_THE DIGGER'S LICENSE._
"Let active laws apply the needful curb,
To guard the peace that riot would disturb;
And Liberty, preserved from wild excess,
Shall raise no feuds for armies to suppress."
--COWPER.
Another and greater grievance which daily stirred up strife between the
diggers and the Commissioners was the gold-digger's license. The
collecting of the license fee was from the first an invidious duty,
which demanded a vast deal of tact on the part of the Commissioners and
staff, for the diggers were always opposed to the tax, and many were the
ruses they adopted to escape its payment.
The first skirmish in connection with this impost took place at the
Golden Point, Ballarat. The diggers at the Point understood that no tax
would be charged for the month of September 1852, as the Government
wished to encourage prospecting on new gold-fields. But the
Commissioners, on arriving at Golden Point, perceived by the general
appearance of cheerfulness that the field was yielding good returns.
Yet the diggers gave most evasive answers to their inquiries as to the
result of the prospecting, and reminded them that the Government would
forego the September tax. These artifices led the Commissioners to
suspect that the men on the Point were more than ordinarily successful,
and were planting their gains out of the range of the official eye. But
an old pioneer named Connor failed to hide a pannikin full of gold dust,
and its discovery confirming the suspicions of the Commissioners, they
concluded that the community was prosperous enough to pay the tax, and
thereupon announced that a license fee of fifteen shillings must be paid
for the latter half of the month.
This proclamation aroused the indignation of the diggers. They held a
meeting, at which a man named Swindells mounted the "stump," and
denounced the sharp conduct of the officials. A deputation of two (the
orator and a Mr. Oddie) were appointed to interview the Commissioners,
in order to get them to revoke their decision. This the Commissioners
bluntly refused to do, and the two representatives, after a wordy war,
were compelled to retreat. The diggers now became exasperated, and when
they further heard that Connor, the man whose carelessness was the
immediate cause of the levying of the tax, had actually paid it, their
wrath knew no bounds. They bonnetted him, pelted him with mud till he
was almost covered, and would have proceeded to greater indignities had
not Oddie and a few others curbed their unbridled feelings by referring
to the grey hairs of the delinquent.
Notwithstanding this heated manifestation of ill-temper, the
Commissioners enforced the license fee, and it was noticed, as is very
often the case in popular demonstrations, that many of the most violent
of the diggers succumbed the readiest under official pressure. But the
last to give in was Swindells, so that when he did apply for a license
his consistent obnoxiousness was remembered by the Commissioners to his
disadvantage, and they refused to grant him one.
To recompense him the diggers, therefore, subscribed and presented him
with 12 ounces of gold for his efforts on their behalf. Swindells
afterwards went to Forest Creek diggings, and as a report came to the
Point that a license was again denied him, the diggers asserted that the
Government had determined to put a stop to his mining in Victoria
because he had championed their cause at Ballarat.
On first hearing of the gold discoveries the Executive of Victoria had
exercised their prerogative, as representatives of the Crown, to claim
all precious metals found within the colony. A notice was issued
forbidding anyone to dig for gold unless under certain rules, one of
which was that the gold-seeker should pay a license fee of 30s. per
month before commencing his search.
The colony, which was then in its infancy, was governed according to the
Crown Colony system; but by the incessant arrivals its population so
increased in numerical strength as to be almost beyond the control of
the ruling powers. The Government appear to have been particularly
puzzled as to their duties towards the vast irregular society upon the
gold-fields. That it should be regarded as merely a migratory flight of
population from the old centres of civilisation, which having swooped
down upon the gold sown broadcast in the land, would presently return
whither it came, carrying away the best of the gold harvest, was the
idea which must have occupied the minds of the authorities, for they
never attempted to make the gold-fields' population a part of the colony
until the clamouring of the insurrectionists at Ballarat dispelled the
illusion, and apprised them of the impolicy of delay in according a
social status to the gold-digger.
The Executive of the day sought to solve the difficulty by the
appointment of Police Magistrates or Commissioners, whose chief duty
seems to have been the enforcement of the gold-tax act.
Now in the digging community were many factious adventurers, whose
peculiar ideas of rights and liberties would have clashed with any form
of government. These malcontents exasperated the Commissioners, and
caused the power lodged in them to be used in its fullest extent. The
police force were directed to keep continual watch on the fields, and
compel the production of licenses as often as they pleased to ask for
them. Even the prudent exercise of this authority would no doubt have
been galling to law-abiding miners, for tax-paying, without the
surveillance, is not as a rule congenial to the feelings of members of
settled communities.
But the majority of the police officers were generally overbearing and
insolent, and their want of tact when dealing with the rough natures on
the diggings greatly increased the embarrassment of affairs. A
license-hunt was the name among the diggers for the collecting of the
tax--the police being the hounds, while many a digger in his wily
attempt to escape payment proved himself a veritable fox in cunning.
DIGGER-HUNTING ANECDOTES.
The following vigorous descriptions of this tax-collecting graphically
portray the feelings of both diggers and officials. The first is
extracted from Kelly's entertaining _Life in Victoria_:--
"W----n shouted down, 'Come up, boys--come along, quick; the game is
started!' and as I was being hoisted up I heard the swelling uproar and
the loud chorus of 'Joes' from every side. As I gained the surface
everybody was in commotion--diggers with their licenses lowering down
their mates without them; others, with folded arms, cursing the system
and damning the Government; some stealing away like hares when hounds
are in the neighbourhood; and several 'tally-ho'd,' bursting from points
where they could escape arrest, while 'Joe! Joe! Joe! Joe! Joe! Joe!'
resounded on all sides; the half-clad Amazons running up the hill-sides,
like so many bearers of the 'fiery cross,' to spread to the neighbouring
gullies the commencement of the police foray. The police, acting on a
preconcerted plan of attack, kept closing in upon their prey; the
mounted portion, under the commander-in-chief, occupying commanding
positions on the elevated ranges to intercept escape or retreat. A
strong body of the foot force, fully armed, swept down the gully in
extended line, attended by a corps of light infantry traps in loose
attire, like greyhounds in the slip, ready to rush from the leash as the
quarry started. But the orders of the officers could not be heard from
the loud and continuous roars of 'Joe! Joe! Joe!'--'Curse the
Government!--the beaks, the traps, commissioners, and all'--'the
robbers,'--'the bushrangers,' and every other vile epithet that could be
remembered, almost into their ears. At length the excitement got
perfectly wild as a smart fellow, closely pursued by the men-hounds,
took a line of the gulley cut up with yawning holes, from which the
cross planks had been purposely removed; every extraordinary spring
just carrying him beyond the grasp of capture, his tracks being
filled the instant he left them, and the outstretched arm of the
trap within an inch of seizure in the following leap. I myself was
strangely inoculated with the nervous quiver of excitement, and
I think I gave an involuntary cheer as the game and mettle of the digger
began to tell. But there arose a terrific menacing outcry of 'Shame!
shame!--treachery!--meanness!' which a glance in the direction of the
general gaze showed me was caused by a charge of the mounted men on the
high ground to head back the poor fugitive. I really thought a conflict
would have ensued, for there was a mad rush to the point where the
collision was likely to take place, and fierce vows of vengeance
registered by many a stalwart fellow who bounded past me to join in the
fray. A moment after the mounted men wheeled at a sharp angle, and a
fresh shout arose as another smart young fellow flew before them with
almost supernatural fleetness, like a fresh hare started as the hunted
one was on the point of being run down. I marvelled to see him keep the
unbroken ground with the gulley at his side impracticable for cavalry;
but no, he made straight on for a bunch of tents with a speed I never
saw equalled by a pedestrian. It was even betting, too, that he would
have reached the screen first, when lo! he stopped short so suddenly as
only just to escape being ridden down by the Commissioner--the Cardigan
of the charge--who seized him by the shirt collar in passing. The rush
of diggers now became diverted to the scene of caption. I hurried
forward there too, although fearing I should witness the shedding of
blood and the sacrifice of human life; but as I approached I was
agreeably disappointed at hearing loud roars of laughter, and jeering
outbursts of 'Joe! Joe!' amidst which the crowd opened out a passage for
the crest-fallen heroes, who rode away under such a salute of
opprobrious epithets as I never heard before, for the young fellow who
led them off the idle chase stopped short the moment he saw the real
fugitive was safe, coolly inquiring of his captor 'what crime he was
guilty of to be hunted like a felon.' 'Your license, you scoundrel!' was
the curt reply. Upon which he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out
the document, to the ineffable disgust of their high mightinesses, who
in grasping at the shadow had lost the substance.
"It was a capital ruse, adopted in an emergency, and played with greater
skill than if there had been a regular rehearsal. I flatter myself that
I am a loyal man on the average, and a respectable upholder of law and
order; but I was unable to repress an emotion of gratification at the
result of the chase, or an impulse of hero worship, as I sought the sole
actor in the successful diversion to offer my congratulations. The
myrmidons of the law now moved up the middle of the gully in close
order, attended by anything but an admiring cortége, who made it a
point never to let the cry of 'Joe! Joe!' subside for a moment.
Occasionally a license was demanded, and its production was the signal
for fresh outbursts of the tumult; but the 'license meet' was brought to
a close by two other successful feints that were played off by a pair of
diggers, who simulated a guilty timidity and dropped themselves in a
slide down their ropes into the bottoms of their wet holes, followed by
a brace of traps with dashing gallantry, who chased them into the muddy
drives, where the lurkers purposely crawled to lead their pursuers into
the muck. Of course they were hauled up in triumph, but the hallelujahs
were quickly superseded by choking screams of 'Joe! Joe!' when the
prisoners produced their digging warrants. The Commissioner did not
venture on another 'throw off,' but moved away sullenly with his forces
to the tune of 'Joe! Joe! Joe!' and expressions of regret 'that he would
have to drink the Royal Family's health after dinner at his own
expense,' and such-like observations."
Another aspect of the digger-hunting process is given by Mr. R. M.
Sergeant, correspondent of the _Geelong Advertiser_:--
"'Traps! traps! Joe! Joe!' were the well-known signals which announced
that the police were out on a license raid. The hasty abandonment of
tubs and cradles by fossickers and outsiders, and the great rush of
shepherds to the deep holes on the flat as the police hove in view,
readily told that there were not a few among them who believed in the
doctrine that 'base is the slave who pays.' Hunting the digger was
evidently regarded by Commissioner Sleuth and his hounds as a source of
delightful recreation, and one of such paramount importance to the State
that the sport was reduced to an exact science. Thus, giving a couple of
dirty constables in diggers' disguise jumping a claim, the gentle
shepherd approaches, with dilapidated shovel on shoulder, and proceeds
to dispossess intruders in a summary manner. A great barney ensues. The
constable and his mate talk big, a crowd gathers round, and 'A ring! a
ring!' is the cry. The combatants have just commenced to shape when the
signal referred to at the head of this paragraph rings through the flat.
On come the traps in skirmishing order, driving in the stragglers as
they advance, and supported by mounted troopers in the rear, who occupy
commanding positions in the ranges. A great haul is made, and some sixty
prisoners are marched off in triumph to the camp, handcuffed together
like a lot of felons, there to be dealt with according to the caprice or
cupidity of their pursuers."
Raffello, in his history of the Ballarat riot, says:--"At the shouting
of 'Joe! Joe!' the diggers without licenses make for the deep shaft, and
leave a licensed mate or two at the windlass. The diggers were besieged
by a regiment of troopers, and traps under their protection would
venture into the holes. The sight of the rich-looking washing stuff in
possession of some lucky diggers aroused the cupidity of the police, and
often made them blind to the condition of the unfortunate ones. Some of
the traps were civil enough, and felt the shame of the duty, but others
enjoyed the fun. The authorities generally treated the diggers very
harshly. Troopers would scour the neighbouring bush, and all the
unfortunate diggers they captured were tied to the stumps of trees, and
left there until the hunt was over, when the captives were collected and
taken to the depôt which the traps established in order to bring
together the whole of their victims. From there the batch of prisoners
were marched off to the camp, and fined £5, or imprisoned. So much for
the unlicensed digger. The digger who wished to obtain a license was
obliged to travel a few miles, and then was often kept waiting at the
Commissioner's tent for two or three hours."