AUSTRALIA.
Quarantined—The Receiver-General of Australia—An Australian Guidebook—A Death Trap—A Death Story—The New Chum—Commercial Confessions—Mad Melbourne—Hydrophobia—Madness—A Land Boom—A Paper Panic—Ruin.
Sydney—The Confessions of a Legislator—Federation—Patrick Francis Moran.
Adelaide—Wanted, a Harbour—Wanted, an Expression—Zoological—Guinea-pigs—Paradise!—Types—Hell Fire Jack—The Horse—The Wrong Room!
ISE chroniclers are welcome to the opinion that "the dreaded Cape Leeuwin was first rounded by a Dutch vessel, 1622." All I can say is that the Cape has got sharpened again, for there is no roundness about save the billows of the Indian Ocean, which everlastingly dash against its side. I'll agree, however, with any chronicler that the cause of the chronic fury of the Indian Ocean at this point is caused through anger. To call that grand if barren promontory after a twopenny-halfpenny Dutch cockle-shell is a gross insult to the thousands of miles of sea between that point and any other land. Fortunately the little Dutch vessel had a name which sounds all right if only pronounced in plain English—Lioness in place of Leeuwin—but the vessel might have been called Rats, or Schnapps, or some other name even less dignified, and one that would have been adopted just the same. It is the principle of the thing that the great sea objects to, and it is not slow to show its rage, as all who round it know full well. Chroniclers are found who seem to have agreed that the name is the whole cause of the roaring winds and waves around Cape Leeuwin, but that the roughness is in reality the result of satisfaction in bearing one so awe-inspiring, and that the "Lioness" is trying to live up to her natural wildness and fury, and fully succeeding in doing it.
COALING.
I regret that I was in too great a hurry to visit Fremantle, which lies at the head of the Lioness, particularly as on my journey to Australia I had cut out the following passage from a description I came across of that place. I read this, and re-read it, and still continue to read it, as a choice specimen of the guide-book-maker's delirium:
"The first coup d'œil of Fremantle is a white scattered township on an undulating plain fringed by a sea-beach and scant vegetation. As you land you are struck on all sides with the unusual activity around you. Long sinuous trains of loaded cargo trucks are coming and going, locomotive whistles warning the pedestrian to beware, lines of rails intersecting each other, crowds of lumpers, and the busy air of a large shipping centre bewilder you, and you are carried back to some old-world port where ships of all nations call and disgorge their lading."
There! Are you not anxious to go to a place with the assurance that you will be struck on all sides as soon as you land with unusual activity? Do you not burn to see what "a long sinuous train" is like? Are you not willing to brave the dangerous locomotives crossing the intersecting lines of railways, just to see those crowds of lumpers? Then to be bewildered by the busy mercantile air, and before you have time to fully realise all this you are to be "carried back to some old-world port where ships of all nations call and disgorge their lading."
That last proposal settled my mind; no attractive trains or lumpers, undulating plains or scant vegetation, or anything equally attractive, would induce me to arrive at a place, after five or six weeks' travelling to get there, to find myself at once carried back to some old-world port before seeing something of the rest of Australia to repay one for the long and tedious journey. I therefore avoided Fremantle.
There is one attraction to visit that port which the traveller from the Old World will appreciate, after his experience of the fleecing dues and charges at Adelaide, Melbourne, and other Australian ports, in which officials all but tear the clothes off the visitor's back to tax them. In this port your mantle at least is free.
In spite of the following paragraph from the same source: "Western Australia has emerged into the full glare of the world's light and renown, and not to know its golden wonders is to argue oneself unknown," I determined to remain in obscurity.
The guide-books assure us Albany deserves more than "passing notice." This is true enough, but travellers do not always get a chance of giving the place its deserts. This was particularly the case with me on my first visit. Quarantine was then in force, and, with my fellow-passengers, I was forbidden to land. All I then saw of the people of Western Australia was limited to a few hours watching the coal-lumpers at work trucking coal along a plank from an ancient hulk moored by the side of the P. and O. steamship Victoria. After the animated scenes of coaling at Malta and Aden, and particularly the wild, indescribable scene at Port Said, coaling at Albany fell decidedly flat. The only diversion that varied the monotony of the proceedings was when a truck would capsize in its Blondin-like trip and pitch the coals into the sea.
HE most interesting personage in Albany is Captain B——, the harbour master. I call him the Receiver-General of Australia, for he is the first inhabitant of Australia to receive and welcome the new comer, and he is also the last to take farewell of the parting guest. Captain B—— has held the post of harbour master at King George's Sound, Albany, for over thirty years, and, though over seventy years of age, he seems equal to many years of service yet. Certainly a stranger gets a good impression of the country if he takes Captain B—— as a sample Australian, and one wonders, when one sees this fine old salt run up the gangway with the agility of a youth of seventeen, whether all Australians are equally active. Chatting with Captain B——, I complimented him on his youthful physique. "Why, sir," said he, "I can climb up anything. I can board the ship hand-over-hand on a rope and never touch the side with my feet." This seemed pretty good for a man of over seventy, but I did not regard it as an exaggeration. Captain B—— remembered his father and uncle, both naval men, going to the funeral of King George IV. His reminiscences included the experiences of singing in a choir at the coronation of the Queen, and also when Her Majesty was married. When the Captain ran down the gangway shouting orders to his men, the strength of his lungs was as evident as the agility of his body. Anyone who took this worthy official as a typical Australian would be greatly deceived. Diminutive in stature and voluble in speech, he is in every way the reverse to the average-born Australian. The Australian is generally tall, not to say lanky, and by no means communicative.
An American walked into the smoking-room of a P. and O. ship outward bound, as it was leaving St. George's Sound, threw himself down on a sofa, stuck his feet on to a table, spit, and said to those in the saloon:
"I thank my stars I am clean out of that one-horse town Albany!"
Another traveller who had joined the ship at the same town and who lay huddled up in a corner more dead than alive after a severe attack of typhoid followed by pleurisy, remarked:
"Well, you must admit, sir, it is the healthiest place in Western Australia."
"Co-rect, stranger—co-rect," replied the Yankee. "Co-rect! guess that's why I have cleared out. This darned Albany is 90 per cent. of climate and only 10 per cent. of business."
SLEEPY HOLLOW.
I visited Albany on my return journey. It struck me that in "Sleepy Hollow" 90 per cent. of the natives were in bed and the other 10 per cent. were dozing on the seats on the parade.
When I started for the Antipodes the place that I looked forward to seeing more than any other was Western Australia. It is the part of Australia most discussed at home, where it is being boomed with all the artifice of the promoter's gang. Every ship brings living cargoes to Western Australia; every newspaper is full of Western Australia. On the front page are shipping advertisements offering every facility for quick and cheap transit; in the centre of the paper leading articles appear to ventilate the wonders of the West; towards the end of the paper—in the City news—thousands eagerly scan the Stock Exchange for prices of Western Australia. There is another column still in which one might find interesting news concerning Western Australia—the deaths column.
When I arrived in Australia the one place that I determined nothing should drag me to was Western Australia. No, not all the gold in the mines would get me to that pestilential plague spot. Here is a place boomed "at home" and abroad at the time of Queen Victoria's Jubilee, when nightly speeches were made at banquets glorifying the charms of the speculators' Eldorado, Western Australia—when columns were written of its boasted civilisation, and cheers were given when "Advance Australia" was roared out, and bumpers were drunk by the stop-at-home wirepullers. Just read the following, published at the moment:—
"A WESTERN PLAGUE SPOT.
"How Fever Is Raging in Perth.
"Various visitors to Perth have expressed their opinions upon the awful conditions, from a sanitary point of view, of the Western city, and almost daily news is telegraphed across of the ravages from typhoid, pneumonia, and other diseases in consequence.
"That the state of affairs is in no way exaggerated by prejudiced outsiders is proved by a full-page account in a recent issue of the Perth Herald, and which is headed: 'Typhoid Fever in Perth; An Alarming Situation; The Position of Affairs Grows Worse.'
"The opinions of doctors, nurses, experts, and others are published, all going to show that public and private action is almost in every case as if the one aim was to increase the death-rate to the highest possible figures.
"The water supply is contaminated; drainage runs into the catchment area, and even fæcal matter is plainly evident in the samples analysed; there is no supervision of the milk supply; vegetables are grown under most dangerous conditions; stagnant drains are in almost all the streets; about public places of recreation there are fever beds; many of the population are crowded in small boarding-houses like rabbits, and ordinary precautions for the removal of filth neglected, even if that were enough in itself; houses are built on pestilential swamps; the wind blows the dust about spots where the typhoid excrement has been deposited to breed germs by the million; and bread, meat, and other food carts go about uncovered to collect it, as if to make sure that any who escaped all other sources of the danger should not be allowed to escape the plague.
"Even the public esplanade has to be shunned, the silt from the sewer which is being used for reclaiming being a mass of foul matter.
"It will interest 't'othersiders' to read this about the conditions of life:—
"'Many of the dwellings in which the t'othersiders are to be found huddled together are first-class fever "germinators." The rooms are small, the ventilation bad, the bed linen rarely changed, while not the slightest attention whatever is paid to sanitation. It is estimated that there are at least 400 small tenements, from two to five rooms, serving as "boarding" and "lodging" houses, and in these over 3,000 persons are sheltered.'"
Stories of how fortunes are made and lives are lost in the race for wealth in Western Australia would fill volumes.
A typical story, and a genuine one to boot, is worth recording. A well-known racing man travelling on a steamer round the coast was attracted by a seedy, out-of-elbows individual seated all alone. He got into conversation with him. The seedy stranger was reticent about himself, but voluble about others, particularly those who were making their piles in Western Australia—he was going there if he had to walk. The idea of a man walking was a repulsive thought to a racing man, so he most generously insisted upon this dilapidated acquaintance accepting £10 to help him to get to the goldfields. The stranger was to pay him back some day if he ever struck oil. Time went on, and one morning the Good Samaritan received a letter with the £10 enclosed and a request to make an appointment. The two met again. The out-of-elbows fellow-traveller turned up to keep the appointment he had asked for, dressed in the height of fashion; he not only looked a millionaire, but he was one! Yet he was sad and depressed, and recited the history of his good fortune to the good-natured sportsman in a most dismal tone. Though his words were full of gratitude and thankfulness, he seemed, strange as it may appear, somewhat reproachful.
"Yes, thanks to you, I have struck a gold mine, the one the world is now talking about, and you shall have half of it; that is the reason I asked to see you."
"Not I," was the reply. "I don't want it; besides, you have relatives."
"I had," said the millionaire, looking sorrowfully away. "I had three brothers. I was very fond of them, and sent for them when my luck came and, thanks to you, my fortune also. They arrived in Western Australia full of life and hope and jubilation, three of the finest and strongest fellows in the Colonies. They were all dead and buried within a month—stricken down by the damned typhoid fever."
PROSPECTORS.
Every day I spent in Australia I had similar stories to these told me—of how those rushing into the death-trap to dig up gold were buried themselves instead. Every day I heard of the swindles as well as of the sewerage. Both the towns and the business stank. Bogus mines were foisted into the "new chum," and huge companies started to work them; businesses advertised as big affairs with tremendous capitals were in reality a paltry village hut or two, with a few pounds of goods flung into them.
If you are not robbed in England right away by such swindles, you are invited to sail for Western Australia.
I met the manager of a Western Australian mining property, who was justly savage at the influx of "new chums" sent out by the directors of the company he represents. These ne'er-do-wells, of all ages and of all degrees of stupidity and vice, arrive weekly, with letters of recommendation from the London directors, and in most cases actual contracts signed for berths as book-clerks, secretaries, corresponding clerks, &c., &c.—worthless incumbrances, but, even should they be found capable, not a berth open for one per cent. sent out: a fault showing that the directors in London are ignorant of the working of things they are supposed to direct. A sharp manager, finding himself face to face with a cargo of these silly "new chums" so landed, after going carefully over the binding contracts they came armed with, addressed them thus:—
"You, Mr. Nogood, hold a contract made in London by your uncle, a director of this company, to be engaged on arrival as clerk at £10 a week. You, Mr. Boozer, are to be engaged at £6 a week as book-keeper; and you, Mr. Flighty, at £5 a week as an assistant engineer, and so on. Now, gentlemen, in my position as manager here I may tell you plainly that your relatives and friends—the directors in London—are not conversant with the business here in detail. Were they, I am certain, gentlemen, you would never have signed these contracts agreeing to give your valuable services to us for such a ridiculously small remuneration. Things are dearer here than in London, you know; you could not live on such miserable pittances. Now I am unfortunately in the unhappy position that whilst here absolutely at the head of affairs and an autocrat, I am at the same time bound to accept these contracts made in London, and am therefore powerless to improve your unfortunate acceptances of these posts assigned to you. However, if you will agree to tear up these contracts I shall engage you weekly all the same, but at double salaries. Do you agree to this, gentlemen?"
They all did. The contracts were destroyed, they received double salaries, for a fortnight, were not asked to do anything, and were all dismissed with a week's notice by the autocrat, the manager of the property, who has his picked, tried, and trusted men to do all the work necessary.
The Western Australian boom is over. The rooks have plucked every feather they can off the poor pigeon. The Land of Promise, the Land of Myth, the Land of Sharks and Sharpers, is discovered by the paying public, and is in disgrace. Truth will out, and the truth about Western Australia is out of the designing promoter's bag now, never to be caught in it again. Africa suggests a comparison. In mining there is a great difference between Africa and Australia. Take, for instance, the Rand in Africa: it is one long reef of general excellence, divided into mines all of solid value. Australian mines, with one or two notable exceptions, do not run so; they are short, broken and erratic.
Each of these when struck may or may not yield the three ounces to the ton they are boomed as having, but what is not explained to the investing public is the fact that the mines are limited and uncertain—they are not continuous, they are most expensive to open and work, and consequently they are practically worthless, and the investors' money is swamped and the land shows no return.
A man who has most exceptional experience in mining, in a conversation with me used an expression à propos of the character of the mining lodes. He said that they were "patchy." That expresses everything Australian. Australia is a patchy country. Look at the sheep stations: a good season or two, property investment, rush, extravagance, no rain, ruin, despair, exodus. So it is with land, with everything—it is patchy. The people are patchy. One set, pleasant, refined, kindly, lovable; the next objectionable, vulgar, low and detestable.
A friend of mine on board the steamer had the following interesting conversation with an Irish lady moving in Australian society:
"Do you happen to know Mrs. Larry O'B. and Mrs. Mike O'C.?
"Do I know thim? Well, iv course I do. Shure, me darlin', both of their husbands stood in the same dock wid moi husband on their thrial for murder—for killin' a process server in Oireland years ago. Moi husband was acquitted, worse luck!"
"Yis. Maybe y'don't know as how the other two gintlemen got sintinced and were sent out here as convicts, and both of thim now are millionaires, and my poor man is still workin' hard for his livin' in the ould counthry."
Hydrophobia is unknown in Australia. A traveller on arrival has his pet dog taken from him and the poor animal is thrust into quarantine for six months. These four millions of inhabitants, spread over the largest colony in the world, consider themselves so precious they quarantine everything and everybody but lunatics. Why not quarantine lunatics? Are they not dangerous? Did not a whole city go mad? Stark, staring, raving mad—Mad Melbourne—and yet a Maltese terrier is quarantined in the same port for six months!
QUARANTINE ISLAND.
Yet lunatics arrive and make lunacy rampant, and a whole city is left after such a visitation an asylum of melancholia—Mad Melbourne. Lunacy frequently takes the form of egotism. Peasants imagine themselves princes; Calibans believe themselves to be Adonises; beggars imagine themselves millionaires. It is a harmless vanity and hurts no one, but a mad city may ruin thousands by suddenly imagining itself a gold mine. Melbourne a few years ago imagined it suddenly became the hub of the universe. The world and his wife had but one burning desire—that was to live in Melbourne. Some lunatic started this ridiculous idea, and the boom spread like lightning. Melbourne was by this magic boom turned into an Aladdin cave. No prairie fire ever started with such suddenness, with such fury, burning up, as it leapt and galloped along, all the reasoning powers and common sense of the people. Those who cleared a space around them to avoid destruction were tongued by the fire of speculation, and before they could move away were irreparably lost. Great and small, old and young, were carried away in the blaze of speculation. The frightened reptiles and beasts running in front to escape it were, it was thought, miserable fools who had not the pluck or sense to aid in setting speculation in Melbourne on fire. A fanciful picture on paper this? True, so was the great boom of 1887 merely a fanciful picture on paper. Had it been otherwise banks would not have failed, nor would families have been ruined wholesale, nor would trade and speculation have been left charred roots and stubble on the scene of folly—Mad Melbourne.
It is difficult to say how it began—it is unnecessary to say how it ended. I am told that at the height of the boom Melbourne went frantically and absolutely mad. Poor men and women rushed about fancying that they had suddenly become millionaires. In the few hours between breakfast and lunch they had bought a piece of land for £1,000, and in a few hours had sold the same block for £10,000—on paper. They then heard that the purchaser had re-sold it for £20,000 before dinner, they bought it back for £30,000, and re-sold it over supper again for £50,000, a good day's work—on paper. Everyone did the same—all were mad. Money flowed in from the Old Country in millions, champagne flowed freely all over Melbourne in gallons, everyone was intoxicated with joy and soused themselves and their friends in champagne to wash down success. Vehicles rushed speculators through the streets, trains whisked them to the land free, luncheons free awaited all at every turn, fortunes at every step. Melbourne was mad drunk—lost!
Buildings—comfortable, sensible buildings—were pulled down and "sky scrapers" and mansions were erected in their places. Bridges, good for a hundred years to come, were pulled down and millions spent in erecting in place of the old ones others not more serviceable or of more use. Huge docks, not wanted, were built at fabulous outlays—all these buildings stand as monuments of Melbourne's Madness.
The extraordinary good spirits of the Melbournites is a healthy sign. Those who not only lost all their money invested, chagrined by their folly and left with liabilities that will cripple them for life, smile and bear their fall right cheerily.
Some of these notes made by me whilst seeing the Kangarooists at home "in a hurry" may not be received in the proper spirit. All new countries are sensitive, and resent truths coming from a stranger, while at the same time their home critics, though far more severe, are tolerated and unchallenged. Now I met one of the most prominent Australians, a man of the world, a leading legal light and a Member of Parliament. It was in the Legislative Chamber I had a conversation with him on matters Australian. He led off: "This bit of a place here (Sydney), with a population less than that of a second-class provincial town in England, has in it people with more cheek than would be found in the capitals of London, Paris and St. Petersburg rolled into one. Why, these people have some ingrained vain idea that everything and everybody connected with them are the most important things and the most important people in the world. Small-minded people in a large country—that is what they are—a country the size of Europe with a population less than that of London with the intellect of a country village. That is Australia."
I AM INVITED TO PRESENT MYSELF.
"And divided among themselves. Do you believe in Federation?"
This conversation took place in June, 1897, and three years after, Australian Federation had become a reality. It is therefore interesting to repeat the opinion of this important Australian on Federation, exactly as it took place:
"Well—yes and no. I believe in the principle, properly worked, in a country ripe for it; but here in Australia, my dear sir, we do not know what federal government means. I have travelled round and round the world—ha! ha! not in a hurry, my dear sir, but with the object of seeing and learning all about the political workings of countries as well as other subjects. I travel so much sometimes that on waking in the morning I have to rub my eyes to think for a moment whether I am in St. Petersburg or Ottawa, San Francisco or London. I travel so much, one country and another to me is like walking out of this room into the next. I am, in this respect, an exception. This place is provincial, the minds of the people are essentially provincial, they do not understand big questions—Federation is a very big question. Now, sir, I am shown a new machine that you have at home for cutting your hair—good, it is scientific, a thing of beauty and tremendously costly. I say, 'Yes, that's all very well, but I cannot see how Mr. Furniss can afford such a machine for cutting his hair.' Then everyone cries: 'Oh, he does not believe hair should be cut!' Why, I say nothing of the sort—hair-cutting is an excellent thing, a necessary thing perhaps, but why have in a small establishment tremendous machinery to do it?"
At that moment I caught sight of my head in a glass; the same thought struck me, why indeed?
"That is Federation here," my interesting acquaintance continued. "Here, in this little bit of a community, not the population of one city—London—spread over the whole of it want five separate governments to govern those few millions cut up into States!"
From all I could gather, Federation in Australia might possibly be realised some day, but it would be in the dim and distant future, certainly not "in our time"!
There is a good story told à propos of the candidature of "The Cardinal." Of course, the votes recorded for him were solely Catholic, the Irish turning up in great force. Two gentlemen from Erin were found fighting a deadly battle. When separated and the battle changed for one of words in place of blows, Mike declared that he'd "livil the baste to the ground for not voting for the Cardinal."
"And who has he voted for?"
"Whoi the blackguard tills me he's voted for Patrick Francis Moran—who ever heard of Patrick Francis Moran?"
"Oive voted for the Cardinal—iv course Oi have," replied the other, "and it's glad Oi am that Oive nearly kilt that varmint for Moran's sake!"
Needless to explain to you Patrick Francis Moran was the Cardinal.
Kangarooists drive engines much in the same way as they drive horses, or anything else—a reckless, devil-may-care style.
A certain driver in Queensland was told to run the journey through and make no stoppages—this just suited him. On he went. He found the iron gates closed at a crossing in a town he passed through; he did not pull up—not he—he rushed right through, carrying the gates away. Of course, he was reprimanded for this recklessness.
"You might have killed the passengers."
"Why, we only carried two!"
This satisfied the Enquiry Committee as reasonable—in Australia.
This Queensland driver has his prototype in New South Wales. You will find him on the express between Melbourne and Sydney, known as "Hell Fire Jack," a sobriquet he has gained by his dash and daring in running the express. He had brought us on at a rare rate, and having completed the middle run, we pulled up to exchange drivers and engines. The conductor noticed me gazing at the portly form of the engine-driver, who had just jumped off.
"That is Hell Fire Jack. Jack is a wonder—here we are a quarter of an hour before time, and Jack had an hour and a half to make up in his run—he did it—Jack always does—he'd make up anything. It's he as nearly got the sack for making a splendid run some time ago—160 miles without a stop. Nothing wrong in that? Well, you see we had four stops to make in that 160 miles, and he didn't make 'em. Some bookies in the train wanted to get to the races, and made Jack a handsome bet he couldn't get 'em there in time—Jack did—that's all—bless you, he's a wonder—never had an accident neither, not one! He knows all about engines—can stop and mend 'em on the road if it's wanted. And you ought to see him pick up his express disc with his train going at 60 miles an hour. There is a little arm sticks out of the side of the engine, and the disc is suspended at the station. Jack takes it, as I say, going 60 miles an hour, never eases up—not he—but the disc he has to drop in its place has fallen off long before! and the next train has to wait an hour to find it. Oh, Jack is a wonder—good-bye, Jack!"
I returned to the carriage relieved by knowing that Hell Fire Jack was no longer in charge. Two men were conversing about travelling of a different kind—one was saying to the other: "Why, the last time we met was on the Coolgardie Coach—wasn't as smooth going as this, eh? ha! ha! I shall never forget our driver—don't you remember how drunk he was, and how we had to tie him into his seat?—and when he did upset us we went flying a couple of hundred yards away. I saw him as I was landing on my head on the rock tied to his seat turning over, laughing at us. I wonder what became of the old lady and gentleman inside—they carried 'em off for dead, you know. He did make those horses fly—they were glad of the rest, never moved when first down, did they?"
I suppose this was the joke of a Hell Fire Tom. Motor-cars will soon be introduced into Australia; then we shall hear of Hell Fire Harry—and a funeral.
The Kangarooists really do not value life as we in the Old Country do—they certainly do not value horseflesh. You can buy a good horse for one shilling. Catsmeat in London is dearer than live horseflesh in Australia. They ride and drive anything and everything.
I recollect visiting the best-known horse-bazaar in the Colonies, and was shown round by an expert.
"That horse is all right, but I can't recommend it as a stayer. You want it for harness? Well, I don't like to deceive you; it ain't much good after going seventy miles—no, it's a rotten-hearted beast. It might go eighty miles at a stretch, but I won't guarantee more."
"Eighty miles! Good heavens! In the Old Country half that distance at a stretch would mean cruelty to animals."
"Maybe it would—those English horses have the best barrels in the world, and they are pretty to look at, but no legs. Why, 120 miles is a decent run here; rough work through the bush too, but then soft as tan—no hard roads like in the Old Country, you know."
"Yes, but the bush is the bush, and you have to go up and down ravines and over trees and obstacles of all kinds."
"Right you are. It frightens you at first, but, like the Irishman who said his wife didn't mind a beating as she had got so accustomed to it, these horses are accustomed to the ups-and-downs of the bush, and you get accustomed to it too after a few hours. You may have it pretty rough. Lor' bless you, some never stop at anything—there's Jack Madcapper and Tom Devil McCary, why, they are daisies. They buy their horses here—well, they work 'em, never stop to open a gate, let the horses go and clear it, over they go buggy and all. Fences? Well it's a little relish now and then to jump 'em, and you ought to see the buggies fly in the air. They always take a rope or two to mend up a bit. If a horse is injured, they go on with the rest and leave it, and wire us for another team. Horses ain't worth thinking about out here, and the gates ain't much use, nor the fences either, now that we have nothing to keep in them."
I turned to the "vet."
"Valuable race-horses are the best off after all, then?"
"Well, they have neither bits of gates nor fancy fences to negotiate; they have stone walls and solid five-foot timber jumps. They have to go over the whole lot clear, or come to grief. I have shot about 1,000 crippled first-class crack racers in ten years on the course alone."
"Then there is no love for the horses here?"
"Nonsense! we love 'em. Why, it is a touching incident, I tell you, when I come on the scene to save further pain for the poor animal. The boy who has had it in charge runs over with a cloth to throw over his favourite. Then he draws me on one side, and says, 'Don't shoot, sir, till I'm away, I can't bear it.'"
LANDING AT ADELAIDE.
Adelaide is a charming place when you get there, but you have to get there first. Getting there is no easy matter if you arrive by sea, as you must when coming direct from the Old Country. Both for comfort and effect Adelaide is better approached by land, as when coming by rail from Melbourne. The railway has to cross the range of hills which shuts Adelaide in from the east, and some fine views of the city and the plains are obtained.
From the anchorage at Largs Bay the city is barely visible, and travellers have to take train through Port Adelaide up to the city, a journey of about eight miles across the plains. These plains have been cleared of trees, and the country is bare and uninteresting.
Before starting on this journey, however, the unhappy voyager has much to go through. In this respect Adelaide compares badly with Melbourne and Sydney. Sydney harbours the largest steamers in the centre of the city; Melbourne allows them to come to the back door—at Port Melbourne; while Adelaide compels them to stay outside in the middle of the road, or roadstead, and a very rough roadstead it is. When the weather is at all fresh, the landing is positively dangerous. The steam launches which come out to the mail steamers are bound round from stem to stern with huge rope fenders. When the launches are jumping, wriggling and plunging alongside the steamers, it is no easy matter to get into them, and anyone but a sailor or a professional acrobat would find it safest to be lowered over the side in a basket. The voyage to the jetty at Largs Bay is a brief epitome of the Bay of Biscay, the Australian Bight, and the monsoons of the Indian Ocean. When you reach the jetty, you are hoisted on to it by practised hands as the launch jumps to the right level. Then—splash! and up comes a green sea through the boards and you are wet to the skin. Bathing, it seems, like education, is "free and compulsory" at Adelaide. Perhaps this is a part of the quarantine operations—disinfection by salt water. This sea bath is, however, the only thing, as far as I am aware, that the traveller gets for nothing in South Australia. Passengers' baggage is charged for when it lands at the jetty at the rate of 1s. 3d. per cwt., and the same has to be paid on leaving. When at last you get into the train!—such a train! but perhaps the railway department does not like the risk of having good carriages soiled by passengers' wet clothes—you compare this "boat express" with those of Folkestone, Dover, Harwich, and Southampton. The first-class carriages are not equal to the third-class on the English lines. Being an express, this train runs more than a mile without stopping. Then you have to change trains. When you get along again, you notice that the railway to Port Adelaide runs along the street without any fence whatever to prevent people from driving or walking on to the line. Fatalities of course are common, and excite little notice; bolting horses and consequent accidents are of almost daily occurrence, and the local residents get quite to enjoy being pitched out of their buggies. Life here cannot be dull, while it lasts. Passengers are lucky if they reach Adelaide within an hour and a half of leaving the steamer, the distance being about ten miles.
PONDICHERRY VULTURES.
THE MAID OF THE INN.
The Zoological Gardens of Adelaide are particularly fine. The situation is lovely, the plan is excellent, and originality shown in the design of the houses. The specimens are fairly numerous and all excellent of their kind, and at most points, this is the best "Zoo" in the Colonies. The most original house is that of the guinea-pigs, which is a huge doll's house, complete with blinds and even a scraper at the door, and an inscription outside, "School for Young Ladies—conducted by the Misses Guinea Pig." The cage that attracted me most was that of Pondicherry vultures. Mr. Gladstone has often been caricatured as a grand old bird, but the Pondicherry vulture is a replica of the veteran statesman, collar and all.
There are many beautiful drives around Adelaide—at least, as beautiful as is possible when the scenery is marred by a barrenness of soil, a lack of greenness in the grass, an absence of wild flowers, and a dull uniform and sombre tint upon all the trees. The hills, which look somewhat featureless from the city, are riven in a hundred places by rocky gorges or gullies, and many well-made roads cross the range at various points. The roads to Belair and Mount Lofty, to Green Hill, Marble Hill, Moriatta, and a score of other places, give at numerous points fine views of the hills and the plain, and some of the waterfalls, notably the one at Waterfall Gully and at Fourth Creek, are eminently picturesque in a rugged way. I was advised to ignore all these beauty spots in favour of one—namely, Paradise. The name seemed to augur well, and my adviser seemed so serious that I determined to make my way to Paradise. In my mind I conjured up a place of infinite romance and beauty, the choice of all the pleasant places in a pleasant land; the Garden of Eden of the Southern Hemisphere. Expectation was at flood with sunny imaginings as I journeyed over level and dusty roads towards this land of promise. I drew Paradise as I saw it, and the sketch will tell more about its beauties than volumes of description. I made for the hotel, and there I found a lady who took me into the garden and pointed out a gap in the fence through which I could squeeze my way into Paradise. I went expecting to be rewarded by a glimpse of the romantic and picturesque of which I was in search. I had been told of the wonderful orange groves of this place. There were trees with oranges growing—about enough to feed an average school-treat; and at last I saw the point of all the joke—a girl-child was tempting a boy to steal oranges; the serpent had left, so I made for the hole in the fence and quitted Paradise for ever, I have looked for the humorist who sent me there, but we have not met since, which is perhaps as well.
THE WAY INTO PARADISE.
PARADISE.
One of the chief characteristics of Australian city life is its lack of characteristic features. The types of civilised humanity one meets might be denizens of Islington or Battersea for any distinguishing trait to stamp them as Antipodeans. There is a certain breezy familiarity and absence of suavity in their manners and deportment, but otherwise they are an average lot of mixed Britishers and no more.
ADAM AND EVE.
As soon as I arrived I went about in search of a type of the Australian girl for my pictures, and was sketching one from my hotel window as typical of a real Australian, when the Captain of our ship came in and said, "Oh, there's that Cockney, Miss So-and-so!"
She came over in our ship second-class, and had never been in Australia before!
I recollect a similar instance in Ottawa, Canada. I was returning from Government House, where I had been taken by the Mayor to sign the visitors' book, and as we were returning in the electric car I sat opposite a fine, smart specimen of a youth. I whispered to my Canadian acquaintance, "Is that a genuine type of a true Canadian?"
"Yes, a perfect type."
I made the sketch.
The following evening I was the guest at Government House, and to my surprise I noticed that one of the servants at dinner was the typical Canadian I had sketched. He was MacSandy, fresh from Aberdeen!
But if I have been mistaken, others are sometimes mistaken in me, for a few hours before the surprise recorded above happened I was in my hotel in Ottawa, the morning after I had appeared in the Opera House in the "Humours of Parliament." An eminent Canadian divine was ushered into my quarters, and addressing me said:
A TYPE.
"Allow me to introduce myself, and to say that I listened with the greatest pleasure and profit to your most admirable discourse last evening."
I bowed my very best.
"I must say," continued the rev. gentleman, "that your efforts in the cause of Christianity in this city are marked by a fervour and earnestness that cannot fail to convert."
"Really," I said, "you flatter me."
"Ah, no, sir; you are one of the brave soldiers of Christianity who march through the world addressing huge audiences and influencing the masses, taking life seriously, and denouncing frivolity and worldliness."
"Well," I said, "I don't think I do any harm, but I must disclaim for my poor efforts to amuse—"
"Amuse, sir!" repeated the astonished divine. "Surely I am speaking to the gentleman whose stirring discourse it was my good fortune to listen to last evening in Dominion Church?"
"No, sir, I was in the Grand Opera House."
"Then you are not Dr. Munhall, the Revivalist?"
"Bless you, no, sir. I am Furniss, the caricaturist."
"Good gracious! where's the door? Let me out! They have brought me to the wrong room!"