Victoria, Australia

“ OF THE COUNTRY AND CLIMATE, AND OF MELBOURNE GARDENS
Victoria, and, indeed, Australia as a whole, has been spoken of as the “Paradise of the working-man”—a paradise in which Melbourne, as the busiest and richest city in the Commonwealth takes the foremost place, this according to its people. The inhabitants of Sydney think differently, so do those of Adelaide and Brisbane. Yet, on the whole, I think Melbourne has the best reason for her proud boast. Wages may not be higher than they are in Sydney, while they are certainly lower than they are in Brisbane or the West ”

“ The most interesting, history is that of Victoria, the youngest colony of the three, which up to the time of the gold discoveries formed a district of New South Wales, not inaptly named by its first explorer 'Australia Felix.' Practically, its history may be said to date from these gold discoveries in 1851. For the next five years adventurers of all nations and classes flocked to the diggings, and quiet settlers from other colonies left their sheep to look after themselves while they hastened to reap a share of the golden harvest. ”

“ If you wish to transact business well and quickly, to organize a new enterprise--in short, to estimate and understand the trade of Australia, you must go to Melbourne and not to Sydney, and this in spite of the fact that Victoria is a small colony handicapped by heavy protectionist duties, whilst Sydney is, comparatively speaking, a free port, at the base of an enormous area. The actual production does not take place in Victoria, but it is in Melbourne that the money resulting from the productions of other colonies as well as of Victoria is turned over. ”

“ Think of Australia alone—parts of which I have seen grow under my own eyes, and have even known some of the first white men who ever set foot on a part of its shores—the now colony of Victoria—and made of it in such a short space of time so great a land. The story of that fine race, the Hentys, ought to stimulate any one. ”

“ In all the Victorian papers, of whatever party, it is noticeable that Victorian topics, and especially Victorian politics, occupy an almost exclusive share both of leading and news columns; while the New South Wales and South Australian papers devote far more attention to intercolonial and European affairs. The fact is that Victoria is much more self-contained and independent of the mother country than its neighbours. Somehow or other there is more local news obtainable, more going-on, in fact, in Melbourne than in Sydney and Adelaide put together. ”

“ To the people at home who assert—as I have often heard them do—that Australia is a completely self-seeking country, I would recommend a short study of Australian commerce—even of Victorian commerce alone—and of the statistics showing the imports of the last few years, a very brief perusal of which will be sufficient to prove that an infinitely larger amount of Australian money is spent in England, and other parts of the Empire, than in any foreign country. ”

“ Size means nothing whatever to such people; if they have any idea of any variety of climate in Australia, they think that it must be “cooler up north,” quite ignoring all that they have ever heard of Queensland and the Northern Territory, which alone covers 523,620 square miles. Victoria is the smallest state in Australia ”

“ At present it may seem idle, to some, to introduce these distant places as elements in the discussion of such a question; but no one who reflects on the power of trade to knit together even more distant points of the earth, will think it visionary to suppose that Victoria must one day--insignificant as may be the value of the districts in its immediate neighbourhood--be the centre of a vast system of commerce, the emporium, in fact, where will take place the exchange of the products of the Indian Archipelago for those of the vast plains of Australia. ”

“ The wealth of Australia has not yet passed beyond the first generation. The majority of the wealthy have themselves made their fortunes, and are not inclined to let them be squandered by their sons, at least during, their lifetime. The number of young men with no regular employment is at present very small. And it is well it should be so. Else we should feel all the evils of a plutocracy, purified neither by education nor public opinion--evils which have already made themselves apparent in the political system of Victoria. ”

“ There are many families in Victoria and elsewhere who bless the day when the goldfields of Western Australia were discovered, and a great many miners in these districts have brought over their wives and families and have made humble but comfortable homes for them. They all seem happy, and I have talked with many of the women, who tell me that, though the life is rather rough, yet they have money always regularly coming in, while, on the other side, they had nothing to keep themselves with the failure of the banks and general crash in Melbourne having ruined so many people. ”

“ It was always the main plea of the pioneers of the movement. A joiner, who had wrought in the West Indies and in Brazil, said he found it far more trying to work in Victoria than to work in those countries. Doctors came forward, both at Melbourne and at Ballarat, and declared ten hours a day in the glaring sun of Australia was deadly, and left a man fit for nothing but drink or sleep. ”

“ The great main Dividing Range, indeed, can be traced from New Guinea across the Torres Straits to Cape York, and thence southward through Queensland, New South Wales, and Victoria to Wilson’s Promontory, being from there continued by the Flinders group of islands to Tasmania, a second spur traversing Victoria in a westerly direction. South Australia and Western Australia alone lie out of touch of this great backbone of the continent, possessing a mountain system of their own. ”

“ The states are named Victoria, New South Wales, South Australia, Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania. They will be noticed in these pages in turn. Victoria, with an area of 87,000 square miles, has a population of a little more than 1,000,000. Thus it is the most densely peopled of the group. Agriculture, gold mining and wool growing are its prominent industries, and it is the colony in which manufactures are most developed. New South Wales has also a population of 1,000,000, with an area of 309,000 square miles. ”

“ To its policy, therefore, alone is attributable its downfall for, while England, with its more enlightened, free, and independent government—unhampered by the despotic sway of a bigoted priesthood—and its iron and coal mines, only aided by industry, is now the richest and happiest country in the world,—we may hope that Australia, untrammelled by the fetters of a vacillating and grasping government, but following the example of the mother country, will advance, as it has even already done, into power and greatness. ”

“ Whatever may be the balance of the natural advantages, whether of climate or population, is on the side of Victoria, whose compact, fertile, and well watered territory gained for it, on its first discovery, the well-deserved title of Australia Felix. The striking and ultimate point of difference between the two countries is their fiscal policy. ”

“ A source of unbounded wealth is thus opened to that fortunate young colony: coals had previously been discovered there. She is also better supplied with timber and forests than the more southern districts. Victoria, with her capital, Melbourne, will have to wait for the extension of railways, marking her position as the centre of commerce, and will in time reap her well-merited reward. ”

“ In Australia itself there seemed to be only one opinion. The Earl of Hopetoun was easily favourite.
It may be safely said that no Governor of any of the Australian colonies up to that time had so successfully represented the Throne. Those who were in Melbourne on his arrival when he became Governor of Victoria well remember a man of somewhat light build, middle height, pale, clean-shaven, youthful in appearance. ”

“ Early on the morning of the 4th of September, 1839, the Beagle was once more slipping out of Port Essington before a light land wind. We had taken a hearty farewell of our friends at Victoria, in whose prosperity we felt all the interest that is due to those who pioneer the way for others in the formation of a new settlement. No doubt the hope that our discoveries might open a new field for British enterprise, and contribute to extend still more widely the blessings of civilization, increased the sympathy we felt for the young colony at Victoria. ”

“ This point conceded, the question arose as to what particular section of the Colonies seemed to offer the most attractive opportunities. The bride-elect objected to New South Wales as being too near home (she had always been a home-body, and wished to see the world) ; Victoria, also, was not to her taste for some other feminine but conclusive reason; Western Australia had just begun to come into notice as likely to become one of the world's greatest gold-producers—there, it seemed to her, was the land of promise for a young and experienced mining-engineer. ”

“ Many places in Victoria are so densely timbered, that, to prepare a single acre for the plough would be as much as any two men could accomplish in a week. The timber is not of such value as one would suppose, in consequence of the difficulty and expense in sawing and carting it away, and the largest trees are uniformly uneven and rotten within. Nor have the settlers of Australia the same facilities the American has, for they cannot make rafts of it to send down the rivers; the timber of Australia will not float. ”

“ It is very difficult for us, who in England count time by centuries, to realize during how very few years Australia has existed for the p. 174white man, and for how still shorter a period Victoria has had a separate existence to New South Wales. Indeed, only in the year 1855 was it declared a State, while but twenty years earlier, in 1835, Melbourne was for the first time occupied by white people. ”

“ VICTORIA, a British colonial state, occupying the south-eastern corner of Australia. Its western boundary is in 140° 58′ E.; on the east it runs out to a point at Cape Howe, in 150° E. long., being thus rudely triangular in shape; the river Murray constitutes nearly the whole of the northern boundary, its most northerly point being in 34° S. lat.; the southern boundary is the coast-line of the Southern Ocean and of Bass Strait, the most southerly point is Wilson’s Promontory in 39° S. lat. The greatest length east and west is about 480 m.; the greatest width, in the west, is about 250 m. ”

“ In Australia I have seen in Victoria a hybrid, though excellent game of their own, but they have had the sense in other parts to fall into line, and are already taking the same high position which they hold in other branches of sport. ”

“ The highest authorities in Australian geography have frequently pointed to the promising rivers which enter the Gulf of Carpentaria, as the certain means of internal communication; and if New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia, would combine together, with the co-operation and vast resources at the command of the mother try, there is but little doubt that such an expedition would lay open the continent across the tropical interior, and a short, practicable way to the north-eastern region. ”

“ Victoria, Queensland, Tasmania and Western Australia were represented at the Council, and such laws as it can pass will thus affect three-fifths of the area of the continent. The absence of South Australia is understood to be accidental. ”

“ As may be imagined, the excitement in Perth and the south-west districts was intense, and it was even thought that Western Australia might emulate the history of Victoria in 1851-6. As news was received from Dr. Lovegrove at Derby, or from returning diggers, of promising finds, the excitement grew with what it fed on, and parties were constantly being formed and going forth. The reports circulated in the Eastern colonies were greatly exaggerated, and men merged to Kimberley from every colony, and even from New Zealand. ”

“ The mother country has a right to something of a share in the bargain.
The argument would be infinitely less strong if the Australians were using Australia. But they are not. The vast Melbourne, of which Victoria is so proud, holds half the population of the colony, and produces little or nothing. Melbourne is the city of brass plates. There are more brass-plates to the acre in the thoroughfares which diverge from Collins Street than could be found in any other city of the world. ”

“ In the year 1860 an ill-fated expedition, equipped at lavish cost and led by Burke and Wills, had started from Melbourne amid the enthusiasm of the citizens to traverse Australia from south to north. When month after month passed and no word came of the explorers, great uneasiness was felt in Victoria, and on June 18th, 1861, it was decided to send out a search party to their relief Of this party Mr. Howitt was appointed leader. ”

“ There are Trade Winds, and there are counter Trades, as we know; and if Australia owes her climate and her fertility to the warm, teeming East, mentally, in the tastes and outlook of her people, she is still altogether Western; so p. 13markedly so, indeed, that, in Melbourne in particular, one is at times seized with the whimsical idea that it has something to do with the roll of the earth, and that we may yet be slid into the very lap of America, ending by being far more completely akin to that democratic country than to the slow-moving, monarchical methods of England. ”