For the Term of His Natural Life

A Convict in the Tasmanian Penal Colony

Marcus Clarke

• Publisher: Aeneas Press
• Year: 2026
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9785501867178
• Subtopic: Classics
• Index: Literature

An innocent man is transported to Van Diemen's Land and passes through the whole convict system - the hulks, Macquarie Harbour, Norfolk Island - and out the other side barely human. Clarke researched it in the colonial archives and interviewed survivors; it is the great Australian novel of the convict era. Fifty-seven plates from Hogarth to Holman Hunt, 1732 to 1877, fix the novel in the English social world whose courts and prisons sent its characters to the other side of the earth.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Copyright
• For the Term of His Natural Life
• Prologue.
• Chapter I. The Prison Ship.
• Chapter II. Sarah Purfoy.
• Chapter III. The Monotony Breaks.
• Chapter IV. The Hospital.
• Chapter V. The Barracoon.
• Chapter VI. The Fate of the “Hydaspes”.
• Chapter VII. Typhus Fever.
• Chapter VIII. A Dangerous Crisis.
• Chapter IX. Woman’s Weapons.
• Chapter X. Eight Bells.
• Chapter XI. Discoveries and Confessions.
• Chapter XII. A Newspaper Paragraph.
• Chapter I. The Topography of Van Diemen’s Land.
• Chapter II. The Solitary of “Hell’s Gates”.
• Chapter III. A Social Evening.
• Chapter IV. The Bolter.
• Chapter V. Sylvia.
• Chapter VI. A Leap in the Dark.
• Chapter VII. The Last of Macquarie Harbour.
• Chapter VIII. The Power of the Wilderness.
• Chapter IX. The Seizure of the “Osprey”
• Chapter X. John Rex’s Revenge.
• Chapter XI. Left at “Hell’s Gates.”
• Chapter XII. “Mr.” Dawes.
• Chapter XIII. What the Seaweed Suggested.
• Chapter XIV. A Wonderful Day’s Work.
• Chapter XV. The Coracle.
• Chapter XVI. The Writing on the Sand.
• Chapter XVII. At Sea.
• Chapter I. A Labourer in the Vineyard.
• Chapter II. Sarah Purfoy’s Request.
• Chapter III. The Story of Two Birds of Prey.
• Chapter IV. “The Notorious Dawes.”
• Chapter V. Maurice Frere’s Good Angel.
• Chapter VI. Mr. Meekin Administers Consolation.
• Chapter VII. Rufus Dawes’s Idyll.
• Chapter VIII. An Escape.
• Chapter IX. John Rex’s Letter Home.
• Chapter X. What Became of the Mutineers of the “Osprey”
• Chapter XI. A Relic of Macquarie Harbour.
• Chapter XII. At Port Arthur.
• Chapter XIII. The Commandant’s Butler.
• Chapter XIV. Mr. North’s Disposition.
• Chapter XV. One Hundred Lashes.
• Chapter XVI. Kicking Against the Pricks.
• Chapter XVII. Captain and Mrs. Frere.
• Chapter XVIII. In the Hospital.
• Chapter XIX. The Consolations of Religion.
• Chapter XX. “A Natural Penitentiary.”
• Chapter XXI. A Visit of Inspection.
• Chapter XXII. Gathering in the Threads.
• Chapter XXIII. Running the Gauntlet.
• Chapter XXIV. In the Night.
• Chapter XXV. The Flight.
• Chapter XXVI. The Work of the Sea.
• Chapter XXVII. The Valley of the Shadow of Death.
• Chapter I. Extracted from the Diary of the Rev. James North.
• Chapter II. The Lost Heir.
• Chapter III. Extracted from the Diary of the Rev. James North.
• Chapter IV. Extracted from the Diary of the Rev. James North.
• Chapter V. Mr. Richard Devine Surprised.
• Chapter VI. In Which the Chaplain Is Taken ILL.
• Chapter VII. Breaking a Man’s Spirit.
• Chapter VIII. Extracted from the Diary of the Rev. James North.
• Chapter IX. The Longest Straw.
• Chapter X. A Meeting.
• Chapter XI. Extracted from the Diary of the Rev. James North.
• Chapter XII. The Strange Behaviour of Mr. North.
• Chapter XIII. Mr. North Speaks.
• Chapter XIV. Getting Ready for Sea.
• Chapter XV. The Discovery.
• Chapter XVI. Fifteen Hours.
• Chapter XVII. The Redemption.
• Chapter XVIII. The Cyclone.
• Epilogue.
• Appendix.
• About the Author