AustLit

A mother recalls the night her own baby died and the comfort she takes in knowing it is in heaven waiting. Pathos/sentiment. (PB)

The difficulties and misadventures of bicycle riding. A puncture occurs one day mid-ride and, after discovering that a passing cyclist has not stolen his bike, the narrator gains his aid in fixing it. (PB)

Set on a Lachlan station in 1848, the owner and his Irish man of all work 'Murphy' defend themselves from a combined force of bushrangers and blacks. A small friendly black boy, Jacky, meanwhile rides for help. Good action descriptions of the attack where the Irishman's sabre plays a part. Interesting treatment of the boy; and the Irishman's souvenirs of a bottled black hand and fingers. (PB)

An English specialist advises an Irish woman whose mother had recurring fits of madness, during one of which she killed her young son, that she should not marry. Accordingly, without disclosing the reasons, she refuses her lover 'bravely' and self-sacrificingly. 'Good Woman' tale, with some sense of the agony. (Oh for contraception!) Advice very limited. Slight. (PB)

India in 1857 and a major's kindness to a native boy being beaten by English soldiers is amply rewarded when the boy's self-sacrificing sally to bring help saves them from death in the Sepoy mutiny. The boy uses strategy to outwit the sepoys at risk of his own life. Includes officer's wife's request for a pistol to prevent herself falling into their hands. (PB)

US Western tale. The narrator and a half-breed Indian boy are camping out in the mountains. While the narrator is lying awake a panther takes the sleeping Indian boy from next to him - and he realises nothing. Hand of fate etc. Slight (sketchlike). Sounds of night in the wild. (PB)

Domestic romance set in Northern Hemisphere. For some years Mary Knight has been deceiving her husband, telling him that she has been visiting a friend whenever he was absent from town. A child's illness, a shortened business trip, and a visit from the woman purportedly visited (whose son is in Australia!) reveal the deception. Mary confesses that she visits the children of a hidden former marriage, unrevealed because she feared her husband would cease loving her ... Competent. Loving couple - kindness, restraint, etc. (PB)

Practical joke played by an itinerant English band on a bumptious non-smoking railway companion rebounds when they discover he is mayor of a town they wish to play in. He refuses them permission to perform. Includes account of a practical joke played on a station master. Slight. (PB)

A barber taking advantage of a deaf and dumb client to insult him is struck dumb when the man speaks. (PB)

Probably English. A novice to horse racing decides to spend £100 drawn out of an Australian bank in betting, and experiencing the thrill of seeing his horse win or lose. An attractive and light-fingered lady gives him the thrill of watching a horse race eager for the winner, and losing his money, all without backing a horse. (He had been unable to understand the method of betting through the bookmakers.) (PB)

US romance. An Easter meeting in Palermo promises love to a travelling American woman and man. A ring accidentally bestowed in parting cements their promise of another meeting in a year. But it also threatens disillusion when an abandoned wife dying in hospital recognises it as her husband's ring. All is made happy when the traveller is found to be the cousin of the absent husband. Slight. (PB)

A florist gently questions a husband as to why he never takes flowers to his sweetheart now she is his wife. (PB)

An English racehorse seems plagued by ill-luck to the disappointment of her hard-pressed owner. His daughter proves that a trial for the horse was fixed and it has hopes of winning the Oaks until she overhears that her brother will be ruined by bets if it wins. The horse goes 'lame', father is disappointed but worse misfortune is avoided. Slight. (PB)

Robberies from a Melbourne judge's house point to the guilt of his dandy nephew recently arrived from England. Detective Sinclair's enquiries gradually uncover the kidnap of the nephew by disowned and dishonest cousins in Adelaide determined on revenge on the uncle they judged to have abandoned their father in his hour of need. A woman disguised as the male cousin on revenge and her escape together with her brother just as the kidnapped cousin, escaped from Adelaide, appears in Melbourne follows an attempt to disfigure the judge's daughter. A "Wicked and curious woman's letter" announces their intention. The cousins flee to South America, "the land in which is being founded a New Australia." (PB)

Greet her coldly, repress her etc, etc. Brief. (PB)

English tale of a London commercial traveller who mistakes another pug dog for his own and takes it with him to Manchester by rail where it costs him more than his own to keep. On his return he finds his own at home and that he has stolen another. He finds the old lady who owns it and attempts to return it through a firm of lawyers - the old lady mistakes her dog too. Slight. Humour? (PB)

Dieppe in 1846, and a brave French widow who recognises a thief and murderer in her mirror by the shadow of his hand coolly sends a note to the police through her maid and waits an hour for their arrival. Slight. (PB)

Decline and misadventures of a once splendid, Bourke Street Melbourne hat. Feelings hurt when reduced for sale to 3d. Bought for a squatter's son to wear to school where he is regularly abandoned in a tree trunk rather than make his owner a butt of ridicule. Once taken to school the hat is beaten up and eventually ends up at the dump. Light; lively. (PB)