"Oh, heard ye of a silly harper, Wha lang lived in Lochmaben town, How he did gang to fair England, To steal King Henry's wanton brown?" Once upon a time, there was an old man in L...
Once upon a time there lived a king and queen who loved each other so dearly that they were an example to all the married couples in their kingdom. In an adjoining country lived a...
The honeysuckles were beginning to bud. Already the humming-birds were hovering near and had built a nest right in the heart of the vine. This vine was in a nice old-fashioned gard...
"Some sing o' lords, and some o' knichts, An' some o' michty men o' war, But I sing o' a leddy bricht, The Black Agnace o' Dunnebar." It was in the year 1338, when Bruce's son was...
If you had visited the convent of St. Sebastian in the Spanish town of the same name at the end of the sixteenth century, you would have found there a merry, naughty, clever little...
"On good and bad an equal value sets The stupid mob. From me the worst it gets, And never fails to praise," With vile pretence, The scurrilous author thus his trash excused. A poet...
FROM THE FRENCH of J. JARRY. ONCE upon a time there was a poor man, who lived somewhere in the middle of the woods near a place called Gatines de Treigny. Everybody called him Fath...
If some absurd presumption show-- In seeking everything to know, To serve but for a single use May also be without excuse. Upon a table, once, together lay A Muff, Umbrella, and a...
Once upon a time there lived a stone-cutter, who went every day to a great rock in the side of a big mountain and cut out slabs for gravestones or for houses. He understood very we...
CHAPTER I Finnian, the Abbott of Moville, went southwards and eastwards in great haste. News had come to him in Donegal that there were yet people in his own province who believed...
Tell me, CORINNA, if you can, Why so averse, so coy, to man? Did NATURE, lavish of her care, From her best pattern form you fair, That you, ungrateful to her cause, Should mock her...
Once upon a time there lived a king who was so fond of wine that he could not go to sleep unless he knew he had a great flaskful tied to his bed-post. All day long he drank till he...
On the banks of the river Euphrates there once lived a man called Zadig, who spent all his days watching the animals he saw about him and in learning their ways, and in studying th...
Dame Martha lived at the foot of a high mountain. Her cottage was large enough to give shelter only to herself and two young girls, one of them her own child and the other the chil...
From the Danish Once, upon a time there was a man and his wife who had two children, a boy and a girl. The wife died, and the man married again. His new wife had an only daughter,...
Coming to a little town, The mountain's skirts within, Two youthful travellers, seeking rest, Looked round them for an Inn. Of two rival Inns, the host, Each, with a thousand offer...
"The fairies had one of their fine balls just two evenings ago," said daddy. "Among their guests were the brownies, elves, gnomes, many of the birds, butterflies, humming-birds, re...
Once upon a time there lived a king and queen who longed to have a son. As none came, one day they made a vow at the shrine of St. James that if their prayers were granted the boy...
FROM THE FRENCH of SAINT-JUIRS. IT was a dull, heavy afternoon, and the long, dusty road looked quite deserted, not a horse or even a foot-passenger in sight. The birds were taking...
A copious fountain played In a garden's flowery bed, And served to form a basin Where many fish were fed. Of the watering of his flowers The Gardener thought alone; And drained it...
The birds had begun their early morning concerts. "I know why," said daddy. "It is because they have been practising for their opening concert of the season which they gave this mo...
Once upon a time a town near the North Pacific Ocean suffered greatly from famine and many of the Indians who lived there died of hunger. It was terrible to see them sitting before...
From the Danish. There was once a man who had twelve sons: the eleven eldest were both big and strong, but the twelfth, whose name was Esben, was only a little fellow. The eleven e...
From the German of W. Hauff. IN the time of Haroun Al-Raschid, ruler of Bagdad, there lived in Balsora a man Benezar by name. His means enabled him to live quietly and comfortably,...
We were hunting bears. My companion had a chance to shoot at a bear: he wounded him, but only in a soft spot. A little blood was left on the snow, but the bear got away. We met in...
"Well," said daddy, "I suppose you are ready for your story, and this evening I am going to tell you about a little boy I saw as I passed by a ward in a hospital I was visiting to-...
From China, once, the Tea-plant coming, Met with the Sage upon his way. "Friend,"--said the latter,--"whither roaming?" "For Europe, where for me they pay A generous price,"--quoth...
"Ae gloamin' as the sinking sun Gaed owre the wastlin' braes, And shed on Oakwood's haunted towers His bright but fading rays, Auld Michael sat his leafu' lane Down by the streamle...
When Marcella was called into the house she left Raggedy sitting on the chicken yard fence. "Now you sit quietly and do not stir," Marcella told Raggedy Ann, "If you move you may f...
A certain queen had twin children, a boy and a girl, both as beautiful as the dawn of a summer morning. As the mother was one day hanging over the double cradle, shaped like two si...