Recollections by David Christie Murray — Read

It is many years since I saw a sight which so pricked and stirred my blood as the final episode of the procession of Eight Hours Day in Melbourne. The day was wintry and dismal. Early rains had threatened the dispersal of the patient crowds which lined the roads; the pavements were muddy and the sky was lowering. The march of the trades bodies did little to dispel the gloom of the day for the one onlooker concerning whose sentiments I am authorised to speak. The vast crowd gave each trade a reception as it passed, and sometimes the marchers passed below the Treasury windows and cheered the governor. There was plenty of noise and enthusiasm, but I was unawakened until the tail-end of the procession came. Two brakes drew up below the governor's standing-place, and some score of grey-bearded men rose up in these vehicles and waved their hats with vigour, whilst the whole orderly mob roared applause at them and Lord Hopetoun himself clapped his hands like a pleased boy at the theatre.

All the men in the two brakes were elderly and grey-headed, but as far as I could see, they were all stalwart and able-bodied, and the faces of a good many were bronzed with years of sun and wind. Over the leading vehicle was suspended a strip of white cloth, and on this was painted the words, "The Pioneers. " These men were the makers of Victoria, the fathers of the proud and populous city which lay widespread about us. There is no need to be eloquent about Melbourne. Too many people have sung its praises already. But it is one of the cities of the world; it has a population of over half a million; it has its churches, its chapels, its synagogues, its theatres, its hotels; it is as well furnished in most respects as any other city of its size; and these grey men yet staunch in body, bronzed and bright-eyed, were among the beginners of it.