History Books

INTRODUCTION. To many people the return of the Bradford Manuscript is a fresh discovery of colonial history. By very many it has been called, incorrectly, the log of the "Mayflower." Indeed, that is the title by which it is described in the decree of the Consistorial Court of London. The fact is, however, that Governor Bradford undertook its preparation long after the arrival of the Pilgrims,... more...

Chapter One he end of August, 1914, found me following my usual employment as second mate on a small steamboat plying between St. John's, Newfoundland, and various stations on the coast of Labrador. The news from the front aroused my patriotism, and though my captain, who was a Britisher through and through, strongly urged me to remain with him because of the great difficulty of securing another... more...

CHAPTER I CANADA IN 1672 The Canada to which Frontenac came in 1672 was no longer the infant colony it had been when Richelieu founded the Company of One Hundred Associates. Through the efforts of Louis XIV and Colbert it had assumed the form of an organized province.[] Though its inhabitants numbered less than seven thousand, the institutions under which they lived could not have been more elaborate... more...

CHAPTER I. Condition of the Persians under the Successors of Alexander—under the Arsacidce. Favor shown them by the latter—allowed to have Kings of their own. Their Religion at first held in honor. Power of their Priests. Gradual Change of Policy on the part of the Parthian Monarchs, and final Oppression of the Magi. Causes which produced the Insurrection of Artaxerxes. "The Parthians had been... more...

PREFACE. The events recounted in this book group themselves in the main about a single figure, that of Count Frontenac, the most remarkable man who ever represented the crown of France in the New World. From strangely unpromising beginnings, he grew with every emergency, and rose equal to every crisis. His whole career was one of conflict, sometimes petty and personal, sometimes of momentous... more...

The settlement of New Milford began in 1707, exactly a century after that of Jamestown, Va. At that time, although Milford and Stratford at the mouth of the Housatonic had been settled almost seventy years, and the river afforded a convenient highway into the interior, for much of the distance, this place, only thirty miles from the north shore of Long Island Sound, was still beyond the extreme... more...

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH. There is still preserved a letter from England, written in a fine hand, with red ink, dated Obeydon? Feb. 5, 1641, and directed, “to her very loveing sonneSamuel Boreman,Ipswich in New Englandgive this withhaste.” The letter is as follows: “Good sonne, I have receaved your letter: whereby I understand that you are in good health, for which I give God thanks, as we are... more...

Richard Hakluyt, notwithstanding the Dutch look of his name, was of a good British stock, from Wales or the Welsh borders. At the beginning of the fourteenth century an ancestor of his, Hugo Hakelute, sat in Parliament as member for Leominster. Richard Hakluyt, born about five years before the accession of Queen Elizabeth, was a boy at Westminster School, when visits to a cousin in the Middle Temple,... more...

CHAPTER 1.Plan of the Expedition.Outfit and Occurrences to the time of leaving England.Description of the Breadfruit.1787. The King having been graciously pleased to comply with a request from the merchants and planters interested in his Majesty's West India possessions that the breadfruit tree might be introduced into those islands, a vessel proper for the undertaking was bought and taken into... more...

INTRODUCTION This is the first-hand story of what was done and seen and felt on each side in the battle of the Monitor and the Merrimac. The actual experiences on both vessels are pictured, in one case by the commander of the Monitor, then a lieutenant, and the next in rank, Lieutenant Greene, and in the other by Chief-Engineer Ramsay of the Merrimac. Clearly such a record of personal experiences has a... more...