CHAPTER XVII 



A WHITE AUSTRALIA 



A LTHOUGH untroubled by any questions 

 f\ arising out of the presence of an indigenous 

 coloured race, the Australians recognise a more 

 serious danger in the proximity of Asia and its 

 surplus millions of population. They con- 

 sequently enforce the most stringent measures of 

 exclusion against the coloured alien, and espe- 

 cially against Chinese, Japanese, and Indian 

 coolies. It is contended, and with some force, 

 that the development of Northern Australia is 

 seriously retarded by these restrictions, and there 

 are those who say that tropical Australia will 

 always remain a wilderness if white labour is 

 relied upon for its cultivation. The same argu- 

 ments are advanced in support of the employ- 

 ment of Kanakas, or South Sea Islanders, upon 

 the sugar plantations of Queensland. Before the 

 restrictive measures were applied, a large number 

 of coloured immigrants had already found their 

 way to Australia, the latest census revealing 

 their number at fifty-five thousand, of whom 

 thirty-two thousand are Chinese, and ten thou- 

 208 



