1 Apri, 1898.] QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JOURNAL. 319 
‘mother kind alike to all,” has seen fit to deny to this colony of “ magnificent 
distances” great forest resources ; but, doubtless, has made up the deficiency 
in some other way for— 
Though patriots flatter, still shall wisdom find 
An equal portion dealt to all mankind, 
In consequence of this deficiency, due to the compensating balance of 
Nature, forestry has received great attention in South Australia. At some of 
the reserves it has been brought to a fine art, and a few years ago timber, cut 
from trees which had been planted and tended by human hands, was sold to 
timber-getters for fencing and other purposes. Of course this statement will 
not appear incredible to those who have knowledge of the rapidity with which, . 
‘under favourable conditions, the Eucalyptus grows. This is demonstrated in 
“America, and also on the Continent, where trees of the Eucalypt family have 
been planted in the interests of health, and also in the forestless parts of 
Australia (notably Mildura, Victoria, and Renmark, South Australia), where 
“oums’’ have been grown to form breakwinds for fruit trees. 
; In all the Australian colonies, with the single exception of South 
Australia, timber-getting has become an important industry, and has played, 
and is still playing, animportant part in the opening up of country for settle- 
ment, and subsequent development. 
5 Take, for example, Queensland. Much of the pioneering in the eastern 
slope of the colony was done by men engaged in timber-getting. In the early 
days (and it must be borne in mind that twenty-five to thirty years covers the 
whole history of some districts in this category)—in those days these men 
would go to the mouth of a coastal river, where they would make a rendezvous 
and a centre for their operations. From thence they would penetrate the 
dense scrubs, and traverse the broad belts of forest timber in quest of cedar 
and pine logs. : : 
These men seem to have been hardy fellows. Probably their hard life and 
wild surroundings stamped their rugged features with some of the sternness of 
the bleak Swiss. They often ventured, in their quest, where civilised man had 
never set foot, and cut tracks which in many rugged and romantic spots are the 
roads of to-day and the inlets of civilisation. The men who afterwards came to 
these sequestered places— : 
Where the silver water sings, 
Down hushed and holy dells, i 
to settle on the soil, frequently followed in the wake of the timber-getters ; 
though, usually, like Peter, “afar off.” 
. No one who has not trudged and tramped through the unkempt scrubs of 
Queensland—no one who has not been “ within the maze” and seen it in its 
wild and native grace—can appreciate the difficulties the pioneers had to face. 
The impenetrability, the confusion, the entanglement cannot be described ; 
while for general “riotous conduct” it would be hard, indeed, to surpass a scrub 
scene. (See llustration.) It is amongst those matted masses ot “ lawyer” 
cane, of spiked stems, of thorny vines, and bewildering creepers, which 
challenge every forward step—on stony hillsides and in broken glens—that the 
coyeted cedar and hoop pine grow. 
Bullock-teams are used for extracting the logs; in fact, no other motive 
power could do the work. The bullock is a patient’and a long-suffering animal, 
very slow, but equally sure. Under favourable conditions his lot is by no means 
happy, but when engaged in timber-getting his life, like that of his master, is 
rough enough, and his living at times precarious. But, fortunately, he has the 
power of adaptation strongly developed, and soon becomes inured to hardship 
‘and privation. It is an exciting thing, and should prove quite a revelation to 
the inexperienced, to see a team of bullocks bringing a huge pine log down a 
mountain side. The driving of the team is either a fine art governed by laws 
of great precision, or else it is simply a thing of chance in the hands of 
the Fates which preside over the life of the timber-getter. 
