WALKS ABOUT SYDNEY
Come with me for a walk through the city of Sydney. The sun is hot, but
the porticoes of iron and glass, built out over the sidewalks, will
protect us from its rays. We stroll by great stores with fine window
displays, and find we can buy almost anything here that is to be had
in New York. The prices are marked in pounds, shillings, and pence.
Some of the department stores sell several million dollars’ worth of
goods annually and employ from five hundred to one thousand clerks.
Such stores do a big mail-order business with the people on the sheep
stations and farms of the “back blocks.”
One feature of Sydney is the numerous arcades that are cut through
from one street to another and lined with stores. They are ceiled
with glass, paved with tiles, and decorated with tropical plants and
flowers. They are delightful quarters in which to shop during the heat
of the day.
The principal artery of the business section is Circular Quay, where
the many ferries to the suburbs move in and out with their thousands
going to and from work. The main streets of the down-town district lead
to it. On Macquarie Street is the entrance to the Government House,
where the governor of New South Wales resides. This thoroughfare was
named for a stern old administrator of colonial times who used convict
labour to put up the Parliament House and other buildings, many of
which are still in use. Pitt and King streets are lined with handsome
stores and office buildings. Above Circular Quay are great concrete
wheat elevators with a capacity of six million bushels, which were
erected not long ago under American supervision.
Sydney has big insurance buildings, bank buildings, excellent clubs,
and many hotels. The two largest hotels are the Australia and the
Wentworth, which have the features of the best American and European
houses. The prices are about the same as in the United States, though
at first they seem cheaper. The extras make up the difference. There
are small hotels in every block, but most of these are merely saloons,
or public houses, with a room or so for rent to conform to the law
providing that liquor shall be sold only at places offering board and
lodging as well as drinks.
There are some splendid public buildings. Take the town hall, for
example. It is a magnificent stone structure in the heart of the city,
containing a pipe organ, which is the largest south of the Equator,
and a hall seating five thousand people. Some years ago the city of
Melbourne bought what was then the largest organ in Australia. But
Sydney was, of course, bound to beat Melbourne, and bought a bigger
one. Her organ cost eighty-five thousand dollars, and has several
thousand pipes.
Other fine structures are the Public Works office and the buildings of
the various state departments. On George Street is the Victoria Market,
put up at enormous expense to serve the whole city. But it did not
succeed and has now been turned into offices. Throughout the city and
suburbs are a number of well-regulated municipal markets.
In the down-town section is the office of the Sydney _Bulletin_, the
most widely read paper in the Commonwealth. This bright pink weekly
has been called a “cross between the London _Punch_ and the New York
_Nation_,” for its contents are both grave and gay. But it also has
a flavour peculiarly its own. For one thing, it is so full of slangy
phrases that outsiders almost need a glossary to understand some of
its paragraphs. In it “Bananaland” may stand for Queensland; “Apple
Isle” for Tasmania; the “Ma State” for New South Wales; “Fog Land”
for Great Britain; the “Big Smoke” for London. Under the heading of
“Aboriginalities” are paragraphs from correspondents throughout the
country on matters relating to Australian place names, natural history,
strange customs, and the like. The tone of the paper is often flippant,
and, so the conservatives say, even irreverent and disloyal.
Nevertheless, the _Bulletin_ is doing much toward building up an
Australian literature, for its encouragement and prompt checks have
kept going many a struggling young poet or journalist. It is the chief
literary and dramatic paper of the country, and its so-called “red
page” always carries able book reviews and criticisms. Politically,
it is independent, although it inclines more to the Labour than to
the Liberal view. Still, it does not hesitate at times to publish
editorials denouncing the Labour leaders. It is Australian of the
Australians, and is read in the towns and cities, in the scorching
northern mining camps, in the remotest sand plains of the west, and in
the isolated sheep stations of the “bush.”
Sydney has as good lungs as any city of Europe. It is noted for its
extensive park system. Moore Park contains more than three hundred
and fifty acres, Centennial Park five hundred and fifty acres, and
there are also the cricket fields, race courses, and fair grounds. One
of the best zoos of the world is at Taronga Park on the north side
of the harbour. Here cages have been largely dispensed with, and the
animals are given as nearly as possible their native conditions and
surroundings. The Botanical Gardens are on the spot where the early
convicts raised their vegetables.
Sixteen miles south, of Sydney is the National Park, which contains
more than thirty-three thousand acres, most of them covered with virgin
forest. Convenient to the city there are also a number of sandy beaches
where “surfing,” swimming, and fishing are enjoyed. At the Manly and
Bondi beaches “surfing” is especially popular. It is the sport of
expert swimmers, who throw themselves on boards on which the incoming
waves dash them to shore. The pastime is borrowed from the South Sea
Islanders and is especially adapted to the heavy surf of the Sydney
beaches.
The most interesting park in all Australia is the Domain. It is in the
centre of Sydney and has magnificent trees, velvety lawns, and walks
and drives of every description. The park is accessible to everyone;
there are no signs to keep off the grass, and babies and grown-ups play
and stroll upon it.
Every Sunday afternoon the Domain becomes the forum of the people. Any
one who wishes to preach or pray or talk politics has a right to set
up his pulpit on the grass and toot for hearers. No one questions his
doctrines, and he may say what he pleases. There are at least a score
or more of such speakers here every Sunday, each with a crowd about
him. There are lightning calculators, labour agitators, Socialists,
preachers of every gospel and every creed, phrenologists and beggars,
faith healers and cranks of all sorts.
The crowd is a good-natured one, made up of all classes, but with
working people in the majority. When I visited the Domain the other
Sunday, there were at least twenty-five thousand persons there. I
paused for a time at each group. The first was gathered about a
lightning calculator, who talked a blue streak as his hand danced over
a blackboard, stopping only at intervals to sell books explaining how
to learn the higher mathematics in three lessons. The next speaker was
a temperance orator. He was criticizing the rich men and the officials
of the city and denouncing the saloons. Beyond him was a Socialist,
who demanded heavier taxes from the rich and a general division of
property, and farther on was a Negro, who was preaching the end of the
world in a marked Yankee accent. At another place a Salvation Army band
was led by a woman with a sweet singing voice and a complexion as fair
as that of a baby.
About fifty feet from this crowd I saw a walking hospital in charge
of a woman called “the Good Samaritan.” The old lady had thirteen
invalids, each of whom was terribly afflicted. They were of all ages,
from babies to threescore and ten--some lame, some halt, and some
blind. They sat about in chairs on the grass while the Good Samaritan
in their midst showed their sores and deformities to the crowd and
begged money for their support. She had a carpet laid at her feet and
upon this the charitably inclined cast their pennies and sixpences.
Near by was a blind man with a cracked voice and a fiddle, who sang
and sawed for money, and farther over an orator haranguing about the
big captains of industry in America. They were, he said, enslaving the
Yankee labouring men, and would in time probably come over to place the
yoke of bondage on the workers of Australia.
All this discussion in the different parts of the park went on without
commotion or trouble; every one said what he pleased and none bothered
about what anybody said.
Leaving the Domain, I walked back to the hotel, noticing the queer
signs by the way. One was “Lollies for Sale.” It was over the door
of a confectioner’s store where all sorts of candies were displayed.
“Lollies” is the popular word here for candies, and between the acts at
the theatres boys go about through the audience calling out “Lollies,
ladies! Lollies, gents! Does any one want a box of fine fresh lollies?”
So, I suppose, America is indebted to Australia for its “lollipops.”