G A Henty was a 19th century novelist, special correspondent and Imperialist. His best-known works are historical adventures. A Knight of the White Cross was published in 1896. Gervaise Tresham, the hero of this story, leaves England as a member of the Order of the White Cross of St John. Soon after becoming a knight he is made commander of a war galley. During his first command his ship conquers a Moorish fleet. When attacked and captured Gervaise is sold as a slave in Tripoli. He escapes in time to return to Rhodes and help defend its fortress.

Although the immediate results of the Battle of Hastings may have been of less importance to the world than were those of some other great battles, the struggle has, in the long run, had a greater influence upon the destiny of mankind than any other similar event that has ever taken place. That admixture of Saxon, Danish, and British races which had come to be known under the general name of English, was in most respects far behind the rest of Europe. The island was, as it had always been, -except during the rule of two or three exceptionally strong kings, -distracted by internal dissensions....

A mounted officer, followed by two orderlies, was proceeding at a brisk trot from Paris to St. Denis, in October, 1639, when he came upon a large party of boys, who, armed with sticks, were advancing in something like military order against a wall on the top of a low hill. "What are you doing?" he asked the lad who appeared to be the leader. "We are playing at war, sir. We are advancing against the fortress of La Motte. This is the regiment of Turenne." "And who are you at other times?" the officer asked with a smile. "My name is Hector Campbell, sir." "Then you are not French?" "No, sir; my...

In the present volume I have endeavoured to give the details of the principal events in a struggle whose importance can hardly be overrated. At its commencement the English occupied a mere patch of land on the eastern seaboard of America, hemmed in on all sides by the French, who occupied not only Canada in the north and Louisiana in the south, but possessed a chain of posts connecting them, so cutting off the English from all access to the vast countries of the west. On the issues of that struggle depended not only the destiny of Canada, but of the whole of North America and, to a large...

"I won't have it, Pearson; so it's no use your talking. If I had my way you shouldn't touch any of the field hands. And when I get my way-that won't be so very long-I will take very good care you shan't. But you shan't hit Dan." "He is not one of the regular house hands," was the reply; "and I shall appeal to Mrs. Wingfield as to whether I am to be interfered with in the discharge of my duties." "You may appeal to my mother if you like, but I don't think that you will get much by it. You are too fond of that whip, Pearson. It never was heard on the estate during my father's time, and it...

The reconquest of the Soudan will ever be mentioned as one of the most difficult, and at the same time the most successful, enterprises ever undertaken. The task of carrying an army hundreds of miles across a waterless desert; conveying it up a great river, bristling with obstacles; defeating an enormously superior force, unsurpassed in the world for courage; and, finally, killing the leader of the enemy and crushing out the last spark of opposition; was a stupendous one. After the death of Gordon, and the retirement of the British troops, there was no force in existence that could have...

Among the great wars of history there are few, if any, instances of so long and successfully sustained a struggle, against enormous odds, as that of the Seven Years' War, maintained by Prussia--then a small and comparatively insignificant kingdom--against Russia, Austria, and France simultaneously, who were aided also by the forces of most of the minor principalities of Germany. The population of Prussia was not more than five millions, while that of the Allies considerably exceeded a hundred millions. Prussia could put, with the greatest efforts, but a hundred and fifty thousand men into the...