ion seems to be the
one thing lacking in this favored land. Canals tapping these rivers at
points where they should first be dammed, would pay a twofold
reward,--not only supplying water wherewith to quench the thirst of the
half-exhausted land, but, being made navigable, they would convey to
market the very crops they had already enabled the husbandman to raise.
Where the country is thus irrigated,--as in India and Utah,--the crops
are simply certain, rain or shine; and the transportation is also
assured at a reasonable figure. Australia, with its rich virgin soil and
dry climate, is just the place to repay tenfold all irrigating
enterprise. We were told of certain points on the Murray River, where,
by one properly constructed dam, water in abundance could be held and
thrown back for a distance of thirty miles. It appears that in one year
not long ago, when there was a great drought, over fifteen million sheep
and horned cattle died of thirst in New South Wales and Queensland! This
sounds almost incredible, but it was so recorded in the official reports
of the colonies. And yet the means of conserving water by simple methods
are, as we have seen, quite within the reach of government or private
enterprise. In one year, by suitable arrangements, animal property alone
might have been saved to the value of fifty million dollars. We were
told of one extraordinary period of drought which extended over five
years previous to 1870, which was followed by copious and excessive
rains lasting for months,--"thus," as our agricultural informant pithily
expressed it, "turning a blessing into a judgment."

Queensland, as we have shown, occupies the northeastern portion of the
continent, and measures thirteen hundred miles in length from north to
south, by eight hundred miles in width, containing a population at the
present time of about three hundred and forty thousand. The climate of
Brisbane is often compared to that of Madeira; it is entirely free from
the hot winds which sometimes render Sydney, Melbourne, and Adelaide so
extremely uncomfortable. The river which divides the city into north and
south Brisbane is crossed by a grand iron bridge over a quarter of a
mile in length, a portion of which swings upon a centre to admit of the
passage of steamers and sailing-vessels, the river being navigable above
the capital.

Political excitement runs high in Brisbane. We were told of scenes that
occurred in the local parliament leading t