Fiction Books

LESS my soul! I nearly forgot," exclaimed Colonel Jinks, as he came back into the store. "To-morrow is Sam's birthday and I promised Ma to bring him home something for a present. Have you got anything for a boy six years old?" "Let me see," answered the young woman behind the counter, turning round and looking at an upper shelf. "Why, yes; there's just the thing.... more...

There is an hour or so before the train comes puffing round the curve of the Gulf from Cordelio, and you are gone down into the garden for a while because the mosquitoes become tiresome later, and the great shadows of the cypresses are vanishing as the sun sinks behind the purple islands beyond the headlands. You will stay there for a while among the roses and jasmine, and then you will come in and... more...

CAPTAIN MANSANA CHAPTER I I was on my way to Rome, and as I entered the train at Bologna, I bought some newspapers to read on my journey. An item of news from the capital, published in one of the Florence journals, immediately arrested my attention. It carried me back thirteen years, and brought to mind a former visit I had paid to Rome, and certain friends with whom I had lived in a little town in the... more...

CHAPTER I The sound of voices suddenly arrested Captain Pott’s fork in mid-air, and the morsel of untasted salt-mackerel dangled uncertainly from the points of the dingy tines as he swung about to face the open door. Fork and mackerel fell to the floor as the seaman abruptly rose and stalked outside. The stern features of the rugged old face sagged with astonishment as he blinked at the small army of... more...

CAPTAIN ROGERS A man came slowly over the old stone bridge, and averting his gaze from the dark river with its silent craft, looked with some satisfaction toward the feeble lights of the small town on the other side. He walked with the painful, forced step of one who has already trudged far. His worsted hose, where they were not darned, were in holes, and his coat and knee-breeches were rusty with much... more...

CHAPTER I. A MUTINY. f you open your mouth again, I'll drive my fist down your throat!" The young man, or boy rather,—for he was not yet eighteen years old,—who made this very emphatic remark, was a stalwart, well-built youth, lithe of limb, elastic in movement, slender, straight, tall, with a rather thin face, upon which there was as yet no trace of coming beard, high cheek bones, and... more...

They had seen the fog rolling down the coast shortly after the Maggie had rounded Pilar Point at sunset and headed north. Captain Scraggs has been steamboating too many unprofitable years on San Francisco Bay, the Suisun and San Pablo sloughs and dogholes and the Sacramento River to be deceived as to the character of that fog, and he remarked as much to Mr. Gibney. "We'd better turn back to... more...

TED and Hubert were proud of the commission and felt that much depended on them. Ted led the way, not merely because he was past fourteen and more than half a year older than his cousin, but because Hubert unconsciously yielded to the captaincy of a more venturesome and resolute spirit. Everything was ready for Christmas at home—mince pies, fruit cake, a fat turkey hanging out in the cold—and... more...

CAPTAINS ALL Every sailorman grumbles about the sea, said the night-watchman, thoughtfully. It's human nature to grumble, and I s'pose they keep on grumbling and sticking to it because there ain't much else they can do. There's not many shore-going berths that a sailorman is fit for, and those that they are—such as a night-watchman's, for instance—wants such a good... more...

CAPTAINS ALL Every sailorman grumbles about the sea, said the night-watchman, thoughtfully. It's human nature to grumble, and I s'pose they keep on grumbling and sticking to it because there ain't much else they can do. There's not many shore-going berths that a sailorman is fit for, and those that they are—such as a night-watchman's, for instance—wants such a good... more...