CHAPTER I. There was once, it may be now many hundred years ago, a good old fisherman, who was sitting one fine evening before his door, mending his nets. The part of the country in which he lived was extremely pretty. The greensward, on which his cottage stood, ran far into the lake, and it seemed as if it was from love for the blue clear waters that the tongue of land had stretched itself out into... more...

CHAPTER I TWO YOUNG PEOPLE, A SHIP, AND A FISH The month was September and the place was in the neighbourhood of Bridgetown, in the island of Barbadoes. The seventeenth century was not seventeen years old, but the girl who walked slowly down to the river bank was three years its senior. She carried a fishing-rod and line, and her name was Kate Bonnet. She was a bright-faced, quick-moving young person,... more...

CHAPTER I The Second Son Lady Rosemary Granton! Strange how pleasant memories arise, how disagreeable nightmares loom up before the mental vision at the sound of a name! Lady Rosemary Granton! As far back as I could remember, that name had sounded familiar in my ears. As I grew from babyhood to boyhood, from boyhood to youth, it was drummed into me by my father that Lady Rosemary Granton, some day,... more...

It should be able to stand up by a chair by the tenth month, and be able to walk alone at the end of the first year. It is important that parents should know this, since not knowing what a normal baby ought to be able to do, cases of birth palsy, or even an attack of paralysis due to teething, are not infrequently overlooked, not only by the mother, but even by the doctor, who attributes the inability... more...

The Woman of the Saeter. By Jerome K. Jerome. Illustrations by A. S. Boyd. Wild-Reindeer stalking is hardly so exciting a sport as the evening’s verandah talk in Norroway hotels would lead the trustful traveller to suppose. Under the charge of your guide, a very young man with the dreamy, wistful eyes of those who live in valleys, you leave the farmstead early in the forenoon, arriving towards... more...

CHAPTER IThe Sound in the Night UPON the moonlit stillness came suddenly a far-off, muffled, crashing sound. Just once it came, then once again the stillness of the wilderness night, the stillness of vast, untraversed solitude. The Boy lifted his eyes and glanced across the thin reek of the camp-fire at Jabe Smith, who sat smoking contemplatively. Answering the glance, the woodsman muttered “old tree... more...

CHARIVARIA. "We doubt," says a contemporary, "if the Government has effected much by refusing to let Dr. Mannix land on Irish shores." We agree. What is most wanted at the moment is that the Government should land on Ireland. We feel that the time is now ripe for somebody to pop up with the suggestion that the wet summer has been caused by the shooting in Belfast. Manchester City... more...

Current History The Maine disaster is to the public almost as much of a mystery as ever. Little of absolutely reliable information has been made known, and until something is officially stated by the court of inquiry, judgment must be suspended. The court of inquiry began the investigation almost immediately after its arrival at Havana. The sittings were held on the lighthouse tender Mangrove, and... more...

CHAPTER I. A FRIENDLY WARNING "Mary Adams, you're a fool!" The single dimple in a smooth red cheek smiled in answer. "You're repeating yourself, Jane——" "You won't give him one hour's time for just three sittings?" "Not a second for one sitting——" "Hopeless!" Mary smiled provokingly, her white teeth gleaming in obstinate good humor.... more...

CHAPTER I. THE DISCOVERY OF THE UNIVERSE The beginning of the victorious career of modern science was very largely due to the making of two stimulating discoveries at the close of the Middle Ages. One was the discovery of the earth: the other the discovery of the universe. Men were confined, like molluscs in their shells, by a belief that they occupied the centre of a comparatively small... more...