SOCIAL LIFE, SPORTS, AND RECREATIONS 263 



was such as could hardly be seen elsewhere, and 

 the cavaliers of the Logan were no more distin- 

 guished a band of racers than the cavahers of Western 

 Victoria. 



A slightly different scene is painted by later observers 

 than the chronicler of Early Queensland. Now the 

 jockeys are stockmen, though some of these are still 

 men of good family. " Only those who have seen a 

 Christmas race-meeting in the interior can have any 

 idea of such a scene, with its motley crovvd of niggers 

 [blacks] and stockmen from the adjacent runs, all 

 eager to knock down their twelve-months' cheque in 

 drinking or in backing the horses from their respective 

 stations." * 



Race-time was a carnival equally for blacks and 

 whites. There might be as many as a hundred guests 

 at table. The bushmen rode up in spotless moleskins ; 

 the bush girls, too, were on horseback ; the blackboys 

 were picturesque in bright -coloured shirts. Racehorses 

 and heavily freighted buggies were driven up to the 

 station. 



Station amusements expanded and refined with the 

 rising tide of pastoral prosperity. Large parties were 

 then invited to spend a week at a station, when picnics, 

 dances, and " all sorts of al fresco entertainments " 

 were provided. Each day's programme was prepared 

 and the necessary arrangements regally made. Drags, 

 mail-phaetons, carriages, dog-carts, and horsemen formed 

 a Derby-day-hke procession, and traversed a mile-long 

 avenue. Races, riding-parties, shooting parties, fishing 

 excursions, kangaroo and opossum battues made the 

 week one of mirth and revelry. It was as a decameron 

 from Boccaccio, and never, by the confession of its 

 most gifted chronicler, did mortals drink more deeply 

 of the cup of innocent pleasure, or return with more 

 regret to every-day life. We may compare it with an 

 intoxicating day spent by Herbert Spencer with the 

 Valentine Smiths on their Highland estate, but the 

 * A. E,, Overlanding, p. 76. 



