CHAPTER III.
LORD BEACONSFIELD AND YOUNG AUSTRALIA.
In recently overhauling a chaotic accumulation of colonial books, pamphlets, and political documents, I lighted upon a suggestive out-of-the-way chapter in the brief annals of "Young Australia," which, I think, should not be suffered to pass without the tribute of an ephemeral sketch. It seems to me that the mere fact of Lord Beaconsfield exercising so potent a fascination on a number of young men born, or at least bred, in our remote antipodean colonies, alone gives to my reminiscence an element of some general interest. Australia is now in direct hourly communication with the Motherland by means of the magic submarine cable, and nothing transpires of importance from day to day without its being known within twenty-four hours in the far-off Island Continent. Lord Carnarvon asserts that recently, when in Melbourne and
