The Awful Australian Part 1

The Awful Australian.

by Valerie Desmond.

FOREWORD.

There has been so much adulation lately of Australia, Australian inst.i.tutions, and the Australian people by writers with axes to grind and English politicians with party ends to serve that the people of the Commonwealth have come to believe that they are the salt of the earth, and that their country is the earth. Personally, I am impatient of such credulity, and I think it is time somebody called upon the self-satisfied Australians to show cause why a little more humility and a little less arrogance were not more seemly. With a view to restoring an apparently lost sense of proportion to the press and public of the country, I have written the following pages. If in telling the truth I shame the Australian this book will achieve its object. Should a howl of indignation be provoked, then will the condition of affairs be proved worse than my pen has power to depict, and nothing will be left but to declare Australia past redemption. This is the case for the prosecution.

VALERIE DESMOND.

Sydney, July 15, 1911.

CHAPTER I.

AUSTRALIAN POLITICS.

This strange, topsy-turvey country, not content with having fruit with stones on the outside, has made the unique experiment of handing over its government to its peasantry! Other lands have at times fallen under the sway of the hoi-polloi, but this has always been temporary, and the result of some hysterical upheaval. But in Australia this has not been the case. The electors calmly and deliberately voted the Labour Party into power in April, 1910, and, since then, two of the six ridiculous States that this country of four and a-half millions has divided itself into have also calmly and deliberately decided, by majorities, to entrust their national guidance to butchers and bakers and candlestick-makers.

That any body of people should do this--even in a country where every man and woman, irrespective of education, wealth, or social position has a vote--seems unintelligible to the English visitor. It certainly was unintelligible to me at first. It grew more of a mystery when I saw and heard several of the Labour leaders. Then I saw and heard the Liberal leaders, and I no longer wondered.

Of all the products of Australia, the politician is the least worthy and the least competent. Oratory in this land is in the same embryo condition as gem-cutting or the manufacture of scientific instruments.

Generally speaking, there is not in the public life of Australia a speaker who reaches to the standard of mediocrity in England or America.

And in speaking, so is it much in the other qualifications that make a politician. The present Prime Minister, Mr. Fisher, I heard in Melbourne just before he left for England. Knowing him to have been a miner, I was prepared. It would be unfair to compare Mr. Fisher with one of our cultured statesmen at home. But put him beside another miner--Mr. Keir Hardie--the comparison is ludicrous. I was told to wait until I heard Mr. Deakin, and, as luck would have it, I did get an opportunity of hearing Mr. Deakin at a social function at Toorak. Mr. Deakin was fluent, I'll say that for him, but to regard him as an orator or even an average public speaker is ridiculous to one accustomed to the polished delivery and deep thought of our English politicians.

Among the minor members of the London County Council are many speakers who stand head and shoulders over Mr. Deakin. I also heard Mr. Hughes, Mr. Tudor, and that amusing gentleman Mr. King O'Malley while I was in Melbourne, but I must admit that I was not deeply impressed. The great ones of the Victorian State Parliament I missed, which is possibly as well, if it bears any resemblance to the State Parliament of New South Wales. In this deliberative a.s.sembly I found the standard even lower than in the Federal Parliament. I was unfortunate--or was I fortunate?--in not being able to hear Mr. McGowen. That gentleman was already in England, upholding the honour of New South Wales by hammering a rivet in a girder and walking three miles along a sewer.

But I heard Mr. Holman and I heard Mr. Wade, and I heard Mr. Edden and Mr. Wood and Mr. Fitzpatrick, and several other funny little men whose names I cannot remember. Mr. Holman reminded me of the Polytechnic young man who apes the style of the Oxford Union. Mr. Wade was a lame and halting speaker, whose thoughts moved slowly, and whose diction was execrable. Mr. Edden reminded me of an old gardener we had at home. Mr.

Wood was the colonial excelsis. He has the Australian accent strongly developed, he uses slang indiscriminately, and he is b.u.mptious and aggressive. Mr. Fitzpatrick struck me as a mild man naturally trying hard to be like Mr. Wood. The others were colourless. In point of ability, it was ludicrous to think of these men controlling the destinies of a colony--even one of a paltry million and a-half people.

I doubt very much if Mr. Holman or Mr. Wade would ever be elected to the London County Council or even one of the surrounding vestries. If they contrived to do so, they would certainly never go back at the ensuing election. Messrs. Holman and Wade in the London County Council would be simply overwhelmed. The inherent bl.u.s.ter of the Australian might prevent them being shamed to silence by the preponderating ability that surrounded them, but it would not be many days before they were forgotten, overlooked, and not even accorded the dignity of an "also spoke" by the press. To think of such politicians being in the Mother of Parliaments is enough to make the legislative angels weep.

CHAPTER II.

THE AUSTRALIAN ACCENT.

One of the strongest prejudices that one has to overcome when one visits Australia is that created by the weird jargon that pa.s.ses for English in this country. Created is too mild a term to apply to the process. It comes as a positive shock, and I recall with actual pain the morning I awoke as the mailboat lay at Fremantle breakwater, and I heard this horrible patois filter through my porthole to offend my ear for the first time.

Strangely enough, English people who have lived in the colonies for any length of time grow accustomed to the p.r.o.nunciation of the Australian, and, worst of all, it insinuates itself into their own language, until it is really difficult to find a resident of more than ten years'

standing in Australia who does not sing-song like a native.

The Australian accent has frequently been described by travellers, but none have done justice to its abominations. Many un.o.bservant persons, shuddering through three or four months' experience, have left Australia saying that the people of the island continent use the dialect of the East End of London. This is a gross injustice to poor Whitechapel. Neither the coster of to-day, nor the old-time c.o.c.kney of the days of d.i.c.kens, would be guilty of uttering the uncouth vowel sounds I have heard habitually used by all cla.s.ses in Australia. For the dialect of this country differs from those of other lands in being as strongly developed among the educated people as among the peasantry.

Were its use restricted to the bullock-driver and the larrikin one could make excuses; but this is not so. Judges, scientists, University graduates, and bottle-gatherers use the same universal Australian esperanto. The doctor, who has attained eminence in Australia, and who, in point of merit, is probably quite up to the standard of the average provincial pract.i.tioner at Home, will give such words as "light" and "bright" the same exaggerated vowel sound as the cabman and the bootblack. The barrister will not say, "May your Honour please," but "May-ee yer Honour please." The scientist will refer to "Me researches."

There is no such word as "my" in the Australian language. "Me husband, me yacht, me motor," one hears everywhere. But the most striking instance of vowel misp.r.o.nunciation occurs in respect of the diphthong "ow." A cow is invariably a "keeow," brown is "bree-own," town is "teeown."

So exaggerated is the Australian's rendering of this sound that they actually accuse English people of being in error. "Naturally the difference would strike you," once said a leading Australian journalist to me, with a superior smile; "you English people always say rahnd the tahn and talk about milking a brahn cah." I was too used to Australian self-sufficiency by that time to take offence. The people had ceased to offend me and commenced to amuse me.

But it is not so much the vagaries of p.r.o.nunciation that hurt the ear of the visitor. It is the extraordinary intonation that the Australian imparts to his phrases. There is no such thing as cultured, reposeful conversation in this land; everybody sings his remarks as if he were reciting blank verse after the manner of an imperfect elocutionist. It would be quite possible to take an ordinary Australian conversation and immortalise its cadences and diapasons by means of musical notation.

Herein the Australian differs from the American. The accent of the American, educated and uneducated alike, is abhorrent to the cultured Englishman or Englishwoman, but it is, at any rate, harmonious. That of the Australian is full of discords and surprises. His voice rises and falls with unexpected syncopations, and, even among the few cultured persons this country possesses, seems to bear in every syllable the sign of the parvenu. There is a nouveau riche in culture as well as in material things, and the accent of the cultivated Australian proclaims to the world that his acquisition of learning belongs to his generation alone. At Home, we are occasionally forced to encounter individuals whose sudden access to money is revealed by their tongues, but we are spared from such unpleasant revelations when we meet the intellectuals.

These are products of generations. In Australia, they are turned out while you wait, with all the uncouthness of their fathers. Australia alone of all the countries in the world has lingual hobnails on its culture.

In the counties of Great Britain and the provinces of continental Europe the possession of a marked dialect denotes lowly origin. The educated gentleman of Yorks.h.i.+re or Sligo is differentiated only by a very slight and not displeasing accent. In fact, in Great Britain, the dialect is of some benefit in indicating the origin of the man who uses it. I have frequently found it of value in engaging servants and in dealing with the lower cla.s.ses generally. But in Australia, this abominable p.r.o.nunciation pervades the entire continent. The native of Perth and the native of Townsville use precisely the same phrases p.r.o.nounced precisely the same way, gentleman and labourer alike. Possibly this is one of the results of the extraordinary democracy of this country--a democracy which makes Jack as good as his master. Perhaps it is a cause rather than an effect. When Jack finds his master speaking in the same manner as he does himself, and, making no effort to maintain his position as a gentleman, he is not so much to be blamed for thinking that he is as good as his master--and in Australia he probably is.

The Australian's practice of singing his remarks I can only ascribe to the influence of the Chinese. During my stay in Melbourne, I spent one evening at supper in a Chinese cook-shop in Little Bourke street, and I was instantly struck by the resemblance between the intonation of the phrases pa.s.sing between the Chinese attendants and that of the conversation of the cultivated Australians who accompanied me. But, in addition to this lack of good-breeding and the gross misp.r.o.nunciation of common English words, the Australian interlards his conversation with large quant.i.ties of slang, which make him frequently unintelligible to the visitor. This use of slang is so common that the public memory forgets that it is slang, and it finds its way into most unexpected places. Chief Justices on their benches, leading newspapers in their editorials, statesmen--such as Australia boasts--all disfigure their utterances by jarring slang terms and phrases, so commonly used as to pa.s.s unnoticed by either their hearers or themselves.

English slang has a foundation of humour. There is a note of whimsical comedy about the Oxford undergraduate's practice of calling a bag a bagger, and n.o.body can repress a smile the first time he hears a coster call eyes "meat-pies" or trousers "round-the-houses." But there is no humour in Australian slang. It is drawn from the lowliest sources--the racecourse, the football match, and the prize-ring. Like most of the imagery of primitive people, it is largely metaphorical, so involved as to require an interpreter.

When a man's chances are regarded as hopeless, the invariable Australian comment is that "he's got Buckley's." After having heard this stupid expression a dozen times, I became curious, and set out on the task of tracing the meaning of it. I ascertained that at the beginning of the nineteenth century three convicts escaped from a party which landed at Port Phillip. Two were killed and eaten by the blacks, but the third, one Buckley, escaped death and lived on friendly terms with the aborigines, to be found alive and well when Melbourne was founded thirty years later. The remote chance of escaping with his life which Buckley secured has since been applied to all remote chances. This is typical of Australian slang, and the visitor who desires to understand fully the patois encountered in this country needs to employ an interpreter.

In conclusion, it is only necessary to point out that so objectionable is the Australian accent that theatrical managers resolutely refuse to employ Australian-born actors or actresses. Though a few of these are possessed of talent--or what pa.s.ses for talent in Australia--the managers prefer to import English artists of inferior merit, solely because they possess the essential qualifications that Australians lack--the ability to speak the English language.

CHAPTER III.

AUSTRALIAN MANNERS.

Governor King, when in Australia in that administrative capacity, wrote in a despatch of his inst.i.tuting an orphan school:--

"It is the only step that would ensure some change in the manners of the next generation. G.o.d knows this is bad enough."

That was in 1801.

I made diligent search, and that is the last evidence I could find of hope having been entertained for Australian manners.

My observations during the last few months have convinced me that the average Australian simply doesn't know the meaning of the word. One thing that struck me most forcibly is the despicable habit of cadging invitations to the best social functions. I find that it is quite a common thing for a citizen who has been neglected in the case of a big ball to ring up the gentleman in charge of the invitation list, and remind him of the omission. This willingness to humiliate oneself in order to gratify social ambition was a revelation to me. Another thing that left me dumb with astonishment was the boorish behaviour of your women in the trams. I have repeatedly seen an alleged lady compel a man to occupy an uncomfortable seat rather than move up a little to make room for him. A glaring example of this ill-mannered selfishness came under my notice only the other day. A bejewelled female sat on an outside seat with about a foot of spare s.p.a.ce on either side of her. A man got in, and jambed himself between her and the end of the seat. The man on the other side of her moved up to allow the society dame to s.h.i.+ft along, but not she! She just stuck there, and ignored her unfortunate fellow pa.s.senger altogether. It would be difficult to find any country in the older and more cultured world in which the common decencies of civilisation would be so completely ignored.

n.o.body ever considers the convenience of others. People in the streets of every civilised portion of the world--I don't say every "other"

civilised portion of the world--walk on the right-hand side of the footpath. If one of them happens to be eccentric or possessed of the anti-social instinct or overcome by any cause and obstructs the traffic by walking on the wrong side, he is promptly checked by authority in the guise of a policeman. But in the streets of Sydney there is no such law and order. The public wander over the footpaths like sheep--and with the same directing intelligence. The result is that instead of there being two clearly defined streams of traffic on each footpath there is a struggling, chaotic ma.s.s. Under intelligent discipline, and with a people possessed of decent manners, the immense London crowds that fill the streets around the Bank and the Exchange and the Mansion House flow to and fro to their destinations like trains in a railway yard. But in Sydney, where only a comparatively handful of people fill the streets, all is confusion. There being no rule of the path, there is no order.

There being no manners, there is no mutual courtesy to ease the position. There being no chivalry, the women get hustled, and the elderly and weak b.u.mped and injured. The police never interfere until somebody is a.s.saulted, and, as may be expected with chaotic traffic regulation and ill-mannered people, this is not an infrequent occurrence. But the moment the offender has been dragged off the police retire to their places by a verandah post, and the same old rabble again fills the footpaths. Considering that the police do not control the vehicles, it is scarcely surprising that they permit the pedestrians to wander where they will. Carts and horses take any course they like. One never hears of anybody being prosecuted for driving on the wrong side of a Sydney street. A London policeman could not believe his eyes were he suddenly transported into an Australian city at a busy hour of the day.

As an example in chaos and ill-manners, the Government provides the public with a tramway system. The tramcars do not run on the wrong side of the road. I'll say that for them. But they commit every other offence against civic management that it is possible to think of. It would be difficult to find any tramways in the world in which the pa.s.sengers are treated less considerately. The old motto of Boss Tweed, the Tammany leader, was, "The public be d.a.m.ned," and the Government of New South Wales seems to have adopted it for its tramway department. As may be expected, accidents are frequent. It is scarcely possible for anybody who has not visited Australia to picture what this means--a badly managed tramway service, run by badly-mannered officials, and carrying about double the number of badly-mannered pa.s.sengers. An old time bear-pit must have been a refined a.s.semblage as compared with a Sydney tramcar.

The bad manners of the people are manifest in other places besides the trams and trains and ferries. It is impossible to find a woman who will stand aside to let others in or out of a pa.s.sage way. One of the most common experiences is to find two or more women standing in front of the turnstile to talk while 50 or 100 persons miss the ferry. The same thing occurs at the doors of all the elevators in places of business, and at the railway wickets. On the tramways, men and women alike rush the doors the moment a car stops, utterly careless of the pa.s.sengers who wish to alight. In the restaurants customers place parcels, umbrellas, even hats, on the tables. Whether other customers have any elbow room or room for their plates doesn't trouble them one jot. n.o.body ever apologises in Australia. One gets used to that after one's toes have begun to get callous from frequent treading on by strange feet. One's dress may be spoilt by a pa.s.sing painter or by a fellow dancer at a ball overturning a cup of coffee, but one never hears an expression of regret.

The culmination of Australian bad manners was probably reached when the New Year of 1908 was ushered in. Australia on New Year's Eve follows the silly practice of hanging about the streets of the city generally doing nothing. But this time it did something. It let off fireworks. It blew horns and otherwise made a fool of itself. And eventually growing tired of making a fool of itself, it proceeded to make a hog of itself. The women, I understand, were as much to blame as the men at the outset.

What followed cannot be related, but the Saturnalia of Ancient Rome, the Bal des Quartz Arts, and the worst of the orgies of seventeenth century rural England all found excellent imitations in the streets of Sydney that night.