 section 16 personal recollections of early Melbourne and Victoria this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org this reading by Lucy Burgoyne personal recollections of early Melbourne and Victoria by William Westgarth section 16 post script Melbourne 1888 here 50 winters since by Yarrow's stream a scattered Hamlet found its modest place what nine would venture then involved a stream it's wondrous growth and eminence to trace what's here predict a stripling in the race would swift as the lantern win the prize a progress meet the world's astonished eyes J.F. Daniel the jubilee of Melbourne and behold one half of the greatness was not told me second chronicles 9 6 my intended post script on Melbourne as I found it in 1888 has been delayed until I've seen Sydney also so that I have a few words of comparison on the two great capitals of the southern section of our Empire arrival at Hobart allow me first to complete the outward passage I concluded my recollections when still at sea within about a day of our ships destination Hobart the Tasmanian shores gave us a salutation not usually associated with Australia that namely of the snow thickly sprinkled over the southern slopes of the island I'm welcome the scene both is recalling that of home and as giving the promise of the highest of civilization which is Mr. Proud reminds us belongs to the countries where the snow remains on the ground we shortened our course by a few miles in taken the on contrast this channel and where as I understood the first of the large vessels from the other hemisphere to do so we cast anchor of Hobart after nightfall the many bright lights of the city gladdening our eyes while the battle of English tongues from the boats around us reminded us once more that after so many thousands of additional miles since at Cape Town we were still within the British Empire West Teller hotel my first salutation came from an exact namesake of mine Mr. William Wesgarp whom I had known at Melbourne 35 years ago and who after varying fortunes had for the last dozen years been conducting a superior class a boarding house or family hotel it was called West Ella and was situated in Elizabeth Street the chief thoroughfare of Hobart the house I recollected as that of Mr. Henry Hopkins a very early merchant of the city whom I had met more than once between 40 and 50 years ago it was the undisputed palace at the city of its day nor was it disposed even now to bend its head to any second position as my friend conducted our party over the pretty scene of garden and cliff behind the house we found it all wrapped in frost except where the bright morning Sun had struck and we broke the ice quite quarter of an inch thick on a fish pond of the grounds these Tasmanian ascendancy in the civilized world is secured progress of the antipodes already we begun in Hobart and we continued as we went further north to meet with indications of the progress of the age quite a breast of and indeed rather ahead of all that we had been used to at home for instance we were hardly settled comfortably within West Ella when the waiter announced that Mr. Fish that Tasmanian Premier wished to see me I had met Mr. Fish in London and I quite expected that he wished to have a talk with me about Tasmanian finance and loans is he waiting I asked jumping up at once to go to him no sir was the reply that he is speaking to you through the telephone I passed to the telephone room and the signal being sent that I was in attendance I was given two earcaps and told to listen a clear but also a still small voice came up as from the vasty deep whether from the smallness of it or from my being unaccustomed to that mysterious sort of thing I did not catch the words and had to relinquish the business to our hostess miss West Garth and thus a meeting was conveniently arranged Australian features fortunately for us we had arrived in a leisure season in the hotel way so that our host was free to devote himself to us in sightseeing and thus with hardly a day and a half to spare we got a fair idea of Hobart including a drive along the Hewn Road in whose shaded valleys we found as much snow and ice as though we perambulated the Scotch Highlands in January this had been however an exceptionally severe winter on the way to Government House my eyes were once more regaled with the gumtrees in the well accustomed form of open forests the ground being covered with grass on which sheep were dispassuring this is the pleasing characteristic of much of Australian scenery the Tasmanian main line the next day Sunday we had to leave for Lonseston by a special train at the Tasmanian main line so as to be in time for the boat to Melbourne on which we depended for arrival prior to the opening of the great exhibition on 1st August we formed a large and important party including the Governor and Lady the Premier Treasurer and Attorney General while the Auditor General and others were to follow a few days after we understood there was to be a general concourse from all the surrounding colonies and so far as regarded the official contribution to the concourse Tasmania had done its duty while we ran along this the Chief Railway of Tasmania I recalled something at the endless contentions between its proprietors or agents and the Tasmanian government the question requires some study for the literature thereof has already swollen to most inconvenient dimensions and way of it the government would have done best for the colony if they had themselves built the line as matters now stand the company cannot be made to maintain the line in due efficiency because unfortunately it has neither capital nor credit to do so nor can the amount needed for that purpose be permitted to be taken out of earnings because that only increases the guaranteed interest properly payable on the bonded debt of the line by the government nor can the government keep back any of this latter amount because the innocent and helpless bondholders or the company as their advocate are at once down upon them for such atrocity nor lastly can the colony buy up the line and thus be extricated from the mess because the company utterly scouts the idea of a sale at mere valuation the River Tama next day we were steaming down the Tama famous for its beauty as a narrow inlet of the sea from one system downwards rather than properly a river a small boat took us the first 12 miles and we were then transferred to the larger vessel in which we were to cross the straits in the format we were rather crowded for some 25 youths of DeLong we're returning from the football contest with some Tasmanian young folks they kept us lively with songs and recitations in which the praises of DeLong were dutifully mingled I was delighted to see the small DeLong of my early memory turning out in such strength and recalling in a parental way this said small past of the place I might have mourned it in the bless you my children sort of vain had I not been kept in check by the prolix and humor of the boys Port Phillip Harbour two disappointments awaited me on entering the heads of Port Phillip first it was early morn just before daybreak and next when the day did develop upon us halfway up the bay it was in such mist and rain as all but deprived us of any view but the mist and cloud lifted somewhat as we approached Hoppsons Bay and thence I was rushed in to the multitudinous shipping of Williamstown and Port Melbourne the Great Harbour works going on all around the new cut the crowded walls and all the other marvels of modern Melbourne Melbourne here apartments have been provided for us at Scott's Hotel as Menzies in its near neighborhood the more usual place the families was quite full with exhibition visitors but although our hotel had the noise of ceaseless business below we on the floor above were so quiet with the best of attendance and cooking and with every other comfort that we are by choice to return to it after visiting the other colonies here then we opened our campaign amongst old scenes and old friends separated for more than a generation I had to a certain who were dead and who still alive a glance over the city soon revealed to me that one old friend the oldest I might say upon the ground had entirely passed away and that was the old Melbourne itself which I had left behind me more than 31 years before but happily the old street names remained and thus I began to feel again at home old colonists honours labors and honours opened at once the day of my arrival I was to be the guest of the Melbourne Chamber of Commerce for the honour of a dinner to their first president my friend Mr. Cowderoy the secretary had telegraphed me to Hobart in the hope that I might arrive in time to secure the dinner taking place prior to the exhibition opening with all its proposed and grossing after festivities Mr. Robert Reed whose acquaintance I had made at the Grand Colonial Exhibition two years before was now president of the Chamber and received me most quarterly for the following day again there was the opening of the exhibition at which I was to march in the procession through the Avenue of Notions alongside of Mr. Francis Henty now the sole survivor of the illustrious brotherhood who founded Victoria 54 years before so far from anticipating such honours I had been preparing myself to plead on any public occasion that might offer the cause of the early pioneers that although as I proposed to put it we were but the babes and have since been succeeded by the men we were surely to count for something as without the baby there could never have been the man but all fears on that head were promptly dispersed and at every turn honours were poured out upon the old pioneers of the days of small things I had repeatedly to confess for myself as one of them that it was a most pleasant unfortunate accident to have been an early colonist but one disadvantage of these honours and attentions is that they are apt to excite the envy of your fellow mortals human nature even the very best can never be perfect my old friend James Stuart Johnston challenged my right to appear in the grand procession where he and a good half dozen other old colonists had equal rights I replied soothingly regretting that so glorious a band of early warriors who had born nobly all the rough battle of early progress how eloquent people can be in their own praise should not have been super added to honor and adorn the procession but this not satisfying him I was driven to bay and fired my reserve shot to the effect that I was the only old colonist who had come 12,000 miles on purpose to attend the opening that shut him up the suburbs a busy time of public entertainment during the intervals of which I visited energetically persons and places of old association the Melbourne suburbs were quite as surprising as the city itself almost countless miles of streets had taken the place of the country roads or mere bush tracks of my recollection while I stood wondering at these changes I had to regret that the old features had so completely disappeared that I was at home nowhere save that in an otherwise entirely unrecognizable area there would still appear the old name such as the Sydney the Richmond or the two racked road I had to be content with this can't remnant of the past and to begin acquaintance with an entirely new set of occupant streets and dwellings old friends and old times then I turned to the old and early friends of the past some of them kindly called others less able I had myself to seek out thus I met besides Mr. J. S. Johnston already mentioned Mr. J. A. Marsden Mr. Alfred Woolley Mr. E. B. White Mr. Damion Mr. Bra Mr. John Barker Mr. R. W. Shadforth the messes Ham and Dr. Black Mr. Jermaine Nicholson another old and worthy friend was in Sydney where he called for us but we have not yet met I found time to reach Sir William Stahl at his pleasant suburban residence at Q and was most agreeably disappointed to find the veteran head of the law very much more like his former self than report had accredited him another old friend Sir Francis Murphy I have yet failed to meet and also Mr. David Moore Mr. Francis Henty drove us to the Sinkilda Road to pay our respects to Mrs. Edward Henty who pleasantly surprised us with as yet hardly the marks of age and as though fully intending to see at least one generation more of the progress of the great colony which her departed husband had found it Mrs. D. C. MacArthur was still residing at Heidelberg along with her nieces Ms. Wright and Mrs. Wer the widow of my late old and intimate friend Mr. J. B. Wer I salute at the former as the venerable mother of Melbourne society and being thus one of her sons I claimed and exacted the full salutation of sonship I claim the same privilege from my other dear old friend Mrs. A. M. McCray whom I found hardly changed in vigour of mind at least although now 85 years of age almost next door was Mrs. Henry Kreswick daughter of my old friend Dr. Thompson of Jalong of whom is one of the very earliest and only a few months behind Batman himself I have already spoken we enjoyed a chat over the very oldest Victorian times the benevolent asylum I had one opportunity of taking old friends and fellow colonists in a wholesale fashion the committee of the benevolent asylum complimented me by so pressing an invitation to visit an institution which I remembered and was interested in from its first commencement that it was imperative on me to find the time to do so the spectacle was a lot most edifying and most interesting the institution had enormously extended since my time both in its accommodation and the number of its inmates there were nearly 700 men and women all of them helpless and destitute and nearly all passed into old age some who were paralyzed in their lower limbs and unable to move about we're put out in a sheltered place in the sunshine to busy themselves in various ways of their own choosing and we particularly noted two rather pretty young women whose lively expression of face indicated no lack of happiness and whose neat and nimble fingers turned out quantities of daily work there was a considerable section of the blind who were systematically treated and had a library of their own in one of the rooms were two dying men one already past consciousness the other still observant and even lively but not expected to survive the night among so many and such age people this site was too familiar to greatly disturbed the others one of these was understood to be related to an English nobleman and had passed through much adversity of colonial life his face was still singly indicative of the gentleman such cases are by no mean for air in Australian experience our inspection was completed by a view of the kitchen and lada and the interesting spectacle of about 300 of the men engaged together under one roof at dinner everyone whom revel in solid beef to his heart's content included in their number with 12 children who seemed as comfortably at home as any of the others and whose presence perhaps helped to impress a Chinese commissioner who had lately visited the asylum and who had left his record in the visitor's book to the effect that such an institution was an honor to mankind the old Melbourne cemetery the old Flagstaff Hill and the old cemetery were two objects which I sought for on the earliest opportunity and as the business daytime was so full of work I took the early morning the Flagstaff Hill I had soon to give up as quite unrecognizable under new plantations and roadways but the cemetery in its close vicinity was much as I had left it and then the old friends albeit voiceless now cropped up at every turn let me select a few commenting as I go along and beginning with the earliest in date 1841 a series of the well-known early family of the Langhorns some of whose members I often met let me begin with the wife of William Langhorn who died in this far-backed year and end with Alfred who used to amuse us all with interminable stories who had a strikingly beautiful wife and who died in 1874 1846 the beloved wife of Joseph Riley aged 32 years whose funeral I attended to be witnessed to the profound grief of the husband thus prematurely bereft of a wife who was as I recollect a really fine woman even Carlisle's indifference to tombstone literature might tolerate these lines recorded on her monument both for their own high quality and as the eloquent expression of the heart of the bereaved husband they are God to the grave but we will not deploy thee the God was thy ransom thy guardian and guide he gave thee he took thee and he will restore thee and death have no sting for the saviour have died 1846 Alan K. Rennie of Dundee Scotland age 24 a remarkably fine young man who died thus early to the grief of all his friends he was one of the staff of the Union Bank of Australia although the favourite of everyone he retained his unaffected simplicity of manner and character to the last he died of consumption in the house of Mr. Castle who had invited him there when he took ill in order that he might be better attended to Castle James Gill Alfred Ross and myself took the last night of the dying lad in relays of three or four hours each and when the last breath passed from the fine young face Mrs. Castle who stood by with the rest of us and who had nursed him with the fondest mother's care broke out into loud sobs of irrepressible grief we decided upon a broken column as his monument fit emblem of the life so early broken and we settled his brief simple epitaph which mr. Castle grew up erected by his friends in this colony in testimony of esteem and regard 1848 Edmund Charles Hobson MD born 1814 died in his 34th year the monument erected by public subscription commemorates also two sons and one daughter all the family save one thus early carried off for alas the father although a large and well-filled mind was a man a poor health and feeble physique Mrs. Hobson our old friend still survives but is it present in England I have already alluded to the doctor and his high qualities 1850 James Jackson of Turak who died at sea age 47 this was Melbourne's graces merchant of his early time although he died at so early an age his house at Turak or rather the second house which he with his enlarging fortune built there but which he did not live to enjoy was long the finest of the place and serve for some years as the governor's residence it supplies a striking illustration of the sudden needs of the advancing colony after its golden era a prominent Melbourne trader had leased it at 300 pounds a year but in the midterm of the lease a demand suddenly arising in 1854 for a government house for Sir Charles Hobson Turak was sublet at 10,000 pounds a year I recall the early happy Turak home where personal beauty in mother and young children lost its edge by being so common the remaining family are now all in the old country Mrs. Jackson still lives the honoured head of a surrounding of descendants which to me at least have been long past counting 1850 Isabella widow of James Williamson solicitor Edinburgh age 70 this is the lady of whom I have already spoken who gave up six fair daughters to the young settlement in its direst need and who in turn have given to its multiplied sons and daughters 1850 Edward Kerr age 52 in your charity pray for the soul of Edward Kerr of St. Helios this is my old friend the father of separation from New South Wales with whom I marched for years towards attaining that object he was a proud man who with his figure of mind and body grasped his will with a firm hand and was not perhaps of the humor to ask the help or prayers of anyone but his church by and joining the above formula over its dead had its own way of humbling even the proudest whether the great or the small the prince or the peasant I was surprised to find that one who held so commanding a position in our young community should have been at death only 52 he took the chief charge of the separation movement if indeed it did not originate with him but sad to say he died at this too early age just the year before the great object of his later life had been attained in considering this question practically as a merchant my view at the determining principle as to the mutual boundary line was that the natural tendency of the trading whether it took the Sydney or the Melbourne direction should decide that's the hoofs of the bullocks whether they indicated the northerly or the southerly direction would decide the contentious question when I mentioned this point to Kerr who curiously enough had wholly admitted it from a very long list of my reasons for separation he saw it once its importance and in incorporating it in his list remarked that it was worth all the rest put together whenever we sat together afterwards at a separation meeting he would pass me the joke about the hoofs of the bullocks deciding the boundary Sir Robert Robertson has since told us that Melbourne missed its destiny in this fatal separation movement for had she remained within New South Wales she would have been the capital of Eastern Australia well that slap in the face to us is not altogether uncleverly or unfoundedly directed the eventuality that's predicted for us might indeed have happened and we too might have hesitated in our divisive course if we could but have foreseen two things first that the very next year Victoria should produce as much as 15 millions of gold and for some 20 years after between six and 12 millions yearly and second that our mother Sydney who had completely the whip hand over us at the time would have permitted us to use all our great resources in order to place ourselves at her expense the first in the race 1853 the Honourable James Horatio Nelson Castle HM Commissioner of Customs member of the Executive Council of Victoria born 18 14 39 years of age I have already had to mention repeatedly one of my very best and most intimate friends he died in November 1853 while I was upon a home visit he left a message for me that he looked forward to resuming our most pleasant friendship in heaven what a reality of voice has this hope when it comes us from the brink of the grave what a strength of resistance to that tendency of modern science which as interpreted by some even of its greatest chiefs is to abolish the hope of the life beyond the grave and to class us all with the beasts that perish the Melbourne races those who delight in contrasts may follow me now to the Melbourne races although not in any sense or degree a racing man I could not forgo this spectacle so illustrative of the socialities of general progress of the colonists this was a considerable occasion as there were about 70,000 present but it was not the grand cup day an occasion which can muster 150,000 the grandstand here seemed to me from my recollection equal to Epsom and as got together the racing was in admirable style the horses generally taking hurdles and steeples without visible hitch in their pace I used to have a racing theory which was confirmed here namely that the horse should never be allowed ahead or at least for more than a yard or two till close on the finish because he thus loses the highest of the excitement and is more amendable to fatigue in one splendid race of a dozen or more on this occasion one man who came in far ahead at the first round I predicted was to lose the race and so it proved for at the second and final round he came in only sixth or seventh the honour of the railway free pass 16 days of Melbourne life had pleasantly glided away and we must needs be off because we had the rest of Australasia to see and a very brief term for accomplishing so great a business honors had been heaped upon us how we are to take it when we tumble once more to the common level at home I hardly know or like to think about one of the most gratifying of these honors was the railway free pass which Tasmania first sent us followed by Victoria South Australia New South Wales and Queensland later on I was accorded through Mr. Libby to Shays kind agency the golden key or pass over the Victorian lines for life which I was assured was my due as one of the original members of the first Victorian Parliament from my old friend of nearly 40 years standing Sir Henry Parks I had a courteous note to the effect that our railway comfort should be looked after so soon as we cross the frontier the honor of these things is by infinity greater than the mere saving of money this is to be literally the case for our daughter is already counting up these savings with the intention of claiming them for kangaroo and opossum cloaks and rugs end of section 16 section 17 personal recollections of early Melbourne and Victoria this is a Libra Vox recording all Libra Vox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit Libra Vox.org this reading by Lucy Burgoyne personal recollections of early Melbourne and Victoria by William Wesker section 17 Albury we took the day train to Albury instead of the through-night mail so as to see Victoria and have a few hours to spare to see Albury and its great wine business we paid our respects to the mayor of Albury Mr. Mate who with Mr. Thompson his son-in-all showed us much attention and we also inspected Mr. Fallon's great wine vaults and tasted some excellent wine including the pale delicate tokay Albury with its population of 8,000 reminded me of Melbourne about 1845 there was an air of comfort and prosperity all about and a leisurely way of it which contrasted pleasantly with the hurry and bustle of larger places the bracing cold once more transferring ourselves now to the night mail and awaking with the broad daylight of a sunny morning between yes and golden we looked out upon a country or white with whole frost while our carriage windows had an inside coating of ice this recalled an inspiring discussion at the chamber of commerce dinner a fortnight before on my introducing the question of the snow and the highest civilization it symbolized i had said that victoria as well as Tasmania presented the significant snow mr. service the leader of the federation movement alike intercolonial and imperial corrected me by substituting australian for victorian snow that mr. mcdonald paterson of queensland extended the snow line well over even northern new south wales as he told us of a heavy snowstorm he had encountered when traveling south from brisbane and which lay so thickly upon the ground as to tempt the passengers to a vigorous snowballing which latterly concentrated upon the railway guard the he's grudging attempt to end the sport by ringing his signal bell but this snow and coal however favorable to ultimate civilization were by no means a pleasure just at the moment and i had to put on the very warmest clothing i ever heaped upon me in an english or scotch winter nor did i escape a severe cold with all which is only now disappearing under the genial influence of the barmy air of queensland which now as i write comes to us off the land towards the end of our voyage from sydney to brisbane 19th to 21st august we are just passing the south queensland boundary at 30 degrees latitude and as a few more hours will land us admits troops of new friends at brisbane i expedite my work fearing that as at melbourne a brief space of time will be otherwise occupied melbourne and sydney having just seen sydney as well as melbourne i feel bound to give my impressions of both which will i think be best and most briefly done in the form of a comparative sketch i must premise with the remark that the great extent of both cities the great and solid basis of trade on which they appear to rest and above all the quick and ready step with which they apply to practical purposes the progress mechanical or scientific of our age are beyond anything i had expected to meet with well prepared as i had previously been upon the subject thus the electric light electric bells and other electric uses the telephone and the lift system all seem to me in more general use than in london and our larger home cities the lift for instance is as the rule in every bank or other large institution for the use of the staff or customers or visitors it is certainly as yet the rare exception in such cases in london the sydney press in sydney i was first met by my old and esteemed friend the honorable george elford lord who besides many other attentions took me to sir henry parks with whom i enjoyed some interesting political and financial conversation i afterwards met the honorable mr burns the treasurer and discussed with him the prospects for consolidated australian three percents a prospect which as he said he feared might be still far off owing to the perverse fancy of the other colonies to enter upon special protective systems of their own which after being established they or the interests protected might not be disposed to give up even for the sake of a federated australia next we call for one of our fellow passengers percoptic mr sydney at the grand offices of the evening news and the town and country journal for one or other of which he had been editorially engaged this happily led to our introduction to the proprietor mr benet and to our being shown the wonders of the press of our southern empire and here again i had to notice that all the latest steps of progress are taken up so promptly and so thoroughly the time of our visit was between one and two o'clock and the work of throwing off the evening news of that day had begun the machines we were told embodied the very latest improvements and when we alluded to that of the august just then being fitted up with every latest appliance at the melbourne exhibition mr benet assured us that the machinery before us comprised them all we saw first the stereotyping process by which copies of the one type setting of the paper can be multiplied indefinitely then three machines were set in action delivering 10 000 copies each per hour a fourth machine was added shortly after which delivered somewhat more and this latter appeared to us the exact counterpart of the august machine as already seen by us in london i recall a joke of many years back when mechanical contrivance was attracting much general attention and arousing great hopes to the effect that a sheep would someday enter the machine of the future at one end and be delivered at the other as really cooked food and broad cloth what we saw was not a wit less wonderful the great role of paper unrolled itself into one end of the machine and even more quickly than one could war the half dozen yards of distance it emerged in separate papers dropped as i said a 10 to 12 000 an hour printed folded cut and numbered to the dispersing hand which received them the circulation at the evening news is 60 000 daily that of the age as i learned on arrival at melbourne has now advanced in its inspiring career to 76 000 these are the papers of greatest circulation in the southern hemisphere such as already the press of infant hercules of australia another stirring site next greeted our eyes earlier we quitted the evening news office namely the crowd of eager little news boys waiting for their trade stock pressing to the small open window where their tiny sums were paid to the cashier they received their check and forthwith proceeded to the fountains which were dropping out their supplies at the rate of four copies per second all ready for delivery they received 12 of the penny papers for nine pence these poor little fellows would begin perhaps with nine pence as all their capital they get their dozen papers and if smart sell them possibly in not many more minutes then they are back with their increased capital and so by quick degrees they get to be quite large dealers we saw one little fellow already a great capitalist in his way with a load of papers which one would have thought he could hardly carry but which nevertheless he managed with well practiced a draughtness comparison of the two capitals if comparisons are proverbly odious they must be especially so withdrawn out upon insufficient data i must not therefore on such a flying inspection go very deeply into my comparative analysis and yet under all the circumstances the subject is one for which i feel not altogether incompetent to begin with i had not perhaps sufficient time in failing a note any material difference of physique due to the difference of latitude melbourne having the cooler temperature by four to five degrees of Fahrenheit Tasmania and southern New Zealand give notably the ruddy clumpness of the English face conversing with a young friend who was interested in football he remarked that latitude is important in a game which was mainly one of muscular strength that's speaking generally Hobart will beat melbourne melbourne sydney and sydney brisbane but what as to New Zealand i said New Zealand he replied will square with england and the southern island may beat her the tide of general business in either city seemed to me equal but the streets and the public and business buildings of sydney were scarcely equal either in number or style to those of melbourne at least if the great edifices and other works of the latter either just being finished or in progress of erection be considered the melbourne harbour is conspicuously one of these and will surpass the life that of sydney and those of most of the rest of the world on the other hand however the grand natural harbourage of port jackson not to dwell upon its surpassing scenic beauty gives to sydney a most decided economic advantage for all time melbourne has two obvious superiorities first in the systematic laying out of the streets and second in the more conveniently level of sight thus no sydney street can compare with culland street where even the moderate rise of the eastern and western hills still adds to the commanding effect of the whole line the melbourne streets tram system is also greatly superior to that of sydney and seems indeed to have attained to all that is possible in that direction in point of population melbourne continues ahead having with the suburbs about 400 000 while sydney has about 350 000 on the other hand new south wales has rather the advantage over victoria in the total population as well as in the amount of external commerce having lately in these respects overtaken her younger sister after the latter had clean distance her senior for a whole generation by help of the surpassing gold production the populations are now about 1 million 50 000 respectively the rival race in estimating the future of these two great colonies and their respective capitals i will endeavour to mark some distinctive considerations unquestionably the climate difference although it may not be serious it is in favour of victoria for the english race of both colonies and for english industries then again we have this ever-recurring Australian drought from which victoria does not indeed always or altogether escape but to which with their cooler seagirt shores she is certainly less liable than her sister colonies including new south wales even now as i sail along the northern shores of the latter and along southern queensland the severe drought which has prevailed for the past six months is indicated by the ascending smoke the bushfires in every direction while victoria as i left it was in universal green from the sufficiency of rain lastly there is the disputable question as to how the much wider area of new south wales than victoria bears upon the question is that a help to her or a drag with the present scant population to either the advantage seems to me with victoria compact as she is and full of fertile land 50 years hence when the population of each has passed from 1 million to 10 millions and when a system of irrigation has fertilized the large proportion of now sterile areas of the larger colony the latter will assert her presence and perhaps easily pass her rival but for the present she is rather handicapped than otherwise by her distances granting that she has threw out as many rich acres as victoria still she is for the time being under the disadvantage of having to draw her resources from greater distances from an average say of more than 300 miles to victoria's 100 against this collective relative handicapping in her race new south wales has happily still to oppose her good fortune in having adored as yet to the impartial freedom of exchange for the labor products of all her workers while victoria has restricted that freedom and has consequently by so much reduced that product by her protective enactments let me try to estimate this most important matter victoria has seen fit to protect certain interests agricultural and manufacturing at the expense of the whole of her public happily for her the agricultural protection is probably almost if not indeed altogether inoperative as the climate and the soil of the country and the bigger of her people give to her independently the natural lead in agricultural products but the manufacturing protection is confessedly effective so that the manufacturers would not be forthcoming without the extra price of protection let us average this protection at 25 percent and let us further suppose that one fifth of all the people's requirements are thus extra charged this means that the victorian public are made to pay in the proportion of 125 pounds for a class of their daily requisites which the new south wales public by virtue of their freedom of exchange for all the products of their labor can secure for a hundred pounds and that this very considerably enhanced cost affects as much as the one fifth part of all those requisites victoria and the vigorous life which peoples her will in any case ever present a spectacle of surprising progress but if she is mated in a race in which while the two rivals are otherwise equal she is just restricted in labor output by protection while the other keeps herself free she is assuredly to be beaten in that race as if on her grand flemington race course she were the seriously handicapped horse of a noble pair admitted to be otherwise equal post post script brisbane 22nd august my publisher affords me just time to record my arrival yesterday at the capital of the youthful but already great Queensland and to give some opinions of the place after a glance which is however of necessity so cursory brisbane is to me not less astonishing than either sydney or melbourne from the adjacent heights of mount cooter i looked over several square miles mostly of thickly compacted streets and dwellings comprising a town and connected suburbs of 75 000 busy people while the suburban houses are chiefly of wood the town proper already in some respects fairly rivals at senior sisters of the south thus queen street in its general architectural aspect and in the tide of business life which it presents is that little short of the cheap streets of these other cities while the structures of two of the Queensland banks the Queensland national and the london chartered of Australia together with those of the australian mutual provident society and of the stores of messes d l brown and co messes stewart and hem and and mrs scott dorsen and stewart seemed to me quite equal to anything of the kind respectfully which i had met with since my arrival indeed i am prepared to congratulate my friend mr dreary at the head of the former of these banks upon an edifice which in graces of structure as well as in mere dimensions seems to me to surpass all rivalry the bank of england the highly conservative old lady a thread needle street on the recent occasion of negotiating yet one more large queen slain loan broadly hinted to her go ahead client that her burrowing must for a time at least be more restricted i do not deny the wisdom of this advice for truly all australian burrowing has been utterly outside of all principle and precedent that while the home public is preoccupied with these colonies great debts my visit here has diverted the leading idea rather to the solid and expansive basis of trade and prosperity which i see around me i have not yet seen south australia or new zealand but from what already reaches my ears i have no reason to expect that my account of either colony is to differ materially if at all from that of the others the ready facility to incur debt on behalf of colonial progress is due as it seems to me rather to consciousness of strength than to indifference about financial obligation each colony will pay with equal certainty and promptitude although a new south wales or a victoria may do so with less strain than their sisters end of section 17 end of personal recollections of early melbourne and victoria by william weska