THE GOLDFIELDS AND THEIR MANAGEMENT 19 



It was the middle of November before the committee brought 

 up its final report. It upheld the principle of the licence fee, and 

 opposed an export duty on gold. It recognised that the amount 

 of the fee pressed heavily on the unsuccessful, and recommended 

 its reduction to 1, 2, 3 and 5, for one, three, six and twelve 

 months respectively. It expressed a strong opinion that the discon- 

 tent of the miners was largely due to the inflammatory articles in a 

 portion of the public press, which led them to believe they were the 

 victims of Government rapacity. The report also condemned the 

 prohibition system in the matter of spirits as a fertile source of irri- 

 tation and crime, and recommended that the same facilities for their 

 legal sale should be made on the goldfields as elsewhere. 



Upon this report was based the mining statute entitled " An Act 

 for the better management of the Goldfields of Victoria," which was 

 assented to on the 1st of December, 1853. It stopped short of the full 

 reduction recommended by the committee, and fixed 1, 2, 4 and 

 8 as the cost of a licence, for one, three, six and twelve months 

 respectively. Unfortunately, the admitted evils of the mode of col- 

 lection were left unremedied, and under a harsher disciplinarian the 

 digger hunting was continued in a manner that was fruitful in angry 

 collisions, and engendered much discontent and bitterness. The 

 concession in the amount of the payment certainly worked some 

 amelioration, but the constant efforts of the unsuccessful diggers to 

 evade the fee evoked active sympathy, and demoralised the mining 

 population. 



When Sir Charles Hotham arrived, and began his visitations to 

 the goldfields, the diggers thought, from his rather florid talk about 

 the rights of the people, that they had at length got an advocate who 

 would support their claims. It would be difficult to adduce any- 

 thing from his speeches that justified this expectation, and when he 

 had settled down in the gubernatorial chair, and mastered the com- 

 plicated question of the State finances, he promptly realised that 

 the payments prescribed by law did not bring in anything like the 

 amount represented by the number of workers. With a large deficit 

 in full view he could not, if he had been willing, afford to trifle with 

 so important a source of revenue. But he was not willing; and 

 already in his short experience he had imbibed the foolish idea that 



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