These figures, taken from official papers in 1882, have never been dealt with by Victorian Protectionists, but are full of meaning to all those whom vested interests have not made blind. While it is true that Australia presents, and will continue to present, a great field for the surplus population of older countries, it is, in my opinion, a mistake to suppose that the upper grades of English artisans improve their position much by going there. Wages are higher it is true, and eight hours make up a day’s work; animal food also is cheaper, but almost everything else is dearer than in England—house-rents, indeed, enormously so. An artisan who in Birmingham would be well housed for 5s. to 6s. a week would have to pay £1 for much inferior accommodation; this remark applies generally in Australia, the principal cause being the great lack of artisans in the building trade. Many too, may consider the higher wages and shorter hours of labour as not too great a compensation for the exhaustion induced by the heat and dust of the climate and the annoyance from insect life. But for unskilled labour and for skilled agricultural labour there can be only one opinion,—viz., that the Colonies present a field where sobriety and industry are certain to bring a reward such as is altogether unattainable at home.
The education of the people is admirably provided for by the Legislature, every district being well supplied with first-rate schools, while the means of intercommunication by rail, post, and telegraph are superior to those of any country in the world, when the smallness of the population and the immense distances to be covered are taken into consideration.
In Australia, especially in the southern Colonies, there is happily no native question to absorb the attention of the people and to upset the calculations of financiers, consequently the colonists are able to devote all their energy to opening up the natural resources of the country. At the present time many millions of money are set aside for the construction of new railways and for the supply and storage of water, and when these are completed vast areas of agricultural land will be opened sufficient to accommodate all the spare population of England for many years to come.
If “Young Australia,” like his cousin in America, has an unbounded confidence in the future of his country, he has even more in himself, as is well illustrated by the following story told me by an old resident. In one of the cities a number of young men had established a Debating Society, which met every Wednesday evening in a room in a narrow street. On the other side of the street was a church where service was held at the same time. The weather being hot the windows of both buildings were usually open, and the important deliberations of the young men were much interrupted by the preaching and singing in the church. With a delightful unconsciousness of what in slang phrase is called “cheek,” they instructed their secretary to write to the minister of the church, requesting him to hold his service upon some other evening of the week!
The people of Australia are possessed of vast energy and great intelligence: and, having unlimited and well-grounded faith in their capacity to conquer the many difficulties which lie before them, they determined that their future career shall do no discredit to the great country from which they have sprung, and of whose history they are so proud.
CHAPTER VII.
We left Sydney in the first week in April, and although we had greatly enjoyed the beautiful scenery of its fine harbour and the neighbouring Blue Mountains, and had experienced the greatest kindness and hospitality on every side, we were not sorry to depart.
In the first place, we were homeward-bound, and I had recovered the health, in search of which I had left home and friends, and the weather had been so oppressively hot and the dust so troublesome, that we were glad of the prospect of the abatement of the one and the total disappearance of the other.
For ten months the Colony had had no rain, and in the neighbourhood of Sydney trees were dying by hundreds, and gardens which had been carefully tended for fifteen or twenty years were nearly spoiled. The outlook for agriculturists was dark indeed, very indifferent hay was selling for £10 a ton, and the cattle were perishing for want of water. I saw a statement in the paper that one farmer had already lost 45,000 sheep, and if the drought lasted a few weeks longer he would lose 50,000 more. The most inveterate grumbler at the moisture of the English climate would, if here in Sydney, soon arrive at the conclusion that six months’ rain is to be preferred to ten months’ drought and dust under a scorching sun.