In a few years Collins and Bourke Streets will be very like Westbourne Grove.  The less frequented streets in the city are like those of London suburbs.  There are a few lanes which it is wiser not to go down after ten o’clock at night.  These are known as the back slums.  But nowhere is there any sign of poverty or anything at all resembling Stepney or the lower parts of an European city, The Chinese quarter is the nearest approach thereto, but it is quite sui generis, and squalor is altogether absent.

The town is well lighted with gas, and the water-supply, from reservoirs on the Yarra a few miles above, is plentiful, but not good for drinking.  There Is no underground drainage system.  All the sewage is carried away in huge open gutters, which run all through the town, and are at their worst and widest in the most central part, where all the principal shops and business places are situated.  These gutters are crossed by little wooden bridges every fifty yards.  When it rains, they rise to the proportion of small torrents, and have on several occasions proved fatal to drunken men.  In one heavy storm, indeed, a sober strong man was carried off his legs by the force of the stream, and ignominiously drowned in a gutter.  You may imagine how unpleasant these little rivers are to carriage folk.  In compensation they are as yet untroubled with tramways, although another couple of years will probably see rails laid all over the city.

It is a law in every Australian town that no visitor shall be allowed to rest until he has seen all its sights, done all its lions, and, above all, expressed his surprise and admiration at them.  With regard to their public institutions, the colonists are like children with a new toy—­delighted with it themselves, and not contented until everybody they meet has declared it to be delightful.  There are some people who vote all sightseeing a bore, but if they come to Melbourne I would advise them at least to do the last part of their duty—­express loudly and generally their admiration at everything that is mentioned to them.  Whether they have seen it or not is, after all, their own affair.

In this respect a Professor at the Melbourne University, on a holiday trip to New Zealand, has just told me an amusing anecdote, for the literal truth of which he vouches.  A couple of young Englishmen fresh from Oxford came to Melbourne in the course of a trip round the world to open up their minds!  For fear of a libel suit I may at once say I am not alluding to the Messrs. Chamberlain.  They brought letters of introduction to Professor S——­, who proposed, according to the custom of the place, to ‘show them round.’  ‘Have you seen the Public Library?’ he began.  ‘No,’ answered the Oxonian.  Shall I take you over it?’ continued the Professor; ’it is one of the finest in the world, well worth seeing; and we can kill two birds with one stone by seeing the Museum and National Gallery at the same time.’  ‘Well, no, thanks,’ was the reply; ’it’s awfully good of you, we know; but I say, the fact is books are books, all the world over, and pictures are pictures; and as for minerals, I can’t say we understand them—­not in our line, you understand.’