The Awful Australian Part 2

The same objection was taken to the coolie as is taken to the Chinaman--viz., he is saving and economic. And if good citizenship is merely a matter of spending money with the beer vendor--plainly a false and untenable premise--then was the Kanaka of all "desirables" the most to be desired. All he got out of the production of a ton of sugar, valued at 20, roughly, was 30/-, and at that cost he created a profitable avenue of energy for the white worker. He never took a shilling back to his island.

The American is getting over "the dignity of labour" trouble by machinery. The Australian hasn't the brains to do likewise, nor is he a workman as reliable as a mechanical contrivance, because the latter doesn't get drunk or strike on any pretext.

CHAPTER VI.

_THE AUSTRALIAN IN SOCIETY._

There is no work for the phrase _n.o.blesse oblige_ to do in Australia.

The nearest one can get to it is _noveau riche_. For in Australia the parvenu is paramount.

The people have no ancestry to boast of; all its nastiness is near the surface. If it isn't the beer pump half the time I am very much mistaken.

For the other half history is not silent. Arthur Gayle tells of it in the "Bulletin's" History of Botany Bay. Not so very long ago he wrote: "We are still ridden by the influence and ruled by the lineal descendants of the squalid officialdom of the grisly past. The whistle of the lash and the clank of the convict's chain are still distinctly heard though fifty years have pa.s.sed away since transportation ceased.

The reason is, in a word, that the men of the cla.s.s that came into existence under the Imperial regime made the most of their time. They founded family fortunes and became territorial magnates, the lords of the soil...."

But it was not only "squalid officialdom" that made the most of its time. Those comprising the other cla.s.s were also "in the van of circ.u.mstance."

"Be thou therefore in the van of circ.u.mstances, Yea, seize the arrow's barb."--Keats.

They had in England been in a different kind of van--Black Maria.

Subsequently they got the "Arrow's barb"--broad arrows. The genealogical records have been destroyed, but ever and anon the grim figure in prison garb steps out of the family cupboards. Sometimes it is mere atavism.

During the visit of the American Fleet all the spoons were stolen from the Flagship during a reception. Again, when Shackleton returned from his Antarctic exploration Esquimo dogs were stolen from the Nimrod. Last time, however, that fifty thousand or so close-cropped heads obtruded themselves through the interstices of family cupboard doors it was at the beck of Lord Beauchamp, who is an Australian. He duly qualified as such by making a general Australian of himself when Governor of New South Wales. His first act of bad tact and worse taste was to send this little Kipling slur over the telegraph wire to Sydney by way of showing that they must regard him as one of themselves:--

"Greeting! my birthstains have I turned to good; Forcing strong wills perverse to steadfastness; The first flush of the tropics in my blood, And at my feet success."

It showed an appreciative, social spirit--that sort of Australian spirit that leads to calling each other names, etc., at meals.

The next proof of his being an Australian was for him to deny, through one Henry Lawson, that he sent the slur. A friend of mine, however, has seen the "birthstains" message in his handwriting, and, furthermore, knows where it now is.

But tuft-hunting Sydney society obligingly pushed the close-cropped heads back inside the cupboards and tried to marry their daughters to the Australian who had caused their ancestors to feel restive to the point of obtrusiveness.

As he became more and more Australian, Lord Beauchamp made a delicate concession to society sn.o.bbery. He issued blue and white tickets when he entertained. It was a nice differentiation of the status of his guests. Seidlitz-powder functions they were called, but the recipients of both blue and white went for all the disturbing elements.

And the matrons still pursued Lord Beauchamp with their daughters.

Eventually they ran him out of the country.

As is usual with Australians, once he went to England little more was heard of him. He married there, however--that, of course, was cabled, and Australian sn.o.b papers have since had domestic details, including the birth and christening.

Whenever I have felt sympathetic with Australia it has been on the score of what it has to put up with from the cable man and the London correspondent. She can't shake off her old Governors, and she also has the relatives of those in gubernatorial state inflicted upon her. For instance, when Lord Bra.s.sey was falling out of, off, and under things in Victoria,[A] an additional family misfortune was cabled. His brother, while playing tennis, was. .h.i.t in the eye with a ball. Victorian society liked it; it gave the opportunity to write condolences and have the Government House orderly ride up to its front door and leave the acknowledgment.

[A: Lord Bra.s.sey fell off a bicycle, a horse, a pier, and sundry other things too numerous to mention. A bridge built by Lord Bra.s.sey across the Brisbane River also fell into that stream when it was in flood in 1893.]

When the Australian pater-vulgarius makes a rise in the world his daughters start to teach him etiquette. If he blows his nose in the way we expect Gabriel will announce himself one of these mornings early, it is "bad form," and he may not even know his friends of adversity.

Fortune makes him acquainted with well-fed fellows--at his own board--to whom he is most affable. If he would keep silent and let his money do the talking his daughters would be less fidgety. It must be an awful thing to try to regulate one's behaviour by a book on etiquette, and, but for his bound and hide, the torture of the new-rich Australian with a family would be worse than vivisection. But he has bound and hide. G.o.d is good to him.

But the family take the altered circ.u.mstances seriously. They become finickety on the matter of social distinctions. Had their father kept a shop they cease to remember the fact, and shopkeepers in general are altogether "beyond." So is now also the reception of a suburban mayoress. For has not the head of the house been made an M.L.C., bringing them into contact with vice-royalty. It is as often as not of the slightest, but the newspapers only publish a list of "those present."

It is the same when these women are gathered together ostensibly in charity's cause. Charity begins at sn.o.bbery in Australia. Let the wife of a Governor but take the chair, and the inst.i.tution in need of funds is "deserving" from the moment the announcement goes forth.

Max O'Rell saw it all. Hear what he said: "Colonial society has absolutely nothing original about it. It is content to copy all the shams, all the follies, all the impostures of the old British world. You will find in the Southern Hemisphere that venality, adoration of the golden calf, hypocrisy and cant are still more noticeable than in England, and I can a.s.sure you that a badly cut coat would be the means of closing more doors upon you than would a doubtful reputation." This was really another way of saying Australia is a land of doubtful reputations.

Everybody in Australian society is better than everybody else, and everybody can give full and particular reasons why (including dates).

The position is obvious--everybody is trying to hide what everybody else knows, and is prepared to make even better known should occasion offer.

This is a natural consequence of money being the "open sesame." It does not matter how the money may have been acquired. The sons and daughters of p.a.w.nbrokers, for example, loom large in Melbourne society to-day. And butchers become squatters. This, above all, the money must have been made; society starts the nouveaux riches from that point. Money covers everything--except the women at evening entertainments.

CHAPTER VII.

THE AUSTRALIAN AT SHIRK.

The masterly inactivity of the Australian is something to marvel at. He is, of course, very tired, but how he manages to get along without doing any kind of work from early morn to dewy eve throughout the circle of the golden year I must confess knocks me kite high. It's not that he dislikes work. He is really very fond of it--in the abstract.

This is borne out by an account of Sydney business methods published in an evening paper of that city in the form of an extract from a commercial traveller's diary. It is most ill.u.s.trative:--

"MONDAY.--Called to see Mr. Beeswax, of the firm of Beeswax and Bullswool, in the hope of placing a big line of saddlers' ironmongery with him. Mr. Beeswax sent out word that he wanted something of the sort, but that, being Monday, he was busy clearing up business left over from the Sat.u.r.day half-holiday. Asked me to call again.

"TUESDAY.--Called again. Mail day. Mr. Beeswax couldn't see me. To call to-morrow.

"WEDNESDAY.--English mail arrived late, and letters only to hand to-day.

Mr. Beeswax busy with English letters. To call to-morrow.

"THURSDAY.--Called again. Mr. Beeswax gone to Arbitration Court to fight his employees. May be in again; may not. Most likely not! I went to the Arbitration Court and waited. Beeswax was fined 100 for selling wooden dolls and toothpicks in contravention of the 951st clause of the Amalgamated Wooden Dolls and Toothpick Makers' Union log. I decided not to approach him for an order to-day.

"FRIDAY.--Called again just before twelve. Cab was waiting outside. Just as I was shown into the room, Mr. Beeswax was putting on his hat. I said, 'About that saddlers' ironmongery!' He said, 'D---- your saddlers'

ironmongery! Who won the toss, did you hear?' Then he jumped into a cab, and said, 'Cricket Ground!' and drove off.

"SAt.u.r.dAY.--Only half a day. No hope of seeing Beeswax, or anyone else for that matter. Decided to go to the Cricket Ground myself and join the crowd whose prosperity during the week enables them to enjoy themselves on Sat.u.r.day free from care. I have no cares--no money either. Next week there is a public holiday for the election, a levee, and another cricket match, so I don't suppose I shall sell much saddlers'

ironmongery just for a while. Australia is such a busy place."

The only thing I doubt about this is the persistence of the commercial traveller. I have seen a good deal of that flamboyant person in my travels of Australia, and the conclusion I formed of him was that he was not out to do business so much as to circulate the latest risque story, criticise the management of railways and hotels, explain the European situation, and generally to make the rustic gape and feel discontented.

He is the great Australian "bounder."

Every Australian who isn't in the Civil Service aspires to be a business man. Art and matters of temperament are side lines, so to speak.

Primarily, it is the business faculty that is developed in all lie-downs of Australian life. It is generally as office boy that a start is made.

The position of office boy means that young Australia is paid ten shillings per week to look through the "situations vacant" column in his employer's paper every morning, and apply for all positions advertised at 15s. per week by other firms, said applications to be written on his employer's notepaper. If he doesn't get another place quickly he knows he'll be sacked, for n.o.body keeps an office boy in Australia more than a week. Indeed, his record has been sung in verse thus harmoniously:--

Monday, hired; Tuesday, tired; Wednesday, fired.

One week you see the business man in the making a messenger at a chemist's shop. Next week he is carrying reporters' "copy" from meetings to the sub-editor of an evening paper. The week after that he is taking tickets at a picture show. The following week he will be delivering circulars down drain pipes. Then he will put in two days sweeping up the hair about barbers' chairs in a saloon and brushing customers up to the level of the elbows where the bits of hair are not. He will next take a spell at driving a cart, and after that go bill posting at night. At this work he will become acquainted with a theatrical manager, and will abandon it to go on with the populace in melodrama until he gets a job working a lift. He is by this time a fully qualified clerk. At the age of twenty he applies for admission to the police force. All Australians do that, apparently under the belief that it's the only position that will enable them to keep out of gaol.