DARLING DOWNS AND NEW ENGLAND.
The Darling Downs were the last I saw of Queensland. From Brisbane you go to them by train. One of the waiters at the hotel told me that I had better take my luggage to the station on the evening before starting. If I took them before 8 p.m. I paid a shilling for a cab. If I took them between the hours of 8 p.m. and 6 a.m. I should pay ten shillings. I shall have more to say about Australian cabs and carts by-and-bye. Independently of the cost of a conveyance, I was glad to take my bag and boomerang to the station in daylight. The latter might have been dangerous in the dark. The train left at 5.50 a.m. It was quite dark, and I did not see much of the country or fellow-passengers until about 7 a.m., when we reached a pretty big town called Ipswich. Here we had a scramble for a very bad breakfast, after which we got into the train almost as cold as when we came out of it. At Ipswich I saw several factories. Up to this point the country was undulating. Farther on I saw a number of post and rail fences, a few small houses, and a great lot of gum trees forming open woods. After a climb up a range of yellow sandstone hills, we entered a park-like country.Here and there were a lot of palms with heads on them like tufts of grass. These were grass trees I suppose. Now and then there was a creek, consisting of a series of pools of stagnant water. These I put down as an example of the so-calledwater-holeswe read so much about in books on Australia. Near the water there were some trees which looked like pines. These I learnt were river oaks. Some big trees were called honeysuckles. There are a lot of things in Australia which are not what they look like. Sometimes we rushed past a ploughed clearing. It may have been planted with wheat. In a few hours more we were again amongst hills, and as we wound in and out, gradually climbing upwards, I had glimpses of many pretty scenes. At mid-day we reached Toowoomba—the capital of the Darling Downs. I don’t know whether I have spelt Toowoomba right, but it is a very good example of the Hoos and Woos and Moos and Boos they are so fond of in Australia. The letter O is a great favourite. In Sydney I saw a word, in fact, I saw it every day, with eight O’s in it. It was usually on an omnibus. At first I couldn’t read it for astonishment. The next time I saw it I got as far as Woo, but as I ran my eye along the length of the wonderful word, it got confused. It is easy to lose your way in a good long word, especially if it is stuck on a bus and the bus is moving. Once I chased a bus along a street, but I never got past Wooloo. After that my sight was dazed, and I was in a jumble. On returning to a hotel in the evening, I described my troubles to the waiter, who wrote the mysterious word for me, and after ticking slowly off the letters I found it was Wooloomooloo.I was told that Woo-loo-moo-loo was the war cry of the aborigines, who resisted the landing of the early settlers. Wooloomooloo, it may be observed, rhymes with Timbuctoo.
The latter part of the climb up to Toowomba (I spell the name differently in different places because I hope that I may get it right sometimes), which is situated on the very edge of the downs, was steep enough to require two engines. If our engine had not been so leaky, it might possibly have done the work alone. I never before saw an engine that could afford to lose so much steam through its cylinder covers outside a workshop. I am glad I went up to Toowomba, if it was only to see this engine. The view looking back down the incline, over the heads of the trees which filled the valley up which we had come, was beautiful and extensive. Gum trees, in quantity, do very well for general effect; when you get close to them, then you see too many spaces. A forest of gum trees would look all right if viewed from above, say from a balloon about ten miles high. Turning round and looking ahead the scene was altered. Before us were the undulating open Darling Downs, brown, flat, and anything but inviting. In spring time, when they are green, they may perhaps be prairie-like, and beautiful to the eye of the farmer, but as I saw them with their miles of wire fencing, they were not so interesting as the desert of Arabia. I was always going to places at the wrong season. They are of basaltic formation, which probably overlies the sandstone which I had seen below. Perhaps the basalt welled up through great fissures; perhaps it came from some of the small conical hills which I sawfarther along the line. All the water from the basalt contains magnesia. New-comers don’t like it. It produces peculiar effects. Now and then I saw flocks of sheep. They did not seem to be eating. If they liked dry stubble, clay, or bits of basalt, they might do very well. They were usually standing still, with their noses all pointing one way. Why sheep should keep parallel, and cows point about in all azimuths, I couldn’t make out. I thought I should never get across the downs. Late in the afternoon the basalt was replaced by sandstone, and we reached the thriving township of Warwick. Here I saw a race-course. Every town in Australia has a race-course, I fancy. Some of them have two or three racecourses. Racing is an Australian mania. Australians like cricket, football, rowing, and athletic sports generally.
At Warwick there were a lot of Toowoomba football boys waiting to go home. They must like football very much to cross the Darling Downs for a game. I would as soon cross the Sahara. From Warwick we again commenced to climb up hills. On either side we had open forests of gum trees. Now and then we saw a wallaby or a kangaroo. Wallabys and kangaroos are like gigantic crickets covered with hair. They have long tails. Their great forte is jumping. From what I saw, I fancy they would win the long jump at any athletic sports. Unless closely pursued by the hunter, they do not care about jumping over wire fences. They get past obstacles like these by lying down and rolling through between the wires. Like donkeys, kangaroos carry their battery in their back legs. When cornered by a pack of hounds, the kangaroo pivots andplaces his back to the aggressors, and astonishes them with lightning-like jerkings of his battery. Dogs are often disembowelled by kangaroos. Some kangaroos have pouches in which they carry provisions. If one kangaroo picks the pocket of another kangaroo the fight which succeeds is terrific. At Thulimba, where we passed some clay slates and granite, we were at an elevation of 3,004 feet, so said the railway guide. It was cold enough for 10,000 feet. When we reached Stanthorpe, which was the end of the line, it was bright moonlight and freezing hard. Half an hour’s walk took us to Farley’s Hotel. Stanthorpe is a funny little place. It consists of a few low, one-storied houses along the sides of wide roads, I can’t call them streets. They have too much grass on them to be streets. I hardly know why, but I shall remember Stanthorpe, the last town I visited in Queensland, for very many years. Perhaps the difficulty I had in getting there makes me remember Stanthorpe. After a long journey at sea, any rock may be hailed as a paradise. The hotel was like a little old-fashioned English hostelry. There was the white-capped maid-servant, and there was the open hearth with its huge log fire. When I looked at these logs fizzing and crackling and throwing out a generous warmth, I thought well of scrubby gum trees. The best thing, however, was the steaming fragrant half an acre of beefsteak. ‘Will you try a little more beefsteak, sir?’ said Mary; and I tried another perch or so. ‘Will you try a little pie—will you try a little salt—will you try a little bread?’ Everything, it did not matter whether it was flesh, fish, fowl, vegetable or mineral, Mary always inquired if youwould try a little of it. In this respect I may remark that Mary was like nearly every waiter I met in the Colonies. They all wanted you to try a little. The usual reply is to say, ‘Yes, please, I will try a small piece more.’ If it is steak, a small piece means the usual slab.
Stanthorpe was at one time one of the principal tin mining centres in this part of the world. There is still a little mining going on. The tin occurs in grains and pebbles distributed through alluvium. The earth is thrown into boxes or sluices through which water is flowing. The light materials are washed away and the heavy tin remains behind. At one place I was shown a band of granitic rock, through which grains of tin were disseminated. It is probable that it was by the decomposition of rock like this, that the alluvium deposits have been formed. On my way out to this we passed the house of a gold miner who had at one time been so elated with his success, that he made horseshoes out of gold, with which he shod his horse. After a five-mile ride, I believe the shoes were carefully removed.
During the night I found it bitterly cold. Next morning everything was white with frost, the ground was steaming in the rising sun, and there was ice half an inch thick in the pails. This was tropical Queensland. The streets were quiet, and with the exception of one man, who was drunk and holding a maudlin conversation with a post, they were deserted. This was the first time that I had heard a man talking to a post, and I was quite interested to know what they had to say to each other. People do sometimes talk to inanimate objects. I once heard of a certain Mr. Smithwho, when returning home late at night, had a conversation with a pump. ‘Hillo, Tompkins, old chap! Hie! you’re out late to-night.’ Tompkins was the pump. ‘Why don’t you walk about? Hie! Very ridiculous standing there. You’ll catch cold, and what’ll your wife say?’ Here Smith made a long pause, wondering why his friend was so silent. ‘Can’t you talk? Suppose its beastly pride. I’m not proud. Gimme your hand, and let’s help you home, old chappie.’ And rolling up to the pump he took hold of the handle.
‘Oh! ’ow cold your ’ands is; you gimme the shivers. You’re like an iceberg, Tompkins!’ Just then the pump-handle, under the weight of Smith, slightly moved and squeaked. ‘Hillo, you’re wheasy, old man. Let’s go and get six pennoth ’ot. Your wife’ll blow me up if I bring you home cold.’ Leaning a little more on the pump, the handle suddenly sank, and Smith tumbled forwards just in time to receive a deluge of water from the spout. ‘So you’re sick; are you, you beast? No need to treat a fellow like that. Shan’t stay here any more. May take yourself home, Mr. Tompkins.’ And away Smith rolled, muttering something about ‘beastly behaviour’ and the ‘evil effects of drink.’
My man was not so bad as Smith. He had got his arm round the post of a veranda. At one time he looked like the picture of Samson carrying off the gates of Gaza. At another time he was like a revolving hobby horse. His conversation was too inarticulate to be noted.
I spent a Sunday in Stanthorpe. A gentleman at the hotel took me out for a drive. As we went along he carefully pointed out the devastation left by theChinese. ‘They come here,’ he said, ‘bring nothing but a blue blouse, eat nothing but what they import themselves, work out the ground that ought to be worked by white men, and then they go carrying away gold, and only leaving those heaps of gravel’ (here he pointed with his whip) ‘where they have been fossicking. They are usurpers of a white man’s country. The white man is starving, and his wife and daughters are thrown on charity, and all this because our Government is wicked enough to let Chinamen come in the country.’
As we came back I saw a small Australian bear lying dead at the foot of a tree. It looked to me like a sloth. It is a feeble, timid creature, but has certain peculiarities which renders it worthy of a passing note. When up a tree which is being felled, it has been known to sob and cry with so much pathos, that the woodman has often ceased his work, and gone beneath the branch on which he hung to seek for falling tears. Many bushmen have sobbed themselves, and no one, I have been told, can fell trees in Southern Queensland without several pocket-handkerchiefs. A tender-hearted man can never earn a livelihood by felling trees. The child-like grief of this little bear has been known to overcome the stoutest hearts. Even the bloodthirsty bushranger has had his heart softened by its weeping, and chronic sorrow is not uncommon in districts where this animal abounds.
From Stanthorpe I travelled by coach to Glen Innis. It was a long journey through the bush. I started at 8 a.m., and got to the end of my journey at 6 a.m. next morning. I thought I was going to die in this journey, so I am not likely to forget it. I had a box-seatall the way, and a box-seat in a gale of wind, with the thermometer below zero and wearing ordinary summer clothes, is not an enviable position. The scenery was certainly lovely. Outside Stanthorpe we crossed the track of a new railway line, which in time will be the connecting link between the lines of Queensland and New South Wales. Near here we crossed the border between these two colonies. After that our road was over hills and valleys through interminable bush. Once or twice we saw a kangaroo, and now and then a wallaby. Some of the old kangaroos, which are known as old men kangaroos, will often sit up and stare at you before they jump away. ‘No papers this morning, Jim?’ said a driver to one of those old men sitting near the road, and the old man jumped away. ‘Dear me,’ said a new chum, sitting next the driver. ‘I didn’t know that kangaroos were so civilized.’ When the driver told this story all the passengers in the coach laughed immoderately, and, not to be conspicuous, I joined them.
At one of the stations where we changed horses, I was very much amused by watching two frisky lambs chasing a flock of geese. The geese were terrified and flapped away from their pursuers. Presently a dog appeared about half a mile away, and the frisky lambs bolted in the opposite direction. At the next station to this there were only young girls living. They groomed the horses, and gave us our dinner. At all of these places we had glorious wood fires and open chimneys, at which we could toast our frozen feet. As we jogged along, the driver tried to instruct me about gum trees, and to illustrate his lessons as we passedalong, he grabbed bunches of leaves from overhanging trees, which he gave me sometimes to smell and sometimes to taste. Some of them were not unpleasant to the nose, others were frightful. ‘Some you might live on,’—at least that is what he said.
Notwithstanding all that I was taught, gum trees are to me all alike—a scraggy variety of the vegetable kingdom. Tenterfield, which we reached in the afternoon, is a nice little town with modern buildings, some of which are three stories high. It is situated on an open undulating country laid out in blocks for farming purposes. Many of the gentlemen in the streets wore tall hats—many the ladies wore brilliant and shiny black satin. By this time the box-seat had begun to tell on me, and I was more than wheezy. Notwithstanding something hot and a bag of ‘lollies,’ by the time I reached the next station, which was a solitary house in the bush called Bolivia, I could only whisper. This was at 9 p.m., and it was a question whether I should stay and die at Bolivia, or get in the coach to be hauled along to die at or about Glen Innis. At Glen Innis I might get a decent burial. In the bush there would not be much ceremony. This latter ride, through dark bush, on rough roads, up hill and down dale, with your marrow frozen, is not to be forgotten. The cold I got remained with me for three months. All this is extremely personal, but as it may possibly be the means of preventing some other innocent wanderer from anticipating death, I put it in. When I am next seen coaching in a tropical country, I hope to be wearing a fur coat and a blanket. All that I can say about Glen Innis is that it is a good-looking town withseveral fairly good hotels, situated about 3,500 feet above sea level.
From Glen Innis to Newcastle there is a regular English narrow-gauge railroad. The carriages were, so far as my unprofessional eye could tell, a senseless copy of what there is in the old country. In winter they were bearable, but in summer the carriage I was in must be stifling. It had neither curtains nor sunshades. The Brisbane line was American, narrow gauge and with long carriages on bogie trucks. At one place we passed over a height of 4,500 feet. This was on the side of a mountain called Ben Lomond. All the way down to Newcastle through New England there was much cultivated country, and many prettily situated towns. The journey took fourteen and a half hours.
At Newcastle I took quarters in an hotel, which was not the best one in the place. A fellow-traveller on the train recommended it to me as the best house in Newcastle. You entered at a bar where there was a stream of visitors passing in to drink, and then passing out rubbing their mouths with their coat-sleeves.
My bedroom was like a cellar taken upstairs. But for a glimmer that came in over a door leading into a drawing-room, I was in utter darkness. It was even necessary to light a candle to dress by. When next morning I interviewed the landlord I inquired as to the nature of his contract with the neighbouring barber, forno one could possibly see to shave in his establishment.
“What, were you in number sixteen?” asked the landlord. “I gave strict orders that no guests were to be put in that room. The trouble that I experienced about that room nearly killed me once. If you want me to pay your barber’s account I’ll do it with pleasure, but anyhow you might take a drink before you leave just to show that you don’t owe me any ill feeling on account of having slept in number sixteen.” All the while the landlord looked so anxiously at me, that I began to think that he was astonished at seeing me alive. “Can’t visitors sleep in number sixteen?” I asked. “Sleep indeed,” was the reply, “the difficulty is to stop them sleeping. I had one man sleep in the room for nearly a week without ever coming out of it.” “Well, what’s the matter?” I inquired; “has there been a murder committed in number sixteen, is it haunted or what?”
“It happened in this way,” said the landlord. “Just about this time last year, we had a lot of visitors from up country making their way southwards towards Melbourne, anxious, I suppose, to be in time to see the Melbourne Cup. One cold drizzly afternoon an elderly man arrived carrying in his hand a small yellow portmanteau tied up with a rope. He said he had been sitting in the coach for the last three or four days, and was very tired. From his dirty clothes and a curious limp that he had got, we could quite believe that he had been knocking about for some time.
“I asked my wife what we should do with the stranger, as all the rooms were full. ‘Oh, put him in numbersixteen, Joe,’ said my wife. ‘It’s dark now, and maybe he’ll get up pretty early and never know that there’s no window.’ At that time I may tell you that the door into the drawing-room had not been made, so there was no window. The quantity of steak and bread that the old man put away while having his supper was something terrible. Matilda, who had been sitting in the back parlour listening to the order which he gave, said ‘she thought he was provisioning a fortress.’ At last he went to bed. On his way upstairs he hoped that number sixteen was a quiet room, and that no one would disturb him in the morning. He wanted to make up for the sleep he had lost sitting in the coach. As I was going downstairs I heard him lock and double-bolt his door, and then commence to hum a tune. This was at 9 p.m. on June 30th. I don’t know whether you can believe me, but that door was not opened until 12 o’clock on the 5th of July. Of course we didn’t take much notice of him next morning. He wanted to sleep he said, and perhaps might not turn out until 12 o’clock. When dinner time came I had forgotten all about him. You know it is difficult for us to keep the run of all our guests, and, besides, he might have been outside attending to business in the town.
“That night, however, Susan, the chambermaid, told my wife that she could not open number sixteen; whenever she knocked at the door there was no answer. We thought it a bit odd, but as he said he was tired and wanted to sleep we did not disturb him.
“Next morning, as he did not turn up to breakfast, my wife was a bit anxious, and said to me, ‘You’d better goupstairs, Joe, and see if number sixteen is going to get up.’ Well, after knocking at the door two or three times, somebody inside said, ‘Hillo! what’s the matter?’ ‘Ain’t you going to get up?’ says I. ‘All right,—presently,’ was the answer, and I went downstairs and told my wife.
“Dinner time came and then tea time, but still number sixteen hadn’t come down. ‘Better go and rap again, Joe,’ said my wife. Up I went, and after thumping on the door till I heard somebody inside grumbling about a noisy house and people not being allowed to sleep. ‘Are you never going to get up?’ I said through the keyhole. ‘Will get up when it’s daylight,’ was the answer. ‘He’ll get up when it’s daylight,’ said I to myself. ‘Why, it’s nearly forty-eight hours since he went to bed, and he talks of sleeping twelve hours more.’ When I told my wife what number sixteen had said, she looked at me a moment, and then said, ‘Joe, this comes of putting a man into a dark room. It never will be daylight in there.’ ‘Matilda, you’ve struck it, exactly,’ I said; ‘the old fool thinks it is in the middle of the night.’ Then we discussed what we should do. ‘Better let him alone to-night,’ was Maria’s suggestion; ‘he has got to sleep somewhere you know. We can tell him that it’s daylight to-morrow morning.’
“Next morning I was at the door of number sixteen pretty early.
“Rat-tat-tat went my knuckles on the panels. ‘Hillo!’ was the answer. ‘Going to get up to-day; it’s morning,’ says I. ‘Morning be hanged,’ was the answer. ‘If you don’t go away, I’ll call up the landlord and have you removed. Don’t want to be disturbed by intoxicatedvisitors. Telling me it’s morning when it’s pitch dark. You’re drunk.’
“Well, I was just flabbergasted to be called drunk. At this moment Matilda, who was getting curious about the stranger, had joined me. ‘He calls you drunk, does he?’ says Matilda; ‘let me talk to him,’ and rat-tat-tat went Matilda’s knuckles on the door. ‘Hey, you inside there, are you going to get up? You’ve been sleeping sixty hours,’ said she.
“‘At it again, are you, old fool?’ was the answer. At the word ‘old fool’ you ought to have seen Matilda’s face. I thought her eyes would have come out of her head. ‘Old fool!’ she gasped, ‘me an old fool; it’s the first time I’ve been called an old fool, and in my own house too.’ For the next ten minutes Matilda kept on saying ‘old fool’ to herself.
“Me an old fool and my husband drunk indeed! I’ll give it to you, you wicked old ass,’ then, putting her mouth to the keyhole, she poured into number sixteen’s ears such a shower of superlative adjectives as he’ll never forget. I didn’t know she had it in her. ‘You dirty old bear, do you think we’re going to have you hibernating all winter in our bedroom. Get up, you old beast, and we’ll teach you some manners. So you think Joe’s drunk, and I’m an old fool, do you? Out you get now, quick, before I call in the policemen. You old villain, you, to think you can insult people in their own house.’ Here she paused to get a little breath. She was just putting her lips to the hole to continue, when there was a fearful bang on the door, and something which sounded like a boot dropped on the floor.
“‘Joe! Joe!’ said Matilda, ‘he’s thrown his boot at me,’and with a little scream she fell fainting in my arms. For the next few hours number sixteen held quiet possession of his apartments while I was plying Matilda with brandy and cold water.
“What was to be done nobody knew. ‘Starve him out’ was one suggestion. ‘At nine o’clock to-night he will have been in bed seventy-two hours, and he must be getting pretty hungry.’
“By this time the other guests in the hotel had got wind of the fact that there was something strange going on in number sixteen, and several of them left us.
“Nine o’clock came, but yet there was no sign that the old man intended to capitulate. All night long Matilda was so worked up about our guest that she would not let me sleep. We couldn’t burst the door open, because it was double-bolted. It would be easier to cut a hole through the wall—the one on the drawing-room side was only plaster and wood.
“‘If we can’t starve him,’ said Matilda, ‘we can stop the old bear from sleeping. Yes, that’s what we’ll do.’ Next morning we were up betimes, and the business of keeping number sixteen from sleeping commenced. The work we did that day was something terrible; we took it in turns, two hours at a time, beating a frying-pan on the door-handle. At first the visitors who had remained in the house thought it a joke, but towards evening several of them thought it a nuisance, and moved with their traps over to the Great Northern. Number sixteen never made a sound. At eight o’clock that night, when Matilda came up to relieve me with the frying-pan she said: ‘Suppose he is dead, Joe?’ He seemed to have heard this. ‘So you are there again, you old fool, areyou; it isn’t your fault that I’m not dead. You have had your racket for the last twelve hours, now I’m going to have mine;’ and then there commenced such a row as you never heard. How he managed it I don’t know, he seemed to have got all the fire-irons tied together and kept them bumping against each other and the wooden wall. ‘Stop! for goodness’ sake, stop!’ I shouted. ‘Oh, no,’ says he. ‘Why have you stopped? Please go on; the two together will make a charming duet!’ and then he continued to bang and clash as if he was going to bring down the house. By eleven p.m. every visitor that had remained in the house had disappeared, and there was I, Matilda, Susan, and Jo, the ostler, listening to the inferno going in number sixteen. At midnight two neighbours came in saying they couldn’t sleep, and if the row did not cease they would report the house as disorderly, and have our licence cancelled. Of course nobody slept that night. Matilda spent most of her time in weeping. ‘Let us try quiet measures to-morrow,’ I suggested.
“Next morning we both went to the door, and told the gentleman that he had been in bed for nearly five days, and if he would get up we should be much obliged. We were sorry, we said, that there was no window in the room; but if he would open the door, we would give him a light.
“Getting quite ‘perlite’ we heard him remark to himself, and then speaking louder he said ‘he would do what he could to oblige us.’ Then we heard him step on the floor. For a moment there was quietness; but it was only for a moment, for immediately afterwards we heard a crash. ‘My looking-glass!’ said Matilda, and tears againbegan to run down her face. Presently there was another crash. ‘There go the washing utensils!’ I said; but, before I could tell him how to steer, we heard some fearful abuse, and he told us he had got into bed again. He couldn’t steer through a pot-shop in the dark.
“‘Never mind the things,’ sobbed Matilda; ‘do please try and find the door.’
“‘What will you give me to try?’ said he. ‘You have imprisoned me in a dark cell for five days, my feet have been cut with trying to get out, and I am nearly dead from starvation. I shall certainly prosecute you when I do get out. If you will push £5 through the keyhole, and send with it a bit of paper, saying that the money is on account of the five days’ pleasant company I have afforded, I’ll make a try and say no more about the business.’ There was no doubt but that we were cornered, so, after a consultation, we poked the five sovereigns and the bit of paper through the keyhole.
“After he heard the sovereigns fall, he asked us to shine a light through the hole; and, as you can guess, it wasn’t long before he found the door.
“When he was gone, and we went to clean up the room, we found the bedclothes full of the tailings of ham sandwiches and crumbs of bread. Underneath the bed there were several empty bottles. What the yellow portmanteau tied up with string had contained was clear; but why a healthy, strong man should come and camp in a bedroom for five days, it took us long to discover. We had all sorts of theories. Tilly had a notion that he was hiding to escape justice.
“Some time afterwards the mystery was solved by some strangers from Rockhampton laughing over astory that they had seen in one of their local papers.It was about a fellow who won a wager of £500 by staying at an hotel in Newcastle to which he was a perfect stranger, and being paid £5 for the pleasant company he had afforded.
“I never like strangers to sleep in number sixteen now, sir.”
The trade of Newcastle is indicated by its name. Although there are no collieries in the town, the town has nevertheless a very dingy aspect. It looked like a town where there ought to be coal—like a town where there was more business than pleasure. At breakfast the landlord officiated at the slabs of meat and mounds of steaming chops. It is a common thing in the Colonies for landlords and landladies to do the polite at the head of the table. To me they were like watchdogs, guarding the spoons and forks. When you go away they are usually very friendly, and shake hands. One landlord, after two hours’ acquaintance, began to slap me on the back, and commence his sentences with, “Now, Tom, old boy!” If landlords are jovial, this does not matter very much; but when they are of a retiring disposition, they make you feel that they are obliging you by giving you admission to their houses. One rule for a traveller in Australia is to remember that, in entering an hotel, he is not necessarily obliging the landlord. While breakfasting I looked over an old copy of theNewcastle Morning Herald and Miner’s Advocate, where, under the title of “Football on Sunday,” I read about an unfortunate little boy who had been summoned by the police for having played football onSunday in the Royal Park. Oh, you goody, goody people! How particular you are not to be naughty on Sunday—that is to say, on the particular twenty-four hours you have set apart to represent Sunday! When you are roistering, your father and mother in Britain may be praying; and when your father and mother in Britain are roistering, you may be praying. You seem to recognise your vices, and you do what you can to prevent them. On Sunday you close your public-houses for the whole day, and on week-days you usually close them at night about ten o’clock. You would not even go to the limits of a Forbes-Mackenzie. On Sunday you stream to your churches, with the spires of which many of your towns are fairly bristling, and often listen to the wisdom of a young man. You look up to him, admire him, and discuss him. Even if his views are palpably wrong, you tolerate him and give him support. While travelling in the Colonies I talked on religious subjects with several persons, all of whom were wealthy—one was a member of Parliament—who inveighed against all forms of religion but their own, in a manner which reminded me of the fanaticism of the Middle Ages. One gentleman, and a high Government official took me round one Sunday evening to look through the windows of a Roman Catholic chapel, where we saw a priest swinging incense. “Look at the idolaters! They are the ruin of the country; they ought to be classed with savages, and swept off the face of the earth!” was what he expressed.
Religion of this sort is a religion of all who are partially educated. They regard themselves as thecentre of the universe, and, regardless of what their own particular views would have been had they been reared in Mecca, they have the conceit to publicly express the measures they would adopt to reform the world. In the Colonies there are undoubtedly many of every denomination who have an education and ideas equally advanced with the leaders of similar denominations in other parts of the globe. About these we will say nothing—we only speak of the generality; and that generality, I must confess, was judged of by a small experience. One measure of the general uncouthness with regard to religious ideas is the enormous support the Salvationists have received in the Colonies. Where is the country in the whole world which has given a greater support (I reckon support by percentages of the whole population) to the Salvation Army than Australia? Ranting, raving, roaring processions of the lower classes may be seen in every town. A low, uneducated mind apparently finds comfort in a rough form of worship.
Look, again, at the followers of the Blue Ribbon. I have never yet been on a steamer where some of these gentlemen desirous of advertising their principles have not been present. Further, it has but rarely happened that they have not opened an argument about their views to a fellow-passenger, who in many cases was perhaps a better exponent of their doctrines than they themselves. To declare your principles may be heroic, but it is only the vulgar who make themselves objectionable when making their declarations. Nearly every Blue Ribbonite I met with was decidedly vulgar, and, like the Salvationists, bold but ignorant. When these middle lower classes of Australia are educated, theremay be fewer examples of these primitive kinds of worship. The same may be said for other countries.
Notwithstanding all the religious parades which continually bumped against me, I observed that vices were about the same as in other countries. There was the usual gambling to be seen on steamers and in hotels, the usual betting and bookmaking, the usual drinking, the usual games at euchre, and, in short, the usual everything.
The traffic-manager of every railway tries to stop smoking, or at least to surround smoking with so many discomforts that it will stop itself. In New South Wales, for instance, you read at every station, “Any person found smoking on the railway premises is liable to a fine of £2.” Still you get a smoking-carriage. To call it a truck or van might be better.
On the suburban lines of Melbourne, between the hours of four and eight in the afternoon, you get a sort of smoking-box to sit in. It almost seems to have been intentional to make the smoking accommodation as filthy as possible. Nowhere in the world—and I have been round it and round it in many directions—did I ever meet with smoking-carriages in such a very dirty condition as those near Melbourne. If you got in quickly, you might possibly get a seat. If you were late, you had to stand in the middle of the van (for the conveyances are more like vans with seats round them than carriages). There is a mat, which I always saw in a state of sop: this was produced by saliva. To drop a parcel would be to leave it, for it would be too soiled to pick up.
If people are crammed together like pigs, a place has a tendency to become like a pigstye. Why Victoriansare content with the smoking accommodation provided by the suburban lines at Melbourne is a mystery.
From Newcastle I made a trip to one of the coal-mines, distant perhaps ten miles. Part of the journey was accomplished on the ordinary railroad; the remainder of the journey, on a private line, was made in a locomotive kindly put at my disposal by the proprietors of one of the mines.
On the Newcastle line I was particularly struck by a large printed notice at the bookstall, which ran as follows: “Personsnotrequiring books at the stall are requested to leave the same alone.” This was in large type, and thenotwas underlined. Directions for the guidance of the public so courteous as this are worthy of record.
My companions in the railway-carriage are also worthy of a note. To see one lady that is stout and plain is not an unusual occurrence; but on the memorable day of July 30, 1885, I had no less than ten stout ladies to admire. Each of them looked cross, and, from the way in which they glared at me, they were evidently strong-minded. Perhaps I was in the compartment reserved for ladies; but as the train was in motion before this dawned upon me, my mistake could not be rectified until I reached the end of my journey. Once or twice I glanced upwards, just to see a battery of flashing eyes, a circle of fat red faces, and bale-like heaps of lace and spangles, each of which extended over the area usually occupied by two people. While breathing a close atmosphere of rich perfumery, I made the calculation that as the most fairy-like of my companions weighed at least 200 lb., the whole ten ofthem must have reached the enormous weight of 2000 lb., or nearly a ton. Fancy being cooped up with a whole ton of female beauty, each unit of the whole having a strong intellect, and being at the same time fearfully muscular. I often wondered whether they were on their way to some show. They looked domestic, and, assuming they were blessed with spouses, the spouses must have felt blessed too. From these remarks I do not wish it to be supposed that all Australian ladies are like the remarkable ten into whose company I unintentionally had forced myself. Australian ladies are as pretty and as enchanting as the ladies in other parts of the globe. Abnormalities occur in every country. I only remember seeing one other stout lady. She was jolly and agreeable, as stout people usually are. I travelled with her for perhaps two hundred miles. By the time the first hundred were over we were quite confidential. She was going to see Parker. Parker was her husband. Her name was Cleopatra, but her husband called her Cloppy for short. “When I left Parker three years ago,” said Cloppy, “I was slim as a lath.” At the end of the journey Parker was standing on the platform. He must have looked at Cloppy for at least two minutes before he opened his mouth. When he did open it, he smiled, then he grinned, until finally he couldn’t contain himself for laughing. We had to pat him on the back. “Why, Cloppy,” he said, and then he was off in convulsions again; “I hardly knew you. You are fat!” and he was off again in tears. “Well,” replied Cloppy, who was commencing to look a little bothered, “if I’d thought you was going to make a fool of yourself in this way, I’d never have come. There now,come along;” and she led Parker away with his sides shaking.
There are big men as well as big ladies in Australia. The tall men you see about the streets and in the hotels they are often quite noticeable.
The coal-mines well repaid the visit. I was shown every courtesy that could be desired. There was no particular reason why I should have been shown any courtesy whatever. I visited the coke-ovens and works above ground, and afterwards walked some miles underground, where everything that was remarkable was carefully described. On the surface I was particularly struck with the size of a coal-box. Ordinary coal-boxes are portable; this coal-box had been made too large to admit of removal. It held, I was told, upwards of 3,000 tons of coal. If they had told me that it would have held half the coal in the universe I should have unhesitatingly accepted the statement, and noted it down as a fact to be publicly recorded. This box was built of wood. It stood on legs, so that locomotives and whole trains could run underneath it. Beneath this particular coal-box—for at other mines there are also coal-boxes—there were three lines of rails, so that three long trains could seek the shelter of its wings. These wings were sliding doors. Open the doors, when, presto! the trucks beneath were full, and three great trains could start away laden with a cargo of black diamonds sufficient to supply the British fleet. Unfortunately, the British fleet never came to be supplied. Newcastle folks have had a mania for coal loading. At Newcastle itself they have a wonderful arrangement of hydraulic cranes, which lift wholetrucks, much as we would lift a spoonful of soup, and then tip it into any portion of a ship where the coals are wanted. In many cases I believe that the supply comes in more quickly than those in the ship can get it trimmed. It is a wonderful fact, but skippers say it is a fact, that, in consequence of this, the coolies of China and the boys and girls of Japan can load an ocean-going steamer as fast with coals as it can be done with the hydraulic cranes of Newcastle. At Nagasaki I have been told that the passing in and passing out of a cargo is a sight to be remembered. Women or boys stand shoulder to shoulder up the gangways from the lighter to the steamers. The baskets of coal fly along from hand to hand, and so rapidly, that no individual ever carries any weight; all that he does is to give the flying parcel an additional quantity of momentum. The empty baskets pass back in a similar manner. The general effect is that of a huge circle of revolving baskets. All this is accompanied by parrot-like chattering and giggling. The Easterns are a happy lot. When they have finished coaling they wash themselves.
Underground I was shown where a great fire had occurred. In places the coal was burnt to a cinder. As you receded you passed places where it was only coked. The shales that accompany the coal had been baked to a state of brick or porcelain. This fire had been put out by flooding the mine with water. This was accomplished by making a huge syphon out of a 6-inch pipe, and conducting water from a creek which, at the time of the fire, very luckily happened to be in a state of flood. The seam I saw was six feet thick. In places it was a bituminous coal; in other parts it had a stonylook—this was splint coal. On one occasion this splint coal had been returned, the buyers thinking it was shale. As a matter of fact, it was a better coal than the bituminous variety. Buyers often grumble about it. One thing of interest was a contrivance for automatically greasing the wheels of the coal-trucks. Another striking arrangement was a bar of iron called a “bull,” which was to stop a truck from running away, supposing it got free when on an incline.
Sydney was the next great city which I visited. There is a daily, or rather nightly, steamer communication between Newcastle and Sydney. Before long there will be a railway connection, when the steamers will have to lower their prices, or to seek their freights in other ports. It was night when I left Newcastle. On my way to the wharf I asked a young man the way to the boat for Sydney. His reply could not even be put in Latin. In all countries which are leading factors in the world’s advancement, we find the over-civilized, the civilized, the semi-civilized. The gentleman to whom I spoke on the Newcastle wharf might out of courtesy be admitted to the last class. I suppose he belonged to that particular division of the human species known in Australia as the larrikin, in ’Frisco as the corner boy, and in London as the loafer. Sydney and Melbourne are the headquarters of the larrikin. They may, if it is an honour, claim the invention of this excrescence in Australian civilization. By some, the larrikin is regarded as a type of humanity which owes its peculiarity to a redundance of animal spirits. Itincludes shop-boys and young workmen, who shriek after couples in the act of spooning: “Heh! why don’t you marry the girl! I’ll tell your mother what you’ve done!” Young gentlemen who are impertinent and cheeky. Young men who are given to larks and larking. Thus their name. The larrikins I have seen have certainly the above qualification; but, in addition, not only do they make themselves conspicuous by their wits, but they live by them. During the day they are apparently idle. They stand at corners, where they smoke. The better class of them, or rather those whose “wits” are above the average, adopt black suits, velvet collars, and high-heeled boots. You see the larrikin in numbers on piers, especially on the arrival of a steamer. I say they live on their wits, because, like the policemen, I really do not know how they do live. “Go down Clarence Street at night with some money, and you will find out,” said a friend of mine. What he meant I do not know.
The larrikins are the town loafers of Australia. The country loafers are called sundowners. These are gentlemen who travel with their swag on their backs, and so arrange their movements that if possible they reach a station at sundown. Here they take advantage of the hospitality accorded to strangers, and practically demand shelter and food. To refuse them might be dangerous, for after their departure fences might be destroyed, fires might break out, or other little troubles might occur which would be objectionable and dangerous. The sundowner is a black mailer, and many ofthe squatters find his demands a serious item in their expenses.
An old gentleman whom we suspected as being a sundowner visited our ship while it was lying at the wharf in Newcastle. He was a tall old man with a long grey beard. His tattered clothes, his staff, and the bundle on his back, made him so much like the pictures of Rip Van Winkle that he attracted general attention. His worn shoes and dusty appearance indicated that he had travelled many miles. He told Captain Green, who did the interviewing, that he had walked across the Blue Mountains from Sydney to Brisbane, and was in search of work. He was an engineer, but wherever he went, there was always the same answer,—‘Old men are not employed.’ As he was evidently a man who had interesting experiences to relate, our Captain asked him on board. His foot was no sooner on the deck than he saw a Chinaman. “What!” exclaimed the old man, “you carry wretches like that,—heathens who have robbed me of honest employment,” and he seemed inclined to leave the ship. A little persuasion, however, brought him into the cabin, and when a heathen had given him a steak and a bottle of porter, his bitterness subsided.
It turned out that he had been educated at Bath, and when he heard that the captain had been in Bath, the old man’s eyes almost filled with tears. ‘You must know the old church, then?’ ‘Yes, yes; I shall never forget an inscription on one of the gravestones I read there; forty years ago now: