To take the machinery first. Here were engines, threshing-machines, mowers, ploughs, harrows, planters, seed-sowers, rollers, hoes, pumps, forges, grinders, separators, tanks, stoves, fire-fighters, and hundreds of other agricultural implements “too numerous to mention,” as the consecrated phrase runs, such as one would find in any English agricultural show. But there were others peculiar to Australia. For example, fly-proof tents, window fly-screens, rabbit poisoners, poison carts, all suggestive of Australian conditions. Of the rabbit poisoners I know next to nothing, save that the farmers are compelled to resort to strong measures in order to exterminate these pests of the land. But of the flies I am beginning to learn, by experience, a little. How grateful these fly-proof screens and tents appeared! Flies are already appearing in alarming numbers, and we are bidden to prepare for the annual invasion, when nothing is sacred from their inquisitive and poisonous tentacles. Still amongst the machinery, we observe “forest devils” and stump-pullers. These, again, are peculiarly Australian, called into existence by the exigencies of agricultural life. The country abounds with the stumps of trees. The giants have been levelled to the ground, but the stumps remain, firmly rooted in the soil. Now certain portable “forest devils” have been invented by means of which one man can, with the aid of a lever and a wheel-gear, draw from the ground the most stubborn stump of a tree. Agricultural dentistry—that is what it is! Again, there are several varieties of steel windmills and other machinery for raising and distributing water. Irrigation is one of the problems of this growing country, and engineering science is doing its best to solve that problem. They have even the milking machine, that last contrivance to compel steel and rubber to do what hitherto the human hand alone has been able to accomplish. Farther on are carriages and buggies, eminently suited for this land. But one needs to know them. To a new-comer they present the appearance of supreme uncomfortableness. Persons who try them speak in different terms of them. Certain types of English carriages do not appear to have found their way here. But while machinery has a peculiar fascination, it is wholly eclipsed by the live stock and produce of the country. I am no judge of cattle, but the professional judges who awarded prizes had much to say about the quality of the horses and oxen and sheep and swine. And everybody seemed pleased, so I cheerfully add my “Amen,” without reason, save that unreasonable reason that “everybody says so.” And “everybody” in this connection must be right. But I do know wool when I see it. Australia is proud of its wool, and it has reason to be. Many of the prize sheep seemed to have more wool than flesh upon them. Again and again I buried my hand, and wrist, and even beyond that, in the wool of the sheep. It hung upon them in layers; a burden to the poor animals, a little gold mine to the wool-growers. Of poultry, also, I am no judge, being severely limited in experience to a few hens who do not lay nearly so many eggs per day as they should, considering what is spent upon them. But in the show they had hens which had laid an average of 240–250 eggs in the season, and they looked quite cheerful after the effort. One farmer printed a notice to the effect that his profits on eggs alone during the year had been £441. Intimations of that kind provoke serious thought in many directions. But the produce! It was a perfect revelation of the wealth of the country. The average Englishman, coming out here for the first time, would not believe that any State could produce the variety that these States produce. The point to be observed is that this wonderful productiveness is the fertility of a country not long cleared. And the further point to be noted is that there is very much more to follow as the country develops. Perhaps the most interesting thing in the show was the various collections of exhibits from societies or groups, representing the produce of a certain district. The whole of the produce of the district was shown in sample. Think of one limited area producing wheat—yielding thirty-six bushels for every bushel and a quarter of seed—oats, barley, maize, peas, rye grass, linseed, hemp, mangolds, beetroot (nearly half a yard long), sugar beet, carrots, onions, turnips, cabbage, potatoes (many weighing more than a pound), apples, lemons, nuts, olive oil, meal, poultry, eggs, wool, wine, bacon, butter and honey. That is the product of one district only. The place seems capable of producing everything. Honey is the thing that imposes itself upon one. It is a great country for honey. In the bush it flows wild and men gather it in bucketfuls. And where it is cultivated it is cheap enough, being about one-third the price of English honey. Of course, all this means that industries are springing up everywhere. Australia has its own condensed milk factories; it dries its own raisins, makes its own chutney, and sauces, and jams, and tins fruit for home use and export.
I said there is more to follow. The science of agriculture is being developed. There are State Schools’ competitions, which include samples of forestry, fruit trees, grains, forage and roots, grasses and clovers, potatoes, fibres, vegetables, honey, etc. But the competitors must describe as well as exhibit. They must be able to answer questions on soils and produce, and they must be able to make models. The whole trend of agricultural education is scientific.
The folk at home do not know all this. They ought to know. Now that a Land Act is in operation, and the big estates are being cut up, we may expect a great boom in agriculture. People will then be wanted from the Old Country. There is plenty of room, and a population is imperatively needed. But let none go over until the gong sounds.
CHAPTER XXII
AN INTERLUDE—A DUST STORM IN SUMMER
The day had been intolerably hot. A copper haze hung over the landscape, weighing upon it with the solemnity of a funeral pall. All life was weary. The leaves of the blue gum tree drooped in a manner unusual for them. The flowers hung their heads upon their stalks as if the oppression of the atmosphere was insupportable, and the day for the shattering of the fragile floral vase had arrived. Men returned home from their labour, and after the evening meal refused to stir out either to concert, lecture, theatre, or entertainment of any kind. It was a north wind day of a peculiarly unpleasant type, followed by a still more unpleasant evening. Then came a lull. A deathly silence reigned over the city and suburbs. A curious veil of murky cloud overspread the face of the sky. In the bedroom the thermometer registered over 90 degrees. We glanced at the glass and thanked God that our beds were outside in the open air. But even there the heat was oppressive. The little lad, always so careful to cover up his body, had flung off all the coverings from his bed, and lay exposed to the air of the night. It was a night when to woo the goddess of sleep was next to impossible. The hours passed by—eleven, twelve, one. Still no sleep. Still that terrible oppression. Still that suffocating heat.
And then, in a moment of time, without the least warning or premonitory sign, there came a change such as Englishmen never experience in their own country. It was a sudden roar, a descending blast, a tempest unchained. The storm literally burst upon us. It was an explosion, instantaneous and complete. The great trees around us were suddenly seized by the mysterious and invisible power of the storm, and bent and rocked and shaken and twisted in a manner terrifying to behold. The wind travelled, so we learned the next day, at the mad speed of sixty-five miles an hour.
The entire neighbourhood appeared to be seized in the grip of a storm fiend which wreaked its vengeance upon everything that lay in its path. Balconies upon which men slept were shaken as if some malign power determined to wreck them. Out into that storm I stepped, clad only in pyjamas. The terror of it fascinated me, held me spellbound, compelled me to share it. It was a tourmente of the Alps repeated in the streets of a Southern city, but with clouds of dust in place of clouds of snow. The cold air from the South encountering the hot air of the languishing city created an aerial funnel which sucked up the débris of the streets into its enormous mouth. That dust! Can I ever forget it? It blotted out from my vision the brilliant light of the electric lamps. It obscured the houses across the wide streets. It blackened the country beyond, and made the dark night a scene of terror. Steadily the temperature dropped until within half an hour the glass registered twenty-five degrees less than it did at midnight. Then the heavens began to blaze and the thunder to roar. From a dozen points at once the lightning broke forth. Crash after crash of thunder shook the house. And still the choking dust mounted high into the air. Would the rain never descend and give us once more a clear atmosphere? One short, sharp, tropical storm of rain, one welcome deluge, and this dust fiend would be laid for the time. The inky clouds could not promise so much benediction and after all mock us!
The lightning ceased as suddenly as it commenced. The last peal of thunder sounded, and still no drop of rain fell. Meanwhile the storm of wind and dust recommenced, this time with increased fury. It drove all outdoor sleepers within doors. Beds were hastily dragged from balconies into bedrooms. Lights were seen in nearly every room within the line of vision. The cries of startled children mingled with the furious screaming of the wind. It was a night of horror and of fear. For three hours the tempest raged, and then, in a moment of time, it ceased with dramatic suddenness. The dust gradually fell again to the ground from which it had been drawn. The face of the sky cleared, and the stars shone out. The atmosphere became chilly, and discarded blankets were once more drawn over shivering persons, half asleep and half awake. The tourmente had spent itself.
From out of a brazen sky the sun shone down next morning upon a scene of wreckage. Trees were uprooted, fences torn down, shrubs destroyed, flowers broken from their stalks and left dead upon the ground. Gardens looked as if some demon had wrought his evil will upon them during the night. Poor broken lilies, prostrate roses, crushed herbs, wounded by that cruel storm! The house within was enveloped in a mantle of fine dust. Nothing had escaped. It was but yesterday that the entire establishment was clean and attractive; this morning it is a scene of desolation, a place over which a woman can only shed tears. The rain had not descended: we must set to work and clean up the house and hope for the merciful showers from heaven to come and wash the face of that Nature which the storm has so begrimed.