Convicts & Colonials: Adulthood

Good News for the Lasses
The Moreton Bay Courier reported in November 1849 that:

The town last week was a scene of great gaiety, no fewer than three marriages having taken place. Dinners, balls (in more senses than one), and suppers were the order of the times; conviviality reigned predominant. In many portions of the village might be heard the jocund fiddler scraping away in his vocation, while the lads and lasses "troll'd the merry round," inducing even some of the old stagers to remember the days of auld lang syne. In fact, poor "Dull Care" was kicked out of Ipswich sans ceremonie, and merry Momus enthroned in his stead. I can reckon about fifty marriages which have taken place here within a (comparatively speaking) very short time; - a large number for so small a community as ours. Now if this is not good news for the girls, I know not what is.