His ambition
was probably stimulated by the fact that amongst the busy colonists, who
perhaps foresaw more work than either honour or pay, there was no
candidate but himself. The rest of us speculated, not without expected
amusement, as to the official attire our new dignitary would appear in.
Probably any other of the elected members, as Speaker, would have
decided on simple evening dress, as most consistent with the modern
tendency to make a gentleman plain, and the waiter and footman dressily
conspicuous; and this would perhaps have decided as to "the Chair" in
that respect for all the future. But Palmer we all knew to be too much
of the old Tory for any surrender of that kind, and there was, besides,
just a trace of the oddly positive in him, although otherwise a genial
good fellow, which held out promise of sport. We were only half
gratified. He appeared in a plain quaker-like but much braided coat,
which was understood to have gone for dress in the good old times of
Charles II.--a time when kings were really kings.
Three prominent subjects came before us for legislation. First, that
fundamental topic of interminable difference, the Land Question. Second,
the Goldfields Question, which was even more important then, seeing that
the Government, under pretence of old English law, to the effect that
all "treasure trove" was the Crown's, claimed the whole goldfields as
Crown territory, whose population had thus no rights, political or
fiscal, except the Crown chose to give such.
Pages:
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176