ettled
life.

SUDDEN ACCUMULATION OF WEALTH.

And it is not to be wondered at that the young and ardent eagerly embrace
a line of life so replete with exciting events and incidents, and which
at once enriches the successful speculator, and fills with plenty and
prosperity the region which he enters. The first individual who opens a
market, which no other Overlander has yet visited, rides into the
district an ill clothed way-worn traveller; the residents do not at first
deign to cast a glance upon him till presently it is noised about that an
overland party has arrived, that a route from the stock districts has
been formed, and that the incalculable advantage of abundance of cattle
at a cheap rate has been secured; landed property instantaneously rises,
perhaps to double the value it had a few hours before; numbers of persons
find themselves suddenly made rich without an exertion on their own part,
and from all sides individuals flock to see their benefactor. The ill
clothed way-worn traveller now finds himself at once invested with the
dignity of a conqueror. On all hands he is feted, dinners are given to
him, a piece of plate presented, and as he feels the sweets of renown and
of the wealth which he has won he meditates fresh conquests on the
trackless desert, new adventures with his tried stockmen, and further
acquisitions of riches.

EFFECTS OF THEIR ENTERPRISES.

Then comes a strange change over the unoccupied Overlander; he has
brought with him every head of stock which he could muster, and in the
course of a few days his last beast is disposed of; his establishment is
broken up, he awakes some morning and finds himself a rich man, but he
has no stock; he has so much money but no cattle. He no longer follows
the long array of his stately herd and bleating flocks, his loaded drays
and bearded stockmen, through the free wilderness; no longer regulates
and watches their perilous course through the intricate ford of a deep
river, or stands upon some solitary hill to reconnoitre the trackless
country and select the line along which the motley assemblage is to pass.
He is now an idle unoccupied gentleman, the inhabitant of a
boarding-house, with no object in the world before him; but ere long the
plans of fresh achievements and speculations are sketched out. You see a
muster of bearded weather-beaten men, carrying short-handled whips. The
Overlander enters the group, a short consultation takes place, and in a
day or