[Illustration: Thistle]
Arcadian
Adelaide.
By THISTLE ANDERSON
(Mrs. Herbert Fisher.)
Author of “Barenski,” “Verses at Random,” &c.
ADELAIDE:
PRINTED BY MODERN PRINTING COMPANY,
TWIN STREET,
1905.
ARCADIAN ADELAIDE.
BY
THISTLE ANDERSON
(MRS. HERBERT FISHER).
Author of “Barenski,” “Verses at Random,” &c.
[Illustration: Thistle]
ADELAIDE:
MODERN PRINTING COMPANY, TWIN STREET.
1905.
[Illustration: Thistle Anderson
Signed Yours faithfully, Thistle Anderson.]
DEDICATION.
“To any kindred spirit whom duty may
compel to live in Adelaide, and who,
living there, suffers as we suffer.”
IN PREPARATION:
“MARK MAROON.”
FOREWORD.
It has been suggested to me, O people of Adelaide, that, should any
of you deign to glance through these pages, you will misunderstand
them--that is to say, you will believe them to have been written with
malicious intent. What the public may think or say troubles me little,
but for the benefit of one or two persons here who merit consideration,
I emphatically declare that this is not so. Adelaide has crushed my
youthful ambitions, and, possibly, narrowed my ideas--and you, her
people, have done your best (by force of example, and other methods) to
root out any broad or human sentiment that was in me. So that I have
nothing for which to thank you, and I owe you nothing--not even the
merest courtesy.
But the feeling of bitterness that characterised my first unhappy
moments here has long since passed, and there is left only resignation,
and perhaps a faint hope that some day I may sail “beyond the sunset
and the baths of all the Western stars” forever. It may be argued that
I have taken a near and dear--very near and very dear--relation from
among you, and to that my only answer can be that he did not choose his
birthplace, and that it is his misfortune--a misfortune which, however,
has happily produced no lasting effect.
THISTLE ANDERSON.
“STRAMSHALL,”
NORTH ADELAIDE,
_April 12th, 1905._
CONTENTS
PART I.--THE PLACE.
CHAPTER.
I.--THE HOLY VILLAGE.
II.--LIVING ACCOMMODATION.
III.--THE TRAM-CARS.
PART II.--THE INHABITANTS.
CHAPTER.
I.--THE MEN.
II.--THE WOMEN.
III.--LESSER ANIMALS.
PART III.--GENERALITIES.
CHAPTER.
I.--MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.
II.--INDUSTRIES.
III.--REDEEMING FEATURES.
CHAPTER I.
THE HOLY VILLAGE.
Adelaide, known to all intelligent people as the City of Juvenile
Depravity, and to the less enlightened as the City of Churches, is
situated on the River Torrens, and is the capital of South Australia.
A poor claim to distinction for South Australia, but we assure the
reader that, although Adelaide is nominally the principal town, there
are several equally, if not more, interesting places in the State--Port
Pirie, for example, or Petersburg, where they have rifle ranges,
public libraries, and other wild excitements, to say nothing of the
periodical visits of a “first-class dramatic company” and an occasional
“sensational accident.”
The Village itself consists of a main street (Rundle Street) and
several lesser streets, and is surrounded by Park Lands, which, unlike
Adelaide itself, are quite useful--in that they supply the homeless
wanderer with sleeping accommodation free. In early morning they are
almost as thickly peopled as Sydney Domain, and afford a refuge to
burglars, sundowners, unemployed, and other unfortunates. We have
camped out ourselves when fishing, and we think the Park Lands are
green enough, at certain seasons, to offer every inducement to quiet
rest.
Outwardly, Adelaide is intensely respectable--that is to say,
the inhabitants go to church regularly, and think it extremely wrong
to play cards for money. They are ostentatious in their charity, but
it goes very little below the surface. Their ideas are, for the most
part, about as broad as Blondin’s wire, and their cardinal virtues are
Religious Belief and Conventionality. Briefly summed up, the creed of
Adelaide so-called Society runs:--
“I believe in Lewis Cohen, Mayor of Adelaide, and in Sir George LeHunte
(or any other man), Governor of South Australia, from whom much
hospitality may be expected. He was appointed in England, and ascended
into Government House. From thence he shall issue many invitations. I
believe in the social laws, in much going to Church, in doing to others
as they would do unto you if they could, in the charity that will be
beneficial to our social position, and in the Life of the Everlasting,
Amen.”
Of real charity there is little, as will be shown later on.
Several well-known pillars of Adelaide have been more than generous,
and have showered gifts on the village--notably a School of Mines,
Statues, wings to Hospitals, Lions to the Zoo, etc.--not forgetting
an elderly lady who paid for building nearly half of a famous church.
Rumor hath it that the youthful curate promptly offered her his hand
and heart, presumably in gratitude for her generosity.
So much for charity in Adelaide.
The Village is less holy than might be supposed, for Melbourne, with
approximately a population of 494,129, has seven opium dens; while
Adelaide, with a population of 162,261, has eight. Then, too, it is
pretty generally admitted that, in proportion to its size, Adelaide
has more prostitution and more young girls on its streets than any
other city in Australasia. Many women of the unfortunate class in
Adelaide begin their wretched profession at the early age of thirteen
or fourteen. Most of the Village’s newspapers have, to do them justice,
militated against this evil--but unsuccessfully. The author knows of
two local cases in which a mother deliberately trained her daughter to
her own degrading career. It may be argued that similar cases abound
in every city, but the reader must remember that Adelaide has clothed
itself in a self-constituted halo of excessive virtue. This is not a
treatise on morality--it is not Adelaide’s lack of morality to which
I am objecting, but her lack of sincerity, to my mind a far greater
evil. Be a little more humble, ye people of Adelaide, try to remember
that your hills are not the greenest, or your morals the cleanest, or
your shops the brightest in the whole world--and if you cannot bring
yourselves to remember these things, then bear in mind that your wines
are the worst ever made, that some of you are passing plain to look
upon, and that you have acquired a world-wide fame for your cruelty to
animals--especially horses.
Adelaide is justly famed for the beauty of her Botanical Gardens, and
the antiquity of her tramway system, and it is on these two facts
that her main claim to distinction is based. To be sure there is no
antiquity in Adelaide _except_ the trams (and the tailors!)--and this
is distinctly a pity. Next to the downright, thorough civilization of
Paris or London, the happiest state is primitive rusticity; but here,
a desire to be civilized, coupled with an inability to carry out the
idea, have resulted in a distressing state of semi-civilization, which
is most unpleasant. Things which should be old, are young, and _vice
versa_. For instance, the shops are amazingly old, and the buildings
aggressively new, which is a pity, for it is the privilege of shops to
be modern, just as it is the privilege of buildings to be ancient.
The daily excitements of Adelaide are the coming of letters, and the
going of the Melbourne express--the fascination of the latter will be
readily understood, when it is remembered that it forms the principal
link between Adelaide and civilization. To be sure, the letters are as
behind-hand as the local divorce law, but this fact merely shows an
excusable disinclination on the part of the engine driver to revisit
Adelaide, for, be it observed, the express always _leaves_ the
Village at the appointed time.
Adelaide has a theatre and a music hall--the former is open for about
four months in the year, and generally spells financial disaster to
enterprising managers. The latter, when not devoted to the lectures
of the Reverend Henry Howard, revels in biograph entertainments,
occasionally varied by a good variety show, which latter is, need we
say, but little patronised.
The climate of Adelaide is good in spots--dust in summer, and hot
winds--and in winter, much rain. The Hills, of which residents are so
proud, are deluged with rain for nearly six months in the year, and
for nearly all the remaining six they are burnt so brown as to lose
all semblance to anything but volcanic rocks. Still, I have enjoyed
glorious spring and autumn days in those hills--days that have lent
themselves to picnics, which were generally made merry by the presence
of persons not of Adelaide. Apart from the tram-steeds, the Adelaide
horseflesh is superior, and takes many prizes, and I have a few
delightful recollections of equine adventures--of horses difficult
to master, splendid to look upon, and exciting to drive. Many of
these emanated from Hill & Co.’s stables, an excellent institution
of its kind, where both horses and men are of good calibre, but,
unfortunately, not smartly turned out--to be smart is to transgress the
social etiquette of the Village.
And there are other bright memories of Adelaide, notably Adams, a
merry soul from Hill and Co.’s stables, who taught present scribe the
delights of four-in-hand driving, thereby offering endless facilities
for desecrating the virtuous Adelaide Sabbath. To Adams, a vote of
thanks! and a thrill of real enthusiasm when I remember those crisp
June mornings, the thud of the bloods’ hoofs in the frosty stillness,
the scent of the fragrant earth--peace in my heart, sunshine abroad,
and, for the time, the petty mortifications of my surroundings
forgotten. Ah! Those were good days, and they stand out from the rest;
but, alas! they are too few to compensate for other more frequent, and
less enjoyable, days that must be endured.
Other attractions of the Village are a gallery of pictures, for the
most part badly chosen; much statuary, which looks cheap, and was in
reality expensive; and several tea-rooms. These latter are, of course,
unlicensed, the tea is inferior, the cakes stale, and all the cups
cracked, so they are not to be recommended.
Altogether, as a place of education Adelaide falls far short of the
mark; as a place of amusement it is hopeless; and as a village--well,
it is tolerably clean, and comparatively healthy.