received, as their time was limited, and they were
anxious to press on to the northward. So one day they bade farewell to
their friends and took the train for Newcastle, the principal point of
the coal-mining industry of the colony.

CHAPTER XIX.

COAL MINES AT NEWCASTLE--SUGAR PLANTATION IN QUEENSLAND--THE END.

"The region between Sydney and Newcastle," wrote Ned in his journal, "is
a diversified one. Here and there are forests interspersed with open
country. Some of the ground is level, and some of it very much broken
and mountainous. Most of it is fertile, and we passed through many
fields of wheat and other grain. Some of it is devoted to cattle raising
and some to the production of wool, though it is not generally regarded
as a good country for raising sheep. In places the mountains come quite
close to the sea-coast, and there we found the railway winding over a
very tortuous course, where the rocks that rose on either hand, and the
tunnels through which we were occasionally whirled, convinced us that
the building of the railway must have cost a great deal of money. At
several places coal mining was in progress, and it was evident that
Newcastle didn't have an entire monopoly of the coal-producing business.

"Newcastle is quite as much devoted to the coal business as the English
city from which it was named. More than two million tons of coal are
shipped from this port every year, and the engineers who have carefully
examined the coal seams say that there is enough coal under Newcastle
to keep up the supply at the present rate for more than five hundred
years.

"We were first taken to the harbor where the shipments are made. There
we found admirable facilities for loading vessels with the products of
the mines. They claim that they can handle twenty-five thousand tons of
coal daily, and that a good-sized coal steamer can leave port with her
cargo six hours after entering. I'm not an expert in such matters, and
therefore don't know, but from what I saw it seems to me that there is
no difficulty about it.

"The harbor of Newcastle was not a very good one originally, but they
have made it so by extending into the sea a breakwater, which shelters
it from the gales that formerly swept it. It is not a large harbor, but
an excellent one for its purpose.

"We visited some of the coal sheds and coal breakers, and went into one
of the mines. They would gladly have taken us through all the mines in
the place,