CHAPTER VII.
FREE LAND CHEAP MONEY, AND "CONFISCATION."
Oliver returned to Sydney, the undisputed and supreme ruler of all Australia. The people regarded him a a hero, and he was treated as one. Vast triumphal arches covered with laudatory mottos and inscriptions of welcome decorated the principal streets. Everyone smiled on him, everyone rushed to shake him by the hand. It was even proposed to offer him a throne and crown him king of Australia. But for such gee-gaws Oliver had no mind, and so in no unhesitating fashion, he informed his admirers. Until the expiration of his term of office he was the uncrowned "Tsar of all the Australia," and with that dignity he would rest content until the time came for him to resign his office into the hands of those who had elected him.
His sweetheart Mary was the first to meet him when he set foot in Sydney. When she saw him, the tears in her eyes seemed to vanish and to be replaced with a smile like a sunbeam. Her lover, her hero, her god, was back in Sydney again, safe and sound, with the old winning smile, the old manly bearing, free to stroll with her, to talk with her. Her happiness was ecstatic, she walked on air, feeling so elastic, so buoyant, as she walked by his side that she half-wondered why she did not fly off with him into cloudland, there to wander until they reached the realms of the blest.
Oliver, too, was happy in the company of his comrade-sweetheart, and was busy considering how, when, and where their marriage should take place, for needless to say he had long ago "popped the question," and had received her consent, but he was compelled to leave the problem unsolved for the time, and to give his attention to weighty matters of State.
The Convention had appointed for Spence's assistance and guidance a Board of Advice, consisting of forty trusted and tried members of the Brotherhood of the Poor, and after consulting with them, he determined to issue a proclamation declaring that in future all unoccupied and unused land should be treated as unowned, and the first-comer be lawfully entitled to take possession of it. This proclamation at once swept away the monopolists, who for speculative purposes, had "locked-up" some of the richest land in Australia, and it threw open to the people an immense quantity of "free land."
His next step was the creation of a National Bank of Issue, such a bank having been imperatively necessary, even before the collapse of the private banks. The syndicates had introduced the system of farming upon a large scale, with all kinds of elaborate and expensive machinery, driven by steam, compressed air, or electricity. The consequence was that the agricultural population had become so accustomed to these large farms, which by their competition had reduced most of the farmers to the position
