When the tide began its upward turn, a Mr. O'Farrell, a quiet
unpretending house agent and rent collector (one of whose sons
afterwards came to so bad an end), made promptly a large fortune by
buying up leases or fee-simples, and in an incredibly short time
re-disposing of them at a great advance.
EARLY BALLARAT.
"All that glisters is not gold."
--Merchant of Venice.
Let me begin upon early Ballarat by stating, what many may now have
forgotten, namely, that the original and native name was Balaarat, or
Ballaarat, which was the pronunciation then, and for some years after.
But our English way is to put the emphasis on the first part of a
polysyllabic word. I have long remarked this practice, comparing it with
that of races of inferior, or more or less barbarous condition, who, as
in countless other examples in Australia, and still more strikingly in
New Zealand, and generally, I think, over the world, lay the emphasis on
or towards the end of the word. What does it mean? I arrived at my
solution. The emphatic ending best preserves the whole word. The
barbarous, with few ideas, give surpassing importance to words; while
the civilized, under the crowd of ideas, disregard words except as mere
vehicles, and traverse them easiest by the early emphasis, to say
nothing of dropping the after part entirely when troublesomely long.
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