INTRODUCTION By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN There was once a green book, deliciously thick, with gilt-edged pages and the name of the author in gilt script on the front cover. Like an antique posy ring, it was a "box of jewels, shop of rarities"; it was a veritable Pandora's box, and if you laid warm, childish hands upon it and held it pressed close to your ear, you could hear, as Pandora did,... more...

PART I.   "God gave us only over beast, fish, fowl,  Dominion absolute; that right we hold  By his donation. But man over man  He made not lord; such title to himself  Reserving, human left from human free." MILTON. My wife and myself were born in different towns in the State of Georgia, which is one of the principal slave States. It is true, our condition as slaves was not by any... more...

A FOREWORD BY MEG. In the good old times, when "Little Women" worked and played together, the big garret was the scene of many dramatic revels. After a long day of teaching, sewing, and "helping mother," the greatest delight of the girls was to transform themselves into queens, knights, and cavaliers of high degree, and ascend into a world of fancy and romance. Cinderella's... more...

Notes on Midland County Minstrelsy. It has often occurred to me that the old country folk-songs are as worthy of a niche in your mausoleum as the more prosy lore to which you allot a separate division. Why does not some one write a Minstrelsy of the Midland Counties? There is ample material to work upon, and not yet spoiled by dry-as-dust-ism. It would be vain, perhaps, to emulate the achievements of... more...

CHAPTER I. HERE he comes! here he comes!" "He" was the "post-rider," an institution now almost of the past. He rode by the house and threw off a copy of the "Boston Gazette." Now the "Boston Gazette," of this particular issue, gave the results of the drawing of the great Massachusetts State Lottery of the Eastern Lands in the Waldo Patent. Mr. Cutts, the elder, took... more...

The Rev. Mark J. McNeal, S. J., who was one of the successors of Lafcadio Hearn in the chair of English Literature at the Tokyo Imperial University, in an interesting article recounts the following incident of his experience in that institution. "I was seated on the examining board with Professor Ichikawa, the dean of the English department... There entered the room a student whom I recognized as... more...

"It's your own choosing," said the man with the withered arm once more. I heard the faint sound of a stick and a shambling step on the flags in the passage outside. The door creaked on its hinges as a second old man entered, more bent, more wrinkled, more aged even than the first. He supported himself by the help of a crutch, his eyes were covered by a shade, and his lower lip, half... more...

INTRODUCTION Does the fact that a weak mortal sought an unprofaned sanctuary—an island removed from the haunts of men—and there dwelt in tranquillity, happiness and security, represent any just occasion for the relation of his experiences—experiences necessarily out of the common? To this proposition it will be for these pages to find answer. Few men of their own free will seek seclusion, for... more...

CHAPTER IMISS DOYLE INTERFERES"Daddy," said Patricia Doyle at the breakfast table in her cosy New York apartment, "here is something that will make you sit up and take notice." "My dear Patsy," was the reply, "it's already sitting up I am, an' taking waffles. If anything at all would make me take notice it's your own pretty phiz." "Major," remarked... more...

PREFACE 1. Whereas the war which the Jews made with the Romans hath been the greatest of all those, not only that have been in our times, but, in a manner, of those that ever were heard of; both of those wherein cities have fought against cities, or nations against nations; while some men who were not concerned in the affairs themselves have gotten together vain and contradictory stories by hearsay,... more...