One thing that must give a sincere patriot grave qualms upon visiting a new country like this is the terrible effects of that canker known as sport—save the mark!—upon the people. It is, as we all know, the curse of our own country; not real sport, but that foul business which, in its gambling outcome, keeps the best of our workers poor, and has raised an immense body of utterly worthless parasites to prey upon the community. This abominable thing flourishes here as ill weeds do, especially in new countries. Its worst form is, as usual, horse-racing, which always attracts the very worst elements of the people, and occasionally results in some such scene as that recently witnessed on the Flemington Racecourse, where one of the harpies was kicked to death. This paralysing mania pervades every class, takes precedence of business, of religion, of morality, and is responsible for a whole host of minor evils. It is simply incomprehensible how so many otherwise sensible people can be led, apparently helplessly, from all that makes life worth living into this vile vortex, which defies all law, all order, and creates a class of beasts of prey, all the more dangerous because human and intelligent.
The development of these wonderful countries is sure but slow. What it would be but for "sport," even with the present ridiculously inadequate population, I cannot imagine, seeing what it already is, but one thing stands out most prominently, and that is the large margin left for any careful workman between his earnings and his necessary expenditure. No one here in the possession of brains and vigour need hawk them round fruitlessly for hire, nor having let them to an employer need he despair of ever being able to raise himself from the position of a hired man. Education is not merely free, it is of very high order, and ever tending more and more in the direction of common-sense inculcation of those things that are useful, while the ornamental is certainly not neglected. In consequence it is quite usual to meet men, while travelling, whose appearance is—well, shabby, according to Old World ideas—that is, they are in ordinary working clothes—who will talk most intelligently upon many subjects, and will not interlard their conversation with senseless expletives. These men, and they are a very large class indeed, form the backbone of the country, and will, in due time, a good many of them, develop into its rulers.
What tends more to the dissemination of ideas and breadth of thought out here than anything else, I think, is the amount of travelling that is done. There are very few people that I have met on my journeyings to and fro who do not know these Colonies personally, very well, in spite of the immense distances. This, of course, is one of the causes as well as one of the results, of the great, the truly marvellous development of the Australasian Mercantile Marine. Another is that so large a proportion of the men have either been sailors or have never quite got over the effect of their long passage out from the Old Country. The spirit of the seafarer, his self-helpfulness, his adaptability to whatever circumstances he may find himself in and his indomitable optimism is over all. Which also accounts for a great many things otherwise mysterious and hard to understand.
But I am told that there is another factor largely in evidence to account for the really slow development of this vast area of habitable and valuable land besides their invincible repugnance of being flooded with cheap labour. It is the spirit of content. I give this for what it is worth, and it was told to me by many. When a man who has known what it is to toil hopelessly at home with only the prospect of the poorhouse before him, comes out here and finds that half the amount of labour will provide him with a comfortable living and a nest-egg for the slope of age, he is very apt to say, "Why should I strive for wealth? I am quite comfortable, and can now earn all I need or wish for with a slight expenditure of energy, while, should misfortune overtake me through no fault of my own, the State will support me without pauperising me." This feeling, it is said, robs a man of the burning desire to get on which makes a country possessing such men great in the sense of being wealthy. "People are too jolly comfortable to work hard out here," said a working man to me the other day, and I had nothing to say about the matter at all. It is a problem for far wiser heads than mine. But it is based upon the root idea that the possession of more than a man feels that he wants, brings not happiness, but misery. The cynic may say that there are few men who possess more than they feel that they want, but I can assure him that they are a far larger class than he wots of, especially out here.
Well, there are many things which leap to the pen, especially at the close of a book like this, but they must wait more fitting opportunity. What must not be omitted is mention of the deep and abiding feeling of the love for and the loyalty to the dear old land manifested by everybody, affection which coexists most comfortably with an almost passionate devotion to the new land which is, indeed, their own. No other passport to their hearts is needed than the fact that the visitor comes from the Homeland and loves it, he only is disliked and discredited who is ready to decry and belittle Britain in all things after the fashion of many curiously-minded folks at home. My best love and best wishes for Australasia. Root and branch, may she flourish for ever!
UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.