Family Books

I. Hatty Lee had been on a visit to her grandmother, and now she was coming home. Mrs. Lee had hard work that morning to keep her young people in order, for Hatty was a favorite with her brothers and sister, and they were wild with delight at the idea of seeing her again. Hatty was only ten years of age, and Marcus, her brother, thought because he was two years older he was almost a man, and quite able... more...

CHAPTER I A LETTER FROM GRANDPA "Bunny! Bunny Brown! Where are you?" Bunny's mother stood on the front porch, looking first in the yard, then up and down the street in front of the house. But she did not see her little boy. "Sue! Sue, dear! Where are you, and where is Bunny?" Again Mrs. Brown called. This time she had an answer. "Here I am, Mother. On the side porch." A... more...

CHAPTER I SAMMIE'S STORY They were playing on the lawn of Aunt Jo's house—the little Bunkers, six of them. You could count them, if you wanted to, but it was rather hard work, as they ran about so—like chickens, Mrs. Bunker was wont to say—that it was hard to keep track of them. So you might take my word for it, now, that there were six of them, and count them afterward, if you care to.... more...

Opens the Ball. If ever there was a man who possessed a gem in the form of a daughter of nineteen, that man was Samuel Ravenshaw; and if ever there was a girl who owned a bluff, jovial, fiery, hot-tempered, irascible old father, that girl was Elsie Ravenshaw. Although a gem, Elsie was exceedingly imperfect. Had she been the reverse she would not have been worth writing about. Old Ravenshaw, as his... more...

CHAPTER I 'HASTE TO THE WEDDING' 'Wooed and married and a'.' 'Edith!' said Margaret, gently, 'Edith!' But, as Margaret half suspected, Edith had fallen asleep. She lay curled up on the sofa in the back drawing-room in Harley Street, looking very lovely in her white muslin and blue ribbons. If Titania had ever been dressed in white muslin and blue ribbons,... more...

CHAPTER I BUNNY IS UPSIDE DOWN "Grandpa, where are you going now?" asked Bunny Brown. "And what are you going to do?" asked Bunny Brown's sister Sue. Grandpa Brown, who was walking down the path at the side of the farmhouse, with a basket on his arm, stood and looked at the two children. He smiled at them, and Bunny and Sue smiled back, for they liked Grandpa Brown very much, and... more...

Morning in the Grifoni Palace. Near the banks of the river Arno, in an upper room of the beautiful old palace of the Grifoni family, Beppina, the twelve-year-old daughter of the Marchese, lay peacefully sleeping. In his own room across the hall from hers, Beppo, her twin brother, slept also, though it was already early dawn of Easter Saturday in the city of Florence, and both children had meant to be... more...

CHAPTER 1. THE PSAMMEAD There were once four children who spent their summer holidays in a white house, happily situated between a sandpit and a chalkpit. One day they had the good fortune to find in the sandpit a strange creature. Its eyes were on long horns like snail's eyes, and it could move them in and out like telescopes. It had ears like a bat's ears, and its tubby body was shaped like... more...

CHAPTER I ASTOUNDING NEWS FROM THE SHORE "This is most astounding news!" exclaimed Captain Horatio Passford. It was on the deck of the magnificent steam-yacht Bellevite, of which he was the owner; and with the newspaper, in which he had read only a few of the many head-lines, still in his hand, he rushed furiously across the deck, in a state of the most intense agitation. It would take more... more...

Chapter One. This family was not only Thorogood but thorough-going. The father was a blacksmith, with five sons and one daughter, and he used to hammer truth into his children’s heads with as much vigour as he was wont to hammer the tough iron on his anvil; but he did it kindly. He was not a growly-wowly, cross-grained man, like some fathers we know of—not he. His broad, hairy face was like a sun,... more...