On our way we passed many residences of great woolgrowers, owning as much as 20,000 acres of land each, but living, for the most part, in England, their affairs in the Colony being managed by agents. They keep only one man on each 5,000 acres. There is scarcely any agriculture, although the land is very suitable, but being taken up in this way, there is no room for population to increase, and the people have to emigrate.
At Fingal we stopped at an hotel, kept by an Irishman married to a Jewess. They presided at either end of the table, and kept us short of food; indeed, I never saw a small joint go so far before. Next day we left the hotel, still hungry, although the charges were quite as high as those at the Great Western Hotel, Paddington.
Soon after leaving Fingal we saw something by the roadside which looked very like a snake, and on examining it we found it was one—a black snake, 4ft. 6in. long. It lay perfectly still, and presently we found it was dead; but the sensation was not pleasant. A gentleman at the hotel told us he had killed four the night previously, and doubtless this was one of them.
After passing through the charming village of St. Mary’s, embowered in trees, we entered a lovely avenue, two miles in length, filled with beautiful flowers and ferns, the air laden with scents from the gum and other trees, and on emerging came upon St. Mary’s Pass. This is an immense gorge, four miles long, filled with fine trees, the road, which is remarkably good, being cut in the side of the cliff by convicts in the old days of Van Diemen’s Land. It winds down the valley to the sea at Falmouth, and on either side rise lofty hills, while the valley below is 1,000 feet deep, and filled with immense trees of various kinds, including the tree fern. I have seen most of the passes and valleys in the Tyrol, but have never seen one to excel this in grandeur or beauty.
In the map the word “Falmouth” was printed in rather large letters, so we expected to find a somewhat considerable place. At the head of the pass we were told the township lay between the foot of the hill and the sea. On getting down the hill we could plainly view the sea and the intervening land, but no town was visible. Inquiring of some little boys the way to Falmouth, they directed us away to the right. We went on, feeling assured we were going wrong; and presently, meeting a gentleman, we inquired again, when he told us to retrace our course, to go through an ordinary field gate, and that we should then get to Falmouth in three minutes! We told him that the little boys had directed us the other way, but he said we should have asked for “Hotel.” The town of Falmouth, where the boys lived, consisted of two or three houses, and was a mile from the hotel. On exploring the place next day we were informed that fifty years before it was much more important than now. Miles of streets were marked out, but were grass-grown, and there were not more than a dozen houses in the place, all built of wood, and of one storey in height. The burying-place for the district is about a mile away, on the open common, each grave being surrounded with stakes, with no wall or fence enclosing the whole. It was a melancholy sight, reminding me strongly of the graves on the battlefields of the Franco-German war.
The beach and sands are very fine, like those of my native county. The bathing is delightful, but you must keep a sharp look out for sharks. One morning, however, while bathing, we stood in much greater danger from the mad folly of some Cockneys who had recently come to the hotel. We had been bathing in an arm of the sea, the point beyond which it was not safe being marked by a stake driven into the sand. Between our bathing place and the hotel was a high sand bank, screening us from sight, the stake being visible from the verandah of the hotel. After dressing, we were leisurely walking up the sandbank towards the hotel, when we were startled by a bullet passing between our heads and lodging in the sand behind us! We threw up our towels and shouted, and then saw the Cockney sportsman standing on the platform under the verandah, from whence he had been aiming at the stake in the sand with his rifle for the past half hour. On examination we found the sand riddled with bullets, not 50ft. from where we had been bathing. The little burying ground possessed a new significance in our eyes after this incident. We found some beautiful sea-shells during a delightful walk along the beach towards Swansea, and on our return called upon the gentleman who put us right for Falmouth on our arrival. He is a farmer from near Oxford, and had been here seven or eight years, finding it a terribly lonely place. Recently his nine children and his servants took the measles, and his wife being ill, he had to nurse them all. When they got well his wife sickened and died, leaving him with seven daughters and two sons, the eldest being only fourteen years old. The nearest doctor lived more than thirty miles away.