Australian Life in Town and Country

^v AUSTRALIAN LIFE IN TOWN ® COUNTRY E.G. BULEY «^5e»'I c^>->a: AV TT'^ Digitized by tiie Internet Arciiive in 2007 witii funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation littp://www.arcliive.org/details/australianlifeinOObuleuoft OUR ASIATIC NEIGHBOURS Indian Life. By Herbert Compton Japanese Life, By George W. Knox Chinese Life. By E. Bard Philippine Life. By James A. Le Roy Australian Life. OUR ASIATIC NEIGHBOURS AUSTRALIAN LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY HYDRAULIC MINING, THE WALLON BORE, MOREE DISTRICT. DEPTH 3695 FEET, FLOW 800,000 GALS., TEMP. 114° F. & fe AUSTRALIAN LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY c2S a« By E. C. BULEY ILLUSTRATED G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS NEW YORK AND LONDON Zbe 'Knfclietbocltei: press 1905 Copyright, 1905 BY G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS •Cbe "Rnlcftetbocftcr presa, Hew IPorft CONTENTS CHAPTER I PAGE Country and Cwmate i CHAPTER II Squatters and Stations 14 CHAPTER III Station Work 28 CHAPTER IV On a SeIvECTion 42 CHAPTER V The Never-Never IvAND 55 CHAPTER VI On the WaIvIvAby Track 69 CHAPTER VII In Time oe Drought 81 V vi Contents CHAPTER VIII PAGE Urban Austrawa 95 CHAPTER IX I^iFE IN THE Cities io8 CHAPTER X State Sociai,ism and the Labour Party . 122 CHAPTER XI Golden Australia 134 CHAPTER XII Farm and Factory 145 CHAPTER XIII The Australian Woman 157 CHAPTER XIV Home and Social Life 169 CHAPTER XV The Australian at Play 182 CHAPTER XVI The Aborigines 195 CHAPTER XVII A White Australia 208 Contents vii CHAPTER XVIII PAGE Education, Literature, and Art . 220 CHAPTER XIX Nationai, Life in Austrawa . .232 CHAPTER XX The Austrawan 245 CHAPTER XXI Industrial, Pioneers 258 CHAPTER XXII Australia's Destiny 270 Index 283 ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE Hydrauwc Mining, tkb Wai,i.on Bore, Moree District, Depth 3695 Feet, Flow 800,000 GAI.S., Temp. 114° F. Frontispiece Head oe Freshwater River, Nationai, Park 16 Mount Victoria Pass, New South WaIvES . 28 (Courtesy of Marselis C. Parsons, Esq., New York.) State Nursery near Cairns .... 46 A Miner's Hut, IvIThgow Vai.i,ey, New South Wai.es 54 Broken Hii,i, Sii^ver Mines, New South Wai.es 64 Road Scene on the Camberwarra Mountain, SH0A1.HAVEN District 86 (Courtesy of Marselis C. Parsons, Esq., New York.) S1.UICING FOR Goi,D AT Freshwater . 104 CATTI.E Crossing, Nepean Towers, New South Wai.es 120 (Courtesy of Marselis C. Parsons, Esq., New York.) Hannan Street, Looking West, Kai.goori,ic, IN 1895 140 ix X Illustrations PAGE Hannan Street, Kai^gooruc, in 1905 . 144 View op a Queensland Seaport Town, Towns- vii,i<E 156 P1.ANTING Sugar-Cane, Queensi,and . .170 AT Work amongst the Cane . .182 View of Harti^ey Vai,e 202 CCourtesy of MarselisC. Parsons, Esq., New York.) Scene at a Wayside Inn, New South Waives 224 AUSTRALIAN LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY AUSTRALIAN LIFE IN TOWN AND COUNTRY CHAPTER I COUNTRY AND ClylMATB IT has often been claimed for the British that they are a successful colonising people, and this claim has not been advanced without very sufficient grounds. Those who assign this characteristic to the race imply that it possesses, above all things, the faculty of adaptability. If the colonising Briton were not able to suit himself readily to the necessities and the climatic conditions of his new environment, he would not be a success as a colonist. It is further characteristic of the Briton that, until very recently, he has not been disposed to exhibit any satisfaction in his colonising feats. His attitude in the past has been that of a father of a family of young children, who re- gards each new arrival as a source of additional expense and responsibility. 2 Australian Life In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, however, a new era was inaugurated, when the importance of the many colonies Great Britain has planted in America, Africa, and Australasia was at last recognised. The problems of colonial life are now engaging the attention of the most thoughtful of British statesmen and public offi- cials, and the study of colonial affairs has already shown that in each of the great British colonies different circumstances are producing an entirely separate type of over-sea Briton. It is well that this fact should be recognised, if the fabric of Empire now being created is ever to be made complete. In a new country, events move with a rapidity bewildering to those born and brought up under settled and accepted conditions. Ten years served to convert Australia from a collection of separate provinces into a na- tion. Not very long ago it was the custom to write of the Australian as an exiled Briton, who jealously maintained British customs and traditions in his new environment, and always spoke of the British Isles as "home." Observers who obtained their information concerning Australia during visits paid to the chief Australian cities, or while enjoying the delightful hospitality of some large and prosperous Australian station, were induced to regard this as an established state of affairs, rather than an interesting phase in the development of a new community. They lost sight of the fact that a native-born race was grow- Country and Climate 3 ing up, to whom many of the British customs would be traditions instead of things remembered with sentimental pleasure, and that to the suc- ceeding generation even the traditions would be lost. For instance, the Englishman born celebrated Christmas Day in Australia in the good old-fash- ioned style, with a smoking hot joint, and an abundance of rich puddings and pies. His Aus- tralian-born son in many cases maintained the custom, although fully alive to the absurdity of such fare at a season when the thermometer stands at more than one hundred in the shade. The present-day Australian may often be found spend- ing his Christmas Day in some shady fern-tree gully, clad in the easiest of clothes, and with everything as cool as it is possible to be made. The Australian climate renders the English Christmas festivities practically impossible. In the same way many other customs carried from Great Britain to Australia by the pioneers of the new race have been modified by conditions against which the first-comers struggled, but which their grandchildren accept as part of their everyday life. For this reason, any one seeking to make ac- quaintance with the Australian Hfe of the present day must bear in mind that it has essentially changed during the past twenty years, and that in another quarter of a century it will probably have advanced yet another stage in its evolution. The chief factors conducing: to this evolution are 4 Australian Life the nature of the Australian continent itself, its isolation in the Southern seas, its climate, and the peculiar conditions under which it was colonised. It is necessary to conceive of Australia not as a colony containing a population equal to little more than one half the number of inhabitants of the city of I/)ndon, but as an immense continent, three million square miles in extent. Compared to other continents, which have their coast lines indented by huge gulfs, and which push great peninsulas out into the ocean, Australia is a sin- gularly solid piece of land. As a matter of fact, its coast line is smaller in proportion to its area than that of any other continent. The physical con- tour of the continent is remarkable for the same monotony. Its surface is, broadly speaking, a graduated system of immense plateaux and plains. The one striking feature in Australian orography is a strip of highland running from north to south along the eastern coast. These highlands, which separate the coastal plains and valleys from the immense level interior of the continent, bear the general name of the Dividing Range. In the south-eastern corner of Australia, this range bends westward, traversing the whole state of Victoria and ending near the eastern border of South Aus- tralia. It is in the south-eastern corner that the Dividing Range attains its greatest altitude, sev- eral peaks of the Australian Alps being over seven thousand feet in height. The eastern portion of Australia consists, then, Country and Climate 5 first, of a coastal strip, backed by a mountain range, beyond which a plateau gradually declines to the low-lying central plains. The western di- vision of Australia, a large part of which is still practically unknown country, may also be de- scribed as a low plateau, broken here and there by well-marked mountain ranges of no great height. Considerable prominence has been given to the position and character of the Dividing Range, be- cause of its influence upon the climate of Australia. The chief rain-bearing winds, blowing from the eastward and meeting these highlands, provide tHe coastal districts with a plentiful rainfall. Be- yond them the rainfall is scanty and irregular, growing less in proportion to the distance from the eastern coast. Hence the interior of Australia suffers from dryness. The average rainfall of more than half the continent is less than twenty inches a year, and for the greater part of this area an annual rainfall of ten inches and under is cus- tomary in ordinary seasons. As the evaporation caused by the sun's heat is very great in Central AustraHa, it is obvious that the normal condition of the soil there must be one of extreme aridity. The Dividing Range is naturally the main watershed of the continent. The rivers flowing to the eastern coast are necessarily short, but some of them are of considerable volume and depth.

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