(those painted libels on nature) whom art has afflicted with crooked wooden legs, twisted shoulders, jointless arms, and worse than all (when a lady’s in the case), distorted throats and countenances, would disappear, and no longer disgrace the canvas they were meant to adorn. And that in future no great works, otherwise of the highest order of art in every particular, would be deteriorated by that fatal want—the absence of correct outline and good drawing.
Intending students, of course, should inform the Head Master of Kensington what branch of art they particularly wish to study, and the time they can afford to stay; so that he may best advance their desired end. So, wishing all such well through ornament and perspective, we say farewell.
THE DESERTED DIGGINGS.
BY AN OLD CHUM.
It was about an hour before sunset, on a beautiful day in early spring, that I rode slowly amongst the solitary heath-clad ranges of the once famous Kajunga diggings. For miles and miles the bed of every gully, the crest of every hill, and the broad surface of every flat, were thickly dotted with hillocks of pipe-clay heaped up near some fallen-in shaft, over the mouths of many of which windlass-legs, with here and there a windlass-barrel, were still standing. Three years before, every hill and gully in the district was thickly peopled. The site of tents and stores might still be easily traced on the ground, which, where they had stood, was hard and grassless, while on every side sod or log-chimneys—the latter, for the most part, entire, the former in various stages of decay—gave abundant proof how numerous had once been the dwelling-places of the digger. The country through which I had for some hours been travelling is in general barren and desolate in the extreme, badly watered and seldom affording even the scantiest feed, so that, once robbed of its gold, it had speedily relapsed into its former uninhabited state. The past winter, however, had been a remarkably rainy one, and, under the genial influence of the spring sun, the landscape had assumed the most beautiful appearance. The flats were emerald-green with young grass, while the ranges presented all the hues of the rainbow from the many-coloured heaths through which my horse made his way breast-deep. Thousands of wild flowers sprang up on every side, whilst overhead the wattle-blossoms, gleaming like gold amongst the delicate foliage, filled the air with perfume. The timber had been sadly thinned in old times by the axe of the digger, and by frequent bush-fires, but still many a noble white-gum stood in the flats, and the summits of the hills were clothed with the stringy bark and peppermint. Pausing on the top of a range a little higher than its neighbours to contemplate the beauty of the scene, my eye caught sight of something bright glancing amongst the trees to the north, which I at once guessed to be the Kajunga Creek, on the banks of which I meant to camp for the night. Giving my nag his head, he settled at once into that curious shambling gallop which an old stock-horse will keep up for hours, and in a few minutes I reached the creek on whose banks I found, as I had expected, very tolerable feed.
Dismounting, I took off the saddle and bridle, and placing them on the ground beside my blanket and cooking utensils, I hobbled my horse, and left him to go where he would; then, after a plunge in the creek, I kindled a fire, made my tea, toasted my chops on the end of a stick, and, having thoroughly satisfied my appetite, mixed myself a good stiff pannikin of brandy and water from my capacious flask, and, seating myself cozily on a log before the fire, lighted my pipe and began to smoke. The sun had now gone down some time, and the stillness of the starlit night was unbroken save by the rattle of my horse’s hobbles as he changed his feeding-ground, and occasionally by the plaintive notes of the curlew, or the cry of the more-pork, the night-cuckoo of Australia.
Yielding to the potency of the grog and the soothing influences of the honey-dew, I had fallen into a semi-dozing state, when I was suddenly aroused by the sound of voices, and almost immediately afterwards three men stepped out of the gloom into the bright fire-light, and, with a hearty “What cheer, mate!” commenced making themselves comfortable for the night, much after the same fashion I myself had pursued an hour or so before. They were evidently all diggers, for I noticed the marks of the pipe-clay on their moleskins, and as they had only their blankets with them and no tools, I guessed, as was the case, that they must be on their road down to town. After they had supped, I produced the brandy-flask, and, as may be imagined, we fraternised at once. We talked upon various subjects; of the good old times, when gold was plentiful and diggers few—of the bad new times, when diggers abounded, but gold was, alas! scarce; of Eaglehawk; of the Balaarat riots, in which one of my companions had lost a couple of fingers; of dodging the police in the old licence-hunting days, and of a hundred other kindred subjects which, to an old gold-seeker, furnish an endless fund of amusement. I myself had handled the pick and rocked the cradle for many a long day, so that I was fully qualified to bear my part in the conversation. After some time, however, the current of talk slackened gradually, and at last we had remained silently smoking for several minutes, when one of my companions, addressing himself to another, a short but enormously powerful man, who was extended at full length before the fire, and whose face was so completely buried in hair that only the tip of his nose and his sharply twinkling eyes were visible, said:
“Bill, my boy! didn’t you work somewhere hereabouts, once upon a time?”
“Yes,” replied Bill; “about a matter of three years and a-half ago I worked on the old Kajunga, more by token, I had the best hole in Murder-will-out Gully that ever fell to my share since I first handled a pick.”
“Murder-will-out Gully!” I exclaimed; “well, I have heard some queer names given to gullies and flats in my time, what with Dead-horse, Lucky-woman, Peg-leg, Nip-cheese, Pinch-gut,