other, with hearty cheers as they stepped out
into the open air, once more free men.

#12. Improvements on the Goldfields.#--The commission appointed by Sir
Charles Hotham commenced its labours shortly after the conclusion of the
riot, and in its report the fact was clearly demonstrated that the
miners had suffered certain grievances. Acting upon the advice of this
commission, the Legislative Council abolished the monthly fee, and
authorised the issue of "Miners' Rights," giving to the holders, on
payment of one pound each per annum, permission to dig for gold in any
part of the colony. New members were to be elected to the Council, in
order to watch over the interests of the miners, two to represent
Sandhurst, two for Ballarat, two for Castlemaine, and one each for the
Ovens and the Avoca Diggings. Any man who held a "Miner's Right" was
thereby qualified to vote in the elections for the Council.

These were very just and desirable reforms, and the Government added to
the general satisfaction by appointing the most prominent of the diggers
to be justices of the peace on the goldfields. Thus the colony very
rapidly returned to its former state of peaceful progress, and the
goldfields were soon distinguished for their orderly and industrious
appearance.

CHAPTER XIV.

NEW SOUTH WALES, 1851-1860.

#1. Effects of Gold Discovery.#--For some years after 1851 the colony of
New South Wales passed through a severe ordeal. The separation of Port
Phillip had reduced her population by one-fourth and decreased her
wealth by fully a third; the discoveries of gold at Ballarat and Bendigo
had deprived her of many of her most desirable colonists. But the
resources of the colony were too vast to allow of more than a merely
temporary check, and, after a year or two, her progress was steady and
marked. The gloomy anticipations with which the gold discoveries had
been regarded by the squatters and employers of labour were by no means
realised; for though men were for a time scarce, and wages exceedingly
high, yet, when the real nature of a gold-digger's life and the
meagreness of the average earnings became apparent, the great majority
of the miners returned to their ordinary employments and the colony
resumed its former career of steady progress, though with this
difference, that the population was greater, and business consequently
brisker than it had ever been before.

Fortune, however, had given to Victoria so great an