R. M. Ballantyne
Author
Language
English
Description
Excerpt: "Fred Temple was a tall, handsome young fellow of about five-and-twenty. He had a romantic spirit, a quiet gentlemanly manner, a pleasant smile, and a passionate desire for violent exercise. To look at him you would have supposed that he was rather a lazy man, for all his motions were slow and deliberate. He was never in a hurry, and looked as if it would take a great deal to excite him. But those who knew Fred Temple well used to say that...
22) Rivers of Ice
Author
Language
English
Description
Excerpt: "On a certain summer morning, about the middle of the present century, a big bluff man, of seafaring aspect, found himself sauntering in a certain street near London Bridge. He was a man of above fifty, but looked under forty in consequence of the healthful vigor of his frame, the freshness of his saltwater face, and the blackness of his shaggy hair."
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "Everyone has heard of those ponies-those shaggy, chubby, innocent-looking little creatures-for which the world is indebted, we suppose, to Shetland. Well, once on a time, one of the most innocent looking, chubbiest, and shaggiest of Shetland ponies-a dark brown one-stood at the door of a mansion in the west-end of London. It was attached to a wickerwork vehicle, which resembled a large clothesbasket on small wheels. We do not mean, of...
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "Old Ravenshaw, as his familiars styled him, was a settler, if we may use such a term in reference to one who was, perhaps, among the most unsettled of men. He had settled with his family on the banks of the Red River. The colony on that river is now one of the frontier towns of Canada. At the time we write of, it was a mere oasis in the desert, not even an offshoot of civilisation, for it owed its existence chiefly to the fact that retiring...
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "There is a particular spot in those wild regions which lie somewhere near the northern parts of Baffin's Bay, where Nature seems to have set up her workshop for the manufacture of icebergs, where Polar bears, in company with seals and Greenland whales, are wont to gambol, and where the family of Jack Frost may be said to have taken permanent possession of the land. One winter day, in the early part of the eighteenth century, a solitary...
Author
Language
English
Description
Excerpt: "Davy was a fisher boy; and Davy was a very active little boy; and Davy wanted to go to sea. His father was a fisherman, his grandfather had been a fisherman, and his great-grandfather had been a fisherman: so we need not wonder much that little Davy took to the salt water like a fish. When he was very little he used to wade in it, and catch crabs in it, and gather shells on the shore, or build castles on the sands. Sometimes, too, he fell...
29) The Hot Swamp
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "Nearly two thousand seven hundred years ago-or some-where about eight hundred years BuCu-there dwelt a Phoenician sea-captain in one of the eastern sea-ports of Greece-known at that period, or soon after, as Hellas. This captain was solid, square, bronzed, bluff, and resolute, as all sea captains are-or ought to be-whether ancient or modern. He owned, as well as commanded, one of those curious vessels with one mast and a mighty square-sail,...
Author
Language
English
Description
The Garret and the Garden by R. M. Ballantyne is a children's story about a young boy who moves from the city to the country. He is initially excited to be living in a house with a garden, but he quickly becomes bored since he doesn't know how to garden. He learns to garden from his elderly neighbor, and he eventually comes to love gardening.
Author
Language
English
Description
In this story, the follow-up look at what happened with the escaped mutineers of the famous ship the H.M.S. Bounty. It begins with a recounting of the famous mutiny and the casting adrift of Captain Bligh instigated by Fletcher Christian and his comrades due to severe treatment of the men by the infamous Captain. After a brief stay on the island of Otaheite the mutineers finally resolve to find an uninhabited remote island to spend the rest of their...
Author
Language
English
Description
Skipping Rabbit is the daughter of Bounding Bull. Then, observing another gleam of surprise and triumph on the chief's face, she added quickly, "and the Blackfoot knows that Bounding Bull and his tribe are very strong, very courageous, and very revengeful. If Moonlight and Skipping Rabbit are not sent home at once, there will be war on the mountains and the plains, for Whitewing, the great chief of the prairies, is just now in the camp of Bounding...
Author
Language
English
Description
When Bill was a baby-a round-faced, large-eyed, fat-legged baby, as unlike to the bronzed, whiskered, strapping seaman who went by the name of "Fighting Bill" as a jackdaw is to a marlinespike-when Bill was a baby, his father used to say he was just cut out for a sailor; and he was right, for the urchin was overflowing with vigor and muscular energy. He was utterly reckless, and very earnest-we might almost say desperately earnest. Whatever he undertook...
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "On a dark November afternoon, not many years ago, Captain Boyns sat smoking his pipe in his own chimney-corner, gazing with a somewhat anxious expression at the fire. There was cause for anxiety, for there raged at the time one of the fiercest storms that ever blew on the shores of England. The wind was howling in the chimney with wild fury; slates and tiles were being swept off the roofs of the fishermen's huts and whirled up into the...
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): "After becoming acquainted with gun-cotton, nitroglycerine, dynamite, lithofracteur, and other combinations of powerfully-explosive agents, I took to searching for and inventing methods by which these might be utilized. To turn everything to good account is a desire, which I cannot resist. Explosives naturally drew my attention to mines-tin-mines, coalmines, and other commercial enterprises. They also suggested war and torpedoes. At that...
Author
Language
English
Description
(Excerpt): ""Well, Jeff, what do you think of doing?" asked that austere relative, two days after the funeral. "Of course at your age you can't carry on the school alone." "Of course not," answered the boy, with a suppressed sob. "What say you to entering my office and becoming a lawyer, Jeff?" "Thanks, uncle, I'd rather not." "What will you do, then?" demanded the uncle, somewhat offended at this flat rejection of his proposal. The lad thought for...
Author
Language
English
Description
On a small island in the heart of the Pacific, a colony of settlers receives a visit from a mysterious man known as the Sandal Wood trader. Some say he's a pirate while others believe he is exactly what he claims-a harmless trader. Join Henry, Bumpus, Reverend Mason, and a host of other memorable characters as they unravel the mystery of who this trader really is. Are the settlers about to be robbed and destroyed? Or, is this man's assistance necessary...