SYDNEY
Where Sydney Harbour got its reputation for beauty I am quite at a
loss to imagine. I never saw anything more forlornly ugly in the way
of scenery. Undoubtedly it is one of the finest harbours from a naval
point of view in the world, but there is nothing whatever picturesque
about it. It is surrounded by low rocky ridges about 200 feet high,
covered all over with stunted trees.
At the far end lies the town itself, which has not a single feature to
recommend it. All over the ridges to the south, and on a part of those
to the north, are scattered staring white villa residences. Many of
these have lovely gardens and grounds, and when you get near them are
very pretty spots. But the general panorama of Sydney Harbour, whether
viewed from the sea or from the land, is positively ugly.
There is no distance to be seen anywhere, and nothing pretty in the way
of a foreground. The sea is never a healthy blue, and the colouring of
the land is a dull, dirty, monotonous green, that looks as if it had
been dredged over with sand. There is invariably a sickly glare in the
atmosphere, except just at sunrise and sunset, that would effectually
destroy far greater pretensions to beauty than any that Sydney can
boast of. I have lived in Sydney for months. I have sailed all over the
harbour in a boat, and have walked round about it on land. I have seen
it in every weather, under every sort of sky, but I never for a moment
saw it look pretty.
The town of Sydney is by no means a pleasant one. The streets are
winding and cramped, the pavement in many places being only five or
six feet wide, and George Street, the main street, follows exactly
the winding of an old track that went through a Blacks’ camp that
originally occupied the present site of the town. There are many very
fine buildings in the town, but they do not show to advantage, and
their position prevents any possibility of widening or improving the
streets. The first thing that strikes anyone who goes to Sydney is the
extraordinary number of people that there seem to be there who have
nothing to do.
Crowds of loafers block up the main streets, standing in mobs at the
corners, or sauntering along the _trottoir_, with their hands in their
pockets, a pipe in their mouth, and their hat tipped well over the
eyes. They never get out of anyone’s way, and are a source of infinite
inconvenience to anyone who is in a hurry.
The town and suburbs are built on a series of steep hills and valleys
round the harbour, and it is impossible to go a hundred yards anywhere
without going up or down hill. The best thing about the place is the
Botanical Gardens and grounds of the late Exhibition, which are really
quite beautifully kept.
[Illustration: GOVERNMENT HOUSE, SYDNEY.]
The Exhibition itself was unfortunately burnt to the ground in 1883. It
would have been an eyesore anywhere else, but was quite an ornament to
Sydney, and its loss was deeply felt by the inhabitants, who entertain
feelings of superstitious reverence for the supposed beauty of the
place. Land in the town and suburbs has risen to such a fabulous value
that, although it is never likely to be worth less than it is at
present, it cannot rise much higher for some time.
The wealth of Sydney is enormous. For miles to the north-east of the
town, away towards the south head, the suburbs are a mass of villa
residences overlooking the harbour. Many of them are extremely pretty,
and an immense deal of money has been laid out on them. But the
inhabitants of Sydney never know what to do with their money, and seem
incapable of having a really good time.
In the first place, society is split up into cliques, the members
of which regard anyone who is not in their own set with the most
unreasoning hatred and contempt. Besides this, the climate is a most
depressing one, which accounts in a great measure for the prevailing
listlessness of everyone in the place.
In spite of the climate, I have most pleasant recollections of many
very happy days spent at a house on the shores of the harbour beyond
Rose Bay. A son of the owner, whom I had known five years before, found
me staying at a hotel in the town. I was in bad health at the time,
and he took me away to stay at his home. He was the only member of the
family with whom I was acquainted, but had I been their oldest friend I
could not have been made more heartily welcome.
Since then I have stayed there very often, and a friendship of many
years has given me ample opportunity of appreciating the real kindness
that has made the hospitality of Carrara a household word, even in
Australia, where kindness to strangers is the universal rule. I am
bound to say that the pleasure with which I look back upon the time
that I spent there has no reference to the proximity of Sydney. The
attractions of the place itself, beautifully situated on the shore of
the harbour, were sufficient to prevent any great wish to wander far
away, and the powers of entertainment possessed by its inmates made
their visitors quite independent of any other society, and rendered a
moment’s dulness impossible.
The climate of Sydney, always a detestable one, is never the same
for more than a few hours. I have often seen a day there open with a
hot, scorching wind, which lasts perhaps until one o’clock; suddenly
a fierce, cold wind--a “southerly buster,” as it is called--sweeps up
from the ice-fields of the southern sea, and blows, perhaps, for two
days, perhaps only for a few hours, to be succeeded either by a dead
calm or a “black north-easter,” accompanied by torrents of rain. But
whether it is hot or cold, whether it blows from the north, south,
east, or west, or not at all, there is always a sickly, enervating
feeling about the air, which the inhabitants themselves complain very
much of, and which a stranger at first feels unbearable. Most of the
inhabitants who can afford it always go away for a few weeks in the
summer, either to Tasmania or to the Blue Mountains, which is the
sanitorium of Sydney, and where there are townships at an elevation of
from 2000 to 3000 feet.
Sydney is, if possible, worse off than Brisbane for hotels. I have
tried half-a-dozen of the best of them, and everywhere the dirt,
discomfort, and bad attendance are the same. The Sydney waiter is
an entirely distinct species, of which fact he is himself quite
unconscious, and treats all visitors who will allow him to do so as his
equals.
At the fashionable _table d’hôtes_, where hundreds of business-men and
visitors in the town assemble every day for luncheon, the flippant
behaviour of the waiters is perfectly bewildering to a stranger.
His call for “waiter” will probably be answered, after an interval,
by an inquiry of “Did I hear your lovely voice?” from a patronising
individual, who leans on the table and begins to talk on the merits
of the harbour. I have seen the astonished look on a visitor’s face,
who was explaining to a waiter that he had brought the wrong wine, when
that functionary suddenly offered to bet him five pounds that he had
done nothing of the kind. His neighbour, a stranger to Sydney too, was
so interested in the discussion, that he paused in his occupation of
helping himself to the greens, and remained motionless, with the spoon
in his hand, and an expression of blank amazement on his countenance.
From this trance he was rudely awakened by another waiter laying his
hand on his shoulder and remarking, “After you with the cabbage.”
The first time I went to Sydney I camped at what was supposed to be
the best hotel in the town. The walls between the bedrooms were not
particularly thick, and the morning after I arrived, as I was lying in
bed, I overheard the following dialogue in the next bedroom to mine:--
“I say, old man, lend me a shirt.”
“Can’t, old man. I’ve only got one.”
“Never mind, lend it me. I want to go out for an hour now, but I’ll
bring it back before you want to get up.”
The town of Sydney suffers from an odious nuisance in the shape of
steam tram-cars, which run along several of the main streets. The
shares of the company that works them are about the best paying thing,
next to the telephone, that has been started for a long while in
the colony. But the cars themselves are a perfect infliction. They
rush down the most crowded thoroughfares, terrifying the horses, and
killing, on an average, about two foot-passengers a week, besides
maiming numerous other ones. There are omnibuses and hansoms all over
the place, and, of course, any number of private carriages to be seen.
But although many of the latter are well-appointed, and the quality
of some of the horses undeniable, it is remarkable that one never by
any chance sees a coachman decently got up. There is something quite
pitiable in seeing the effect of a really good turn-out entirely marred
by an apparition on the box with check trousers, an acre of green tie,
and a moustache.
Altogether Sydney strikes one as a steady-going, sleepy old town,
thickly covered with blue mould, without any of the rowdyism of the
north, and with little of the vigorous life of Melbourne.
Nowhere in Australia are there to be found pleasanter people than in
Sydney in their own homes. But they do not care to go much out of them,
and take life very quietly. Money comes to them more by accumulation
than by speculation, and they spend it lavishly in beautifying their
residences by the shores of their beloved harbour. The lower orders in
Sydney drink heavily, but the middle and upper classes drink less than
any community in Australia, and the ascending scale of sobriety attains
its zenith in the present head of society, who, when he gives a ball,
regales his guests with nothing more potent than raspberry vinegar and
lemon syrup.
Sydney keeps several newspapers going, the chief of which is the
_Sydney Morning Herald_. Except to the readers of advertisements, it
is impossible to imagine a more dreary publication. It contains the
“latest intelligence” only in the sense of its being a week later than
anywhere else, and most of the space allotted to news is occupied with
hypothetical accounts of what would have happened if something else had
taken place that never occurred.
For instance, its readers are informed that H.M.S. _Wolverene_ has left
Fiji for Sydney. After following the editor in an intricate calculation
as to the different dates on which she may be expected, supposing the
wind to be favourable or not, and supposing her to steam seven knots
or eight, they are next informed that it is quite uncertain whether
the destination of H.M.S. _Wolverene_ be Sydney or not. This involves
more calculations as to how long she will take to arrive if she goes
round by New Zealand, Hobart, or Melbourne. Finally those who have
had patience to read to the end find a telegram to say that H.M.S.
_Wolverene_ entered Sydney Harbour from Fiji that morning.
But the _Sydney Bulletin_, a weekly publication, is probably the
wittiest and most amusing social paper in the world. It sticks at
nothing, and never troubles its readers with asterisks instead of
names. The editor is constantly in hot water, and has more than once
been heavily fined for libel; but he is far too valuable an institution
to be parted with, and his supporters subscribe freely to see him
through a bad time, and the fire of sarcasm, raillery, and scandal
never ceases. Of its kind, the _Sydney Bulletin_ is perfect, and all
the wretched wit of _The World_, _Truth_, and all the London social
papers put together, might be clipped from it without being missed.
The harbour always presents a most animated appearance. Vessels of
every description, from a yawl to a 4000-ton steamer, are constantly
passing in and out, and endless little steamers ply between the
different bays all round. Yachting is a very favourite pastime with the
inhabitants, and sometimes the whole harbour is alive with a flotilla
of small craft. The largest vessels can come right up and lay alongside
the quays right against the town.
The line of railway is completed now from Sydney to Melbourne, but, of
course, the jealousy of the two colonies has impelled them to adopt
different gauges, so that through traffic is at present impossible. The
population of Sydney is 237,000, and that of the whole colony of New
South Wales 840,000.
The first discovery of gold made in Australia was at Summer Hill
in 1851. Since then gold has been found occasionally in very large
quantities in various parts of New South Wales, and several of the
alluvial diggings have proved both rich and permanent. But so far,
strange to say, there has never been a true reef discovered in this
colony. Some immensely rich veins of quartz have been found, but they
have all run out, or proved barren at a depth.
The chief produce of the country is stock of all kinds, and a
considerable quantity of wheat and Indian corn is also grown. The
number of sheep in the colony in 1883 was 31,796,308, and in the
previous year no less than 153,351,354 lbs. of wool were exported. New
South Wales, however, has suffered most terribly during the recent
drought, which has been the most severe ever known in the colony.
The whole of the northern and western portions were described by one
who had recently visited them as one vast corpse-dotted desert, and the
description is hardly exaggerated. No returns have as yet been made of
the total losses, and, indeed, in Riverina and Southern Queensland the
drought still continues (October ’84); but I hear of one station alone
that has lost 160,000 sheep, and another where every single hoof of
cattle on the run, in number over 20,000, have perished.
New South Wales and Southern Queensland have suffered by far the most
severely during the recent drought, Victoria and Northern Queensland
having had, if anything, more than usually favourable seasons. But the
depression caused by the enormous losses in stock has made itself felt
in every branch of industry, in every part of Australia; and although
the price of stations has not gone down, very few are changing hands.
In New South Wales the feud against the squatters among the lower
classes, which obtains all through Australia, is very violent.
Following the example of Victoria, the Government have dealt with the
land question in a manner that has brought the transfer of leasehold
land throughout the colony to a dead-lock, and a Bill is now before
Parliament by which all squatters holding leases will be deprived of
half their runs; but the squatting element in New South Wales is still
very powerful, and it is probable that they will obtain compensation
for improvements.
There is a railway from Sydney to Melbourne, and the journey across
takes about twenty-three hours. It is very comfortable travelling, the
berths in the sleeping-cars being certainly above the average in point
of size and cleanliness. There is nothing that could by courtesy be
called an express train, and on the Victorian line all the trains stop
at every station, and at about every third one there is an extra pause
for refreshment.
On the New South Wales line the sale of liquor is everywhere
prohibited, and the consequence is that both the guards and the drivers
lay in a store of liquor to take with them, and consequently drink a
great deal more than they would if there were a bar at every other
station, which is shown by their being much more frequently drunk than
the _employés_ on the Victorian lines, who can get liquor whenever they
want it.
The mail-train leaves Sydney every night at 8.30. Passengers for
Melbourne change carriages at Wodonga, a station on the border of
Victoria. On the Sydney line the trains travel a fair pace; but from
Wodonga to Melbourne, a distance of about 190 miles, they absolutely
crawl, and take nearly eight hours over the journey.