| In one of life's coincidences (and indicative of the small population of Queensland then), baby Meta grew up to marry, on 15 April 1896 at All Saints Church of England in Brisbane, Dr Hobbs' son Arthur, a solicitor who lived in Townsville.((The online Qld marriage registration B17986 gives her name as Matilda Annie; //Leader//, 25 April 1896, p.30.)) Not surprisingly, he became his widowed mother-in-law's solicitor.((M-P papers, NLA, MS 7801, Box 4, folder 23.)) Arthur's mother was Anna nee Barton,((Qld births registration B11948)) no relation to Nora but a sister of {{http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/barton-sir-edmund-toby-71|(later Sir) Edmund Barton}}, who became Australia's first Prime Minister. It says much about Nora that, when Meta married, she and Meta's eldest step-brother shared the duties that would have been TLM-P's if he had been alive. Thomas de M. M-P escorted Meta up the aisle, but it was Nora who gave her daughter away.((//Leader// 25 April 1896, p.30.)) Later in life, by 1913, Meta lived in the Brisbane suburb of Ascot.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.))\\ | In one of life's coincidences (and indicative of the small population of Queensland then), baby Meta grew up to marry, on 15 April 1896 at All Saints Church of England in Brisbane, Dr Hobbs' son Arthur, a solicitor who lived in Townsville.((The online Qld marriage registration B17986 gives her name as Matilda Annie; //Leader//, 25 April 1896, p.30.)) Not surprisingly, he became his widowed mother-in-law's solicitor.((M-P papers, NLA, MS 7801, Box 4, folder 23.)) Arthur's mother was Anna nee Barton,((Qld births registration B11948)) no relation to Nora but a sister of {{http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/barton-sir-edmund-toby-71|(later Sir) Edmund Barton}}, who became Australia's first Prime Minister. It says much about Nora that, when Meta married, she and Meta's eldest step-brother shared the duties that would have been TLM-P's if he had been alive. Thomas de M. M-P escorted Meta up the aisle, but it was Nora who gave her daughter away.((//Leader// 25 April 1896, p.30.)) Later in life, by 1913, Meta lived in the Brisbane suburb of Ascot.((Andrew Darbyshire, A Fair Slice of St Lucia. Thomas Lodge Murray-Prior, St Lucia History Group research paper no. 8, p.90.))\\ |
| When Nora wrote to Rosa Praed, she often described her children. In 1883, when Meta was a young girl, Nora described her having 'little bent towards book learning preferring outdoor pursuits of any description, but she has observation & is shrewd, going straight to the root of any question & taking a common sense, & not a conventional, view of matters... She is quite on the ground, never soars to the stars but sees what is on the ground plainly & shrewdly.'; 'Meta is Papa all over from top to toe – in deposition I mean, so trustworthy & strong & self-confident I already lean on her a great deal.' However, she suffered in comparison to her more attractive younger sister Dorothy.((Nora to Rosa, 14 March 1883 and 1884, check exact date, JOLQ))\\ | When Nora wrote to Rosa Praed, she often described her children. In 1883, when Meta was a young girl, Nora described her having 'little bent towards book learning preferring outdoor pursuits of any description, but she has observation & is shrewd, going straight to the root of any question & taking a common sense, & not a conventional, view of matters... She is quite on the ground, never soars to the stars but sees what is on the ground plainly & shrewdly.'; 'Meta is Papa all over from top to toe – in deposition I mean, so trustworthy & strong & self-confident I already lean on her a great deal.' However, she suffered in comparison to her more attractive younger sister Dorothy.((Nora to Rosa, 14 March 1883 and 1884, check exact date, JOLQ)) TLM-P approvingly repeated to a Salvation Army officer a question Meta had asked 'Why God let the Devil make her bad?' . Her father's response, at least in 1882, was to let faith develop of its own way.(Diary, 14 June 1882) \\ |