ROBERTS, Morley, English novelist and journalist: b. London, 29 Dec. 1857. After study at Owens College, Manchester, he went, in 1874, to Australia, and there worked on railways in Victoria and as a sheep and cattle rancher in the New South Wales bush. Then he was be fore the mast in merchant ships, and after some experience in the quartermaster-general's de partment of the British war office and in the India office, set out again traveling, visiting in 1884-86 many of the western United States, Canada, British Columbia and Manitoba, and later the South Seas. His hardships and adven tures have lent a certain element of vigor to his stories, which are better known in England than in the United States and include (King Billy of Ballarat) (1891) ; (The Reputation of George Saxon) (1892) • 'Red Earth' (1894) ; 'The Degradation of Geoffrey Alwith> (1895) ; 'The Great Jester' (1896) ; (The Circassian' (1896; with Max Montesole), an interesting book of Eastern life;
was perhaps most talked of among Roberts' works; 'Immortal Youth> (1902) ; (The Way of a Man) (1902); (The Promotion of the Admiral) (1903) ;