A STRAMASH IN SYDNEY

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 1824, 25 April 1888, Page 3

A STRAMASH IN SYDNEY

If the streets of Sydney are somewhat narrow for the highways of the Qaeen City of Australia, when the looil <f Freeman's Journal " leta its young mm looie the fact becomes painfully manifest. "Our country oonslnB," he writes, " accustomed as they are to sidewalks three acres broad, are simply pitiable m their helplessness when tangled up on a Sydney pavement. Only the other mornins; a ( lanky ' bush native was rolling ; nnd gaping along m George street, when he plumped on top of a stout old lady who was ohesing a runaway child, and landed her heavily In the gutter.. Hastily turning round to apologise to the wrong party altogether, he was cinght a sounding whack on the back by a man who was darting along with a load of shutters, nnd as he lurched forward on his faoe a nirse girl skilfully ran a twin-laden perambulator m front of his knees, and over the whole lot went m the most picturesque confusion. Just as tho ' bushy ' had disentangled himself, and o nib dup on his hands and knee 3, ahurdy ■ gurdy man, who was going one way and locking another, ran his music shop into the countryman's coat-tails and sent him pprawllng, with a mighty swish, fair across the pathway, where he was trampled on and most unmercifully kicked by about a dczan disgusted citizoue, who as they spitefully dag their heela into his spine excitedly asked each other where were the police that they allowed a drunken hog l'ke that to obstruot the -footpath. Just aa the confusion was at its highest, and the franctlc cit'zans were catching wildly at the pavements, a nigger, who was carrying a bucket of whitewash on the end of a stick which rested on his shoulder, came along m an abstracted sort of way, and m a second he tangled his toes amongst the ehrieking crowd below and landed himself and his whitewash over tho lot with a etriot impartiality that seemed born of a better world. Hasiily scrambling to his feet the darkey caught a email boy, who was enjoying the fun, a klok j that lifted him 50ft away, when the email boy unhesitatingly fired halt a brick at the nigger'B head and broke £15 worth of a j jeweller's window into splinters. By this time the unfortune ' bushy ' who started the trouble had got clear, and was scooting of£ for the railway station yelling { fire ' and ' murder ' at every jump, when an intelligent constable tripped up his heels and had very little difficulty next morning m getting him fined 40s for ' drunk and disorderly, righteous conduct, and tearin' hof me uniform, yer Wurßhup.' Half of the other victims wore carried to the Infirmary first and tho Steam Laundry to be washed afterwards, while the rest remained to break the nigger's bucket over his head, and curse the memory of the man who first chalked out the streets of Sydney."