CHAPTER I. A GREAT MISFORTUNE. It was an intensely hot July day—not a cloud appeared in the high blue vault of the sky; the trees, the flowers, the grasses, were all motionless, for not even the gentlest zephyr of a breeze was abroad; the whole world seemed lapped in a sort of drowsy, hot, languorous slumber. Even the flowers bowed their heads a little weariedly, and the birds after a time ceased... more...

CHAPTER I. "THREE ON A DOORSTEP." In a poor part of London, but not in the very poorest part—two children sat on a certain autumn evening, side by side on a doorstep. The eldest might have been ten, the youngest eight. The eldest was a girl, the youngest a boy. Drawn up in front of these children, looking into their little faces with hungry, loving, pathetic eyes, lay a mongrel dog. The three... more...

THE SCHOOL. The house was long and low and rambling. In parts at least it must have been quite a hundred years old, and even the modern portion was not built according to the ideas of the present day, for in 1870 people were not so aesthetic as they are now, and the lines of beauty and grace were not considered all essential to happiness. So even the new part of the house had square rooms destitute of... more...

CHAPTER I. BESSIE, ALICE, GWIN, ELMA. Bessie! Bessie! "Yes, mother," replied Bessie Challoner. "You'll be late for school, child, if you are not quick." "Bessie!" shouted her father at the top of his voice from below stairs."Bessie; late as usual." "I am really going, father; I am just ready," was the eager reply. Bessie caught up her sailor hat, shoved it... more...

CHAPTER I. "You have kept us waiting an age! Come along, Bet, do." "She ain't going to funk it, surely!" "No, no, not she,—she's a good 'un, Bet is,—come along, Bet. Joe Wilkins is waiting for us round the corner, and he says Sam is to be there, and Jimmy, and Hester Wright: do come along, now." "Will Hester Wright sing?" suddenly demanded the girl who... more...

THE CHILDREN OF THE UPPER GLEN. There was, of course, the Lower Glen, which consisted of boggy places and endless mists in winter, and a small uninteresting village, where the barest necessaries of life could be bought, and where the folks were all of the humbler class, well-meaning, hard-working, but, alas! poor of the poor. When all was said and done, the Lower Glen was a poor place, meant for poor... more...