Read "The Hillyars and the Burtons" by Henry Kingsley online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
GERTY didn't like England; she couldn't possibly conceive why the people in England didn't all go and live in Australia. James wanted to get as many of them as would come, over to Cooksland free of expense, and when they came they always liked it,--in the end, you would understand her to mean; for at first they felt strange, and were, Lord bless you, more particular over their rations than any corn-stalk cockatoo who might have treed his section on the burst, and come back to the shed: or than any real stringy back hand ever thought of being. She didn't see why they should not all move over together. It wouldn't do to leave the Queen behind; but she might get to think better of it as soon as she saw how much superior Australia was to England. And so she used to twitter on to old Sir George Hillyar, never allowing for the fact that, when most confidential and affectionate with him, she was apt (as above) to ramble off into fields of utterly incomprehensible slang, and to leave his close-cropped gray hair standing on end with amazement.
Gerty didn't like Stanlake. "Not very much, papa," she would say to Sir George, taking his hand in hers; "you ain't offended, are you? because I mustn't offend you, or else James will be angry with me when I go back home, and say it is all my fault. I love you, but I don't like Stanlake. George knows you are going to leave it to him, because Mr. Compton advised him to cut down the east belt. But I don't like it. It's so cold to your bones."