This proposal, when all mining property was going up by leaps and bounds, met with the fullest support from all the local, and indeed the colonial press generally. It seemed from the eulogistic notices which poured in from all sides, British, foreign, and provincial, as if any man or woman, with a capital exceeding a ten-pound note, must be wanting in ordinary intelligence, criminally indifferent to the interests of his family, of the colony in which he dwelt, or the Empire to which he owed fealty, if he or she did not immediately take advantage of this wonderful opportunity to enrich himself and his family, his friends and his countrymen.
This proposal, however, did not find favour in the eyes of the principal shareholder. He had seen the decline and fall of so many magnificent projects—over-capitalised, and ‘boomed’ up to highly speculative if not fictitious values, with flattering reports and favourable surveys, dwelling more upon the visions of the future than the facts of the present. They had soared to an aerial height, only to waver, and finally, after irregular gyrations, fell to rise no more, involving all connected with the enterprise in ruinous loss, besides damaging the reputation of solid, legitimate mining properties. He preferred to accept the honestly earned profits of the mine, carefully worked and safely managed; issuing monthly reports, regularly supplied to the press, and open to all men for general information. He placed his views so strongly before the shareholders and partners in the ‘Last Chance Proprietary Mine, Limited,’ at a special meeting summoned to decide upon the offer of the Syndicate referred to, that it was respectfully declined.
Meanwhile the city, which had grown and flourished around the once bare, solitary Pilot Mount, had reached a stature—a transformation, indeed, resembling one of the dream-cities of the Eastern story-teller,—broad streets, bright with electric lamps, and gardens watered by an aqueduct fed from a reservoir miles distant. Thronged, too, with every kind of vehicle, every kind of beast of burden; every kind of horse, from the Clydesdale to the thoroughbred, from the dog-cart trotter to the polo pony; bullock teams and camel trains jostled one another; while well-horsed coaches daily, hourly indeed, brought mails and passengers from distant goldfields and lately discovered ‘rushes.’ These last were often founded upon ‘Great Expectations,’ which too often proved unsubstantial, if not illusory. Nevertheless, progress _was_ made notwithstanding; and the monthly output remains to testify to the stability of the Great Industry, energy of the population, and the increasing richness of the auriferous area. Wonderful hotels, livery stables containing saddle-horses sufficient to remount a squadron, arose on every side, with race-courses and polo grounds where the young bloods of the ‘field’ disported themselves—where, indeed, such prizes as the Golden Belt Handicap, value one thousand pounds—second horse, two hundred, were competed for. All these, and other wonders and marvels, had been produced—had arisen literally _out of the earth_—the auriferous earth—so miraculously productive, by methods compared with which the ancient processes of the sower and the reaper were contemptibly ineffective. Think of a month’s output such as this!