INTO THE WOODS Theo Swift dropped into a chair before the blazing fire in the log cabin, and drew a long breath of delight. At last his dream had come true; he was in the heart of the Maine woods! It was a wonderful experience for a boy of his age to be his father's companion on a fishing trip. Each spring when Dr. Swift had packed his tackle for his annual vacation into the wilderness, and Theo... more...

CHAPTER I. One bright day in July, 1858, two women carrying well filled market baskets, were crossing the old Hand Street bridge that spans the Alleghany River between Pittsburgh and Alleghany City, Penn. "Oh, Mrs. Boyton, do look at that child in the middle of the river paddling around on a board." "Well," said the one addressed as Mrs. Boyton, "I'm glad it is none of mine. My... more...

THE EARLY CHRISTIAN CHANTS The first Christians sang hymns. The Saviour went to His passion with a song on His lips. Matthew and Mark agree that the last act of worship in the Upper Room was the singing of a hymn. “And when they had sung a hymn, they went out unto the Mount of Olives.” How we wish that the words of that hymn might have been preserved! Perhaps they have. Many Biblical scholars... more...

CHAPTER I. The spring has come again to the hills and valleys of our home. The day awakes, a breeze moves strongly through the forest, as if its task were to carry away the lingering night; the birds begin to twitter, and here and there an early lark utters his note. Among the pine-trees, with their fresh green needles, a whispering and rustling is heard. The sun has risen above the mountaintop, and... more...

MEMORANDUM The Sacred Legends touched by this Trilogy would be familiar, in outline, to the Auditors: e. g.: The woes of the House of Atreus: the foundation of them laid by Atreus when, to take vengeance on his brother Thyestes, he served up to him at a banquet the flesh of his own sons; His grandsons were Agamemnon and Menelaus: Menelaus' wife, Helen, was stolen by a guest, Paris of Troy, which... more...

ONCE UPON A TIME. Once upon a time, there lived in a city of Asia Minor, not far from Mount Ida, as old Homer tells us in his grand and beautiful poem, a king who had fifty sons and many daughters. How large his family was, indeed, we cannot say, for the storytellers of the olden time were not very careful to set down the actual and exact truth, their chief object being to give the people something to... more...

IF any of the readers of this book should have the chance to take a railroad ride over the vast region of the United States, from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, they would see a wonderful display of cities and towns, of factories and farms, and a great multitude of men and women actively at work. They would behold, spread out on every side, one of the... more...

I. ON LANDSEER'S CHARACTER AS AN ARTIST. If the popularity of a painter were the measure of his artistic greatness, Sir Edwin Landseer's would be among the foremost of the world's great names. At the height of his career probably no other living painter was so familiar and so well beloved throughout the English-speaking world. There were many homes in England and America where his... more...

LONDON:HENRY J. DRANE & CO.Paternoster Row E.C.                  New York: E.P. Dutton & Co.         I.                  What dreams the flower cups enfold                    Within their fragrant leaves,                 Of meadow-ways grown fair with spring,                    Soft mists that April... more...

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. As the hour approaches when the legislature must deal with the Irish Land question, and settle it, like the Irish Church question, once for all, attempts are redoubled to frighten the public with the difficulties of the task. The alarmists conjure up gigantic apparitions more formidable than those which encountered Bunyan's Pilgrim. Monstrous figures frown along the gloomy... more...