 Section 16 of the Ladies' Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia. We soon left Port Phillip far behind, and in a few days saw nothing but a vast expanse of water all around us. Our vessel was filled with returning diggers, and it is worthwhile to remark that only two had been unsuccessful, and these had only been at the diggings a few days. One family on board interested me very much, and consisted of father, mother, and two children. The eldest, a little girl, had been born some time before they had left England. Her brother was a sturdy fellow of two years old, born in the colonies soon after their arrival. He could just huddle about the deck, where he was everlastingly looking for dole and nuggets. The whole family had been at the diggings for nine months, and were returning with something more than £2,000 worth of gold. In England it had been hard work to obtain sufficient food for the most constant labour. They had good reason to be thankful for the discovery of the gold fields. Saturday, November 27, was 48 hours long, or two days of the same name and date. Sailing right round the world in the direction of from west to east, we gained exactly 24 hours upon those who stay at home. And we were therefore obliged to make one day double to prevent finding ourselves wrong in our dates and days on our arrival in England. Melbourne is about 10 hours before London, and therefore night and day are reversed. Rapidly it became cooler, for the winds were rather contrary, and drove us much farther south than was needed. We were glad to avail ourselves of our opossum rugs to keep ourselves warm. One of these rugs is quite sufficient covering overnight in the coldest weather, and in parts as much heat as a dozen blankets. They are made from the skins of the opossums, sewn together by the natives with the sinews of the same animal. Each skin is about 12 inches by 8 or smaller, and as the rugs are generally very large, they contain sometimes as many as 80 skins. They may be tastefully arranged, as there is a great difference in the colours, some being like a rich sable, others nearly black, and others again over grey and light brown. The fur is long and silky. At one time a rug of this description was cheap enough, perhaps as much as two sovereigns, but the great demand of them by diggers, etc., has made them much more scarce, and it now requires a 10-pound note to get a good one. The best come from Van Diemen's land. In summer they are disagreeable, as they harbour insects. However, whilst rounding Cape Horn in the coldest weather I ever experienced, we were only too happy to throw them over us during the nights. One morning we were awakened by great confusion on deck. Our ship was plowing through a quantity of broken ice. That same afternoon we sighted an immense iceberg about 10 miles from us. Its size may be imagined from the fact that although we were sailing at a rate of 10 knots an hour, we kept it in sight till dark. This was on the 3rd of December. We soon rounded the horn and had some very rough weather. One of the sailors fell off the jib boom and the cry of a man overboard made our hearts beat with horror. Every sail was on. We were running right before the wind and the waves were mountains high. A boat must have been swamped and long before we could boat ship he had sunk to rise no more. After rounding Cape Horn we made rapid progress. By Christmas Day we were in the tropics. It was not kept with much joe-vilty. The water and food were running scarce. Provisions were so dear in Melbourne that they had laid in a short allowance of everything and our captain had not anticipated half so many passengers. We tried therefore to put into St Helena. The contrary winds prevented us. We sailed back again to the South American coast and anchored off Pernambuco. It was providential that economical intentions made our captain prefer this port. But had we touched at Rio we should have encountered the yellow fever which we afterwards heard was raging there. Pernambuco is apparently a very pretty place. We were anchored about four miles from the town so had a good view of the coast. I longed to be on shore to ramble beneath the elegant coconut trees. The weather was intensely hot for it was in the commencement of January and the boats full of fruit sent from the shore for sail were soon emptied by us. I called them boats but they are properly termed catamarans. They are made of logs of wood lashed securely together. They have a sail and oars but no sides so the water rushes over and threatens every moment to engulf the frail conveyance. But no the wood is too light for that. The fruits brought us from shore were oranges, pineapples, watermelons, limes, bananas, coconuts etc and some yams which were a good substitute for potatoes. The fruit was all very good and astonishingly cheap. Our oranges being green lasted till we reached England. Some of our passengers went on shore and returned with marvellous accounts of the dirtiness and narrowness of the streets and the extremely natural costume of the natives. We remained here about four days and then with favourable winds pursued our voyage at an average rate of 10 or 12 knots an hour. As we near the English coast our excitement increased to an awful height and for those who had been many years away I can imagine every trivial delay was fraught with anxiety. But we come in sight of land and in spite of the cold weather for it is now February 1853 everyone rushes to the deck. On we go at last we are in the downs and then the wind turned right against us. Boats were put off from the deal beach. The boatmen were rightly calculated that lucky gold diggers wouldn't mind paying a pound apiece to get ashore so they charged that and got plenty of customers notwithstanding. On Sunday the 27th of February I gained set foot on my native land. It was evening when we reached the shore and there was only an open vehicle to convey us to the town of Deal itself. The evening was bitterly cold and the snow lay upon the ground as we proceeded along the sands of the Sabbath bell broke softly on the air. No greeting could have been more pleasing or more congenial to my feelings. End of section 16 Section 17 of a lady's visit to the gold diggings of Australia. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. A lady's visit to the gold diggings of Australia by Ellen Casey. Section 17. Conclusion As I trust that in the foregoing pages I have slightly interested my readers in our party. The following additional account of their movements containing letters addressed to me by my brother may not be quite uninteresting. The oven's diggings are on the river of the same name which takes its rise in the Australian Alps and flows into the Murray. As these Alps separate New South Wales from Victoria these diggings belong to the latter province. They are about 40 miles from the town of Albury. They are spread over a large base of ground. The principal locality thus bring and reads Creek. Now for the letters. Melbourne, January the 5th, 1853 My Dear E You'll be surprised at the heading of this but the ovens are not to my taste and I'm off again with Frank and Octavius to Bendigo tomorrow. I suppose you'd like to hear of our adventures up to the ovens and the reasons for this sudden change of plans. We left Melbourne the Monday after you sailed and camped out halfway to Kilmore a little beyond the lady of the lake. The day was fine but the dust made us wretched. Next day we reached Kilmore, stopped there all night. Next day I went again and the further we went the more uncivilised it became. Hills here, forests there as wild and savage as anyone could desire. It was bushing it with a vengeance. This lasted several days. Once we lost our road and came by good luck to a sort of station. They received this very hospitably and set us right next morning. Four days after we came to the Golden River. There was a punt to take us over and a host of people many from Bendigo waiting to cross. Three days after we pitched our tents at the ovens. Here I soon saw it was no go. There was too much water and too little gold and even if they could knock the first difficulty on the head I don't think they could do the same to the second. In my own mind I think it impossible that the ovens will ever turn out the second Bendigo that many imagine. Hundreds differ from me therefore it's hundreds to one that I'm wrong. The average wages as far as I can judge are an ounce a week some much more many much less. We did not attempt digging ourself Eaglehawk shallowness as sportive. For not even Octavius, who you know of old was a harder worker than either Frank or self thinks it's worth digging through 14 or 16 feet of hard clay for the mere pleasure of exercising our limbs. Provisions there were not at the high price that many suppose they would be but quite high enough heaven knows. Meat was very scarce and bad and flour all but a shilling a pound and if the fresh arrivals keep flocking in and no greater supply of food it will get higher still. We stayed there two weeks then bought our tray back again and are now busy getting ready for a fresh dart to Bendigo. Among other things we shall take are lemonade and ginger beer powders a profitable investment though laughable. The weather is very hot fancy 103 degrees in the shade water is getting scarce. Have seen all our friends in Melbourne except Richard who left for England a fortnight ago. Jesse as well and growing quite pretty. She says she is extremely happy and sends such a number of messages to you that I'll write none for fear of making a mistake. We'll write again soon. Your affectionate brother in haste. Melbourne April the 17th 1853. My dear E. I suppose you've thought I was buried in my hole or killed by bush rangers in the black forest. But I've been so occupied with the worship of man as to have little thoughts for anything else. We made a good thing of our last two speculations ginger beer and lemonade or lemon-carly at six months a tiny glass paid well. A successful deer would drink off a dozen one after another. Some days we have taken ten pounds in six pence at this fun. What they bought of us wouldn't harm them but many mix up all sorts of injurious articles to sell. But our consciences thank God are not colonised sufficiently for that. We have had steady good luck in the digging line for we combine everything and after this next trip mean to dissolve partnership. Obtavious talks of going out as overseer or something of that sort to some squatter in New South Wales for a year or so just to learn the system etc. and then if possible take a sheep run himself. Frank means to send for Mrs. Frank and Small Co. He says you shall stay in Victoria for some years. I do believe he likes the colony. As for myself I hope to see the last of it in six weeks time. Hurrah for Old England, no place like it. You're very affectionate brother. With a cordial assent to the last few words I conclude these pages. End of section 17 Section 18 Have a ladies visit to the gold diggings of Australia. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org A ladies visit to the gold diggings of Australia by Alan Clancy. Section 18 Appendix Who Should Immigrate The question of who should immigrate has now become one of such importance owing to the number who are desirous in their native land to seek assurer means of subsidence in our vast colonial possessions that any book creating of Australia would be sadly deficient were a subject of such universal interest to be left unnoticed and where there are so many of various capabilities means and dispositions in need of guidance and advice as to the advantage of their immigrating. It is probable that the experience of any one however slight that experience may be will be useful to some. Anyone to succeed in the colonies must take with him a quantity of self-reliance, energy and perseverance. This is the best capital a man can have. Let none rely upon introductions. They are but useless things at the best. They may get you invited to a good dinner but now that fresh arrivals in Melbourne are so much more numerous than here to fall I almost doubt if they would do even that. A quick clever fella with a trade of his own endued to labour and with a light heart that can laugh at many privations which the gypsy sort of life he must lead in the colonies will entail upon him. Any one of this description cannot fail to get on but for the number of clerks, shopmen etc. who daily arrive in Australia there is a worse chance of their gaining a livelihood than if they had remained at home. With this description of labour the colony market is largely overstopped and it is distressing to notice the number of young men incapable of severe manual labour who with delicate health and probably still more delicately filled purses swarm the towns in search of employment and are exposed to heavy expenses which they can earn nothing to meet. Such men have rarely been successful at the diggings. The demand for them in their accustomed pursuits is very limited in proportion to their numbers. They gradually sink into extreme poverty too often into reckless or criminal habits till they disappear from the streets to make way for others similarly unfortunate. A little while since I met with the histories of two individuals belonging to two very different classes of immigrants and they are so applicable to this subject that I cannot forbear repeating them. The first account is that of a gentleman who went to Melbourne some eight months ago carrying with him a stock of elegant acquirements and accomplishments but little capital. He is now in a starving condition almost without the hope of extrication and is imploring from his friends the means to return to England if he lived long enough to receive them. The colours in which he paints the colonies are plurable in the extreme. The other account is that of a compositor who immigrated much about the same time. He writes to his former office mates that he got immediate and constant employment at the rate of seven pounds per week and naturally thinks that there is no place under the sun like Melbourne. Both immigrants are right. There is no better place under the sun than Melbourne for those who can do precisely what the Melbourne people want and which they must and will have at any price but there is no worse colony to which those can go who have not the capabilities required by the Melbourne people. They are useless and in the way their accomplishments are disregarded. Their misfortunes receive no pity and whilst a good carpenter or bricklayer would make a fortune a modern Raphael might starve. But even those possessed of every qualification for making first class colonists will at first meet with much to surprise and annoy them and will need all the energy they possess to enable them to overcome the many disagreeables which encounter them as soon as they arrive. Let us, for example, suppose the case of an immigrant with no particular profession or business but having a strong constitution good common sense and a determination to bear up against every hardship so that in the end it leads him to independence. Let us follow him through the difficulties that bewildered the stranger in Melbourne during the first few days of his arrival. The commencement of his dilemmas will be that of getting his luggage from the ship and so quickly do the demands for pounds and shillings fall upon him that he is ready to wish he had pitched up his traps overboard. However, we will suppose him at length safely landed on the wharf at Melbourne and all his boxes beside him. He inquires for a store and learns that there are plenty close at hand and then forgetting that he is in the colonies he looks round for a porter and truck and looks in vain. After waiting as patiently as he can for about a couple of hours he manages to hire an empty cart and driver. The latter lifts the boxes into the conveyance expecting, of course, his employer to lend a hand smacks his whip and turns down street after street till he reaches a tall grim looking building in front of which he stops with a, that's her a store and a demand for a sovereign more or less. This settle he coolly requests the immigrant to assist him in unloading and leaves him to get his boxes carried inside as best he can. Perhaps some of the storekeeper's men come to the rescue and with their help the luggage is conveyed into the storeroom which is often 60 or 80 feet in length where the owner receives a memorandum of their arrival. Boxes or parcels may remain there in perfect safety for months so long as a shilling a week is paid for each. Our immigrant having left his property in security now turns to seek a lodging for himself and the extreme difficulty of procuring house accommodation with its natural consequences an extraordinary rate of rent startles and amazes him. He searches the city in vain and but takes himself to the suburbs where he procures a small half furnished room in a wooden house for 30 shillings a week. The scarcity of house in proportion to the population is one of the greatest drawbacks to the colony but we could not expect it to be otherwise when we remember that in one year Victoria received an addition of nearly 80,000 inhabitants. The masculine portion of these immigrants with few exceptions started off at once to the diggings hence the deficiency in the labour market is only partially filled up by the few who remain behind and by the fewer still who forsake the gold fields whilst the abundance of money and the deficiency of good workmen have raised the expenses of building far above the point at which it would be a profitable investment for capital. Meantime the want is only partially supplied by the wooden cottages which are daily springing up around the boundaries of the city but this is insufficient to meet the increasing want of shelter and on the southern bank of the Yarra there are four or five thousand people living in tents. This settlement is appropriately called Canvas Town but let us return to our newly arrived immigrant. Having succeeded in obtaining a lodging he proceeds to purchase some necessary articles of food and looks incredulously at the shopkeeper when told the butter is three shillings and sixpence a pound cheese, ham or bacon two shillings to two shillings sixpence and eggs, four shillings or five shillings a dozen. He wisely dispenses with such luxuries and contents himself with bread at one shillings and sixpence the four pound loaf and meat at five pence a pound. He sleeps soundly for the day has been a fatiguing one and next morning with renewed spirits determines to search immediately for employment. He does not much care what it is at first so that he earns something for his purse feels considerably lighter after the many demands upon it yesterday. Before an hour is over he finds himself engaged to a storekeeper at a rate of three pounds a week his business being to load and unload trays, roll casks, lift heavy goods etc and here we will leave him for one sec going he will soon find a better birth if he have capital it is doubtless safely deposited in the bank until a little acquaintance with the colonies enables him to invest it judiciously and meanwhile if wise he will spend every shilling as though it were his last but if his capital consists only of the trifle in his purse no matter the way he is setting to work will soon rectify that deficiency and he stands a good chance in a few years of returning to England a comparatively wealthy man. To those of my own sex who desire to emigrate to Australia I say do so by all means if you can go under suitable protection possess good help and not fastidious or fine lady like can milk cows, churn butter cook a good damper and mix a pudding the worst risk you run is that of getting married and finding yourself treated with twenty times the respect and consideration you may meet within England here as far as number goes women beat the lords of creation in Australia it is the reverse and there we may be pretty sure of having our own way but to those ladies who cannot wait upon themselves and whose fair fingers are unused to the exertion of doing anything useful my advice is for your own sakes remain at home rich or poor it is all the same for those who can afford to give forty pounds a year to a female servant will scarcely know whether to be pleased or not at the acquisition so idle and impertinent are they scold them and they will tell you that next week Tom or Bill or Harry will be back from the diggings and then they'll be married and wear silk dresses and be as final lady as yourself and with some such words will coolly dismiss themselves from your service leaving their poor unfortunate mistress uncertain whether to be glad of their departure or ready to cry because there's nothing prepared for dinner and she knows not what to set out about first for those who wish to invest small sums in goods for Australia boots and shoes, cutlery, flash-dury watches, pistols particularly revolvers gunpowder, fancy articles, cheap laces and baby linen offer immense profits the police in Victoria is very inefficient both in the towns and on the roads fifteen persons were stopped during the same afternoon whilst travelling on the highway between Melbourne and St Kilda they were robbed and tied to trees within sight of each other this too in broad daylight on the roads to the diggings it is still worse and no one intending to turn digger should leave England without a good supply of firearms in less than one week more than a dozen robberies occurred between Kighton and Forrest Creek two of which terminated in murder the diggings themselves are comparatively safe quite as much so as Melbourne itself and there is a freemasonry in the bush which possesses an irresistible charm for adventurous bachelors and causes them to prefer the risk of bush rangers to witnessing the dreadful scenes that are daily and hourly enacting in a colonial town life in the bush is wild, free and independent healthy exercise, fine scenery and a clear and buoyant atmosphere maintain an excitement of the spirits and a sanguiness of temperament peculiar to this sort of existence and many other pleasant evenings enlivened with the gay gist or cheerful song which are passed around the bushfires of Australia the latest accounts from the digging speak of them most encouragingly out of a population of 200,000 which is calculated to be the number of the present inhabitants of Victoria half are said to be at the Goldfields and the average earnings are still reckoned at nearly an ounce per man per week Ballarat is again rising into favour and its riches are being more fully developed the gold there is more unequally distributed than at Mount Alexander and therefore the proportion of successful to unsuccessful diggers is not so great as at the latter place but then the individual gains are in some cases greater the labour is also more severe than at the Mount or Bendigo as the gold lies deeper and more numerous trials have to be made before the deposits are struck upon the ovens is admitted to be a rich gold field but the work there is severely labourers owing to a super abundance of water the astonishing mineral wealth of Mount Alexander is evidenced by the large amounts which it continues to yield not withstanding the immense quantities that have already been taken from it the whole country in that neighbourhood appears to be more or less Eurypherius up to the close of last year the total supposed amount of gold procured from the Victoria diggings is 3,998,324 ounces which when calculated at the average English value of four pounds an ounce is worth nearly 16 million sterling one third of this is distinctly authenticated as coming down by escort during the three last months of 1852 in Melbourne the extremes of wealth and poverty meet and many are the antidotes of the lavish expenditure of successful diggers that are circulated throughout the town which shall only relate to which fell under my own observation having occasion to make a few purchases in the linen drapery line I entered a good establishment in Collins Street for that purpose it was before noon for later in the day the shops are so full that to get a trifling order attended to would be almost a miracle there was only one customer in the shop standing beside the counter gazing with extreme dissatisfaction upon a quantity of goods of various colours and materials that lay there for his inspection he was a rough looking customer end up and the appearance of his hands gave strong indication that the pickaxe and spade were among the last tools he had handled it's a shiny thing that I want he was saying as I entered these are what we should call shining goods said the shopman as he held up the silks alpacas etc to the light they're not the shiny sort that I want pursued the digger half doggedly, half angrily I'll find another shop I guess you won't show your best goods to me you think may have I can't pay for them but I can though and he laid a note for 50 pounds adding, maybe you'll show me some shiny stuff now unable to comprehend the wishes of his customer the shopman called to his assistants the master of the establishment who being I suppose a quicker apprehension placed some sentence before him I thought the paper would help you find it I want a gown for my missus what's the price 20 yards of 110 30 pounds that do so no, not good enough was the energetic reply the shrewd shopkeeper quickly fathomed his customers desires and now displayed before him a rich orange coloured satin which elicited an exclamation of delight 25 yards couldn't sell less it's a remnant at 3 pounds the yard that's the go interrupted the digger four notes upon the counter my missus was married in a cotton gown and now shall have a real golden and seizing the satin from the shopkeeper he twisted up the portion that had been unrolled for his inspection placed the hole under his arm and triumphantly walked out at the shop little thinking how he had been cheated a lucky digger that observed the shopman as he attended to my wants I could not feel bare a smile for I've pictured to myself the digger's wife mixing a damper with the sleeves of her dazzling satin dress tucked up above her elbows a few days after a heavy shower drove me to take shelter in a pastry cook's where under the pretense of eating a bun I escaped a good branching hardly had I been seated five minutes when a sailor looking personally jented and addressed the shopwoman with I'm going to be spiced tomorrow young woman show us some large wedding cakes the largest which was but a small one was placed before him and 18 pounds demanded for it he laid down four five pound notes upon the counter and taking up the cake told her to keep the change to buy ribbons with pleasant to have plenty of gold digging friends I remarked by way of saying something not a friend said she smiling I never saw him before I expect he's only a successful digger turn we now to the darker side of this picture my favourite walk whilst in Melbourne was over Princess Bridge and along the road to Lyadet's beach thus passing close to the canvas settlement called Little Adelaide one day about a week before we embarked for England I took my pasta more in this direction and as I passed the tents was much struck by the appearance of a little girl who with a large picture in her arms came to procure some water from a small stream beside the road her dress though clean and neat bespoke extreme poverty and her countenance had a wane sad expression upon it which would have touched the most indifferent beholder and left an impression deeper even than that produced by her extreme no delicate beauty I made a slight attempt at a clientorship by assisting to fill her picture which was far too heavy went full of water for so slight a child to carry and pointing to the rise of ground on which the tents stood I inquired if she lived among them she nodded her head in token of ascent and have you been long here and do you like this country I continued determined to hear if her voice was as pleasing as her countenance no she answered quickly we starve here there was plenty of food when we were in England and then her childish reserve giving way she spoke more fully of her troubles and a sad though a common tale it was some of the particulars I learnt afterwards her father had held an appointment under government and had lived upon the income derived from it for some years when he was tempted to try and do better in the colonies his wife the daughter of a clergyman well educated and who before her marriage had been a governess accompanied him with their three children on arriving in Melbourne which was about three months previous he found that situations equal in value according to the relative prices of food and lodging to that which he had thrown up in England were not so easily procured as he had been led to expect half desperate he went to the diggings leaving his wife with little money and many promises of quick remittances of gold by the escort but week followed week and neither remittances nor letters came they removed to humbler lodgings every little article of value was gradually sold for unused to bodily labour or even to sit for hours at the needle the deserted wife could earn but little then sickness came there were no means of paying for medical advice and one child died after this step by step they became poorer until half a tent in little Adelaide was the only refuge left as we reached it the little girl drew aside the canvas and partly invited me to enter I glanced in it was a dismal sight in one corner lay the mother a blanket her only protection from the human soil and carrying down beside her was her other child I could not enter it seemed like a heartless intrusion upon misery so slipping the contents of my purse which were unfortunately only a few shillings into the little girl's hand I hurried away scarcely waiting to notice the smile that tanked me so eloquently on arriving at home I found that my friends were absent and being detained by business they did not return till after dusk so it was impossible for that day to afford them any assistance early next morning we took a little wine and other trifling articles with us and proceeded to little Adelaide on entering the tent we found that the sorrows of the unfortunate mother were at an end the deprivation, ill health and anxiety had claimed her victim her husband sat beside the corpse and the golden nuggets which in his despair he had flung upon the ground formed a painful contrast to the scene of poverty and death the first six weeks of his career at the Diggings had been most unsuccessful and he had suffered as much from want as his unhappy wife then came a sudden change of fortune and in two weeks more he was comparatively rich he hastened immediately to Melbourne and for a whole week had sought his family in vain at length on the preceding evening he found them only in time to witness the last moments of his life sad as this history may appear it is not so sad as many others, for often instead of returning with gold the digger is never heard of more in England many imagine that the principal labour at the Diggings consist in stooping to pick up the lumps of gold which lie upon the ground at their feet only waiting for someone to take possession of them these people when told of holes being dug in depths of from seven to forty feet before arriving at the desired metal look upon such statements as so many myths or fancy they are fabricated by the lucky gold finders to deter too many others from coming to take a share of the precious soil there was a passenger on board the vessel which took me to Australia who held some such opinions as these and although in other respects a sensible man he used seriously to believe that every day that we were delayed by contrary winds he could have been picking up fifty or a hundred pounds worth of gold had he but been at the Diggings he went to Bendigo the third day after we landed stayed there at a fortnight left it in disgust and returned to England immediately poorer than he had started this is not an isolated case young men of sanguine dispositions read the startling amounts of gold shipped from the colonies they think of the John Bull Nugget and other similar prizes turn a deaf ear when you speak of blanks and determinately overlook the vast amount of labour which the gold Diggings have consumed whenever I meet with this class of would-be immigrants the remarks of an old digger which I once overheard recurred to my mind the conversation at the time was turned upon the subject of the many young men flocking from the old country to the gold fields and their evident unfitness for them every young man before paying his passage money said he should take a few days fell at well-sinking in England if he can stand that comfortably the Diggings won't hurting many are sadly disappointed on arriving in Victoria at being unable to invest their capital or savings in the purchase of about a hundred acres of land sufficient for a small farm I have referred to this subject before but cannot resist adding some facts which bear upon it by return of the land sales of Victoria from 1837 to 1851 it appears that 380,000 acres of land were sold in the whole colony and the sum realised by government was 700,000 pounds in a return published in 1849 it is stated that there were three persons who each held singly more land in their own hands than had been sold to all the rest of the colony in 14 years for which they paid the sum of 30 pounds each per annum yet whilst 700,000 pounds is realised by the sale of land and not a hundred pounds a year gained by letting three times the quantity the colonial government persists in the latter course in spite of the reiterated disapprovation of the colonists themselves by one of the last gazettes of Governor Latrobe he has ordered 681,700 acres or 1,065 square miles to be given over to the squatters the result of this is that many immigrants landing in Victoria are compelled to turn their steps towards the sister colony of Adelaide there was a family who landed in Melbourne whilst I was there it consisted of the parents and several grown up sons and daughters the father had held a small tenant farm in England and having saved a few hundreds determined to invest it in Australian land he brought out with him many agricultural implements an iron horse etc on his arrival found to his dismay that no less than 640 acres of crown lands could be sold at a time at the upset price of one pound an acre this was more than his capital could afford and they left for Adelaide the expenses of getting his goods to and from the ships of storing them, of supporting his family while in Melbourne and of paying their passage to Adelaide amounted almost to a hundred pounds thus he lost nearly a fourth of his capital and Victoria a family who would have made good colonists much is done nowadays to assist immigration but far greater exertions are needed before either the demand of labour in the colonies or the oversupply of it in England can be exhausted thus down the best streets of Melbourne you see one or two good shops or houses and on either side an empty spot or a mass of rubbish the ground has been bought the plans for the proposed building are already then why not commence there are no workmen bricks are wanted and 15 pounds a thousand is offered carpenters are advertised for at 8 pounds a week yet the building makes no progress there are no workmen go down towards the Yarra and an unfinished church will attract attention are funds wanting for its completion no thousands were subscribed in one day and would be again were it necessary but that building like every other is stopped for lack of workmen in vain the bishop himself published an appeal to the various labourers requiring offering the very highest wages others offered higher wages still and the church up to the time I left Victoria remained unfinished and yet whilst labour is so scarce so needed in the colonies there are thousands in our own country able and willing to work our lives here are one of prolonged privation whose eyes are never gladdened by the sight of nature who inhale no purer atmosphere than the tainted air at the dark courts and dismal solace in which they heard send them to the colonies food and pure air would at least be theirs and much misery would be turned into positive happiness I heard of a lady who every year sent out a whole family from the poor but hard working classes to the colonies it was through one of the objects of her thoughtful benevolence that this annual act became known to me and what happiness must it bring when she reflects on the heartfelt blessings that are showered upon her from the far off land of Australia surely among the rich and the influential there are many who, out of the abundance of their wealth could go and do likewise End of section 18 End of A Lady's Visit to the Gold Diggings of Australia by Alan Clacy