AustLit

A country wife deserts her family for a few days shopping and visiting a new friend in Melbourne. The shambles she discovers on her return is exceeded only by the disruption caused by a return visit from her Melbourne hostess' mad husband ... Moral tone against a woman leaving her family. (PB)

On the loss of friends to death, and particularly of the minor poet Edward James McDonnell who is buried in Epping Cemetery. Includes a lengthy poetry extract. (PB)

Christmas dinner with a hearty sociable old man reveals his family cruelty. (PB)

Account of a journey in 1870 from dull Campbelltown to Camden after a serious downpour and flooding. (PB)

Account of the narrator's attempt at being a theatrical manager in a large Victorian mining town ... (PB)

A Christmas gathering in the St. John's family home in the little town of Cheltenham Victoria is the setting for romance, and for the recounting of a series of Christmas tales from family and friends. Includes 'A Tale of 1852' - of murder on the Victorian goldfields; 'The Dandy's Story' - a tale of ghosts and sleep-walking set in Southampton; another of life as an un-country 'governess' on a Victorian station; a sketch of an excursion to Fern-tree Gully; and an amateur charade. (PB)

Description of the customs and ritual surrounding Moslem marriages and divorces. (PB)

A wager on the outcome of the gentleman rider's steeplechase at a Victorian race country meeting is to determine the marriage of Isabel Phillips and Jack Van Arsdale of South Yarra. Then an accident occurs ... (PB)

Recounts the sad history of a pair of socially unequal lovers in the village of Garryowen in county Limerick. (PB)

On the emphasis on wealth in Victoria and the consequences of living in debt ... (PB)

Romance betwee a 48 year-old headmaster and a free-spirited 18 year-old girl already engaged to a young man. (PB)

An encounter between mother, father and son on a California gold diggings includes a near-lynching and a reconciliation. Lively and interesting account, often through the comments of an ex-newspaper reporter. (PB)

Fairy tale of three princesses with fragile hearts and the young page who won the youngest sister. (PB)

English tale ostensibly of friendship between women but equally occupied with the friends' growing love for the same man - plain but noble character. (PB)

Drewanna, a vineyard in Victoria, is the site for a sundowner's murderous vengeance on the owner who refused him food and shelter. As the anniversary of the day of revenge approaches, Mark Sinclair is called in to assist in preventing it - and his suspicions include the housekeeper and the local police trooper. (PB)

On women who wear their hair short, laugh and jest at males in Collins St. Argues that they lower the reputation of women and are worse than prostitutes. (PB)