Before the middle of 1852 Livingstone was ready to start on the journey which resulted in the opening of routes from Central Africa to the West and East coasts; but the way was still beset with difficulties. The missionary societies were regarded as "unpatriotic" by the authorities at the Cape; and he, as the most outspoken of critics, and the most uncompromising denouncer of the slave-trade and champion of the natives, came in for a double share of their suspicion. On the other hand, his brethren gave him only a half-hearted support and doubted his orthodoxy. He found great difficulty even in procuring ammunition. A country postmaster whom he had accused of overcharging, threatened an action at the last moment, which he compromised rather than be detained. As it was, he had anticipated his meagre salary by more than a year, and had to be content with very inferior oxen, and a wagon which required constant mending throughout the journey. On June 8, 1852, he at last got away, taking with him a Mr. Fleming, the agent of his friend Mr. Rutherford, a Cape merchant, in the hope of by degrees substituting legitimate traffic for that in slaves.
The heavy Cape wagon with its ten poor oxen dragged heavily onward. Livingstone had so loaded himself with parcels for stations up-country, and his wagon and team were so inferior, that he did not reach Kuruman until September. Here he was detained by the breaking of a wheel.
The journey to Linyanti by the new route was very trying. Part of the country was flooded, and they were wading all day, and forcing their way through reeds with sharp edges "with hands all raw and bloody." "On emerging from the swamps," says Livingstone, "when walking before the wagon in the morning twilight, I observed a lioness about fifty yards from me in the squatting way they walk when going to spring. She was followed by a very large lion, but seeing the wagon she turned back."
It required all his tact to prevent guides and servants from deserting. Everyone but himself was attacked by fever. "I would like," says his journal, "to devote a portion of my life to the discovery of a remedy for that terrible disease, the African fever. I would go into the parts where it prevails most and try to discover if the natives have a remedy for it. I must make many inquiries of the river people in this quarter." Again in another key: "Am I on my way to die in Sebituane's country? Have I seen the last of my wife and children, leaving this fair world and knowing so little of it?"
February 4, 1853: "I am spared in health while all the company have been attacked by fever. If God has accepted my service, my life is charmed till my work is done. When that is finished, some simple thing will give me my quietus. Death is a glorious event to one going to Jesus."
Their progress was tedious beyond all precedent. "We dug out several wells, and each time had to wait a day or two till enough water flowed in for our cattle to quench their thirst."
At last, however, at the end of May, he reached the Chobe River and was again among his favorite Makololo. "He has dropped from the clouds," the first of them said. They took the wagon to pieces and carried it across on canoes lashed together, while they themselves swam and dived among the oxen "more like alligators than men." Sekeletu, son of Sebituane, was now chief, his elder sister Mamochishane having resigned in disgust at the number of husbands she had to maintain as chieftainess. Poor Mamochishane! After a short reign of a few months she had risen in the assembly and "addressed her brother with a womanly gush of tears. 'I have been a chief only because my father wished it. I would always have preferred to be married and have a family like other women. You, Sekeletu, must be chief, and build up our father's house.'"
On November 11, 1853, he left Linyanti, and arrived at Loanda on May 31, 1854. The first stages of the journey were to be by water, and Sekeletu accompanied him to the Chobe, where he was to embark. They crossed five branches before reaching the main stream, a wide and deep river full of hippopotami. "The chief lent me his own canoe, and as it was broader than usual I could turn about in it with ease. I had three muskets for my people, and a rifle and double-barrelled shotgun for myself. My ammunition was distributed through the luggage, that we might not be left without a supply. Our chief hopes for food were in our guns. I carried twenty pounds of beads worth forty shillings, a few biscuits, a few pounds of tea and sugar, and about twenty pounds of coffee. One small tin canister, about fifteen inches square, was filled with spare shirts, trousers, and shoes, to be used when we reached civilized life, another of the same size was stored with medicines, a third with books, and a fourth with a magic lantern, which we found of much service. The sextant and other instruments were carried apart. A bag contained the clothes we expected to wear out in the journey, which, with a small tent just sufficient to sleep in, a sheepskin mantle as a blanket, and a horse rug as a bed, completed my equipment. An array of baggage would have probably excited the cupidity of the tribes through whose country we wished to pass."
The voyage up the Chobe, and the Zambesi after the junction of those rivers, was prosperous but slow, in consequence of stoppages opposite villages. "My man Pitsane knew of the generous orders of Sekeletu, and was not disposed to allow them remain a dead letter." In the rapids, "the men leaped into the water without the least hesitation to save the canoes from being dashed against the obstructions or caught in eddies. They must never be allowed to come broadside to the stream, for being flat-bottomed they would at once be capsized and everything in them lost." When free from fever he was delighted to note the numbers of birds, several of them unknown, which swarmed on the river and its banks, all carefully noted in his journal. One extract must suffice here: "Whenever we step on shore a species of plover, a plaguy sort of public-spirited individual, follows, flying overhead, and is most persevering in its attempts to give warning to all animals to flee from the approaching danger."
But he was already weak with fever; was seized with giddiness whenever he looked up quickly, and, if he could not catch hold of some support, fell heavily—a bad omen for his chance of passing through the unknown country ahead—but his purpose never faltered for a moment. On January 1, 1854, he was still on the river, but getting beyond Sekeletu's territory and allies, to a region of dense forest, in the open glades of which dwelt the Balonda, a powerful tribe, whose relations with the Makololo were precarious. Each was inclined to raid on the other since the Mambari and Portuguese half-castes had appeared with Manchester goods. These excited the intense wonder and cupidity of both nations. They listened to the story of cotton-mills as fairy dreams, exclaiming: "How can iron spin, weave, and print? Truly ye are gods!" and were already inclined to steal their neighbors' children—those of their own tribe they never sold at this time—to obtain these wonders out of the sea.
Happily Livingstone had brought back with him several Balonda children who had been carried off by the Makololo. This, and his speeches to Manenko, the chieftainess of the district and niece of Shinte, the head chief of the Balonda, gained them a welcome. This Amazon was a strapping young woman of twenty, who led their party through the forest at a pace which tried the best walkers. She seems to have been the only native whose will ever prevailed against Livingstone's.
He intended to proceed up to her uncle Shinte's town in canoes: she insisted that they should march by land, and ordered her people to shoulder his baggage in spite of him. "My men succumbed, and left me powerless. I was moving off in high dudgeon to the canoes, when she kindly placed her hand on my shoulder, and with a motherly look said, 'Now, my little man, just do as the rest have done.' My feeling of annoyance of course vanished, and I went out to try for some meat. My men, in admiration of her pedestrian powers, kept remarking, 'Manenko is a soldier,' and we were all glad when she proposed a halt for the night."
Shinte received them in his town, the largest and best laid out that Livingstone had seen in Central Africa, on a sort of throne covered with leopard-skin. Thekotla, or place of audience, was one hundred yards square. Though in the sweating stage of an intermittent fever, Livingstone held his own with the chief, gave him an ox as "his mouth was bitter from want of flesh," advised him to open a trade in cattle with the Makololo, and to put down the slave-trade; and, after spending more than a week with him, left amid the warmest professions of friendship. Shinte found him a guide of his tribe, Intemese by name, who was to stay by them till they reached the sea, and at a last interview hung round his neck a conical shell of such value that two of them, so his men assured him, would purchase a slave.
Soon they were out of Shinte's territory, and Intemese became the plague of the party, though unluckily they could not dispense with him altogether in crossing the great flooded plains of Lebala. They camped at night on mounds, where they had to trench round each hut and use the earth to raise their sleeping places. "My men turned out to work most willingly, and I could not but contrast their conduct with that of Intemese, who was thoroughly imbued with the slave spirit, and lied on all occasions to save himself trouble." He lost the pontoon, too, thereby adding greatly to their troubles.
They now came to the territory of another great chief, Katema, who received them hospitably, sending food and giving them solemn audience in his kotla surrounded by his tribe. A tall man of forty, dressed in a snuff-brown coat with a broad band of tinsel down the arms, and a helmet of beads and feathers. He carried a large fan with charms attached, which he waved constantly during the audience, often laughing heartily—"a good sign, for a man who shakes his sides with mirth is seldom difficult to deal with."
"I am the great Moene Katema!" was his address; "I and my fathers have always lived here, and there is my father's house. I never killed any of the traders; they all come to me. I am the great Moene Katema, of whom you have heard." On hearing Livingstone's object, he gave him three guides, who would take him by a northern route, along which no traders had passed, to avoid the plains, impassable from the floods. He accepted Livingstone's present of a shawl, a razor, some beads and buttons, and a powder-horn graciously, laughing at his apologies for its smallness, and asking him to bring a coat from Loanda, as the one he was wearing was old.
From this point troubles multiplied, and they began to be seriously pressed for food. The big game had disappeared, and they were glad to catch moles and mice. Every chief demanded a present for allowing them to pass, and the people of the villages charged exorbitantly for all supplies. On they floundered, however, through flooded forests. In crossing the river Loka, Livingstone's ox got away from him, and he had to strike out for the farther bank. "My poor fellows were dreadfully alarmed, and about twenty of them made a simultaneous rush into the water for my rescue, and just as I reached the opposite bank one seized me by the arms and another clasped me round the body. When I stood up it was most gratifying to see them all struggling toward me. Part of my goods were brought up from the bottom when I was safe. Great was their pleasure when they found I could swim like themselves, and I felt most grateful to those poor heathens for the promptitude with which they dashed in to my rescue." Farther on, the people tried to frighten them with the account of the deep rivers they had yet to cross, but his men laughed. "'We can all swim,' they said; 'who carried the white man across the river but himself?' I felt proud of their praise."
On March 4th they reached the country of the Chiboques, a tribe in constant contact with the slave-dealers. Next day their camp was surrounded by the nearest chief and his warriors, evidently bent on plunder. They paused when they saw Livingstone seated on his camp-stool, with his double-barrelled gun across his knees, and his Makololos ready with their javelins. The chief and his principal men sat down in front at Livingstone's invitation to talk over the matter, and a palaver began as to the fine claimed by the Chiboque. "The more I yielded, the more unreasonable they became, and at every fresh demand a shout was raised, and a rush made round us with brandished weapons. One young man even made a charge at my head from behind, but I quickly brought round the muzzle of my gun to his mouth and he retreated. My men behaved with admirable coolness. The chief and his counsellors, by accepting my invitation to be seated, had placed themselves in a trap, for my men had quietly surrounded them and made them feel that there was no chance of escaping their spears. I then said that as everything had failed to satisfy them they evidently meant to fight; and if so, they must begin, and bear the blame before God. I then sat silent for some time. It was certainly rather trying, but I was careful not to seem flurried, and, having four barrels ready for instant action, looked quietly at the savage scene around." The palaver began again, and ended in the exchange of an ox for a promise of food, in which he was wofully cheated. "It was impossible to help laughing, but I was truly thankful that we had so far gained our point as to be allowed to pass without shedding blood."
He now struck north to avoid the Chiboque, and made for the Portuguese settlement of Cassange through dense forest and constant wet. Here another fever fit came on, so violent that "I could scarcely, after some hours' trial, get a lunar observation in which I could repose confidence. Those who know the difficulties of making observations and committing them all to paper will sympathize with me in this and many similar instances."
At this crisis, when the goal was all but at hand, obstacles multiplied till it seemed that after all it would never be reached. First his riding ox, Sindbad—a beast "blessed with a most intractable temper," and a habit of bolting into the bush to get his rider combed off by a climber, and then kicking at him—achieved a triumph in his weak state, "when the bridle broke, and down I came backward on the crown of my head, receiving as I fell a kick on the thigh. This last attack of fever reduced me almost to a skeleton. The blanket which I used as a saddle, being pretty constantly wet, caused extensive abrasion of the skin, which was continually healing and getting sore again."
Then the guides missed their way and led them back into Chiboque territory, where the demands of the chief of every village for "a man, an ox, or a tusk," for permission to pass, began again. Worst of all, signs of mutiny began to show themselves among the Batoka men of his party, who threatened to turn back. He appeased them by giving them a tired ox to be killed at the Sunday's halt. "Having thus, as I thought, silenced their murmurs, I sank into a state of torpor, and was oblivious of all their noise. On Sunday the mutineers were making a terrible din in preparing the skin. I requested them twice to be more quiet as the noise pained me, but, as they paid no attention to this civil request, I put out my head and, repeating it, was answered by an impudent laugh. Knowing that discipline would be at an end if this mutiny was not quelled, and that our lives depended on vigorously upholding authority, I seized a double-barrelled pistol and darted out with such a savage aspect as to put them to precipitate flight. They gave no further trouble." Every night now they had to build a stockade, and by day to march in a compact body, knowing the forest to be full of enemies dogging their path, for now they had nothing to give as presents, the men having even divested themselves of all their copper ornaments to appease the Chiboque harpies. "Nothing, however, disturbed us, and for my part I was too ill to care much whether we were attacked or not." They struggled on, the Chiboque natives, now joined by bodies of traders, opposing at every ford, Livingstone no longer wondering why expeditions from the interior failed to reach the coast. "Some of my men proposed to return home, and the prospect of being obliged to turn back from the threshold of the Portuguese settlements distressed me exceedingly. After using all my powers of persuasion, I declared that if they now returned, I should go on alone, and returning into my little tent, I lifted up my heart to Him who hears the sighing of the soul. Presently the head man came in. 'Do not be disheartened,' he said, 'we will never leave you. Wherever you lead, we will follow. Our remarks were only made on account of the injustice of these people.' Others followed, and with the most artless simplicity of manner told me to be comforted. 'They were all my children; they knew no one but Sekeletu and me, and would die for me: they had spoken in bitterness of spirit, feeling they could do nothing.'"
On April 1st they gained the ridge which overlooks the valley of the Quango and the Portuguese settlements on the farther bank. "The descent is so steep that I was obliged to dismount, though so weak that I had to be supported. Below us, at a depth of one thousand feet, lay the magnificent valley of the Quango. The view of the Vale of Clyde, from the spot where Mary witnessed the Battle of Langside, resembles in miniature the glorious sight which was here presented to our view."
On the 4th they were close to the Quango, here one hundred fifty yards broad, when they were stopped for the last time by a village chief and surrounded by his men. The usual altercation ensued; Livingstone refusing to give up his blanket—the last article he possessed except his watch and instruments and Sekeletu's tusks, which had been faithfully guarded—until on board the canoes in which they were to cross. "I was trying to persuade my people to move on to the bank in spite of them, when a young half-caste Portuguese sergeant of militia, Cypriano di Abren, who had come across in search of beeswax, made his appearance and gave the same advice." They marched to the bank—the chief's men opening fire on them, but without doing any damage—made terms with the ferrymen, with Cypriano's help, crossed the Quango, and were at the end of their troubles.
Four days they stopped with Cypriano, who treated them royally, killing an ox and stripping his garden to feast them, and sending them on to Cassange with provisions of meal ground by his mother and her maids. "I carried letters from the Chevalier du Prat of Cape Town, but I am inclined to believe that my friend Cypriano was influenced by feelings of genuine kindness excited by my wretched appearance."
At Cassange they were again most hospitably treated, and here, before starting for Loanda, three hundred miles, they disposed of Sekeletu's tusks, which sold for much higher prices than those given by Cape traders. "Two muskets, three small barrels of powder, and English calico and baize enough to clothe my whole party, with large bunches of beads, were given for one tusk, to the great delight of my Makololos, who had been used to get only one gun for two tusks. With another tusk we purchased calico—the chief currency here—to pay our way to the coast. The remaining two were sold for money to purchase a horse for Sekeletu at Loanda." Livingstone was much struck both by the country he passed through and the terms on which the Portuguese lived with the natives. Most of them had families by native women, who were treated as European children and provided for by their fathers. Half-caste clerks sat at table with the whites, and he came to the conclusion that "nowhere in Africa is there so much good-will between Europeans and natives as here."
The dizziness produced by his twenty-seven attacks of fever on the road made it all he could do to stick on Sindbad, who managed to give him a last ducking in the Lombe. "The weakening effects of the fever were most extraordinary. For instance, in attempting to take lunar observations I could not avoid confusion of time and distance, neither could I hold the instrument steady, nor perform a simple calculation." He rallied a little in crossing a mountain range. As they drew near Loanda the hearts of his men began to fail, and they hinted their doubts to him. "If you suspect me you can return," he told them, "for I am as ignorant of Loanda as you; but nothing will happen to you but what happens to me. We have stood by one another hitherto, and will do so till the last."
The first view of the sea staggered the Makololo. "We were marching along with our father," they said, "believing what the ancients had told us, that the world had no end; but all at once the world said to us: 'I am finished; there is no more for me.'"
The fever had produced chronic dysentery, which was so depressing that Livingstone entered Loanda in deep melancholy, doubting the reception he might get from the one English gentleman, Mr. Gabriel, the commissioner for the suppression of the slave-trade. He was soon undeceived. Mr. Gabriel received him most kindly, and, seeing the condition he was in, gave up to him his own bed. "Never shall I forget the luxurious pleasure I enjoyed in feeling myself again on a good English bed after six months' sleeping on the ground. I was soon asleep; and Mr. Gabriel coming in almost immediately after, rejoiced in the soundness of my repose."
(1851) THE COUP D'ÉTAT OF LOUIS NAPOLEON, Alexis de Tocqueville
By his astounding act of December 2, 1851, known as thecoup d'état, Charles Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, commonly called Louis Napoleon, practically assumed imperial power, and on the first anniversary of thatcoup d'étathe was officially proclaimed Emperor of the French under the title of Napoleon III. He was the son of Louis Bonaparte, King of Holland—a brother of Napoleon I—and was born in Paris, April 20, 1808. From 1815 to 1830 he lived in exile. In 1836 he made an unsuccessful attempt to organize a revolution among the French soldiers at Strasburg. Four years later he tried to seize the throne of France; but failing in this attempt, he was imprisoned in the fortress of Ham until 1846, when he escaped to England. During his confinement he continued in his writings a Bonapartist propaganda. He had addressed himself particularly to the workingmen, and this class won a victory in the Revolution of February, 1848. After the fall of Louis Philippe in that year, Napoleon was elected to the National Assembly, largely by the votes of the working classes, and on June 13, 1848, took his seat. In December he was elected President of the Republic by an immense majority.
Although he was regarded as possessing a rather dull intellect, and as being, partly for that reason, a "safe" man for the presidential office, Napoleon soon proved his capacity for intrigue and for cajoling the people. By intervening in behalf of Pope Pius IX, whom revolutionists had driven from Rome, he gained the support of the clergy. Napoleon's troops restored Pius IX (1850) to the papal throne. The President's aims at supremacy were approved by the French monarchists, and he used all means to increase his popularity, placing only his adherents in office.
When the Assembly, composed of seven hundred sixty members, undertook to restrict the suffrage, which was "universal," Napoleon opposed the change. He thus appeared to be the champion of the people against the legislative body. As his term was to expire on May 2, 1852, and as he was ineligible for a second term, although he knew that a majority of the people favored his continuance in office, he saw no way to accomplish that except by force. He therefore determined to use force, and the method he adopted was that of thecoup d'état. The success of that stroke insured all that he aimed at. In December, 1851, by an almost unanimous vote he was elected President for ten years. All his "ideas" and purposes were embodied in a new constitution, and before the end of 1852 the question of restoring the empire was submitted to the people; and by the plebiscite of November, in that year, an enormous majority of the voters elected him Emperor.
No account of thecoup d'état,—the most striking and effective in this series of dramatic events—surpasses in authenticity or interest that of De Tocqueville. The famous author ofDemocracy in America, and of equally celebrated works of French history, became Vice-President of the National Assembly in 1849. As a member of that body he was justified in saying of his story of thecoup d'état, "I merely relate, as an actual witness, the things I saw with my eyes and heard with my ears." The first step taken by Napoleon in this affair was the arrest of the opposition leaders of the Assembly in their beds, on the pretext of a conspiracy against him in that body. De Tocqueville describes what followed.
When the representatives of the people learned on the morning of December 2, 1851, that several of their colleagues were arrested, they ran to the Assembly. The doors were guarded by the Chasseurs de Vincennes, a corps of troops recently returned from Africa and long accustomed to the violence of Algerine dominion, and, moreover, stimulated by a donation of five francs distributed to every soldier who was in Paris that day. The Representatives, nevertheless, presented themselves to go in, having at their head one of their Vice-Presidents, M. Daru. This gentleman was violently struck by the soldiers, and the Representatives who accompanied him were driven back at the point of the bayonet. Three of them, M. de Talhouet, Étienne, and Duparc, were slightly wounded. Several others had their clothes pierced. Such was the beginning.
Driven from the doors of the Assembly, the Deputies retired to themairieof the Tenth Arrondissement. They were already assembled to the number of about three hundred when the troops arrived, blocked up the approaches, and prevented a greater number of Representatives from entering the apartment, though no one at that time was prevented from leaving it.
Who then were those Representatives assembled at themairieof the Tenth Arrondissement, and what did they do there? Every shade of opinion was represented in this extemporaneous Assembly. But four-fifths of its members belonged to the different conservative parties which had constituted the majority. This Assembly was presided over by two of its Vice-Presidents, M. Vitet and M. Benoist d'Azy. M. Daru was arrested in his own house; the Fourth Vice-President, the illustrious General Bedeau, had been seized that morning in his bed, and handcuffed like a robber. As for the President, M. Dupin, he was absent, which surprised no one. Besides its Vice-Presidents, the Assembly was accompanied by its secretaries, its ushers, and even its phonographer who preserved for posterity the records of this last and memorable sitting. The Assembly, thus constituted, began by voting a decree in the following terms:
"In pursuance of article sixty-eight of the constitution, viz., the President of the Republic, the ministers, the agents, and depositaries of public authority are responsible, each in what concerns himself respectively, for all the acts of the Government and the Administration: any measure by which the President of the Republic dissolves the National Assembly, prorogues it, or places obstacles in the exercise of its powers is a crime of high treason.
"By this act alone, the President is deprived of all authority; the citizens are bound to withhold their obedience, the executive power passes in full right to the National Assembly. The judges of the High Court of Justice will meet immediately, under pain of forfeiture; they will convoke the juries in the place which they will select to proceed to the judgment of the President and his accomplices; they will nominate the magistrates charged to fulfil the duties of public ministers.
"And seeing that the National Assembly is prevented by violence from exercising its powers, it decrees as follows, viz.: Louis Napoleon Bonaparte is deprived of all authority as President of the Republic. The citizens are enjoined to withhold their obedience. The executive power has passed in full right to the National Assembly. The judges of the High Court of Justice are enjoined to meet immediately, under pain of forfeiture, to proceed to the judgment of the President and his accomplices; consequently, all the officers and functionaries of power and of public authority are bound to obey all requisitions made in the name of the National Assembly, under pain of forfeiture and of high treason.
"Done and decreed unanimously in public sitting, this second day ofDecember, 1851."
After this first decree was voted, another was unanimously passed, naming General Oudinot commander of the public forces, and M. Tamisier was joined with him as chief of the staff. The choice of these two officers, each having distinct shades of political opinion, showed that the Assembly was animated by one common spirit.
These decrees had hardly been signed by all the members present, and deposited in a place of safety, when a band of soldiers, headed by their officers, sword in hand, appeared at the door, without, however, daring to enter the apartment. The Assembly awaited them in perfect silence. The President alone raised his voice, read the decrees which had just been passed to the soldiers, and ordered them to retire. The poor fellows, ashamed of the part they were compelled to play, hesitated. The officers, pale and undecided, declared that they should go for further orders. They retired, contenting themselves with blockading the passages leading to the apartment. The Assembly, not being able to go out, ordered the windows to be opened, and caused the decrees to be read to the people and the troops in the street below, especially that decree which, in pursuance of the sixty-eighth article of the constitution, declared the deposition and impeachment of Louis Napoleon.
Soon, however, the soldiers reappeared at the door, preceded this time by twocommissaires de police. These men entered the room and, amid the unbroken silence and total immobility of the Assembly, summoned the Representatives to disperse. The President ordered them to retire themselves. One of thecommissaireswas agitated and faltered; the other broke out in invectives. The President said to him: "Sir, we are here the lawful authority and sole representatives of law and of right. We know that we cannot oppose to you material force, but we will leave this chamber only under constraint. We will not disperse. Seize us and convey us to prison."
"All, all!" exclaimed the members of the Assembly. After much hesitation thecommissaires de policedecided to act. They caused each of the two Presidents to be seized by the collar. The whole body then rose, and, arm in arm, two and two, they followed the Presidents, who were led off. In this order they reached the street, and were marched across the city, without knowing whither they were going.
Care had been taken to circulate a report among the crowd and the troops that a meeting of Socialist and Red Republican Deputies had been arrested. But when the people beheld among those who were thus dragged through the mud of Paris on foot, like a gang of malefactors, men the most illustrious by their talents and their virtues—ex-ministers, ex-ambassadors, generals, admirals, great orators, great writers, surrounded by the bayonets of the line—a shout was raised, "Vive l'Assemblée nationale!" The Representatives were attended by these shouts until they reached the barracks of the Quai d'Orsay, where they were shut up.
Night was coming on, and it was wet and cold. Yet the Assembly was left two hours in the open air, as if the Government did not deign to remember its existence. The Representatives here made their last roll-call in presence of their phonographer, who had followed them. The number present was two hundred eighteen, to whom were added about twenty more in the course of the evening, consisting of members who had voluntarily caused themselves to be arrested. Almost all the men known to France and to Europe, who formed the majority of the Legislative Assembly, were gathered in this place. Few were wanting, except those who, like M. Molé, had not been suffered to reach their colleagues.
There were present, among others, the Duc de Broglie, who had come, though ill; the father of the House, the venerable Kératry, whose physical strength was inferior to his moral courage, and whom it was necessary to seat in a straw chair in the barrack yard; Odilon Barrot, Dufaure, Berryer, Rémusat, Duvergier de Hauranne, Gustave de Beaumont, De Tocqueville, De Falloux, Lanjuinais, Admiral Lainé and Admiral Cécille, Generals Oudinot and Lauriston, the Due de Luynes, the Due de Montebello; twelve ex-ministers, nine of whom had served under Louis Napoleon himself; eight members of the Institute—all men who had struggled for three years to defend society and to resist the demagogic faction.
When two hours had elapsed this assemblage was driven into barrack-rooms upstairs, where most of them spent the night, without fire and almost without food, stretched upon the boards. It only remained to carry off to prison these honorable men, guilty of no crime but the defence of the laws of their country. For this purpose the most distressing and ignominious means were selected. The cellular vans, in which convicts are conveyed to prison, were brought up. In these vehicles were shut up the men who had served and honored their country, and they were conveyed like three bands of criminals, some to the fortress of Mont Valerien, some to the prison Mazas in Paris, and the remainder to Vincennes. The indignation of the public compelled the Government two days afterward to release the greater number of them; some remained in confinement, unable to obtain either their liberty or a trial.
The treatment inflicted upon the generals arrested in the morning of December 2d was still more disgraceful. Cavaignac, Lamoricière, Bedeau, Changarnier, the conquerors of Africa, were shut up in these infamous cellular vans, which are always inconvenient and become almost intolerable on a lengthened journey. In this manner they were conveyed to Ham—that is, they were made to perform more than a day's journey. Cavaignac, who had saved Paris and France in the days of June—Cavaignac, the competitor of Louis Napoleon at the last elections, shut up for a day and a night in the cell of a felon! I leave it to every honest man and every generous heart to comment on such facts. Such were the indignities offered to eminent men.
Let me now review the series of general crimes. The liberty of the press is destroyed to an extent unheard of even in the time of the empire. Most of the journals are suppressed, those which appear cannot say a word on politics or even publish any news. But this is by no means all. The Government has stuck up a list of persons who are formed into a "consultative commission." Its object is to induce France to believe that the Executive is not abandoned by every man of respectability and consideration among us. More than half the persons on this list have refused to belong to the commission; most of them regard the insertion of their names as dishonor. I may quote, among others, M. Léon Faucher, M. Portalis, First President of the Court of Cassation, and the Duc de Albuféra, as those best known. Not only does the Government decline to publish the letters in which these gentlemen refuse their consent, but even their names are not withdrawn from the list which dishonors them. The names are still retained in spite of their repeated remonstrances. A day or two ago, one of them, M. Joseph Perier, driven to desperation by this excess of tyranny, rushed into the street to strike out his own name, with his own hands, from the public placards, taking the passers-by to witness that it had been placed there by a lie.
Such is the state of the public journals. Let us now see the condition of personal liberty. I say again that personal liberty is more trampled on than ever it was in the time of the empire. A decree of the new power gives thepréfetsthe right to arrest, in their respective departments, whomsoever they please; and thepréfets, in their turn, send blank warrants of arrest, which are literallylettres de cachet, to thesobs-préfetsunder their orders. The Provisional Government of the Republic never went so far. Human life is as little respected as human liberty. I know that war has its dreadful necessities, but the disturbances which have recently occurred in Paris have been put down with a barbarity unprecedented in our civil contests; and when we remember that this torrent of blood has been shed to consummate the violation of all law, we cannot but think that sooner or later it will fall back upon the heads of those who shed it. As for the appeal of the people, to whom Louis Napoleon affects to submit his claims, never was a more odious mockery offered to a nation. The people is called upon to express its opinion, yet not only is public discussion suppressed, but even the knowledge of facts. The people is asked its opinion, but the first measure taken to obtain it is to establish military terrorism throughout the country, and to threaten with deprivation every public agent that does not approve in writing what has been done.
Such is the condition in which we stand. Force overturning law, trampling on the liberty of the press and of the person, deriding the popular will, in whose name the Government pretends to act. France torn from the alliance of free nations to be classed with the despotic monarchies of the Continent—such is the result of thiscoup d'état.
The army refused to submit to the decree of the captive Assembly impeaching the President of the Republic; but the High Court of Justice obeyed it. The five judges composing it, sitting in the midst of Paris enslaved and in the face of martial law, dared to assemble at the Palace of Justice, and to issue a process beginning criminal proceedings against Louis Napoleon, charged with high treason by the law, though already triumphant in the streets. I subjoin the text of this memorable edict:
"The High Court of Justice, considering the sixty-eighth article of the constitution, considering that printed placards, beginning with the words 'The President of the Republic,' and bearing at the end the signatures of Louis Napoleon Bonaparte and De Moony, Minister of the Interior, which placards announce among other things, the dissolution of the National Assembly, have this day been affixed to the walls of Paris; that this fact of the dissolution of the Assembly by the President of the Republic would fall under the case provided for by the sixty-eighth article of the constitution, and render the convocation of the High Court of Justice imperative, by the terms of that article declares that the High Court is constituted, and names M. Renouard, counsellor of the Court of Cassation, to fill the duties of public accuser; and to fill those ofgreffier, M. Bernard,Greffier-en-chefof the Court of Cassation; and, to proceed further in pursuance of the terms of the said sixty-eighth article of the constitution, adjourns until to-morrow, December 3d, at the hour of noon.
"Done and deliberated in the Council Chamber. Present, M. Hardouin, President; M. Pataille, M. Moreau, M. de la Palme, and M. Cauchy, judges, this second day of December, 1851."
After this textual extract from the minutes of the High Court of Justice there is the following entry: "(1) Aprocès-verbalannouncing the arrival of acommissaire de police, who called upon the High Court to separate. (2) Aprocès-verbalof a second sitting held on the morrow, the third day of December (when the Assembly was in prison), at which M. Renouard accepts the functions of public prosecutor, charged to proceed against Louis Napoleon, after which the High Court, being no longer able to sit, adjourned to a day to be fixed hereafter."
(1851) DISCOVERY OF GOLD IN AUSTRALIA, Edward Jenks
It was a remarkable sequence in successful enterprise that brought to light and developed the vast gold deposits in Australia within three years after the great discovery in California. This event "was to change, if not the entire character, at least the rate, of Australian progress." The date of Captain James Cook's exploration of the eastern coast (1770) marks the beginning of a new era in the history of Australia. Cook took possession of the country for Great Britain. From the resemblance of its coasts to the southern shores of Wales, he called it New South Wales, and this name is still retained by one of the States of the Commonwealth of Australia (inaugurated January 1, 1901). The first English settlement (1788) was a convict colony at Port Jackson (Sydney). From the establishment of this colony the development of Australia as a British possession was gradual, but progressive, up to the discovery of the gold-fields, by which it was so greatly accelerated. At first a few pastoral groups occupied the lands near the coast. Many of the newcomers were mere squatters, bent on making money and then returning to England. But gradually small towns and settled industries grew up. Increasing numbers of farmers immigrated, squatters were pushed toward the interior, and a state of social organization began. Up to 1850, however, this nucleus of a new commonwealth had reached no great development.
As in the case of California, long before the great discovery of gold in Australia there had been rumors of its existence in that country. Most of the early stories told by persons said to have found specimens of the metal were scouted. In 1844 the distinguished geologist, Sir Roderick Impey Murchison, having compared specimens of Australian rocks brought to him with other specimens from gold-bearing lands, declared that he found in the former no trace of gold. Two years later, however, Sir Roderick declared his belief in the existence of gold in Australia, and in 1848 he announced that he had seen specimens of gold from New South Wales, and recommended a government mineral survey there. Little attention might have been given to the matter then but for the discovery of gold in California. From the excitement caused by that the "gold fever" spread over the world. Nothing was done in the way of discovery of the metal in Australia until many months had elapsed; but finally results of the utmost importance were obtained.
The story of the great Australian gold discovery is here told in an authentic and highly interesting manner by the historian of the Australasian colonies.
In the year 1851 Edmund Hammond Hargraves, an old settler in New South Wales, returned thither from California, where he had spent about eighteen months in the search for gold. His efforts in California resulted in no immediate prosperity, but he gained much useful practical experience. More than this, as he looked at the natural features of the California gold-fields, a great idea grew up in his mind. Though not a geologist, he appears to have had a quick eye for stratiform resemblances; and the more he studied the peculiarities of rocks and soil in California, the more he became convinced that he knew, in his own colony, a district which presented the same features and which, therefore, might be expected to produce the same results.
Remaining in California only long enough to verify his observations, he returned to Sydney at the beginning of the year 1851. Seldom has such absolute confidence in unverified observation proved so completely justified. According to Hargraves's own account he went without hesitation to a spot on the banks of a little stream known as Lewes Pond Creek, a tributary of Summer Hill Creek, itself a tributary of the Macquarie River, and there at once, on February 12, 1851, found alluvial gold. In April he had so far advanced as to be able to write to the Government offering to disclose his treasures for five hundred pounds. But he subsequently decided to trust to the liberality of the Government, and offered at once to show his workings to the government geologist, an official recently sent out from England to report upon gold prospects. On May 19th Mr. Stutchbury officially reported the discovery of gold in workable quantities at Summer Hill Creek, and by the end of the same month the immigration to the diggings had begun. Hargraves himself took no part in the digging, merely pointing out to others, without reserve, the places in which his experience led him to predict discovery, and instructing them in the processes of washing and cleaning. He was soon made a commissioner of Crown lands, and received a reward of ten thousand pounds.
Now began a period which can have no complete parallel in earlier history, save the almost contemporaneous parallel of California.
For in days when news travelled slowly, and travelling for ordinary men was still slower, in days when governments jealously prohibited the expatriation of their subjects, and only allowed the immigration of aliens under strict limitations, nothing like the Australian gold-rush could have taken place. As it was, everything favored the stampede. The Australian colonies themselves were anxious for immigrants. The European disturbances of 1848 had led many Continental rulers to the conclusion that it was wiser to allow turbulent spirits to go than to attempt to keep them. The new era of industry had completely unsettled the old relationships and awakened a spirit of restlessness. Finally, the recent application of steam to sea-going ships had rendered a rapid decrease in the length of the voyage from Europe a practical certainty. From the moment that the genuineness of Hargraves's discoveries was placed beyond doubt a swarm of pilgrims from all parts of the world set their faces toward the diggings. Many, perhaps the majority, of the arrivals were totally unsuited for the actual work of mining. Some of these turned to other pursuits in the neighborhood, and, in no small number of cases, did far better than the diggers whose gold they received. But thousands turned back in despair after a few days' experience of the hardships of the life; so that, almost from the first, there was an enormous traffic to and fro, and strong division of parties upon the gold question. An extreme view of the effect upon population may be obtained from a comparison of the statistics of Victoria at the close of the years 1850 and 1855 respectively. At the former date the population was under seventy thousand; at the latter, it was upward of three hundred thousand. But no other colony increased to anything like this extent during the gold rush.
The first care of the Government at Sydney, on receiving the official report of the existence of gold, was to decide upon the attitude to be assumed toward the diggers. It was abundantly clear that the establishment of mining industries would mean a great increase of expense to the Government. It was equally clear that, as the law had been declared over and over again in the colony, unauthorized digging on Crown land constituted a trespass, for which the digger was legally responsible. But the Governor was wise enough to see that no threats of prosecution would deter men bent on digging in unoccupied lands, even if it were possible to preserve the lands of private owners from forcible intrusion. The "squatting" question had demonstrated that, beyond a certain point, the theory of Crown occupation of waste lands was liable to break down.
So the government advisers suggested a compromise. Falling back on a still older feudal doctrine, they asserted the indefeasible right of the Crown to all gold found either on private or public lands, but recommended that licenses to dig should be granted on easy terms, which would have the double effect of providing a revenue and of preserving an acknowledgment of the Crown's title.
Acting on this advice, Governor Fitzroy, on May 22, 1851, issued a proclamation forbidding all persons to dig for gold on any lands without license, but expressing the willingness of the Government to grant licenses at a fee of thirty shillings a month to diggers on Crown lands. For the present, the Governor refused to allow digging on private lands without the owner's consent. The proclamation also announced that no license would be given to any laborer or servant unless he could produce a certificate of discharge from his last service. At the same time the Governor established the practice of appointing special commissioners for the gold-fields, charged with the administration of the licensing system and the general maintenance of order in their respective districts. He also strengthened the police force by every means in his power, and then awaited developments.
He had not long to wait. Almost immediately after the issue of the proclamation another gold-field was discovered on the Turon River, also a feeder of the Macquarie, only a few miles from Lewes Pond; and shortly afterward a third was opened up on the Abercrombie, a tributary of the Murrumbidgee, which takes its rise in the Cordillera, south of Bathurst. By the beginning of June, gold began to pour into Bathurst; but Mr. Hardy, the chief commissioner, was able to report an almost idyllic peace and plenty at the diggings.
In the middle of July an event occurred which at once produced a violent attack of gold fever. This was the discovery of an enormous mass of virgin gold, weighing upward of one hundred pounds, by Doctor Kerr, a squatter on the Meroo Creek. Doctor Kerr had been guided to the spot by an aboriginal who had been in his service several years; and, in his excitement, he broke the matrix in which the nugget was imbedded, and thus spoiled what would have been the most magnificent specimen of gold quartz hitherto discovered. Even as it was, the display in Bathurst of a single find of gold worth four thousand pounds was enough to excite the feelings of the inhabitants to a pitch inconsistent with steady industry.
But Doctor Kerr's find raised a point of some interest to the Government. In framing the licensing regulations, the advisers of the Crown had thought only of the possibilities of alluvial mining. Had they even directed their thoughts toward rock gold, they would probably have considered it highly improbable that any explorer should be able to extract the metal without an amount of preparation which he would hardly undertake upon the security of a bare license. But, as it happened, Doctor Kerr had not even a license when he discovered the gold, though he took one out as soon as possible afterward. To strengthen its position, the Government seized the gold in the hands of a firm of shippers who were about to send it to England; but, on the firm's representation, it was released, security being given for the payment of a royalty of 10 per cent, if the Crown should see fit to demand it.
Early in August, 1851, the Governor announced that, for the future, licenses would be held to cover only alluvial gold, and that for rock gold found on Crown land the Government would demand a royalty of 10 per cent., half that amount if the working was on private land. A fortnight later the Government undertook the escort of gold from the diggings to Sydney, thereby adding considerably to the Crown revenue and at the same time obtaining additional power over the gold districts. By the end of August, gold to the value of seventy thousand pounds had been exported from the colony. But these figures were soon eclipsed by those which followed.
The news of the gold discoveries near Bathurst had soon spread through the Australian colonies. The more adventurous of the colonists started at once for the diggings. Others, often encouraged by their governments, who foresaw a constant drain of population in favor of the gold colony, endeavored to find gold within their own limits. Rumors of discoveries were constantly arising. Gold was found at Echuca in South Australia, in the Fingal district of Tasmania, and in the Curumandel ranges of New Zealand. But none of these discoveries could compare for a moment with those which took place within the newly constituted colony of Victoria. Even so early as August, 1851, gold had been worked at a place called "Deep Creek" (or "Anderson's Creek"), not far from Melbourne, but this was soon abandoned in favor of the diggings at Clunes, on the headwaters of the streams which flow north from the great dividing range to the Murray River. A month later, these again were temporarily deserted in favor of the rich Buninyong district, just south of the range, whose chief centre was Ballarat. Finally, at the beginning of October, 1851, the wonderful finds at Mount Alexander, a spur of the Macedon range to the north of Melbourne, were eclipsing all previous discoveries.
Before the end of the year the export of gold from Victoria alone had very nearly reached half a million in value. In two years the population of the Victorian gold-fields almost equalled the whole population of the colony at the close of 1850. Most of the diggers lived in tents, and had absolutely no interest in the colony beyond the mere hope of profit from the diggings. If a more profitable field had opened elsewhere, they would have left at once. By the end of the year 1851 the probable area of future discoveries was pretty well recognized. The gold-fields, with few exceptions, were found to lie on one side or the other of the eastern Cordillera or chain of mountains which, beginning with Mount Elliot in Northern Queensland, follows the coast with remarkable precision till it reaches Port Phillip Bay. But all the more northerly part of this chain was unexplored in 1851, and of course there was room for almost any development within such wide limits.
Warned by events in New South Wales, the governments of the other Australian colonies had made preparations for the crisis. Western Australia was too remote to be much affected; and her newly arrived supply of convict labor rendered her contented. But South Australia and Tasmania suffered severely from the drain of population, which set in toward the diggings.
In South Australia, the effect was in some districts almost as if a pestilence had swept away the men, leaving the women and children untouched. Some of the emigrants really deserted their families, but the bulk were honorable men, and remittances of gold soon began to find their way to Adelaide for distribution among relatives in the colony.
After the comparative failure of the gold-diggings in South Australia, the Government had wisely set itself to secure some part of the prosperity of the gold discoveries for its colony by establishing both land and river traffic routes. In these efforts it was highly successful. Many South Australians made handsome fortunes by sending provisions to the Buninyong and Mount Alexander districts, and the new steamers on the Murray proved a source of profit to the colony which lasted until the development of the railroad system. Unfortunately, this prosperity could hardly be realized at the time, owing to the great scarcity of coined money in the colony. In 1851 the privilege of coining was still jealously monopolized by the mint in London; while the rapid expansion of business in the latter part of that year had rendered the supply of coin in Australia totally inadequate to the demand.
Very soon after the discoveries, Governor Fitzroy had sent home a memorial from the Legislative Council at Sydney, praying for the establishment of a branch mint in that city, and similar applications soon followed from the other colonies. On March 22, 1853, a Treasury minute sanctioned the applications, and colonial mints were shortly afterward established by order in council. But in the mean while the South Australians had got over their difficulty by passing a colonial act authorizing the issue by the Colonial Government of gold ingots, of slightly higher intrinsic value than the coins they were supposed to represent, stamped with an authentic mark. These ingots were not made legal tender, and the only object of the government mark was to guarantee quality and weight. But they were generally accepted in official and commercial transactions, they tided over the crisis of scarcity, and the Home Government, though with due official caution, approved the action of Governor Young.
In Tasmania, the main difficulty arose from the drain of emigrants. In August, 1851, Sir William Denison wrote home urging the transportation of more convicts or "probationers," on the ground that there would be a great demand for foodstuffs by the neighboring colonies, while the supply of agricultural laborers would be shorter than ever. Both Tasmania and South Australia united in deciding upon the continuance of the system by which free emigrants were sent out at the expense of the land fund of each colony, notwithstanding that such emigrants would probably leave for Victoria immediately after their arrival. Of the existence of this contingency there could be little doubt. On January 16, 1852, the Governor of Tasmania wrote: "I have a number of men who have come back from Mount Alexander after an absence from this colony of not more than eight weeks, with gold to the value of one hundred twenty pounds to one thousand pounds." During the five months which followed the writing of this letter, four thousand persons (most of them wage-earners in the prime of life) left Tasmania for Victoria. As the whole population of Tasmania was at this time only about fifty thousand, the matter was serious. Nevertheless, Tasmania tided safely over the difficulties of the gold period, and even was able to help her sorely tried sister.
For it was upon the newly established Government at Melbourne that the strain of the new era most severely fell. The Government at Sydney was an old and tried institution, with traditions of more than half a century, and a staff of experienced officials under an exceptionally able chief. When Hargraves made his discoveries in 1851, the population of the mother-colony was nearly a quarter of a million, exclusive of the Port Phillip district, and such a population meant a government organization of corresponding magnitude. Moreover, the people of New South Wales had always, from circumstances, been accustomed to much governmental control, and did not resent it; while Victoria had been started as a colony whose people were too prosperous and contented to require more than a minimum of guidance. When the gold discoveries suddenly drew into the colony, not merely the most turbulent characters of Australia, but the crews of deserted ships and the general offscourings of the civilized world, and when, overcome by the contagion, the government officials threw up their posts, one and all, and started for the diggings, it became evident that the Lieutenant-Governor had his hands full. Even so early as November, 1851, he began to anticipate trouble from the preemptive clauses of the Crown Lands Leasing Act of 1847, by which the squatters had a right to purchase land in the neighborhood of the gold-fields. The claims of the squatters barred the way, and the squatters themselves looked with small favor upon a class of men whom they regarded as troublesome intruders, and whose proceedings rendered it almost impossible for the pastoralists to procure sufficient labor to carry on their operations. The squatters chose to overlook two important facts; viz., that they had themselves originally acquired their position precisely as the digger acquired his, and that the presence of the digger, if it raised the price of labor, also enormously increased the prices of the squatter's produce.
But more immediate financial troubles began to press upon the Government. It had been necessary, not merely to add largely to the number of the official staff—to provide additional police, commissioners, magistrates, customs officers, etc.—but also to increase their pay in some proportion to the greatly increased cost of living. Even with an increase in their salaries of 50 or 100 per cent, the subordinate officials would not stay. The sight of the reckless and prosperous diggers who came down to Melbourne to spend the Christmas of 1851, and who flung their gold about recklessly, was too much for the feelings of the civilians. They deserted in troops.
On January 12, 1852, Lieutenant-Governor Latrobe wrote: "The police in town and country have almost entirely abandoned duty," and he begged of the Secretary of State to send military aid. In May, 1852, Sir John Pakington replied, promising six companies of the Fifty-ninth Regiment from China, but subsequently decided to send a whole regiment direct from England. A man-of-war was also to be stationed in Australian waters. A still more welcome assistance came in the early part of the year from the Governor of Tasmania, who sent, at Latrobe's earnest request, a body of two hundred pensioners, who had been serving as convict guards, and who might be expected to resist those temptations which, if yielded to, would result in the loss of their pensions. But all this assistance meant money, and the Government soon fell into sore straits.
It is true that at first the revenue rose substantially. Comparing the income for the quarters ending December 31, 1850, and December 31, 1851, respectively, we find, on general account, an increase of eleven thousand pounds, or about 30 per cent., and, on the Territorial account, or Land Fund, an increase of seventy-three thousand pounds, about 100 per cent. Three months later the increase was about 200 per cent. on the general revenue, while the Territorial revenue was about the same. But the latter fact may be accounted for by the transferrence of the fees for gold licenses to the general revenue. It is more important, however, to notice that, though the revenue was rising, expenses were increasing still faster. Not only had the staff to be doubled, or trebled, at a very large increase of pay, but government contracts for public buildings, printing, stores, fittings, and other necessaries could be placed, if at all, only at extravagantly high prices. "No tenders can be obtained for supplies of boots and shoes; orders have been sent to neighboring colonies for them. Old furniture sells at about 75 per cent. advance on the former prices of new; scarcely any mechanics will work." Latrobe estimated the deficit in the revenue of the year 1853 as nearly four hundred thousand pounds, notwithstanding that he reckoned the whole gold revenue of six hundred thousand pounds as available for general expenses.
In his anxiety the Lieutenant-Governor had at first (December, 1851) proposed to double the license fee of thirty shillings a month; but the proposal had provoked such a storm of opposition that he withdrew it. The revenue from licenses was the source of much contention. The Government alleged that it was not taxation, but rent, of Crown lands, and at first devoted it exclusively to the service of the gold-fields. The diggers denounced it as taxation without representation; and the Legislative Council, almost necessarily in opposition to the Government while the latter was administered by nominees of the Colonial Office, refused to make up deficiencies out of the general revenue. Thus the Lieutenant-Governor was placed between two fires. If he enforced the license fees he angered what was rapidly becoming the largest part of the population; if he relinquished them, he left himself without means to carry on the government of the gold-fields.
From this dilemma he was saved by the receipt of a general permission from the Colonial Office, toward the close of 1852, to deal with the gold revenue in the same manner as ordinary revenue. By placing this fund at the disposal of the Colonial Legislature, the Home Government not only removed a great grievance and relieved the hands of the Lieutenant-Governor from the shackles previously laid upon them by the Colonial Office, but it took a substantial step toward the end that was now acknowledged on all sides to be the ultimate outcome of the new discoveries; viz., the introduction of responsible government. The same despatch contained a still more important concession, authorizing the Lieutenant-Governor to devote the remaining part of the land revenue—viz., that arising from sales and pastoral licenses—"to the purposes rendered urgent by the present crisis." As this fund was jealously reserved by the existing constitutions of the Australian colonies, and devoted, under the provisions of the Crown Land Sales Act, exclusively to the purposes of emigration and public works, it will be seen that the Colonial Office took a strong step in sanctioning its diversion. But it must be observed that the expenditure of this additional fund was placed exclusively in the hands of the Lieutenant-Governor and his Executive Council, acting independently of the Colonial Legislature.
With this assistance, the Lieutenant-Governor struggled on amid increasing difficulties till the spring of the year 1853. By this time the agitation against the license fee had reached an alarming height, for the first successes of the new discoveries had passed away, and, although the export of gold continued to increase, it was by no means at its former rate nor in proportion to the increase of population. At the beginning of September, 1853, there were said to be nearly seventy thousand persons living at the Victorian gold-fields, and many of these, in all probability, earned very little more than mechanics employed in settled work. Hence there was a fair ground for an orderly agitation against the amount of the fee; but, unfortunately, the diggers preferred violent measures. There was some excuse for them. They were not represented in the Legislative Council, for they had sprung into existence as a body since the passing of the Act of 1850, and, though a measure had been introduced with a view to giving them the franchise, it had not yet received the assent of the Home Government. In the mean time, therefore, they could not, through their representatives in the Council, effectively criticise either the existing law or its administration. With regard to the latter, there was obviously room for complaint, for the immense increase of business had compelled the Government to appoint an inferior class of officials, and some of these, at least, succumbed to the strong temptations of their positions.
At the beginning of August, 1853, a petition had been presented by the Bendigo diggers, in which they urged the reduction of the license fee and the grant of representation to the diggers. The Lieutenant-Governor returned a pacific reply, but the delegates in charge of the petition were evidently bent on arousing strong feelings, and they held meetings in Melbourne which went the extreme length permissible to loyal subjects. Still, the Lieutenant-Governor shrank from strong measures, and endeavored to remove one ground of complaint by appointing, as a nominee member of the Legislative Council, a gentleman who was believed to possess the confidence of the diggers. The nomination was at once repudiated by the delegates of the latter, and at the end of August an organized attempt was made to resist the renewal of licenses on the old terms. Hundreds of diggers pledged themselves to pay no more than a third of the sum previously demanded, and those who were inclined to yield to the Government's demands were warned that the agitators would not "be responsible for their safety" if they remained at the diggings. The license system had by this time extended, beyond the diggers, to the storekeepers and other tradesmen at the gold-fields, who were making enormous profits out of the diggers, and these, for the most part, unhesitatingly complied with the demands of the agitators, willing rather to pay the fines for breach of the government regulations than to offend their customers. A daring attack on a private escort of gold near Bendigo, which occurred about this time, showed that the colony was on the verge of civil war.
Just at this moment an event occurred which rendered it impossible for the Government to maintain its position unimpaired with the scanty forces at its disposal. In the middle of September, 1853, the total abolition of the license fee was seriously proposed in the Legislative Council of New South Wales. The news flew like wildfire to Victoria, where the diggers had hitherto looked upon the colonial legislatures—in which, it will be remembered, they were not yet represented—as their natural enemies. It seemed to them now that they had everything in their own hands, and it became clearly impossible for the Government, in the existing temper of the diggers, to exact the full amount of the license fee. A proclamation, hastily published with a view to allay excitement, by an unfortunate omission in the printed copies led the public to believe that the total abolition of the license system was contemplated by the Victorian Government. A select committee of the Legislative Council reported unfavorably upon the system. The Government made the best of a bad bargain, and accepted a fee of forty shillings for the three months ending November 30, 1853; and, on the following day, the Legislative Council passed a new Gold-fields Act, which greatly reduced the fees for diggers' licenses, while it substantially increased those demanded for permission to open stores at the gold-fields. It also provided for the grant of leases of auriferous lands, at a royalty of not less than 5 per cent., and gave legal sanction to the customs regarding the "claims" of diggers, which had gradually grown up to regulate the rival interests of neighboring miners. Offences against the act were to be decided upon by the magistrates; but the accused might demand a court of at least two members, and there was to be an appeal to General Sessions.
These measures were partly successful in restoring order, but it was obvious that the gold-fields contained men who were averse to a peaceable settlement. Notwithstanding that the number of the elective members of the Legislative Council was more than once increased; that, with the full consent of the Home Government, a bill was being prepared for the introduction of responsible government; and that the material condition of the diggers was being rapidly improved, the Lieutenant-Governor had, in January, 1854, to report the formation of a "diggers' congress," which obviously had for its object the supersession of the ordinary government.
Latrobe retired from office in May of the same year, and one of the first points noticed by his successor, Sir Charles Hotham, was the existence of an agitation against the Chinese at the Bendigo diggings. Notwithstanding the enthusiastic character of his reception in his progress through the gold-fields in September, the new Governor soon had to face serious disturbances.
The events of the next few months formed a crisis in the history, not only of Victoria, but of Australia. Naturally there is much dispute concerning them, and, as the following account is taken chiefly from Sir Charles Hotham's reports, it is possible that the acts of his opponents may not obtain strict justice. But it is admitted on all sides that Sir Charles acted with the most perfect good faith; and the accounts given by the insurgents are far too contradictory and prejudiced to receive much credit.
On the night of October 16, 1854, a miner named Scobie was murdered, or at least killed, at the Eureka Hotel, near Ballarat. The Eureka Hotel was a place of no good repute, kept by a man named Bentley, who, as well as his wife, was (it is said) an ex-convict from Tasmania. Suspicion fell upon the couple, and they, with a second man (named Farrell), were arrested by the magistrates, but almost immediately released for alleged default of evidence. The dismissal of the charge excited a storm of indignation in the camp, and a body of diggers at once proceeded to wreck the hotel and lynch the accused. In the latter object they, fortunately, did not succeed, and so rendered themselves liable only to charges of riot and arson, instead of the more serious charge of murder. Four of the ringleaders were, through the prompt measures of Sir Charles Hotham, shortly afterward arrested, and committed for trial. But the accusations of partiality against the officials were too strong to be resisted, and a board of inquiry hastily instituted by the Governor disclosed the ugly facts that Dewes, the magistrate who presided at the hearing of the charge against the Bentleys, had been in the habit of borrowing money from residents, and that Sergeant-Major Milne, of the police force, had been guilty of receiving bribes. The officials implicated were at once dismissed, and the Bentleys and Farrell rearrested and convicted. But the Governor very properly declined to release the arrested rioters, who, shortly before Christmas, 1854, were convicted and sentenced to short terms of imprisonment.
Meanwhile, more disturbances had occurred. Though a commission upon the general condition of the gold-fields was holding its inquiries, in November many diggers again refused to pay the reduced license fees, and, on the 30th of the month, a serious riot took place. The military were called out, the Riot Act was read, and there was some shooting. Eight captures were made, but the lesson had not been severe enough, and a state of open war ensued. The diggers intrenched themselves in a fortified camp known as the "Eureka Stockade," openly drilled their forces in the presence of the authorities, and levied horses and rations from unwilling miners in the name of a "commander-in-chief." At the same time they issued a long political manifesto, which, while it did not avowedly disclaim allegiance to the Crown, contained proposals to which no regularly constituted government could ever have assented.
The Governor at once ordered all the available military force to Ballarat; but, before reinforcements arrived, the coolness and promptitude of Captain Thomas—the officer in command of the troops on the Ballarat gold-field when the riot of November 30th took place—had nipped the insurrection in the bud. Captain Thomas saw that, while the Eureka Stockade threatened to become a serious obstacle to the Government if its completion were allowed, in its uncompleted state it was really a source of weakness to the insurgents. By collecting their forces in one spot, and thus rendering them more exposed to a crushing attack, and by drawing off the men who threatened the government camp, it really left the commander of the troops free to act with decision. Accordingly, Captain Thomas at once determined to attack the position. Assembling his forces (somewhat fewer than two hundred men) at three o'clock on the morning of December 3d, he moved toward the stockade.
At about one hundred fifty yards from the intrenchments he was perceived by the scouts of the insurgents, who promptly fired on the advancing troops. Thomas himself, Pasley (his aide-de-camp), Rede (the resident commissioner), and Racket (the stipendiary magistrate), all of whom were present at the attack, positively assert that the insurgents fired before a shot was discharged by the troops. Upon this reception Captain Thomas gave the order to fire, and the intrenchments were carried with a rush after about ten minutes of sharp fighting. Captain Wise was fatally wounded, and three privates were killed outright; one officer and eleven privates were wounded. Of the insurgents, about thirty were known to have been killed, and many more wounded. Nearly one hundred twenty prisoners were taken. The effect of the victory was, so far as local disturbances were concerned, instantaneous. Even before the reinforcements under General Nickle appeared, all resistance to the authorities had died away; and, though the Governor at once proclaimed a state of martial law, he was able to recall the proclamation in less than a week.