The material on this page is available to AustLit subscribers. If you are a subscriber or are from a subscribing organisation, please log in to gain full access. To explore options for subscribing to this unique teaching, research, and publishing resource for Australian culture and storytelling, please contact us or find out more.
A rich entrepreneur commits suicide and so a doctor visits his widow. Because they had once been engaged, she tells him about a safe where jewels are hidden. She wants to keep her pearls from the police because she doesn't want to pay her husband's business debts. That night her husband comes to her room telling her he had faked his death. He opens the safe and gives her the pearls. Suddenly a thief enters and takes everything, laughingly explaining that her maid was his accomplice.
Two farmers, Long Tom and Tubby, have long been friends but when Tubby begins to raise chickens (White Leghorns) the men begin to fight. Long Tom also begins to raise chickens and has much better luck getting eggs from his black Orphingtons. Tubby discovers that one of his hens is laying on Long Tom's land and in order to justify his being on Long Tom's property he obtains a mining licence. Long Tom follows suit and when he discovers gold he takes it to Tubby to share in his find and the men regain their friendship.