The Strange Story Book

So well did she act that the Pharaoh was completely deceived, and when the hour for supper arrived, he sat down to the table with his wounded vanity soothed and his good temper...

Left at liberty the treasurer hastened to give an account of these strange events to various bishops and cardinals, who desired that it should instantly be taken down in writing...

It was noon, on September 8, 1705, and Mrs. Bargrave was sitting alone in an armchair in her parlour, thinking over all the misery her husband had caused her and trying hard to...

Then we have all of us heard of the famous Miss Biffin, who lived at the time when James Caulfield wrote his book. She went to the big fairs round London, and had a little booth...

Owen was apprenticed by his father to a tailor as soon as he had reached the proper age, and learnt his trade thoroughly. But he hated sitting still sewing all day long, and one...

Are you fond of puzzles? I am. And here is a mystery which all sorts of people have been seeking to explain for a hundred and fifty years, and nobody, not even the lawyers who h...

'Who can the woman be that lives behind the curtain?' said the elder sister at last. 'I daresay she is not so very bad after all, and perhaps she can teach us some fresh games....

Dame Webber, not trusting her husband in the strange condition he had been in for months, had begged the young man to follow him, and though Dick had started too late to overtak...

For a while Rip was left in peace and enjoyed himself; then one day his wife broke in upon the peaceable company and scolded them for their idleness till they all fled in differ...

'Why, when did you begin to be a coward!' asked he. 'We have been over worse places twenty times, and you never dreamed of being frightened! Come along! If we are not home by fi...

When he awoke the storm had passed, and all that remained of it was a pale flash of lightning now and then. By the light of these flashes--for there was no moon--Sam was able to...

It was Hannah's first sea-voyage, but, in spite of the roughness of the life on board ship in those days, she was happy enough. England was behind her; that was the chief thing,...

Jack was now about fifteen and was famous throughout Knaresborough, which had grown quite proud of him. He had continued to practise his violin, and everybody declared that neve...

'If it is for the Prince, you must have him of course,' and waited till the sound of their footsteps died away. He then led out the other horse, which they had not noticed, and...

One day the nuns assembled as usual for vespers or evening prayers, and just as they were all going into chapel the Superior discovered that she had left her psalm-book upstairs...

When they were all assembled, the three monarchs fell on their faces before the king and his daughter, and then offered the gifts they had brought with them. The present of the...

'Your father and mother live in a salmon creek, a little way along the beach. It might be well for you to go and pay them a visit.' So the girl went, and after a time she saw he...

A pretext for his treason was soon found: it was easy for him to send over a Turkish prisoner to Constantinople, on the plea of the man raising money for his ransom, and instruc...

Now both the big and little classes had divided themselves into three camps: the 'good' girls, who would probably one day become nuns; the 'demons,' or rebels, who were always i...

Deschartres, as has been said, performed the duties of a steward of the estate, as well as those of tutor to the children, and on one occasion he left Nohant quite early in the...

Once the house had been filled with a gay family; music had floated through the garden, children had played at knuckle bones in the hall, and young men had thrown discs in the c...

_MRS. ANDREW LANG desires to give her most grateful thanks to the Authorities of the Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology for permission to include in her Christ...

Aurore became very learned about birds and their ways, considering them far cleverer than men or animals, and endowed with finer qualities than either. Warblers she held superio...

But when, half fainting from loss of blood, she was carried into the palace and a doctor was summoned, she knew that the moment she had dreaded had come, and that she must now c...