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G McCrae

While the boys were away at the beach, I heard somebody shout excitedly, five or six times, and, on going out of the house, I noticed Mr McLure ahead of me, running towards the saw-pit. I followed as fast as I could and was astonished to see our dray, tipped up, with the two shafter-bullocks hanging by the bows from the pole which had become caught in a native 'cherry'.

Georgiana McRae arrived in Melbourne in 1841, only six years after settlement began. Georgiana's Journal records her observations, her reactions, and her daily experiences. Nothing is too small to be ignored: a velvet bonnet, a grasshopper plague, spring cleaning. Even the largest and most public events are drawn with humour and domestic insight.

Edited by her grandson, the poet Hugh McCrae, Georgiana's Journal is a charming--and sharp--reflection of the social life of Australian colonial settlement.