The PATRIOTS

WILLIAM STUART LONG

In this eighth, absorbing volume of The Australians, new arrivals in the Colony of New South Wales, Lady Kitty Cadogan and her twin brother Patrick, cause some speculation. They are Irish and do not appear to be cast for the role of settlers or, indeed, to have the intention of seeking their fortune in the goldfields.
   The Norfolk Island penal settlement is in the process of being closed down, its inmates being transferred to the dreaded Port Arthur prison in Tasmania and Red Broome is puzzled when, at the behest of Governor Denison, he is required to give passage to the Island to the two young Cadogans, on board his frigate, H.M.S. Galah.
   The discovery of a diary kept by one of the convicts and hidden in the old prison on the Island partly clears up the mystery but involves his brother John in a daring escape from Port Arthur by four convicts, who were previously imprisoned on Norfolk Island. One is an Irishman who goes by the name of Big Michael . . .
   And in India, mutiny breaks out among the native regiments in Bengal soon after the arrival there of William and Jenny De Lancey...