Mister Henderson called me into his office my third day back in Tangiers. That was a day and a half later than I'd expected. Roving claims investigators for Tangiers Mutual Insurance Corporation don't usually get to spend more than thirty-six consecutive hours at home base. Henderson was jovial but stern. That meant he was happy with the job I'd just completed, and that he was pretty... more...

OUR BOOKING-OFFICE. The origin of the phrase, Le Coup de Jarnac, is interesting, and the story is well told by Mr. MACDOWALL in Macmillan's Magazine. Good, this, for "The Two Macs." In The Argosy, edited by Mr. CHARLES WOOD, there are two good most seasonable Ghost Stories, by CHARLES W. WOOD, the "Rev. F.O.W." The first is not new, as there is a similar legend attached to several... more...

I may assume, that after the terrible example given in my last chapter, you have firmly made up your mind never on any account to take service in the great army of bores. But this determination is not all that is necessary. A man must constantly keep a strict guard on himself, lest he should unconsciously deviate even for a few minutes into the regions of boredom. Whatever you do, let nothing tempt you... more...

THE RIDE. When I was a child I used to glance at the first sentence in a new book to see whether it looked interesting. If it began, "There was once a boy, who lived in a fine house," I was encouraged to go on. Now I wish to make these little books very interesting to my young readers. I want to have the words so simple that they can be read and not skipped over, and at the same time my object... more...

THE SOUL OF NICHOLAS SNYDERS,OR THE MISER OF ZANDAM Once upon a time in Zandam, which is by the Zuider Zee, there lived a wicked man named Nicholas Snyders. He was mean and hard and cruel, and loved but one thing in the world, and that was gold. And even that not for its own sake. He loved the power gold gave him—the power to tyrannize and to oppress, the power to cause suffering at his will. They... more...

ROSAMOND'S WELL AND LABYRINTH .Rosamond's Well and Labyrinth at Woodstock. For the originals of the annexed engravings we are indebted to the sketchbooks of two esteemed correspondents. The sites are so consecrated, or we should rather say perpetuated, in history, and the fates and fortunes of Rosamond Clifford are so familiar to our readers, that we shall add but few words on the locality of... more...

CHAPTER I. The American Ship and the American Sailor—New England's Lead on the Ocean—The Earliest American Ship-Building—How the Shipyards Multiplied—Lawless Times on the High Seas—Ship-Building in the Forests and on the Farm—Some Early Types—The Course of Maritime Trade—The First Schooner and the First Full-Rigged Ship—Jealousy and Antagonism of England—The Pest of... more...

CHAPTER I. Towards the close of the last century the Baron de Beaurepaire lived in the chateau of that name in Brittany. His family was of prodigious antiquity; seven successive barons had already flourished on this spot when a younger son of the house accompanied his neighbor the Duke of Normandy in his descent on England, and was rewarded by a grant of English land, on which he dug a mote and built a... more...

CHAPTER I When the Deluge Came With the coming of night, Siluk, the Storm-God, laid a heavy hand upon the cowering jungle. Now, the coming of night in the Upper Amazon is in itself an awe-inspiring event; but coupled with the furious onslaught of Siluk, the Storm-God, it is terrible. In the tropics there is not the lengthy twilight of a temperate clime; nor the fearsome splendor of the Aurora Borealis... more...

A Gold Hunter's Experience Early in the summer of 1860 I had a bad attack of gold fever. In Chicago the conditions for such a malady were all favorable. Since the panic of 1857 there had been three years of general depression, money was scarce, there was little activity in business, the outlook was discouraging, and I, like hundreds of others, felt blue. Gold had been discovered in the fall of... more...