The Village Champion

A very pretty village was Ogleport, stuck away off there in that fertile valley among the hills. Mountains these latter grew into within a few miles, with ravines and rocky gorg...

Mr. Ashbel Norton and Mr. George Brayton spent the evening of that day at Dr. Manning’s, and the former had an excellent opportunity for getting better acquainted with his new-f...

If Bar Vernon’s companion in the carriage during his ride up-town that morning had been Judge Danvers, instead of Dr. Manning, he would doubtless have been subjected to a sort o...

There was one man who had never been able to get Bar Vernon fairly out of his head since the first day he saw him, and that man was old Judge Danvers.

To be sure, there were a few clouds lurking along the far away outlines of the hills, but they did not seem to amount to anything in particular; not even enough to justify Mrs....

Just about the time that Barnaby Vernon sat down to his first breakfast at his hotel, old Gershom Todderley, the fat and crusty miller of Ogleport, stood, with his hands in his...

It was grand fun to catch fish; the very sailing and rowing were a kind of new life; every crab and clam they laid their hands on was a sort of new wonder. Still, if Bar had tri...

When Barnaby Vernon, at the close of his first day at Dr. Manning’s, found himself alone in the really luxurious room assigned him for the night, it would have been too much to...

This was all the easier, because the very man who had caused that gentleman’s arrest had done so without any intention of actually bringing him to any “trial and conviction.”

At very nearly the hour when Bar Vernon and Val Manning set out for that day’s fishing on Skanigo, a big, well-dressed man was standing in the front door of an “east side” hotel...

His anxiety, however, led him into a very judicious piece of extravagance. He could not think of either losing time or exposing himself to any perils by the way; and so he calle...

As he walked down-town, towards his hotel, off came the mustache, the glasses, the pin, one after another, and then even the duster was removed and thrown over his arm.

On the morning after the visit of Mr. Ashbel Norton, old Judge Danvers was opening his mail. He had spent a good part of the previous evening with Dr. Manning, and the remainder...

The evening after the “opening exercises” at the Academy, and after the sudden appearance in Ogleport of the great city lawyer, and his equally sudden departure, George Brayton...

“A bloated young aristocrat from the city,” said Zeb. “I suspect him of being one of the new boarders. The Academy’s going to ruin, Gershom. There’s your twelve dollars, with my...

The rest of that night was reasonably calm, and Bar and Val slept soundly, without any fear of trouble in the belfry, nor did they fail to promptly answer the bell for breakfast.

It was nearly a week after the beginning of Bar Vernon’s “new time,” and he had never enjoyed anything so thoroughly in all his life, that he returned to his hotel from one of h...

Dr. Dryer and his trustees did not care to remain for any great length of time after the opening of what, in their eyes, were little better than scientific toys and curiosities,...

An unusually fine-looking man was George Brayton, only his full beard and mustache, and his length and strength of limb, made him seem at least three years older than he really...

A beautiful sparkling sheet of water was Skanigo, and it always mixed itself up, somehow, with Puff Evans’s ideas of Paradise; but the Rev. Dr. Solomon Dryer could never forget...

The village of Ogleport was satisfactorily quiet, and as dark as the occasion called for, when Bar Vernon and Val Manning, with their shoes fastened to their waistbands, crept n...

George Brayton had been guilty of the most natural thing in the world that afternoon. He had spent the whole morning among his books, retorts, air-pumps, and other matters, over...

The stage-driver was getting somewhat impatient, although the delay had not been a long one, but the stranger turned for one more word with Zeb Fuller before he climbed back to...

It was towards the end of a very hot summer, and all the human population of that crowded square of the great city had spent the first half of the night in the streets. Either t...

On the return of the boys to the house of Dr. Manning, Val’s hospitable young mind had been somewhat disturbed as to how he should amuse his new friend during the remaining hour...

When George Brayton arrived in the great city that Tuesday morning, he went directly to the hotel designated by Ashbel Norton’s telegram, and neither one of them had the slighte...

Before matters at the Academy had a fair chance to settle into their customary routine, the news had passed swiftly from desk to desk and bench to bench, whispered, penciled, ch...

“Zebedee, my son,” remarked old Deacon Fuller to that young gentleman, when he returned from driving the cows to pasture, the evening after the affair at the spring-board--“Zebe...

When Mr. Ashbel Norton called on Judge Danvers, according to appointment, that Monday morning, he found the old lawyer alone in his private office, with a small, black leather v...

The results of that boating excursion were nothing short of “nuts and honey” to Mrs. Dr. Dryer. Never in all her life had she been blessed with so magnificent an opportunity to...

To say that the usual amount of sleeping was done in Ogleport that night would be to trifle with truth but, for all that, everybody was astir bright and early the next morning.

“Why,” said Mrs. Wood, “Puff Evans came to the door with them, ready cleaned, by the time we were up, and left them with his respects to Mr. Vernon. He said, too, that the boat...