I. What a month of March it was! And after an unusually mild season, too. Old Winter seemed to have hoarded up all his stock of snow and cold weather, and left it as an inheritance to his wild and rollicking heir, that was expending it with lavish extravagance. March was a jolly good fellow though, in spite of his bluster and boisterous ways. There was a wealth of sunshine in his honest heart, and he... more...

THE LAST SPIKE "Then there is nothing against him but his poverty?" "And general appearance." "He's the handsomest man in America." "Yes, that is against him, and the fact that he is always in America. He appears to be afraid to get out." "He's the bravest boy in the world," she replied, her face still to the window. "He risked his life to drag me... more...

The League.—War Declared against the Huguenots.—Queen Marguerite Sets out for Spa. At length my brother returned to Court, accompanied by all the Catholic nobility who had followed his fortunes. The King received him very graciously, and showed, by his reception of him, how much he was pleased at his return. Bussi, who returned with my brother, met likewise with a gracious reception. Le Guast was... more...

In his garden, Negu Mah, the Callisto uranium merchant, sat sipping a platinum mug of molkai with his guest, Sliss the Venusian. Nanlo, his wife, pushing before her the small serving cart with its platinum molkai decanter, paused for an instant as she entered the shell of pure vitrite which covered the garden, giving it the illusion of out-of-doorness. Negu Mah sat at his ease, his broad, merry,... more...

News from the Province of Filipinas, This Year, 1621 By letters which we have received from Japon this January, 1621, we heard how bitterly the persecution of God’s religion is carried on in Boxu, the country of Masamune,who has been accustomed to send embassies to Spain in past years. The spread of the holy gospel and uninterrupted preaching went on until the return of the ambassador. Hitherto... more...

The “Pampered Pet.” “There goes the ‘Pampered Pet’ again! Got its little keeper with it, as usual. Why don’t they lead her by a chain, and be done with it?” Miles stood by the schoolroom window, hands jingling in pockets, as he surveyed a prospect, sufficiently grey and drear to make any diversity doubly welcome, and at his words there came the sound of a general pushing-back of chairs,... more...

  remember some bad times, most of them back home on Excenus 23; the worst was when Dad fell under the reaping machine but there was also the one when I got lost twenty miles from home with a dud radio, at the age of twelve; and the one when Uncle Charlie caught me practicing emergency turns in a helicar round the main weather-maker; and the one on Figuerra being chased by a cyber-crane; and the time... more...

CHAPTER I: Jerry Muskrat Has A Fright What was it Mother Muskrat had said about Farmer Brown's boy and his traps? Jerry Muskrat sat on the edge of the Big Rock and kicked his heels while he tried to remember. The fact is, Jerry had not half heeded. He had been thinking of other things. Besides, it seemed to him that Mother Muskrat was altogether foolish about a great many things. "Pooh!"... more...

NAT TURNER Back 'fore the sixties, I can 'member my Mistress, Miss Sara Ann, comin' to de window an' hollerin', "De niggers is arisin'! De niggers is arisin'! De niggers is killin' all de white folks, killin' all de babies in de cradle!" It must have been Nat Turner's Insurrection; which wuz sometime 'fo de breakin' of de Civil War. I... more...

Christopher Columbus The Boy of Genoa: 1446(?)-1506 A privateer was leaving Genoa on a certain June morning in 1461, and crowds of people had gathered on the quays to see the ship sail. Dark-hued men from the distant shores of Africa, clad in brilliant red and yellow and blue blouses or tunics and hose, with dozens of glittering gilded chains about their necks, and rings in their ears, jostled... more...