Juvenile Fiction Books

CHAPTER 1 The studio was filled with the rich odour of roses, and when the light summer wind stirred amidst the trees of the garden, there came through the open door the heavy scent of the lilac, or the more delicate perfume of the pink-flowering thorn. From the corner of the divan of Persian saddle-bags on which he was lying, smoking, as was his custom, innumerable cigarettes, Lord Henry Wotton could... more...

THE APPLE DUMPLING. Many years ago, there was a little old woman who lived a long way off in the woods. She lived all by herself, in a little cottage with only two rooms in it, and she made her living by knitting blue woollen stockings, and selling them. One morning the old woman brushed up the hearth all clean, and put everything in order; then she went to the pantry and took out a great black pot,... more...

Past Memories Ceasing his restless walk up and down the room, Tom Swift strode to the window and gazed across the field toward the many buildings, where machines were turning out the products evolved from the brains of his father and himself. There was a worried look on the face of the young inventor, and he seemed preoccupied, as though thinking of something far removed from whatever it was his eyes... more...

PADDY THE BEAVER BEGINS WORKWork, work all the nightWhile the stars are shining bright;Work, work all the day;I have got no time to play.  HIS little rhyme Paddy the Beaver made up as he toiled at building the dam which was to make the pond he so much desired deep in the Green Forest. Of course it wasn't quite true, that about working all night and all day. Nobody could do that, you know, and... more...

CHAP. I. ABOUT CROTCHETS. Don't be frightened, reader, at what you see on the title-page of this book, or at the head which I have given to my first chapter. Don't let the idea creep into your head, that I am going to give you a dull and sleepy essay on music. It is not the crotchets which you find in the singing-book, that I intend to talk about; I leave them to those who know more about... more...

Preface. This tale is the last from the pen of Captain Mayne Reid, whose stories have so long been the delight of English boys. Our readers may, perhaps, like to know something of the writer who has given them so much pleasure; especially as his own life was full of adventure and of brave deeds. Mayne Reid was born in the north of Ireland in 1819; his father was a Presbyterian minister, and wished that... more...

KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN. It is an advantage for an author to have known many places and different sorts of people, though the most vivid impressions are commonly those received in childhood and youth. Mrs. Wiggin, as she is known in literature, was Kate Douglas Smith; she was born in Philadelphia, and spent her young womanhood in California, but when a very young child she removed to Hollis in the State of... more...

CHAPTER I RETURNING FROM A GREAT GAME "Zip! Boom! Ah!" "Hurrah for Putnam Hall!" "Let her go, Peleg, lively now, and mind you don't upset us, or we'll use you worse than we did the football." "All right, young gents. All in? Hold fast, everybody, or I won't be responsible, nohow, if you drop off. Git along, Jack; up with ye, Sally!" And with a crack of the... more...

CHAPTER I. FOUR YEARS OLD.   In all England there is not a prettier village than Wavertree. It has no streets; but the cottages stand about the roads in twos and threes, with their red-tiled roofs, and their little gardens, and hedges overrun with flowering weeds. Under a great sycamore tree at the foot of a hill stands the forge, a cave of fire glowing in the shadows, a favourite place for the... more...

TRADITION."What can he tell that treads thy shore?No legend of thine olden time,No theme on which the mind might soarHigh as thine own in days of yore." The Giaour.—BYRON In the beginning of the eighth century Guernsey was a favoured spot. Around, over the Continent and the British Isles, had swept successive conquests with their grim train of sufferings for the conquered; but these... more...