FOREWORD.

There has been so much adulation lately of Australia, Australian institutions, and the Australian people by writers with axes to grind and English politicians with party ends to serve that the people of the Commonwealth have come to believe that they are the salt of the earth, and that their country is the earth. Personally, I am impatient of such credulity, and I think it is time somebody called upon the self-satisfied Australians to show cause why a little more humility and a little less arrogance were not more seemly. With a view to restoring an apparently lost sense of proportion to the press and public of the country, I have written the following pages. If in telling the truth I shame the Australian this book will achieve its object. Should a howl of indignation be provoked, then will the condition of affairs be proved worse than my pen has power to depict, and nothing will be left but to declare Australia past redemption. This is the case for the prosecution.

VALERIE DESMOND.

Sydney, July 15, 1911.

FIGURES AND FACTS.

By John Scott.

1. How to Become Quick at Figures, comprising the Shortest, Quickest, and Best Methods of Business Calculations. By John Scott. 2/6, postage 2d.

2. How to Kill Time, Catches, Tricks, Comicalities, Puzzles, etc., etc. 1/-, postage 1d.

3. How to Play Games, Cards, Dice, Racing, Lotteries, Dictionary of Gambling, Curious Wagers, How to Make a Book, etc., etc. 1/-, postage, 1d.

4. The Puzzle King, Amusing Arithmetic, Bookkeeping Blunders, Commercial Comicalities, Catches, Problems, Tricks, etc.; 2/6, postage 2d.