“Did you hear Balaclava’s won?” or “Windsor’s clean wiped out” or “Mentone”—in which the final “e” is not sounded—“has been knocked to bits!” Gradually, however, one gets to adapt one’s mind to the new conditions among which one lives, and realize that if the people are discussing “Burns” on the trams, it is not the poet nor the politician; it is the prize-fighter; while any unknown name which strikes your ear—and which, from the way it is uttered, you might make sure belonged to some all-powerful politician, at least, is probably that of the latest hero who has kicked a goal or won a race. The Melbourne men work hard enough when they are at it, but once free of their offices, they are like boys out from school. They do not talk shop, they do not even think of it; and at one o’clock on Saturdays I believe it is only by some stupendous effort of will that—as they flock out from chambers, offices, and counting-houses, off to a cricket or football match, race-meeting, or golf—they desist from throwing their hats in the air and shouting from sheer delight. It is strange that, in the face of all the indomitable pluck and light-hearted gaiety these people show, that their literature should be permeated with that uncouth melancholy which gives other nations so false an idea both of the country and the people. “Most wretched men Are cradled into poetry by wrong; They learn in sorrow What they teach in song.” Shelley says; and perhaps this is most truly the case in Australia. That it is not prosperity, wide sheep-runs, good seasons, horse-racing, and theatre-going that has produced the literature of the country, but loneliness of heart and soul; the terrifying size of the country; and poverty and misunderstanding. Literature began early in Australia. Among the first writers Barron Field—whose name, particularly in conjunction with his book, “The First-Fruits of Australian Literature,” touched Charles Lamb’s whimsical humour to such a delightful issue; C. H. Harpur, who struck a typical Australian—if not a particularly musical note, despite the fact of being hailed as the Australian Wordsworth; John Dunmore Lang; John Farrell; and Matthew Flinders—whose every word should be read for the sake of the character, personality, and achievements of the man who wrote it, and the direct, tense style of his sturdy prose. Arthur Lindsay Gordon is still the most widely read and quoted poet in the country, yet, though he had a great feeling for and knowledge of Australian life, he was, in his appearance, in his ways, and his outlook, to the very end, most essentially an Englishman; though, perhaps, on the whole, he saw and realized more of the character of the people and the aspects of the country than one who had always been familiar with it, just as any artist is more successful in drawing a face which he does not know too well.