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 them. Purdy, open-mouthed, his eyes a-dance, turned his head this
way and that, pointed and exclaimed. But then HE had slept like a log, and felt in his own words "as fit as a fiddle." Whereas Mahony had sat his horse the whole night through, had never ceased to balance himself in an imaginary saddle. And when at daybreak he had fallen into a deeper sleep, he was either reviewing outrageous females on Purdy's behalf, or accepting wagers to kiss them.
Hence, diverting as were the sights of the city, he did not come to them
with the naive receptivity of Purdy. It was, besides, hard to detach his
thoughts from the disagreeable affair that had brought him to Melbourne. And as soon as banks and offices began to take down their shutters, he hurried off to his interview with the carrying-agent.