If a "privileged class" can be said to exist in the colony, it is that of the shepherds, who receive their wages unabated by truck, and are paid from thirty to forty pounds a year with the addition of their food; nevertheless, the men's own folly, combined with other agencies, will often rid them of a twelvemonth's wages in a few days. A shepherd comes into a town for a holiday, after a year or two's solitary life in the bush, much like a sailor going ashore from a long voyage; he wants amusement, and in absolute default of anything better, goes into a public-house, and remains there, drinking and treating others, until the publican knows that his customer has no money left, and dismisses him to begin the world again. In this way, incredible and disgusting as it may appear, we have known of shepherds getting through two years' wages in one fortnight, without ever stirring from the public-house into which they first entered.
That the character of the tap-rooms in Western Australia is often very bad needs no stretch of the imagination to conceive, and, in such cases as these that I allude to, actual robbery has, no doubt, often assisted the drink in dispersing a man's money; but that there were publicans who would permit men to be drunk continuously for days together, was a fact not to be controverted. The duty upon spirits, which is something like a tax of eleven shillings upon each gallon sold in the colony, instead of being prohibitory has only helped to make the matter worse, having led, as might have been foreseen, to an excessive amount of adulteration, and to this cause, rather than to the climate, which is sometimes supposed to induce it, may be ascribed the frequent instances of insanity.
