But, even while they made it, the proposers of this scheme were knee-deep
in petty, local affairs again. All Europe was depressed under the
cloud of war; but they went on belabouring hackneyed themes--the
unlocking of the lands, iniquitous licence-fees, official corruption.
Mahony could not stand it. His heart was in England, went up and down
with England's hopes and fears. He smarted under the tales told of the
inefficiency of the British troops and the paucity of their numbers;
under the painful disclosures made by journalists, injudiciously allowed
to travel to the seat of war; he questioned, like many another of his
class in the old country, the wisdom of the Duke of Newcastle's orders
to lay siege to the port of Sebastopol. And of an evening, when the
store was closed, he sat over stale English newspapers and a map of the
Crimea, and meticulously followed the movements of the Allies.
But in this retirement he was rudely disturbed, by feeling himself
touched on a vulnerable spot--that of his pocket. Before the end of the
year trade had come to a standstill, and the very town he lived in was
under martial law.
On both Ballarat and the Bendigo the agitation for the repeal of the
licence-tax had grown more and more vehement; and spring's arrival found
the digging-community worked up to a white heat. The new Governor's tour
of inspection, on which great hopes had been built, served only to
aggravate the trouble.
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