26 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



the cost, it is a pertinent illustration of the rapidity with which 

 publicans made fortunes in those days, for Bentley arrived penni- 

 less on the diggings in 1852. Before he had been six months 

 in the Eureka it had earned a very bad reputation. Probably 

 from old association he seemed to attract to his bar the most 

 dangerous scum of the population. He always had at his call 

 a number of rowdies and bullies, to whom deeds of violence were 

 as their daily bread. If by chance a drunken digger, lured by 

 the open gambling or the boisterous games of the skittle-alley, 

 wandered into these quarters with any gold-dust in his belt, he 

 generally lost it before he had been long under Bentley 's roof. 

 If he made a disturbance, there were plenty of willing hands to 

 throw him out, if need be to throw him into the creek, or down 

 an abandoned shaft. Nightly orgies were held that should have 

 been suppressed by the police, but the ruffianly landlord was known 

 to be on terms of intimacy with the Eesident Police Magistrate, 

 one Dewes, a venal official, who was believed to have a share 

 in his disreputable gains, so no notice was taken of the lawless 

 tumults. On the night of the 6th of October a digger, named 

 James Scobie, who was endeavouring to obtain admission after 

 the house was ostensibly closed, had his skull split by a blow from 

 a shovel during an altercation at the door. In the confusion of 

 a general scuffle there was no certainty as to who struck the fatal 

 blow, but circumstantial evidence and the positive statement of two 

 witnesses implicated Bentley. At the inquest next day Bentley 

 was allowed to be present, unmolested, but the popular indignation 

 was so strong that the police were compelled to take out a warrant 

 for his arrest. They were so considerate as to send a special 

 messenger to his hotel to inform him that it would be put in force 

 next morning. He was spared the indignity of the lock-up, and 

 released on bail. Two days later he was brought before the Police 

 Magistrate Dewes, and Messrs. Eede and Johnston, Goldfields 

 Commissioners, and notwithstanding the weight of evidence ad- 

 duced he was promptly acquitted by a majority of the Bench. 

 Anger and indignation surged through the miners' tents when they 

 learned this strong confirmation of the general belief in the venality 

 of Dewes. A hurried meeting was called by placards for the 17th 



