The charming little town of Bowen, on the shores of the beautiful
harbour named Port Denison, was in the zenith of its glory and
prosperity. There were certainly other towns in the north of
Queensland--Mackay for instance--which enjoyed the advantage of being
nearer the capital, and so obtaining more consideration from the
Treasury; but Bowen, although six hundred miles from Brisbane, was the
most thriving town in the north, and affected a haughty indifference to
her rivals for supremacy, such as the “sugar” growing towns of Bundaberg
and Mackay to the south, and the vulgar, upstart, and newly-founded
Townsville to the north.
“With our matchless harbour, surpassed only on this island continent by
that of Sydney,” said the Port Denison _Clarion_, in one of its inspired
and lofty-languaged leaders, “we can regard with a serene, yet not
discourteous or contemptuous indifference, the statements of our
esteemed, though hasty contemporary, the Mackay _Planters' Friend_, that
Bowen may yet find that the newly-founded hamlet of Townsville on the
shores of Cleveland Bay will ere long usurp the claim of beautiful Bowen
to be the natural _entrepôt_ for all that vast extent of territory to
the northward and the westward of Port Denison, and which, ere many
decades have passed, will, through its marvellous agricultural,
pastoral, and auriferous resources, add not a jewel but a confiscation
of blazing and lustrous gems of the most priceless value to the already
glorious crown of that noble lady upon whose Empire the sun never sets.
Townsville is simply a collection of humpies and shanties built upon an
ill-smelling mud bank. We have personally satisfied ourselves that
unless some enterprising British capitalist can convert the only
available possession of Townsville (which is mud, and bad mud at that)
into bricks, which, perhaps, may be used for the minor classes of
buildings which must of necessity soon be built for the accommodation of
the poorer classes of working men who, in their thousands, will soon be
established in Bowen, Townsville will no more prove a factor towards the
development of this great country of North Queensland than the numerous
alligators in the Burdekin River will be employed by the municipality of
Bowen as paid scavengers, and be provided brass badges, dust shovels,
and other such implements to denote their vocation. As for the other
assertions of the editor of the _Planters Friend_, we, with all
kindliness, should like to point out that the _Friend_ is the organ of
the Sugar Planters; it sees nothing beyond Sugar; Sugar is its God, its
Mokanna, and (incidentally) we may remark that Rum is a product
resulting from the manufacture of the saccharine plant, and we fear that
many samples of this aromatic liquid may have found their way into the
editorial sanctum of our esteemed and valued contemporary in Mackay. At
least, we judge so when a dirty, ill-smelling mud bank is compared with
one of the most noble evidences of God's handiwork--Port Denison!”
To such a courteous reproof as this, the _Planters' Friend_ would
invariably make the same reply in the form of a leaderette of ten or
twenty lines, enclosed in a square of black to denote mourning:
“Our esteemed Bowen contemporary has 'got 'em' again. We are sorry we
cannot #do any more than again, in the most kindly spirit, urge him to
try the Dr Jordan cure, an advertisement of which will be found on page
3. We have personal knowledge of a case of the rescue from utter wreck
and degradation of one of the brightest intellects of the present
century by the use of the Jordan system; and as the price is but
trifling, it should be within easy access of our squatter-adoring
contemporary.”
To these vaguely-worded, funereal-encompassed remarks, the _Clarion_
would retort:
“No one who believes in the trite but, nevertheless, all-powerfully true
assertion that the Press is the Archimidean lever which moves the world,
cannot but regret the unblushing statement of the editor of our esteemed
contemporary, the _Planters' Friend_, that he has been the victim of a
soul-destroying, home-wrecking, and accursed habit, which that gifted
American, Colonel Robert Ingersoll, has, in words of fiery eloquence,
called 'the treacherous, insidious murderer of home and happiness; the
Will-o'-the-Wisp that draws honour, genius, and all that is good
into its fatal, deadly quagmire.' To the assertion that our valued
contemporary is 'the possessor of one of the brightest intellects of the
present century' (as he so modestly informs us) we do not cavil at for
one moment. But even the patients under the Jordan (American quack)
system may have relapses; and, when the _Planters' Friend_ can calmly
publish two columns of leaded matter insinuating that a mud bank on
the shores of Cleveland Bay is to become the leading port of North
Queensland, we can but regretfully infer that the Jordan cure is not
entirely satisfactory, and that even the 'brightest intellects' suffer
terrible and deplorable relapses.”
These journalistic amenities were accorded serious attention by the
society of Bowen, which, by reason of the many Government officials
established there, considered itself very exclusive. The majority of
these officials were connected with the law, for Bowen was the proud
possessor of not only a resident judge, but also a new courthouse of
such ample dimensions that the whole population of the town could have
been accommodated therein. How the numerous barristers, solicitors, and
the smaller legal fry lived was a mystery. Perhaps, like the mythical
French town whose population supported themselves by doing each other's
washing, the legal gentry of Bowen existed by performing each other's
clerical work. Next in numbers--though not in social standing--were the
Government officials connected with the Harbour and Lights Department,
and “The Jetty.” The Jetty was one of Bowen's triumphs; was over a
quarter of a mile long, cost twenty thousand pounds to build, and was
costing four thousand pounds a year to keep in order, and enable the
staff of engineers, inspectors, etc., to dress in a gentlemanly style,
and maintain their prestige as officials of higher importance than the
Customs officers, of whom Bowen was provided with six, all dressed very
becomingly, and all more or less related to members of the Queensland
Cabinet--as a matter of fact it would have been a difficult task to
find any male person in the Government service in Bowen--from His Honour
Judge Coker to Paddy Shea, the letter-carrier, who was not connected
with, or did not owe his position to a member of the Ministry. And Bowen
revelled in the knowledge that Brisbane and the Legislature dared not
refuse Bowen any reasonable request, for already there was a dark
rumour concerning Separation--the division of the colony into North and
South--and the _Clarion_ had warned the “inert and muddling Government”
of the colony “that unless the just and courteous request of the
telegraphic staff of the Bowen Repeating Office for a punkah is acceded
to without further circumlocution, the growing movement in favour of
Separation will be openly advocated by this journal. Already (of this we
have private knowledge) has Lord Kimberley expressed himself astonished
at the heartless refusal of our benighted Colonial Secretary and
Treasurer to grant the insignificant sum of two hundred pounds to the
necessitous widow of Samuel Wilson, who was killed by being run over by
a trolley on our beautiful jetty. Does the Colonial Secretary know the
meaning of the word Nemesis? Let him ponder!”
The appearance of Bowen at this time of latent agitation for Separation
and open and undisguised animosity to the “upstart collection of humpies
on a mud bank in Cleveland Bay,” was pleasing in the extreme. Wide,
tree-planted, grassy streets, kept scrupulously clean, handsomely-built
bungalows, enclosed in gardens containing tropical and sub-tropical
plants (the residences of the officials and their families), a
court-house and other public buildings of such size and ornate
construction that they surpassed those of any other town in the colony,
except the capital; an environment of back country grateful to look
upon, and a harbour of surpassing beauty.
The editor of the _Clarion_ despite his inflated leaders, was a
thoroughly sensible man, who fully recognised the potentialities of
the port, and yet saw that it was doomed to sink into comparative
insignificance, and that the “collection of humpies on a mud bank” was
to be the future capital of the Far North. But he struggled on gamely.
He was a genial, merry-hearted old bachelor, who had once loved his
paper as a mother loves her one child, and had spent his capital of two
thousand pounds in trying to keep the town alive as long as possible.
A refined, highly-educated man, he was obliged--after two years' bitter
financial experience--to resort to the type of journalism prevalent
amongst Australian country newspapers; otherwise he could not have made
a living. But he despised the very people for whom he was apparently
fighting so strenuously, and often savagely reproached himself for
having turned aside from the straight path.
“Thank Heaven, I'm not married!” he said to himself one evening, as
throwing himself down upon a couch in his bedroom at the Queen's Hotel,
he began to glance through a bundle of exchanges which he had brought
from the office, and in a few minutes a smile spread over his face, as
he read the following in the Rockhampton _Bulletin_:
“The Bowen _Clarion_ is making a game effort to bolster up that little
tin-pot township with its _coterie_ of highly-paid, useless officials,
who for six years past have battened on the public revenues. It was the
misfortune of a representative of this journal to be obliged to spend
two weeks in Port Denison not long since, and his terse description of
the spot and its inhabitants deserves a place in the guide book of the
colony which has yet to be written. Bowen is a delightfully laid-out
town on the shores of Port Denison. It is inhabited by some six hundred
people--mostly official loafers and spongers of the worst type. The
community consists of boozy squatters, snobbish wives of snobbish
officials, anaemic old maids, obsequious tradesmen on the verge of
insolvency, and two respectable and hard-working persons--the latter are
Chinamen. The 'tony' society of Bowen is about as lively and intelligent
as that of a decaying Cathedral town in the old country. The atmosphere
of matchless snobbery and vulgarity that pervades Bowen can be perceived
by the passing voyager many miles out at sea.”
“By Jove! he's not far wrong,” commented the editor, as putting down the
paper he took up another, and had just ripped off the the cover, when
the chambermaid tapped at the door, then entered with a card.
“The gentleman wishes to see you particularly, sir.”
He took the card from the tray, and read,
THOMAS GERRARD. Ocho Rios.
beneath was written, “Urgently desires to see the editor of the
_Clarion_ on business of importance.”
“Ask him to come in, Milly,” he said as he kicked a chair into position.