THE ADMINISTEATION OF SIR HENRY BARKLY 95 



underlying these lordly offers. Had Mr. Haines been in office when 

 Messrs. Baring's ambassador arrived, it is probable he would not 

 have been able to resist the proposals of his late colleague, whose 

 sudden return to the colony was the result of the Chief Secretary's 

 appeal to the great London firm. But before the answer came to 

 that appeal Mr. O'Shanassy reigned in his stead. Now that gentle- 

 man was chairman of the recently established Colonial Bank ; his 

 Minister of Customs, Henry Miller, was chairman of the Bank of 

 Victoria, and his Treasurer, George Harker, was also a director of 

 that institution. Such a triumvirate naturally regarded it as a slight 

 upon the banking officials of the colony to go past them in seeking 

 financial assistance, and they successfully organised a combination 

 of six banks, whose tender was accepted for floating the loan, on 

 terms which were slightly in excess of the remaining competitors. 

 This was an early small instalment of the tendency which, later on, 

 became so characteristic of Victoria, to pay for the privilege of dealing 

 with the local man rather than take a profit from the "foreigner". 

 There is little doubt that in this case there were advantages, not 

 presentable in figures, which justified the preference, since the re- 

 lations between the banks and the Government from that time to 

 the present day have been of vast commercial importance, and have 

 proved cordial and mutually beneficial. 



When the money was provided controversy revived over rival 

 routes, and petitions poured in from a score of small centres of 

 settlement praying for deviations in their favour. When all these 

 difficulties were adjusted, the work was undertaken on a scale of 

 solidity and permanence that must have shaken the belief of those 

 witnesses who had prophesied a 10 per cent, return on the outlay. 

 The contract for the line to Sandhurst was let on the 4th of May, 1858, 

 for 3,356,937. With subsequent extras and variations its actual 

 cost averaged over 45,000 per mile. The line from Geelong to 

 Ballaarat, through much easier country, cost over 33,000 per mile. 

 These surprising figures were largely due to the high rate of wages 

 ruling, especially for skilled labour, and to what has since been re- 

 cognised as errors in encountering exceptionally difficult country, 

 which might have been avoided by variations in the surveyed route. 

 It is no exaggeration to say, that five or six years later equally sub- 



