once more choose our bed for the night. In
the morning, a short pull of three miles
through a swampy gum-forest brings us
again upon the road, which now lasts as far
as Castlemaine. We pass through Carlsrhue
and the large and rapidly-increasing
township of Kyneton, where we cross the little
river Campaspie, the banks of which, in the
unfrequented portions of it, abound with
game—teal, black-duck, plover, black swans,
water-hens, &c. The road skirts next along
the edge of a green flat—which in winter is a
boggy swamp—and enters on a small tract of
the beautiful park-like scenery for which
Victoria is famous, but which is rarely met
with on the road to, or in the neighbourhood
of, the diggings.

Patches of bright green in the distance,
and long dark lines of fences show that
cultivation has commenced in earnest, and,
with the large steam flour-mill at Kyneton,
give hopes that Victoria will not long be
dependant upon other countries for her
bread. A. few miles farther we pass another
township—Malmesbury, and, rare pleasure,
another river—the Coliban; though I fear
that Ouse or Trent would shame to call it
sister, for it is, in summer, but a thread
indeed.

From hence, passing through an occasional
turnpike—for Civilisation, having no fear of
Rebecca before her eyes, has advanced so far
—we go on to Taradale, or Back Creek, and
passing through it, push forward to Elphinstone
or Saw-pit Gully. Nearly all the
townships on the road have two names—one
given by the bushmen in old times, the other,
the new baptism of some government
surveyor. The most remarkable feature in
Elphinstone is the number of wine and spirit
merchants it contains. They seem to constitute
the majority of the inhabitants. This is
accounted for, by the fact of this being the
nearest township to the diggings; and before
townships were formed upon the diggings
themselves, it became the depot from which
the grog-cart started on illicit traffic. Before
licenses to retail liquors were granted on the
diggings, a heavy penalty was attached to
their sale there; but each man was allowed
to have not more than two gallons in his
tent at one time. Of course, neither this nor
any other law could totally prevent the sale
of spirits; and by every refreshment
tentkeeper as well as by the majority of the
storekeepers, a supply was kept for the use of
customers. In order to prevent the seizure of
the drays which carried in the liquor, it was
usual to take it all up in two-gallon kegs or
cases. Any person ordering spirits gave at
the same time a list containing as many
names as there would be kegs in his cart-
load. The names were those of friends or
acquaintances on the diggings; and in the
event of the drayman being stopped and
accompanied by a trooper, these men were
always ready to step forward, claim the kegs
bearing their respective names, and carry
them off to their tents, whence they were
restored to the person who had sent for them
when the squall was over. The same system
was successfully adopted with whole dray-
loads, brought up on speculation for chance
sale; but it sometimes happened that the
names being taken at random, no owners
could be found; forfeiture of the grog and
a heavy fine were then the results of the
speculation. The same plan is still adopted
when spirits are smuggled into the diggings.

Leaving Elphinstone and its grog-sellers,
we turn to the left over a small bridge, the
other branch of the road continuing to Bendigo;
and in a sheltered gully once more fix our
temporary resting-place. We have had a
long day's journey of about twenty-six miles,
and are now within five miles of Forest
Creek.

As we travel on in the morning, indications
of the neighbourhood of a gold-field become
more striking. We see barren ranges stretching
to the north thickly strewn with small
quartz and intersected by numerous little
gullies: at the points of which, holes have
been sunk by prospecting parties.
Occasionally, a short line of holes running up the
gully show that gold has been struck,
probably, but not in sufficient quantities to pay
for working. Ridges of laminated stone, crop
out from the surface, all resting on their
edges; and where the road has been cut
along the side of the hill, the exposed stone
seems to have been violently pitched out of
its bed, and the slaty layers are raised upright
or recline at any angle.

After running thus for a short distance
along the side of a hill, the road descends
into a narrow flat, then turns abruptly round
the foot of another hill, and the wide, diggings
of Forest Creek lie suddenly before us. In
a few minutes we are passing between lines
of tents and wooden houses, every one of
which bears an announcement that some sort
of trade is carried on within. The whole of
the road through the Forest Creek diggings
—about five miles—is a succession of ascents
and descents, every little hill having its
name—as the Old Post Office Hill, the Argus
Hill, the Red Hill, and so on. On the right
stretches an extensive flat, which runs away
up to the celebrated Golden Point at the foot
of Mount Alexander. Every inch ot this
ground is turned over. The hills on the left
are in the same condition. The whole
country seems to be turned inside out, and
presents only a broken and irregular surface
of many-coloured earths. In various places
horse-puddling machines are at work breaking
up and re-washing, for the second or
third time, auriferous earth from which the
earlier diggers had, as they thought,
extracted all the gold, but which is still found to
contain quite sufficient to repay their
successors. Some are employed in throwing
out the fallen earth from old holes in order