SHAKESPEARE THE BOY
Reading edition
With Sketches of the Home and School Life, the Games and Sports, the Manners, Customs, and Folk-lore of the Time. By William J. Rolfe, Litt.D., Editor of "Rolfe's English Classics," etc. Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, $1.25.
Dr. Rolfe has in this book combined all that we know of the youth of the poet with all that is on record of the life of the time, as it affected boys. In other words, he has described the games Shakespeare played, the amusements of the country-side, the school and the lessons taught, the training at home and the town life. He gives a picture of Stratford-on-Avon as it must have been then, and incidentally calls attention to the influences which affected the character of the great dramatist while growing up.
BY THOMAS W. KNOX
THE "BOY TRAVELLERS" SERIES
ADVENTURES OF TWO YOUTHS—
IN THE LEVANT.
IN SOUTHERN EUROPE.
IN CENTRAL EUROPE.
IN NORTHERN EUROPE.
IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.
IN MEXICO.
IN AUSTRALASIA.
ON THE CONGO.
IN THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE.
IN SOUTH AMERICA.
IN CENTRAL AFRICA.
IN EGYPT AND PALESTINE.
IN CEYLON AND INDIA.
IN SIAM AND JAVA.
IN JAPAN AND CHINA.
Copiously Illustrated. Square 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $3.00 per vol.
OTHER BOOKS BY COLONEL KNOX:
THE YOUNG NIMRODS IN NORTH AMERICA.
THE YOUNG NIMRODS AROUND THE WORLD.
2 vols. Copiously Illustrated. Square 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $2.50 each.
HARPER & BROTHERS, Publishers, New York
"IT IS THE UNEXPECTED THAT HAPPENS."
OVERHEARD IN A HOTEL.
"Let's get up a game of ball," said the Tennis Racket.
"All right," said the Big Fiddle. "I'll play first base."
"And I," said the china Water-Jug, "will take my usual position of pitcher."
Patrick was the captain of a brick-schooner that plied between New York and Haverstraw on the Hudson. One day his schooner was loaded, ready to start for New York. But Patrick never gave the word to the crew to cast off the hawsers and get under way. Instead, he sat lazily swinging his leg over the spokes of the wheel, smoking his pipe.
The owner of the brick-yard, who was also the owner of the schooner, seeing that the vessel had not started, and wishing to have the load landed in New York as soon as possible, rushed down to the dock and irately demanded of Patrick why he did not get under way.
"Shure, yer honor, there's no wind."
"No wind! Why, what's the matter with you? There's Lawson's schooner under sail, going down the river now."
"Yis, I've been er watchin' her, but it's useless my gettin' under way. She's got the wind now, and, faith, there's not enough of it fer two."
AT THE MOUNTAIN HOUSE.
"Say, Billie," Jacky whispered, gleefully, "this place is simply fine. It costs thirty-five cents to take a bath, and I guess we won't have to take 'em every five minutes, the way we do at home, when pa finds that out."
The water in the bucket was very muddy, and the farmer had poured it out on the ground.
"You mortify me dreadfully," said the Bucket to the Water, after the farmer had gone. "The idea of your getting so dirty; and everybody will blame me, because I've brought you up."
NOT THAT KIND.
"Hullo!" said Bobbie to the violin-player in the hotel orchestra. "Wouldn't you rather be at the sea-shore than here on a hot day like this?"
"No," said the violin-player, "You know I'm not a sand-fiddler."
WHAT HE WAS AFRAID OF.
"I wonder why that dog howls so every time the band plays?"
"I guess maybe he's afraid somebody will put the band around his neck."
"How do you feel this morning?" asked the Butterfly of the Caterpillar.
"Oh, kind of creepy," said the Caterpillar.
"Look at that old Centipede with his hundred legs—how proud he is!" said the Beetle.
"Yes; and how absurdly so," returned the Katydid. "With all hundred of 'em he couldn't ride a bicycle!"
"My name is a great one," said the Lettuce head. "It has been spoken by one of the most illustrious soldiers of modern times, and is, in fact, engraved upon most of his monuments."
"Your name?" cried the Egg-plant. "Nonsense!"
"It is true," said the Lettuce head. "The soldier's name was Grant, and on all his statues you are likely to find his famous words Lettuce Have Peace."
"I tell you," said the Shepherd's Dog, "our lambs know how to treat those geese."
"What do they do?" asked the Cow.
"Why, only this morning as we passed them the geese hissed us, and those lambs simply looked at 'em scornfully, and said, 'Bah!'"
"Do you like fishing?" asked the Carrot of the Angle-worm.
"Well—yes," said the Angle-worm. "That is, I like it down near the Jersey coast better than in the mountains."
"What's the difference?" asked the Carrot.
"It's pleasanter for me fishing 'off the Hook' than on it," explained the worm.
The Cabbage and the Beet had had a race, and the Cabbage won.
"It couldn't be otherwise," sighed the Beet. "The Cabbage was made to come out a head, and I to be Beet."
"That squash is the funniest-looking squash I ever saw," said the Turnip to the Potato. "He's round and flat like a pin-cushion. Looks as if somebody'd stepped on him."
"Yes," said the Potato. "He looks more like a squush than a squash."
"I wish you'd keep quiet," said the Dormouse to the Corn-stalk. "You make so much noise I can't sleep."
"Well, if you had as many corns as I have, you wouldn't be a bit quieter," retorted the Corn-stalk.