THE EVOLUTION OF COLONIES. 297 



tliey had in tliemselves no principle of expansion. Tlie mining set- 

 tlement is a mechanical formation and not an organic growth. Its 

 rise has been too often observed to need description. A lucky 

 prospector finds a gold- or silver-bearing reef, possibly in a district 

 indicated by a geologist, who is thus also a pioneer. The news 

 spreads like the cry of fire. From the adjacent colonies and distant 

 countries a mob of adventurers and old gold diggers crowd in and 

 clamor for concessions. The field is soon white with tents, huts 

 spring up as by magic, a " store " is set up, a hotel follows or pre- 

 cedes, and in a few weeks a wild-cat township comes into existence. 

 It grows with the growth of the " diggings," and declines with them. 

 "When they are exhausted, the fortuitous concourse of its inhabitants 

 scatter as swiftly as they came, and the township leads a death-in- 

 life existence on the tailings; or, if the country is favorable, the 

 solider portion of the miners take to agriculture or industry, and the 

 town becomes a manufacturing or distributing center. Denver, 

 Ballarat, and Johannisburg are types of the miner's camp turned 

 into flourishing cities. South America was founded as a series of 

 gold and silver colonies, and saltpeter has lately established an Eng- 

 lish colony in Bolivia. The gold discoveries of 1851 " precipitated 

 Australia into a nation." In still more recent days silver has gen- 

 erated several of the Western States and built up a great political 

 party. Within the last decade gold has transformed a scattered 

 population of farmers and big-game hunters in South Africa into a 

 warlike republic. The j)recious metals thus start colonies, or give 

 them an impulse when founded. They may even change their base. 

 A pastoral and agricultural country, like Victoria, may be converted 

 into a commercial and industrial country. Other results are more 

 questionable. Population is attracted, but it is disorderly and with- 

 out cohesion, and state industries have to be created for the support 

 of the multitudes whom the exhaustion of the mines has thrown out 

 of employment. Hence arise huge loans and oppressive debts, pro- 

 tective duties, overgrown cities and plethoric communities, where 

 the brain is overfed and the extremities are starved. 



These are, roughly outlined, the pioneer types of settlement 

 that constitute the first chapter in the history of all colonies and 

 countries. They have been assimilated to the asexual method of 

 reproduction because they belong to a low grade of organization. 

 They are initiated mainly by men; they do not, taken singly or all 

 together, form a perfect social organism or a self -subsisting society; 

 and they are incapable of a prolonged existence. 



Asexual passes into sexual reproduction by a series of gradual 

 transitions that are no longer a mystery; they have been well dis- 



