Our First Half-Century Part 17

The old-style factory carried on its operations solely by day. The present-day factory is lit throughout with electric light, and works day and night (Sunday excepted) for five or six months, employing, according to its capacity, from 100 to 150 men. Around each factory has sprung up a small settlement of artisans, storekeepers, and others, while, under a statute pa.s.sed by the Queensland Parliament, the employees are decently housed, fed, and a.s.sured of good sanitation, their mental, moral, and financial welfare being provided for by the inst.i.tution of reading and recreation rooms, and the establishment of branches of the Government Savings Bank.

Turning to the agricultural operations, similar evidence of the evolution of the industry is to be found. Time was when a visitor could stand on some slight eminence and look over vast areas of cane, the vista unbroken save for a few trees, or the plantation roads running like ribbons through a sea of waving green. Now the prospect discloses the homes of farmers standing out amongst the cane, with all the evidences of a closely settled and thriving population. The large gangs of labourers tending the cultivation have for the most part disappeared. Instead, the farmer and his sons, with possibly one or two labourers, work side by side in the fields.

At harvest time long lines of carts drawing cane to the mills no longer make a picturesque feature in the landscape; locomotives now haul cane-trains over the hundreds of miles of narrow-gauge tramline which radiate from the factories to all points from which supplies of cane are drawn. Where but a few years back was naught but the lonely bush, its silence broken only by the lowing of a few cattle, the occasional pa.s.sing of an aboriginal stockman or a party of drovers, carriers, or a chance swagman--birds of pa.s.sage between the inland stations and the ports on the coast--towns.h.i.+ps have sprung into being, and every half-mile reveals the home of the farmer nestling among his fields of emerald green.

During the past few years, mainly owing to the satisfactory prices received for their cane, the farmers have been profitably employed.

They have learned in the school of experience that cane cultivation requires practical knowledge, and that in many cases their land needs special treatment, which they must study for themselves. Nothing has brought this fact home to the farmers more thoroughly than the work of the Sugar Experiment Station at Mackay, and the valuable reports published by the late Director, Dr. W. Maxwell.

In the early seventies the sugar-planters of Mackay awoke one morning to discover the whole of their crops destroyed, as if a fire had pa.s.sed over them. They then grew only one variety of cane, which had become diseased. Fresh varieties had to be introduced from abroad, with all the risk of introducing canes that were worthless, or, worse still, of bringing in pests or diseases. So far, sugar-cane in Queensland has been singularly and fortunately free from natural enemies. Thanks to the work of Mr. H. Tryon, the Government Entomologist, the grower readily recognises the presence of insect pests, and knows how to deal promptly with them on their first appearance.

The farmer is learning to know his cane; he studies its habits, and is quick to appreciate the good and bad effects of his operations. The a.n.a.lyses at the mills have directed his attention to the importance of cane being a good sugar-producer, and, as he is in many cases a shareholder in a factory, he is alive to the fact that weight of cane is not the only essential to success. For many years the need for securing canes richer in sugar was largely neglected all over the world, but recently efforts have been made to repeat in the case of cane the splendid results won by such men as the late Sir J. B.

Lawes and the French chemist, Vilmorin, in connection with the sugar-producing qualities of the beet. The officials at the Queensland Sugar Experiment Stations have tested fully sixty varieties of cane, including some from Papua, to discover the agricultural and milling value of each.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CAMBANORA GAP, HEAD OF CONDAMINE, KILLARNEY]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MINTO CRAG, DUGANDAN, Fa.s.sIFERN DISTRICT]

It is only natural that in an industry whose operations extend over so many degrees of lat.i.tude conditions must greatly vary. Irrigation is necessary in some districts, notably in the Burdekin Delta, which lies in a dry belt. Drainage is the prime requisite in other places.

Fertilisation varies with the soils, and information as to the latter has been compiled in a series of exhaustive a.n.a.lyses made by Dr. W.

Maxwell at the laboratory in Bundaberg. In South Queensland the cane frequently takes two years to mature, while in the extreme North fifteen months after planting it is fit for the rollers.

According to the official estimate of the Commonwealth Treasurer for 1908, 4,825 farmers were then engaged in the industry in Queensland, 917 per cent. of whom employed white labour only, the number of employees being in round figures 30,000. In 1902 the number of farmers was only 2,496, showing the rapidity with which closer settlement is taking place. It is true that of late there has been a reduction in the area under cultivation, but this is probably attributable to the tendency to make "intense cultivation" a feature of the industry in order to solve the labour problem. Some of the larger areas under crop have been curtailed, and the reduction has not been made good by the increased settlement; but, as in the eighties those engaged in the industry found, possibly unconsciously, a remedy for the dearth of labour, so we may reasonably expect that the present difficulty in obtaining men for the ordinary work of cultivation will be met by new developments.

What does the future hold for us? Can we continue the work of building up a white nation beneath a tropical sun--a task which in many parts of the world is considered quixotic? The areas available for cane cultivation are still enormous, and, though hesitancy and doubt may for a time join hands in checking expansion, the main facts remain that there is room for the people and that there is a demand for the product. Australia, in her fiscal policy, has recognised that the sugar industry is a national industry, and our statesmen realise that it is doing for the Australian tropics what no other industry on the coastal lands has yet seriously attempted--what, indeed, no other country in the world is as yet prepared to try.

a.s.suming, as we have a right to a.s.sume, a sympathetic Australian Government, we can turn to the future with eyes full of hope. There are many directions in which we may look for the expansion of the industry. The increasing population of the Commonwealth involves an added capacity to consume the product. The field of invention in regard to the harvesting of the cane has yet to be explored and exploited. At present the cost of cutting and loading a field of cane is from eight to ten times that of harvesting an equal amount of sugar beets. Experiments are constantly being made with mechanical appliances for cutting and loading and unloading cane, and this is one direction in which Queenslanders may look forward hopefully to the time when they will not only lessen the volume of labour required, but when they will reduce the burdensome nature of the work, and place the cane-sugar industry in a position to compete successfully with the great beet-sugar industry of Europe.

Some 250,000 gallons of rum are distilled annually at Bundaberg, but we are told officially that 4,000,000 gallons of mola.s.ses go to waste every year. The conversion of this product into foodstuffs for live stock as an adjunct to the main industry would add materially to the profits.

In some sugar districts, dairying is finding a footing, and possibly the time is not far distant when a form of mixed farming will enable the cane-grower to utilise more of the by-products of his industry, at the same time rendering him more independent of unfavourable meteorological conditions. Generally speaking, improvement in the quality and quant.i.ty of the cane, intense culture, mechanical inventions, and the use of by-products are all within the bounds of possibility, and will make for further progress.

But all these things are of secondary importance compared with the need of a settled working population. Back from the coast lies a range of mountains, rising often 3,000 feet above the level of the sea.

Along and behind these mountains are excellent lands, well suited for close settlement and for the production of cereals, and the fruits and vegetables so greatly needed in the more humid areas of the littoral belt. The climate of this elevated hinterland is excellent, and the close settlement of these lands will furnish one of the safeguards of the sugar industry, seeing that a permanent population within easy reach will always be available for employment in the canefields and sugar-mills. To a large extent, the populations of the lowlands and the highlands will be mutually dependent upon each other.

In the early days of settlement in East and West Moreton and on the Darling Downs, the small selector, with no capital in many cases save a pair of strong hands, a courageous heart, and a tireless energy, made his way every year to the squatter's shearing shed. No thought had he of "knocking down" his hard-earned cheque. Labour disputes never entered his mind. With his earnings he paid his rent and improved his land. It was men of this stamp who built up the great agricultural industry of Southern Queensland, and they and their descendants of the second and third generations are the very cream of the farmers of to-day. It is to a similar cla.s.s of settlers in the sugar districts and their hinterland that we look for the proper settlement and development of our tropical lands. And in our aspirations for a great white agricultural population we are ent.i.tled to expect the sympathetic a.s.sistance of our kinsmen in the South and of the Empire at large. For not only are we doing what we can to make a prosperous and contented people, but we are doing a great work for the whole of the white races. We are proving that the tropics can be conquered and permanently settled by people of our own race and colour; we are holding one of the gateways of the East; and we are garrisoning an important outpost of the Empire. Kipling's stirring words, written of Queensland, find an echo in the hearts of Queenslanders--

The northern stirp beneath the southern skies-- I build a Nation for an Empire's need, Suffer a little, and my land shall rise, Queen over lands indeed!

CHAPTER IV.

A HALF-CENTURY OF MINING.

The Quest for Gold a Colonising Agency.--Earliest Discoveries of the Precious Metal in Queensland.

--Port Curtis.--Rockhampton District.--Peak Downs.

--Gympie.--Ravenswood.--Charters Towers.--Palmer.--Mount Morgan.--Croydon.--Later Discoveries.--Yield at Charters Towers and Mount Morgan.--Copper Mining.--Tin.--Silver.

--Queensland the Home of All Kinds of Minerals and Precious Stones.--Mineral Wealth in Cairns Hinterland.--Copper Deposits in Cloncurry District.--The Etheridge.--Anakie Gem Field.--Opal Fields.--Extensive Coal Measures.--Railway Communication with Mining Fields.--Value of Queensland Mineral Output.--Prospects of Industry.

The quest for gold, to say nothing of other minerals, has had much to do with the settlement and development of Queensland, apart from the direct advantages conferred on the State by her mining industry.

It has brought to our sh.o.r.es many thousands of people who would not otherwise have come here; it has helped to open up for occupations other than mining previously unknown and unexplored regions that, but for the prospector, might have lain dormant for many more years; while the successful development of the territory's rich and almost unlimited mineral wealth has aided in making our State known in other parts of the world, and thus a.s.sisted in attracting hither the people and capital that have been the chief contributing factors to our wonderful progress.

Fifty years ago, when what is now Queensland, casting itself free from the parental skirts of New South Wales, began to walk alone, its mining industry did not exist. It would not be correct to say that gold--here, as elsewhere in Australia, the first to be sought and found of the numerous minerals that have since proved a source of so much wealth to the State--had not been then discovered upon our sh.o.r.es. Fifteen years before, men attached to an official establishment at Gladstone, Port Curtis, found "colours" of the yellow metal; and in 1858, the year preceding "Separation," occurred the Canoona "rush," which proved so disastrous to the 15,000 or 20,000 adventurers who then swarmed to the Rockhampton district in search of the "saint-seducing gold." But the so-called "colours" detected at picturesque Gladstone were nothing more than can to this day be traced in scores of places in Queensland; while the find at Canoona proved a fiasco so great as to spread abroad the impression that this part of Australia, as a prospective field for mining enterprise, was a delusion. But was it? Within a dozen miles or so of the scene of the Canoona disappointment was situated the "mountain of gold" that has since earned world-wide fame under the name of Mount Morgan; and by the end of Queensland's first half-century the Rockhampton (or Central) district has turned out gold to the sum of nearly 3,500,000 fine ounces, representing a money value of over 14,500,000--the bulk of it won within the last moiety of the half-century.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MOUNT MORGAN: COPPER WORKS, LOOKING NORTH]

[Ill.u.s.tration: MOUNT MORGAN: GENERAL VIEW OF WORKS]

Three years after the foundation of the colony of Queensland gold in payable quant.i.ties was discovered on the Peak Downs, inland from Rockhampton; but it was not till the finding of the Gympie field late in 1867--eight years after severance from New South Wales--that Queensland first definitely took rank as a gold producer. Within six months from the time when the wandering digger Nash, fossicking in the gullies running into the upper Mary River, found the promising specimens in his dish which made him hasten to Maryborough to report his discovery, 15,000 men had flocked to the spot from all parts of Australia. The place had hardly been heard of before. Pressmen in Brisbane did not even know how to spell the name "Gympie" when first the news arrived; but within a very few weeks its fame spread far and wide. The gullies in the vicinity of Nash's claim were rich and numerous. One nugget brought to light weighed nearly a thousand ounces, and was worth 3,675. Soon alluvial gave place to quartz mining, and within five years gold to the value of more than 1,500,000 had been won. Up to the end of 1908--that is, in forty-one years--the field had produced gold worth 10,350,000, and is still "going strong." Like all other fields, it has of course had its ups and downs, and just now is recovering its feet after one of its "downs." Last year Gympie produced gold to the value of nearly 270,000; the grade of its ore is improving, and its monthly yields are now showing comparative increases.

Since the discovery of the Gympie goldfield there has been no cessation in the progress of mining in Queensland. From one end of the territory to another the existence of gold and other minerals has from time to time been disclosed. For many years--

"Gold! Gold! Gold! Gold!

Bright and yellow, hard and cold--"

but still much to be desired--was the magnet which attracted the peripatetic prospector away from the comforts of civilisation into the rugged wilds of the coastal ranges and the gullies and stony stream-beds of the eastern watershed; and for a long while it was only the gold discoveries that attracted much attention. A year or so after the Gympie find, the Ravenswood goldfield, south-west from Townsville, "broke out," to use the phrase of the old-time digger. In 1869 the precious metal was found on the Gilbert River, and the Gilbert, Etheridge, and Woolgar fields were proclaimed. Then came Charters Towers, our premier goldfield, in 1872; the Palmer, inland from Cooktown (then the very far North), in 1873; the Hodgkinson, a little more to the south, in 1875; the great Mount Morgan in 1882; Croydon in 1886; and other discoveries, until d.i.c.kie, a veteran prospector, found the Hamilton and Alice River fields in the Peninsula--the former in 1899 and the latter as late as 1904.

In its thirty-six years of existence Charters Towers has turned out over 5,800,000 ounces--more than 24,600,000 worth of gold; last year's output was of the value of 700,000; and to-day the indications in the deeper ground of the field are such that there is reason to expect that both the term of its existence and the volume of its output will be greatly extended. At Mount Morgan--the show mine of Queensland, and one of the greatest in the world--there has been quarried out of the hill and dug from the depths beneath stone that, under treatment by works in every way worthy of such a mine, has, in a little over twenty-two years, yielded gold to the value of over 13,760,000; has paid in wages and other expenditure about 7,000,000; and has given to the fortunate holders of its 1,000,000 shares some 7,230,000 in dividends. That is what the big mine has done. What is it doing now? True, the phenomenal yields of gold and the high grade of its auriferous ores that characterised the earlier years of its history showed signs of diminis.h.i.+ng as time went on; but diminis.h.i.+ng yields were counterbalanced by improved methods of mining and treatment, with consequent reduction of costs; and a few years since copper as well as gold was found in the lower levels, with the result that the mine has become at once the most productive copper and the most productive gold mine of the State. It has already turned out copper to the value of about 1,500,000, which has to be added to the gold yield, given above, to arrive at its total product; while the value of the mine's aggregate output for 1908 (over 1,017,000) was greater, with perhaps one exception, than that of any previous year in its history.

Though for some years gold was the only string to the bow of Queensland's mining industry, that state of things has long since changed. In the early sixties copper was mined in the State, but then and for many years afterwards only to a limited extent. Tin came on the scene in 1872. During the first forty years of Queensland's existence the gold won within her borders was four times the worth of all other minerals and coal produced; but so rapid has been the increase during the past ten years in the production of the industrial metals--or "other minerals," as they are officially termed, to distinguish them from gold--that in 1907 their value exceeded that of the gold yield by over 170,000. Indeed, during the five years ending with that year there was an almost phenomenal expansion. The output of 1902 was of the value of only 589,960. In the following year it increased to 846,280, and then for four years jumped up by leaps and bounds, until in 1907 the yield was worth no less than 2,153,226.

The known mineral-producing country of Queensland extends over an immense area. It begins on the southern border, where the Silver Spur mine maintains a constant output of silver and other mineral products, and where the Stanthorpe district, our first stanniferous field, still materially a.s.sists, with the aid of dredges, in the tin production of the State; and extends northerly a hundred miles beyond the goldfield of Coen, in the Cape York Peninsula. Over this immense distance of some 1,300 miles from south to north, and extending inland from 50 to 200 miles from the eastern coast, are located at varying intervals fields producing gold, silver, copper, tin, coal, lead, sapphires, manganese, wolfram, molybdenite, bis.m.u.th, and graphite; while further to the west are the opal fields of Jundah, Opalton, and Kynuna, the copper deposits of the vast Cloncurry district, the silver-lead mines of Lawn Hills in the Burketown district, and the Croydon goldfield, also on the Gulf waters. Queensland, with a huge area of 670,500 square miles and a scant population of little more than half a million of people, has a hundred proclaimed gold, mineral, and coal fields, having a combined area of about 50,000,000 acres.

Apart from goldfields, by far the most important and productive of these areas is the tract of country which forms the hinterland of the port of Cairns--a tract which includes the tin-mining centres of Herberton, Stannary Hills, Irvinebank, Nymbool, and Reid's Creek; the copper and silver-lead mines of Chillagoe and Mungana; the copper mines of Mount Molloy and O.K.; the wolfram, molybdenite, and bis.m.u.th mines of Wolfram Camp, Bamford, and Mount Carbine; and the antimony deposits of the Mitch.e.l.l River. The two large mineral fields into which this portion of the State is now officially divided--Chillagoe and Herberton--have together an area of over 8,500,000 acres. The port of Cairns was not established till 1876--seventeen years after the foundation of the State. Now there yearly pa.s.s through it from the area mentioned minerals worth from 600,000 to 800,000, exclusive of the mineral product from the Etheridge and Croydon fields, which also, for the most part, finds an outlet through the same channel. Copper and tin are responsible for more than half the amount named, but the potentialities of the district as far as other minerals are concerned are almost unlimited. Of wolfram--taking only one example--this part of the State alone can supply the world's demand, and have a good deal to spare afterwards. The Queensland Government Geologist has estimated that the wolfram-bearing country in this portion of Queensland extends over an area of 3,500 square miles. Given anything like a permanent demand and a fair and steady market, wolfram production would soon take a prominent position in our mining industry. The historical tin mine of the district is the Vulcan, at Irvinebank, which has attained the greatest depth (1,450 feet) reached by any tin mine in Queensland, and where the appliances for recovering the metal are more up-to-date than at Dolcoath, the most famous tin mine of Cornwall. During the twenty-five years of its existence, the Vulcan Mine has from 106,000 tons of tin ore produced over 9,790 tons of concentrates, worth something approaching 500,000, and has paid its lucky shareholders dividends to the extent of 160,000. The opening up of this large and prolific district is largely due to the enterprise of the Chillagoe Company, which not only has developed extensively its several mines and erected large ore-treatment works, but has built the railway--in length 93 miles--which connects those mines and numerous others with the Government railway at the top of the Coastal Range at Mareeba, and is building a further extension to the Etheridge field, nearly 150 miles further inland.

Queensland is known as a country of magnificent distances, and one example of its vast expanse is the extent of the copper area of the Cloncurry district, which is tapped by the Great Northern Railway 480 miles westward from the port of Townsville. This district is by far the largest tract of copper-bearing country in Australia, and one of the largest in the world. As the crow flies, it extends north and south for more than 150 miles, and east and west some 80 or 100 miles.

Over this large area, covering at least 15,000 square miles, copper has been proved to exist. At the close of 1907 there were on the Warden's books over 800 mineral leases, besides some hundreds of claims and several freeholds. The outcrops throughout the district have been described by one of the Government Geologists as innumerable and phenomenally rich. But the district is still in the prospecting stage, and it is yet too soon to p.r.o.nounce an opinion as to whether the deposits generally will live at depth, or of what value they will be if they do, although it may safely be said that the developments in the more important mines during the past twelve months have been distinctly encouraging. Smelting operations are already in progress at two, if not three, of the princ.i.p.al mining centres of the district, and a railway extension from Cloncurry 74 miles southward is now in course of construction. Another Queensland mineral field of vast extent is the Etheridge. It has an area equal to half that of Scotland, and the Warden for the field, when he undertakes his periodical patrol, has an itinerary of about 400 miles.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CHARTERS TOWERS: PLANT'S DAY DAWN]

Pa.s.sing reference has been made to the sapphire field of Anakie, in Central Queensland, and to the opal to be found in her trackless West.

As a matter of fact, isolated finds of many kinds of gems besides these two have been made in widely separated parts of the State, but as a recognised branch of the mining industry opal and sapphire mining has for years occupied an important place. In the Anakie field, 190 miles from Rockhampton, on the Central Railway, the existence of gem-stones was officially reported as early as 1892. Ten years later the Government Geologist, reporting on these sapphire fields, stated that "the total distance along which deposits are found ... is altogether about fifteen miles. Of an area of 400 square miles examined, fifty square miles contain deposits carrying sapphires of more or less value." In 1905, another member of the Geological staff reported that the most important recent development had been the opening up of a second bed of the sapphire wash at a depth of 25 feet, and that excellent stones, freer from flaws than those nearer the surface, were being obtained from the lower deposit. Mining for these precious stones, many of which are of the most beautiful description, has been to a considerable extent detrimentally affected by the difficulty experienced in getting a regular market and what is considered a fair price for the gems; but, notwithstanding this drawback, there was a large expansion in the industry during the four years preceding 1907--the annual production having increased in that period from 7,000 to 35,000 in value. In 1908, however, there was a considerable falling off, mainly because miners were not satisfied with the prices obtainable; but, with an improvement in this respect, renewed activity on the field, which even now supports a population of over 1,000 persons, may be looked for.

The opal-bearing country extends over a much wider area than sapphires. The width of this country is, roughly, about 250 miles, while in length it extends right from the New South Wales border half-way up the State in a curve bending towards the South Australian border. The chief centres of production have been Kynuna (near Winton), Opalton and Fermoy (in the Longreach district), Eromanga, and Yowah (near Thargomindah). The Queensland opal is recognised as being unsurpa.s.sed for its brilliance and iridescence, and there is reason to believe that much more will be found than has yet been unearthed; but the quest for it is difficult owing to the arid nature and vast extent of the western plains where it occurs. In good seasons men in those regions find ready employment on the pastoral stations; in very dry ones, they cannot prospect for the precious stone, and the result has been that the industry has fluctuated even more than that of sapphire mining. The highest point was attained in 1895, when the value of the opal product reached nearly 33,000. Of late years Queensland has been blessed with good seasons, and the uncertain occupation of opal mining has, with many men, given place to the more regular and more comfortable station life. While the opal, the sapphire, and other precious stones have been dug from Queensland's earth, her Northern waters have for years yielded the l.u.s.trous pearl, and in 1908 pearl-sh.e.l.l to the value of 71,000 was exported.

Sir William Ramsay, speaking as a scientific authority, lately stated that the day will come when Great Britain, if she continue to be dependent on her own coal supplies, will find it difficult not only to carry on her manufactures but to provide fuel for household purposes.

Well, when that day does come, she can send to Queensland for what coal she wants. Here there are coal measures in abundance--in the South, Central, and Northern divisions of the State, and on the Darling Downs. True, we have not yet done much in the way of production, but all that is wanted is a market, and coal, both bituminous and anthracitic, can be dug out of the earth and sent away in practically unlimited quant.i.ties. Of ironstone, also, there is an abundance, and that, too, in such close proximity to the coal supplies that when the time arrives for Australia to enter earnestly into the enterprise of iron and steel manufacture Queensland should play an important part both in producing the raw material and in preparing the product for the market.

With only one or two exceptions, all the important mining centres of Queensland are now connected with the eastern coast by rail, and those that are not are being rapidly linked up. During the year 1908 thirteen new railways were authorised by Parliament, five of them to serve mineral districts. Four of these lines are now under construction; and in addition the railway to the Etheridge field is completed for two-thirds of its length.

To sum up: Queensland during the half-century of her existence has produced gold to the value, in round numbers, of over 69,000,000, and other minerals, coal, and precious stones worth more than 21,000,000--or an aggregate of 90,000,000. Last year's mineral production was worth 3,844,000, so that, even at the same rate of output, in less than three years we shall have topped the 100,000,000. The number of men obtaining employment in connection with the industry during 1908 was just upon 21,000--only 4,000 less than Queensland's total population in 1859. The value of machinery and plant used for mining and ore reduction purposes throughout the State is over 2,000,000. The worth of the coal output of the West Moreton district alone last year (193,000) was more than the total revenue of Queensland during the first year of her existence; while the mineral product of the Herberton district during the same period was nearly four times as great.

In the s.p.a.ce available for this article it has been possible to take but a cursory view of the mineral progress which has characterised the first half-century of Queensland's life, but enough has been written to show that that progress has been remarkable, if not phenomenal. And who shall say what strides will be made during the next fifty years, or venture to predict what will be the value of our mineral wealth in the year 1959? It is a safe rule "not to prophesy till you know," but even the most timid prophet could hardly hesitate to predict expansion for Queensland's mining industry. Where there has been so much growth in the past, and where there is such an unlimited field for greater growth in the years to come, it would be absurd to suppose that there will be no further advance. As a matter of fact, many well qualified to judge do not hesitate to say that the industry is as yet in its infancy. It has been truly said of gold that "what it is, there it is"; and what you have to do is to find where it is. When it is remembered, however, that the prominent hill known as Mount Morgan, with its millions' worth of golden ore, was within a day's journey of the populous town of Rockhampton, and remained undiscovered until 1882, although alluvial gold had been found at its base for years previously and the disappointed miners from Canoona had twenty-three years before swarmed in its vicinity; when we recollect that only quite recently nuggets have been found in the streets of some of the oldest of Victorian mining towns.h.i.+ps, who shall say what has yet to be unearthed in the wide expanses of Queensland's bush, a great deal of which is already known to be "rich with the spoils of Nature"?

"Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear;"

and the experience of the last half-century amply justifies the belief that untold millions lie hidden in the earthen depths of Queensland.