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Chapter xvi. The Tide Has Flowed.—It Now Ebbs.

What an unpleasant thing it is to be losing money. Look at this picture, as you have already looked on that. I have just given, from personal experience, a few dashes from the pen of one who found it a very pleasant thing to be making money. A regard for truth, rather than the love of an altered position, now compels me to sketch the opposite of a pleasing picture.

After a tedious and tempestuous passage of nearly four months' duration, here I am at the golden region, located at the same hotel at which I was lodged twelve months ago. But in the interval there has been a commercial revolution. Never was change more sudden or complete. Instead of Hobson's Bay bearing on the surface of its waters a few straggling ships, each alike without either goods or crew, those waters are now studded by a prodigious fleet of merchantmen, among which might be seen a flag from almost every nation but that of Russia. From this imposing array of floating warehouses, inland store-rooms, shops, wooden huts, and even diggers' tents have been, or are being filled to overflowing. Instead of ten buyers to one seller, as heretofore, there are now ten sellers to one buyer. It looks for all the world, as if London, Manchester, Birmingham, and Glasgow had, by some ex- page 271traordinary agency, shot their entire stock both of things wearable, serviceable, and eatable on the opposite side of the globe, without sending the necessary stock of human beings to buy, wear, or swallow their commodities. Instead of the demand for goods being greater than the supply, the supply is now ten times greater than the demand.

Like some poor distracted spirit that bears daily torment from toothache, rather than submit to that momentary operation which would bring the wished-for sound of "it's all over," I lacked courage to take my little stock of merchandise—the very eye-tooth of dearly-cherished hopes—to the dreaded slaughter-house of colonial skill. But a month's hesitation convinced me there was no chance of obtaining relief under the fallacious hope that the commercial disease would cure itself. Every tide brought fresh cargoes of evidence that delay would only make more painful the approaching sacrifice of my two thousand guinea enterprise. Gaining wisdom by experience, and seeing that I had already wasted thirty days, and a far greater number of guineas, in hoping for improvement where there was no hope, I now resolved to close the business in hand—one which could not be improved by keeping open. Acting on this resolve, I desired my agent to "sell," and (to use a not very classical expression) I may observe that the gentleman did sell, and a pretty "sell" it was; for not only were the goods sold, but the owner also. Enough. Without troubling the reader with the details of this unfortunate speculation, I will merely add that after the auctioneer's hammer had sacrificed my commercial enterprise, and the auctioneer had deducted from the result of the operation the very moderate expenses involved in the destruction, I received from the effects of the same a little more than enough money to take me on my contemplatedc page 272tour through the colonies, and to cover the cost of my passage to England.

Consolation, when sought, may be found under any and every trouble. In the present instance, I consoled myself with the balm of the Irishman who said, "after I had been killed by the enemy I had the satisfaction of saving my friend." Though not gifted with the supernatural power of Doctor O'Toole, I derived considerable pleasure from the simple knowledge of having, as I thought, saved not the person, but the property of a valued friend from almost total destruction. The sale of my own stock had entailed a loss to its owner of about seventy per cent. But I had managed to make better terms for the disposal of goods which were not mine. As previously stated, a gentleman whom I regarded as a real friend had consigned to my care, for sale on his behalf, merchandise to the value of about four hundred pounds. For these goods I succeeded in finding a firm by whom the entire lot was taken at a discount of about twenty-five per cent,—the purchase money to be paid in cash within thirty days, or one month after the goods had been delivered to the purchasers. The delivery was duly made to one of the largest, and—so I was informed—one of the first houses of its class in Melbourne, and I was pleased at having effected a sale which would not entail on an absent friend a loss of such magnitude as that which I had myself suffered at the hands of the most merciless of commercial knackers.

Alas, for the sandy groundwork of human calculations! The little pleasure arising from my hope of the structure I had just built, like the building itself, had but a brief existence. Before the expiration of a month, consequently before the arrival of the day on which I was to have received payment for the goods that had been intrusted to page 273my care, the purchasers failed. By other houses this house had just been declared "one of the very first of its class." Therefore, either the class itself, or the declaration of the class to which it belonged, must have been altogether bad. After wasting about twenty pounds in a fruitless endeavour to obtain from these fraudulent dealers either goods or money, I took my final departure from the city. But I took nothing—not a shilling—for that valued friend who no doubt expected to receive for his four hundred guinea venture a weighty box of Australian treasure.

This loss was the heaviest blow of all. I was sorely grieved that the last and only ray of hope in an unfortuate speculation was thus entirely extinguished. But after the first severe shock, I found consolation even under this the most painful of all blows—which was a thrust direct at the heart. A little quiet thought, followed by a reflex of what I had seen in the way of the world convinced me that there is nothing like a monetary test for proving real or counterfeit friendship. Men seldom relinquish their claim to the—often unmerited—name of friend, so long as there is anything to gain or nothing to lose by the title. But a good pull or even an attempted pull at the pocket seldom fails to draw the curtain from the heart, and to reveal a friend in his true colors. I required no such test applied to one whom I knew—so far as human sagacity can know—to be genuine. But the proof was now an unavoidable necessity. In a future chapter a single sentence will give the result of its application.

The loss from my own speculation ceased to be a serious matter, so soon as the business in which it originated was at an end. It failed to inflict on its victim that fretful wound which causes subsequent trouble or pain. I was again free and comparatively easy—like a late sufferer page 274from toothache, whose tormentor had just been removed. My weaknesses, though great and many, have never had among their number the following little one—that of repining, or of regretting the impossibility of being unable to recall what is beyond human reach. I have always had in this poor mortal frame enough—though but one little drop—of the spirit of philosophy to prevent the folly of wishing to bring back yesterday. I never gave way to saying or thinking "if I had not done so and so," or "if I had not lost so much, I should have been so much better off," or "what a fool I was to do as I did," and so on. Knowing these lamentations to be, if not a fatal barrier to present action, at least a serious drag on a desire to do better in the future than has been done in the past, I never gave audience to such dismal reflections. Had I done so, I might often have been overwhelmed with trouble instead of being comparatively happy.

Now that my pretty pair of colonial speculations—like the "nuggets" made by the first and lost by the second—were numbered with things of the past, I returned to the point from which I had been enticed by the alluring sweets of sudden gain. Now that eighteen months had been wasted, half of which had been spent in making money and the other half in losing it, I retraced my steps, though the time lost could not be recalled, by returning to the position and occupation I had so hastily and so unwisely abandoned. Now that—contrary to expectation—I had failed to make a fortune in the golden region, I started on my original design, and began to make a book descriptive of the region itself.

And let me tell you, my literary readers—if I have any—you who are wont to charm and elevate other imaginations by lofty flights from your own—however faithful page 275may be your ideal pictures of pleasure or pain, there is nothing like a prick from the weapon of a wasp for a life-like exposition of its sting. Here is a brief extract, the only one that will be given, from the work on which I entered immediately after I had emerged from the scene described:—

"Melbourne, at present, is a kind of modern Babel—a little hell upon earth—a city of rioters, cut-throats, gamblers, and drunkards—a crowded den of human iniquity—where, from the highest merchants downward, there appears to be but one object in view—where the very faculties of mind, body, and soul, are employed and directed to one worldly end—where thousands are anxiously and almost exclusively bent towards the consummation of their own selfish desires—where calm reflection and all the higher attributes of the mind lose their proper influence in artificial excitement—where the ties of friendship, domestic duties, kindred obligations, intellectual study, and the immortal spirit of true religion are often neglected, if not entirely forgotten in the busy work of self-aggrandizement—where, in fine, the priceless possessions of health, together with all those sweet enjoyments which constitute the real happiness of life, fall a sacrifice to an insatiable thirst for gain."

The truth of the sketch, of which the foregoing is but a small portion, has never been questioned—not even by the actors in the fearful drama. But was I not one, though a minor one, of the characters? In this scene of commercial gambling had I not played, and—had success attended my second appearance on the stage—might I not have continued to play a part? Be this as it may, I did not, in my first venture, object to share the spoil of the speculators, though I joined them not in their drunken gambols. Like page 276one who secretly and silently contributes to a dangerous agitation, I had no cause for complaint, till my own fingers had been burnt by the very fire I had kindled. Is such the way of the world? Is it thus in each overgrown garden of corruption men are ready to pick up for themselves fruit from the very paths they condemn? The preceding pages have already recorded that such—at least, for eighteen months of my career—had been the case with me. As a sort of justification for a false step, people often endeavour to prove that other people are equally foolish. Whatever the object in the present instance, I will simply observe that in a future part of this work the reader may observe that Australia is not the only country, nor the writer the only individual, of which positive proof will be given concerning similar or perhaps greater strides for gold on the part of number one.

I will not now tire the reader with a long account of my many "hairbreadth 'scapes" during a tour through the civilized and uncivilized, the inhabited and uninhabited parts of the colonies. Neither will it be necessary to attempt an elaborate description of persons and places, of countries and communities, which of late years have formed subjects for so many pens—some accounts, let me add, by penmen who have furnished the world with highly-finished, if not strikingly faithful pictures taken by artists at a distance of sixteen thousand miles from the localities and objects represented. A few sketches however of those distant regions have been the result of personal observation. Among the small number of these my own feeble one forms an unit. That book—so far as sale is concerned—proved one of the most successful of my works. To this I may perhaps briefly refer hereafter. As the social aspect of Australia is at present very different to what it was in page 2771852-3 I will not now dwell on abominations which have in a great measure, if not entirely ceased to exist. But there is a colony with which the general reader may be less familiar. The natural advantages rather than the mineral riches—though these are of considerable extent—of that colony may justify a few passing remarks. Everybody has either heard a good deal or read a good deal about Australia. But it is not everybody that has heard so much or read so much about New Zealand—at least not from one who has personally explored that distant region.

In 1855 the European population of New Zealand was only about 60,000. At present it is probably rather under than over 120,000, while the territorial extent of the country is somewhat greater than that of Great Britain and Ireland, or only 50,000 acres less than the whole of Great Britain and Ireland, with all the adjacent isles—as New Zealand contains 78,300,480 acres.

Here, then, is one of the finest colonies, if not the finest colony in the world, with a population smaller than that of a good-sized English town, and with square acres as many as those of England, Ireland, and Scotland together. The climate of the colony is as superior to that of Australia as are the Maories or natives of New Zealand compared with the emaciated and inanimate aborigines of the golden region. In Australia, however, the native race will soon become extinct. Even the Maories of New Zealand—the finest native race of darkies in the world—are decreasing in number every year, although the decrease is much less rapid than with the Australian native. The present Maori population of New Zealand is about 50,000. Like other native races in countries where Europeans have permanently settled, the New Zealanders will no doubt in the course of time—say fifty or a hundred years—become page 278nearly if not entirely extinct. At present there is room to accommodate at least 25,000,000 European settlers, although the entire colony does not contain the two hundredth part of that number.

I once either read a prediction or heard it predicted that "New Zealand would at some future period become the Great Britain of the southern hemisphere." Although I have but little faith in modern prophets and prophecies, I confess myself sufficiently credulous to accept and believe in the above prediction as an exception to the rule.

Comparatively little known as she is at present, New Zealand will, no doubt, some day become an important and populous country, if not a great nation. She has all the elements to warrant such an opinion and to justify such a belief. With a fine, if not the finest climate in the world, the colony has every corresponding advantage. Though she cannot, at present, boast of extensive gold fields fully developed, like those of Australia, a treasure more valuable and inexhaustible may be found in the periodical riches of her soil.

It would be foreign to the object of this work to say more on a subject which I have previously described in detail. In the few foregoing sentences will be found the summary of my former opinion. That opinion is unchanged. And if asked to name the first colony in the southern hemisphere, as a desirable home for the intending emigrant I should still with the most impartial sincerity answer—New Zealand.

This opinion was arrived at after having visited and personally inspected every province in the colony, from Auckland to Otago.

Having completed my tour through, and taken voluminous notes of the colonies of Australia, Tasmania and New Zealand, I now, like a tired and long absent child, turned page 279towards my own home in the mother country—a country the beauties of which will bear comparison with most countries, and a home the comforts of which are unobtainable in any other part of the world.

Before bidding a final farewell to the Antipodes, I may just mention that during my tour through New Zealand a presentation was made to me of a somewhat singular character. But neither the singularity of the gift nor the event in which it originated would alone have justified an account of the affair by its present recorder. The mere allusion to compliment of a personal nature might in itself subject a writer, no less than a speaker, to the charge of vanity. But future reference which will be made to the following incident—in the shape of a sequel to the story—may disclose the real motive for its present revelation, the chief object of which is to show that the leading features in human nature—especially those noted by Honest John—have a striking resemblance and are in all respects very much the same all over the world.

In a former chapter mention is already made of my having at the close of my first visit to Australia given a lecture with some success. Soon after this the pleasure market, no less than other markets, became glutted with all manner of subjects, and with things both suited and unsuited to the particular tastes of the community. Immediately on the appearance of ballad singers, dancers, tumblers and rope-walkers, each steady-going lecturer had to make his final bow to a colonial audience. Everything was changed. While a learned professor gave scientific lectures, or lectures on scientific subjects to empty benches, some clown from the ring at Astley's or elsewhere drew large, if not fashionable audiences and sixty pounds a-week, as a reward for his services. Finding matters thus, I abandoned all idea of another page 280attempt in the way of a poetical exposition—poetry being now declared "dry and uninteresting." This evidence of the popular taste however, is merely typical of the changes which of late years have taken place in the mother country. At the present day, how many of the general public are there that attend or care anything about lectures on literary or scientific subjects? Let the secretaries of literary institutions answer this question. In the absence of such answer, that of one who has had some experience in the matter may suffice. There was a time when those lectures were attractive. That time is past. A musical entertainment, or one in which the entertainer personifies some sixty characters in as many minutes never fails to draw the multitude, while poetry never fails to keep the multitude away. Some institutions have discovered this, and give their members an occasional light dessert in place of the more substantial repast. Others again are opposed to all innovation. It is scarcely necessary to say which of the two is in the best position to pay twenty shillings in the pound. It is useless to attempt to cram the public with poetry while the public taste lies in another direction.

At the time of my visit to New Zealand but few, if any, out of the vast fleet of modern entertainers had reached that remote region. Consequently the few lectures and dramatic readings which I gave during my tour through the colony were at least liberally patronised, if they were not duly appreciated. It was after the delivery of one of these lectures that I received a note of which the following is a copy:—

"Nelson, February 18th.

"Dear Sir,

"Having to make a communication which may probably prove to your advantage, may I request the honor of your company at dinner to-morrow at six o'clock?

"The favor of an early reply will oblige,"

Yours truly, "Thomas —

"To—, Esq., Trafalgar Hotel."

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"Something to my advantage!" On reading that part of the note, I felt as though a detective officer had just conveyed the gentle hint of "take care of your pockets." Even after the mysterious invitation of Mr. Sharp, who feasted his guest much after the fashion and with the view of "throwing a sprat to catch a whale," I looked with grave suspicion on the voluntary offer of a personal benefit from any person who could have no interest—unless a selfish one—in a stranger. But, putting aside the suspicious "something to the advantage" of the guest, I had no objection to a good dinner, provided the host was "a proper man." And hereupon I proceeded to make enquiry on the subject, by ringing the bell and requesting, as a preliminary step, the presence of the landlord of my hotel.

"Good morning, landlord. As you appear to know most persons of importance in the town, may I ask whether your knowledge extends to a gentleman of the name of Thomas—."

No doubt Hon. Thomas Renwick, M.D., dies at his residence "Newstead," Nelson, 1879"Doctor ——you mean," replied the landlord. "Oh yes, know him quite well. Everybody knows the doctor."

"Indeed! But you don't say what everybody knows about him, though your answer leaves ample room for enquiry. You say he is well known; is he equally respected?"

"I believe he is, too," said the landlord, "Not a man in Nelson more respected than the doctor."

"Of course, then, he is what people call 'well off,' is he not?"

"Rich as a Jew," was the reply. "Married, I suppose?"

"Yes—and to one as rich as himself."

"Any family?"

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"I never heard of any but their broad acres."

"Do they keep much company?"

"I think not. The wife is a good-hearted though rather peculiar sort of body—so the ladies say—but the ladies, you know will talk, 'specially in small places where they've only theirselves to talk about."

"Very true, landlord; and I thank you for all this information. By-the-bye, you were good enough to promise me some wild fowl on an early day. I shall not dine at home to-morrow, but will gladly avail myself of your offer on any other day during the week. Good morning."

After the foregoing evidence, the reader will not be surprised to hear that immediately on the landlord's departure, I wrote a note, accepting an invitation to dine with one whom I had heard of, but not yet seen. Though still in a maze concerning the object of that invitation, I had just been informed that the author of it was universally respected and was moreover "as rich as a Jew." Would any poor man either on this or on the other side of the globe have declined a summons so graciously worded? I think not. The experience I had now had of the way of the world made me doubt, even in this case, whether I should find anything to "my advantage" beyond a good dinner and good company. Still, there was the daily recurring fact that in a strange world strange things are for ever taking place, and that every hour of man's existence supplies evidence of some new mystery.

The day and the dinner hour arrived. On entering the well-furnished, though not extensive villa of the host, I was met and complimented both by the host and hostess, who said they had already—at a distance—derived much pleasure from my presence in the lecture hall, having attended each of my dramatic readings; but they had now page 283the additional pleasure of receiving me as their guest. Hereupon I was introduced to good company and to a good dinner; and the entire party afterwards enjoyed, or seemed to enjoy an agreeable evening in the drawing-room. Not a whisper was heard—at least not by the principal person concerned—of anything to "my advantage" beyond what was then going on. But on taking leave, the host accompanied me to the hall door, wished me "God speed" on the homeward voyage, and placed in my hand a huge envelope, the contents of which he desired me to examine at my leisure, or when I had nothing better to do.

It was somewhat past two o'clock when I reached my hotel with the mysterious packet. Yet I found leisure and had "nothing better to do"—before saying prayers—than to examine and ruminate on the contents of the monster envelope, which even now failed to impress me with the belief that it would disclose anything to "my advantage." At the moment of breaking the seal, I expected to find within nothing more than the MSS. of a prose or poetical composition, founded on the life or death of some favorite kitten, cousin, or native chief, and probably dedicated to Frank Foster. In my editorial capacity I had often received anonymous contributions of poetry and prose—why not one duly authenticated? But in this case I mistook the character of the formidable document, for on withdrawing it from its temporary hiding place I found it clothed in legal forms, duly supported by the well-known upright or buckram style of letter and figure in which the hand of a lawyer's clerk is at once visible. The document was accompanied by the following note from the gentleman by whom I had just been so liberally entertained:—

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"Nelson, February 19th.

"Mr dear Sir,"

In company with a large number of the inhabitants of Nelson, we have been highly pleased with your literary entertainments.

"Mrs. R—desires to express, in something more than words, the pleasure she has herself derived from those exhibitions by requesting your acceptance (in trust, and for the benefit of Miss—) of ten acres of land, the legal conveyance of which is herewith enclosed.

"Wishing you a speedy, safe, and pleasant passage to England, believe me, my dear sir,

"Yours faithfully,

"Thomas —.

"To—Esq., Trafalgar Hotel."

Ten acres of land! A present! not to me, but to a young lady in England whom the donor had never seen. The affair was in every way a mysterious if not a romantic one. Had the lady presented me with ten ounces of gold, or ten ten-pound notes, a diamond ring, an elephant's tusk, a silver snuff-box, or any other convertible mark of her gracious favor, the thing would have been a little more intelligible. But as it now stood, and was likely to stand,—for land is not a moveable commodity—the distant owner, who was yet in blissful ignorance of her little estate at the Antipodes, would probably never see either the gift or the giver, though she would not be able to think of the one and forget the other.

On enquiry I was informed that the land, being in the immediate district of a new township, would probably increase in value every year. With this information, and as trustee pro tem, of the singular gift, I took my berth in a ship which, with fair winds, fine weather, and the lapse of about three months, would enable me, on the opposite side of the globe, to present myself to, and surprise the young lady who, in my absence, had become a landowner without purchase.

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With regard to the passage from New Zealand to England, I will merely observe that a literary man or anyone partial to writing has some little advantage over those who lack profitable occupation for their leisure hours during a long sea voyage. The majority of passengers—when tired of the innocent amusements, or the gaming and expensive sports peculiar to social life—tax their inventive faculties for some new mode of "killing time." Authors, on the contrary, endeavour to preserve rather than to destroy time—to make the present live in the future, rather than to let it fly like a cloud, or drift down the ever-fleeting quicksands of unrecorded moments in the past.

I will not dwell on the product of my own labor at sea, beyond the simple statement that during this my last voyage I put into proper shape and prepared for press the notes on which my forthcoming work on Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand was founded, and that during the preceding voyages I wrote three dramas—a drama to each voyage.