CHAPTER I. Jacky.—His brothers and sisters.—His cottage home.—What happened to the little pet-dog.—How Jacky's father forgave the wicked men of Epworth.—"Fire! Fire!" ONG, long ago, more than one hundred and fifty years, lived the hero of this book. Because his name was John, everybody called him Jack or Jacky; and by everybody I mean his dear, good father and mother, and his... more...

INTRODUCTION. The object of the following story has been to weave simple facts into form dependent upon the usages of society during the administration of Sir Howard Douglas, 1824-30. The style is simple and claims no pretensions for complication of plot. Every means has been employed to obtain the most reliable authority upon the facts thus embodied. The writer is deeply indebted to several gentlemen... more...

A High Family. “Con-found those organs!” said the Earl of Barmouth. “And frustrate their grinders,” cried Viscount Diphoos. “They are such a nuisance, my boy.” “True, oh sire,” replied the viscount, who had the heels of his patent leather shoes on the library chimney-piece of the town mansion in Portland Place. He had reached that spot with difficulty, and was smoking a cigar, to calm... more...

CHAPTER I. Along the banks of the Red River, over those fruitful plains brightened with wild flowers in summer, and swept with fierce storms in the winter-time, is written the life story of Louis Riel. Chance was not blind when she gave as a field to this man's ambition the plains whereon vengeful Chippewas and ferocious Sioux had waged their battles for so many centuries; a country dyed so often... more...

"LADY DAISY."A DOLL STORY. Little Flora's father gave her a small china doll on her fourth birthday. It was only a little one, but Flora's father said that his little girl was very small too, and he thought she could not carry a big doll yet. When Flora was five years old her father gave her a larger one, and when she was six her father presented her with a beautiful baby doll in long... more...

CHAPTER I "Well, now we've done all we can, and all I mean to do," said Alice Hooper, with a pettish accent of fatigue. "Everything's perfectly comfortable, and if she doesn't like it, we can't help it. I don't know why we make such a fuss." The speaker threw herself with a gesture of fatigue into a dilapidated basket-chair that offered itself. It was a spring... more...

Lady Clare It was the time when lilies blow,And clouds are highest up in air.Lord Ronald brought a lily-white doeTo give his cousin, Lady Clare. I trow they did not part in scorn:Lovers long betrothed were they;They two will wed the morrow morn;God's blessing on the day! "He does not love me for my birthNor for my lands so broad and fair;He loves me for my own true worth,And that is well,"... more...

A Matrimonial Hurdle. Cassandra Raynor stood on the terrace of her great house, looking over the sweep of country stretching to right and left, and in her heart was the deadliest of all weariness,—the weariness of repletion. It seemed at that moment the bitterest cross that she had nothing left for which to wish, that everything good which the world could give was hers already, and had left her cold.... more...

Chapter I. THE BEACH. A coach-and-six, as a rule, may be called an impressive Object.But something depends on where you see it. Viewed from the tall cliffs—along the base of which, on a strip of beach two hundred feet below, it crawled between the American continent and the Atlantic Ocean—Captain Oliver Vyell's coach-and-six resembled nothing so nearly as a black-beetle. For that matter the... more...

CHAPTER I. A LETTER FOR SUNNYSIDE COTTAGE. Thomas Dawson was busy in the kitchen trying to make the kettle boil, and to get the fire clear that he might do a piece of toast. He had already tidied up the grate and swept the floor, and as he stood by the table with the loaf in his hand, about to cut a slice, his eye wandered down through the dewy, sunny garden, where every tree and bush was beginning to... more...