Force and Fraud Read Online Free Page A

crime, rather than mystery story. It was the best of her short stories and a significant early fictionalisation of European atrocities against Aborigines. Possibly the editor thought the bloodthirsty matter was unsuitable to appear under a woman’s name.
    Almost certainly Ellen had met an eyewitness to the 1840s massacres in the Gippsland region; identifiable here from the details, such as the cannon loaded with glass, and the role of Scots settlers, who having been dispersed from their homes via clearances, were singularly keen in inflicting the same upon Aboriginals.
    â€˜The Highlander’s Revenge’ comprises two stories, a memoir of genocide, and the reaction to it from an audience; yarners around the fire in a bush hotel.
    The convention of oral narratives, as with the Canterbury Tales , was used in contemporary Australian writing. One instance was the pseudonymous ‘William Burrows’ whose 1859 memoir, Adventures of a Mounted Trooper in the Australian Constabulary was published in London by Routledge, Warne, and Routledge. Another appeared in the Christmas 1865 issues of the AJ , at a time when Ellen was a major writer for the magazine. It seems likely the ‘The Highlander’s Revenge’ was written for the series, and possibly rejected as too strong meat.
    It is interesting that part of the story was reprinted in the Gippsland Times (10 Oct. 1867, 4); the incident described being apparently recognisable. Missing are the worst of the atrocities, and the frame story, which shows the audience reaction. The listeners range from supportive to being utterly appalled; bloodthirsty to anguished white liberal, in our terms.
    What was Ellen’s position on the issue? In this subtly-nuanced story, watch how the murder of the speaker’s uncle is paralleled with the treatment of an old black man; a point at which the speaker seems to lose all vestige of his civilisation. She first engages reader sympathy and then lets the narrator’s own words damn him utterly, a powerful act of alienation. A very sophisticated writer can be seen at work here.
    This skilled story apparently drew little attention; the Gippsland reprint apart. After 1868 it is impossible to trace Ellen’s publications, although in September 1869 her name appeared in a list of contributors to the AJ . She may have continued writing anonymously, or working as an editor, for on an 1874 application form she coyly stated her profession as “Connected with literature”. Most likely she was writing the women’s content of the AJ . 36
    In 1874 Ellen applied to rejoin the State Education system, which sent her to Kangaroo Flat, near Bendigo. At this point her story repeats itself, becoming again a tale of bureaucracy, intransigence, and jerrybuilt school buildings.
    This school consisted of an eccentric but sound brick building, for the use of the male teachers and students; and for the females a weatherboard ‘lean-to’ which Ellen described as: “wet, ill-ventilated and dilapidated”. Conditions were so bad, she claimed, that “pools of water stood on the floor, and the chalk was literally washed off the black-boards”. 37
    The leaky classroom was not the only cause of stress, another being the Head Teacher, John Burston. Prior to Ellen’s appointment as first assistant he had expressed a bias against female teachers, and suggested that the job go to his brother Harry, who also taught at the school. The arrival of a middle-aged woman with a strong personality would not have impressed him. 38
    The situation was physically and mentally unpleasant for Ellen. She had not been given a teaching certificate, despite her previous experience, and was being paid at the lowest rate of salary for her position. Burston was trying to get rid of her, and it seemed she would soon be dismissed, as both he and the School Inspector found her teaching unsatisfactory. However, events took a dramatic turn. 39
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