AustLit

US Civil War tale set in a military hospital in 1863. A wounded soldier recalls President Lincoln sitting with a 16 year-old Vermont youth the 2 hours it took him to die. Pathos; warmth. (PB)

Marriage and mother-in-law. A new wife refuses to meet her mother-in-law until a terrible bout of pneumonia teaches her to love her nurse - who she finally discovers is the dreaded relative. Light; family; probably US. (PB)

A baby's reflections on the absurdity of the behaviour of visitors: a doctor, a courting youth unsure of his praises; men with moustaches, ladies and children. 'Character' sketch. (PB)

A child's death on the wagon trail across the US Western prairies. Father-daughter bond; father suicides when he realises she is dead. Pathos. (PB)

English tale of a father's feigned death to collect insurance money and the terrible toll on his wife and daughter's health. A London doctor is consulted by a mother concerned about her daughter's health and learns of her conviction that her father is still alive. Includes his consultation with the family doctor; the exhumation of a coffin; the mother's illness and delirious confessionl reunion of husband and wife on their deathbeds (her "suicide" from an overdose of Indian hemp); his confession of the counterfeit to collect the insurance money and avoid dishonour; and the daughter's love and loss of both parents. Interesting theme: sense of daughter's love for both parents and their passion for each other is well-conveyed; also the sense of the doctor's compassion. (PB)

At an English race meeting where a group of friends have won a bet at good odds, one of them tells why he never bets. In his youth he won a long odds bet - and discovered not even the owner had backed his horse. Uncertainty of racing and inside information. Slight; not gripping. (PB)

Identity; royalty. A visit of the Prince and friends to the actress Genevieve Ward and humour around her pet dog. Slight. (PB)

Proud Maria Stanley determines to murder her friend Sophie Carnegie when she learns Sophie is to marry her uncle and thus inherit the station and income she has counted as her own. Detective Sinclair and another detective solve the disappearance of Sophie in the lagoon - not married and gone to Tasmania as a letter suggested but left to drown by Maria who had been secretly meeting the old groom's son - the old man tried to protect her with the false letter. An old mad woman Madge rescued Sophie from death and cared for her in an old hut until Sinclair discovers her. Maria never recovers consciousness after her own accident on the lagoon - she is better off dead is the general consensus. Sophie marries happily her elderly army officer. (PB)

A mother and wife persuades her husband to come home after a week at the pub telling him their baby is ill. Tale of woman's love conquering (!) (PB)

Northern hemisphere. A crippled girl survives the winter in the slums only to die the day before spring blossoms. Pathos. (Narrator passes the old house daily.) (PB)

Romance, adventure and gold in this story of Maori and whites in New Zealand. A sailor jumps ship to stay with a Maori woman only to discover she is married to the chief. They flirt while the chief is away and she shows him gold deposits. The chief returns early and kills him one day. The skeleton is not discovered til years later when the Maori settlement is almost wiped out by white settlers and two prospectors follow up a hidden gold reef. Well written; predictable; conveys sense of passing civilisation etc. Very colloquial speech. (PB)

A minister's sermon on Daniel is interrupted by his son's dog Dan, who is rescued by his sleepy master. Weak humour. (PB)

An orphan and her baby go to stay with her husband's uncle in his neglected mansion when the husband is posted with the army to Africa. They have been estranged from the rest of his family by her plebian birth but the crusty uncle warms to her and the child. She learns that he banished his own son for marrying beneath him - and that she is in fact the old man's granddaughter. Her husband is wounded in Africa and appears one night unexpectedly at the mansion, frightening her as she mistakes him for the ghost of her own banished father. The old man's remorse for her cruelty years before unites them into a happy family. Loyal old house-keeper and a portrait play their part in the plot of identity discovered and inheritance restored. Well written, not outstanding. (PB)

Opium tale. A manuscript is obtained from a former friend within a few weeks of his death in an opium den. It reveals his intense depression after his sister's death and the terrible dreams haunting him - to murder his closest friend who has been possessed by grief at her death, for he was her fiancée. In an obsessed dreamlike state he kills him - finding relief for a time in the cessation of the dreams. But an awakening to his act and conscience haunt him then by day - opium gives him ease and the sleep which is now comforting. Hazy inward tale; some suggestion that the murder saved his friend from suicide and enabled a reunion of the lovers which might not be wholly wrong. 'Judgement in the next world' is conclusion. Atmospheric; interesting in uncertainty of judgement of murder. (PB)

A London visit and the chance for a last night at the theatre drives Daisy to persuade her married sister to find them a male escort for the evening. Two friends fail them but they answer an advertisement in the newspaper to discover a short, sloppy ill-bred man in the drawing room ... They do not attend the theatre. Humour; two sisters agree to keep silent. (PB)

Exemplary exhortation to keep in touch with relatives, do duties in society etc. Not to blame fate. (PB)

Tale of love lightly betrayed and faithful love rewarded. A weak indulged and dissipated youth loves a poor but beautiful orphan he assists as her mother dies. He proposes but returns to London and marries the society girl long intended as his bride. They are unhappy, she scorning him, but when he returns to his old love affair after his wife's death he finds he is too late - she has no love left for him and has learned to love her humble faithful lover who has made a fortune on the Californian goldfields. Slight. Study of the weaknesses of a man's character and the loss of true love that he suffers. (PB)

A Melbourne society woman, her family's fortunes ruined in a bank crash, becomes a teacher at a small unclassified country school. She is much admired by the local young men but feels superior though attracted to one of them. The breaking of a new dam, the swift departure of a bejewelled city suitor and the courage of a country admirer in saving first her and then the city suitor wins her love. Romance is declared on the mullock heap to which she is carried by her hero - and gold is also discovered. Well written, humorous - light irony; well-studied references interwoven. (PB)

Brief California anecdote of a judge and a young priest who both miss their train by bowing to each other. (PB)

The death of a rough godless bounty jumper in hospital is softened by a child's kiss where men and women failed. Sentiment. (PB)