This Month’s New Reading

Out Amongst the

Bull-Dust

TWENTY or more years ago, an Englishman went to Australia, travelled extensively on that Continent and went back home and wrote a book called Cobbers. Since then it has been fashionable —and apparently has shown some profit— to write factual books about the Australian Outback, or about journeys through the Outback.

And still they come. Latest is Overlanding With Annabel, an amiable enough tale of the wanders of Stuart and Jan Gore in a vintage Chrysler, from Perth through the NW of the Continent, over to Darwin and down the Centre. How ever, if the book had remained un written, neither literature nor the extent of human knowledge would have suffered to any discernible degree.

These two adventurers were pro fessional photographers. They left Perth with practically no money and thereafter managed to exist on the proceeds of showing films of their own making to outback audi ences at townships and stations.

There is always one inescapable inference to be drawn from this sort of story—that the people who undertake these outback adventures are something more than human.

Sand-traps, dust—bull-dust, they call it —sandflies, mosquitoes, heat, cold, car troubles, discomfort. But does wife ever bat husband over the head with the frying-pan in a fit of despondency? No.

Does husband, after struggling with recalcitrant carburettor in a sand-drift for 17 hours, curse whing ing wife and say he wishes to God he’d left her behind in the city?

No.

No —the pair continue like a couple of sucking-doves, while it is your reviewer who is thrown into a fit of despondency as she con siders the inevitable reactions of her own (indubitably lesser-fibred; menage under similar frustrating conditions. (Published by Angus and Robertson, Ltd.

Australian price, 18/-.)

Cornish Gentlemen

A NOVEL based on historical fact oftimes is like a sandwich with little meat and although Mary Dunstan’s new book, Trusty and Well Beloved , suffers somewhat from this disability its picture of Cornwall in the days of the Stuarts more than makes up for it.

Particularly so for anyone with the least acquaintance with this rugged part of England, or anyone with the Celtic blood of Cornwall in their veins.

In 1625, when the first Charles Stuart came to the throne, Cornwall could still almost be regarded as frontier country. Its Celtic people had been the last to submit to Saxon rule, and in the early 17ih century the feudal system was still supreme. What the Cornish gentry thought became the opinion of all.

Each gentleman could unquestion ably count on the loyalty of his own people.

Educated by tutors and at Oxford, followed by a polishing period at Court or through Continental travel, the Cornish gallant was usually satisfied to come home in due course to his estates, to marriage, to work and to his sports and to the welfare, as he saw it, of his retainers.

Such a one was Francis Basset of Tehidy.

But with Charles came change, even in Cornwall —and in the end, divided loyalties: between King and Commonwealth; between Puritan and Anglican.

The book covers the period of Charles I’s reign from 1625 until its end with the victory of Cromwell in 1645. It covers also this period in Francis Basset’s life, and in the life of Cornwall. It finds the county in its simplicity, its greatest problem the raids of the so-called “Turks” —Moorish pirates from North Africa—and leaves it licking the wounds of civil war.

In all it is a narrow canvas — Cromwell’s name is never mentioned and Charles himself is a nebulous figure, the unseen writer of those communications which invariably began: To Our Trusty and Well beloved Francis Basset, esqre.

But it does give a fascinating picture of southern England of that day and an almost incredible re minder that time was when distance was measured by the pace of a swift horse, and not by the speed of a supersonic jet air-craft.

A smaller world; more leisurely.

But better? It is doubtful. Misery and uncertainty abounded. The conflict of men’s ideas led, then as now, frequently to death. (Published by William Hienemann, Ltd.

Australian price, 18/9.)

One Kentish Summer

IN a very dull month, a new novel by Kate Mary Bruce—Felicity— probably seems even more enjoy able than it should be.

Th°re is nothing profound about Miss Bruce’s stories; their virtue lies in their sheer entertainment value, and for the delight of her characters.

Her sure touch for narrative is, no doubt, a natural gift, diligently cultivated; and her plots attempt to solve no world-shaking problems.

But how very pleasant it is to read a book occasionally for the pleasure

it gives, and not to be harasstj by the psychoses of charactes adrift in this world of woe.

This story is told by Fanny. Sft had not seen Felicity for 20 yea* until Felicity appeared in coul charged with the attempted murdi of her (Fanny’s) father, Char!

Roland. The story had become sensation and had been spresi across the front pages of the popull newspapers: Charles and Felicii admit that they have been seen lovers for 20 years.

Fanny goes back to the early 30C to a summer house-party in Ken when the affair was just beginnii. —ignored by her mother, observe by her grandmother and unknov? to Fanny and her sisters, immers* in teen-age affairs of their own.

Miss Bruce handles the story wii great skill, never letting it on: descend into bathos, yet keepiij her characters completely human (Published by William Hienemann, U Australian price, 17/-.)

Guess What, in

the Garret

YOU write it, we’ll read it. Tlr is the slogan we work by—■■ to a point.

The point seemed to have be: reached on page 67 of The Sorroi Of Travel (by John Breon), as as we had not by then found c what it was all about, or appean likely to, we gave up.

So —having fallen down on o side of the bargain—we tell y < merely what it says on the jacH flap. We quote: “Paris has always served as lodestar for the artistic young.

To-day a new crop of hopeful e patriates is growing, crammed w:' the fantasies and dreams of youi all as intriguing in their way their forebears were to earll readers. . . Paul is a composer o voted to crippled Chuck; both s

more than half in love with Lit] who shares the hardships of tH garret life although she does need to; and George, who hopes write, pursues Livia with his affi tion but never seems quite ables find fulfilment with her. . . n this close circle comes a forr Army companion of Paul’s, Alben How he shatters their roman withdrawn world ... is the bun: of this appealing story. Perhaps some readers the serious impl j! tions of Mr. Breon’s theme will, apparent, although the book can read primarily for its narrai values. . . His talent is sensitive : yet remarkably disciplined. Herr a truly remarkable novel.”

Unquote. The italics above, our own, and are put in as a fer excuse for our own ignorance: H quite obvious that the publisl do not expect the meaning of novel to be easily apparent.

So it is over to you, gentle rea* For us —we are probably growing? and crusty. The haverings American post-World War Ilyov in search of their souls in Mo: marte do not appear to us tcc important. (Published by Peter Davies. Austr price, 17/-.)

When the Paddle-

Steamers Ran

IN this year of exceptional fid in all the main river syst of Eastern Australia —you I to go back to 1890 to find anytl; comparable the re-issuing Dreadnought of the Darling, K C. E. W. Bean, first published 1911, has a certain amount! topical appeal to Australians.

Much history, too. Australia in those days, a raw and yo- Commonwealth with the Out; correspondingly closer to the cost fringe than it is to-day. It was day of the stage-coach, and — be* the Murray had been dammed at Albury, or locks and weirs below Renmark —when pa d£ steamers plied on the Murray ' the Darling, bringing in the groco and taking out the wool, right o to the sea. In between trips literally holed up when the n dwindled to a series of holes, v ing again for the bankers, or I bankers that permitted navigj? almost 1,700 miles from the sa Author Bean has, of course the intervening years become 0 monwealth Historian, but whes gathered the material for this ' in 1908 and 1909, he was a y? reporter on the Sydney Mem Herald. In 1908, he was sem his paper to report on the all ative routes which the State was vestigating for a railway to < Sydney with Broken Hill.

In the following year, the editor of SMH, T. W. Heney,, years before had been editor newspaper on the Darling

m of Wilcannia, sent him again o the outback to write a series articles on the wool industry, Jean travelled by buggy and ge-coach and, above all, by river amer, which he called the zadnought, and whose real name 5 Jandra. ?he Commonwealth then had a mlation of 4i millions and amed of the day when “60 or million, mostly British,” would settled along the coastal fringe figure now realised to be much ve capacity. rrigation and railways were be ed to be capable of bringing this ut. . . Australia was then young years and with youth’s grand sions. Bean’s stories of the itier West and the big rivers t sometimes ran and often did , have a tranquillity since shat ;d by two World Wars and an mic Age. onic reading for Australians, it of whom have now lost con ; with pioneering days—but bably of not very much interest >ther than Australians. jblished by Angus and Robertson, Ltd. ralian price, 21/-.) [r. R. S. Skeen, Government iter in Tonga since 1935, and a nber of the Tongan Public hce since 1916, is now on pre rement leave. Mr. R. S. Wall k has been promoted to the post government Printer.

High Produce Prices in

Suva Market

WHEN Mr. J. Falvey, European Elected Member, said in the Fiji Legislative Council that between the consumer and producer somebody was getting a mighty rake-off, he expressed the opinion of many citizens.

Prices in the Market are about on a par with those in the shops, although stall rentals are only one shilling a day, compared with the high town rentals and overhead ex penses which have to be met by

shopkeepers.

Some of the larger Chinese shop keepers have either their own gardens, or close connections with Chinese growers, so they can brine produce to their shops at prices I( ? w ii£ A han those available to stallholders. Also they have greater turnover, better storage facilities and less loss through deterioration.

Whatever the cause, produce prices in Suva are far too high, and are causing considerable discontent The Market was built to bring pro ducers directly into contact with low-wage consumers, and benefit both. In that respect, it has failed