About two centuries ago, in times with which we are all familiar, as they comprised a period of English history, the events of which have affected the social condition of the British people more than almost any which have preceded or followed that period--about two centuries ago, there stood upon the slope of a gentle hill, in a picturesque part of England, an old brick mansion of considerable extent, and of a venerable though flourishing exterior. On the right hand and on the left there was a wood of various trees, amidst which Evelyn might have delighted to roam, choice children of the...
About two centuries ago, in times with which we are all familiar, as they comprised a period of English history, the events of which have affected the...
It was in the olden time of merry England--not at that far removes period when our native land first received its jocund name from the bowmen of Sherwood, and when the yeoman or the franklin, who had wandered after some knightly banner to the plains of the Holy Land, looked back upon the little island of his birth with forgetfulness of all but its cheerful hearths and happy days. Oh, no it was in a far later age, when, notwithstanding wars and civil contentions not long past by, our country still deserved the name of merry England, and received it constantly amongst a class peculiarly its...
It was in the olden time of merry England--not at that far removes period when our native land first received its jocund name from the bowmen of Sherw...
It was a dark and stormy night, -a very dark night indeed. No dog's mouth, whether terrier, mastiff, or Newfoundland, was ever so dark as that night. The hatches had been battened down, and every aperture but one, by which any of the great, curly-pated, leaping waves could jump into the vessel, had been closed. What vessel? the reader may perhaps inquire. Well, that being a piece of reasonable curiosity, -although I do wish, as a general thing, that readers would not be so impatient, -I will gratify it, and answer the inquirer's question; and, indeed, would have told him all about it in five...
It was a dark and stormy night, -a very dark night indeed. No dog's mouth, whether terrier, mastiff, or Newfoundland, was ever so dark as that night. ...
At that time in the world's history when watches, in their decline from the fat comeliness of the turnip to the scanty meagerness of the half-crown, had arrived at the intermediate form of a biffin--when the last remnant of a chivalrous spirit instigated men to wear swords every day, and to take purses on horseback--when quadrupeds were preferred to steam, and sails were necessary to a ship--when Chatham and Blackstone appeared in the senate and at the bar, and Goldsmith, Johnson, and Burke, Cowper, Reynolds, Robertson Hume, and Smollett, were just beginning to cumber the highways of arts and...
At that time in the world's history when watches, in their decline from the fat comeliness of the turnip to the scanty meagerness of the half-crown, h...
The night was as black as ink; not a solitary twinkling star looked out through that wide expanse of shadow, which our great Poet has called the "blanket of the dark;" clouds covered the heaven; the moon had not risen to tinge them even with grey, and the sun had too long set to leave one faint streak of purple upon the edge of the western sky. Trees, houses, villages, fields, and gardens, all lay in one profound obscurity, and even the course of the high-road itself required eyes well-accustomed to night-travelling to be able to distinguish it, as it wandered on through a rich part of...
The night was as black as ink; not a solitary twinkling star looked out through that wide expanse of shadow, which our great Poet has called the "blan...
In writing the pages which follow this Preface, I have had to encounter the difficulty of compressing very extensive matter into an extremely limited space. As the subject was, in my eyes, a very interesting one, and every particular connected with it had often been food for thought and object of entertainment to myself, the task of curtailing was the more ungrateful: nor should I have undertaken it, had I not been convinced by my publisher that one volume would be as much as the public in general would be inclined to read.
In writing the pages which follow this Preface, I have had to encounter the difficulty of compressing very extensive matter into an extremely limited ...
There was a small, old-fashioned, red brick house, situated just upon the verge of Cambridgeshire, not in the least peculiar in its aspect, and yet deserving a description. The reader shall know why, before we have done. As you came along the road from London you descended a gentle hill, not very long, and yet long enough to form, with an opposite rise, one of those sweet, calm valleys which are peculiarly characteristic of the greater part of this country. When you were at the top of the hill, in looking down over some hedge-rows and green fields, the first thing your eye lighted upon in the...
There was a small, old-fashioned, red brick house, situated just upon the verge of Cambridgeshire, not in the least peculiar in its aspect, and yet de...
There is a small town in one of the remote provinces of France, about ten miles from the sea shore, and two or three hundred from the capital, on the appearance of which it may be as well to dwell for a short time; noticing not alone its houses and its streets as they appeared in the seventeenth century, but its inhabitants, their feelings, and their customs, at that period.
There is a small town in one of the remote provinces of France, about ten miles from the sea shore, and two or three hundred from the capital, on the ...
I wrote to you, my dear sister, from the pretty little town of Baltimore; and I hope you have received my letter. Although this so speedily follows it, my only motives for writing are, to occupy idle time, and to relieve your mind from apprehension regarding my safety during my passage through all the terrors of Chesapeake Bay: "that long and dreadful inlet," as you call it, "in which uncle Richard was shipwrecked twenty or thirty years ago." Believe me, all these dangers are imaginary.
I wrote to you, my dear sister, from the pretty little town of Baltimore; and I hope you have received my letter. Although this so speedily follows it...
George Payne Rainsford James, Historiographer Royal to King William IV., was born in London in the first year of the nineteenth century, and died at Venice in 1860. His comparatively short life was exceptionally full and active. He was historian, politician and traveller, the reputed author of upwards of a hundred novels, the compiler and editor of nearly half as many volumes of letters, memoirs, and biographies, a poet and a pamphleteer, and, during the last ten years of his life, British Consul successively in Massachusetts, Norfolk (Virginia), and Venice.
George Payne Rainsford James, Historiographer Royal to King William IV., was born in London in the first year of the nineteenth century, and died at V...
