SURVEY OF THE EARLY SEVENTIES 159 



and tumble of Australian politics sadly blocked the realisation of 

 these agreeable dreams. A generation has passed and seen no 

 triumph of the industries so alluringly propounded. Dried fruits 

 have indeed been produced at Mildura, at the cost of enormous losses 

 of capital to the confiding shareholders and entangled creditors, who 

 financed that experiment. Olive oil could not stand against the 

 competition of South Australia, where it had been produced for a 

 quarter of a century. Victorian tobacco is almost unknown in 

 the world's market, and the silk-worm, after being for a time an 

 interesting but tedious toy, took himself off to more congenial 

 surroundings. While these results were undisclosed, Mr. Duffy's 

 picturesque oratory won over the people, and he toured the colony 

 as the prophet of the good time coming, entertained at innumerable 

 banquets, cheered to the echo after every speech, and generally 

 glorified by the country press. It looked as though nothing could 

 hinder his triumphal march. Yet things were not what they 

 seemed ; there were conspiracies afoot. To quote his own words : 

 " The wealthy classes, to whom free selection means extinction, the 

 party who had held power so long that they deemed themselves 

 robbed of their inheritance if any other intruded into that domain, 

 and the free lances fighting only personal ends, were agreed upon 

 one point to disparage and misrepresent whatever we undertook ". 

 Something more than a fear of the schemes of so insignificant a 

 minority as the " wealthy classes " represented must have prompted 

 this wail. The atmosphere of Parliament was beginning to be omi- 

 nous of hostile votes. Mr. Fellows launched the first attack. It 

 arose out of some proceedings at a colonial conference in whioh Mr. 

 Duffy had taken part in Sydney, and implied a censure on the dis- 

 loyalty of his utterances. Mr. Duffy vindicated himself with such 

 impassioned rhetoric that, he says, " tears overflowed the eyes of 

 hardened politicians," and they gave him a triumphant majority. 



However much Mr. Duffy might be able to work upon the feel- 

 ings of politicians, his eloquence could not charm away the hard 

 facts of adverse finances. His Treasurer soon found that the pro- 

 spective deficit, so flippantly ignored, was a reality after all. Mr. 

 Berry was not dismayed by the discovery, and promptly engineered 

 a revision of the tariff, which doubled the ad valorem duties over the 



