South Australia and Western Australia

by Anthony Trollope

I travelled to Perth with a friend, having made a bargain with the mail contractor to take us,—not with the mail, which goes through without stopping in seventy hours,—but by a separate conveyance in four days, so that we might sleep during the nights. This we did, taking our own provisions with us, and camping out in the bush under blankets. The camping out was, I think, rather pride on our part, to show the Australians that we Englishmen,—my friend, indeed, was a Scotchman,—could sleep on the ground, sub dio, and do without washing, and eat nastiness out of a box as well as they could. There were police barracks in which we might have got accommodation. At any rate, going and coming we had our way. We lit fires for ourselves, and boiled our tea in billies; and then regaled ourselves with bad brandy and water out of pannikins, cooked bacon and potatoes in a frying-pan, and pretended to think that it was very jolly. My Scotch friend was a young man, and was, perhaps, in earnest. For myself, I must acknowledge that when I got up about five o’clock on a dark wet morning, very damp, with the clothes and boots on which I was destined to wear for the day, with the necessity before me of packing up my wet blankets, and endeavoured, for some minutes in vain, to wake the snoring driver, who had been couched but a few feet from me, I did not feel any ardent desire to throw off for ever the soft luxuries of an effeminate civilisation, in order that I might permanently enjoy the freedom of the bush. But I did it, and it is well to be able to do it.

No man perhaps ever travelled two hundred and sixty miles with less to see. The road goes eternally through wood,—which in Australia is always called bush; and, possibly, sandy desert might be more tedious. But the bush in these parts never develops itself into scenery, never for a moment becomes interesting. There are no mountains, no hills that affect the eye, no vistas through the trees tempting the foot to wander. Once on the journey up, and once on the return, we saw kangaroos, but we saw no other animal; now and again a magpie was heard in the woods, but very rarely. The commonest noise is that of the bull-frog, which is very loud, and altogether unlike the sound of frogs in Europe. It is said that the Dutch under Peter Nuyt, when landing somewhere on these coasts,—probably near Albany,—were so frightened by the frogs that they ran away. I can believe it, for I have heard frogs at Albany roaring in such a fashion as to make a stranger think that the hills were infested with legions of lions, tigers, bears, and rhinoceroses, and that every lion, tiger, bear, and rhinoceros in the country was just about to spring at him. I knew they were only frogs, and yet I did not like it. The bush in Australia generally is singularly destitute of life. One hears much of the snakes, because the snakes are specially deadly; but one sees them seldom, and no precaution in regard to them is taken. Of all animals, the opossum is the commonest. He may be easily taken, as his habits are known, but he never shows himself. In perfect silence the journey through the bush is made,—fifteen miles to some water-hole, where breakfast is eaten; fifteen on to another water-hole, where brandy and water is consumed; fifteen again to more water, and dinner; and then again fifteen, till the place is reached at which the night-fire is made and the blankets are stretched upon the ground. In such a journey, everything depends on one’s companion, and in this I was more than ordinarily fortunate. As we were taken by the mail contractor, we had relays of horses along the road.

Perth I found to be a very pretty town, built on a lake of brackish water formed by the Swan River. It contains 6,000 inhabitants, and of course is the residence of the chief people of the colony,—as the governor is there, and the legislative chamber, and the supreme judge, and the bishop. The governor’s house is handsome, as is also the town-hall. The churches,—cathedrals I should call them,—both of the Protestants and Roman Catholics, are large and convenient. On my first arrival I stayed at an inn,—which I did not indeed like very much at first, as the people seemed to be too well off to care for strangers; but which in its accommodation was better than can be found in many towns of the same size in England. I must acknowledge, however, that I was much troubled by musquitoes, and did not think the excuse a good one when I was told that a musquito curtain could not be put up because it was Sunday.

I found that crime of a heavy nature was not common in Perth or the districts round it, though so large a portion of the population consisted of men who were or had been convicts. Men were daily committed for bad language, drunkenness, absconding, late hours, and offences of like nature. For men holding tickets-of-leave are subjected to laws which make it criminal for a man to leave his master’s employ, or to be absent from his master’s house after certain hours, or to allude in an improper manner in his master’s eyes. And for these offences, sentences of punishment are given which seem to be heavy, because it is difficult to bear in mind the difference between free men and prisoners who are allowed partial freedom under certain conditions.

I have heard it said, more than once or twice, in reference not specially to Perth, but to the whole colony, that the ticket-of-leave men are deterred from violence simply by fear, that they are all thieves when they dare to steal, and that the absence of crime is no proof of reformation. The physiognomy, and gait, and general idleness of the men, their habits of drinking when they can get drink, and general low tendencies, are alleged as proof of this. It cannot be supposed that convicts should come out from their prisons industrious, orderly men, fit for self-management. The restraint and discipline to which they have been subject as convicts, independently of their old habits, would prevent this. The Bill Sykes look of which I have spoken, is produced rather by the gaol than by crime. The men are not beautiful to look at. They do spend their money in drink, filling the bars of the public-houses, till the hour comes at which they must retire. But it is much in such a community that they should not return to crimes of violence.

For myself, I must say that I spent my time in Perth very pleasantly. I remember being reminded once of the injustice done to a certain poor community by a traveller who had wandered thither and had received hospitable treatment. “They cannot be so poor,” the traveller had said, “because they gave me champagne every day.” Doing honour to the stranger, they had broached their last bottles of the generous wine, and, though poor, had put their best foot foremost in exercise of genuine hospitality. I was told how cruel this was. “We were poor,” said my informant, “but we gave what we had freely, and were then twitted with making false complaints.” I cannot but think of this as I tell my experiences of Perth. I heard very much of the poverty of Western Australia, but I found that people there lived as they do elsewhere. There were carriages and horses, and good dinners, and, if not liveried servants,—a class which is not common in the colonies,—men waiting with white cotton gloves, who in London would be presumed to be greengrocers, but who in Perth were probably “lags.” They seemed to hand the dishes very well.

Of the other town, Freemantle, I have already spoken. I went also sixty miles up to the west, to Toodjay and Newcastle, which, from the returns showing the acres under cultivation and the produce, I find to be one of the best agricultural districts in the colony. It is surpassed only by the Greenough district. As to the prospects and past experiences of farmers in this and other parts of the colony, I found it very difficult to get information on which I could rely. I came across men who had been farmers, whose report was anything but good,—who said that to farm in Western Australia was simply to break the heart. And I came across others,—notably two old colonists in the Toodjay and Northam districts,—who assured me that they had done very well. In each of these cases the men had had sons capable of working with their own hands and not too proud to work. Hitherto I do not think that there has been scope for farmers who employed much outside labour. The labour has been dear and bad,—and money has been hard to get. There has always been and still is a great effort to pay labourers in produce,—but this cannot be done entirely, and the farmer who hires has drained from him almost all the money that he can earn.

That the farming has been and is atrociously bad, there can be no doubt. Men continue to crop the same ground with the same crops year after year without manuring it, and when the weeds come thicker than the corn, they simply leave it. Machinery has not been introduced. Seed is wasted, and farmers thrash their corn with flails out on the roads after the old Irish fashion. I need hardly say that there is no reason why this should continue to be so. That the land would soon pay for good farming I have no doubt, even though the surplus grain were sent home to England. At present the colony, which should above all things strive to be an agricultural colony, actually imports flour and grain to the amount of about £6,000 per annum.

I have already said that wool is the staple commodity of the country. I doubt much whether it will continue to be so, as the trade of wool-growing does not seem to extend itself in any way at all commensurate with the area of land which it occupies. In 1869, there were 654,054 sheep in Western Australia, and in 1871 the number had increased only to 670,999. In the other wool-growing colonies, it is thought that no squatter can make money on a run with less than 10,000 sheep. In Western Australia, 3,000 or 4,000 are considered to be a fairly large number, and squatters frequently run flocks that do not exceed 1,500 or 2,000 over enormous tracks of land. In New South Wales and Queensland, few squatters have less than a sheep to three acres. No rule can be laid down, as every run must be considered as a whole, and on most runs there is some land, more or less, which is not fit for use at all. But a squatter with 60,000 acres will generally have grass for 20,000 sheep. In Western Australia, one hears of a sheep to ten acres, and a sheep to twenty acres. The sheep of the Australian colonies amount together, I believe, to about forty millions. In Western Australia, which boasts of being the largest in area of them all, there is not as yet one million. In truth there is very much against the squatter. It is not only that much of the land which is called pastoral bears a poisoned shrub fatal to sheep;—but that, from this and other causes, the distances are so great that a sufficient number of sheep to make the business really remunerative can hardly be kept together.

I found rural wages lower in Western Australia than in the other colonies,—the reason for which is of course to be traced to the nature of the labour market. The squatter, or farmer, expects to get a man who is or was a convict, and the price of the work is arranged accordingly. It averages about 3s. a day without rations, or from 30s. to 40s. a month with rations. I was told that a man’s rations cost 10s. a week,—which is much higher than in the other colonies. I do not doubt that the men are charged at this rate. If the man be paid full wages, so that he has to feed himself, he must in most cases get all his supplies from his employer’s store, and the employer exacts a large profit. If the employer feeds the man, he calculates the rations supplied at the rate that he would sell them, and fixes his wages accordingly. Thus a man with 40s. a month, with rations, would be supposed to receive 80s. a month, although he would not cost his employer above 68s.