lliamstown contains, also,
graving docks and building yards where many vessels engaged in local
trade along the coast have been constructed. The gentleman who
accompanied our friends called their attention to the railways which
connect Williamstown and Sandridge with the city, and remarked that
times had changed since the gold rush in the early fifties.

"At the present time," said he, "you can go between Sandridge and
Melbourne for threepence or sixpence, according to the class you select,
but in the time of the gold rush prices were very much higher. If you
wanted a carriage from here to the city, you would be lucky to escape
for a sovereign, and a dray load of baggage drawn by a single horse
would cost fifteen dollars. There used to be an omnibus line that
carried passengers for two shillings and sixpence, but it was somewhat
irregular in its movements, and could not be relied on. Nowadays the
omnibus will carry you for threepence.

"When a ship arrived and anchored in the bay the passengers had to pay
three shillings each to be put on shore, and very often the boatman
raised the tariff to five shillings whenever he thought he could induce
or compel the passengers to pay it. The charge for baggage was a
separate one, and sometimes it cost more to take a quantity of baggage
from Sandridge to Melbourne than it had cost to bring it all the way
from London to Sandridge, a distance of thirteen thousand miles."

"It was a golden harvest for the boatmen and everybody else engaged in
the transportation business," Harry remarked.

"Indeed, it was," said the gentleman; "and a great many people had the
sense to perceive that they had a better chance for a fortune by
remaining right here than by going to the mines, where everything was
uncertain."

"I suppose everything else was in proportion, was it not?" queried Ned.

"That was exactly the case," was the reply. "When goods were brought on
shore they were loaded into carts for transportation to Melbourne, and
the cart was not allowed to move out of the yard until three pounds
sterling had been paid for taking the load to the city. The travelers
protested and said they would not pay, but they generally did, as there
was no other alternative. When they got to the city they found the same
scale of prices.

"The poorest kind of a room without any furniture would bring ten
dollars a week, and a stall in the stable of a hotel which would
accommodate two men rented readily for