COACHY. BY ELINOR VEY. The first time I ever saw Coachy she was scratching about on the garden walk, kicking the dirt out in two ways behind her, and then nimbly hitching back a step or two and staring and pecking at the hole that she had made. Every little while she said something to herself in a comical drawling tone, standing on one foot, and looking up at me with curious eye, as if wondering who I... more...

General Prescott, commanding the British forces on Rhode Island in 1777, was a petty tyrant, imperious, irascible, and cruel. He would command citizens of Newport who met him on the streets to take off their hats in deference to him, and if not obeyed, he would knock them off with his cane. If he saw a group of citizens talking together, he would shake his cane at them, and shout, "Disperse, you... more...

"Jim," said Charley, "has that dog of yours gone crazy?" "Old Nap? No. Why? What's the matter with him?" "Just look at the way he's diving in and out among the trees. He'll run full split right against one first thing he knows." "No, he won't. He's after rabbits. We're 'most to the swamp now, and Nap knows what we've come for... more...

BY MARGARET EYTINGE. Sunshine on the meadow,Sunshine on the sea;Green buds on the rose-bush,Blossoms on the tree.Two wee children singingIn a rapt delight—One as fair as morning,One as dark as night.Hymn-book held between themWith the greatest care,Though they can not read a wordThat is printed there. "Jesus, Saviour, meek and mild,Friend of ev'ry little child,Once a child Thyself, we... more...

NANCY HANSON'S PROJECT. BY HOWARD PYLE. It was in the old Quaker town of Wilmington, Delaware, and it was the evening of the day on which the battle of Brandywine had been fought. The country people were coming into town in sledges, and in heavy low carts with solid wheels made of slices from great tree trunks, loaded with butter, eggs, milk, and vegetables; for the following day was market-day.... more...

CLAUDINE'S DOVES. BY MRS. E. W. LATIMER. A few days since, as I was driving in the Bois de Boulogne with a friend, a slender, sweet young girl was pointed out to me. She was walking beside her mother, and there was a loving, tender look in her blue eyes, a shrinking modesty in her deportment, which interested me at the first glance. She was apparently about fifteen. I observed to the friend who... more...

THE NEW PUPIL. The boys who attended Mr. Morton's Select School in the village of Laketon did not profess to know more than boys of the same age and advantages elsewhere; but of one thing they were absolutely certain, and that was that no teacher ever rang his bell to assemble the school or call the boys in from recess until just that particular instant when the fun in the school-yard was at its... more...

The first beams of the morning sun were tipping with fire the jagged and icy peaks of the Wellhorn and Matterhorn, those gigantic monarchs of the Bernese Oberland, when a slender youth came out to the door of a small herdsman's cottage near Meyringen, and looked up at the sky to note the weather. "We shall have a splendid day, father," said he, after glancing all around for a few minutes.... more...

"Bal-loon! balloon! Oh, Charley! where are you, Charley? There's a balloon a-comin'." Charley's big brother Harry came running excitedly down the road, and vaulted the farm-yard fence in a state of great excitement. "Oh, Charley, come out quick and see the balloon." Charley was nowhere to be found. He had wandered off hours before to his favorite rock by the brook to have... more...

THE FURNACE-ROOM. Had Frank lain awake he would have seen a curious sight; for there are few more picturesque scenes than the "forecastle interior" of an ocean steamer at night, lit by the fitful gleam of its swinging lamp. This grim-looking man, fumbling in his breast as if for the ever-ready knife or pistol, must be dreaming of some desperate struggle by his set teeth and hard breathing. That... more...