General Books

The Manor of Stoke, with its magnificent mansion and picturesque park, is situate near the village of Stoke Pogeys, in the county of Buckingham, four miles north-west of Windsor. About two miles distant from Stoke lies the village of Slough, rendered famous by the residence of the celebrated astronomer, Sir William Herschel, and a short way further, on a gentle slope continued the whole way from Stoke,... more...

Jacob Jones was clerk in a commission store at a salary of five hundred dollars a year. He was just twenty-two, and had been receiving this salary for two years. Jacob had no one to care for but himself; but, somehow or other, it happened that he did not lay up any money, but, instead, usually had from fifty to one hundred dollars standing against him on the books of his tailors. "How much money... more...

OUR NATIONAL ANNIVERSARY. BY BENSON J. LOSSING. ON the morning of a brilliant day in October, 1760, the heir apparent to the British throne and his groom of the stole, were riding on horseback near Kew Palace, on the banks of the Thames. The heir was George, son of the deceased Frederick, Prince of Wales; the groom was John Stuart, Earl of Bute, an impoverished descendant of an ancient Scottish... more...

While living in the neighborhood of Chelsea, we determined to look upon the few broken walls that once inclosed the residence of Sir Thomas More, a man who, despite the bitterness inseparable from a persecuting age, was of most wonderful goodness as well as intellectual power. We first read over the memories of him preserved by Erasmus, Hoddesdon, Roper, Aubrey, his own namesake, and others. It is... more...

ABRAHAM LINCOLN. Edited by Ida M. Tarbell. II. LIFE IN INDIANA.—REMOVAL TO ILLINOIS.—LINCOLN STARTS OUT IN LIFE FOR HIMSELF AT TWENTY-ONE.—THE BUILDING OF THE FLATBOAT AND THE TRIP TO NEW ORLEANS.—LINCOLN HIRES OUT AS A GROCERY CLERK IN NEW SALEM.—HIS FIRST VOTE. INDIANA REMINISCENCES OF LINCOLN. Abraham Lincoln grew to manhood in Southern Indiana. When he reached Spencer County in 1816, he... more...

ELLEN TERRY The first time that there was any talk of my going to America was, I think, in 1874, when I was playing in "The Wandering Heir." Dion Boucicault wanted me to go, and dazzled me with figures, but I expect the cautious Charles Reade influenced me against accepting the engagement. When I did go, in 1883, I was thirty-five and had an assured position in my profession. It was the first... more...

But I had known all about him before that. As little boys, we had by heart, in those days, the song which saved “Old Ironsides” from destruction. That was the pet name of the frigate “Constitution,” which was a pet Boston ship, because she had been built at a Boston shipyard, had been sailed with Yankee crews, and, more than once, had brought her prizes into Boston Harbor. We used to spout at... more...

Cassidy gazed long and blankly across the desert. "Wot a life!" he muttered grimly. "Say, wot a life this is!" Cassidy made the words by putting his tongue against his set teeth and forcibly wrenching the sounds out by the roots. The words had been a long time in the making, but now, because of the infinite sourness of their birth and because of the acrid grinding and gritting that had... more...

LINCOLN'S FIRST EXPERIENCES IN ILLINOIS. T was in March, 1830, when Abraham Lincoln was twenty-one years of age, that he moved from Indiana to Macon County, Illinois. He spent his first spring in the new country helping his father settle. In the summer of that year he started out for himself, doing various kinds of rough farm work in the neighborhood until March of 1831, when he went to Sangamon... more...

LINCOLN'S LIFE AT NEW SALEM FROM 1832 TO 1836. BERRY AND LINCOLN'S GROCERY.—A SET OF BLACKSTONE'S COMMENTARIES.—BERRY AND LINCOLN TAKE OUT A TAVERN LICENSE.—THE POSTMASTER OF NEW SALEM IN 1833.—LINCOLN BECOMES DEPUTY SURVEYOR.—THE FAILURE OF BERRY AND LINCOLN.—ELECTIONEERING IN ILLINOIS.—LINCOLN CHOSEN ASSEMBLYMAN.—BEGINS TO STUDY LAW.—THE ILLINOIS STATE LEGISLATURE IN... more...