The children and the pictures

One evening the children were gathered in the drawing-room, and Miss Ross sat among them working at her tambour frame. She wore a slender gold thimble set with corals, and in a...

_I saw these glassy messengers of pain Drench her cheeks damask in a watery rout, Of salty rush and follow. Till one, A Laggard in its sorry chase Gather’d more slowly on the ch...

_If there were dreams to sell What would you buy? Some cost a passing bell Some a light sigh. That shakes from Life’s full crown Only a rose-leaf down, If there were dreams to s...

“Whether you like it or not, depends on what you require in a picture.” Robert Mayne was speaking to a circle of friends. “If you like narrative in a picture, then you will like...

_Under the salt sea’s foam it lay, At the outermost point of a rocky bay, A sandy, tide-pooly, cliff-bound cove With a red-roofed fishing village above Of irregular cottages per...

The dusk was falling, and the great limbs of the elms in St. James’ Park stood leafless and black against the sombre twilight. Flocks of white seagulls circled among them. It wa...

_Forsooth the present we must give To that which cannot pass away, All beauteous things for which we live By laws of time and space, decay. But oh, the very reason why I clasp t...

_One I have marked, the happiest guest In all this covert of the best: Hail to thee, far above the rest In joy of voice and pinion! Thou, Linnet! in thy green array, Presiding s...

_Below, the open space through every nook, Of the wide area twinkles, is alive With heads; the midway region and above Is thronged with staring pictures and huge scrolls, Dumb p...

The Manor-house was a small gabled building, set deep among orchards and lush grass. It was built of flint and stone in chequers, and was one of those buildings (you see them cl...

Two days later there were few people situated more uncomfortably than Oliver Charlock, of the “Mariner’s Rest.” For he was in a hamper, a variety of sail-cloth, and oddments of...

For news spreads quickly in a household of children, and rumour had it that Mrs. Inchbald was sitting in the drawing-room, and an idea of stories was about. Clare met Bimbo here...

_There is no private house in which people can enjoy themselves so well, as at a capital tavern. Let there be ever so great plenty of good things, ever so much grandeur, ever so...

One day the children went on a long expedition with Freedom. It was to a neighbouring race meeting. They started in the early morning, and it was a treat to them to escape for o...

It was not long before Robin’s pretty red coat had a good many holes in it. The lace was torn away from his throat and his flying cape, and that delightful little hat of his had...

Faith had finished her story, and looked up. It was surely some time since Martin had moved away? She looked round and found she did not recognise her surroundings: wandering al...

The days passed happily for the children in their almost daily companionship of the old woman. They liked to work for her. They would clean the cottage, or wash the china, hangi...

_How can a bird that is born for joy Sit in a cage and sing? How can a child when fears annoy But droop his tender wing And forget his youthful spring?_

I dreamed I was in a great garden full of flowers, and beautiful trees. The lawns were smooth, with never a daisy to break the green of them, and the shadows in the moonlight la...

_Anything is worth what it costs; if it be only as a schooling in resolution, energy, and devotedness; regrets are the sole admission of a fruitless business; they show the bad...

_Five and twenty ponies Trotting through the dark, Brandy for the parson, Baccy for the clerk, Laces for a lady, letters for a spy, And watch the wall, my darling, While the gen...

Soon they heard a strange medley of sounds that their beating hearts told them came from the fair. Men’s voices shouting, the sound of wheels and stirring, a clamour of many mus...

_“Who are thy Playmates, boy?” “My favourite is Joy, And he his sister Peace doth bring to play, The livelong day. I love her well, but he Is most to me.”_

_Where now are these? Beneath the cliff they stand To show the freighted pinnace where to land; To load the ready steed with guilty haste; To fly in terror o’er the pathless was...

It happened one day Granny had been longer than usual, and the children sat waiting her return. When she entered the cottage it was with a hurried step and her hood drawn over h...

The story finished, all the children bounded along the passage, laughing and leaping as they ran. They found the drawing-room lit, and a company assembled. It took Clare’s breat...

When Ratface left the “Mariner’s Rest” that evening, he walked skirting the hedgerow, his thoughts busy with a new plan. For some time he had been suspicious of Daniel Maidment,...