AustLit

This column gives a short history of the journal from its inception in 1865 to 1951.

'It may or may not be true that a sailor has a wife in every port, but it is certain that to him every port is a new hunting ground to be approached in the spirit of adventure. In his stories, Australian author, Dale Collins, who has sailed round the world several times, in every type of vessel from a small yacht to a luxury liner, writes of what he has seen when he relates the adventures of love and chance experienced by a sailor on his nights ashore.' (p. 16)

'This story is about Benjamin Disraeli, afterwards Lord Beaconsfield, author and statesman. For many years one of the most powerful political leaders in the world, Disraeli’s most spectacular coup was in 1876, when he anticipated the French government by purchasing, on his own responsibility and at a moment’s notice, all the shares in the Suez Canal owned by the Khedive of Egypt, thus assuring his country a controlling interest in the world’s most important waterway. Disraeli was a close friend and constant counsellor of Queen Victoria, who his advise assumed the title of Empress of India. Dying in 1881, he is buried in Westminster Abbey. Lady Beaconsfield married Disraeli in the death of her first husband, Wyndham Lewis, a prominent figure in the House of Commons. They met at the house of Edward Bulwer, afterwards Lord Lytton, author and politician. His novels, the most famous of which is ‘The Last Days of Pompeii,’ are better known today than those of Disraeli. For many years he was a Member of the British Cabinet. His marriage to Rosina Wheeler was unhappy, and terminated in a legal separation in 1836.' (25)