Fiction Books

CHAPTER I. ALL ABOUT THE FLAG. "Rodney Gray, I am ashamed of you; and if you were not my cousin, I should be tempted to thrash you within an inch of your life." "Never mind the relationship. After listening to the sentiments you have been preaching in this academy for the last three months, I am more ashamed of it than you can possibly be. You're a Yankee at heart, and a traitor to... more...

A Sceptic’s Home. Look back some forty years—there was not a quieter place then than the little village of Crossbourne. It was a snug spot, situated among hills, and looked as though it were hiding away out of the sight and notice of the bustling, roaring traffic that was going ceaselessly on all around it. A little fussy stream or brook flowed on restlessly day and night through the centre of the... more...

PREFACE. This volume is an historical fiction, but the plan of it was suggested by biography, and is made to include the most interesting and picturesque episodes in the home side of the life of Benjamin Franklin, so as to form a connected narrative or picture of his public life. I have written no book with a deeper sympathy with my subject, for, although fiction, the story very truthfully shows that... more...

CHAPTER I. A FRONTIER FARM. "Concord, March 1, 1774. "MY DEAR COUSIN: I am leaving next week with my husband for England, where we intend to pass some time visiting his friends. John and I have determined to accept the invitation you gave us last summer for Harold to come and spend a few months with you. His father thinks that a great future will, ere many years, open in the West, and that it... more...

WOMAN AS GOD MADE HER. The biography of our first parents, as God made them, and described them, before sin ruined them, is very brief and truly suggestive. It is as follows:— "And Jehovah God created the man in his image; in the image of God created he him; a male and a female created he them. And God blessed them; and God said to them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue... more...

CHAPTER I. SCHOOL BEGINS. Forty years ago Mr. Savory Gray was a prosperous merchant. No gentleman on 'Change wore more spotless linen or blacker broadcloth. His ample white cravat had an air of absolute wisdom and honesty. It was so very white that his fellow-merchants could not avoid a vague impression that he had taken the church on his way down town, and had so purified himself for business.... more...

A WAGER IS MADE After the termination of a three months' struggle on the floor of 'Change, resulting in the rout of his adversaries, who had counted on an easy acquisition of his heritage in the P. & S. system, Calvert Carter was grateful for that particular armchair in the reading-room of the Racquet Club. "Those gentlemen, in banking on my inexperience in manipulations," he... more...

CHAPTER I TRUXTON KING He was a tall, rawboned, rangy young fellow with a face so tanned by wind and sun you had the impression that his skin would feel like leather if you could affect the impertinence to test it by the sense of touch. Not that you would like to encourage this bit of impudence after a look into his devil-may-care eyes; but you might easily imagine something much stronger than brown... more...

CHAPTER I "Boy, come here!" Squire Walker was a very pompous man; one of the most notable persons in the little town of Redfield, which, the inquiring young reader will need to be informed, as it is not laid down on any map of Massachusetts that I am acquainted with, is situated thirty-one miles southwest of Boston. I am not aware that Redfield was noted for anything in particular, unless it... more...

CHAPTER I AROUND THE BREAKFAST TABLE "Well, wife," said Mr. Benjamin Stanton, as he sat down to a late breakfast, "I had a letter from Ohio yesterday." "From Ohio? Who should write you from Ohio? Anyone I know?" "My sister, Margaret, you remember, moved out there with her husband ten years ago." "Oh, it's from her, is it?" said Mrs. Stanton, indifferently.... more...