Tales of the Chesapeake

"Brethren--sisters," he cried, "I cannot find my boy!" and his voice was tremulous. They gathered round him and some said that Paul had ridden away with the worldly lads; others...

"Marion," said the young man with a thoughtful face, "if I have not long ago recognized this fidelity, which, to be also frank with you, I have suspected--not because of any des...

"Uriel Basil, a page in the House of Representatives, bein' an infirm, deservin' boy, willin' to work to support his mother. Infirm boy wants to be a page, on the recommendation...

"Worshipful masters and good people all, I have been at great pains to get this stork, not for my own gratification entirely, though there are some here I expect to please parti...

"One day I ventured to Falling Waters, a reservoir which is precipitated from a cliff, called Campbell's Ridge, into a gorge of the Shawnee Mountains. The deafening roar of the...

But the boy was of such docile and beautiful nature that he excited no general antagonism. He was four removals from pure African blood, and as his mother had been a freed girl,...

"Pshaw! Arty," he said, with agitation, "everything here goes by friends. You brought with you no renown, no superstition, nothing which would entitle you to the Speaker's consi...

There was no bank at Ross Valley, but people began to say that old Jabel Blake had particles of gold in the flinty composition of his life, and that his trip to Washington had m...

"Joyce," he said, taking her hand, "this is not enough. I will not press you to betray any secret you may possess. Keep it. But of yourself I must know something more. You are a...

Robert Utie looked, and this time with a livid, sobered face, into the open pistol of the man he had provoked, the professional officer of death. The fine, cool face behind the...

Immediately our wagons are on the way. The clustering village roofs and the church spire sink down behind. We are too full of excitement to share the silence of our elders, and...

"Phosphates! phew!" shouted the great birds of this land of Lethe, as Mr. Waples' stalagmite broke off and dropped him and set him astride of an ancient pterodactyl bird that fl...

"The discovery and the trust embarrassed Minuit, but he had never denied the request of any man. His time, as his sign affirmed, was everybody's. Yet a thrill, a twang, a twinge...

"'What devil of the deep is this?' said the captain, bending forward with his blade. The sailors ceased with hot faces, and stared aghast. I seemed to hear calling voices; I gre...

"The schools are good, the brethren say, and our Church holds the wheel; The Presbyterians lost their house; the Baptists lost their zeal. The parsonage is clean and dry; the to...

Whisper, whisper, whisper! leaf and wave and grass; Look not sidewise, maiden, as the place you pass. If you hear a restless spirit when you pray, 'Tis the voice that tempted He...

The mob seemed to be fearfully incensed as Paul pushed close to the scene. There were said to be two of the man-stealers, both of whom had been very daring and successful. He he...

A fruity smell is in the school-house lane; The clover bees are sick with evening heats; A few old houses from the window-pane Fling back the flame of sunset, and there beats Th...

"The people of this region were sparse in number, but of strong, sober, and yet wild characteristics. The long boundary quarrel had made them predatory, and though God-fearing p...

The old steed darted in the fort, And neighed and shook his long gray mane; Then, seeing soldiery, his port Grew savage. With a charger's snort, Upright he reared, as young agai...

We have dreamed our last. Burst from the narrow chrysalis which we would gladly rebuild again, the seething, churning sea is before us and around us; we only catch, like the str...