Page:The Boy Travellers in Australasia.djvu/487

Rh a heavy shower of rain falls about 6, the supply of vehicles is insufficient.

"The house of our host is well built and well furnished, and has plenty of ground surrounding it for garden, lawn, and shrubbery. English trees grow in the grounds. Much of the furniture came from the old country, but the portion of it that was made in Melbourne is by no means inferior to the imported part. Prosperous people in Melbourne know how to live well, and some of the wealthier inhabitants spend a great deal of money on the support of their establishments. We dined as well as we could have dined in London or New York, the local luxuries of those cities that were wanting here being fully atoned for by the products of the colony.

"It was late in the evening when we got back to our hotel in the city, after listening to stories of colonial life in general, and of life in Melbourne in particular, until our heads were nearly giddy with what had been poured into them. Anthony Trollope intimates that the Melbournites are given to 'blowing' about the wonders of their city, and he excuses them on the ground that they have something worth