the use of themselves alone.

Chapter V

Melbourne is built on two hills and the valley that lies between.

It was over a year since Mahony or Purdy had been last in the capital,
and next morning, on stepping out of the "Adam and Eve," they walked up
the eastern slope to look about them. From the summit of the hill their
view stretched to the waters of the Bay, and its forest of masts. The
nearer foreground was made up of mud flats, through which a sluggish,
coffee-coloured river wound its way to the sea. On the horizon to the
north, the Dandenong Ranges rose storm-blue and distinct, and seemed
momently to be drawing nearer; for a cold wind was blowing, which
promised rain. The friends caught their glimpses of the landscape
between dense clouds of white dust, which blotted everything out for
minutes at a time, and filled eyes, nose, ears with a gritty powder.

Tiring of this they turned and descended Great Collins Street--a
spacious thoroughfare that dipped into the hollow and rose again, and
was so long that on its western height pedestrians looked no bigger
than ants. In the heart of the city men were everywhere at work, laying
gas and drain-pipes, macadamising, paving, kerbing: no longer would the
old wives' tale be credited of the infant drowned in the deeps of
Swanston Street, or of the bullock which sank, inch by inch, before its
owner's eyes in the Elizabeth Street bog. Massive erections of
freestone were going up alongside here a primitive, canvas-fronted
dwelling, there one formed wholly of galvanised iron. Fashionable
shops, two storeys high, stood next tiny, dilapidated weatherboards. In
the roadway, handsome chaises, landaus, four-in-hands made room for
bullock-teams, eight and ten strong; for tumbrils carrying water or
refuse--or worse; for droves of cattle, mobs of wild colts bound for
auction, flocks of sheep on their way to be boiled down for tallow.
Stock-riders and bull-punchers rubbed shoulders with elegants in
skirted coats and shepherd's plaid trousers, who adroitly skipped heaps
of stones and mortar, or crept along the narrow edging of kerb.

The visitors from up-country paused to listen to a brass band that
played outside a horse-auction mart; to watch the shooting in a
rifle-gallery. The many decently attired females they met also called
for notice. Not a year ago, and no reputable woman walked abroad
oftener than she could help: now, even at this hour, the streets were
starred with th