When the gold discoveries
suddenly drew into the colony, not merely the most turbulent characters
of Australia, but the crews of deserted ships and the general
offscourings of the civilized world, and when, overcome by the
contagion, the government officials threw up their posts, one and all,
and started for the diggings, it became evident that the
Lieutenant-Governor had his hands full. Even so early as November, 1851,
he began to anticipate trouble from the preemptive clauses of the Crown
Lands Leasing Act of 1847, by which the squatters had a right to
purchase land in the neighborhood of the gold-fields. The claims of the
squatters barred the way, and the squatters themselves looked with small
favor upon a class of men whom they regarded as troublesome intruders,
and whose proceedings rendered it almost impossible for the pastoralists
to procure sufficient labor to carry on their operations. The squatters
chose to overlook two important facts; viz., that they had themselves
originally acquired their position precisely as the digger acquired his,
and that the presence of the digger, if it raised the price of labor,
also enormously increased the prices of the squatter's produce.
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