CHAPTER IV.

THE PACIFIC FERRY.—ANOTHER ROUTE.

The Hawaiian Islands—King and Parliament—Pleasant Honolulu—A Government Hotel—Honeysuckle‐covered Theatre—Productions of the Islands—Grand Volcanoes—Ravages of Lava Streams and Earthquakes—Off to Fiji—A Rapidly Christianised People—A Native Hut—Dinner—Kandavu—The Bush—Fruit‐laden Canoes—Strange Ideas of Value—New Zealand—Its Features—Intense English Feeling—The New Zealand Company and its Iniquities—The Maories—Trollope’s Testimony—Facts about Cannibalism—A Chief on Bagpipes—Australia—Beauty of Sydney Harbour—Its Fortifications—Volunteers—Its War‐fleet of One—Handsome Melbourne—Absence of Squalor—No Workhouses Required—The Benevolent Asylums—Splendid Place for Working Men—Cheapness of Meat, &c.—Wages in Town and Country—Life in the Bush—“Knocking Down One’s Cheque”—Gold, Coal, and Iron.

A popular route now to New Zealand and Australia is that _viâ_ San Francisco, Honolulu, and Fiji, the bulk of the voyage being usually over the quieter parts of the Pacific; it takes the passenger, of course, through the tropics.

Honolulu, the capital of the Hawaiian or Sandwich Islands, is now a civilised and pleasant city, while the natural attractions of the islands themselves are many and varied. One need not now fear the fate of poor Captain Cook. Most of the natives, of whom there are 50,000, are clothed in semi‐European style: the men in coats and trousers of nankeen, and the women more picturesquely clad in long robes fastened round the neck, and pretty often of pink or some other bright colour. There is a white population of some 10,000 souls scattered over the islands, a large proportion of whom are English and American. Honolulu is the Government centre and residence of King Kalakau, who used to be called “Calico” in the United States, and who, in fact, is a very slightly tinted, good‐ looking, and most intelligent gentleman. The Ex‐Queen Emma, who visited England some years ago, has a villa beautifully situated a few miles out of town. The king devotes his energies to bettering the condition of his people, and some few years ago, when the money was voted to build a new palace, declined to accept it, at least for two years. The Hawaiian Parliament consists of a House of seventeen nobles and twenty‐eight commoners, who, strange to say, sit in the same hall, their votes being of equal weight. There are always several Europeans or Americans in this council.

Mr. Guillemard thus describes Honolulu(20):—“The town, which is built on the low land bordering the shore—partly, indeed, on land reclaimed from the sea, thanks to the industry of the architects of the coral reef—looks mean and insignificant from the harbour, but on going ashore to breakfast we get glimpses of fine public buildings and numerous shops and stores, of neat houses nestling among bowers of shrubs and flowers, and evidences of a busy trade and considerable population. The streets are narrow, and the houses built of wood, without any attempt at decoration or even uniformity. In the by‐streets or lanes pretty verandah‐girt villas peep out from shrubberies of tropical foliage, honeysuckle, roses, lilies, and a hundred flowers strange to English eyes. Tiny fountains are sending sparkling jets of water up in the hot, still air; and other music is not wanting, for here and there we hear the tinkle of a distant piano, telling us that early rising is the rule in Honolulu, and suggesting as a consequence a _siesta_ at mid‐day.

“But here we are at the grand Hawaiian Hotel, a fine verandahed building, standing back from the road in a pretty garden, the green lawn, cool deep shade, and trickling fountain of which are doubly grateful after the glare of the scorching sunlight, scorching even though it is not yet seven a.m. The theatre, half‐hidden by its wealth of honeysuckle and fan‐palm, is not fifty yards distant, but is quite thrown into insignificance by the hotel. This was built by Government, at a cost of £25,000, and is admirably planned and appointed.” Its large airy rooms and cool verandahs, shaded with masses of passion flowers, its excellent food and iced American drinks, all combine to make it a capital resting‐place.

In the streets Mr. Guillemard noted bevies of gaily‐attired girls on horseback, their robes being gathered in at the waist with bright scarves, which fling their folds far over the horses’ tails. Their jaunty straw hats were wreathed with flowers, and now and then some dark‐eyed beauty would be found wearing a necklace of blossoms. The girls rode astride up and down the main streets, making them ring again with their merry laughter. Mosquitoes were abundant, and, as some compensation, so also were delicious melons, guavas, mangoes, bananas, and commoner fruit.

The sugar‐cane was first grown on these islands in 1820; now over 20,000,000 pounds of sugar are produced annually by the aid of Hawaiian and Chinese labour and steam‐mills. Not a quarter of the land suitable for this purpose is yet under cultivation, though some of the plantations are of thousands of acres in extent. Hides and wool are staple exports.

A few hours’ sail from Honolulu some of the largest and most wonderful volcanoes in the world are to be found. Two of them, Mauna Loa and Mauna Kea, are each over 13,000 feet in elevation. The eruptions from the great crater of Kilauea, which is _ten miles_ in circumference, are something fearful. One explosion ejected streams of red mud three miles, killing thirty‐one people and 500 head of cattle. This was followed by several earthquakes, which destroyed a number of houses. These, again, were succeeded by a great earthquake wave, during the continuance of which three villages were swept away and seventy people killed. Next a new crater formed upon Mauna Loa, from which rose four fountains of red‐hot lava to a height of 600 feet. A lava stream, eight to ten miles long, and half a mile wide in some places, carried all before it. In one place it tumbled, in a molten cataract of fiery liquid, over a precipice several hundred feet in height. The interior of Hawaii is a vast underground lake of fire, and were it not for the safety‐valves provided by Nature in the form of craters, it would be shaken to pieces by successive earthquakes.

And now the passenger has before him a fortnight of the most tranquil part of the ocean called the Pacific. He must not be surprised if the heat rises to 90° or so in the saloon. The distance from San Francisco to Sydney direct is 6,500 miles, and Fiji is naturally _en route_; the detour to New Zealand considerably increases the length of the voyage. It will be remembered that these islands were formally annexed to Britain in 1874, after vain attempts at a mixed native and European government. The population was then 140,000; in a year or two afterwards 40,000 of the poor natives fell victims to the measles, another of the importations apparently inseparable from civilisation. The Wesleyan missionaries, in particular, have worked with so much zeal in these islands that more than half the people are Christians. There are 600 chapels in the 140 islands comprising the Fiji group. Formerly the natives were the worst kind of cannibals. They not merely killed and ate the victims of their island wars, but no shipwrecked or helpless person was safe among them. Numbers were slain at the caprice of the chiefs, especially at the building of a house or canoe, or at the reception of a native embassy. Widows were strangled at the death of their husbands, and slaves killed on the decease of their masters. The introduction of Christianity and partial civilisation has changed all that for the better; and the natives of to‐ day are described as mild and gentle, and little given to quarrelling. Among their customs is that of powdering the hair (always closely cropped) with lime, which is often coloured. Their huts are of dried reeds, lashed to a strong framework of poles, and have lofty arched roofs, but are without windows or chimneys. Each has two low doors, through which one must crawl. The best native huts have a partition between the dwelling and bed room, and all are carpeted with mats. The only furniture consists of one article, a short piece of wood on two small legs, used for a pillow! Clay pots are used for cooking their principal diet, yams and fish. Many of them nowadays have houses well furnished with mats, curtains, baskets, jars, &c.

Mr. Guillemard describes a tropical dinner, served to himself and companions in one of these huts. A couple of banana‐leaves formed the dishes, on which boiled fish and half a dozen yams, or sweet potatoes, were offered. A large block of rock‐salt was handed them to use _à discretion_. Then followed ripe cocoa‐nuts. Dried leaves of somewhat tasteless wild tobacco, rolled up rapidly and neatly, and tied round with a fibre, formed the post‐prandial cigars, which were lighted by the women at the fire, and passed from their lips to the guests’.

The natural productions of this group are extensive, and comprise bread‐ fruit, taro, cocoa‐nuts, yams, bananas, plantains, guavas, oranges and lemons, wild and cultivated tobacco, sugar, cotton, and coffee. The india‐ rubber tree is cultivated, and among the leading exports are dried cocoa‐ nut and pearl‐shell. As there are at the present time comparatively few white settlers—perhaps not over 2,500 in all the islands—there are innumerable openings for settlement, and Fiji, with many other neighbouring islands, will doubtless soon afford fresh examples of British enterprise.

The point touched by the steamers is Kandavu, on one of the southernmost islands, where Mount Washington, a fine mountain, rears its head 3,000 feet into the clouds. A visitor says:—“From the eastern point of land run out miles of coral reef, on which the ocean rollers are breaking grandly, and outside this barrier we take our pilot on board. The entrance to Kandavu harbour is narrow and intricate, and here the _Macgregor_, one of the mail steamers, struck on a submerged reef, and remained for several days hard and fast aground.” The passage has been properly buoyed and lighted, and the New Company have built offices and stores, and established a coaling station here.

“The view of Port Ugaloa from the entrance is very beautiful. On our left the coral reef encloses a still lagoon of the softest, lightest green; before us hills and mountains, covered from base to summit with the richest vegetation, are tipped with fleecy cloud; and on our right, dividing the waters of the bay, is Ugaloa Island, its slopes feathery with the foliage of the cocoa‐palm and banana, half hidden in which appear here and there the low brown huts of the natives.... The brothers L. accompany me ashore on Ugaloa, landing close to a small collection of huts scattered about just above the coral‐strewn beach. It is Sunday afternoon, and a native missionary is preaching to some fifty men, women, and children, squatting on their hams on the mat‐covered floor of a neat, white‐washed mission house. Amongst the congregation is a tall native, with a thick cane, keeping silence by tapping the heads of the inattentive. The preacher is eloquent and energetic in gesture; but Fiji is hardly a pretty language to listen to, being decidedly characterised by queer guttural sounds, and spoken very fast. The sermon over, a hymn is read out and sung to a rather monotonous dirge‐like chant, and the congregation disperse. We are at once surrounded by an olive‐skinned crowd; the ladies’ dresses are minutely examined, for a white lady has scarcely been seen in Kandavu before the present year. The gentlemen have to display their watches and chains, and by means of shouting and signs every one is soon carrying on a vigorous conversation. Why is it that one always elevates the voice when trying to make one’s native tongue intelligible to a foreigner?

“We wander away into the bush, and are soon lost in a wilderness of ferns, creepers, bananas, cocoa‐palms, and chestnut‐trees. We meet with a young native, and make signs to him that we are thirsty, and wish to refresh ourselves with the juice of a green cocoa‐nut. Clutching the trunk with both hands, he almost runs up a palm, and our wants are soon plentifully supplied. He receives his _douceur_ with apparent nonchalance, and proceeds to tie it up in a corner of his sulu with a fibre of banana bark.

“Monday morning breaks fine and clear, and our slumbers are early disturbed by the chattering of a hundred natives, a whole squadron of whose fruit‐laden canoes are alongside the steamer. Queer crank‐looking craft are these, roughly dug out of the trunk of a tree, and kept steady on the water by an outrigger consisting of a log half the length of the canoe, attached to it amidships by a few light poles projecting some four or five feet from its side. They are usually propelled by means of a long oar worked between the poles, after the fashion of sculling a boat from the stern; but sometimes we see the ordinary short paddle being plied at bow and stern. Some of the larger craft hoist a large long sail, but they do not seem very weatherly under canvas, which they use but little compared with the Society Islanders.

“The scene on deck is amusing enough. Forward, fifty natives, their olive skins blackened and begrimed with dust, are hard at work replenishing the coal bunkers from the hold, and thoroughly earning their shilling a day; on the poop as many more, laden with lemons, huge bunches of bananas, cocoa‐nuts, shells, coral, matting, tappa—a soft, white fabric, called by the natives ‘marse’—and a few clubs and other weapons, are driving a brisk trade with the passengers. Everything is to be had for a shilling. ‘Shillin’ is the only English word that all the natives understand; in fact, this useful coin seems to be the ‘almighty dollar’ of Kandavu. You take a lemon, and ask, ‘How much?’ ‘Shillin’ is the reply; but you can obtain the man’s whole stock of sixty, basket and all, for the same money!”

Our next stopping place is one of particular interest to the British colonist. New Zealand, albeit one of the youngest, is now among the most promising of England’s outposts. Auckland, in the North Island, is the port at which the steamers touch. The harbour is very fine, and residents compare it to the Bay of Naples.

Every schoolboy knows that New Zealand includes two large and one small island, respectively known as North, Middle, and Stewart’s Island. One great feature of the coast line consists of its indentations; the colony is rich in fine natural harbours and ports. The area of the islands is nearly as great as that of Britain and Ireland combined, and about half of that area consists of excellent soil. The climate is that of England, with a difference: there are many more fine days, while winter is not so cold by half. The islands are volcanic; on the North Island, Mount Ruapahu, a perpetually snow‐capped peak, rises to a height of 9,000 feet, while in the same range, the Tongariro mountain, an active volcano, rises to a height of 6,000 feet. The highest mountain range is on the Middle Island, where Mount Cook rises to a height of 14,000 feet. One can understand that in such a country there should be an abundance of evergreen forests of luxuriant growth. These are interspersed with charming fern‐clad slopes and treeless grassy plains. Water is everywhere found; but none of the rivers are navigable by large vessels for more than fifty miles or so. One great advantage found in the country is the absence of noxious reptiles or insects: of the latter there is not one as offensive as an English wasp. The pigs, introduced by Captain Cook, run wild over the island, and there is plenty of large and small game: the red and fallow deer, the pheasant, partridge, and quail. Everything that grows in England will thrive there, while the vine, maize, taro, and sweet potato grow in many districts. A traveller(21) says of the (Thames) gold fields:—“Mines here, like everywhere else, are now dull. At one time there was a population of 22,000, but now this is only 13,000. Everybody one sees seems to have lost in the gold‐diggings, and it is a mystery to me who is the lucky person that wins—one never seems to meet him.” This somewhat random statement may be taken _cum grano salis_, as the gold‐fields have yielded largely at times. Nevertheless, mining is always more or less a lottery.

Mr. Anthony Trollope testifies to the intense British feeling in New Zealand, where he felt thoroughly at home. Australia he found tinged with a form of boasting Yankeeism. “The New Zealander,” says he,(22) “among John Bulls is the most John Bullish. He admits the supremacy of England to every place in the world, only he is more English than any Englishman at home.”

Discovered by Tasman in 1642, England only commenced to take an interest in the islands more than a century and a quarter later, when Cook surveyed the coasts. The missionaries came first, in 1814, and a British Resident was appointed in 1833. All this time a desultory colonisation was going on, and the natives were selling parcels of their best lands for a few cast‐iron hatchets or muskets, shoddy blankets, or rubbishy trinkets. In 1840 a Lieutenant‐Governor was appointed from home, and his presence was indeed necessary. The previous year a corporation, calling itself the New Zealand Company, had made pretended purchases of tracts of the best parts of the country, amounting to _one‐third_ of its whole area! The unscrupulous and defiant manner in which this company treated the natives and the Government brought about many complications, and led to very serious wars with natives not to be trifled with. The New Zealand Company was “bought out” by the Government in 1852 for £268,000. During 1843‐7, and in 1861 and after, England had to fight the Maories—foes that she learned to respect. At last, weary of war, all our troops were withdrawn, and the colonists, who of course knew the bush and bush life better than nine‐tenths of the soldiers, were left to defend their homes and property, and in the end to successfully finish the fight. The natives now are generally peaceful and subdued, while many are even turning their attention to agriculture and commerce. Nine years ago they numbered 37,500, but are fast dying out.

Physically and intellectually, the Maories are the finest semi‐savage natives on the face of the earth. Mr. Trollope is an author and traveller whose words carry weight, and he has given us the following concise summary of their qualities and character:—“They are,” says he, “an active people, the men averaging 5 feet 6½ inches in height, and are almost equal in strength and weight to Englishmen. In their former condition they wore matting; now they wear European clothes. Formerly they pulled out their beards, and every New Zealander of mark was tattooed; now they wear beards, and the young men are not tattooed. Their hair is black and coarse, but not woolly like a negro’s, or black like a Hindoo’s. The nose is almost always broad and the mouth large. In other respects their features are not unlike those of the European race. The men, to my eyes, were better‐looking than the women, and the men who were tattooed better‐ looking than those who had dropped the custom. The women still retain the old custom of tattooing the upper lip. The Maories had a mythology of their own, and believed in a future existence; but they did not recognise one supreme God. Virtue with them, as with other savages, consisted chiefly in courage and a command of temper. Their great passion was revenge, which was carried on by one tribe against another to the extent sometimes of the annihilation of tribes. The decrease of their population since the English first came among them has been owing as much to civil war as to the injuries with which civilisation has afflicted them. They seem from early days to have acquired that habit of fighting behind stockades or in fortified pahs which we have found so fatal to ourselves in our wars with them. Their weapons, before they got guns from us, were not very deadly. They were chiefly short javelins and stones, both flung from slings. But there was a horror in their warfare to the awfulness of which they themselves seem to have been keenly alive. When a prisoner was taken in war he was cooked and eaten.

“I do not think that human beings were slaughtered for food in New Zealand, although there is no doubt that the banquet when prepared was enjoyed with a horrid relish.

“I will quote a passage from Dr. Thompson’s work in reference to the practice of cannibalism, and will then have done with the subject. ‘Whether or not cannibalism commenced immediately after the advent of the New Zealanders from Hawaiki, it is nevertheless certain that one of Tasman’s sailors was eaten in 1642; that Captain Cook had a boat’s crew eaten in 1774; that Marion de Fresne and many other navigators met this horrible end; and that the pioneers of civilisation and successive missionaries have all borne testimony to the universal prevalence of cannibalism in New Zealand up to the year 1840. It is impossible to state how many New Zealanders were annually devoured; that the number was not small may be inferred from two facts authenticated by European witnesses. In 1822, Hougi’s army ate three hundred persons after the capture of Totara, on the River Thames, and in 1836, during the Rotura war, sixty beings were cooked and eaten in two days.’ I will add from the same book a translation of a portion of a war‐song:—‘Oh, my little son, are you crying? are you screaming for your food? Here it is for you, the flesh of Hekemanu and Werata. Although I am surfeited with the soft brains of Putu Rikiriki and Raukauri, yet such is my hatred that I will fill myself fuller with those of Pau, of Ngaraunga, of Pipi, and with my most dainty morsel, the flesh of the hated Teao.’”

Mr. Laird testifies to their cleanliness, but states that they are, like most savages, and for that matter, most white men, very improvident. If a bad potato or other crop occurred, they would eat it all at once, and half starve afterwards.

The same author tells a good story of the nonchalance of a leading Maori chief who was invited to dinner at Government House during the visit of H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh. After dinner the Duke’s chief bagpiper came in and played. The chief was asked how he liked the music. He replied briefly: “Too much noise for me; but suit white man well enough.”

And now we are approaching that great continent which has had, has, and will increasingly have, so much interest for the emigrant, who must be, more or less, a voyager and man of the sea. Australia, a country nearly as large as the United States, must be for many a day to come a very Paradise for the poor man.

The American steamers from San Francisco land one at Sydney, of which charming place Mr. Trollope says:—“I despair of being able to convey to my readers my own idea of the beauty of Sydney Harbour;” he considers that it excels Dublin Bay, Spezzia, and New York. And the colonists, left to themselves—for England maintains no troops there now—have fortified it strongly. Mr. Trollope tells us of five separate armed fortresses, with Armstrong guns, rifled guns, guns of eighteen tons’ weight, with loopholed walls and pits for riflemen, as though Sydney was to become another Sebastopol. “It was shown,” says he, “how the whole harbour and city were commanded by these guns. There were open batteries and casemated batteries, shell‐rooms and gunpowder magazines, barracks rising here and trenches dug there. There was a boom to be placed across the harbour, and a whole world of torpedoes ready to be sunk beneath the water, all of which were prepared and ready for use in an hour or two. It was explained to me that ‘they’ could not possibly get across the trenches, or break the boom, or escape the torpedoes, or live for an hour beneath the blaze of the guns. ‘They’ would not have a chance to get at Sydney. There was much martial ardour, and a very general opinion that ‘they’ would have the worst of it.” New South Wales and Victoria have about 8,000 volunteers and a training‐ship for sailor boys; while an enormous monitor, the _Cerberus_, presented by the mother country, forms its war‐fleet of one.

Of Melbourne, Victoria, mention has already been made. There are many cities with larger populations, but few have ever attained so great a size with such rapidity. Though it owes nothing to natural surroundings, “the internal appearance of the city is,” Mr. Trollope assures us, “certainly magnificent.” It is built on the Philadelphian rectangular plan; it is the width of the streets which give the city a fine appearance, together with the devotion of large spaces within the limits for public gardens. “One cannot walk about Melbourne without being struck by all that has been done for the welfare of the people generally. There is no squalor to be seen—though there are quarters of the town in which the people no doubt are squalid.... But he who would see such misery in Melbourne must search for it specially.” There are no workhouses; their place is supplied in the colony of Victoria generally by “Benevolent Asylums.” In Melbourne about 12,000 poor are relieved yearly, some using the institution there as a temporary, and others as a permanent place of refuge. These places are chiefly, but not entirely, supported by Government aid. “Could a pauper,” says Trollope, “be suddenly removed out of an English union workhouse into the Melbourne Benevolent Asylum, he might probably think that he had migrated to Buckingham Palace,” so well are the inmates fed and cared for. There are no workhouses proper in any part of Australia, and the charity bestowed on these asylums is not given painfully or sparingly.

The wideness of the streets, however, and grandeur of general dimensions, have their drawbacks, among which the time consumed in reaching distant parts of the city counts first. Melbourne has a fine and entirely free Public Library and a University, as, indeed, has Sydney. Melbourne is the centre of a system of railways, and the well‐to‐do people all live out of town; in the south and east of the city there are miles of villas and mansions.

Mr. Trollope says:—“There is perhaps no town in the world in which an ordinary working man can do better for himself and for his family with his work than he can at Melbourne.” The rates of wages for mechanics are slightly greater than at home, and all the necessaries of life are cheaper. With meat at 4d. per pound, butter from 6d. upwards, bread, tea, and coffee about the same prices or rather under, coals the same or a trifle higher, potatoes, vegetables, and fruits generally considerably cheaper, all can live well and plentifully. Meat three times a day is common all over Australia, and in some parts the price is as low as 1½d. or 2d. per pound. Wages for good mechanics and artisans average about 10s. a day; gardeners receive about 50s., and labourers about 30s. per week; men‐servants, in the house, £40 to £50 per annum; cooks, £35 to £45 per year; girls, as housemaids, &c., 8s. or 10s. per week. It is usual to hire the last named by this short term. Some of these prices rule all over the country, but are liable to rule lower, rather than higher, outside of Melbourne.

In the country sheep‐shearers can earn 7s. to 14s. per day for about four months in the year; shepherds, £30 to £40 per year, with rations. The common labourer can count on 15s. to 20s. per week, with rations: these consist generally of 14 lbs. meat (usually mutton), 8 lbs. flour, 2 lbs. sugar, and a quarter of a pound of tea. Of course, where fruit or vegetables are plentiful they would be added. The meat, bread, and tea diet, however, is that characteristic of the whole country. In the great sheep runs and cattle ranges(23) it would be the shepherd’s diet invariably.

Mr. Trollope advises the poor man to save for three or four years, and then invest in land, which in some places is to be had at 3s. 9d. an acre, payable to the Government in five instalments of ninepence per acre. Of course, he would require money for the erection of a house, farm implements, &c. The great trouble with most men working in the bush as shepherds or shearers, or at the mines, or elsewhere at distant points, is that the enforced absence from civilisation and social life makes them inclined for reckless living when they have accumulated a sum of money. The tavern‐keepers of the nearest town or station reap all the benefit, and there are numbers of men who, for ten or eleven months of the year perfectly steady and sober, periodically give themselves up to drink until their earnings are melted, it is called “knocking down” one’s cheque, and it is a common practice for them to hand such cheque to the publican, who lets them run on recklessly in drink and food until _he_ considers it exhausted. A good story is told by Mr. Trollope of a man who had been accustomed to do this at regular intervals, but who on one occasion, having some loose silver, “planted” his cheque in an old tree, and proceeded to the usual haunt, where he set to work deliberately to get drunk. The publican showed evident doubt as to the propriety of supplying him freely. Why had not the man brought his cheque as usual? The tavern‐ keeper at last put him to bed; but the man, though drugged and stupefied, had his wits about him sufficiently to observe and remember that the host had examined his clothes, his hat, and boots, for the lacking cheque. Next morning he was ignominiously expelled from the house, but he didn’t mind: the cheque was found by him safely in the tree by the roadside, and he surprised his master by returning to the station a week or two before he was expected richer than he had ever come home before. Let us hope he was cured of that form of folly for ever.

The gold yield of Australia for the twenty years between 1851 and 1871 was 50,750,000 ozs. But gold‐fields die out sooner than most mines, and Australia has a more permanent source of prosperity for the future in its coal and iron‐fields, which are in close proximity to each other. The coal is already worked to great profit, and is one of the principal steamship fuels of the Pacific.

The steamship route homeward from Australia is that by the Indian Ocean (usually touching at Ceylon), then reaching the Mediterranean _viâ_ the Red Sea and Suez Canal. These points of interest have already been fully described in early chapters of this work.