The Last Chance. A Tale of the Golden West

London: Macmillan and Co., Limited. 1905.

First edition. 8vo. 190x125mm. pp. [iv], 461, [1bl, 10 adverts]. Original blue cloth, upper cover decorated in blind and lettered in gilt. Slight rubbing to extremities and mild toning internally but otherwise in excellent condition throughout. Protected by a plastic transparent wrapper. Rare in commerce, only five copies appearing in the auction records in the last century.
Rolf Boldrewood is the pseudonym of Thomas Alexander Browne(1826-1915). Although born in London, he was largely brought up in Australia where he father, a shipmaster, had moved with the family in 1831 after delivering a cargo of convicts to Tasmania. Browne was a magistrate and a government official in the mining industry and took up writing when laid up after a riding accident. He adopted his nom de plume in 1884 taking the name Boldrewood from his favourite author, Walter Scott. Best known for the three volume Robbery Under Arms, Boldrewood wrote sixteen novels. Most of these began life in serial form in Australian magazines and whilst they rely, in part, on the tropes of exotic and romanticised adventure stories, they are today, regarded as authentic recreations of the hard life of bushmen, miners and convicts in mid nineteenth century Australia. The Last Chance is Boldrewood's final novel and is set in a gold mining community.