Old tales of a Young Country

The narratives which follow have, with one exception, already been

published in the Australasian weekly newspaper.

They were dug out by me at odd times during a period of three years,

from the store of pamphlets, books, and records of old times, which is

in the Public Library; and in their narration, I lay claim but to such

originality as belongs to the compiler. The fact, that, being in a

measure themselves records of bye-gone days, they have tickled the

memories of old colonists, and so attracted an attention altogether out

of proportion to their literary merits, is my reason for publishing them

in a collected form.

I have done my best to secure accuracy in names, dates, and minute

particulars; but the meagreness of the early colonial newspapers, the

wanton destruction or mutilation of many of the early colonial official

documents, the jealousy with which colonial families guard the secret

histories bequeathed to them by their ancestors, and the fact that the

rude, adventurous life of those early colonial days prevented the

registration of the very romances which it induced, render it difficult

to obtain correlative evidence of many statements quoted, and have

compelled me in some few instances to accept the narrative as correct on

the sole authority of the first and only narrator.

I shall therefore be glad to receive any corrections or suggestions from

persons whom accident has furnished with fuller information than I

possess, on the subjects treated of in the following pages. MARCUS

CLARKE. The Public Library, Museums, &c., Melbourne, 30th November,

1871.