I've written a small python script to convert ArcView 3.x Legends (.AVL) to QGIS styles (.QML):
https://github.com/snorfalorpagus/avl2qml
You can download the current version here:
https://github.com/snorfalorpagus/avl2qml/archive/master.zip
To use: python avl2qml.py pathtothe.avl > pathtothenew.qml
It's only had limited testing, but I've had some good results with it.