A number of gold diggers, however, gradually congregated in the Blue Mountains from the various colonies. When the work proved to be very profitable the rush was so great that one of the earlier colonies, the little Victoria, which had recently been founded, was on the point of being entirely deserted. To prevent the colony from perishing altogether, the leading men in Melbourne offered a large reward to any person who succeeded in discovering gold in Victoria. Before long, specimens of gold were found on the Yarra river, a few miles from Melbourne; in the course of a short time the famous gold mines of Ballarat and Bendigo were discovered.
At first gold was found in Ballarat in the usual manner—that is, in the bed of a river; but this was soon exhausted. A thick layer of clay was struck below the sand, and the work was abandoned in order to search for new fields. Fortunately one of the gold diggers, who had made up his mind to stay some time longer, got the idea of working through the clay, and by so doing he reached enormous quantities of gold in the old bed of the river. For centuries the streams had carried gold down from the mountains and deposited it here in “pockets” in the bed of the river. A single “pocket” of this kind would sometimes contain thousands of pounds’ worth of gold. Within a month Ballarat became the richest gold field in the whole world.
The gold fever grew into a perfect rage. Melbourne was almost deserted. People of every class and from every part of the world left their work, their situations, and their homes to seek their fortunes. In Melbourne policemen left their posts of duty, officials threw up their offices, and sailors deserted their ships.
In spite of the fact that everybody rushed to the gold mines, thus preventing a normal development of the country, Australia got full compensation in the new impetus given to immigration. The year after the discovery of gold more than 100,000 immigrants arrived in Victoria. Thus the population was doubled in a single year, and during the following five years it increased fivefold. While in 1830 there were less than 4000 inhabitants, in 1860 their number had increased to 1,300,000. The quantity of gold found was also sufficiently large to explain this increase of population. During the next ten years £100,000,000 were produced in Victoria alone.
As a matter of course, money had but little value in such circumstances. During he first years after the discovery of the gold fields sovereigns passed as freely as copper pennies. A barber would get £1 for cutting a gold digger’s hair; the idea of giving change back was never thought of.
Many characteristic stories are told of this golden age of the fortune-seekers. A gold digger took a holiday, and went into a restaurant where he demanded a breakfast for £10. The hostess looked at him, smiled, and answered that she was not able to furnish so expensive a breakfast at present. Her highest price was five shillings. “Well,” said the customer, “give me the best you have.” The hostess did her best, and served every hot and cold dish she could devise. The gold digger seated himself at the table, looked at the various dishes with the air of an epicure, but at length turned up his nose and declared that there was nothing fit for him to eat. Then he took a large roll of bank-notes out of his pocket, selected a £10 note, laid it between two pieces of bread and butter, ate it, and washed it down with champagne. “That’s what I call a ten-pound breakfast,” he added, and paid his bill and walked out.
Two Irishmen came into an inn to rest while the coachman was changing horses. The Irishmen were gold diggers who had reaped an abundant harvest, and they were now on their way home to the Emerald Isle with their pockets full of gold.
They learned that the innkeeper also was an Irishman, and this fact aroused their patriotism; so they resolved to drink a toast to old Ireland in champagne. Fifty bottles of this choice beverage were demanded for the honour of Ireland. But no sooner had they paid the £50 and opened the first two bottles than the coachman shouts, “All ready!” The Irishmen climb into their places in the coach and proceed on their journey, leaving the host to finish the remaining forty-eight bottles.
The average individual gains were, however, not so large, and the digging for gold was gradually reduced to systematic methods. The work by degrees became a link in that mining industry which embraced copper, coal, and tin. Copper and coal were discovered in Australia long before gold—as was also tin, which in its importance to the colonies may in time equal the others. New discoveries of gold have attracted adventurers to the north of Australia, and opened new avenues for immigration; but the continent is, upon the whole, pastoral and agricultural.
The Chinese have forced their way into all the islands of the Indian Ocean, and this new current of immigration has given the development of Australia, particularly of tropical Queensland, a peculiar character.