AustLit

First appearing in The Bulletin in 1892, Henry Lawson's short story 'The Drovers Wife' is today regarded as a seminal work in the Australian literary tradition. Noted for it's depiction of the bush as harsh, potentially threatening and both isolated and isolating, the story opens with a simple enough premise: an aggressive--and presumably deadly--snake disrupts the working life of a bushwoman and her young children. Brave but cautious, the woman resolves to protect her children since her husband is, characteristically, away from home and of no help. 

As time passes within the story, tension builds, and the snake's symbolic threat takes on layers of meaning as the sleepless heroine recalls previous challenges she faced while her husband was away. A series of flashbacks and recollections propel the story through the single night over which it takes place, and by the time the climax arrives--the confrontation with the snake--readers have learned much about the heroine's strengths and fears, most of the latter involving the loss of children and dark figures who encroach upon her small, vulnerable homestead. To be sure, this "darkness" is highly symbolic, and Lawson's use of imagery invokes Western notions of good and evil as well as gendered and racial stereotypes. 

Dave and Andy create a bomb to blast fish out of the waterhole. However their dog picks the bomb up and begins a deadly, yet hilarious, game of 'fetch'.

Describes a bush funeral.

The narrator remembers how his father would be visited by old mates and how they sit together talking about their days on the Ballarat and Bendigo goldfields.

An old shepherd discovers his mate, Brummy, dead and mummified in the bush. Saddened, he feels compelled to bury him.

Injured in a drunken brawl, a shearer refuses treatment in a hospital unless his dog, also injured, is allowed to stay as well.

Steelman poses as a geologist, with Smith as his offsider. They are offered accommodation in a railway camp and stay for several days, but decide to move on when they discover they are not the only tricksters in the camp.

Expatriate for fifteen years, a man denigrates Australia throughout a coach-trip in New Zealand, until he encounters the smell and sight of imported blue gum trees.

Mitchell relates the sorry tale of Bill, a rooster mystified by the echo of his crowing.

Young people attending a bush dance fear that the musician will never arrive.

Two drovers, Andy and Jack, watch their boss drink himself to death. They lie to his wife about the cause of his death to spare her unnecessary pain.

Mitchell muses on the behaviour of dogs.

The story of Sarah Moses, a brooding sixteen-year-old Maori girl called 'August' by her new school teacher, and a man with literary ambitions who thinks he may be able to construct a romance from her story. One day August turns up on his doorstep, claiming her family have thrown her out. The teacher and his wife take her in and all goes well at first, but gradually they realise August's real intentions.

Mitchell does some clever talking to replenish his supplies.

The narrator, Joe, is tortured by sandy blight, so he and Mitchell shelter in a hut to wait for sunset. After apparently curing Joe's affliction with a bottle of 'eye water' he finds in the hut, Mitchell reminisces about the perils of amateur bee-keeping.

A man and his young son do their best to hold the family together, despite the complaints of the man's lazy wife.

Lawson describes the oddities of travel by river boat on the Darling River. He also explains how Bourke came to acquire the reputation of being the most drunken town on the Darling.

Three travelling shearers encounter a swagman, 'Rats', having a fight with his swag.

Flour o' Wheat is an Irishman with a temper living in New Zealand. He uses his fists to get his way, but one day when he is passed out, drunk, the township decide to teach him a lesson.