Australia and Its Gold Fields Author:Edward Hammond Hargraves Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER II. A REVIEW OF THE ANCIENT AND MODERN GOLD MINES. The Author's purpose is not with Australia alone but with Gold—Uses of gold amongst the ancients... more »—Notices in Holy Writ—In Homer— Gold the peculiar property of kings, and the fitting ornament of fabled deities—Glaacus and Diomedes—Euripides—The working of gold of a rude fashion at this time, witness Homer's description of the arms of Achilles—Arrived at perfection probably about the time of Phidias—The celebrated statues of Minerva at Athens and of Jupiter at Olympia—Scarcity of gold amongst the early Romans, who never attained much perfection in the working of this metal—Gold amongst the Asiatics—Midas—Croesus—Sources of ancient gold—The Spanish conquests in America—Cruel exactions from the natives—The mining expedition of Pallo Belois—Story of Miguel Diez—Gold mania amongst the Spaniards—Discoveries of Peru by Balboa and his companions—Pizarro—Cruelties perpetrated by Pizarro upon the Inca of Peru, and the vast quantities of gold obtained by these means. In the preceding chapter I drew a rapid and hasty sketch of the discoveries in Australia, as well those on the coast line as in the interior; I also traced the rise and progress of the colony of New South Wales, from its first settlement as a distant convict establishment to its more prosperous though still humble condition of a thriving pastoral, agricultural, and commercial state. Were it my object to dwell only on the fortunes of Australia, I might at once proceed tothe discovery of gold in that country, and having given its history, might proceed to enlarge on the wonderful results which have already followed upon that discovery. But my subject is not Australia alone, but Gold ; and all that has to do with gold at whatever period of the world's history cannot ...« less