Part 57

The Hon. W. Campbell discovered gold in March 1850, at Clunes; concealed the fact at the time from the apprehension that its announcement might prove injurious to the squatter on whose run the discovery was made, but mentioned it in a letter to a friend on the 10th of June, and afterwards on the 5th of July 1851, which friend, at Mr. Campbell’s request, reported the matter to the gold-discovery committee on the 8th of July. Mr. L. J. Michel, and six others, discovered gold in the Yarra Ranges, at Anderson’s Creek, which they communicated to the gold-discovery committee on the 5th of July. Mr. James Esmond, a California digger, and three others, obtained gold in the quartz rocks of the Pyrenees, and made the discovery public on the 5th of July. Dr. George Bruhn, a German physician, found indications of gold in quartz “two miles from Parker’s station,” in April 1851, and forwarded specimens to the gold committee on the 30th of June. Mr. Thomas Hiscock found gold at Buninyong on the 8th of August, and communicated the fact to the editor of the _Geelong Advertiser_ on the 10th of the same month. This discovery led to that of the Ballarat gold-fields. Mr. C. T. Peters, a hut-keeper at Barker’s Creek, and three others, found gold at Specimen Gully on the 20th of July; worked secretly to the 1st of September, then published the account. This led to the discovery of the numerous gold-fields about Mount Alexander, and afterwards to those of Bendigo.

The deposits were found to be richer and to extend over a wider area than any which had been discovered in New South Wales. Their fame soon spread to the adjacent colonies, and thousands hastened to the spot, desirous of participating in the newly found treasures. When the news reached home, crowds of emigrants from the United Kingdom hurried to these shores. Inhabitants of other European countries quickly joined in the rush. Americans from the Atlantic States were not long in following. Stalwart Californians left their own gold-yielding rocks and placers, to try their fortunes at the southern Eldorado. Last of all, swarms of Chinese arrived, eager to unite in the general scramble for wealth.

[Sidenote: TROUBLES ABOUT MINING LICENSES.]

The payment for a license to dig for gold was first fixed at £1 10s. per month, and this was afterwards reduced to £1 10s. per quarter. The license fee was not seriously objected to in the early days of the gold-fields, when gold was found in large quantities by almost all who sought it, but in the course of a year or two, the number of gold diggers had increased so enormously that many were unsuccessful, and the license fee even in its reduced state became a heavy burden. The mode of collecting the tax by means of armed troopers, who surrounded parties of miners at work, and arrested all without licenses, was very obnoxious, and led to resistance.

Towards the end of the first year of the gold discovery, the Government determined to raise the license fee to £3 per month, and actually issued a proclamation, dated 1st December 1851, stating that on and after the 1st of January 1852 such amount would be charged. This was met by strong protests on the part of the diggers, which resulted in the proclamation being rescinded on the 13th of December 1851. No licenses therefore were ever issued at the increased rate.

Public meetings were held on some of the gold-fields to protest against this state of things, but as little notice was taken of them by the government, the discontent continued. It finally culminated in an outbreak at Ballarat, near the end of 1854, when the diggers erected a stockade known as the Eureka, and defied the authorities. All the troops that could be mustered were sent to Ballarat and on the 2d of December, the stockade was taken by storm. The riot was quelled with some bloodshed on both sides, and a government commission was appointed to investigate the matter. None of the prisoners were ever convicted, and the result of the affair was that the oppressive tax upon the miners was removed.

[Sidenote: INCREASE OF POPULATION.]

The effect of the gold discovery upon the population of Australia may be seen by a few figures from the returns of the last census in 1871. On the 2d of April of that year, the number of inhabitants in Victoria was 731,528. Ten years previously it was 540,322. The increase during this interval was therefore 191,206, or 35.39 per cent. In 1851, which was the year of the discovery of gold, the population amounted to 77,345. The increase in the twenty years between that period and 1871 was therefore 654,183, or at the rate of 846 per cent.

Like all gold mining countries, Australia has attracted a great many adventurers in search of wealth. Nearly every country on the earth was represented in the emigration, and many of the representatives were not calculated to reflect credit upon the lands of their birth. Probably the accumulation of all kinds of races and nationalities in California was fully equaled by that in Australia, and particularly at Melbourne. At one time murders were so common in that city that a correspondent writing from thence, said it was the “bourne whence no traveler returns.”

It is a remarkable fact that, both in 1873 and 1874, more persons born in the United States, in proportion to their numbers in the population, were arrested in the colony of Victoria, than those of any other nationality. The chief causes of arrest were, as in the case of citizens of most other countries, drunkenness and disorderly conduct; still, there were a not inconsiderable number of arrests for more serious offenses, and the proportion committed for trial was much greater than that of persons born in any other country. The number of Americans settled in Victoria is but small, and it is not impossible that it is to a certain extent made up of those who, in consequence of their misdeeds, found it desirable to absent themselves from the country of their birth, and that they conduct themselves no better there than they did at home. In the year under review, next to Americans, the Irish, in proportion to their numbers, contributed the largest number to the arrested; and next to them, the French. In 1873, more of the last-mentioned fell into the hands of the police than those of any other country, except the United States. In 1874, Frenchmen were next to Americans in the numbers committed for trial. The remark applied to the latter, with reference to the probable reason for their leaving their own country, will perhaps also be applicable to them. Although the proportion of Irish committed for trial was greater than that of either English, Welsh, Scotch, or Victorians, it was less than that of persons of any of the other nationalities.

[Sidenote: TOTAL GOLD YIELD OF AUSTRALIA.]

The whole quantity of gold taken out in Victoria alone, from the discovery down to the year previous to the exhibition at Philadelphia, was nearly forty-four and a half million ounces, representing a value of not far from nine hundred millions of dollars. Truly, Australia has been of no ordinary importance as a land of gold. Probably her total mineral wealth of every kind thus far taken from the earth and turned to practical use, would not fall short of two thousand millions of dollars!

As in California and elsewhere, the early form of working and surface diggings has given place to quartz mining. Of the yield, set forth in the most recent statistics, it is estimated that sixty per cent. of the gold came from quartz reefs, and forty per cent. from alluvial workings. In the previous year, it was estimated that fifty-seven per cent. was obtained from quartz reefs, and forty-three per cent. from alluvial workings.

According to estimates made by the mining surveyors and registrars, the number of quartz reefs proved to be auriferous is 3,398. The Secretary for Mines points out that these cannot in every case be distinct reefs, as parts of the same reef, in some localities, are held to be distinct ones, and named accordingly; and, moreover, as the reefs are further explored, it is frequently found that what were supposed to be separate reefs are in reality not distinct.

From information obtained by the same officers respecting the amount of gold obtained from a considerable proportion of the quartz crushed, the average yield per ton is estimated to have been 11 dwts. 10.55 grs. in 1873, and 11 dwts. 20.51 grs. in 1874.

Gold-mining in Australia, instead of being, as formerly, practiced by the individual miner, is now almost entirely in the hands of companies. In a single year, the dividends paid by these companies exceeded ten millions of dollars.

Following are some of the most famous Australian nuggets whose fac-similes were exhibited at Philadelphia:

[Sidenote: FAMOUS NUGGETS.]

The “Beauty” Nnugget weighed 242 ozs. It was discovered at a depth of nine feet from the surface, in Kangaroo Gully, Bendigo, in the year 1858. The gold was 22.2-7/8 carats fine.

The “Platypus” nugget weighed 377 ozs. 6 dwts. It was found in Robinson Crusoe Gully, Bendigo, in a pillar of earth of a deserted claim. The claim was situated in shallow alluvium, and the nugget was discovered in March, 1861. The gold was 22.1-1/8 carats fine.

The “Viscount Canterbury” nugget was found in John’s Paddock, Berlin Diggings, at a depth of fifteen feet from the surface, on the 31st of May, 1870. It weighed 1,105 ozs. The gold was 23.3 carats fine.

The “Schlemn” nugget was found at Dunolly on the 11th of July, 1872, at a depth of three feet beneath the surface. It weighed 538 ozs., and is estimated to contain 60 ozs. of quartz.

Nugget [not named] found in Broomfield’s Gully, Creswick, on the 8th of August, 1872. It weighed 24 ozs. 3 dwts., and was got at a depth of one hundred feet below the surface.

The “Kum Tow” nugget weighed 718 ozs. 5 dwts. It was found on the 17th of April, 1871, in Catto’s Paddock, Berlin Diggings, at a depth of twelve feet six inches below the surface. It was found by a party of Chinamen. The gold was 23.3 carats fine.

The “Viscountess Canterbury” nugget was found on the 3d of October, 1870, at Berlin. It was discovered at six feet six inches beneath the surface, and weighed 884 ozs. 10 dwts. The gold was 23.2-5/8 carats fine.

Many other nuggets were shown. The last on the list was the “Welcome,” found on the 11th of June 1858, at one hundred and eighty feet below the surface, at Bakery Hill, Ballarat. It weighed 2,195 ounces!

It was long doubted, by able geologists, whether there were any rock formations in Australia that would yield diamonds; and even after discoveries of them had been made, doubts continued to be expressed about the truthfulness of the reports. For several years past the original discoveries have received confirmation by the undoubted subsequent unearthing of this interesting gem. They occur along with tin-sand and titaniferous ore, close by, if not actually in, decomposed granite; that is to say in rubbish, of which feldspar, mica, quartz, and iron form no inconsiderable proportion.

Lying below the present granitic rocks, and stretching for several miles, sometimes near the surface, and seldom two hundred feet below it, is a gravelly formation, consisting of the materials usually found in what, in Brazil, is called “Cascalho” and “Itacolumite” of the coarser kind. This may be observed quite commonly on the spoil heaps of the gold diggers. No diamonds have hitherto, however, been found in precisely this formation; but their allies, the pale blue topaz, many shades of corundum, both crystallized and amorphous, angular and water-worn, yellow and white pebbles of crystalline quartz, frequently of large size, zircons, &c., are quite common.

[Sidenote: DIAMONDS AND OTHER GEMS.]

The largest diamond yet found did not exceed four carats in weight, but was a fine stone.

Blue and green sapphires, spinels, topazes, and other gems are found occasionally, and there is a general belief among geologists that rich deposits of them may yet be discovered. Some authorities estimate the diamond-producing area of New South Wales at five hundred square miles. By the same estimate the coal fields are placed at 24,000 square miles, iron at 1,400, gold at 13,000, tin at 6,000, and copper at 3,000. Mineral lands are now leased at five shillings annual rental per acre.

[Sidenote: RESOURCES OF NEW ZEALAND.]

From an American point of view, Australia and New Zealand are associated, although they are distinct colonies, and are a long distance apart. New Zealand, discovered and named in 1642, by a Dutch navigator, TASMAN, who also discovered and named Tasmania in the same year, consists of two large and one very small island, lying 1,200 miles south-eastward of Australia, between 34° and 48° south latitude, being about antipodal to Great Britain. Its length of coast line is 3,000 miles, its shape being long and narrow; its area is about that of the State of Oregon. It is of volcanic origin, ribbed with mountains, and is better watered than Australia in respect to both lakes and rivers. Its temperature is lower than that of corresponding latitudes in Europe, and higher than that of corresponding latitudes in America, but the climate is more salubrious than in Great Britain, although very changeful in temperature and moisture.

In minerals, it is nearly as rich as any of the colonies, the gold yield having been $9,937,125 in 1873, and the total exported to July 1, 1875, $151,407,045. Copper, silver, tin, iron, and coal have also been found. Nearly everything grown in Great Britain flourishes there, together with the fern in tree form thirty feet high, a wild flax, nearly equal to manila for rope-making, an excellent variety of valuable building and ship-building woods, and an abundance of the fruits of both semi-tropical and temperate countries. The population has risen thus from 26,707 by the original census of 1851: 1858, 59,413; 1861, 99,022; 1864, 172,518; 1867, 218,668; 1871, 256,260; 1874, 299,514; and of 1875, 375,876; all these figures exclusive of aborigines and Chinese, it thus appearing to be equaled only by Victoria and New South Wales, of the Australian colonies.

In respect to emigration, it compares favorably with Victoria, its excess of immigrants over emigrants having been 38,106 and 25,270 in 1874 and 1875 respectively, against 3,367 and 2,698 for Victoria in those years. It has 550 miles of railroad, and 7,065 of telegraph wire; Victoria has 586 and 4,981 miles respectively; New South Wales, 437 and 8,014. Its number of sheep was 11,704,853 in 1874, having multiplied about two and a half times in ten years. The land under cultivation two years ago was 1,788,797 acres—an increase of 285,445 during the previous twelve months. Small as this total is—less than three per cent. of the whole—the proportion of cultivated land in New South Wales was less than one and one-half per cent., and in all Australia less than one-fourth per cent. at the same time. Taking as the assumed habitable portion the strip 250 miles wide along three sides of the Australian coast, 758,000 square miles in extent, that piece, nearly equaling in size the twenty-six States of this Union lying east of the Mississippi, would contain, if the island population were distributed over it, about three persons to the square mile, against three and one-half in New Zealand, eighty-three in New York, one hundred and fifty-eight in Massachusetts, three hundred and seventy-two in England, and four hundred and ten in Belgium. But the reader should remember that as these colonies are all pastoral, the area tilled is a very different matter from the area occupied. The principal endowment of Australia at present, besides mineral resources, being the vast areas of rich native grasses and the peculiar fitness of soil and climate which “make bad fleeces good and good better,” the colonist has become a herdsman.

It does not appear that New Zealand is behind her larger neighbors, a thousand miles distant, in any material respect. The colonies all invite immigration, and some of them have latterly taken energetic measures to secure it. They offer bounties to settlers, reduced passage rates, and other inducements, and have been quite successful both in England and America.

[Sidenote: RICH MINERAL DEPOSITS.]

The mineral resources of New Zealand are quite as varied as those of Australia. The rocks contain copper, iron, silver, gold, tin, and other metals, and there are extensive beds of coal of excellent quality. The processes employed in working the mines are almost identically the same as in Australia, so that an extended description is unnecessary. The great majority of the miners in New Zealand came originally from Australia, and their proportion of good and bad luck has been much like that in the latter country.

LIV.

UNDERGROUND IN SAN FRANCISCO.

CHINESE OPIUM DENS.—PISCO.—EXPERIMENTS IN LIQUORS.—SATURDAY NIGHT AMONG THE CHINESE.—COCOMONGO.—MURDERER’S ALLEY.—CHINESE MUSIC.—THE THEATRE.—BETEL AND ITS USE.—THE BARBARY COAST.—CHEAP LODGING-HOUSES.—A DYING VICTIM.—A DEN OF THIEVES.—“THE SHRIMP.”—UNDER THE STREET.—A REPULSIVE SPECTACLE.—OPIUM SMOKING.—ITS EFFECTS.—SAMSHOO.—ITS PREPARATION AND QUALITIES.—INTRODUCTION TO AN OPIUM DEN.—THE OCCUPANTS.—EXPERIMENT ON A SMOKER.—HOW TO SMOKE.—TRYING THE DRUG.—MESCAL.—GOING HOME.—TRYING A SEWER.—A COUNTRYMAN’S DRINK.

Underground life, of a peculiar and picturesque character, can be seen in San Francisco, in the parts of the city where the Chinese most do congregate. Soon after my arrival there, two of my friends, whom I will call the Doctor and the Colonel, invited me to a nocturnal visit to the Celestials. I accepted with alacrity, and, dressed in my poorest and oldest clothes, met my friends at the appointed hour in the _Alta_ office. Macrellish and Woodward gave us their benediction, and we set out on our journey.

“The best thing we can do,” said the doctor, “is to lay in a stock of some powerful disinfectant, or neutralizer, before we start; the stench in some of those underground China kennels is something frightful.” I suggested carbolic acid. “Not strong enough!” said the doctor, shaking his head, doubtfully. The colonel forced two long streams of smoke from his cigarito through his nostrils, stroked his long mustache thoughtfully, and suggested,—

“Pisco?”

“What is Pisco?” I demanded.

“That settles it, my friend; you have a new experience before you, and we will fall back on Pisco!” said the colonel.

[Sidenote: EXPERIENCE WITH PISCO.]

“You will be in luck if you don’t fall back on the sidewalk after you have drank it!” growled the doctor.

The colonel took my arm, and as we went down towards Montgomery Street, proceeded, in a confidential manner, to enlighten me on the subject of Pisco. It is really pure, unadulterated brandy, distilled in Peru, from the grape known as Italia, or La Rosa del Peru, and takes its name from the port of Pisco in which it is shipped. It is perfectly colorless, quite fragrant, very seductive, terribly strong, and has a flavor somewhat resembling that of Scotch whiskey, but much more delicate, with a marked fruity taste. It comes in earthen jars, broad at the top, and tapering down to a point, holding about five gallons each. We had some hot, with a bit of lemon and a dash of nutmeg in it, at a marble-paved and splendidly-decorated saloon, near the corner of California and Montgomery Streets. The first glass satisfied me that San Francisco was, and is, a nice place to visit, and that the doctor and the colonel were good fellows to travel with. The second glass was sufficient, and I felt that I could face small-pox, all the fevers known to the faculty, and the Asiatic Cholera, combined, if need be.

The colonel rolled me a cigarito, and insisted on my smoking it. I did my best, choked myself with the fine tobacco, let the paper wrapper unroll, burned my fingers, and failed ignominiously. I was glad to see that, while he pitied me, he did not wholly despise me. These Californians have an appreciably large share of liberality in their composition, and will pardon your ignorance on almost any given specialty of their state, provided you don’t claim that you have something very nearly as good “at the East.” That assumption they cannot, and will not, tolerate on the part of anybody, and I don’t so much blame them, after all.

It was Saturday evening, and the streets were crowded, Montgomery and Kearney Streets swarming, as you may say, with people, well dressed, sociable, orderly, and satisfied with themselves and the rest of mankind. Suddenly the colonel remembered that the wine called Cocomongo, from the vineyard of that name, near San Bernardino, Southern California, was one of the specialties of a saloon which we were passing at the moment, and we went in and had some.

[Sidenote: COCOMONGO.]

It was a warm, fruity wine, of a dark-amber hue, very strong, and withal palatable, which I did not find to be the case with _all_ the California wines that I tasted. We went up Washington Street to Murderer’s Alley, and turned down it, towards Jackson Street. “There is where the French woman was murdered in the night, within ten feet of where hundreds of people were coming and going all the time; and her murderer, after robbing the place, coolly washed his hands and face of the blood, and walked away. He was never discovered. Here, right where we stand, is where the Chinaman cut his runaway mistress open with a sword. I saw him hanged for it. And there is where the police shot—” I thanked my kind friend for this cheerful information, but suggested that it might be well to keep a little of it back for another time. It was not well to exhaust all the pleasant things of life at one sitting. The subject was obligingly changed.

I am satisfied that the name of the alley is well deserved and appropriate. Swarms of Chinese women, with almond eyes, baby faces, painted red and white in the most lavish manner, lips touched with vermilion, hair black and glossy, with a purplish tinge, like the wing of a raven, and clad in blue satin coats and pants, trotted along the alley, their curious wooden-soled, silk and bullion-embroidered shoes rattling like the hoofs of a flock of sheep as they went. Others tapped upon the window panes, to attract our attention as we passed. Before one house we saw “joss-sticks” burning, and the white cloth festooned over the door, and hanging down on either side, told that death was there. We heard the beating of gongs, the squeaking of one-stringed Chinese fiddles, the sharp notes of the kettle-drum and other discordant instruments, making music inside, and, as we passed, a woman, clad in blue and white, threw a bunch of lighted fire-crackers upon the doorstep, where they went off like a running fire of musketry, much to the edification of a gang of little pig-tailed, almond eyed boys,—“demi-Johns,” I think the doctor called them,—who were gathered around, chattering like so many magpies all the time, in their, to me, uncouth jargon. The Chinese is an ancient language, beyond a doubt; and I don’t see why it has not worn smoother by use in the hundred centuries or more since the “Central Flowery Empire” became “known and feared among the nations.”

[Sidenote: A CHINESE THEATRE.—BETEL NUT.]