The Australians are extremely fond of dancing, especially their
_corrobori_ or war-dance, performed always with bodies perfectly nude,
while they brandish a spear in one hand and a flaming brand in the
other. The night is invariably selected for the performance of the
corrobori, and the effect upon unaccustomed eyes is startling in the
extreme. The agile movements of the lean forms, black as night,
reflected by the radiance of their gleaming torches, the yells and
frantic gestures, together with the fierce onsets of the combatants
with spear and tomahawk, present a spectacle of weird interest, quite
in keeping with the wild scenery of the defiles and ravines where the
corrobori is usually celebrated.

[Illustration: A GOLD-MINE.]

The complexion of the Australians is black or very dark brown, their
hair straight, and their features of the negro type. They are of
medium stature, but generally thin, though well-formed, athletic and
agile. They are eager in the pursuit of gain, and this characteristic,
combined with their wonderful powers of endurance both of hunger and
fatigue, renders them patient and successful miners, while all other
causes combined have tended less to the development and improvement of
the Australian than has the discovery of gold within his borders. This
discovery, that has so changed the aspect of everything in Australia,
was the result of a mere accident that a thinking mind knew how to
turn to advantage. An adventurer from California, whose dreams by day
and by night were all of the land of gold he had so recently left,
while searching in company with another for a new pasturage-ground for
their sheep, came one day upon a range of low hills so like the
"Golden Range" of California as to bring back all his old