What has class to do with Australia - the working man{u2019}s paradise, the egalitarian society, where mate is as good as master? Dr Rickard shows that class is more relevant than most Australians would care to believe. The period 1890-1910 is a critical one in Australian history. In 1890 Australia was little more than a collection of provincially minded colonies; by 1910 it was a nation, poised to prove the fact in a European war. Those twenty years saw the emergence of the labor party and of the basic party system as we know it today.

The 'standard histories' of the various Chinese dynasties contain the official biographies of the important figures of the period. However, much additional information can be obtained from epigraphical and other material contained in the literary works of contemporary scholars. This is often scattered in bulky collections and is, therefore, not readily accessible to the historian. Dr de Rachewiltz and Miss Nakano have rendered a singular service to scholars by indexing twenty-three major collections of the Chin and Y{u00FC}an dynasties which are particularly rich in biographical records.

This last book of Professor Rowley's trilogy on Aboriginal Policy and Practice deals with the situation of the 'full-blood' Aborigines in the centre and north of Australia. The author refers to this area as 'colonial Australia', offering reasons including the restrictions on movement by the Aborigines, with the resultant emphasis on mission and government 'settlements'; the much lower wages paid to Aborigines in the area; the withholding of social service benefits which other Australians may obtain easily; and the power vested in officials and missionaries to control Aborigines.

The island of New Guinea is rich in vegetation varying from mangrove swamps through savanna to dense forests. Here, for the first time in one book, this vegetation is considered from the diverse viewpoints of the botanist, the ethnobotanist, the ecologist and the biogeographer.

In its challenge to look afresh at sixteen novels about the Australian experience of life - novels as different as Harris's Emigrant Family, Stow's Tourmaline, Keneally's Jimmie Blacksmith or White's Vivisector - this book adds a new dimension to Australian literary criticism. The novels range from the nineteenth century to today; their subjects are as diverse as colonial utopianism, the savagery of the convict system, the treatment of primitive peoples, war and nationalism. Yet through them all runs one universal, human theme: the search for self-understanding.

The second largest migrant group in Australia is made up of some 300,000 people who regard themselves as Greek. Not all were born in Greece - some come from ancient Greek communities in Russia, Africa and the Middle East, some were born in Australia. What they have in common is their feeling of Greekness, their loyalty to their origins, their deep concern with family ties and values. They resist marriage with non-Greeks, adhere to the Greek Orthodox religion and stubbornly preserve the Greek language and culture.

The 'outcasts' of this book are those of Aboriginal descent, mainly the part-Aborigines, living on the fringes of country towns and in some of the big cities of Australia who, because of their appearance, have not 'passed' into white Australian society. They are the rejects, legislated out of the social, economic, and political life of the nation. The book should shame white Australians. It extensively documents the grim story of human injustice to which, deliberately or unwittingly, they have subjected the part- Aborigines.

The relationship between Peking and Hanoi is one of the perplexing aspects of the Indo China conflict. Are the North Vietnamese merely the tools of the Chinese, who plan to extend their hegemony over most of Southeast Asia, or is there a genuine polycentrism among the countries in the area? By detailed analysis of contemporary material and political events, including the effects of the death of Ho Chi Minh and the ending of the Cultural Revolution, this monograph indicates future trends in terms of politics and economics that must challenge all concerned with events in this turbulent area.