Various

“ As his glass scans the stranger he realizes that in the eyes of naval experts the stranger is nearly equal to the Minneapolis in fighting qualities. He knows that these fast ships have been subsidized by the hostile government, and are heavily armed and protected. His dreams fairly dance before his eyes. But another picture flashes across his mental vision. He is on the battery-deck; the decks are wet and slippery with blood; the terribly mangled dead and wounded are lying all about him; he sees brave men struck down around. ”

“ He knows that if the stranger has not superior speed, his services and his companion's will soon be needed on the deck below.
The two lads scramble down through the hollow mast as the drummers are beating the long-roll to quarters. All during the hot sultry day the chase continues, and when night settles down on the watery waste the Minneapolis is still out of gun-shot astern. The night is bright, and when morning dawns the blood-hound is still upon the trail. ”

“ He fired his gun at the enemy with a fierce exultancy, wondering in a cruel way how many lives the shell had cut down. It seems ages since the battle started. With his eyes always on the enemy, he is spared from seeing his friend, struck by a flying splinter, being carried below to the surgeons. He sees the Calabria, her sides ablaze with fire, sweep majestically across his small horizon, and then disappear. He is always aware of her awful presence from the never-ceasing bursting of her shells around him. ”

“ Finally the poor man, turning to Alaric and saying, "Do what you will. Everything I leave to you," clapped his hands to his ears, broke through the uproarious throng, and started on a run for the open prairie.
"He leaves everything to us," said Alaric, who was almost as bewildered by the clamor and novelty of the situation as was M. Filbert himself.
"Good enough!" cried Bonny. "Now we will be able to do something. I take it that on this cruise you are first mate and I am second. So if you'll just give the word to go ahead, I'll settle the business in a hurry." ”

“ Shortly before the sun sank into the sea of cloud that spread in fleecy undulations beneath them, they reached the base of the Cleaver, a gigantic ridge that seemed to bar their further progress. Here, on a small plat of nearly level ground from which they dug away the snow, they made a fire over which to boil water for a pot of tea, ate supper, and prepared to pass the night. They were four thousand feet above timber-line, and two miles higher than the waters of Puget Sound. ”

“ There are those who say that form is the all-important point, and that if you get the swing right all the rest will follow. And there are others who as stoutly affirm that the only thing to do is to thump away at the ball, and trust to nature and the laws of mechanics. Now it is certainly true that style by itself will never drive a ball, and it may be laid down as an axiom that whenever the mind is intent upon some point of how to strike rather than upon the actual business of hitting, a miss more or less palpable is sure to follow. ”

“ But if you go to work with the idea that in a stiff wrist lies the secret of all golf, you are turning a caution into a fetich, and the result must be unsatisfactory. Even the italicized injunction at the end of each article, about the necessity of keeping the eye upon the ball, is not the whole of golf, and, important as it is, it must not absorb the whole of your attention. All these things work together for golf, and the moment that you exalt any one of them above the others you destroy both your mental and your physical balance, and the result is no game. ”

“ The first snow-storm of the season was driving at a sharp slant past the windows; the wind cried in the chimney in a low-spirited, feeble-minded way; the fire kept up heart, and spat snappishly as stray hailstones and snowflakes flew down the throat of the chimney.
Flea kicked one foot out of the blanket shawl laid over her lap, and moaned fretfully: "I don't care for anything or anybody, and nobody cares whether I live or die!" ”

“ He hated to have the bric-a-brac smashed but if it had to be smashed he wanted to be on hand to see it go. That's me all over again. If I had my choice between seeing a King or a President of the United States, and a bull in a china shop, I think I'd choose the bull. When you think of how he'd toss tea-cups around and lash his tail around pile after pile of dinner plates and soup tureens—well, there's no use trying to describe a sight like that, but it's what Jules was waiting for at Sevres and it never happened. War is full of disappointments anyhow. ”

“ During this small space of time his gun has done all that could be expected; he has watched shell after shell from it explode aboard the enemy; he can see large rents in her black hull, and he notices her fire is becoming more desultory; the fight will soon be over. As she disappears again, he musters up courage to look about him. There is but little life on the battery-deck, that only a half-hour before was the scene of so much activity. The gun next his is not in action; a shell has completely shattered the breech-plug ”

“ When the boat first comes in after hauling the nets, the men must take out their fish and pack them for the market. Then there are the torn nets to be mended; and when all this is finished, and the meals are cooked and eaten, the fishermen may get a few hours' sleep, perhaps; but they never lie down without first setting an alarm-clock for an hour before the tide turns again. For, rain or shine, by night and by day, those nets must be hauled up at every turn of the tide, and the tide turns every six hours. "Time and tide wait for no man." ”

“ The Mobangi natives had decided that their strange visitors were ghosts, and who ever heard of ghosts needing food? As usual, Grenfell tried argument and persuasion instead of force.
"Look here," he said. "We are men like you. If we do not eat we cannot live. We sleep as you do. We have the same number of fingers and toes that you have. You never saw ghosts who were like you as we are."
It took a good deal of this sort of talk to convince the native mind, but at last the explorer went on his way, with as much food as his boat could carry, leaving friends behind. ”

“ When through unwholesome food indigestion seizes hold of the traveller's stomach, he may as well make up his mind to renounce a large part of his anticipated pleasure. There is much more in this than would appear at first thought. When we go to a hotel we look at the beds to see if they are clean, and feel of the cups to know if they are sticky or ill-washed. But we eat what is set before us, thankful if it doesn't taste bad. Would it not be well when you stop at a hotel to ask what baking powder they use, and if it is not Royal to go to the next? ”

“ Promptly at the hour named by Bonny a motley but orderly throng of men, mules, and ponies presented themselves at the camp, and the whole afternoon was spent in making a selection of animals and testing the skill of packers. Both Alaric and Bonny were inexperienced riders, but neither of them hesitated when invited to mount and try the steeds offered for their use. A moment later Bonny was sprawling on the ground, with his pony gazing at him derisively, while Alaric was flying over the prairie at a speed that quickly carried him out of sight. ”

“ Up the Mobangi steamed the Peace, over three hundred miles north of the equator, and Grenfell had travelled four hundred miles on the river, when rapids barred the way, and he turned back. It had been an exciting trip, for thousands of natives lined the banks, convinced that the times were out of joint indeed if these remarkable strangers with their puffing smoke boat must needs be inflicted upon them. Near the most northern point attained Grenfell saw houses built in the branches of tall straight-stemmed trees. ”

“ A crossbar is fastened to one of the poles, high out of water, and the fishermen jump up and down on this until the sapling is driven down firmly into the mud. There are anywhere from twenty to forty of these poles in a row, and they are placed about thirty feet from each other.
At the first sign of the fish the nets are set out on these poles. These shad-nets are like enormous fly-traps, open at one end. The meshes are large enough to let the shad put their foolish heads in the nooses, but not big enough to let their shoulders through. ”

“ Scarcely a thought has one the other does not share. With that reckless ambition that is one of the attributes of youth they are both longing for excitement. Their dreams of battle and glory have toppled like a castle of cards. ”

“ An engineer officer is giving rapid orders to his men; the huge engines start ahead, slowly at first, then the revolutions increase, till the shafts are revolving at a terrific speed. When he again reaches the deck everything is again calm and peaceful. On the port quarter, but a short distance away, he sees the Minneapolis. Both ships are going at full speed; and astern, just out of gun-shot, he sees the hulls of three more ships. He understands it all now. The Calabria had nearly led them into a trap. ”

“ Water is boiling when it bubbles and jumps merrily about, and the steam comes in white puffs from the spout of the kettle. It does not boil when it begins to simmer and to sing. That is only the sign that it is near to boiling. ”

“ He noted all the little streams, the names of villages, the hill features, and so on; and at night he drew on his route map, with the greatest care, the journey of the day, and all the data that may be recorded on a map. Geographers still examine with great interest these neat and methodical map sheets. But they did not know, till years after Junker had returned home, that he had achieved, as we shall see, one of the most remarkable geographical feats on record. ”

“ If your swing is too straight up and down, and you are drawing in your arms across the line of fire, a "top" is pretty sure to follow. Let your arms go out so that the curve of your swing may be longer, or rather flatter, and try to look at the side of your ball, and not straight down upon it. If you are looking persistently at the top of your ball, and your "eye is in," the club head must perforce obey its instructions. It is not only the ball but the side of the ball that you want to hit. Another reason why players "top" is because they are afraid of the ground and of breaking their clubs. ”

“ At first the awakened plant thinks only of forming fresh branches and lovely expanding green leaves. But after a time it seems to say to itself, "I must not forget to make seed, so that if I should die in the autumn my race may not die with me, but live on and on." ”

“ Just as soon as the last ice has left the rivers the shad-fishermen begin to prepare for the fishing season. They must make the most of the few weeks while it lasts, so they never fail to have all their nets ready as soon as the shad begin to "run"—as they call it when the fish commence to swim up the rivers.
There are two ways of catching shad—by small nets set on poles, and with "seine" nets. Most of the fish we see in the markets are taken in the small nets, as the poles are always used in the rivers where the current runs too fast for the "seines." ”

“ DRAGGING THE NETS.
Along comes Mr. Stupid Shaddie, swimming rapidly with the current. Suddenly he runs against the net, and before he knows what has happened his head is thrust through one of the openings in its meshes. Mr. Shaddie foolishly tries to push through the barrier, and soon finds his gills tangled up with the thin cords that hold him. He has not sense enough to turn around when he first finds himself in the net and swim out again the way he came in. ”

“ Slowly and cautiously the fishermen, two at each end, pull in the ropes that hold the net. They soon reach the mouth of the bag, and pulling this over the edge of the boat, they quickly haul up the rest of the meshes; for it is then too late for any of the fish to get away. As the net comes up to the surface, Mr. Shaddie and his companions seem too stupid or too much dazed to struggle. When they are jerked out of the water, however, and into the boat, they hop around excitedly for a few minutes, but it is then too late to escape. ”

“ Each day they gained in agility and daring, and each night they returned to that cheery camp with its light, warmth, and abounding comforts, so healthfully tired and so ravenously hungry that it is no wonder they grew to look upon it as a home and a very pleasant one. ”

“ At rise of curtain Silvia is discovered seated in a big arm-chair to left centre, busy reading.
Silvia (dropping book in her lap as the curtain rolls up) . Oh, dear! I do wish those girls would come! I begin to feel nervous. (Fretfully.) I don't see what good we girls can do, anyhow. We can't prevent those hideous old Turks from scratching the eyes out of the poor Armenians. Oh, why did Miss Peabody suggest that we girls of the graduating class of the Peabody School (mimicking) should form ourselves into some sort of a society in order to keep up the pleasant friendships begun at school? ”