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A USTRALASIA ILL USTRA TED. 



ornate in their design, and the churches have evidently been built to meet the wants 

 of a practical people, and not out of munificent endowments. The School of Arts is a 

 convenient and modern building, while the theatre is suggestive of early days. The 

 Post Office and the Court House with an imposing portico supported by four Doric 

 columns are at the southern end of Hunter Street, and here also are the more 

 important hotels. At the northern end of the Street is a scene of busy life ; omnibuses 

 ply all day to the various outlying villages, and the foot-paths are bustling with shippers 

 and sea-faring men. On Saturday night the one business artery of the city is thickly 

 thronged with crowds of men and women, and youth of both sexes, gaily tricked out in 

 holiday attire. The visitor listening will catch words and phrases with the west of 

 England accent, and may well imagine himself in a Cornish mining town, although the 

 surroundings are rather suggestive of the north of England. 



The population of Newcastle and the surrounding colliery district is not less than 

 twenty thousand, but it covers a wide area. There are no suburbs proper to the great 

 northern coaling city, but each colliery has its separate town. Hamilton, Lambton, 

 Waratah, Plattsburg, Wallsend, Stockton, Wickham, Charlestown, Anvil Creek, Greta and 





HUNTER STREET, NEWCASTLE. 



Minmi are important mining centres the homes of miners who toil upon the spot. 

 Each colliery is connected with Newcastle by rail, and around its mouth spread acres 

 of huts, which are deserted every Saturday night when the tired toilers take their 

 weekly holiday in their dusky city. Interspersed among the homes of each colliery are 



