LIFE IN BRISBANE 



of many sporting hotels in the place. All the racing 

 division used to gather round, and on the eve of big 

 races in Melbourne or Sydney we used to sell Calcutta 

 Sweeps. 



I lived a little way out, at Toowong, and used to 

 hack into town and back two or three times a day. 

 In white duck clothes, and the thermometer 

 frequently at 108° in the shade, there was horse 

 talk in the morning, and the perpetual smoking 

 of Manilla cigars. I used to carry twenty or 

 thirty in my pocket, and would light one from the 

 cinders of another : I have read that Bismarck did 

 the same. On occasions when driving I would stop 

 my buggy and buy a couple of legs of mutton for 

 half-a-crown or a three-pound sirloin of steak for a 

 shilling. It was rare cheap living, but prices are now 

 trebled, they tell me. 



Many good theatrical companies came up there. 

 Nellie Stewart, who was then about twenty, was the 

 great star. She and Howard Vernon, who was a fine 

 artist, used to appear in all the latest comic operas. 

 Then the Holloways played the dramas first acted by 

 Wilson and George Barrett in England, and we had a 

 season of the Silver King, Wages of Sin, Lights of London, 

 etc. There would be comic operas, Gilbert and Sullivan, 

 by Lilliputians. They were wonderful children, and I 

 assure you we got used to anything. Charles Turner, 

 a brother of J. W. Turner, and his wife, Anna Montague, 

 came with opera. With them was Giulio Verdi, who 

 I have seen about London. Verdi was a very hand- 

 some chap. He sang in Italian and the others in 

 English. I loved Brisbane ; there was just that semi- 

 tropical suggestion about it which made the place 

 distinctive. 



I got the idea of another paper and started — of 



lOO 



