came to the goldfields in 1852 based on advertising that made gold seem easy to acquire. He was accompanied by his best friend, Purdy Smith, an Englishman with whom he has little in common, but is more refined than typical diggers like old lawyer Ocock and his son, Tom, and later, his older son, Henry. The fact that Mahony refuses to partake of alcohol on even a social level often causes others to dislike him. A large portion of the first part deals with Mahony's courtship of fifteen-year-old Polly Turnham, who works as a servant at the Beamish Hotel, and with his sleeping with the two plump Beamish sisters, Tilly and Jinny. The sisters are virtually indistinguishable save for their eye color, and they insist on mispronouncing Richard's surname "Ma-hon-y", though the accent is supposed to be on the first syllable. After working with her brother, Ned, and facing a battery of questions from her elder brother, John, Richard is able to marry Polly. John and his beautiful wife Emma are unable to attend when the latter falls ill. Also arriving for the wedding is Polly's older sister, Sarah. Part Two Eight chapters. The store unprofitable, Polly is displeased with the dirt floor shack Richard calls home. Richard takes up medicine at Polly's prompting and she helps Richard build a successful practice in Ballarat. John has gone temporarily mad when his wife's illness leads to her death. He was so devoted to her that he needs the children removed from his home while he recovers from his grief. Polly miscarries, and is more than happy to take in the children, Emma (Trotty, later Emmy), Johnny, and Jerry, along with Sarah. Sarah takes on a new name, Sara "(spoken Sahra)". Mahony & Polly move to a new house. Part Three Eleven chapters. Mahony begins a longstanding habit of shutting himself away reading religion and philosophy, starring with Lamarck and De Maillet, coming from a baseline of Irish Protestantism, and wanting to release God from the "dead-letterism from which the centuries had accumulated about Him" to reveal a God of mercy. Henry Ocock courts Agnes Glenidinning, whose father is in an asylum for trying to kill her. Sara is so sick of her name being mispronounced that she changes it to Zara for a more French feel. John recovers and takes toward politics with great success, and takes the children back in.