THREE FAMOUS CITIES IN THE STREETS OF GENOA BY CHARLES DICKENS The great majority of the streets are as narrow as any thoroughfare can well be, where people (even Italian people) are supposed to live and walk about; being mere lanes, with here and there a kind of well, or breathing-place. The houses are immensely high, painted in all sorts of colors, and are in every stage and state of damage, dirt,... more...

Once upon a time there were three little kittens, and their names were Mittens, Tom Kitten, and Moppet. They had dear little fur coats of their own; and they tumbled about the doorstep and played in the dust. But one day their mother—Mrs. Tabitha Twitchit—expected friends to tea; so she fetched the kittens indoors, to wash and dress them, before the fine company arrived. First she scrubbed their... more...

FOREWORD When considering the manuscript of "The Blue Envelope" my publisherswrote me asking that I offer some sort of proof that the experiences ofMarian and Lucile might really have happened to two girls so situated.My answer ran somewhat as follows: Alaska, at least the northern part of it, is so far removed from the rest of this old earth that it is almost as distinct from it as is the... more...

THE MOVING Peggy, with flying yellow hair, was climbing the high stepladder in the library, getting down books for her mother to pack. She skipped up the stepladder as joyously as a kitten climbs a tree. Everything about Peggy seemed alive, from her gray eyes that met one’s glance so fearlessly, to her small feet that danced about the room between her trips up and down the stepladder. Her skirts were... more...

I.—THE PERSONS OF THE TALE. After the 32nd chapter of Treasure Island, two of the puppets strolled out to have a pipe before business should begin again, and met in an open place not far from the story. “Good-morning, Cap’n,” said the first, with a man-o’-war salute, and a beaming countenance. “Ah, Silver!” grunted the other.  “You’re in a bad way, Silver.” “Now, Cap’n... more...

ROSES AND ROSES. TOLD BY JACK. WHEN papa said positively that only Phil could go to college, we all felt so badly for Felix that we held a council in the schoolroom that very afternoon. At least, six of us did; the other four had been ruled out by Felix, who declared that "kids were not allowed in council." Paul and Mädel didn't mind so much,—they're the twins, they're only... more...

Daniel Boone. In all notices of border life, the name of Daniel Boone appears first—as the hero and the father of the west. In him were united those qualities which make the accomplished frontiersman—daring, activity, and circumspection, while he was fitted beyond most of his contemporary borderers to lead and command. Daniel Boone was born either in Virginia or Pennsylvania, and at an early age... more...

You know a murderer preys on your household—lives with you—depends on you—and you have no defence! Death wore the seeming of a battered Chevrolet. The child's scream and the screech of rubber on concrete knifed through two seconds of time before snapping, like a celery stalk of sound, into aching silence. The silence of limbo, called into being for the space of a slow heartbeat. Then the... more...

A LETTER, &c. Micmaki-Country, March 27, 1755. SIR, I should long before now have satisfied you in those points of curiosity you expressed, concerning the savages amongst whom I have so long resided, if I could have found leisure for it. Literally true it is, that I have no spare time here, unless just in the evening, and that not always. This was my case too in Louisbourg; and I do not doubt but... more...

The sun was sinking low beyond the ford of the foaming Platte. The distant bluffs commanding the broad valley of the Sweetwater stood sharp and clear against the westward skies. The smoke from the camp-fires along the stream rose in misty columns straight aloft, for not so much as a breath of breeze had wafted down from the far snow fields of Cloud Peak, or the sun-sheltered rifts of the Big Horn. The... more...