to the great old-man kangaroo, which measures between seven and eight feet from the nose to the tip of the tail. The peculiarity of all this class of animals, from the smallest to the largest, is the marsupium, or pouch, in which the females carry their immature young until they are old enough to shift for themselves. The kangaroo is almost confined to Australia, though several species are also to be met with in the neighbouring islands.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 10: It is said in the colony that the musquitoes scent out each "new chum," or fresh importation, by the lime-juice he has taken on board ship; and that, being partial to fresh blood, they attack the "new chums" in preference to the seasoned inhabitants.]

[Footnote 11: There is a Hunt Club at Avoca, that hunts kangaroo. The animals abound north of the Murray River; and some parts of the unsettled country in Gipps Land still swarm with them.]



CHAPTER XIV.

GOLD-BUYING AND GOLD-MINING.

HOW THE GOLD IS FOUND—GOLD-WASHING—QUARTZ-CRUSHING—BUYING GOLD FROM CHINAMEN—ALLUVIAL COMPANIES—BROKEN-DOWN MEN—UPS AND DOWNS IN GOLD-MINING—VISIT TO A GOLD MINE—GOLD-SEEKING—DIGGERS' TALES OF LUCKY FINDS.

I must now be excused if I talk a little "shop." Though my descriptions hitherto have, for the most part, related to up-country life, seasons, amusements, and such like, my principal concern, while living in Majorca, was with bank business and gold-buying. The ordinary business of a banking office is tolerably well known, but the business of gold-buying is a comparatively new feature, peculiar to the gold-producing districts, and is, therefore, worthy of a short description.

The gold is found and brought to us in various forms. The Majorca gold is generally alluvial, consisting of coarse gold-dust and small nuggets washed out from the gravel. There are also some quartz reef mining companies, whose gold is bought in what we call a retorted state. Let me explain. The quartz containing the gold is stamped and broken up by heavy iron hammers falling upon it; and a stream of water constantly running down into the box in which the stampers work, the soluble dirt is washed away, while the particles of quartz and gold are carried forward over boards, in which, at intervals, are small ripples containing quicksilver. The quicksilver clings to the gold and forms an amalgam with it. This is collected, taken out, and squeezed in bags of chamois leather,—by which the greater part of the quicksilver is pressed out and saved for a repetition of the process. The residue is placed in a retort, and exposed to heat, by which the remainder of the quicksilver is driven off by evaporation, leaving the gold in a solid lump. There are, however, various other processes by which the gold is separated from the quartz.

Sometimes the gold is offered for sale in a very imperfectly separated state, and then considerable judgment is required in deciding as to its value. In alluvial gold there is always a certain proportion of chips of iron, which have flown from the picks used in striking and turning up the gravel. These pieces of iron are carefully extracted by means of a magnet. The larger bits of gold, if there be any, are then taken out and put to one side. The remainder is put into a shallow tin dish, which is shaken with a peculiar turn of the wrist, and all the sand and dirt thus turned to the point of the dish. This is blown off; then up goes the gold again, and you blow and blow until all the sand is blown off. If there remain any gold with quartz still adhering to it, the particles are put into a big iron mortar and well beaten, and the process above described is repeated. The gold is then ready for weighing and buying, and there is usually no difficulty in settling the price with English diggers, the price varying according to the assay of the gold.[12]

Our great difficulty is with the Chinamen, who are very close-fisted fellows. They mostly work at sludge, which Englishmen have already washed; and they are found hanging on to the tailings of old workings, washing the refuse in order to extract the gold that had been missed. Old tailings are often thus washed several times over, and never without finding gold to a greater or less amount. When a party of Chinamen think they can do better elsewhere, they may be seen moving off, carrying their whole mining apparatus on their backs, consisting of tubs, blankets, tin scoops, and a small washing-cradle.

The Chinamen get their gold in a very rude way, though it seems to answer their purpose. They put the stuff to be washed on to their cradle, and by scooping water over it and keeping the cradle going they gradually rinse it away, the fluid running over two or three ledges of blankets, and leaving the fine gold remaining behind adhering to the wool. After the process has been continued sufficiently long, the gold-dust is collected from the blankets, and is retorted by the Chinamen themselves, and then they bring it for sale. The retorting has usually been badly done, and there remains a good deal of quicksilver and nitric acid adhering to the gold. The only way of dealing with it is to put the whole into a crucible, then make it red hot, and keep the gold at the melting-point for five or ten minutes.

As we have got no furnace of our own on the premises, I have frequently to march up the street to the blacksmith's shop, to put John Chinaman's gold to the test. If John is allowed to go by himself, he merely waits till the gold gets warm, takes it out again, and brings it back, saying, "All light; welly good, welly good gole; no gammon." But you should see John when I go up to the blacksmith's myself, put the crucible into the hottest part of the fire, and begin to blow the bellows! When the gold begins to glow with heat, and he knows the weight is diminishing by the quicksilver and dirt that are flying off, he cries, "Welly hot! too muchee fire; me losem too muchee money!" But the thing must be done, and John must take the choice of his dirty gold or the regular price for it when cleaned. I have known it lose, by this process of purifying, as much as from five to six pennyweights in the ounce.

Sometimes he will bring only a few shillings' worth, and, when the money is tendered for it, he will turn it over in his hand, like a London cabman when his regular fare is given him. One man, who almost invariably brought only a very small quantity, would begin his conversation with, "No more money now—no more chow-chow (dinner)—no more opium!" Sometimes matters come to a climax, and he tells us that we "too much lie and cheatem;" on which we send him out at the door.

The lower orders of Chinamen are almost invariably suspicious that Englishmen cheat them, although some of them are very decent fellows, and, indeed, kind and even polite. Several times I have asked them how they were going to spend the money for which they had sold their gold—say five shillings; and they would answer, ingenuously enough, "Two shillings for opium, three shillings for chow-chow;" leaving no margin for sundries.

We buy from the Chinamen as little as three shillings' worth of gold, and from the mining companies up to any amount. Some of the latter bring in hundreds of pounds' worth of gold at a time. The quartz companies bring theirs in large yellow lumps, of over 200 ounces, fresh from the retort; and the alluvial companies generally deposit theirs in leather bags containing their washings, until the end of the week or fortnight, when they sell the accumulated product.

There is, of course, a good deal of excitement and anxiety about gold-digging. When men get into good gold-yielding ground, by steady work they contrive to make fair earnings, and sometimes a good deal of money; but they have usually to work pretty hard for it. Of course, the most successful men are working miners, men who understand the business; for gold-mining is a business, like any other. The amateur men, who come in search of lucky finds and sudden fortunes, rarely do any good. Nearly all the young fellows, sons of gentlemen, who could do no good at home and came out here during the "rushes," are still in no better position than they were at starting. A few of them may have done well; but the greater number are bullock-drivers in the country, cab-drivers in Melbourne, shepherds in the bush, or, still worse, loafers hanging about the drinking-bars.

I know many men, of good family and education, still working as common miners in this neighbourhood. Although their life is a rough one, they themselves think it is better than a struggling clerk's life at home; and perhaps they are right. I know one young man, formerly a medical student in England, digging for weekly wages, hired by a company of miners at 2l. 10s. a week; but he is not saving money. He came out with two cousins, one of whom broke away and pursued his profession; he is now the head of a military hospital in India. The other cousin remained in the colony, and is now a hanger-on about up-country stations. There is also the son of a baronet here, who came out in the time of the gold-fever. He has never advanced a step, but is wood-cutting and rail-splitting in the bush, like a poor Savoyard. Still the traces of his education can be seen through the "jumper" shirt and moleskin trousers, in spite of rough ways and hard work.

There are many ups and downs in gold-mining. Sometimes men will work long and perseveringly, and earn little more than their food; but, buoyed up by hope, they determine to go on again, and at last, perhaps, they succeed. One day two men came into the bank with 120l. worth of gold, the proceeds of four days' mining on a new claim. They had been working for a long time without finding anything worth their while, and at last they struck gold. The 120l. had to be divided amongst six men, and out of it they had to pay towards the cost of sinking their shaft and maintaining their three horses which worked the "whip" for drawing up the water and dirt out of the mine. When they brought in their gold in a little tin billy, the men did not seem at all elated by their good fortune. They are so accustomed to a sudden turn of luck—good or ill, as the case may be—that the good fortune on this occasion seemed to be taken as a matter of course.

One day, the manager and I went out to see a reef where some men had struck gold. It lay across the bare-looking ranges at the north of the township, in a pretty part of the bush, rather more wooded than usual. The reef did not look a place for so much gold to come out of. There were a couple of shafts, small windlasses above them, and two or three heaps of dirty-looking brown quartz and refuse. I believe the reef is very narrow—only from eight inches to a foot in width; the quartz yielding from eight to twelve ounces of gold per ton. Thus, ten tons crushed would give a value of about 400l. Though this may seem a good yield, it is small compared with richer quartz. I have heard of one mine which gave 200 ounces, or 800l., to the ton of quartz crushed, but this was unusually rich.

At some of the larger claims the works are carried on upon a large scale with the aid of complete machinery. Let me describe one of the mines, close to Majorca, down which I went one day to inspect the operations. It is called the Lowe Kong Meng mine, and was formerly worked by Chinamen, but had to be abandoned because of the great quantity of water encountered, as well as the accidents which constantly happened to the machinery. The claim was then taken up by an English company of Tributors, who pay a percentage of the proceeds of the mine to the proprietor, the large Chinese merchant, Mr. Lowe Kong Meng, who resides in Melbourne.

In some of the shallower workings the men go down the shaft with their feet in a noose at the end of the rope; or, in some small and narrow shafts, by holding on to the sides with their knees and feet. But in large workings, such as this (which is about 150 feet deep), we descend in a bucket, as in ordinary mines. What a speed we go down at! We seem to shoot down into darkness. There—bump! we are at the bottom. But I can see nothing; I only hear the drip, drip, and splashing of water.

In a few minutes my eyes get accustomed to the darkness: then I see the dim light of a candle held by some one not far off. "Come up here," says the guide; and we shortly find ourselves in a somewhat open space, more light than the actual bottom of the shaft. We are each supplied with a dip tallow candle, by means of which we see where we are. The two drives branch off from this space: the main is 6 feet 3 inches in height, broad, and splendidly timbered with stout wood all the way along. The Chinamen did this work.

Water is running everywhere. We try to walk upon the rails on which the trucks run, to keep our feet dry. But it is of no use, as there is more water in our way to get through. Every now and then we slipped off the rail and down into the water. As we got into the narrower and lower drives I was continually coming to grief, my head bumping against the dirty top, my hat coming off, or my candle getting extinguished.

We were taken first up to the place where the water had broken in so heavily upon the Chinamen, and in which direction the mine could not be worked. Strong supports of wood held up the gravel, through which the water poured in, running down the drives of the well underneath the shaft. What a labyrinth all these different passages seemed to me! yet I suppose this claim is a small one compared with many others in the gold-mining districts.

Then we were shown a monkey—not the animal, but a small upright shaft leading into a drive above, where the wash-dirt was being got out. Should the course of the wash-dirt, in which the gold is, go downward below the level of the well or the drives for draining the mine, the shaft must then be sunk deeper down. The monkey was rather difficult for me to scramble up. However, by holding on, and using the niches at the sides, I managed to mount, as usual with the loss of my light.

Along the drive we went, waiting in a corner until a truck of dirt passed by, and its contents were shot down the monkey into the tram waiting for it below. Now we creep up from the drive into a narrower space, where we crawl along upon our hands and knees. We shortly came upon four men getting out the wash-dirt, using their picks while squatting or lying down, and in all sorts of uncomfortable positions. The perspiration was steaming down the men's faces as they worked, for the heat was very great.

We did not stay long in that hot place, and I did not take a pick and happen to strike upon a nugget, as it is said the Duke of Edinburgh did, though I saw a small dish of the dirt washed when we reached the top, and it yielded a speck or two. We saw "the colour," as the expression is. I felt quite relieved at last to find myself at the top of the shaft, and in the coolness and freshness of the open air. Here the dirt raised from the mine is put into the iron puddling-machine, and worked round and round with water. The water carries off the mud, the large stones are picked out, and the gold in the bottom of the machine is cradled off. Such was my little experience in mine-prospecting.

I must also tell of my still smaller experience in gold-seeking. One morning a little boy brought in a nugget for sale, which he had picked up from a heap of dirt, while he was strolling down the lead outside the town. After a heavy washing fall of rain, it is not unusual for small bits of gold to be exposed to sight; and old diggers often take a ramble amongst the mullock after rain, to make a search amongst the heaps. A piece of gold was once brought to us for sale, weighing about two ounces, that had been thus washed up by a heavy shower of rain. Inspired by the success of the little boy, I went out in the afternoon in a pair of thick boots, and with a pair of sharp eyes, to search for treasure! It had been raining hard for several days, and it was a good time for making an inspection of the old washed-out dirt-heaps. After a long search I found only one speck of gold, of the value of about 4d. This I was showing with pride to a young lady friend, who, being playfully inclined, gave my hand a shake, and my microscopical speck was gone, the first and last fruits of my gold-seeking.

Some of the tales told by the old diggers of their luck in the early days of gold-finding are very interesting. One of these I can relate almost in the very words of the man himself to whom the incident occurred; and it was only an ordinary digger's tale.

"My mates and I," he said, "were camped in a gully with some forty or fifty other miners. It was a little quiet place, a long way from any township. We had been working some shallow ground; but as the wash-dirt when reached only yielded about three-quarters of a pennyweight (about 3s.) to the dish, we got sick of it, left our claim, and went to take up another not far off. About a day or two after we had settled upon our new ground an old acquaintance of mine looked in upon us by chance. He was hard up—very hard up—and wanted to know whether we could give him anything to do. 'Well, there is our old place up there,' said I, 'it is not much good, but you can find enough to keep body and soul together.' So he went up to our old place, and kept himself in tucker. A few days after he had been at work, he found that the further down he dug in one direction the more gold the soil yielded. At one end of the ground a reef cropped up, shelving inwards very much. He quickly saw that against the reef, towards which the gold-yielding gravel lay, the ground sloping downwards towards the bottom must be still richer. He got excited, threw aside the gravel with his shovel, to come at the real treasure he expected to find. Down he went, till he reached the slope of the reef, where the gravel lay up against it. There, in the corner of the ground, right in the angle of the juncture, as it were, lay the rich glistening gold, all in pure particles, mixed with earth and pebbles. He filled his tin dish with the precious mixture, bore it aloft, and brought it down to our tent, where, aided by the mates, he washed off the dirt, and obtained as the product of his various washings about 1000 ounces of pure gold! The diggers who were camped about in the gully being a rough lot, we were afraid to let them know anything of the prize that had been found. So, without saying anything, two of us, late one night, set out with the lucky man and his fortune to the nearest township, where he sold his gold and set out immediately for England, where, I believe, he is now. He left us the remainder of his dirt, which he did not think anything of, compared with what he had got; and three of us obtained from it the value of 600l., or 200l. a man."

The same digger at another time related to us how and when he had found his first nugget. He declared that it was all through a dream, "I dreamt," he said, "that I sunk a shaft down by the side of a pretty creek, just under a gum-tree, and close to the water; that I worked down about ten feet there, put in a drive, and, whilst I was working, chanced to look up, and there, sticking in the pipeclay, was a piece of gold as big as my fist. Such was my dream. It took complete possession of me. I could think of nothing else. Some weeks after, I selected just such a site for a shaft as that I had dreamt of, under a gum-tree, close by a creek; and there, new-chum like, I put in the drive at the wrong depth. But, one day, when I had got quite sick at fruitlessly working in the hole, on accidentally looking up, sure enough there was my nugget sticking up in the pipeclay, just as I had dreamt of it. I took out the gold, sat with it in my hand, and thought the thing over, but couldn't make it out at all."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 12: The ordinary price of good gold is 3l. 19s. 6d. the ounce. In the early days of gold-digging, the gold was never cleaned, but bought right off at a low price, 2l. 15s. or 2l. 17s. 6d. an ounce; the bankers thus often realizing immense profits.]



CHAPTER XV

ROUGH LIFE AT THE DIGGINGS—"STOP THIEF!"

GOLD-RUSHING—DIGGERS' CAMP AT HAVELOCK—MURDER OF LOPEZ—PURSUIT AND CAPTURE OF THE MURDERER—THE THIEVES HUNTED FROM THE CAMP—DEATH OF THE MURDERER—THE POLICE—ATTEMPTED ROBBERY OF THE COLLINGWOOD BANK—ANOTHER SUPPOSED ROBBERY—"STOP THIEF!"—SMART USE OF THE TELEGRAPH.

In the times of the early rushes to the gold-fields there was, as might be expected, a good deal of disorder and lawlessness. When the rumour of a new gold-field went abroad, its richness was, as usual, exaggerated in proportion to the distance it travelled; and men of all classes rushed from far and near to the new diggings. Melbourne was half emptied of its labouring population; sailors deserted their ships; shepherds left their flocks, and stockmen their cattle; and, worst of all, there also came pouring into Victoria the looser part of the convict population of the adjoining colonies. These all flocked to the last discovered field, which was invariably reputed the richest that had yet been discovered.

Money was rapidly made by some where gold was found in any abundance; but when the soil proved comparatively poor, the crowd soon dispersed in search of other diggings. A population so suddenly drawn together by the fierce love of gain, and containing so large an admixture of the desperado element, could scarcely be expected to be very orderly. Yet it is astonishing how soon, after the first rush was over, the camp would settle down into a state of comparative order and peaceableness. For it was always the interest of the majority to put down plundering and disorder. Their first concern was for the security of their lives, and their next for the security of the gold they were able to scrape together.

When the lawless men about a camp were numerous, and robberies became frequent, the diggers would suddenly extemporise a police, rout out the thieves, and drive them perforce from the camp. I may illustrate this early state of things by what occurred at Havelock, a place about seven miles from Majorca. The gully there was "rushed" about nine years since, when some twenty thousand diggers were drawn together, with even more than the usual proportion of grog-shanty keepers, loafers, thieves, and low men and women of every description. In fact, the very scum of the roving population of the colony seems to have accumulated in the camp; and crime upon crime was committed, until at length an affair occurred, more dreadful and outrageous than anything that had preceded it, which thoroughly roused the digger population, and a rising took place, which ended in their hunting the whole of the thieves and scoundrels into the bush.

The affair has been related to me by three of the persons who were themselves actors in it, and it is briefly as follows:—At the corner of one of the main thoroughfares of the camp, composed of canvas tents and wooden stores, there stood an extemporized restaurant, kept by a Spaniard named Lopez. A few yards from his place was a store occupied by a Mr. S——, now a storekeeper in Majorca, and a customer at our bank. Opposite to S——'s store stood a tent, the occupants of which were known to be among the most lawless ruffians in the camp. S—— had seen the men more than once watching his store, and he had formed the conviction that they meant at some convenient opportunity to rob him, so he never slept without a loaded revolver under his pillow. One night in particular he was very anxious. The men stood about at the front of his store near closing time, suspiciously eyeing his premises, as he thought. So he put a bold face on, came to the door near where they were standing, discharged his pistol in the air—a regular custom in the diggings at night—reloaded, entered his store, and bolted himself in. He went to bed at about ten o'clock, and lay awake listening, for he could not sleep. It was not very long before he heard some person's steps close by his hut, and a muttering of smothered voices. The steps passed on; and then; after the lapse of about ten minutes, he heard a shot—a scream—and hurried footsteps running close past his hut. He lay in bed, determined not to go out, as he feared that this was only a ruse on the part of the thieves to induce him to open his door. But soon he heard shouts outside, as of persons in pursuit of some one, and jumping out of bed, he ran out half dressed and joined in the chase.

Now, this is what had happened during the ten minutes that he had lain in bed listening. The thieves had stolen past his store, as he had heard them, and gone forward to the restaurant kept by the Spaniard. They looked into the bar, and through the chinks of the wood they saw Lopez counting over the money he had taken during the day. The bar was closed, but the men knocked at the door for admission. Lopez asked what they wanted; the reply was that they wished for admission to have a drink. After some demur, Lopez at last opened the door, and the men entered. Nobblers were ordered, and while Lopez was reaching for a bottle, one of the thieves, named Brooke, made a grab at the money lying in the open drawer. The landlord saw his hand, and instantly snatching up a large Spanish knife which lay behind the counter, he made a lunge at Brooke, and so fiercely did he strike that the knife ripped up the man's abdomen. With a yell of rage, Brooke drew his revolver, instantly shot Lopez through the head, and he fell dead without a groan.

Meanwhile the other thieves had fled; and now Brooke himself, holding his wound together with his hand, ran out of the house, through the street of tents, across the lead, and into the bush. But the hue and cry had been raised; the diggers bundled out of their tents, and before the murderer had reached the cover of the bush, already a dozen men were on his track. It was full moon, and they could see him clearly, holding on his way, avoiding the crab-holes, and running at a good speed notwithstanding his fearful wound. Among the foremost of the pursuers were a trooper and an active little fellow who is now living in Majorca. They got nearer and nearer to Brooke, who turned from time to time to watch their advance. The trooper was gaining upon him fast; but when within about fifteen yards of him Brooke turned, took aim with his revolver, and deliberately fired. The aim was too true: the trooper fell dead, shot right through the heart. Brooke turned to fly immediately he had fired his shot, but the root of a tree behind him tripped him up, and the little man who followed close behind the trooper was upon him in an instant, with his knee upon his body holding him down. Brooke managed to turn himself half round, presented his revolver at his captor, and fired. The cap snapped on the nipple! My friend says he will never forget the look the wretch gave him when his pistol missed fire. A few minutes—long, long minutes—passed, and at length help arrived and the murderer was secured. The number shortly increased to a crowd of angry diggers. At first they wished to hang Brooke at once upon the nearest tree; but moderate counsels prevailed, and at last they agreed to take him into Havelock and send for a doctor.

When the crowd got back to Havelock their fury broke out. They determined to level the thieves' tents and the grog-shanties that had harboured them. What a wild scene it must have been! Two or three thousand men pulling down huts and tents, smashing crockery and furniture, ripping up beds, and levelling the roosts of infamy to the ground. When Dr. Laidman, the doctor sent for from Maryborough, arrived to attend the dying man, he saw a cloud of "white things" in the air, and could not make out what they were. They turned out to be the feathers of the numerous feather-beds, which the diggers had torn to pieces, that were flying about. The diggers' blood was fairly up, and they were determined to make "a clean job of it" before they had done. And not only did they thoroughly root out and destroy all the thieves' dens and low grog-shops and places of ill-fame, but they literally hunted the owners and occupants of them right out into the bush.

I must now tell you of the murderer's end. He was taken to the rude theatre of the place, and laid down upon the stage, with his two victims beside him—the dead Lopez on one side and the dead trooper on the other. When the doctor arrived, he examined Brooke, and told him he would try to keep him alive, so that justice might be done. And the doctor did his best. But the Spaniard's wound had been terrible and deadly. Brooke died in about half an hour from the time of the doctor's arrival The murderer remained impenitent to the last, and opened his mouth only once to utter an oath. Such was the horrible ending of this digger's tragedy.

Cases such as this are, however, of rare occurrence. So soon as a digging becomes established, a regular police is employed to ensure order, and local self-government soon follows. We had often occasion to ride over to Maryborough, taking with us gold; but though we were well known in the place, and our errand might be surmised, we were never molested, nor, indeed, entertained the slightest apprehension of danger. It is true that in the bank we usually had a loaded revolver lying in the drawer ready at hand, in case it should be needed; but we had never occasion to use it.

Some years ago, however, an actual attempt was openly made to rob a bank in Collingwood, a suburb of Melbourne, which was very gallantly resisted. The bank stood in a well-frequented part of the town, where people were constantly passing to and fro. One day two men entered it during office hours. One of them deliberately bolted the door, and the other marched up to the counter and presented a pistol at the head of the accountant who stood behind it. Nothing daunted, the young man at once vaulted over the counter, calling loudly to the manager for help, and collared the ruffian, whose pistol went off as he went down. The manager rushed out from his room, and tackled the other fellow. Both the robbers were strong, powerful men, but they fought without the courage of honesty. The struggle was long and desperate, until at last assistance came, and both were secured. A presentation of plate was made to the two officials who had so courageously done their duty, and they are still in the service of the same bank.

In direct contrast to this case, I may mention a rather mysterious circumstance which occurred at an up-country bank, situated in a quartz-mining district. I must first explain that the bank building is situated in a street, with houses on both sides, and that any noise in it would readily be heard by the neighbours. One young fellow only was in charge of the place. The manager of a neighbouring branch called weekly for the surplus cash and the gold bought during the week. The youth in charge suddenly reported one day that he had been "stuck up," as the colonial phrase is for being robbed. He said that one night, as he was going into the bank, where he slept—in fact just as he was putting the key into the lock—a man came up to him, and, clapping a pistol to his head, demanded the key of the safe. He gave it him, showed him where the gold and notes were kept, and, in fact, enabled the robber to make up a decent "swag." The man, whoever he was, got away with all the money. The bank thought it their duty to proceed against the clerk himself for appropriating the money. But the proof was insufficient, and the verdict brought in was "Not guilty."

We were one day somewhat alarmed at Majorca by a letter received from our manager at Maryborough, informing us that a great many bad characters were known to be abroad and at work—and cautioning us to be particularly upon our guard. We were directed to discharge our firearms frequently and keep them in good order, so that in case of need they should not miss fire. We were also to give due notice when we required notes from Maryborough, so that the messenger appointed to bring them over should be accompanied by a complete escort, i.e., a mounted trooper. All this was very alarming, and we prepared for events accordingly.

A few nights after, as we were sitting under the manse verandah, we heard a loud cry of "Stop thief!" The robbers, then, were already in the township! We jumped up at once, looked round the corner of the house, and saw two men running off as fast as they could, followed at some distance by another man shouting frantically, "Stop thief!" We immediately started in pursuit of the supposed thieves. We soon came up with the man who had been robbed, and whom we found swearing in a most dreadful way. This we were very much astonished at, as we recognised in him one of the most pious Wesleyans in the township. But we soon shot ahead of him, and gradually came up with the thieves, whom we at first supposed to be Chinamen. As we were close upon them, they suddenly stopped, turned round, and burst out laughing! Surely there must be some mistake! We recognised in the "thieves" the son of the old gentleman whom we had just passed, with one of his companions, who had pretended to steal his fowls, as Chinamen are apt to do: whereas they had really carried off nothing at all. In short, we, as well as our respected Wesleyan friend, felt ourselves completely "sold."

The only attempt at dishonesty practised upon our branch which I can recollect while at Majorca was one of fraud and not of force. We had just been placed in telegraphic communication with the other towns in the colony. The opening of the telegraph was celebrated, as usual, by the Town Council "shouting" champagne. Some time before, a working-man, who had some money deposited with us, called in a fluster to say his receipts had been stolen. This was noted. Now came a telegram from Ballarat, saying that a receipt of our branch had been presented for payment, and asking if it was correct. We answered sharp, ordering the man to be detained. He was accordingly taken into custody, handed over to the police, and remanded to Newstead, where the receipt had been stolen. Newstead is a long way from Majorca, but our manager drove over with a pair of horses to give his evidence. It turned out that our customer's coat, containing the receipt, had been stolen while he was at his work. The thief was identified as having been seen hanging about the place; and the result was that he was committed, tried, and duly convicted. So you see that we are pretty smart out here, and not a long way behind the old country after all.



CHAPTER XVI.

PLACES ABOUT.

VISIT TO BALLARAT—THE JOURNEY BY COACH—BALLARAT FOUNDED ON GOLD—DESCRIPTION OF THE TOWN—BALLARAT "CORNER"—THE SPECULATIVE COBBLER—FIRE BRIGADES—RETURN JOURNEY—CRAB-HOLES—THE TALBOT BALL—THE TALBOT FETE—THE AVOCA RACES—SUNRISE IN THE BUSH.

One of the most interesting visits to places that I made while staying at Majorca was to Ballarat, the mining capital of the colony, sometimes called here the Victorian Manchester. The time of my visit was not the most propitious, for it was shortly after a heavy fall of rain, which had left the roads in a very bad state. But I will describe my journey.

Three of us hired a one-horse buggy to take us on to Clunes, which lay in our way. The load was rather too much for the horse, but we took turn and turn about at walking, and made it as light for the animal as possible. At Clunes I parted with my companions, who determined to take the buggy on to Ballarat. I thought it preferable to wait for the afternoon coach; and after being hospitably entertained at dinner by the manager of our Branch Bank at Clunes, I took my place in the coach for Ballarat.

We had not gone more than about a mile when the metalled road ended, and the Slough of Despond began,—the road so called, though it was little more than a deep mud-track, winding up a steepish ascent. All the passengers got out and walked up the hill. In the distance we saw a buggy in difficulties. I had already apprehended the fate of my mates who had gone on before me, and avoided sharing it by taking my place in the coach. But we were in little better straits ourselves. When we got up to the buggy, we found it fairly stuck in the mud, in one of the worst parts of the road, with a trace broken. I got under the rails of the paddock in which the coach passengers were walking—for it was impossible to walk in the road—and crossed over to where my former mates were stuck. They were out in the deep mud, almost knee-deep, trying to mend the broken trace. Altogether they looked in a very sorry plight.

At the top of the hill we again mounted the coach, and got on very well for about three miles, until we came to another very bad piece of road. Here we diverged from it altogether, and proceeded into an adjoining field, so as to drive alongside the road, and join it a little further on. The ground looked to me very soft, and so it was. For we had not gone far when the coach gave a plunge, and the wheels sank axle-deep in a crab-hole. All hands had now to set to work to help the coach out of the mud; while the driver urged his horses with cries and cracks of his long whip. But it was of no use. The two wheelers were fairly exhausted, and their struggling only sent them deeper into the mud. The horses were then unharnessed, and the three strongest were yoked in a line, so as to give the foremost of them a better foot-hold. But it was still of no use. It was not until the mud round the wheels had been all dug out, and the passengers lifted the hind wheels and the coach bodily up, that the horses were at last able to extricate the vehicle. By this time we were all in a sad state of dirt and wet, for the rain had begun to fall quite steadily.

Shortly after, we reached the half-way house and changed horses. We now rattled along at a pretty good pace. But every now and then the driver would shout, "Look out inside!" and there would be a sudden roll, followed by a jerk and pitch combined, and you would be thrown over upon your opposite neighbour, or he upon you. At last, after a rather uncomfortable journey, we reached the outskirts of a large town, and in a few minutes more we found ourselves safely jolted into Ballarat.

I am not at all up in the statistics of the colony, and cannot tell the population or the number of inhabited houses in Ballarat.[13] But it is an immense place, second in importance in the colony only to Melbourne. Big though it be, like most of these up-country towns, Ballarat originated in a rush. It was only in September, 1851, that a blacksmith at Buningong, named Hiscocks, who had long been searching for gold, traced a mountain-torrent back into the hills towards the north, and came upon the rich lode which soon became known as the "Ballarat Diggings." When the rumour of the discovery got abroad, there was a great rush of people to the place, accompanied by the usual disorders; but they gradually settled down, and Ballarat was founded. The whole soil of the place was found to contain more or less gold. It was gathered in the ranges, on the flats, in the water-courses, and especially in the small veins of blue clay, lying almost above the so-called "pipeclay." The gold was to all appearance quite pure, and was found in rolled or water-course irregular lumps of various sizes, from a quarter or half an ounce in weight, sometimes incorporated with round pebbles of quartz, which appeared to have formed the original matrix.

The digging was at first for the most part alluvial, but when skilled miners arrived from England, operations were begun on a much larger scale, until now it is conducted upon a regular system, by means of costly machinery and highly-organised labour. To give an idea of the extensive character of the operations, I may mention that one company, the Band of Hope, has erected machinery of the value of 70,000l. The main shaft, from which the various workings branch out, is 420 feet deep; and 350 men are employed in and about the mine. It may also be mentioned that the deeper the workings have gone, the richer has been the yield of gold. This one company has, in a comparatively short time, raised gold worth over half a million sterling; the quantity produced by the Ballarat mines, since the discovery of gold in September, 1851, to the end of 1866, having been worth about one hundred and thirty millions sterling.

The morning after my arrival in Ballarat I proceeded to survey the town, I was certainly surprised at the fine streets, the large buildings, and the number of people walking along the broad pathways. Perhaps my surprise was magnified by the circumstance that nearly fifteen months had passed since I had been in a large town; and, after Majorca, Ballarat seemed to me like a capital. After wandering about the streets for half an hour, I looked into the Court-house, where an uninteresting case of drunkenness was being heard. I next went into the adjoining large building, which I found to be the Public Library. The commodious reading-room was amply supplied with books, magazines, and newspapers; and here I amused myself for an hour in reading a new book. Over the mantel-piece of the large room hangs an oil painting of Prince Alfred, representing him and his "mates" after the visit they had made to one of the Ballarat mines. This provision of excellent reading-rooms—free and open to all—seems to me an admirable feature of the Victorian towns. They are the best sort of supplement to the common day-schools; and furnish a salutary refuge for all sober-minded men, from the temptations of the grog-shops. But besides the Public Library, there is also the Mechanics' Institute, in Sturt Street; a fine building, provided also with a large library, and all the latest English newspapers, free to strangers.

The features of the town that most struck me in the course of the day were these. First, Sturt Street: a fine, broad street, at least three chains wide. On each side are large handsome shops, and along the middle of the road runs a broad strip of garden, with large trees and well-kept beds of flowers. Sturt Street is on an incline; and at the top of it runs Ledyard Street, at right angles, also a fine broad street. It contains the principal banks, of which I counted nine, all handsome stone buildings, the London Chartered, built on a foundation of blue-stone, being perhaps the finest of them in an architectural point of view. Close to it is the famous "Corner." What the Bourse is in Paris, Wall Street in New York, and the Exchange in London—that is the "Corner" at Ballarat. Under the verandah of the Unicorn Hotel, and close to the Exchange Buildings, there is a continual swarm of speculators, managers of companies, and mining men, standing about in groups, very like so many circles of betting-men on a race-course. Here all the mining swindles originate. Specimens of gold-bearing quartz are shown, shares are bought and sold, new schemes are ventilated, and old ones revived. Many fortunes have been lost and won on that bit of pavement.

One man is reckoned as good as another in Ballarat. Even the cad of a baker's boy has the chance of making "a pile," while the swell broker, who dabbles in mines and reefs, may be beggared in a few days. As one of the many instances of men growing suddenly rich by speculation here, I may mention the following. A short time since, a cobbler at Ballarat had a present made to him of twenty scrip in a company that was looking so bad that the shares had become unsaleable. The cobbler knew nothing of the mine, but he held the scrip. Not only so, but he bought more at a shilling or two apiece, and he went on accumulating them, until at the end of the year he had scraped together some two or three hundred. At length he heard that gold had been struck. He went to a bank, deposited his scrip certificates, and raised upon them all the money he could borrow. He bought more shares. They trebled in value. He held on. They trebled again. At last, when the gold was being got almost by the bucket, and a great mania for the shares had set in, the cobbler sold out at 250l. a share, and found himself a rich man. The mine was, I think, the Sir William Don, one of the most successful in Ballarat, now yielding a dividend of about 2l. per share per month, or a return of about 500 per cent. on the paid-up capital.

But to return to my description of Ballarat. The town lies in a valley between two slopes, spreading up on both sides and over the summits. Each summit is surmounted by a lofty tower, built by the Eastern and Western Fire Brigades. These towers command a view of the whole place, and are continually occupied by watchmen, who immediately give the alarm on the outbreak of fire. The people here say that the Ballarat Fire Brigade is the smartest in the southern hemisphere; though the engines are all manned by volunteers. And a fire must be a serious matter in Ballarat, where so many of the buildings—stores as well as dwellings—are built entirely of wood. Many of the streets are even paved with wood.

In the afternoon I ascended the western hill, from which I obtained a fine bird's-eye view of the town. The large, broad streets, at right angles to each other, looked well laid out, neat, and clean looking. What seemed strangest of all was the lazy puffing of the engines over the claims, throwing out their white jets of steam. But for the width of the streets, and the cleanness of the place, one might almost have taken Ballarat for a manufacturing town in Yorkshire, though they have no flower gardens along the middle of their streets!

In the evening I went to the opera—for Ballarat has an opera! The piece was 'Faust,' and was performed by Lyster and Smith's company from Melbourne. The performers did their best, but I cannot say they are very strong in opera yet at the Antipodes.

After thoroughly doing Ballarat, I set out on my return to Majorca. There was the same jolting as before, but this time the coach did not stick in the mud. On reaching Clunes, I resolved to walk straight to Majorca across the plain, instead of going the roundabout way by the road. But the straightest route is not always the shortest, as my experience on this occasion proved. I had scarcely got fairly into the plain before I found myself in the midst of a succession of crab-holes. These are irregular depressions, about a yard or so apart, formed by the washing up of the soil by eddies during floods, and now the holes were all full of water. It was a difficult and tedious process to work one's way through amongst them, for they seemed to dovetail into one another, and often I had to make a considerable detour to get round the worst of them. This crab-holey ground continued for about four miles, after which I struck into the bush, making for the ranges, and keeping Mount Greenock and Mount Glasgow before me as landmarks. Not being a good bushman, I suspect I went several miles out of my way. However, by dint of steady walking, I contrived to do the sixteen miles in about four hours; but if I have ever occasion to walk from Clunes again, I will take care to take the roundabout road, and not to make the journey en zigzag round crab-holes and through the bush.

Among the other places about here that I have visited were Talbot, about seven miles distant, and Avoca, about twenty. One of the occasions of my going to Talbot was to attend a ball given there, and another to attend a great fete for the benefit of the Amherst Hospital. Talbot gives its name to the county, though by no means the largest town in it. The town is very neat and tidy, and contains some good stone and brick buildings. It consists of one principal street, with several little offshoots.

The ball was very like a ball at home, though a little more mixed. The young ladies were some of them very pretty, and nicely dressed—some in dresses "direct from London"—while a few of the elder ladies were gorgeous but incongruous. One old lady, in a juvenile dress, wore an enormous gold brooch, large enough to contain the portraits of several families. I was astonished to learn the great distances that some of the ladies and gentlemen had come to be present at the ball. Some had driven through the bush twenty and even thirty miles; but distance is thought nothing of here, especially when there is a chance of "meeting company." The ball was given in the Odd Fellows' Hall, a large square room. One end of it was partitioned off as a supper-room, and on the partition was sewn up in large letters this couplet from 'Childe Harold:'—

"No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet, To chase the glowing hours with flying feet."

And, to speak the truth, the young ladies, as well as the young gentlemen present, did ample justice to the text. The dancing continued until daybreak, and we drove back to Majorca as the sun was rising; but remember it was summer time, in November, when the sun rises very early.

One little event arose out of this ball which may serve to illustrate the comparative freeness of up-country manners. A nice young lady, with whom I danced, asked me if I would not like to be very great friends with her. "Oh, yes! certainly." And great friends we became at once. Perhaps she took pity on the stranger boy so far from home. She asked if I was fond of riding. "Very fond." "Then I will come over to Majorca, and call upon you, and we shall have a ride in the bush together." And I was to be sure and have some sweets ready for her, as she was very fond of them. I took this to be merely a little ball-room chaff; but judge my surprise when, next afternoon, the young lady rode up to the bank door and called on me to fulfil my promise,—which I did, lollipops and all.

A great event in Talbot is the Annual Fete, held on the Prince of Wales's birthday, which is observed as a public holiday in Victoria. The fete this year was held in aid of the funds of the Amherst Hospital, a valuable local institution. At this affair the whole population of the neighbourhood turned out. It began at midday with a grand procession through the town. Let me endeavour to give you an idea of the pageant. First came the well-mounted Clunes Lancers, in their light blue and white uniforms, 150 strong, blue and white pennons fluttering from their long lances. Then came lines of members of Friendly Societies, in gay scarfs, accompanied by banners. Then a good band of music. The Talbot 42nd Sectional Lancers next turn the corner of the street, gorgeous in scarlet and white. Then comes something comic—a Welsh lady and gentleman riding a pony barebacked. These are followed by an Irish couple, also mounted. Then comes a Highlandman, in a vehicle such as the Highlands never saw, discoursing music from his bagpipes. A large open boat follows, mounted on a car; it is filled with sailor-boys in blue and white. This boat is a model of the 'Cerberus,' the turret-ship that Mr. Reed is building in England for the defence of Port Phillip. A genuine old salt, with long white hair, plays the part of admiral. In cocked hat, blue admiral's coat, and white ducks, he waves his sword frantically, and gives the word of command to repel boarders; all the while two little cannons in the model are being constantly fired, reloaded, and fired again. This noisy exhibition having passed, a trophy representing the Australian chase appears. A huntsman, dressed in green, blowing his horn, stands amidst some bushes, holding a handsome leash of hounds; dead kangaroos and other Australian animals lie around him. Then follow more lancers. After this comes a huge car, two stories high, with all sorts of odd characters in it: a clown, with his "Here we are again!" playing pranks on two sedate-looking Chinamen; a little fairy boy or girl, flirting with a magician; dragons snapping; strange birds screeching; three bears, one playing a violin, but the tune it plays is drowned by the hubbub of noise and bands. A lady, of the time of Elizabeth, gorgeous in ruffles, follows on horseback. Then knights in armour, one of them with a stuffed 'possum snarling on the top of his helmet. Another band. Then the solemn brethren of the Order of Druids, in white gowns, bald heads, and grey beards. A company of sweeps comes next, attended by an active Jack-in-the-Green. Now an Indian doctor appears, smoking a long pipe in his chariot, drawn by a Brahmin bull. Another band, and then the rear is brought up by more cavalry. There were seven bands—good ones, too—in the procession, which took full twenty minutes to pass the hotel, on the balcony of which I stood. I have seen the London Lord Mayor's Show, but must confess the Talbot procession beats it hollow.

After the procession, we all adjourned to the race-course, where the collection for the hospital was to be made. The admission was eighteen-pence; a good sum for working people to give, yet everybody was there. There was an amateur Richardson's show, a magician's tent, Cheap John's merry-go-rounds, and all sorts of amusements to be had by paying for them; and, above all, there was the bazaar, presided over by the ladies of Talbot, who succeeded in selling a large quantity of useless things at the usual exorbitant prices. There was also a large dancing-platform roofed with canvas, which was very well frequented. Most popular of all, perhaps, were the refreshment-bars, where the publicans gave the liquor free, but charged the usual prices for the good of the hospital fund; and the teetotallers, not to be outdone, managed a very comfortable tea-room. In short, all the usual expedients for raising money were cleverly resorted to, and the result was that between 1400l. and 1500l. was added to the funds of the hospital, about 500l. of which was taken at the ladies' bazaar. Altogether, there were not less than 5000 people on the ground, though I believe the newspapers gave a considerably higher number.

The Avoca races were not very different from races in England. Every town hereabouts has its races, even Majorca. The Carrisbrook race-course, about four miles from our town, is considered second to none in the colony. Avoca, however, is a bigger place, and the races there draw a much larger crowd. We drove the twenty miles thither by road and bush-track. The ground was perfectly dry, for there had been no rain for some time; and, as the wind was in our faces, it drove the clouds of dust behind us. I found the town itself large and well-built. What particularly struck me was the enormous width of the main street,—at least three chains wide. The houses on either side of the road were so remote from each other that they might have belonged to different townships. I was told that the reason of this great width of street was, that the Government had reserved this broad space of ground, the main street of Avoca forming part of the road to Adelaide, which may at some future time become a great and crowded highway. One of the finest buildings in the town is a handsome hotel, built of stone and brick, provided with a ball-room, billiard-rooms, and such like. It is altogether the finest up-country place of the kind that I have seen. Here we put up, and join the crowd of loungers under the verandah. Young swells got up in high summer costume—cutaway coats, white hats, and blue net veils—just as at Epsom on the Derby Day. There are also others, heavy-looking colonials, who have come out evidently to make a day of it, and are already freely imbibing cold brandy and water. Traps and cars are passing up and down the street, in quest of passengers for the race-course, about two miles from the town.

There we find the same sort of entertainments provided for the public as on like occasions at home. The course is about a mile and a half in extent, with the ground well cleared. There is the saddling paddock, in which the "knowing ones" take great interest; and there are the usual booths for the sale of refreshments, and especially of drink. In front of the Grand Stand the betting-men from Melbourne are pointed out to me,—a sharp, rough-looking set they are, dressed in Tweed suits and flash ties, wearing diamond rings. One of them, a blear-eyed, tall, strong man, with bushy brown whiskers, bawling out his "two to one" on such and such a horse—an ugly-looking customer—was described to me as "the second biggest blackguard in Victoria; give him a wide berth." Another of the betting-men was pointed out to me as having been a guard on the South-Eastern Railway some ten years ago. I need not describe the races: they were like most others. There were flat races and hurdle races. Six horses ran for the District Plate. Four of them came in to the winning-post, running neck and neck. The race was won by only a head.

My friend remained on the course until it was too late to return to Majorca that night. As the moon did not rise until towards morning, we were under the necessity of waiting until then, otherwise we might get benighted in the bush. We tried to find a bed in the hotel, but in vain. All the beds and sofas in Avoca were occupied. Even the billiard tables were engaged for the night.

We set out on our return journey to Majorca just as the moon was rising. She was only in her second quarter, and did not yet give light enough to enable us to see the road very clearly, so that we went very cautiously at first. While my companion drove, I snatched the opportunity for a sleep. I nodded and dozed from time to time, wakening up suddenly to find a large bright star blinking before my eyes. The star sank lower and lower towards the horizon. The green-gold rays of the morning sun rose up to meet it. The star hovered between the pale growing light below and the dark blue sky above. Then it melted away in the glow of sunrise. The half-moon still cast our shadow on the dusty track. But not for long. The zone of yellow light in the east grows rapidly larger and brighter. The brilliant edge of the god of day tips the horizon; a burst of light follows; and now the morning sun, day's harbinger, "comes dancing up the east." The summits of the trees far away in the silent bush are bathed in gold. The near trees, that looked so weird-like in the moon's half light, are now decked in green. The chill of the night has departed. It is already broad day. By the time we reach Amherst, eight miles from Majorca, we are glad to shade ourselves from the blazing sun. In an hour more we reach our destination, and after breakfast and a bath, are ready to begin the day's duties.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 13: The population, in 1857, was 4971; in 1861, 21,104. It is now nearly 50,000.]



CHAPTER XVII.

CONCLUSION OF MAJORCAN LIFE.

VICTORIAN LIFE ENGLISH—ARRIVAL OF THE HOME MAIL—NEWS OF THE FRANCO-GERMAN WAR—THE GERMAN SETTLERS IN MAJORCA—THE SINGLE FRENCHMAN—MAJORCAN PUBLIC TEAS—THE CHURCH—THE RANTERS—THE TEETOTALLERS—THE COMMON SCHOOL—THE ROMAN CATHOLICS—COMMON SCHOOL FETE AND ENTERTAINMENT—THE MECHANICS' INSTITUTE—FUNERAL OF THE TOWN CLERK—DEPARTURE FROM MAJORCA—THE COLONY OF VICTORIA.

The reader will observe, from what I have above written, that life in Victoria is very much like life in England. There are the same people, the same callings, the same pleasures and pursuits, and, as some would say, the same follies and vices. There are the same religious bodies, the same political movements, the same social agencies—Teetotal Societies, Mechanics' Institutes, Friendly Societies, and such like. Indeed, Victoria is only another England, with a difference, at the Antipodes. The character, the habits of life, and tone of thought of the people, are essentially English.

You have only to see the interest with which the arrival of every mail from England is watched, to recognise the strength of the tie that continues to unite the people of the colony with those of the Old Country. A flag is hoisted over the Melbourne Post Office to announce its coming, and soon the news is flashed by telegraph all over the colony. Every local post-office is eagerly besieged by the expecters of letters and newspapers. Speaking for myself, my most exciting day in the month was that on which my home letters arrived; and I wrote at intervals all through the month against the departure of the outgoing mail.

The excitement throughout the colony became intense when the news arrived from England of the defeat of the French before Metz. The first news came by the 'Point de Galle,' and then, six days later, intelligence was received via San Francisco, of the disaster at Sedan. Crowds besieged the office of the local paper at Talbot when the mail was telegraphed; and the doors had to be shut to keep them out until the telegram could be set up in type and struck off. At first the news was not believed, it was so extraordinary and unexpected; but the Germans in the town accepted it at once as true, and began their rejoicings forthwith. The Irish at Talbot were also very much excited, and wished to have a fight, but they did not exactly know with whom.