Countess Kate
Charlotte M. Yonge
Excerpt:
The two little girls, who sat on the opposite sides of a little square table in the bay-window, were both between ten and eleven years old, but could not have been taken for twins, nor even for sisters, so unlike were their features and complexion; though their dress, very dark grey linsey, and brown holland aprons, was exactly the same, except that Sylvia’s was enlivened by scarlet braid, Kate’s darkened by black—and moreover, Kate’s apron was soiled, and the frock bore traces of a great darn. In fact, new frocks for the pair were generally made necessary by Kate’s tattered state, when Sylvia’s garments were still available for little Lily, or for some school child.
Sylvia’s brown hair was smooth as satin; Kate’s net did not succeed in confining the loose rough waves of dark chestnut, on the road to blackness. Sylvia was the shorter, firmer, and stronger, with round white well-cushioned limbs; Kate was tall, skinny, and brown, though perfectly healthful. The face of the one was round and rosy, of the other thin and dark; and one pair of eyes were of honest grey, while the others were large and hazel, with blue whites. Kate’s little hand was so slight, that Sylvia’s strong fingers could almost crush it together, but it was far less effective in any sort of handiwork; and her slim neatly-made foot always was a reproach to her for making such boisterous steps, and wearing out her shoes so much faster than the quieter movements of her companion did—her sister, as the children would have said, for nothing but the difference of surname reminded Katharine Umfraville that she was not the sister of Sylvia Wardour.
Her father, a young clergyman, had died before she could remember anything, and her mother had not survived him three months. Little Kate had then become the charge of her mother’s sister, Mrs. Wardour, and had grown up in the little parsonage belonging to the district church of St. James’s, Oldburgh, amongst her cousins, calling Mr. and Mrs. Wardour Papa and Mamma, and feeling no difference between their love to their own five children and to her.
Mrs. Wardour had been dead for about four years, and the little girls were taught by the eldest sister, Mary, who had been at a boarding- school to fit her for educating them. Mr. Wardour too taught them a good deal himself, and had the more time for them since Charlie, the youngest boy, had gone every day to the grammar-school in the town.
Armyn, the eldest of the family, was with Mr. Brown, a very good old solicitor, who, besides his office in Oldburgh, had a very pretty house and grounds two miles beyond St. James’s, where the parsonage children were delighted to spend an afternoon now and then.
Little did they know that it was the taking the little niece as a daughter that had made it needful to make Armyn enter on a profession at once, instead of going to the university and becoming a clergyman like his father; nor how cheerfully Armyn had agreed to do whatever would best lighten his father’s cares and troubles. They were a very happy family; above all, on the Saturday evenings and Sundays that the good-natured elder brother spent at home.
There were four of us—George, and William Samuel Harris, and myself, and Montmorency. We were sitting in my room, smoking, and talking about how bad we were—bad from a medical point of view I mean, of course.
We were all feeling seedy, and we were getting quite nervous about it. Harris said he felt such extraordinary fits of giddiness come over him at times, that he hardly knew what he was doing; and then George said that he had fits of giddiness too, and hardly knew what he was doing. With me, it was my liver that was out of order. I knew it was my liver that was out of order, because I had just been reading a patent liver-pill circular, in which were detailed the various symptoms by which a man could tell when his liver was out of order. I had them all.
It is a most extraordinary thing, but I never read a patent medicine advertisement without being impelled to the conclusion that I am suffering from the particular disease therein dealt with in its most virulent form. The diagnosis seems in every case to correspond exactly with all the sensations that I have ever felt.
Man reading book I remember going to the British Museum one day to read up the treatment for some slight ailment of which I had a touch—hay fever, I fancy it was. I got down the book, and read all I came to read; and then, in an unthinking moment, I idly turned the leaves, and began to indolently study diseases, generally. I forget which was the first distemper I plunged into—some fearful, devastating scourge, I know—and, before I had glanced half down the list of “premonitory symptoms,” it was borne in upon me that I had fairly got it.
I sat for awhile, frozen with horror; and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again turned over the pages. I came to typhoid fever—read the symptoms—discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it—wondered what else I had got; turned up St. Vitus’s Dance—found, as I expected, that I had that too,—began to get interested in my case, and determined to sift it to the bottom, and so started alphabetically—read up ague, and learnt that I was sickening for it, and that the acute stage would commence in about another fortnight. Bright’s disease, I was relieved to find, I had only in a modified form, and, so far as that was concerned, I might live for years. Cholera I had, with severe complications; and diphtheria I seemed to have been born with. I plodded conscientiously through the twenty-six letters, and the only malady I could conclude I had not got was housemaid’s knee.
The Works of Rudyard Kipling One Volume Edition
On one hand, this book had a number of short stories I had not read before. One thing I found interesting after reading several stories, was that some characters appear in more than one story. I enjoyed the stories, many of which were about life in India during the period that England ruled there.
On the other hand, it did not have some of Kipling’s “standards,” like The Jungle Book and Kim. It’s not labelled as “The COMPLETE Works,” just “The Works.”
However, I did not find it difficult to navigate, because you simply click “Go to” and it lists the individual stories and chapters. I don’t know if this is because I was reading on a Kindle Touch, but I did not have the problem that other reviewers did.
My favorite of George Eliot’s novels.
A Princess of Mars
by Edgar Rice Burroughs
North and South
By Elizabeth Gaskell
you should also watch the BBC version of the movie. Set in England during industrialization, a story with a lot of human interest and insight into human nature.
Riders of the Purple Sage
by Zane Grey
Classic western. Formula fiction, but great fun.
The prolific American writer Zane Grey was the pioneer of the Western literary genre. Grey produced well over 100 books, in which he presented the West as a moral battleground, where his characters were either destroyed or redeemed. His semi-outlaw heroes were his most enduring creation. He sold some 17 million books during his lifetime, and an estimated 100 Hollywood Western films have been based on his stories.Born with the name Pearl Grey in Zanesville, Ohio, in 1872, Zane was the son of a farmer and part-time preacher. His mother was a second-generation Danish Quaker. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a degree in dentistry in 1896 and practiced in New York City until 1904. That year, Grey wrote and self-published his first book, Betty Zane, after it was turned down by several publishers. The colorful frontier story was based on his mother’s journal and eventually became a critical success. He married Lina Elise Roth, who encouraged him to become a full-time professional writer. In 1908, Grey made a journey to the West with Colonel C. J. “Buffalo” Jones, who told him tales of adventure on the plains. This trip turned out to be a turning point in Grey’s career. In 1912, Riders of the Purple Sage was published. It sold 2 million copies and was filmed three times. Grey’s formula-in which a mysterious outlaw fights to protect the innocent and the good-shows up in many of his novels.
From a reader review:
After Riders of the Purple Sage was released in 1912, it was labeled “scandalous” by Heber J. Grant, then president of the Mormon church.
Grey reportedly lived several years in Utah, in the society of the saints, in a small cabin he built. Surrounded by Mormon guides and farmhands, he came to hear of secret blood-oaths taken in temples to which only the faithful could gain admittance. He heard of binding loyalties to a priesthood patriarchy, and of plans for the Mormon “political Kingdom of God” to eventually consume all others.
From his writing, it appears that Grey joined other 19th and other early 20th century eastern writers and editors in their moral outrage at the “patriarchal order” of the Latter-day Saints. The antebellum eastern press unitedly condemned slavery and polygamy as “the twin relics of barbarism.”
Set in 1872 in a fictituous souther Utah town of Cottonwoods, Purple Sage became the best selling of Grey’s western novels.
The book is a clasically-romantic double love-story, replete with cattle rustling clergy and other Mormon scoundrels. It is set in some of the most majestic scenery of the United States, “where the clear blue sky arches over the vales of the free,” a Mormon hymn asserts.
Also by Zane Grey: Valley of Wild Horses
Jane Austen titles:
The Idiot
Fyodor Mikhailovich Dostoyevsky
Anthem
by Ayn Rand
Anthem is not a book. It is not a philosophical or governmental treatise. As Ayn Rand herself admitted, it has neither a real plot nor a real climax. Anthem is a poem.
Its final two chapters are (according to Rand) the “anthem”–the celebration of the human ego. This is not done in logical terms, but in pure emotional exultation. In my opinion, Rand’s writing throughout the book is skilled, passionate and evocative, but in the last two chapters she really shines.
For presentations of Rand’s philosophy, Objectivism, in logical form, read Atlas Shrugged. For a ruthless, beautiful evocation of the emotional aspect of Rand’s philosophy of egoism, read Anthem. If you have socialist leanings, or simply have always assumed the many is more important that the one, the book may disturb you greatly (it did me, when I read it the first time). It will change the way you feel, and Rand’s later work will change the way you think.
An Elementary Spanish Reader (Spanish Edition)
I thought the Spanish text in this book was well-selected and it was very useful for gaining experience reading a new language. I found that it worked pretty well when linked to the Merriam-Webster’s Spanish-English Translation Dictionary, Kindle Edition (Spanish Edition)
which I also bought and set as the primary dictionary. For the price I thought it was a good buy. Here are a few criticisms:
1. The book contains 6524 locations but only the first 1344 of them (20% of the book) are devoted to Spanish text. The next 2% of the book is devoted to Spanish verse (The Fables of Iriarte) and the final 78% of the book is devoted to the Spanish-English dictionary that contains the vocabulary with its English translation. Unfortunately that 78% of the book is really not useful in the Kindle edition because it would be impractical to use it for looking up words while reading.
2. The Merriam-Webster dictionary worked pretty well except that it was not able to find any word that was run together with another word, and this practice is very common in Spanish text.
3. Finally, most of the text consisted of storybook content suitable for reading to small children. An elementary reader geared to a more mature audience (yo tengo 65 años) would be welcome.
Divine Comedy, Cary’s Translation, Complete
Secret Adversary
by Agatha Christie
The Woman in White
by Wilkie Collins
Delight Directed Learning: Guide Your Homeschooler Toward Passionate Learning (Coffee Break Books)
“Delight Directed Learning” – Homeschoolers understand that a solid high school education involves more than just the standard high school courses. Yes, it is true that mastering science, math, and literature is important for homeschoolers – and vitally important if college lies ahead. But equally important are those subjects that the student is passionate about, subjects that they will study for hours on end, “just for the fun of it.”
This delight directed learning is the true “secret sauce” of a great homeschool education. It will help your student stand out in a crowd of college applicants. It can launch a career in business, or industry, or the Arts. It can lead to life-changing internships and real world work experience. It can open doors not just to college, but to life!
What are these delight directed topics? How can you recognize them? How can you help your student discover them? How can they be captured and reflected on your student’s educational records? These questions and more are answered in “Delight Directed Learning,” the second book in Lee Binz’s brand new series, Coffee Break Books. The first book in this series, “Planning High School Courses,” describes the traditional high school courses that every homeschool student who is leaning toward college should cover. This companion volume captures the other components of a solid homeschool education, the extra, sometimes non-traditional, subjects that make your child unique!
Nannies Homestead Food Storage
Seems to be best suited for beginners
Audacious (noun): 1. intrepidly daring, adventurous, bold, 2. marked by originality and verve. It’s the way to be. Your success in life depends on how creative you are and on how willing you are to act boldly on your creative ideas. Meet 30 notable professionals (including bestselling authors, well-known speakers, career and life coaches, spiritual teachers, business leaders, healers, therapists, musicians, actors, and artists) whose audacious creativity has touched the lives of millions of people. From them, you’ll learn how to make better decisions, design a vision for a fulfilling future, overcome the fear of self-expression, access your inner genius, get into the flow of universal energy, manifest wealth, raise good kids, enjoy optimal health, and lead an energized lifestyle. As you read their stories, sometimes you’ll be moved to tears, other times to laughter. At the end, you’ll be ready to shine your bright light in the world-audaciously.
As I read the new testament books of the bible and study carefully what it says and how to apply it to my life I usually turn to Warren Wiersbe for a great commentary and devotional. 1 Peter can be a bit overwhelming with all the references to submission and to suffering and rejoicing. Weirsbe’s comments added clarity and devotional insight to a topic that is hard to grasp without time and repetition on the truth therein. If you are going to be using 1 Peter in group study I would highly recommend this BE HOPEFUL as a valuable resource for all. God Bless You as you study and apply! 4 stars not 5 because i would have liked MORE of it!!!
Ready or Not (Aggie’s Inheritance)
Fresh out of college, Aggie Milliken thinks she’s prepared for anything life can throw her way. Think again, Aggie!
After the abrupt loss of her sister and brother-in-law, Aggie is stunned to find herself the sole guardian of their eight lively children. If learning basic parenting skills wasn’t complicated enough, she must also battle the children’s half-crazed grandmother, survive a massive remodeling project, and navigate the waters of new friendships-alone.
She has little experience with children and none with housekeeping, and it shows. What she has going for her is grit, a double dose of determination, and the confidence that this is exactly where the Lord wants her to be. With an unlimited P-mail account and enough hymns to keep her spirits bolstered, she tackles one catastrophe after another.
It seems like nothing Aggie does is right, but ready or not, here she comes!
Walden
Driftwood – Understanding Life’s Unforeseeable Hardships
Driftwood: Understanding life’s unforeseeable hardships offers insights as to how to overcome adversity and the challenges of life as well as how to cope with depression and to improve confidence.
Driftwood is a magical allegory about Seymour, a Sycamore tree, and Renee, a small bird who forge a deep bond of friendship while Seymour deals with the various trauma’s that befall him through no fault of his own.
Seymour learns the value of friendship, the importance of embracing change and the wisdom that comes with understanding that hardships exist. That kindness, compassion and charity are often unrecognized and unrewarded until it is too late to return the thanksgiving, but that life’s challenges are there to be accepted, and sometimes not understood. This simple book provokes you to take control of your mental state during times of unforeseeable hardships and uncertainties and to rediscover the true person within.
