Dot and the Kangaroo

By Ethel C. Pedley and Neralea T Dell

Dot and the Kangaroo follows the adventures of Dot, a little girl who gets lost in the bush and is taken under the protection of a kind Kangaroo. The Kangaroo, who is wise and caring, helps Dot find her way back home through the rugged Australian wilderness. This unlikely duo embarks on a wondrous adventure through the breathtaking land

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bygone Era Press
• Release date: Oct 8, 2024
• ISBN: 9781923276024

Ethel C. Pedley

Ethel Charlotte Pedley (1859–1898) was an English Australian author, musician, and conservation activist. Dot and the Kangaroo is her only published work.

Book preview

Dot and the Kangaroo

An Australian Classic

Ethel C Pedley

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www.bygoneera.com

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All original additions, including illustrations and chapter summaries, are copyright © 2024 by Neralea Dell and no portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any mean, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission from the publisher and copyright owner.

Illustrations by Frank P. Mahony

Front Cover: Neralea Dell

ISBN Paperback 9781923276000

ISBN Hardback 9781923276017

1st edition 2024.

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Contents

About the author

Preface

Introduction

1.The Kangaroo Finds Dot

2.So Thirsty and so Frightened

3.The Kookoobura and the Snake

4.The Home of the Platypus

5.The Native Companions Dance

6.Dot and the Native Bear

7.The Blackfellows’ Borroboree

8.The Chase in the Night

9.The Kangaroo’s Story

10.The Search for Willy Wagtail

11.The Animals’ Court of Justice

12.Willy Wagtail to the Rescue

13.Home at Last

Finale

About the author

Ethel Charlotte Pedley is best known as an English-born Australian author, composer, music educator and pianist. She was born in Acton near London in 1859 and at the age of 5 started to learn the piano. The family migrated to Australia in 1870s but shortly after she was to return to London and study at the Royal Academy of Music. She studied with her uncle who was a professor of violin, which she won a medal as well trained at the Vocal Academy with her famous aunt, Charlotte Sainton-Dolby.

In 1882 Ethel returned to Sydney, Australia where she taught singing and the violin. On her returned visit to London in 1988, she successfully persuaded the Associated Board of the Royal Academy of Music and the Royal College of Music to extend their examinations to Australian Colonies. She was appointed the solo representative of the Royal Academy of Music for New South Wales with the first examiners visited in 1897.

A prolific composer, writing over 200 songs, piano pieces and choral works. Her music was performed by professional musicians and choirs throughout Australia and New Zealand. She was also an advocate for music education and founded the Ladies' College of Music in Sydney, which provided training for young women in music. Pedley's music is characterised by its simplicity, elegance, and lyricism.

Ethel Pedley's legacy as a composer and educator has been recognised in Australia, with several of her compositions being rediscovered and performed in recent years. Her music remains an important part of Australia's cultural heritage. Her compositions often featured themes of Australian landscape, folk songs, and stories from Indigenous Australian culture. She was also known for her arrangements of traditional English songs and hymns.

A believer in the conservation of the Australia flora and fauna, she wrote Dot and the Kangaroo from this perspective of the disconnect from nature and wildlife. Her trips to her brother's property (Arthur) near Walgett is also thought to have a large in influence in her only published book in 1898. At aged 39, Ethel was stuck with cancer and passed way at the Darlinghurst home on the 6th of August 1898. The book was published as a posthumously a year after her death. As well her brother set up the Ethel Pedley memorial travelling scholarship for music students.

Her children's book Dot and the Kangaroo has become an Australian classic. It has been read by many generations since its first publication of the story of a girl called Dot who lost her way in the Australian outback and is approached by a grey Kangaroo who offered her berries to eat. The book was adapted in 1924 into a stage production and then in 1977 a film that combined animation and real-life action.

by Neralea Dell

Preface

To the children of Australia

in the hope of enlisting their sympathies

for the many beautiful, amiable and frolicsome creatures

of their fair land,

whose extinction, through ruthless destruction,

is being surely accomplished.

Introduction

Dot and the Kangaroo follows the adventures of Dot, a little girl who gets lost in the bush and is taken under the protection of a kind Kangaroo. The Kangaroo, who is wise and caring, helps Dot find her way back home through the rugged Australian wilderness. This unlikely duo embarks on a wondrous adventure through the breathtaking landscapes of the bush, forming an unbreakable bond along the way. As they traverse the rugged terrain, they encounter a host of fascinating characters and experience heartwarming moments that will tug at your heartstrings. But beyond its entertaining narrative, this story holds valuable lessons and messages about our environment that are more relevant today than ever before.

The story brings to light the significance of several environmental themes throughout its narrative, emphasizing the need for conservation, respect for wildlife, and the impact of human actions on the environment. As Dot navigates the bush alongside her Kangaroo companion, she witnesses firsthand the beauty and fragility of the natural world. In a time where environmental awareness and conservation efforts are more crucial than ever, the lessons from Dot and the Kangaroo resonate deeply with audiences of all ages. The story serves as a gentle reminder of our responsibility to care for our planet and all its inhabitants, urging us to take proactive steps towards sustainability and biodiversity.

The enchanting world created by Ethel C. Pedley continues to inspire readers to cultivate a deeper connection with nature, fostering a sense of wonder and appreciation for the beauty that surrounds us. Dot and the Kangaroo encourages us to look beyond ourselves and consider the well-being of the earth and its creatures. This timeless children's story, it is a powerful narrative that imparts invaluable lessons about respect, empathy, and environmental stewardship.

Chapter one

The Kangaroo Finds Dot

Little Dot had lost her way in the bush. She knew it, and was very frightened.

She was too frightened in fact to cry, but stood in the middle of a little dry, bare space, looking around her at the scraggy growths of prickly shrubs that had torn her little dress to rags, scratched her bare legs and feet till they bled, and pricked her hands and arms as she had pushed madly through the bushes, for hours, seeking her home. Sometimes she looked up to the sky. But little of it could be seen because of the great tall trees that seemed to her to be trying to reach heaven with their far-off crooked branches. She could see little patches of blue sky between the tangled tufts of drooping leaves, and, as the dazzling sunlight had faded, she began to think it was getting late, and that very soon it would be night.

The thought of being lost and alone in the wild bush at night, took her breath away with fear, and made her tired little legs tremble under her. She gave up all hope of finding her home, and sat down at the foot of the biggest blackbutt tree, with her face buried in her hands and knees, and thought of all that had happened, and what might happen yet.

It seemed such a long, long time since her mother had told her that she might gather some bush flowers while she cooked the dinner, and Dot recollected how she was bid not to go out of sight of the cottage. How she wished now she had remembered this sooner! But whilst she was picking the pretty flowers, a hare suddenly started at her feet and sprang away into the bush, and she had run after it. When she found that she could not catch the hare, she discovered that she could no longer see the cottage. After wandering for a while she got frightened and ran, and ran, little knowing that she was going further away from her home at every step.

Where she was sitting under the blackbutt tree, she was miles away from her father’s selection, and it would be very difficult for anyone to find her. She felt that she was a long way off, and she began to think of what was happening at home. She remembered how, not very long ago, a neighbour’s little boy had been lost, and how his mother had come to their cottage for help to find him, and that her father had ridden off on the big bay horse to bring men from all the selections around to help in the search. She remembered their coming back in the darkness; numbers of strange men she had never seen before. Old men, young men, and boys, all on their rough-coated horses, and how they came indoors, and what a noise they made all talking together in their big deep voices. They looked terrible men, so tall and brown and fierce, with their rough bristly beards; and they all spoke in such funny tones to her, as if they were trying to make their voices small.

During many days, these men came and went, and every time they were more sad, and less noisy. The little boy’s mother used to come and stay, crying, whilst the men were searching the bush for her little son. Then, one evening, Dot’s father came home alone, and both her mother and the little boy’s mother went away in a great hurry. Then, very late, her mother came back crying, and her father sat smoking by the fire looking very sad, and she never saw that little boy again, although he had been found.

She wondered now if all these rough, big men were riding into the bush to find her, and if, after many days, they would find her, and no one ever see her again. She seemed to see her mother crying, and her father very sad, and all the men very solemn. These thoughts made her so miserable that she began to cry herself.

Dot does not know how long she was sobbing in loneliness and fear, with her head on her knees, and with her little hands covering her eyes so as not to see the cruel wild bush in which she was lost. It seemed a long time before she summoned up courage to uncover her weeping eyes, and look once more