Boys / Men Books

A BOY SCOUT CAMP On a sunny September afternoon two shelter tents stood in a mountain valley, on the south bank of a creek which, miles and miles below, becomes the Sweetwater river. Above the flap of each tent lifted a yellow pennant, in the center of which a blue beaver stood in an alert and listening attitude, his flat tail outstretched. A campfire blazed in front of the two tents, and some distance... more...

The Diver’s Rock. Boom! with a noise like thunder. Plash! directly after; but the sounds those two words express, multiplied and squared if you like, till the effect upon the senses is, on the first hearing, one of dread mingled with awe at the mightiness of the power of the sea. For this is not “how the waters come down at Lodore,” but how they come in at Carn Du, a little fishing town on the... more...

A Home at Sea. “Here, you, Vince!” cried Doctor Burnet, pausing in his surgery with a bottle in each hand—one large and the other small, the latter about to be filled for the benefit of a patient who believed himself to be very ill and felt aggrieved when his medical adviser told him that he would be quite well if he did not eat so much. “Yes, father.” The boy walked up to the surgery door at... more...

THE STORY OF LITTLE BLACK SAMBO. Once upon a time there was a little black boy, and his name was Little Black Sambo. And his mother was called Black Mumbo. And his father was called Black Jumbo. And Black Mumbo made him a beautiful little Red Coat, and a pair of beautiful little blue trousers. And Black Jumbo went to the Bazaar, and bought him a beautiful Green Umbrella, and a lovely little Pair of... more...

CHAPTER I THE FROG HUNTERS "How many greenback saddles does that last bullfrog Max shot make, Toby!" "T-t-thirteen, all t-t-told, Steve." "Ginger! that's going some for so early in the spring season, isn't it? I'd like to get about twenty before we quit, which would make just five for each of us, Max, Bandy-legs, you and myself. And seems like we ought to knock over... more...

Chapter XV. Tom as King. The next day the foreign ambassadors came, with their gorgeous trains; and Tom, throned in awful state, received them.  The splendours of the scene delighted his eye and fired his imagination at first, but the audience was long and dreary, and so were most of the addresses—wherefore, what began as a pleasure grew into weariness and home-sickness by-and-by.  Tom said the... more...

CHAPTER I THE 'SLUG' 'Now for the Quay Flat!' said Arthur Graydon. 'I say, Dick Elliott, you cut ahead, and see if that crew out of Skinner's Hole are anywhere about! You other fellows, get some stones and keep 'em handy!' A dozen day-boys from Bardon Grammar School were going home one Saturday midday after morning school. All of them lived in a suburb which lay... more...

EARLIEST EXPERIENCES. I call it a Boy's Town because I wish it to appear to the reader as a town appears to a boy from his third to his eleventh year, when he seldom, if ever, catches a glimpse of life much higher than the middle of a man, and has the most distorted and mistaken views of most things. He may then indeed look up to the sky, and see heaven open, and angels ascending and descending;... more...

THE OPEN DOOR "Here we are at your father's feed store, Joe!" "Yes, but there isn't a glimmer of a light. Didn't you say he was going to stay here till you came from the meeting?" "Shucks! he just got tired waiting, and went home long ago; you can trot along now by your lonesome, Joe." "Listen! didn't you hear it, fellows? What was that sound?" The... more...

A MEETING IN THE BARN "All here now, Paul!" "Call the roll, somebody, won't you?" "Keep quiet, fellows, please!" "Shall I strike a match, Paul?" "Not on your life, Bobolink. That crowd of Ted Slavin's is out, looking for us. Somebody must have leaked, or else Ted was tipped off. We've got to be mighty cautious, I tell you, if we want to give them the... more...