Page:History of Adelaide and vicinity.djvu/154

128 ADELAIDE AND VICINITY The Producers the yields would suggest. " Tickle the land with a hoe, and it laughs with a harvest," was at this time a familiar saying in South Australia. In 1866 the value of the export of breadstuffs amounted to ^645,401, figures which were almost doubled five years later. The export of wheat, flour, and bran and pollard in 1867 was valued at ^1,034,461. The principal counties producing breadstuff's in 1868 were in the following order : — Light, Adelaide, Gawler, Stanley, and Hindmarsh. . .. L' The profits of the pastoral ist were greater than those of any other section of the community. " One proof of the remunerative character of the pursuit is," wrote Frederick Sinnet in 1862 in "An Account of the Colony of South Australia," "that all sorts and conditions of men have thriven in it indiscriminately. Gentlemen from England, without experience ; professional men, turning to the bush rather than to their professions ; men of capital or education, or neither, or both — representatives of all these classes have grown Wallaroo Minrs wealthy by squatting, and that not in isolated cases, but almost as a general rule." Even so early as this in the history of the Province the evils of absenteeism were at work, and scathing remarks were made upon it by the democratic party. Exploration was opening up new tracts of pastoral country, and by 1868 stock grazed upon the territory north of Port Augusta and throughout the .South-East. Magnificent estates were formed, comparable with the best wool-growing properties in the world. The example of the South Australian Company, in introducing superior strains of sheep, was followed by individual pastoralists, and the best breeds of the old and new worlds were acclimatised. The export of wool was often of greater value than that of breadstuffs, and the flocks increased encouragingly. From 1,962,460 sheep in the Province in 1856, the number ten years later rose to 3,038,356. In the same period there was a decrease of cattle and an increase of horses: — -Catde in 1856, 272,746; in 1866, 123,820; horses in 1856, 22,260;