Speedily recovering lost ground, we strike the creek and the tin mines thereon located, which had been the cause of the exploration. The sanguine, undaunted prospectors are as usual delving and ditching, felling the forest, constructing dams, and generally committing assault and robbery upon patient mother Hertha.
We see the stream tin being washed out everywhere, like dark-coloured pebbly gravel. We note where the same rivulet has been formerly ravaged by the wandering mining hordes. We thread the gorges which lead into a rock-walled alpine valley, not inaptly named the 'Giant's Den,' and there meet with tin—more tin—toujours tin. For this fastness of the Titans has been turned into the Grand United Sluicing Company—no liability, let us say—and for the ten thousandth time, more or less, we admire the indomitable pluck and sanguine confidence of the miner proper. Here steam engines, pumping machinery, iron piping by the mile, dams, houses, men and material, are all found, in different stages of adaptation to an end. Evidently the shareholders, some of whom are practical men of transcolonial experience, have faith in the venture. The energetic Victorian captain beguiles us into a long, hot, pedestrian tour of inspection. He, always in advance, shovel on shoulder, prospects from time to time, and 'pans out,' with invariable success, the stanniferous gravel. Sooth to say, we have reached at length the mystic region where there is no 'want of tin.' It occurs everywhere in abundance—in new ground, in old workings, in mullock, in trenches, in each and every conceivable place. At the end of our bit of training, which mentally places us on a footing with Weston and other 'peds' of fame, we express our opinion that, with a steady supply of water for ground-sluicing, the Company should pay handsome dividends for years to come. The energetic captain, 'bred and born in a briar patch,' that is, on a goldfield, so that he is a 'legitimate miner' in every sense of the word, smiles appreciatively. We thankfully resume the saddle, and bid farewell to the 'Giant's Den.' 'It may be for years; it may be for ever.'
SPORT IN AUSTRALIA
Very early in a land peopled by the roving Englishman did sport of one kind or another begin to put forth those shoots which have since so grown and burgeoned. For some years there must have been so few horses, that racing contests were difficult if not impossible. The first cattle were herded without horses, some of the pedestrian stockmen acquiring thereby extraordinary speed of foot. It was customary for early Australians to make longish journeys on foot, and legends are yet rife in colonial families as to the distances performed then by the seniors—tales which strike with astonishment their descendants, who rarely walk, much less run.
We doubt not, however, that as soon as the colts and fillies began to grow up, their young riders, with or without leave, commenced to ascertain their relative speed.
Parramatta has, it is said, the honour of holding the first race meeting in 1810, the example being followed by the officers of the 73rd Regiment, then in Sydney, who utilised the reserve now known as Hyde Park for the purpose. From that time annual races commenced to be held there. The country towns, as they arose, were only too eager to follow the example of the metropolis. Favourites of the turf acquired fame which was trumpeted abroad through the restricted sporting circles of the day.
Sir John Jamison's Bennelong—named after a well-known aboriginal—was one of the early racing celebrities. He ran against Mr. Lawson's Spring Gun in 1829 for a heavy wager as they went then; and the old-world system of heats finishing up Spring Gun, he won easily. He carried off the principal turf events in Parramatta in 1832. In the same year Mr. H. Bayley's imported colt, Whisker, won the great races at the Hawkesbury meeting. Trotting was not entirely overlooked. It appears that a Mr. Potter's horse trotted twelve miles within the hour for a bet of £30, winning by fifteen seconds.
In May 1834 the Sydney Subscription Races were held on the New Course, Botany Road, for the first time. This course was new as compared with Hyde Park, but came to be called 'the old Sandy Course,' in relation to Homebush, the next established convincing-ground. At this meeting, Mr. C. Smith's Chester, a son of Bay Camerton, won the Cup; Whisker the Ladies' Purse. This grand horse won the Town Plate of £50; also the Ladies' Purse, £25, again beating Chester. Whisker, for whom £1400 had been offered three days previously, died within the week. I was present at that same old Sandy Course in the autumn of 1835, when Chester beat his half-brother Traveller—the latter fated to belong to my old friend and neighbour, Charles Macknight, at Dunmore, Victoria, in years to come. The well-known Emigrant mare, Lady Godiva, ran at the same meeting, and won her race for the Ladies' Purse, containing the modest sum of £30. The Town Plate was £50.
The celebrated horse Jorrocks, 'clarum et venerabile nomen' in turf annals, belonged to that period. A son of Whisker from Lady Emily (imported), he inherited some of the best racing-blood in the world; the dry air and nutritive pasturage of his native land did the rest. A horse of astonishing speed, stoutness, and courage, his record covers a longer list of victories than that of any other Australian racehorse. In those days of three-mile heats, he might not win the first, but rarely lost the succeeding ones. It used to be said that when the 'native' lads began to cheer, Jorrocks seemed to comprehend the situation, and would win on the post or die in the attempt. I saw him once, a retired veteran, and can never forget his shape, almost symmetrically perfect. A long forehand, with light, game head and full eye, grand sloping shoulders, cask-like back-rib, muscular quarter and Arab croupe, legs like iron, as indeed they needed to have been; a long, low horse, scarcely exceeding fifteen hands, I should say, in height—such was Jorrocks.
Intercolonial races began in 1849. Without railways there was a difficulty in transporting horses; but it was overcome. Petrel, the property of Mr. Colin Campbell, a popular Victorian squatter, ran a great race on the Melbourne Course with Mr. Austin's Bessie Bedlam, a beautiful daughter of Cornborough.