

This ebook was transcribed by Les Bowler

                          [Picture: Book cover]

                  [Picture: Despatching the wool-packs]





                              ON THE WALLABY
                             THROUGH VICTORIA


                                * * * * *

                                    BY
                               E. M. CLOWES

                                * * * * *

                               ILLUSTRATED

                        [Picture: Heinemann logo]

                                  LONDON
                            WILLIAM HEINEMANN
                                   1911

                                * * * * *

_Copyright_, _London_, _1911_, _by William Heinemann_

                                * * * * *




INTRODUCTION


This is not supposed to be a national or political history of Victoria.
When I was asked to write something about the country which has extended
its hospitality to me, and given me bread and cheese—sometimes no cheese,
it is true, and more often than not no butter, but still always bread,
and an ever-increasing appetite—I must confess I felt frankly scared.
There is a very good, if somewhat vulgar, expression in use out here,
which speaks of anyone who attempts what is beyond them as “biting off
more than they can chew.”  And the thought frightened me.  There seemed
to be so many people who had lived all their life in the country, and
were therefore much more capable of writing about it than I could ever
possibly hope to be.

However, I found that other “fools rushed in,” who had been here for even
a shorter period than myself; who had never participated in any way in
the true life of the country, or depended on it for their own life, which
after all teaches one more than anything else ever can about a place.  I
may not be an “angel,” I thought, still I know it, which is one point in
my favour; and, after all, eight years can scarcely be described as a
“rush