Taking Australia from east to west, we find a high range skirting the coast on the east, and supporting a dense sub-tropical vegetation, and giving rise to an extensive but uncertain river system. Next comes a more sterile interior, composed of desert, of shallow salt lakes, and of higher steppes in unknown proportions. Approaching the west coast we meet ranges again, and rivers and fertile country.
Mr. H. C. Russell, Government Astronomer for New South Wales, in his valuable pamphlet on the 'Physical Geography and Climate of New South Wales,' points out that 'if water flowed over the whole of the Australian continent, the trade wind would then blow steadily over the northern portions from the south-east, and above it the like steady return current would blow to the south-east, while the "brave west winds" and southerly would hold sway over the other half—conditions which now exist a short distance from the coast. Into this system Australia introduces an enormous disturbing element, of which the great interior plains form the most active agency in changing the directions of the wind currents. The interior, almost treeless and waterless, acts in summer like a great oven with more than tropical heating power, and becomes the great motor force on our winds, by causing an uprush, and consequent inrush on all sides, especially on the north-west, where it has power sufficient to draw the north-east trade over the equator, and into a north-west monsoon, in this way wholly obliterating the south-east trade belonging to the region, and bringing the monsoon with full force on to Australia, where, being warmed, and receiving fresh masses of heated air, it rises and forms part of the great return current from the equator to the south.'
The 'hot winds' of the colonists are produced by the sinking down to the surface of the heated current of air, which in summer is continually passing overhead; and when this wind blows in force upon a clear summer's day things are not pleasant. The thermometer from time to time indicates a degree of heat which is almost incredible. In Southern Melbourne the official record gives a reading of 179 degrees in the sun, and 111 in the shade, and at the inland town of Deniliquin, the official register in the shade is 121 degrees. Man and beast and vegetation suffer on these days. The birds drop dead from the trees, the fruit is scorched and rendered unfit for market. The leaves of the English trees, such as the plane and the elm, drop in profusion, so that in early summer it will seem as if autumn had set in. The sick, especially children, are terribly affected, and the doctors attending an infant sufferer will say that nothing can be done except to pray for a change of wind. Happily, such days as these are rare. The hot blast will not often send the temperature up to more than 100 to 105 degrees, and the duration of the heated wind is limited to three days, and often it prevails during only one, sunset bringing with it a cool southern gale.
A moderate hot wind is relished by many people, for the air is dry and even exhilarating to the strong for a while; and the claim is made that it destroys noxious germs and effluvia. Sometimes the hot wind will gradually die out, but on other occasions a rushing storm will come up from the south, driving the north wind before it, and in that case the welcome conflict will be preceded by whirling and blinding clouds of dust, and will be accompanied by thunder and lightning and torrents of rain. The fall of the temperature will be something marvellous. The thermometer will be standing at 150° in the sun; then the wind will change, rain will fall, and in the evening the register will be 50°, making a difference of 100 degrees in seven or eight hours.
That these days are exceptional is shown by the manner in which vegetation generally flourishes, and by the admiration which each colonist has for the climate of that particular part of Australia in which he resides. 'The Swan Settlements,' says the Western Australian, 'are the pick of the country. No hot winds there.' At Adelaide the visitor is told: 'Yes, we are often hotter by ten degrees in the sun than they are in Melbourne, but ours is a dry, not a moist heat.' In Melbourne the tale is reversed: 'Sydney is muggy,' it is averred; 'you cannot stand that. A dry heat is the thing, but those poor beggars at Adelaide have it too hot altogether.'
No doubt many mistakes occurred in the descriptions of Australia given by the early explorers. Brave and intelligent as they were, they were 'new chums,' and certainly not born bushmen. Transplanted from a small island, continental features overpowered them. Forests which took weeks to traverse; plains, like the ocean, horizon-bounded; the vast length of our rivers when compared to those of England, often flowing immense distances without change or tributary—now all but dry for hundreds of miles, at other times flooding the countries on their banks to the extent of inland seas—wearied them. Then we know that our cloudless skies, the mirage, the long-sustained high range of the thermometer in the central portion of the continent, troubled them a good deal more than they do us, and helped to make them look on the dark side of things. Hence, as a rule, their reports were unfavourable.
Sturt's account of his detention at Depôt Glen is enough to frighten anybody, and cannot be read to this day without emotion. Here, 'stuck up' by want of water, he dug an underground room, and he and his men passed a terrible summer. The heat was sometimes as high as 130 degrees in the shade, and in the sun it was altogether intolerable. They were unable to write, as the ink dried at once on their pens; their combs split; their nails became brittle and readily broke; and if they touched a piece of metal it blistered their fingers. Month after month passed without a shower of rain. Sometimes they watched the clouds gather, and they could hear the distant roll of thunder, but there fell not a drop to refresh the dry and dusty desert. The party began to grow thin and weak; Mr. Poole, the second in command, became ill with scurvy. At length, when the winter was approaching, a gentle shower moistened the plain; and preparations were being made to send the sick man quickly to the Darling, when Poole died, and the mournful cavalcade returned, leaving a grave in the wilderness. Yet this locality proved in time to be a very good sheep-run, differing in nothing from others around it; and eventually was found to be a gold-field, and was extensively worked. Runs about the spot are commonly advertised in the Melbourne or Sydney papers as carrying immense flocks, and as valued with the stock at from £50,000 to £100,000. The explorer was, in fact, within a few miles of Cooper's Creek.
This process of conquering the interior is still going on. Man modifies all countries, and Australia is no exception to the rule. Even the blacks played their part, and it was a mischievous one. They had an instrument in their hands by which they influenced the whole course of nature. This was the fire-stick. With this implement the aborigines were constantly setting fire to the grass and trees, both accidentally and systematically, for hunting purposes, and probably in their day almost every part of New Holland was swept over by a fierce fire on an average once in five years. Hence the baked, calcined condition of the ground in many parts of the continent, the character of our vegetation, and the comparative scarcity of animal life. The eucalypts survived the fiery ordeal, because of the hardness of their bark; and, when every other creature perished, or had to abandon its litter, the marsupials leaped over the flames with their young in their pouches. Strange as the assertion may appear in the first instance, it may be doubted whether any section of the human race has exercised a greater influence on the physical condition of a large portion of the globe than the wandering savages of Australia. The white man is working in an entirely opposite direction. By clearing the forest he limits the area of the bush fire. He constructs reservoirs, dams rivers, sinks wells in order to bring subterranean water to the surface, and irrigates land, so that a spot where even the hardiest scrub failed to grow in its natural state, is covered with luxuriant crops. Province after province has been rescued from the wilderness already, and the grand work is likely to go on. Those who look at what has been done in the way of reclaiming territory in Australia will be in no hurry to set bounds as to what man is likely to perform.
It is not wonderful that the first inquiry of the practical settler should be as to the rainfall of the country he proposes to occupy. The map most eagerly scanned in Australia is the 'rainfall' map, prepared by the Government, and issued by the leading weekly papers. A glance at this production reveals the tale which it tells. The coast-line is shown in a dark blue, to indicate the heavy rainfall of from thirty to seventy inches. A pleasant blue represents a moderate rainfall on the interior belt of plains, averaging from fifteen to twenty-five inches. Then comes a faint tint spread over what is called the 'never, never' country, where the rainfall is five or ten inches per annum, and where the rain will descend at once, or for two years there will be none, and then the whole average supply will drop from the clouds in one rushing downpour. Under such circumstances it will be readily imagined that the terror of the Australian settler is a drought. Even in the moments of his utmost prosperity he has his anxieties about the next season. A district which has been rainless for a year or two years is a pitiful spectacle of desolation. The grass disappears; the wind carries with it whirling columns of dust; the trees of the dreary plain become more sombre and mournful than ever. If there is a little water left in any dam or reservoir, it is rendered putrid by the carcases of sheep and cattle, for the wretched animals become so weak that, once they fall or stick, they are unable to rise or to extricate themselves. The sun rises in heat, sails through a cloudless sky, and sets a ball of fire. The nights are dewless. The moon only renders more ghastly the depressing panorama.
Mr. Russell complains that pictures of the drought are usually exaggerated, and it may be well therefore to quote official figures. In two years, according to Mr. Dibbs, Treasurer and Premier of New South Wales (November 1885), the drought in New South Wales has killed 200,000 horses, 1,500,000 head of cattle, and 13,500,000 sheep. A loss which is estimated at from £10,000,000 to £15,000,000 has fallen upon a single colony, and a single industry in that colony! But this drought was felt with equal severity in parts of South Australia and of Queensland, and it would be no exaggeration therefore to double the figures communicated to Parliament by Mr. Dibbs. And when 400,000 horses, 3,000,000 cattle, and 27,000,000 sheep die miserably of hunger and thirst, it is certain that scenes must occur the gloom and wretchedness of which can hardly be over-painted. One squatting company in the north lost 150,000 sheep out of 250,000 in the drought in question, and the survivors were kept alive with difficulty. Scrub was cut down for them. The living gnawed the bones of the dead. The company's shares went down to two shillings in the pound, and other squatting property similarly situated was equally depreciated, when one January morning, 1886, the Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, and Adelaide papers gave prominence to the welcome news of the break-up of the drought. From this place, that place, and the other, all down the line, came telegrams of the fall of three inches, four inches, five inches, and six inches of rain, the water saturating the ground, filling the dams, and sending the price of pastoral property up as though by magic.