BALLARAT PAST AND PRESENT.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1521, 19 June 1873, Page 2

BALLARAT PAST AND PRESENT.

The great inland city of Ballarat covers three eminences, and fills up the valleys lying between*. It abounds in massive and striking-looking buildings in brick and stone, and these are adapted t to the several public and private uses to which urban structures are usually put. On every side of the central portions of the city and town oountry roads extend generally lined with thp villa, residences of the wealthier inhabitants, and the snug wooden cottages which are the abodes of the miners'and other working men, the inhabitants of these cottages being for the most part their owners as well. Nor are the streets and roads of Balfarat wanting in sylvan ornamentation. Its principal streets and roads, generally of considerable breadth, are planted at either aide or. in the middle with native and exotic trees, of which gum are now §0 years old, . Jts church and school reserves, and. the allotments on which its chief public buildings stand, are similarly decorated. There is scarcely a cottage that is not set off by shrubs and flowers. A strange and picturesque feature, which arrests the attention of all visitors to Ballarat, is the presencp, in the very centre pf it, of gold workings. Sometimes the" extensive premises of a large mining company are discovered behind an hotel or bank j at others, little parties are seen busily at work re-washing old alluvium by the margin pf creek or waterhole, amid the bustle and hurry of ordinary city life. A few figures will show what the present extent of Ballarat really is. From east to west it extends about four miles, from no^fch tq south (taking in the borough of Sebastqgol, v between which and Ballarat there is no break) it measures five and a quarter miles. The area included is built over quite as closely as is consistent with the health and comfort of the inhabitants. In 1870, 6196 tenement^ were assessed in the city, at a rateable value of I*2o^,^6^ 5 " it fhe borough, in the same year, the tenements numbered 3992, and the valuation was L 80,554. The population of both is about 54,000. Ballarat is 80 miles west of Geelong, or Corio Bay," and 90 miles from Melbourne. With both of these seaports it ia connected by means of an excellent double-lined railway, and new lines are now in progress whiph will fusther conr n.ect it with the chief centres of population to t>he north and west. Besides its great mining wealth, Ballarat has the advantage of being surrounded with rich agricultural country, and has such a variety of resources that it must prove stable and wealthy even after its auriferous treasures ara exhausted.

But it is only in view of the rapidity with which B,allarat has grown to its prespnt dimensions tjiaj; the facts just submitted assume th'ejr, fulj' importance. Except in the case pf some fevv of tne great cities of Western America, no such marvellous growth has elsewhere been 3een. Towards the end of 1837 a small party of adventurers started frqin the shores, of Corio Bay to explore the cp.untry to the westward, and gq'me of those, settling on what is now Ballarat, witl* their flocks and herds, were the pioneers of the settlement. From this date until JB§l pastoral pursuits were t^e sjole occupation pi the sparse population which the district supported, and most of the localities in the surrounding country are still known by the names of the early occupants, many of whom are still resident in the locality. The discovery of gold soon altered the whole face of tha country, and gave Ballarat a large, busy, and restless population. This was in 1851. In August of that year Ballarat was rushed, and ever since then it has been the scene of mining industry so startling in its features, and so successful in its results, that the Rarest outline of ifa hjgtory would fill a boo]j. His Excellency Sir George Bowen has just paid a visit to Ballarat, and it was' but natural that he should have been both astonished and delighted with what he saw. It is seldom that a Colonial Governor has such a history revealed, and such sights submitted to his observation. THE SITE OP THE STOCKADE. Anything more cheerless and desolate than, an abandoned. •« diggings/ ft wo.ujd.

be difficult to imagine. Such a scene is presented to view at the present time, about two miles to the eastward of Ballarat ; but unattractive as the place now is, it happens to be the most historically interesting spot in the whole colony. It was here that the diggers of Ballarat rose in armed rebellion against the constituted authorities. Many attempts were made to obtain redress of grievances by peaceable means, and at last, on about the 14th of November, 1854, the disaffected diggers prepared to do battle on their own behalf. Arms and stores were collected, and the stockade was erected. It was rudely constructed of slabs, and. enclosed an area of about one acre. It was of little value as a fortification, but might have served as a screen from behind which to fire upon an attacking, force. On Saturday, the 2nd of December, it was proposed to march upon the Government establishment, called the Camp, but this course was not pursued. Before daylight on the 3rd, a force numbering 276 men, including a strong body of cavalry, marched upon the stockade. After several volleys had been fired and returned, the slight barrier gave way, and the insurgents were routed. Most of them escaped, but many were put to death. The number killed on the spot was estimated at 35 or 40. Many who were only wounded afterwards died. Of the troops, three privates were killed and several wounded, one of whom died ; two officers were wounded, and one, Captain Wise, died. So ended the battle of Ballarat ; but its effects were long visible in the subsequent . political history _of the colony, and it can scarcely be said that the poor fellows who fell on that Sunday morning, 10 years since, on the now dreary and deserted hill-side died ia vain. THE EUREKA GRAVES. The remains of the men who fell at the Eureka were interred in the Ballarat Cemetery on the same and the following day. Captain Wise did not die tUI the 21st, when he was buried beside Privates Robney and Wale and two ophers, three of whom died on the 3rd, and the other subsequently. The graves are now in a delapidated condition, trodden down and overgrown with weeds, while the lettering on the memorial stones had been allowed to become indistinct ; but thi3 reflection upon Victorian public spirit is about to be removed. The remains of the insurgents have been more wprthUy treated. A handsome monument iggords their names, and the neat enc.}6.su.re within which they lie, planted with shrubs and flowers, is duly cared for. THE CORNER, In Sturt street, near the intersection of Lydiard street, there is a spot which is the scene of great, and sometimes of immense excitement. This is the mining exchange for the Ballarat district, and here much, business is transacted in the shares of the mining companies, not only of Ballarat, but of the wh,ole qf the polony. New Zealand and Mew Soutft Wales raining stock \b also dealt in here extensively, as well as the stock of South Australian copper and Cape diamond mines. N/or in the business of the Corner confined altogether to mining properties. Any proposition that promises to afford large profits or quick returns is here readily entertained and liberally supported. Indeed, the Ballarat Corner has sometimes been the centre of Victorian speculative business, and at those titnes somg. hundreds of husy brokers, agents,, and negotiators of all kinds, have been known to keep possession of the little which it covers, not only from early morn to dewy eve, but far into the night, eagerly, chaffering and bartering, notebooks in hand, and anxious avidity in, every face, The CJorner, whe^ business, is. brfsk, i§ one. of the sights that Visitojra to Bajlarat are careful not to miss. Some of the Melbourne papers are advocating a tax on absentees, and on the profits made by non-residents on their investments in the colony. Prominently among these are the shareholders in the colonial banks residing in England. A Montreal paper says that the managers of a reformatory §chool in tlja> city l^aye had a b.qy, wl*q attempted to escape, confined for three weeks in total darkness, in a cell 3ft. square and 6ft. high, without seat, bed or bedding. He is condemned to remain the'rA two weeks longer, and it is the opinlln of physiciam that the punishment is sufficient to, produce derangement the intellept, ' * , ' A child six years old was recently lost in the bush near Tapunda, South Australia, for twenty-four hours, all through a wet night. She crossed the Gawler River and Barossa Range, and passed through a forest of considerable extent. She was found, eventually, sitting in a ditch in an exhaqstecl itajie.. poqe little thing had wandered a distance of eleven miles. She went astray when despatched on a simple errand by her parents to a house on a district road, not far from home.

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