The Eureka Stockade

This etext was produced by Col Choat colc@gutenberg.org.au
The Eureka Stockade
In Person I solicit no subscription—in writing I hereby ask no favour from my reader. A book must stand or fall by the truth contained in it.
What I wish to note is this: I was taught the English language by the Very Reverend W. Vincent Eyre, Vice Rector of the English College, Rome. It has cost me immense pains to rear my English up to the mark; but I could never master the language to perfection. Hence, now and then, probably to the annoyance of my Readers, I could not help the foreign idiom. Of course, a proper edition, in Italian, will be published in Turin.
I have nothing further to say.
Carboni Raffaello.
Prince Albert Hotel, Bakery Hill,, Ballaarat, Anniversary of the Burning of Bentley's Eureka Hotel, 1855.
Favete Linguis.
Mendacium sibi, sicut turbinis, viam augustam in urbe et orbe terrarum aperuit. Stultus dicit in corde suo, non est Deus. Veritas vero lente passu passu sicut puer, tandem aliquando janunculat ad lucem. Tunc justus ut palma florescit.
I undertake to do what an honest man should do, let it thunder or rain. He who buys this book to lull himself to sleep had better spend his money in grog. He who reads this book to smoke a pipe over it, let him provide himself with Plenty of tobacco—he will have to blow hard. A lover of truth— that's the man I want—and he will have in this book the truth, and nothing but the truth.
Facts, from the stubborn-things store, are here retailed and related— contradiction is challenged from friend or foe. The observation on, and induction from the facts, are here stamped with sincerity: I ask for no other credit. I may be mistaken: I will not acknowledge the mistake unless the contrary be proved.
When two boys are see-sawing on a plank, balanced on its centre, whilst the world around them is up with the one it is down with the other. The centre, however, is stationary. I was in the centre. I was an actor, and therefore an eye-witness. The events I relate, I did see them pass before me. The persons I speak of, I know them face to face. The words I quote, I did hear them with my own ears. Others may know more or less than I; I mean to tell all that I know, and nothing more.