Sisters

"Sisters" by Ada Cambridge is a novel with the underlying idea that marriage and love are not compatible. Sisters is a story of four young women, while Guthrie Carey, a young sailor, appears on and off in the tale. It reveals interesting insights into social values in 19th century Australia. The novel also shows that pride, prejudices, and class conscience make people unhappy. Excerpt: «Guthrie Carey began life young. He was not a week over twenty-one when, between two voyages, he married Lily Harrison, simply because she was a poor, pretty, homeless little girl, who had to earn her living as a nondescript lady-help in hard situations, and never had a holiday. He saw her in a Sandridge boarding-house, slaving beyond her powers, and made up his mind that she should rest. With sailor zeal and promptitude, he got the consent of her father, who was glad to be rid of her out of the way of a new wife; took the trembling, clinging child to the nearest parson, and made her a pensioner on his small wages in a tiny lodging of her own.»