The scourge and the seed: Australia's primal cycle of drought, deluge, and demographic destiny

“ A paradox, or, as a clever writer recently put it, "a surviving fragment of the primitive world," with a nature contradictory and inconsistent, as compared even with itself, cut off from the rest of the globe, and left to work out the problem of its existence alone; no wonder it was only after successive generations had toiled at it, that Australia was, even in part, understood. ”

“ The year 1826 was remarkable for the commencement of one of those fearful droughts to which we have reason to believe the climate of New South Wales is periodically subject. ”

“ In this country there is very little difference in the seasons, save that one part of the year is wet and the remainder dry. The rain comes from the north-west, and during the dry months the wind blows from the exactly opposite direction, namely, the south-east. ”

“ It snows, rains, hails, storms, thunders and lightens, freezes and congeals; all plants die, and animals languish and are wretched.
When this state is reached, again a new life-giving spring returns, and the cycle is renewed. The season of spring with its hosts of freshness and beauty spreads its tent on the plains and mountains with great pomp and magnificence. A second time the form of the creatures is renewed, and the creation of beings begins afresh ”

“ Australia is not only a land of scanty rainfall, few rivers, and great heat. It is also a land of droughts. A district [Pg 64] that has rejoiced in sufficient rain for one or two years and piled up wealth from its crops and its flocks may have to face a year or more of dryness that shrivels up the face of the earth. One need not go far in Australia to hear of the horrors of drought. Stockmen on their stations far off in the interior sometimes go crazy because the rain fails to come, and many have lost fortunes on account of dry weather. ”

“ Unlike other hot countries, this great heat and dryness is unaccompanied by night dews, and the falls of rain being uncertain and irregular, droughts of many months’ duration sometimes occur, during which the rivers and lagoons are dried up, the land becomes a parched waste, vegetation is burnt up, and famine spreads destruction on every side. It is easier for the imagination to conceive than the pen to depict the horrors of so dreadful a visitation. ”

“ A special peculiarity of the ocean-like plains of inmost Australia is the miraculous growth of vegetation after the profuse irrigation which invariably succeeds a drought. In the warm dry earth, now converted into a bed of red or black mud, saturated to its lowest inch, and rich for procreation of every green thing, lies a hoard of seeds of wondrous number and variety of species. ”

“ Nowhere apparently are the alternations of the seasons more sudden and the contrasts between them more striking than in the deserts of Central Australia, where at the end of a long period of drought the sandy and stony wilderness, over which the silence and desolation of death appear to brood, is suddenly, after a few days of torrential rain, transformed into a landscape smiling with verdure and peopled with teeming multitudes of insects and lizards, of frogs and birds. ”

“ There that spongy vegetation retains the water to give it out by degrees, but the rain that falls on the Australian hills runs off at once, and hence the terrific floods to which their creeks are subject. In the barren and stony ranges through which I had now to force my way, no spring was to be found. During heavy rains, indeed, the torrents are fierce, and the waters must spread over the plains into which they descend for many miles ”

“ Our camp itself will shortly be under water; as it is the water is all round us, our camp being the only piece of high ground about. The rain held up about 12 o'clock, thank goodness, though everything is damp or wet. We shall get out of this in the morning, i. e., if we don't have to flit before. We are all most miserable. Camels can't wander, that's a blessing, for the water won't allow them. It is as well we left the cart where we did, we could not have taken it further, and in all probability it would have been swept away by this flood now rapidly coming on. ”

“ One of the most marvellous things about Australia is her quick recovery from a drought. Within a week after a rain plains that have been reduced to dust, without a vestige of any growth for miles and miles, are covered with green and in a short time furnish luxuriant pasturage. The drought never kills the seeds of native grasses in the ground. Three years after the drought of 1902, New South Wales, which had lost seventeen million sheep, had increased her flocks from twenty-three million head to forty million and the number of her cattle and horses had [Pg 71] doubled. ”

“ But they have quick feet, sharp eyes, and cool heads, and fatal accidents seldom occur; though it often happens that a charging cow or bullock will send all the men in the yard scrambling precipitately to the top rail of the strong high timber enclosure.
Drought is the great enemy that these pioneers have to dread. Nature has fitted the grasses and herbage of the interior to withstand prolonged dry periods. By many beautiful adaptations the herbs growing on the plain are enabled to flower and mature their seed with great rapidity ”

“ The drought disaster, of course, is most felt in the newly taken-up country. Here a state of nature obtains, while, as time rolls on, and profits are made, water is conserved, and the run is practically made drought-proof. A minimum quantity of stock can be kept, and the remainder can be travelled to a district which is not smitten. The recuperative powers of the country are enormous; and if the squatter is afflicted one year he holds on, with the consciousness that with three or four good seasons in succession he is a made man. ”

“ With hearts as warm as the climate in which they live, with a spirit to meet any danger, and an energy to carry them through any reverse of fortune, frank, generous, and hospitable, the squatters of the Australian colonies are undoubtedly at the head of their respective communities, and will in after days form the landed, as they do now the pastoral interests, from whom every thing will be expected that is usually required of an English country gentleman. ”

“ Weston, speaking as a man speaks who faces a disagreeable task. “It’s only fair, seeing that you youngsters are so much affected by our bad luck. We’re not going to be permanently ruined, so you needn’t worry too much: unless the drought stretches out indefinitely I’ll pull round all right, once the rain comes. You know, droughts with us generally mean extra good seasons afterwards: the ground has had a rest, and grass and crops come on splendidly.”
Jean and Jo nodded acquiescence. ”

“ There are in South Australia two periods of the year which are equally deceptive to the stranger. The one is when the country is burnt up and suffering under the effects of summer heat--when the earth is almost herbless, and the ground swarms with grasshoppers--when a dry heat prevails in a calm still air. The other when vegetation is springing up under the early rains and every thing is green. Arriving at Adelaide during the first period, the stranger would hardly believe that the country, at any other season of the year, would be so clothed with herbage and look so fresh ”

“ Countries, however, the summer heat of which is so excessive, as in Australia, are always subject to such changes, nor is it any argument against their soil, that it should at one season of the year look bare and herbless. That part of the Darling between Laidley's Ponds and its junction with the Murray, a distance of about 100 miles in a direct line, had not been previously explored, nor had I time to lay it regularly down. I should say from the appearance of its channel that it is seldom very deep, frequently dry at intervals, and that its floods are uncertain, sudden, and very temporary. ”

“ Thousands of rabbits die, and I have been told that even the birds drop dead from the trees and that their bodies line both sides of the fences.
At intervals the whole continent suffers from terrible dryness. Every state except Tasmania has its drought history. The Riverina country of New South Wales is one of the best of the sheep-raising districts. It produces some of the finest wool and is noted for its excellent grass, [Pg 65] yet in times of severe drought it looks as though a fire had swept over it. ”

“ Owing to the drought to which the country is subject, and to the very limited rainfall in the large northern pastoral districts, squatting,—which is always precarious,—is perhaps more precarious in this colony than in others. In 1865 there was a great drought. In 1864 very little rain fell in the districts north of Goyder’s line, and in 1865 none fell. When 1866 came many of the South Australian squatters were ruined,—and others were broken-hearted. The records of this time are terrible to hear. It was not so much that sheep were perishing from want of water. ”

“ In such times, even a man with thousands of acres and tens of thousands of sheep may have to sit helpless and watch the animals die before his eyes.
The droughts clear the land of everything green. The pastures become as bare as the roads, and the sheep stagger about, nosing in the dust for the seeds of grasses and trees. Sometimes trees are cut down to give them food. During one drought a sheep-raiser who had four thousand acres of land kept one hundred men busy cutting off the branches of his apple and other trees to feed the flocks. The sheep ate the leaves and even the twigs. ”

“ I passed by one cattle station in Queensland, four years ago, on which 60,000 head of cattle were grazing. Since then, so severe has been the drought, the stock has been reduced by deaths from starvation to 20,000 head. The deaths of stock on the sheep stations in the same district have been equally heavy. When the seasons have a fair average rainfall in these hot districts everything goes well, and [Pg 208] squatting is the most profitable occupation in the colonies, but when a series of dry years set in the squatter's lot is a heartrending one. ”

“ Australia, with its rich virgin soil and dry climate, is just the place to repay tenfold all irrigating enterprise. We were told of certain points on the Murray River, where, by one properly constructed dam, water in abundance could be held and thrown back for a distance of thirty miles. It appears that in one year not long ago, when there was a great drought, over fifteen million sheep and horned cattle died of thirst in New South Wales and Queensland! ”

“ West of longitude 147 degrees, nearly to the boundary of South Australia, in 141 degrees, the country is unfit for occupation, for, though in favourable seasons there might in some few localities be abundance of feed for stock, the uncertainty of rain and frequent recurrence of drought renders it untenable, the grasses and herbage being principally annuals, which not only die but are swept away by the hot summer winds, leaving the surface of the soil completely bare. ”

“ The grass was nevertheless excellent and abundant; and its waste, added to the distress the want of water occasioned us, made us doubly lament the absence of civilised inhabitants, by whose industry that rich pasture and fine soil could have been turned to good account. We saw no natives; nor were even kangaroos or emus to be seen, as formerly, any longer inhabitants of these parts. I turned at length, reluctantly, convinced that it would have been unsafe to venture with cattle and drays into these regions before rain fell. ”

“ If a man wanting pure good water, digs a well and the water comes, it is useful. But if, in digging a coal pit, water rushes in and prevents the miners reaching the coal seam, it is clear that the water is the opposite of useful. In some countries rain comes very irregularly and uncertainly. In Australia the droughts last for one or two or even three years, and in the interior of the continent the rivers sometimes dry up altogether. The dirtiest pools then become very valuable for keeping the flocks of sheep alive. In New South Wales water has been sold for three shillings a bucketful. ”

“ For some years previously the pastoral industry had been declining and the number of sheep and cattle in Australia had Drought of 1902. greatly diminished, but the year 1902 was one of veritable drought. The failure of the crops was almost universal and large numbers of sheep and cattle perished for want of food. The truth is, pastoralists for the most part carried on their industry trusting very greatly to luck, not making any special provisions against the vicissitudes of the seasons. ”

“ There is one thing, the quantity of water will enable the governor to go where he pleases, as there will be abundance for months to come. He says, "I wish I had a couple of months' rations of flour, tea, and sugar, as then I could thoroughly examine the country in this quarter." It is very stormy, the creek is rising very fast still, and here we are quite isolated on about a quarter of an acre. Pleasant, isn't it? We shall have a swim for it tomorrow, and no mistake. Poor little sheep, it will be hard work for them. The weather looks very angry, and more rain coming. ”

“ In Western Queensland nobody is surprised if a drop of rain does not fall for eight or ten months together. Nevertheless, cattle and sheep keep fat all the year, for the grass retains its nutriment even though it looks dry and gray, and a shower will make these dry stalks green. ”

“ Other plants have through the ages become adapted to the destructive actions of drought and a dry, hot atmosphere, and have only needle-shaped leaves or even no true ones at all, as many of the cacti in the desert lands of the Western plains. ”

“ An Australian drought can never be as disastrous in the twentieth century as it was in 1866; and South Australia, the Central State, has from the first been a pioneer in development as well as in exploration. The hum of the reaping machine first awoke the echoes in our wheatfields. The stump-jumping plough and the mullenicer which beats down the scrub or low bush so that it can be burnt, were South Australian inventions, copied elsewhere, which have turned land accounted worthless into prolific wheat fields. ”

“ The present great need of Australia is the conservation of water, and the irrigation works which have been already commenced on the banks of the Murray River, coupled with the recent discoveries of an apparently unlimited artesian supply on the and plains of Western Queensland, testify alike to the recognition of the want, and to the ease with which it may be met. One inevitable rule of settlement is that population follows water ”

“ The drawback to production is the deficient or uncertain rainfall. A great deal of the northern territory is sterile, uninviting desert, which will possibly never be of any service; but there are also great breadths of pastoral and agricultural land; and the tapping in recent years of vast stores of artesian water in the northern parts of Queensland and South Australia gives hopes that, in a not distant future, the periodical Australian droughts will be deprived of their terrors, for the farmers will be able to keep their cattle and sheep alive. ”

“ By 1905 the number of sheep and cattle in the whole Commonwealth exceeded the figures for 1900.
The Australians cannot be beaten for enthusiastic faith in their country, and some of them go so far as to tell me that droughts are a good thing. They say the soil must rest occasionally and that dry seasons, like ice and snow in cold countries, are simply Nature’s methods of forcing the lands to lie fallow. ”

“ More important than its mineral wealth, however, are the pastoral and agricultural riches of Australia. Enormous flocks of sheep pasture on the sweet grasses of thousands upon thousands of her acres. She produces some of the best wool on earth and exports a quarter of a billion dollars’ worth annually. Her wheat lands produce enough for the needs of her five and a half million people and furnish one hundred million bushels for export. It is estimated that with close settlement she can raise one billion bushels, or sufficient to feed a population of one hundred and fifty millions. ”

“ Our foes are strong and wise and wary; but, strong and wise and wary as they are, they cannot undo the miracles of God who ripens in the hearts of young men the seeds sown by the young men of a former generation. And the seed sown by the young men of ‘65 and ‘67 are coming to their miraculous ripening today.
Rulers and Defenders of Realms had need to be wary if they would guard against such processes. Life springs from death: and from the graves of patriot men and women spring living nations. The Defenders of this Realm have worked well in secret and in the open. ”

“ If mines must be worked and towns built in arid regions, let promoters of these schemes be required to build aqueducts and bore wells sufficient in advance to supply the needed water, not waiting until droughts come and the people die. Every place on this globe has its rainy years and its dry years. Areas of cold and heat, wind and calm, rain and drought, appear and move and disappear in irregular succession. We must prepare for them and provide against disaster. We can not control the weather, but we may control ourselves.
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CONVERSION ”

“ By the ticking of the telegraph we learn that an experiment at Barcaldine, in Queensland, has brought to the surface of the bore a daily discharge of something approaching to 100,000 gallons of water fit for all purposes. Experience is ever revealing new relations of material adaptability. There is a sympathy between a country and its inhabitants, which may have a deeper foundation than the fancy of the poet. The land and the people are the complements of one another. "God made the earth to be inhabited," and there is now no fear of Australia being an exception to the rule. ”