Harry Heathcote of Gangoil by Anthony Trollope
Sheep-farming in the Australian outback might seem like an odd topic for Trollope, an author known best for his forensic analysis of English society. In fact, he spent some time there after his son Fred became a “squatter”. Squatters were settlers who appropriated huge swathes of uncultivated bushland, initially illegally, and later under license from the Crown. Those who possessed the necessary tenacity and acumen could amass immense wealth, enabling them to build flashy houses and emulate the landowning classes of the motherland. Unfortunately, Fred Trollope seems to have suffered a want of pluck and application, and ended up losing thousands of his father’s hard-earned pounds. ...