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A Melbourne family spend the Christmas week with a wealthy aunt at Brighton, in 1874. The son from Mr Marshall's first marriage courts his aunt's poorer-looking female visitor, his step-brother courting the apparent heiress. Pleasant romance; entertaining study of social relations. (PB)
Romance of a coffee-planter's daughter in Ceylon. Vivid descriptions especially of nature and the Minary Lake. Recounts her resource in rescuing her lover from the palunga snake, and his in return. (PB)
His experiences as a naval musician on a US steamer looking-out for slave ships, destination Havana, Cuba. Description of the sailors drinking and thieving, of incidents in Cuba, at Key West and the Tortugas ... (PB)
Moral tale of a husband's decline through his wife's determination to break his vow of total abstinence on their wedding day - and his recovery. Sententious. (PB)
Short humorous tale about a merchant's daughter who avoids marrying the rich dandy and gains her young lawyer through acting Lady Macbeth and being presumed mad. (PB)
Set on the Victorian diggings. Norman Brent adopts a poor orphaned brother and sister on their arrival at Sandridge pier and takes them to his tent on the diggings. Tessa sickens and Ernest falls in love with Norman's girl - plotting murder as reward for his care ... Particularly interesting for its opposition of the young Tessa, and Laura, 'The Bad Woman' who is appropriately punished. (PB)
Society romance: pretty Sylvia, disinherited by the marriage of her rich aunt, discovers that the man she has been avoiding in her two years of poverty had proposed to her in a mislaid letter. Slight. (PB)