The major Melbourne bookseller Samuel Mullen regularly advertised catalogues of new publications for sale. This catalogue, issued in 1861, advertises prices for a ‘select list of new books’ published by the major London and Edinburgh publishing houses over 1860 and 1861, arranged alphabetically by author (or title) without respect to genre. Currency was evidently a paramount concern for Mullen: the yellow paper wrappers in which the catalogue was issued contain a further list of ‘the latest publications… per mail steamer’. Altogether, 153 publications are listed, including the fourth volume of Charles Dickens’ popular periodical All The Year Round, (the catalogue noting that ‘Dickens’s new tale Great Expectations is commenced in this volume’), the first three numbers of Anthony Trollope’s Orley Farm, and the fifth edition of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species.
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