8o6 
THE TROPfCAL AGRICULTURIST. [Mav 2, 1892. 
my destination. The sloping garden where " Paddy," 
not the Irishman, but the Chinaman, toils in endless 
and untiring industry— watering, watering, watering 
in this thirsty climate. His water-melons and lock- 
melons are delicious in this climate. Why cannot 
melons be cultivated in Ceylon ? Surely in Jaffna 
large quantities could be grown.* The house, where 
blinds keep out the light and fine wire gauze doors 
keep out the flies, and glass doors and windows keep 
out the hot winds when they blow. The house is 
comfortable, nay, luxuriously furnished and grape 
vines and creepers shade the verandahs. The 
kitchens and other rooms form a wing at right 
angles, and round the back are the store, the men's 
quarters, the various sheds and stables and yards 
form what you in Ceylon call a "compound." Then 
farther on is the cottage of an old pensioner 
" Harry," and beyond that the stock yard where 
horses and cattle are driven into and out of con- 
stantly. About half a mile away is the wool-shed 
and sheep yards, and then away to the far horizon — 
where deceitful mirages pretend that the distant 
timber is dipping in cool waters — stretches the flat 
succession of paddocks all fenced with wire and 
posts. Ah that mirage 1 In old days how much the 
tortured wanderer, lost — bushed— for days, felt the 
anguish of Tantalus as his eyes revealed cool lakes 
into which the gums and boxtrees dipped their tassels. 
Near this are the "Old Man Plains ' a great stretch 
of dry plain across which many failed to make their 
way to the Murray and lay down and died in days 
gone by. Near by, say half a mile, is the town- 
ship—two hotels and a hovel or two, where drink 
breeds a curse to the improvident station hand, 
where the jaded coach- travellers stacken their thirst 
while they are changing horses. These hotels, pubs, 
or shanties, are a greater curse rather than a con- 
venience. Away beyond the township stretches 
the "common," a reserve attached to every township 
for special grazing privileges, a treeless plain as far 
as the eye can reach save the faint edging of tim- 
ber barely visible in the horizon. Sometimes the 
soil is red and hard, sometimes it is light-coloured 
and sandy, sometimes it is dark and covered over 
with deep cracks showing the stiff clayeyness of its 
composition. The last mentioned is heavy feeding, 
the second is lir/ht feeding, the first is sweet feeding. 
The first mentioned is the best in Mildura. Let us 
mount the well-trained station-horse " Jimmy " and 
start with our host round the yard and away past the 
wool shed and out into the paddocks. Great mobs 
of sheep will stare at us as we "amble " along; or, 
alarmed at the sight of the colley, they will move 
rapidly away in a long gray line marked by dust to 
another " camp " in the paddock. Every paddock 
is so defined that sufficient water, and variety of 
feed is well distributed. The water is found on the 
" frontage " of the Billabong creek or in water-holes, 
or tanks or lagoons. As the' water dries up tliere is great 
danger of the sheep getting "bogged " in the mud. 
As we drove along the other day my host jumped out 
of the buggy and had the disagreeable duty of drag- 
ging a boggged sheep out of the water-hole which had 
become, to put it midlly, considerably " high." And 
talking of driving— driving over the endless plains is 
not wonderful, but when you get on to a pine-ridge 
and go right through the bush among thickly growing 
pines in a double-horse buggy the sensation is de- 
cidedly novel. The perfect obedience of the horses 
and the skilful manipulation of the reins was 
worth seeing.t 
I have taken part in moving a few fat bullocks 
into some other paddocks, and shifting some horses 
over the run, and this has been very enjoyable ; but 
it is merely child's play compared to real cutting out 
cattle and horses, but still the whole thing is plea- 
sant and enjoyable in its novelty. Sitting in the 
garden in the moon-light the dark pines dotted about 
on the park-like expanse, and the varied foliage along 
* In our time, half a century ago, water melons- 
were largely cultivated, and we suppose they sill are. 
— Jii). T. A. 
f The navigation of road traces covered wittli im- 
meuBC tree stumps \>i wonderful.— Bu. '£. A. 
the creek, and the white painted water-tank standing 
on tall scaffolding to which a steam engine pumps 
up water for garden and bathing purposes— all this 
form a delightful surrounding in the dry crisp 
coolness of the evening air. But I have not yet 
begun the real duties of a " jackaroo," and much 
of the glamour and novelty will soon be rubbed off 
in putting one's hand to a job whatever may offer, 
or to whatever one is ordered by the "boss." But 
still the climate, the food, the surroundings, are 
infinitely superior to the enervating, sensual, relaxing 
climate of Ceylon with the ever-present native at 
one's beck and call. Mildura is to be the beacon 
that will beckon me on : for that I will save money, 
and that will, I hope, be my haven of rest after 
years of unsettled restlessness. 
As I write, the stillness and quiet of Sunday is 
round the place. Even the Chinaman in the garden 
refrains from his singing: at least I suppose he 
means the sounds he utters sometimes to be the 
outpourings of a happy heart in the enjoyment of 
song. Sunday is a day of rest on a station just 
as on a plantation in Ceylon. 
Abebdonensis. 
P.S. — Since writing the above I have put in a day 
and a half of work with my hands, and they are 
swollen and tender and wounded. A capital thing 
in a country of the white man, dont-cher-know, to 
use one's hands a bit instead of those everlasting 
coolies, dont-cher-see ? Fine thing to recommend to 
some other fellow, but it gets monotonous to say 
the least of it, especially in a " white man's 
country" and you have the horny-handed son of 
toil muttering in his beard about the " damned 
jackaroo." I strongly recommend discontented 
dories to "take a hand" in roadmaking or cutting 
wood or breaking stones for two days, and try to 
imagine it is Australia ! Those glorious gallops, you 
know, bounding and boundless prairies, fresh, crisp 
air, and ah ! — ah very sore at the " foot of the 
back." Yeth-aw-dont-oher-know. 
{Copy of Letter sent to the Editor of the " Brisbane 
Courier ") 
Dear Sir, — In the issue of the Argus the 13th inst., 
there is a manifesto by Sir Samuel Griffith, favouring 
the introduction of Polynesian labour. 
It begins by explaining how the change of opinion 
in his policy or in his attitude towards the question 
of coloured labour occxirred. The chief reasons that 
had influenced his opinion, and had made him a deter- 
mined opponent to the importation of colom-ed labour, 
are enumerated. I will go over them. 
1. It tended, to encourage the creation of large 
landed estates owned for the most part by absentees, 
and worked by gang-labour and so discouraged actual 
settlement by small farmers working for themselves. 
2. It led to field labour, in tropical agriculture being 
looked down upon as degrading and unworthy of the 
white races. 
3. The permanent existence of a large servile popu- 
lation amongst us, and not admitted to the fran- 
chise, is not compatible with the continuance of our 
free political institutions. And besides this is added, 
so far as Polynesian labour was concerned, the dis- 
credit that had been brought upon Queensland by the 
abuses in the South Sea Island Trade. I have been 
a planter in Ceylon and India for 18 years, and have 
worked Cinhalese, Tamil, and Canarese coolies during 
that time ; and I have thoroughly studied the ques- 
tion of coloured labour, how to get it, and how to keep 
it. I know how labour is sent to Mauritius, the West 
Indies, the Cape, &c., from India, how they are safe- 
guarded and protected by Government ; and how 
they come back to India with great (comparative) 
wealth. The immense boon of a class of labour- 
ers, docile, industrious — from part of our own domi- 
nions, and protected by Government, being introduced 
into a country, tropical, or sub-tropical can only 
be realized by those who have worked coloured 
labour. In Ceylon we get Tamil Coolies from the 
South of India to come over and work in our plan- 
tations. The recruiting is closely watched, and many 
of our recruiting agents, or kanganies, are incarce- 
rated for breaking the simple precautionary rules 
