it with lurid promises of sudden wealth.  It was well worked in London; and bishops, statesmen, and all ports of people made a rush for the land company’s shares.  Immigrants soon began to pour into the region of Adelaide and select town lots and farms in the sand and the mangrove swamps by the sea.  The crowds continued to come, prices of land rose high, then higher and still higher, everybody was prosperous and happy, the boom swelled into gigantic proportions.  A village of sheet iron huts and clapboard sheds sprang up in the sand, and in these wigwams fashion made display; richly-dressed ladies played on costly pianos, London swells in evening dress and patent-leather boots were abundant, and this fine society drank champagne, and in other ways conducted itself in this capital of humble sheds as it had been accustomed to do in the aristocratic quarters of the metropolis of the world.  The provincial government put up expensive buildings for its own use, and a palace with gardens for the use of its governor.  The governor had a guard, and maintained a court.  Roads, wharves, and hospitals were built.  All this on credit, on paper, on wind, on inflated and fictitious values—­on the boom’s moonshine, in fact.  This went on handsomely during four or five years.  Then of a sudden came a smash.  Bills for a huge amount drawn the governor upon the Treasury were dishonored, the land company’s credit went up in smoke, a panic followed, values fell with a rush, the frightened immigrants seized their grips and fled to other lands, leaving behind them a good imitation of a solitude, where lately had been a buzzing and populous hive of men.

Adelaide was indeed almost empty; its population had fallen to 3,000.  During two years or more the death-trance continued.  Prospect of revival there was none; hope of it ceased.  Then, as suddenly as the paralysis had come, came the resurrection from it.  Those astonishingly rich copper mines were discovered, and the corpse got up and danced.

The wool production began to grow; grain-raising followed—­followed so vigorously, too, that four or five years after the copper discovery, this little colony, which had had to import its breadstuffs formerly, and pay hard prices for them—­once $50 a barrel for flour—­had become an exporter of grain.

The prosperities continued.  After many years Providence, desiring to show especial regard for New South Wales and exhibit loving interest in its welfare which should certify to all nations the recognition of that colony’s conspicuous righteousness and distinguished well-deserving, conferred upon it that treasury of inconceivable riches, Broken Hill; and South Australia went over the border and took it, giving thanks.