he Government of Victoria is nearly a pure democracy. Both Houses are elected by the people, the Legislative Council as well as the Legislative Assembly. To vote for the former a slight property qualification is necessary, viz., £10 freehold, or £25 leasehold. The Assembly is practically elected by universal manhood suffrage, the only restriction being that a voter must have resided twelve months in the colony prior to the 1st January or 1st July in any year. Of course, there is a smouldering agitation for female suffrage, but it has not yet attained the dimensions of the similar agitation in England.

It is to me unintelligible how it is that so many people can be enthusiastic about the prospects of Democracy. As Sir James Stephen says, "We may be drifting down the stream, but that is no reason we should sing Hallelujah." There is no magic in the word. It is simply a form of government, just as monarchy or aristocracy are forms of government. Nor is it a new form of government. It has been tried over and over again, more than 2000 years ago, nor has it ever been a particularly successful or a long-continued form. People often talk as if liberty were more attainable under a Democracy than under any other government. Now, putting aside the question whether liberty is good or bad—for it is entirely a question of time, place, and circumstance—the opinion is unfounded, because the tyranny of a majority is just as galling, and usually less intelligent, than other tyrannies. It has rather cynically been said that governments are of two kinds—bamboo and bamboozle. A Democracy combines these two kinds. When political power is so minutely divided as it is among the voters of England, say, it is not worth having; and power, as a rule, resides in the hands of demagogues, instead of the hands of statesmen.

In Victoria, there is government by party, but there are no real lines of demarcation between them, and it is now merely a struggle for office between the ins and outs. Each party must be prepared with a programme to interest the masses, and to be able to go to the electors with a list of measures to be passed. If a measure is bad, the Government may be turned out. But the ministers are saddled with no responsibility in consequence. They simply wait their turn till the other side makes a mistake. This course has led to legislation which unduly interferes with liberty. There is now before Parliament a new Licensing Bill, the principle of which is Local Option. It is also intended to put down barmaids. Those who at present exist are to be allowed to remain, 346 in number, but no fresh ones are to come forward. The publicans are ranged on one side, some religious bodies on the other. Each side interpret facts in their own way. But every one knows that the fate of the bill will depend on the strength of the parties in the House, and not on argument. Again, the eight hours movement many years ago became law in Victoria. On the 21st of April in each year its anniversary is celebrated with a procession and flags and banners. This year the Governor took part in it, which was thought to be rather undignified on his part. It is a Socialistic measure, which reduces the good workman to the level of the ordinary one. All members of the Assembly receive £300 a year. Hence there are many professed politicians whose chief object appears to be to keep their seat. Lately there was an attempt in the House to vote a pension to a member whose circumstances had been reduced, but the proposal was defeated. Perhaps the time is not quite ripe for that yet. The present Ministry is the result of a coalition between Mr. Service and Mr. Berry. The former was at one time a schoolmaster up the country, but by his talents and energy has raised himself to the position of Premier. Mr. Berry is a well-known Radical politician. It is about six years ago since, in one day, he dismissed the greater number of the Civil servants in consequence of a disagreement between the two Houses. Most of them had to be quickly restored to their places, but public confidence was so much shaken by this arbitrary act that a large amount of capital was transferred to New South Wales—five or six millions, I believe—and even yet the country has not recovered from the shock. This period is known as the Berry-blight. The present Ministry seems likely to continue in power so long as they can provide sufficient sensational legislation.

In Victoria the railways all now belong to the State, and are well managed, but to stations beyond the suburban lines return tickets are not issued except on Saturdays, and except to such places as have a competing steam service, such as Warrnambool or Belfast. The speed is not high, and to our notions there are very few trains, but probably enough for the present traffic. Whenever the inhabitants of any particular district think they would like a railway, they get their representative to vote for it, and if he can persuade a sufficient number of other representatives to vote for it, the railway is made. For some time past the people of the small town of Buninyong thought they would like a line from Ballarat, from which it is distant seven miles. As it is not really required, in consequence of a good service of public conveyances between the two places, they did not succeed for some time. At length, during the last session, their representative managed to get 35 others to vote for it, and the line is now to be made. Each of these 35 may in their turn require the vote of the member for Buninyong on some similar occasion. But the actual management of the railways and of the Civil Service has been put beyond the reach of political influence by the appointment of Railway and Civil Service Commissioners, who are permanent officials. When a line is to be made the Railway Commissioners go over the ground and fix the spots for stations &c. Every porter has to pass on examination before he can be appointed. There are only first and second classes. On the suburban lines the first class are about as good as our second. As a fact, a number of second class carriages sent out from England are here used as first, the words "second class" being ingeniously concealed by a narrow strip of wood. Members of Parliament have a free pass over all lines. In Victoria the gauge is 5ft. 3in. In New South Wales it is the same as ours, viz., 4ft. 8-1/2in. Consequently travellers between Melbourne and Sydney have to change trains at the border.

In Victoria there is intense opposition to Free Trade. The people would rather make bad boots and shoes for themselves than import cheap and good ones from England. Of course I use Free Trade in the sense of the opposite of protection of native industries. Advocates of Protection appear to me to confound the end with the means, as if manufacturers existed for their own sake and not in order to produce. I have seen the commercial competition between various countries compared with a horse race. Just as some horses are handicapped, so customs duties must be levied on the productions of certain countries to give the others a fair chance! The comparison would be relevant if the object of a handicap were that the best horse should win, but the race itself is the object. Bastiat has reduced this view of commerce to an absurdity in his famous petition. It is a petition supposed to be presented by the dealers in oil, tallow, lamps, &c., in Paris, who request that all shutters, windows, and other apertures for light may be closed against the sun, which spoils their business by shining so brightly during the day. If wheat rained from heaven some people would tax it to protect the farmers. But Free Trade may be made an object of worship in itself, and can then do nothing but harm. It may be made a rule of life, not merely a rule of trade. The satisfaction of material needs is most necessary, and lies at the bottom of civilization, but it is not therefore the most important, and it is quite conceivable that the moral advantages to be derived by a community through reliance on their own energies, may more than compensate for the higher price of particular articles. It has been found not to be good for the human race to have things made too pleasant. The West Indian negroes, "who toil not, neither do they spin," but pick the fruits of the earth ready to their hands, are not the most exalted specimens of mankind. It may be a good thing for a man not to have things too cheaply, if owing to this he is stirred up to work, and can get money enough to live. Free Traders argue that free trade will prevent war, by making evident the inconveniences thereby occasioned to commerce, yet history has never shown that such considerations have been of much weight when strong national feelings are aroused. Nor is it, in my opinion, a desirable thing that they should have a decisive effect. With this class of arguments Free Traders are powerless to deal.

The absence of caste is a noticeable feature in Australian life. Any man, whatever his original position, can rise to the highest offices, and, as a matter of fact, the ministers are frequently tradesmen. None the worse for that, of course; but it was amusingly illustrated in the Assembly the other day, when one of the members—a "chartered libertine," in regard to speech, and they do speak very plainly—boasted that he was a member of a club to which none of the ministers could belong. "They are decent people," he said, "but not professional men, and the membership is limited to them." Domestic servants are particularly independent as a class, and many people do without them altogether rather than submit to pay very high wages for little work. An ordinary cook will receive about £1 a week. They rarely say "sir," but usually plain "mister," which is to most people not a pleasant way of being addressed. They seem to take a pride in addressing their employer (I must not say master or mistress) by their surname, as Mr. or Mrs. So-and-So, as often as possible. What Emerson calls the "fury of expectoration" is very rife throughout the colonies. If a floor or carpet is particularly clean the temptation to spit upon it is too great to be resisted. In the Court-house at Adelaide is a special notice requesting people not to spit on the floor. I suppose this habit is connected with smoking, and smoking with drinking. All day long the hotel bars are besieged by crowds of men demanding "nobblers," like flies round a pot of honey, and I have heard that a hotel proprietor does not care to see his customers go beyond the bar, as so large a proportion of his profit is derived from it. In a debate in the Assembly, on the new Licensing Bill, one orator referred contemptuously to "miserable tea drinkers." "We do not want," he said, "to be Chinafied; the more men drink the better they are." He would find many outside the House of the same opinion. Per contra it was urged that total abstinence produced strength because "Samson was a teetotaller!"

Considering the comparatively small size of Victoria, it is much more thickly populated than any other colony. Its population is very nearly a million, on an area about as large as Great Britain, giving about 10 persons to the square mile. The chief towns after Melbourne are Ballarat, East and West, with a population of 37,000, and Sandhurst, with 28,000. Next comes Geelong, which, with its suburbs, has 21,000. For purposes of representation, the country is divided into 14 provinces, from each of which three members are returned to the Legislative Council. It is divided into 55 electoral districts, which return 86 members to the Legislative Assembly. The country is also divided into 37 counties, but what purpose this division serves I have not been able to ascertain. I have made two visits into the country, one to the neighbourhood of Ballarat to the north-west of Melbourne, the other into Gipp's Land, which is to the east. I went to Gipp's Land to pay a visit to a gentleman well known to the racing world, who has a large estate in the neighbourhood of Sale. Victorians are nothing if not fond of sport. We have a good many races at home, but I think they are exceeded in number by those in Victoria. My host had been engaged in horse-racing more than forty years, and in these circles he is much respected; because he always, as they say, runs his horses to win, and the high character he has thus deservedly acquired has done much to raise the morality of the turf in Australia. He told me that he was the second squatter in Gipp's Land. When he first went there in 1841, it took him eighteen days to return to Melbourne through the bush. For six days they had provisions, but for the rest of the time they subsisted on native bears—i.e., sloths. Now he owns about 20,000 acres of the best part of Gipp's Land. Gipp's Land is a large district about twice the size of Wales, which begins at a place called Bunyip, about fifty miles to the east of Melbourne. The train to Sale, the capital—there are two a day—takes about six hours, and the distance is 127 miles. As there are no engineering difficulties, the line did not cost more than £6000 a mile. In many places the gradients are very steep to avoid cuttings. By leaving Melbourne at 6-50 a.m. Sale is reached about 1, and a very tedious and dusty journey it is. Near Bunyip we pass the borders of an enormous swamp of 90,000 acres, called Koo-Wee-Rup, which is about to be drained, and will then form rich agricultural land. The ride soon becomes monotonous, by reason of the interminable gum trees. They look very peculiar, being all dead, and stripped of their leaves and bark, and in the moonlight show perfectly white. Most of them have been "ringed" near the bottom to kill them, but others have been killed by caterpillars. They stand so for a long time. At length they either fall or are burnt in a bush fire. The flames get inside the tree, run through it, and come out at the top, as if from a tall chimney. There are none of great height along the line, but some trees near Lilydale, about 30 miles north-east of Melbourne, are supposed to be the highest in the world, and are above 440 feet in height. In several places are seen groups of tree ferns some 20 feet high, which form a pleasant oasis. Gipp's Land did not look its best at the time of my visit. There had been a drought, more or less, for three years, and everything was dried up. The cattle appeared parched, with hard dry skins. Since then, however, there has been a good deal of rain. Sale itself is an uninteresting town of 3,000 inhabitants, with streets at right angles, and the usual Public Library and Mechanics' Institute. It also has an artesian well, which is not usual. Although it was late in the autumn the heat in the middle of the day was great. In the afternoon it is tempered by a steady sea breeze. The nights are cool. Along the roads are posts of about four feet high, painted red and white. These are to mark the road in case of a flood, which is not uncommon. From the verandah of my friend's house could be seen a vast extent of rolling upland, dotted pretty thickly with dead gum trees. Fifty years ago it was a dense forest. What may it be fifty years hence, with the increase of population? On the morning after my arrival I was taken a drive over part of the "cattle run." It is only a small run compared to some. The cattle, nearly all bullocks, have about 16,000 acres to wander over. Everywhere the want of water was apparent. I also saw the stables, where were several racehorses, but the best were in the stables at Flemington, near Melbourne. At the end of the week were the Sale races, but I was unable to stay for them, having already made arrangements for a trip to Tasmania.

About six weeks later I went to stay with some friends in the neighbourhood of Ballarat, between that town and Buninyong. I have previously referred to Ballarat as the next largest town to Melbourne. By rail it is 100 miles from Melbourne, though not more than 60 in a direct line. At present the rail goes round by Geelong. Between Geelong and Ballarat the line is double, and admirably constructed, at a cost of £32,000 per mile. It is as well made as any line in England, and the carriages run as smoothly. My friend's house is called "Moramana," a native name, signifying, I am told, "picking up sticks." Buninyong and Ballarat are both native names. It is a matter for discussion whether Ararat, a town some distance to the N.W. of Ballarat, is a native name, too, or whether it has any connection with the ark. I paid a visit to Buninyong, and two visits to Ballarat. Buninyong is properly the name of the mountain there, an extinct volcano, which forms a prominent object in the landscape. The small town takes the same name. It is remarkable chiefly for the fertility of the land in the immediate neighbourhood. It is older than Ballarat, which previous to the discovery of the gold there in 1851 did not exist. There are gold mines, too, at Buninyong, both alluvial and quartz, but chiefly the latter. The Salvation Army flourishes at Buninyong as well as at most places in the Colonies. I have since read in a paper that General Booth has given out that the Salvation Army is likely to become the State church of Victoria, and that Parliament will make it an annual grant of £1,000; or, if not, that Mr. Service will probably do so himself!

Ballarat is a busy town, and here Victorian energy is seen to its best advantage. It is, too, the centre of a large and fertile agricultural district. Gold mining is not now what it once was there. On all sides are the ruins of abandoned "claims," which give a most desolate appearance to the immediate neighbourhood. There is now more gold found at Sandhurst, further north. During the gold fever of 1851, and before there was a line from Geelong, as much as £70 per ton was paid for carriage from that town. The distance is about 60 miles, and the transit occupied ten days for heavy goods. "Until last year," said my friend, "there was a man walking the streets of Ballarat who was known by no other name than Jimmy. He would never beg and never lie down twice in the same spot to sleep if others got to know of it. People gave him food at the door, or, if not, he went to the Asylum for it. I used to see him taking a zig-zag path about the same time each day. When spoken to he would never reply. He had been in this condition since thirty years ago. Then he was a prosperous digger, but some others drugged him, and took away all his money. The drug spared his life, but took away his brains; and so he wandered about, always looking for something, he did not know what." There must be many similar tales of violence perpetrated during that wild time. Ballarat contains the widest street in the Colonies—one of the widest in the world—viz., Sturt-street, which is three chains wide, but its width is rather concealed by a line of trees in the middle. There are some fair buildings in it too. Lake Wendouree, formerly a swamp, now forms a pleasant resort for the people of Ballarat for boating, and being only four feet in depth, there is no danger of drowning. The drive round it too, of about five miles, is pretty. Of course Ballarat cannot do without an art gallery, but to that much praise cannot be given. Some of the pictures by local artists may be interesting as specimens, but the prices attached to them are purely imaginative. To commemorate the Duke of Edinburgh's visit a public hall was to be built, to which honour both East and West Ballarat—which are separate municipalities—laid claim. The difficulty was solved by building the hall over a small creek which separates the two towns, so that each has one end. As Ballarat is 1,400 feet above Melbourne, the temperature is much lower—10 degrees on an average. When I was there in May the weather was decidedly cold. In winter snow is frequent, while in Melbourne it is the rarest thing. From Ballarat I went to Adelaide, but that must be the subject of another letter.