AustLit

Dramatised historical account of the terrible tortures and execution of a French servant who attempted to assassinate Louis XV of France in 1757 for refusing last rites to the dying ... Horrors. (PB)

English university prank. An Oxford undergraduate plot against a very unpopular dean backfires when the plot to burn his furniture and his effigy on Guy Fawkes night is suspected - and it is the chief conspirators' furniture that is burnt instead. (PB)

A 50 year-old New York astronomy professor is tempted to have an affair with a sophisticated society woman who feigns interest in his work - but the plea of his wife and the thought of their daughter dead 2 years tips the scales in honour's favour. Feeling gentle but overdrawn. (PB)

Romance of a young couple who had eloped together living on nothing in a rich house. The young husband is sick and the wife tries to think of a story to sell for their food. She dreams of a mysterious door into their apartment and a room in which there is a miniature portrait of a beautiful woman and a manuscript telling of a Cuban/American's tragic love for a Cuban beauty. His last testament written before his execution, it recounts their love affair in Cuba, their rapture, her secret sorrow, a stolen encounter between brother and sister which results in her death from a pistol shot - and his death which he suffers rather than reveal it was her father who shot her, not the narrator lover. (PB)

Very brief anecdote of a father attempting to teach his son boxing - and coming off worst. Humour. (PB)

Romance set in England and on a barren island. A storm separates lovers when Reginald Lawrence's yacht fails to return and he is believed dead. Lucy Belgrave's father, Sir Anthony, had refused to allow them to marry and some months after pressures Lucy to marry young rich Lord Bramleigh. Meanwhile Reginald has recovered from a fever on the island where he and his one surviving companion were castaway - they are rescued - and it is he who appears as Lord B. to woo Lucy. Overblown plot, light little romance. (PB)

Brief sketch of a woman's rebuke to another for her rudeness: the bride and groom giggling about her clothes are silenced when she asks the older bride to ask her 'son' to close the window. Humour. (PB)

Romance by bicycle. A younger brother gives a false birthday to his sister's suitor and suggests a bicycle as a present - for his own use. Suitor and beloved rarely meet for a time as she is always out on her bicycle. He finally learns to ride too - but wins her by his failure to stay upright. Sub-plot of the Old and New Woman, bicycle bloomers etc. Light. (PB)

Old school friends, a young banker and a scientist, discover a plan to tunnel into the bank vault from a neighbouring cellar. The French burglary team is met by an elaborate trap of electricity and gas when they succeed in entering the cellar several days later. Light tone of youthful experiment - with a touch of man's responsibility. (PB)

Domestic sketch. Mr Smith decides to wash the walls of their new rented house a light blue - but after colouring everything but the walls and nearly killing himself and Mrs Smith hires a negro whitewasher to do the job. Humour. (PB)

English adventure. A strange comedian meets his fortune when a rich man's 14 year-old daughter runs away from school and asks him to teach her to be an actress. He gives her sausages, sees a reward in the paper and returns her to her father in London by a 'special' train. Not only the reward but the managership of a private theatre for the daughter is his recompense. Light. (PB)

On circumstances surrounding composition of 'Psalm of Life', 'Excelsior', 'Wreck of the Hesperus', and 'The Bridge'. Brief. (PB)

US Civil War tale of marital loyalty and woman's courage. A Yankee captain threatens to shoot the wife of a confederate spy in Virginia if she does not tell where her husband is. She refuses as does her 8 year old daughter - but her husband returns to rescue her and kills the captain just as he is about to command the troops to fire. His soldiers let the family escape. Slight. (PB)

Very brief humour on 627 infallible ways of curing a cold - from Uncle Allen Sparks. (PB)

Saga of an Australian country station. The owner, Honourable Follinger, died in the 1870s - his will left everything to his Oxford friend and manager George Dare. His wife, a mean widow, is enraged, her son disappointed and Follinger's ward Constance incensed. The widow is murdered and suspicion falls on a simple gardener she had had discharged - but he implicates the widow' son whom Constance had eloped with the night before; the son confesses and commits suicide, Constance enters the convent and Dare falls sick from disillusion, remaining unmarried. (PB)

Romance of middle age. A graceful refined woman in her forties, a writer and artist for magazines content in her home, is to meet the man she has loved and sought to prove herself to for 23 years. He is fat and comfortable and has come to ask her to assist his wife - formerly his housekeeper - into society. Disillusion and humour mixed. Light touch. (PB)

Domestic. A wife compares her husband to everyone else's and finds him wanting. He escapes. Humour. (PB)