The Sun.
London, England, 1853-01-20 00:00:00

THE COLONY OF VICTORIA

(From the Melbourne Argus.)
, In accordance with our usual custom, we com-
pile a summary of news for transmission to England
by the Formosa steamer. As, however, the vessel
• only intends to stay a few hours in the harbour,
our review, is of necessity, more imperfect and
brief than we should desire. We hope that on all
future occasions the steamers will either make a
reasonable stay in our port prior to their departure
or else give the public warning of their intention to
leave immediately on their arrival from Sydney.
The previous summary of the Argus developed the
aspect of this colony up to the 27th of September,
the date of the departure of the Australian steamer
and the chief incidents of importance and our pre-
sent condition are as below detailed;—
The yield of gold still continues very large,
although it scarcely keeps pace with the increasing
number of diggers. It is not to be supposed, how-
ever, that the gold is inexhaustably abundant, and
can always be obtained by the simplest processes.
It is evident that in proportion as a given locality
is worked the necessity for finer scientific modes
of operation will increase. That necessity is be-
ginning to be felt at the most prolific fields,
and the average gain of the digger is observably
diminishing. Gold-digging is of all pursuits the
most fortuitous, not only with respect to individual
success, but in regard to the auriferous capa-
bilities of given localities. The wealth of a par-
ticular spot cannot be known till it is fully worked,
and this involves the necessity of unsuccessful la-
bour in some cases. Hence arise the fluctuations
in the pursuit—the alternate success and failure of
individuals, and the changing value of particular
localities. That gold does abound to a most sur-
prising extent every one admits ; but it is not so
easy to point out the spot in which the digger can
Iwork with certain success. The whole pursuit
seems to be a series of experiments at best : the
i marvel is that here they should have been so amaz-
ingly successful.
The largest mass of gold yet found was picked
up a month ago at BendigO, near the spot where
the 281 b. lump was found. It weighed 461 b., and
was valued at 2,1001. It was a singular specimen,
deeply coated with quartz in many places. It has
been sent to England by the Choringhee, for exhi-
bition.
The Ovens Diggings are not proving as produc-
tive as was at first anticipated. The experiment,
howev,lr, has not been fully carried out there.
The geneval impression seems to be that there is a
very rich ii,lld in that district.
In South Australia gold has been found at a spot
miles from _Adelaide. The number of diggers
who have tried the Echunga Diggings has not yet
been sufficiently large to admit of a decisive esti-
mate of their auriferous capabilities being formed.
But we think we are warranted in saying that
there is a strong probability that Echunga is only
one of the innumerable localities in Australia where
gold exists, but in such a finely diffused state, that
the rude process of the digger will never make
working them remunerative, whatever may here-
after be accomplished by science and combination.
The commencement of steam communication—
the event so anxiously looked for by the colonies as
so advantageous to both countries—has not been
very auspicious. Five steamers have arrived up to
the present time, and none of them have achieved
a passage much superior to that of many' sailing
vessels. The Australia and the Sydney were the
worst cases ; judging from these specimens, we are
not disposed to augur much for the Australian
Steam Navigation Company's enterprise. The
Chusan and Formosa were better, but not equal to
what we should expect from he splendid fleet
under the control of the Peninsular and Oriental
Steam Navigation Company. The Great Britain
made a passage of 83 days ; but probably she would
have distanced all her rivals by some days had it
not been for a mistake about the coals. We hope
very soon to witness the results to be attained by
the Panama route ; but meantime we beg to im-
press upon the proprietors of steamers to Australia
that they may just as well send out sailing-vessels
if the steamers cannot make passages of about 60
to 70 days. The prolonged passage of the Sydney
was a positive evil of great magnitude ; it detained
the mails needlessly, confused commercial transac-
tions, and caused very great anxiety.
In connexion with this subject, we may mention
that an immense increase in intercolonial traffic had
caused a corresponding rise in the value of steam-
vessels for the trade. A striking instance recently
occurred. The Clarence, a small steamer built in
England for the Australian colonies, was sold for
29,9501. ; while her first cost, including the expense
of bringing her out, was about 13,0001. She is
the property of a company in Van Diemen's Land,
and runs between this port and Lauunceston. An-
other instance was the Keera ; she cost about
6,0001. in England not many months since, and
was sold the other day for 10,0001. These facts
speak for themselves as to the profits made upon
the exportation of steamers, and the rate of remu-
neration at which they can be worked.
The financial prosperity of the colony is evidenced
by the fact that the revenue for the past September
quarter amounted to 462,3401. ls. 5d., while in the
corresponding quarter of the previous year it was
only 53,1941. 6s. ld. Land was sold during the
quarter to the value of 267,7541. 4s. 10d. The
gold licenses yield 109,7951. 10s. 4d., besides
10,8971. 4s. 11d. for escort fees. The Customs'
duties alone realised 55,3781. Bs. 10d.
On the other hand the public expenditure has
enormously increased. The estimates for next
year have just been laid before the Legislative
Council. The ways and weans are set down at
1,733,6001., the expenditure at 1,749,0421. Of
this latter sum not less than 412,7151. is for the
police establishments, 94,4491. for penal establish-
ments, the administration of justice 42,2801.,
military 67,4891., making a total of 616,9331. to be
spent in protecting life and property and repressing
crime. That such a sum should be deemed
necessary for the purpose in so limited a com-
munity, is sufficiently significant of the blessings
to be reaped from close proximity to a penal
colony. The Secretary of State has very wisely
ceded the entire control of the revenue derivable

from gold to our Legislative Council. Acting upon
a suggestion contained in the official dispatch
which announced that boon, our Executive most
unwisely announced its intention of levying an
export duty of 2s. 6d. an ounce on gold. No
tax could be more unpopular, injudicious, or
unnecessary—unpopular, because it is univer-
sally opposed by the diggers, who already pay
the tax of 30s. a-month ; injudicious, because
it would promote smuggling and disarrange our
commercial relations with neighbouring colonies ;
and unnecessary, beimuse the license fee, if pro-
perly collected, would yield a revenue sufficiently
large for the public requirements. The measure
has not yet, however, obtained the consent of the
Legislature, and the probability is, that it will be
rejected ; should it be passed, there might be a
movement on the part of the diggers to refuse pay-
ment of the license fee. On a former occasion the
Government sustained a signal defeat when at-
tempted to double the fee. A similar result is by
no means impossible in the present case ; but pub-
lic opinion has been declared so strongly, and in so
many ways, against the new impost, that it is
scarcely likely to be exacted even by a body which
is such a mockery of representation as our Colonial
Legislature. _

All recent advices agree in showing the extreme
anxiety that is felt among the woollen manufac-
turers of Great Britain with respect to the probable
effect of the gold discovery upon our yield of wool.
We are happy, therefore, to be able to report so far
favourably of the matter as to state that the shear-
ing is proceeding with its usual regularity, that the
settlers find no difficulty in securing the services of
an adequate number of men, both for washing and
removing the fleece, and that there is every reason-
able probability of the wool being conveyed to the
ports for shipment without any very ruinous ex-
pense or any very serious delay.
The prices realised in the British markets affords
very poor encouragement to Australian settlers to
meet a high rate of wages, the difficulties of con-
tending with disease, and of getting up and for-
warding their wool in first-rate style. We have
before warned those interested in this important
trade, and we now warn them again most empha-
tically, that there is a process going on which has
a most marked tendency to lead to i erra
the d te
titkfi
ionuf ourr beautiful Australian
wools. The rapid
-
e ocolnsu
ersf
at n
population,
all immediately becoming
larg
animal food,o
distant anddate, ableae,
leadto pay t
handsomely for it, e
must o
such a predominance
oo ff the value of the carcass, in
proportion to that
00 1 i ns eagdl ed ci
tt
ie
odn.
mthethmeoetnhoeTeY
he fleece, as to cause the
latter to be comparative)
Considering
f ro
which are now and for tuhlietl s to our popu-
lationand other quarters,
snource of the been flowing in upon us, it is aast few
months have
por.t favourably
great-
est gratification to us that we ca
principal grain-
on the condition of the crops in the port
producing districts of these colonies. We believe
that almost universally, a succession of f
weather has led to their present state b:iv:glisraatbile
s-
factory. The high rates of prices have inducted the
farmers to make considerable efforts to keep up the
breadth of land sown, and the present prospects of
the harvest lead to a well-grounded hope of at least
In this colony the quantity of
less than has been the case for
the last faw seasons, but what there is seems likely
to be good, and there is little doubt of its being
laann d
wheat is
in our grain crops
there can
promptly and energetically harvested.
But, looking at our prospects
in the most favourable point of view,
still be no doubt whatever, that we shall shortly ,

require very large supplies of breadstuffs from
abroad. The harvests of our own colonies have
rarely been more than sufficient for our own wants
even in old times, and before the recent vast addi-
tions to our population. The consumption of flour
for this colony alone has been calculated to amount
to upwards of 100 tons a-day, and our own produce
will go but little way to meet such a demand as
this. -Hitherto we have received no extraneous as-
sistance whatever.
Intimately connected with this subject is the
anomalous condition of the colony with respect to
the difficulties in the way of settlement and occu-
pation of the waste lands. Tens of thousands of
successful miners are willing and anxious to invest
their drofits in the most natural mode—the pur-
chase of a farm or garden near the scene of their
successful labours as gold-diggers. By the absurd
system, however, of locking up thellands in the
hands of the squatters, this most natural and ne-
cessary process appears to be surrounded with suf-
ficient difficulties to prevent our Executive from
taking any means to give a settled character to our
population, or removing the very great evils neces-
sarily resulting from continuing to place nearly
the whole adult population of the colony in the
position of mere reckless and scrambling adven-
turers.
But, while all sorts of difficulties are thrown in
the way of the miners investing their newly-gained
wealth in the soil, or in the erection of houses for
themselves and their families, our Government can
distort the Land Sales Act so far as to alienate
large tracts for the gratification and enrichment of
their friends the squatters ; and the monstrous
anomaly is thereby exhibited of land being, with-
held from the people to be given to the personal
friends or political supporters of the Government.
The digger, with his few hundreds, may " knock
down " his earnings at the public-house or seek an
investment for them in other colonies, while the
pampered squatter may claim his hundreds of acres,
valued by a probably friendly commissioner, lock-
ing round the digger an iron circle of monopoly,
preventing him from raising sustenance for himself,
and interrupting his supplies of animal food, &c.,
when coming through any other than the favoured
channel.
This great injustice, and the absolute necessity
for immediate measures being adopted to adapt our
land regulations to the rapidly progressive condi-
tion of the colony, are shown by the fact that our
population is increasing at present at the rate of
some thousands a week. Since our last summary,
about six months ago, the balance of arrivals
against departures amounts to more than 20,000
souls actually entered through the customs ; but,
as the captains of many vessels conceal the real
number they bring, in consequence of their infrac-
tion of the ,Passengers' Act, the number actually
added to our population will very greatly exceed
the number we have stated. When, then, it is
recollected that our whole population, previous to
the discovery of gold, was only about 80,000, and
that additions to our inhabitants are taking place
at the rate of at least 200,0001. a year ; and when it
is also borne in mind that our exports, represent-
ing the income of the community, have been raised
in one year from a little over 1,000,0001. sterling
to a rate of something like 15,000,0001. or-
-16,000,0001., and that for all this enormous sum of
annual wealth there is scarcely any other possible
investment than is afforded by the public lands of
the colony, the cruelty, the injustice, and the wan-
ton impolicy of locking up these lands in the hands
of a few hundreds of squatters are so transparently
manifest as to render such a national robbery, we
should hope, impossible.
With regard to our social condition, we regret
that we cannot speak much more favourably than
before. Crime still continues fearfully rife and
neither life nor property is invested with anything
approaching to proper security. An act has just
come into operation for the purpose of cutting off
the ready access to our gold fields, hitherto afforded
to the felons which England still so wickedly and
foolishly persists in sending into our immediate
neighbourhood. The act has yet, indeed, been in-
operative, as most acts are in the hands of our
feeble Government, and while we continue to be
deluged with escaped or conditionally-pardoned
criminals, it is not to be wondered at if our streets,
and roads, and villages supply constant scenes of
outrage and villany. The soldiers, considerately
sent out by the English Government, have indeed
arrived, and will,"we dare say, when palled upon,
endeavour to force down the throats of the colo-
nists some of the absurd crochets of a very
shallow executive, but as thief-catchers they
are as useless as soldiers always are, and, how-
ever ornamental they may be, we have yet to
record many instances of their practical inutility.
Our police arrangements, indeed our whole sys-
tem of Government, is, as bad as it well can be. It
is one complete tissue of the grossest favouritism
and jobbery. A mean, cringing sycophancy is the
only passport to viceregal favour, and, as is always
the case under such circumstances, the whole
course of Government is a complication of shifti-
ness, of faithless neglect of duty, and of disregard
to the public interests. Our Lieutenant-Governor
writes home laboured dispatches, which are got up
with sufficient art to succeed in persuading the
Downing-street clerks that he is a very able and a
very zealous man. But here, surrounded as he
habitually is, with a circle of incompetent idlers,
incapable of earning a livelihood for themselves,
and therefore fattening upon the public, both his
Excellency and his advisers are invariably spoken of
and thought of in a strain of contempt, which is
sadly opposed to the feelings which ought to be en-
couraged in the minds of good citizens towards
those in authority over them.
A motion of want of confidence in the Adminis-

tration of M. Latrobe is to come on immediately
for discussion in the Colonial Legislature, and con-
taining, as that body does, a large proportion of
Government officers and nominees, there is little
doubt that the votes will be passed by a large ma-
jority. This, as a constitutional protest against
the employment of the pack of incapables con-
stituting the favourites of theLieutenant-Governor,
may act as a timely warning to him from continu-
ing to make his Government in these critical times
an asylum for the very lame, halt, and blind of
the political world. Failing this effect, we must
look elsewhere for reform, and we should pro-
bably require larger doses in proportion to the
distance which we have to go. We perceive large
concessions in the way of self-government have just
been made to New Zealand, and we would
urge our claims for at least an equal share of
that most necessary right. At present we are little
better than mere slaves, subjected to the follies and
caprice of a nominee of some irresponsible power in
England. This, resulting, as it naturally does, in
bad government, with all its myriad evils, is irri-
tating in the highest degree to a people conscious
of what freedom is, and quite capable of taking I
care of themselves. That the universal anxiety to
get hold of a certain quantum. of the gold which is
now so profusely scattered around us prevents
people from paying much attention to public affairs,
is no proof that they are satisfied with them, or
believe that they are administered with even decent
honesty and vigour. The time will come when
things will settle into more regular channels, when
the money value of time will net be quite so high
as at present ; and if by that period measures are
not taken to enable us to govern ourselves, which
no one else ever can or will do properly, the result
will be neither very certain nor possibly very satis-
factory.
' Before concluding this hasty summary, we must
again advert to the evils arising from the sending
out of large numbers of passengers in single ships.
We lately alluded to several cases in which the
mortality during the voyage had arrived at a fright-
ful extent. Since then, large English vessels have
arrived, also furnishing a sad list of deaths. Seve-
ral vessels are now in quarantine, among them the
Ticonderaga, which recently arrived with the ter-
rible loss of 104 lives. When she, anchored in our
port many scores of passengers were still ill, the
doctor and his assistant were both laid up, and the
medical stores wore all consumed. From the result

of such experience it seems improper that any ship,
however large, however splendid her accommoda-
tions, should endeavour to bring many hundred
passengers for so long a voyage. Those vessels
which have conveyed 200 or 300 passengers each
have usually arrived without any very serious loss
of life ; but those conveying 600 or 700, and up-
wards, have frequently furnished such a list of
casualties as to lead us strongly to recommend ship-
owners to abstain from sending thein, and passen-
gers to avoid coming by them.

RT
l[bAe
inn vaEr
H
s' tsrEeme tEI; Piccadilly,D eafn
ess
observe,Ne w
oppositeDDiscovery,-39,
cov
thee o3r9kotel. The ovganic vibrator, an extraordinary power-
,
ful, small, newly-invented instrument, for deafness, en-
tirely different from all others to surpass anything of the
kind that has been, or probably ever can be produced,
being of the same colour as the skin, is not perceptible ;
it enables deaf persons to hear distinctly at church and
at public assemblies ; the unpleasant sensation of singing
noises in the ears are entirely removed ; and it affords
all the assistance that possibly could be desired. The
Royal Exhibition—valuable newly-invented, very small,
powerful waistcoat pocket glass, the size of a walnut,
to discern minute objects at a distance of from four to
five miles, which is found to be invaluable, for yachting,
and to sportsmen, gentlemen, and gamekeeperfe. Tele-
scopes, possessing such extraordinary power, that some
3i inches, with an extra eye piece, will show distinctly
Jupiter's moons, Saturn's ring, and the double stars
the e yfor
w aSupersede
oecvkeer
ty, osthhoe t aing, ryre
pouf
rapllosseizse,s
Opera and race-course glasses with wonderful power ; a
minute object can be clearly seen, from 10 to 12 miles
distant. Invaluable newly-invented spectacle.—S. &B.
Solomons, Aurists and Opticians, 39, Albemarle-street,
Piccadilly, observe opposite the York Hotel.