Kingston, William Henry Giles (1814-1880), English novelist, son of Lucy and Henry Kingston, was born in London on the 28th of February 1814. Much of his youth was spent at Oporto, where his father was a merchant, but when he entered the business, he made his headquarters in London. He early wrote newspaper articles on Portuguese subjects. These were translated into Portuguese, and the author received a Portuguese order of knighthood and a pension for his services in the conclusion of the commercial treaty of 1842.

In 1844 his first book, The Circassian Chief, appeared, and in 1845 The Prime Minister, a Story of the Days of the Great Marquis of Pombal. The Lusitanian Sketches describe Kingston’s travels in Portugal.

In 1851 Peter the Whaler, his first book for boys, came out. These books proved so popular that Kingston retired from business, and devoted himself to the production of tales of adventure for boys. Within thirty years he wrote upwards of one hundred and thirty such books. He had a practical knowledge of seamanship, and his stories of the sea, full of thrilling adventures and hairbreadth escapes, exactly hit the taste of his boy readers.

Characteristic specimens of his work are The Three Midshipmen; The Three Lieutenants; The Three Commanders; and The Three Admirals. He also wrote popular accounts of famous travellers by land and sea, and translated some of the stories of Jules Verne.

In all philanthropic schemes Kingston took deep interest; he was the promoter of the mission to seamen; and he acted as secretary of a society for promoting an improved system of emigration. He was editor of the Colonist for a short time in 1844 and of the Colonial Magazine and East Indian Review from 1849 to 1851. He was a supporter of the volunteer movement in England from the first.

He died at Willesden on the 5th of August 1880.

The above is substantially an extract from the 11th edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Fred and his brother have an adult friend, Cousin Giles, who is a naval officer who had served under the boys’ father, before injury had compelled his retirement. One day Cousin Giles asks the boys to come with him on a visit to Russia. This was 1856. The boys’ mother is glad they are not going too far, such as to the Antipodes.

The little party arrive in Russia after some problems with their sea voyage. They tour Saint Petersburg, and then travel a little wider. Meeting various people with a knowledge of the land and its customs, they get some good first-hand information about Russia. Some of their new friends tell long stories about things that have happened to them, or to their own friends, and by this device we learn much more about Russia and its people, and their lives, often very difficult, under the Czars.

And the boys have some thrills of their own, for instance during an encounter with wolves.

Eventually it is time to return home, and the last two chapters are letters from Fred to his mother, recounting their adventures during the last few days of their holiday. But Fred must have been a remarkably well-educated boy to write in such an adult style!

This book was written just after a time when it had become possible to travel to Russia. Many people had availed themselves of this chance, and had written of their journeys. Kingston uses the device of telling us about Russia as seen by the two boys, embellished with the adventures of some of the friends they make.

The first edition of this book is dated 1858. The edition used is dated 1885. The publisher was Griffith, Farran, Okeden & Welsh, London. The number of pages is 308.

Bill’s father is a wherry-man in Portsmouth Harbour, who one day has an accident and is killed. Bill’s mother is a seller of apples. The whole family are a happy, good-humoured lot. Bill is befriended by a Captain Trevelyan, who offers him a boy seaman’s place in his ship, the Lilly. So Bill goes off to sea, knowing that it would be perhaps four years or more before he would see his family again.

His companions as boy seamen include Tommy Rebow, a somewhat weaker lad than Bill. The crew are all reasonably pleasant people, maybe grumbling occasionally, but all getting on well together.

But all is not sunshine, for there are hurricanes, fallings overboard, and other serious mishaps resulting in some swimming. Some fighting with the French, some encounters with sharks, some days with little or no food and water. But they get through it all, giving heartfelt thanks to God for each release from their ordeals. They were taking a captured prize to Jamaica, when a lot of this occurred, and it was a considerable time before they found themselves back on board the Lilly, and homeward bound.

This is a neatly written book—no complaints about it. It is also very short, only half the length of most of Kingston’s books, and printed on incredibly thick paper, comparable with the card used to pack breakfast cereals. But the action is lively and frequently unexpected.

The first edition of this book is dated 1870. The edition used is dated 1920. The publisher was The Sheldon Press, Northumberland Avenue, London WC2. The number of pages is 157.

The story really consists of a series of nautical and shore incidents, to do with Ben Burton and his family. During the course of the story he goes from being born, to a senior Naval rank. Shortly after he is born they come across a dinghy drifting with an ayah and a small white girl, who grows up in parallel with Ben, though she is spared some of his more martial adventures.

It’s always difficult to get a timescale with books like this one, as the years seem to go past much faster than the supply of adventures.

I was somewhat baffled by the paragraphing in this book. For most of the book the paragraphing is as you would expect it to be, but there is an over-supply of of very long paragraphs, and some of these contain quite complex conversations, so that one is tempted to split them up so that passage looks more conventional and readable. I have not done so, except in one flagrant case, because I suspect that Kingston may have been experimenting in some way. On the other hand it may be that he had contracted to write a book of so many pages, and this was a way of condensing a long conversational exchange.

There were some other strange things to be noticed, such as places and people changing their spelling (Benjy and Benjie, for instance), within a few lines. And there were some words that Kingston spells correctly in other books, but anomalously in this one. It’s almost as though he dictated the book to a typist, and then never actually read it for himself. It lends weight to the theory that Kingston books were authored by more than one person, because this one is within his rules of style, except for the really quite numerous typographical anomalies mentioned above.

Apart from that, the story is quite good to read or to listen to, just as Kingston books always are.

The first edition of this book is dated 1872. The edition used is dated 1900. The publisher was Thomas Nelson and Sons, London, Edinburgh, Dublin and N Y The number of pages is 332.

Dick is the teenage son of an early nineteenth century vicar in England. The boy has a passionate desire to go to sea, but his family, especially his Aunt Deb, oppose this. One reason is that if he were to go as a midshipman he would be required to have at least fifty pounds a year to keep appearances up, and that money wasn’t available.

He forms a friendship with another boy, Mark, who gets into trouble for being a poacher. Dick peaches on the local smugglers, who imprison him, and he is nearly killed by them.

Wandering out of curiosity round the decks of a ship that is about to sail he falls through a hatchway, and right down into the lower hold. When he comes to the ship is at sea, and the hold is battened down. It takes him several weeks before he can attract attention. But the captain is a horrible man, and some of the crew are not much better. Eventually Dick jumps ship by stealing a ship’s dinghy, and lands on a tiny rocky islet. The dinghy is lost in a storm. Eventually Dick is rescued and is taken back to his home town, where he vows never to go to sea again.

The story was written as a cautionary tale to advise boys like Dick never to go to sea as a stowaway, which is effectually what Dick did, and was inspired by a real case, in which the boy was found dying after only thirteen days at sea.

The first edition of this book is dated 1880. The edition used is dated 1900. The publisher was Thomas Nelson and Sons, London, Edinburgh, Dublin, N.York. The number of pages is 388.

Peter is a young teenager in a family that suffers a series of disastrous events. Family money is lost due to the failure of a bank, not at all uncommon in those days, probably about 1830. They lived in Portsmouth, where the father was a wherryman, ferrying people out to the ships. The father meets with an accident, having ferried a passenger to his ship at anchor outside the harbour, is caught up by freak weather, which broke up his boat and drowned him. The mother does what she can, taking commodities out to the ships for the benefit of the sailors, but trade was bad at that time, and she became ill, and dies as well. Thus the family were left without any support, until a Mr. Gray, a Quaker, comes on the scene, and takes them under his wing. He is also a shipowner, and he gives Peter a chance on one of his ships. However, there are various mishaps with this ship, and Peter and his friend Jim arrive in Shetland, an archipelago in the far north of Britain, where Peter discovers that he has relatives. He takes a lift in a ship back to Portsmouth, as the ship was due to call in at Plymouth, but due to fair weather passes it by.

The ship is a whaler, and needs to get into the Pacific Ocean, but has a lot of trouble trying to round the Horn. Eventually they succeed. But Peter now has a new ambition, to find his long-lost brother Jack who had gone to sea years before, and never been heard of. By chance he hears that Jack may be alive. In due course they find Jack, and come home again with him to Portsmouth, where Mr. Gray has kindly looked after the female members of Peter’s family, including his sister Mary.

Of course there are a lot of coincidences in this story, but that’s part of the fun.

The first edition of this book is dated 1860. The edition used is dated 1910. The publisher was Henry Frowde, Hodder and Stoughton, London. The number of pages is 350.

This is the third in the tetralogy commencing “The Three Midshipmen” and ending with “The Three Admirals,” so the three principal characters will have been familiar to Kingston’s youthful readers. As with the other books it is a very good introduction to Naval life in the middle of the nineteenth century, but there are other things we can learn from this book, as well.

The action soon after the start moves to East Africa, where we see how the anti-slave trade was pursued. The British were against slavery, but the Portuguese, the Americans, the Arabs, and some of the East African states were getting on with it whenever the British backs were turned.

Then we move to the Crimea, where we get a very good view of the naval participation in that war. If you want to know more about the Crimea, you should definitely read this book.

Finally we move to the Pacific, to Sydney and to Hawaii. Here again it is interesting, particularly with regard to the volcanoes of the Hawaii group of islands.

The first edition of this book is dated 1865. The edition used is dated 1931. The publisher was Blackie & Son Ltd, London and Glasgow. The number of pages is 338.

This is rather a short book, only 120 small pages in book format. Harry is a young chap, just about ready to leave school, when his father suffers some business losses, and the stress kills him. Harry is left with some sisters, and he does not want to be a burden to them so he gets a job on board a trading vessel, and off they go to Africa.

Here many of the crew catch the Yellow Fever, and die. The captain is ill, but appears to be surviving. An African seaman is a senior rating aboard the vessel. With a rich cargo, and badly under-manned, the vessel sets off for home. There is a fire in one of the holds, to which the vessel succumbs. Harry and the African seaman make themselves a raft, but the captain perishes. They are picked up almost at once by a slave trader, but a Royal Navy man-of-war appears and gives chase. The slave trader delays the chase by chucking slaves overboard, who then have to be picked up by the pursuer. It all gets sorted out, and Harry’s cousin is an officer on the man-of-war. The African seaman is a religious man, and it actually turns out that he is the very person Harry had been asked to look out for by his old nurse. So there is a happy ending, as far as Harry is concerned, but there certainly were a few casualties on the way.

The first edition of this book is dated 1873. The edition used is dated 1880. The publisher was Gall & Inglis, London & Edinburgh. The number of pages is 120.

This is a fairly short book, and probably an easier read for the younger teenager.

Jack is a young member of a respectable family living in Stormount Tower, on the south coast of England. Unfortunately the silly boy got himself involved with the smugglers, who got caught. This of course would have been a hanging offence, but Jack manages to go to sea aboard the “Truelove”, which, it is later heard, is lost at sea.

Folk at home long to see him again, but meanwhile there are some strange goings-on, involving ghosts, kidnaps, strange noises, secret tunnels, and smugglers’ caves.

Eventually some of the local young men sail to the Pacific, hoping to find where the “Truelove” had gone down, and hoping above all to find young Jack. After some misses they eventually manage to get some useful information, and from this they are able to find Jack, and bring him home to his family.

The first edition of this book is dated 1866. The edition used is dated 1900. The publisher was Frederick Warne and Co Ltd., London and New York. The number of pages is 213.

This small book, starts Ben off as the son of a fisherman on the east coast of England. The father is a pious Christian, and brings Ben up to be one too. Unfortunately various accidents befall the family, and they fall on hard times. Ben, in rescuing some children from a runaway horse, is injured, but is befriended by Lieutenant Charlton, who is able to arrange so that things go better for Ben’s mother.

Ben and Charlton go to sea, where Ben has it in mind to find his long-lost brother Ned.

Many accidents befall Ned, culminating in a shipwreck in the Pacific. Eventually he is rescued, and, not long after, finds his brother Ned. They come home together, and set up a new life in support of their mother.

Throughout, Ben’s morale is upheld by his Christian belief. We are told a great deal about the progress of missionaries among the Pacific Islands. Rather definitely a Victorian book, but a good read.

The first edition of this book is dated 1870. The edition used is dated 1890. The publisher was The Religious Tract Society, London. The number of pages is 156.

There are three short stories in this little book. The first thing to say is that the book has no page-numbers, which must be just about unique. I cannot imagine what the point of this is.

The three stories are of roughly equal length. The first is a story about Nelson purporting to have been written by an admirer whose work at sea kept him near to Nelson.

The second story is about farming in the Red River area of North America in the late 1700s or early 1800s. The weather, with flooding of the river, and the red Indians, made it all rather difficult.

The third story is about a young chap who while no more than fourteen distinguishes himself in battle, and is immediately promoted to midshipman. His bravery and seamanship win him several battles, with their prizes, and he is promoted till he is an Admiral with a baronetcy. Of course there are some jealous people on the way. But it is a pretty tale, with a pretty girl to be married.

The first edition of this book is dated 1870. The edition used is dated 1870. The publisher was Groombridge and Sons, 5 Paternoster Row, London. The number of pages is 132.

This story takes place mainly in or near the Rocky Mountains of North America, as we follow the adventures of a member of an emigrant party during their move to California.

Rattle-snakes, bears, rock-slides, avalanches, steep descents, and many other hazards, to say nothing of numerous attacks by unfriendly tribes of Red Indians, fill the pages of this book with terrifying and perilous situations. Not a long book, but very good value.

The first edition of this book is dated 1863. The edition used is dated 1913. The publisher was Collins Clear-Type Press, London and Glasgow. The number of pages is 228.

This is not a very long book, but the story is a good one. Several families have met together to have a picnic on a pleasant local beach. To everyone’s delight they are joined by Harry Merryweather, a midshipman home on leave. Harry and another youth, David Moreton, go for a wander round the rocks, but are cut off by the strong tide. The weather then turns very nasty, but the boys are able to swim to a passing boat containing an old man, Jefferies, and his young grandson, Tristram. The weather is now so bad they can’t back to the local harbour at Penmore.

There is an accident and young Tristram is lost overboard, and drowned.

They see a vessel, a brig, on her way down channel, but when they get to her they find she is an abandoned wreck. More bad weather. They are seen by a schooner about some bad business, who opens fire, probably to destroy an unwanted witness to some crime. The brig is sinking. They make a raft. Old Jefferies dies. They are picked up by a French schooner, which turns out to be a privateer. At this point the story gets even more convoluted, and you will have to read the book to see what happens next, and how the boys eventually get home.

The first edition of this book is dated 1869. The edition used is dated 1910. The publisher was Frederick Warne & Co. Ltd., London. The number of pages is 184.

Peter’s mother and father were barge people on the London river, the Thames. But the father dies, and Peter and his mother are destitute. She goes out to do cleaning etcetera, and Peter scavenges by the river-side. The boys who did this used to be called mudlarks. Peter’s mother dies. One day a man called Mr. Wells and his friends come by in a boat, and cast money for the mudlarks to dive for. Unfortunately Wells loses his valuable gold ring in doing this. He leaves his card with Peter, who finds the ring, and returns it.

Struck with this honesty Wells gives the orphan and destitute boy a home. Wells is a shipowner, and when Peter is fourteen he is given an apprenticeship on one of his ships. Peter makes his way up till he is a senior officer, but marries a girl in London, whose father owns one small vessel, and when he is dying he makes the vessel and the goodwill over to Peter. Wells’s business fails, and with it go Peter’s savings.

Peter and his wife and children have a sea-going life, but eventually decide to settle in Australia. Arriving there they found it hard to avoid the escaped convicts who are roaming the land and giving everybody a hard time.

All these situations are well written, and you will enjoy the book.

The first edition of this book is dated 1881. The edition used is dated 1900. The publisher was The Sunday School Union, London. The number of pages is 131.

This is an absolutely brilliant book, not least because it is a shining example throughout, of the use of good English. The story is exciting, and the telling of it made interesting, with its wealth of local detail. It was the first Kingston book we put online, and we shall be bringing you more books of Kingston’s during the coming years. Definitely!

We have thoroughly enjoyed creating this e-book for you, and we hope that you will enjoy it as much as we have. This transcription was made during March 2003, by Athelstane e-texts.

The first edition of this book is dated 1852. The edition used is dated 1910. The publisher was Richard Edward King, 106-110 Tabernacle St, E.C. The number of pages is 233.

A gripping story about two young children, a boy of about fourteen and his sister of about twelve, who set off with their father, a south-sea whaling captain, on what is intended to be his last voyage, their mother having died during his previous three-year voyage. Unfortunately some of the crew, especially the bo’sun, are not very well-intentioned, and after a chapter or two about the voyage out to the Pacific, and some whale hunts of varying success, there is a mutiny. The ship ends up on fire and is abandoned with various rafts and ship’s boats getting away from her.

There is a well-written account of the children’s drift on a raft with two of the officers, and a wonderful and kind coloured man, though the story is not quite as simple as that, since people lose one another, and lose their rafts, with considerable drama.

Finally the children’s father turns up, of course, and the story ends with everybody happy, except the wicked bo’sun and his confederates, who have gone to Davy Jones’ Locker on account of their devotion to the Demon Drink.

The first edition of this book is dated 1865. The edition used is dated 1865. The publisher was Thomas Nelson & Sons, London Edinburgh Dublin N,Y, The number of pages is 296.

This is the second in Kingston’s tetralogy that begins with The Three Midshipmen, and ends with The Three Admirals. These books were among the first written by Kingston, and were published serially in weekly magazines. Kingston’s reputation was made by these books, that first appeared about 1860, and dealt with an officer’s life in the Navy at about that time.

By an extraordinary co-incidence, the three young men who had met as midshipmen, get postings that enable them to keep their friendships live when they are lieutenants. Another old friend is Admiral Triton, who, though retired, takes such an interest in the careers of the young men.

This is actually quite a long book, but it is full of adventures, and you will love it.

The first edition of this book is dated 1875. The edition used is dated 1913. The publisher was Henry Frowde, Hodder and Stoughton, London. The number of pages is 459.

This is not a long book, but it is an absolutely delightful one. The Tregellins had owned a large old house on a headland in Cornwall. They had not lived there for some time, and had left it in the care of Clump and his wife Juno, West Indians, while the family lived in Bristol. Tregellin senior decides that he will install some of his young relatives there, in the care of the Clumps and two tutors, one of which, Mr. Clare, has to deal with their academic needs, and the other, Captain Mugford, is to teach them watermanship. The date is early in the nineteenth century.

There is also a brave and virtuous dog, Ugly. The boys’ sailing, swimming and rowing improve, and they rise to various challenges. Eventually they all set off for a longer sailing and fishing expedition. But it all goes pear-shaped, as the weather turns very nasty, and they are marooned on a reef some way out to sea. Clare is not on this expedition, but they need a way to alert him to where they are. It is Ugly that saves the day.

They had been using an old wrecked brig, high ashore in the bay, as a classroom, but unknown to them some smugglers have been using it as a base as well. Open war breaks out, and things get nasty. Read the book to find out what happens in the end.

The first edition of this book is dated 1923. The edition used is dated 1923. The publisher was Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd, London, Edinburgh, & N.Y. The number of pages is 365.

This is the fourth in Kingston’s tetralogy that begins with The Three Midshipmen, and ends with The Three Admirals. These books were among the first written by Kingston, and were published serially in weekly magazines. Kingston’s reputation was made by these books, that first appeared about 1860, and dealt with an officer’s life in the Navy at about that time.

By an extraordinary co-incidence, the three young men who had met as midshipmen, get postings that enable them to keep their friendships live even when they are Admirals. Another old friend is Admiral Triton, who, is now dead and buries on the Isle of Wight, but they get to visit his grave.

This is actually quite a long book, but it is full of adventures, and you will love it as much as you loved its predecessors.

The first edition of this book is dated 1875. The edition used is dated 1900. The publisher was Griffith, Farran, Okeden and Welsh, London. The number of pages is 441.

The time is just before the Indian Mutiny. A young man returns to India in search of important papers of his father’s. He arrives within the territory of the Rajah with whom his father had been associated. Various unrests and disturbances occur, during which it turns out that the young man is in fact the grandson of the ruling Rajah, and his heir. This is not very agreeable to the young man, as he does not like to be venerated.

There is a lot of good action in the book, and it would have been an easy read for the nineteenth century teenager.

The first edition of this book is dated 1865. The edition used is dated 1865. The publisher was Thomas Nelson & Sons, London, Edinburgh & New York. The number of pages is 283.

For political reasons the Macnamara family are forced to leave their old home in Pennsylvania, and elect to resettle in Trinidad. A big mistake because it is being administered by a bigoted Spanish religious government. The mother dies and is buried, but two Roman Catholic priests arrive with the intention of carrying out the funeral under their rites. So once again the family are displaced, this time for religious reasons. They escape to South America, and make their way into the Orinoco river. There follow innumerable adventures and near shaves of various kinds. But it was a mistake again, because the Spanish are administering the territory, and wish to root out anyone who has no business to be there.

On escaping all this they hear that a new administration in Trinidad has abolished the malpractices of the Spanish priestly regime, and they are welcome to return.

They sell the Trinidad plantation at a profit, and return to England, though always hankering after their original settlement in Pennsylvania.

The first edition of this book is dated 1865. The edition used is dated 1889. The publisher was T.Nelson & Sons, Paternoster Row, London. The number of pages is 382.

From an Introduction by Herbert Strang

The present volume gives a capital description of life in the Navy in days of the old three-decker, and many interesting particulars of the naval warfare in the revolutionary period, including the battle of the “glorious first of June.” It differs from the average boys’ story in one important respect. The hero, instead of gaining a title and a fortune, refuses to rise above the class in which he was born, and attains no higher rank than that of a warrant-officer. The author skilfully introduces little touches and incidents, such as True Blue’s conduct when at a theatrical performance, which make his career seem entirely natural and reasonable, and enlists the sympathy and approval of the reader. “He had not aimed high, in one sense of the word,” says Kingston in the closing pages, “and yet he had in another sense always aimed high and nobly—to do his duty.” In Kingston’s eyes no mariner, nor any other man, could have higher praise.

The first edition of this book is dated 1862. The publisher was Humphrey Milford, Oxford University Press. The number of pages is 258.

Peter’s father is a country vicar in Ireland, and Peter is a naughty teenager, who has got in with friends who encourage poaching, at that time a most serious offence. His father confiscates the gun, but one night Peter recovers the gun and has another coaching expedition, during which he is caught by the gamekeepers. The magistrate releases him to his father, who travels with him to Liverpool. For fifteen pounds Captain Swales of the Black Swan agrees to take him and to teach him the rudiments of seamanship on a return voyage to Canada. It turned out she was an ill-managed emigrant ship, and the emigrants were very badly treated. Captain Swales and his officers are as nasty as they come. There is a fire on board, and the people are rescued by the Mary, Captain Dean, who is a very different kind of man than the despicable Captain Swales. At Quebec Peter joins the Foam, Captain Hawk. There then follows a series of events, some good, and some bad, but all well-written.

It must be remembered that Peter the Whaler was probably the first seafaring book by Kingston, although he had written several books during the previous twenty years or so, The book was very well received by the public, and Kingston took up writing adventure novels for teenagers as a permanent occupation, until his death about thirty years later.

The first edition of this book is dated 1851. The edition used is dated 1880. The publisher was Ward Lock & Co Ltd, London New York and Melbourne. The number of pages is 328.

The tale of the Three Midshipmen is carried on to the Three Lieutenants, the Three Commanders, and the Three Admirals. The book starts with the arrival of three new boys at a boarding school for young gentlemen. One boy is English, one is Scottish, and the third is Irish. Under the influence of various bullies and other schoolboy adversities the three lads learn to stick together, and to look after each other. They join the Navy, and get various postings by which from time to time they meet, usually under the most difficult circumstances. Of course they each survive bravely, though any of the boats’ crews that they have the honour to command are mowed down by the enemy. In other words, some of it is pretty tall stuff, but it was very good fare for the nineteenth century and early twentieth century English schoolboy. I can remember these books on our 1940s school library’s shelves, very well-thumbed and many times repaired by one of the masters, whose hobby it was to run a voluntary book-binding class. There are three parts to the book, of which the third, “The Three Midshipmen in China” was not included in the edition used here, so that we hope to add it as a separate book.

We see no reason why you should not enjoy this book. N.H.

The first edition of this book is dated 1862. The edition used is dated 1914. The publisher was Blackie and Son Limited, London, Glasgow & Bombay. The number of pages is 268.

This rather long book is definitely an historical novel. In the edition used there are 470 pages, not above size for one of Kingston’s books, but the text on the pages is tall and wide, while the font is small. All this builds up to 1.1 megabytes of text. In addition the inking was not always good, though the type in the corners of the page was not particularly damaged, as is common in Victorian printings. As a result producing this e-text was rather difficult, and there may still remain some errors, though not, we hope, many.

The main action takes place in the years around 1780.

There are some rather strange aspects to the narration. For example, the hero’s name is Hurry, except that on two occasions in Chapter 8 and one in Chapter 9, his name is mysteriously change to Poynder. Also in Chapter 9, the young Miss Carlyon is referred to as having gone to live with her aunt, Mrs. Tarleton, on the death of her father. Yet the latter figures strongly in the later stages of the book, so we conclude that Kingston wrote the book with parts being pulled in from previous notes, but that he did not go back and re-read the book with a critical eye.

However, those are but passing observations which it is necessary to make. The book is about the war between the British and the American Royalists on the one hand, and the American rebels on the other. The author is probably sympathetic to the rebels, but certainly to the cause of Freedom, and he makes his hero, Hurry, sympathetic to their cause, yet always observant of his duty as an officer of the King’s Navy. While there are the usual fights between ship and ship, or between ship and weather, as always so beautifully expressed by Kingston’s pen, we find that by chapter 9 Hurry has fallen in love with an American young lady, and the rest of the book contains episodes in which he is in contact with her, though she is the daughter of a Colonel active on the Rebel side. It won’t spoil the story if we say that they marry in the last paragraph, five lines from the end.

Slightly annoying is the fact that we are made interested in the fate of Harry Sumner, a very young midshipman, alone in the world, who is wounded in a minor skirmish, and by Chapter 8 is met with in a sick-berth, fully expecting to die. But does he die, or was that but a childish fancy? We never find out.

This book is probably one of the very best historical novels about the American Rebellion, seen from the naval point of view, and as such is well worth reading by both British and American subjects. N.H.

The first edition of this book is dated 1873. The edition used is dated 1873. The publisher was Griffith Farran Browne & Co Ltd. The number of pages is 472.

With great skill and sincerity Kingston depicts many of the struggles and efforts that the would-be settlers in the West had to make. Constant harrying by Red Indians, the weather, nasty neighbours, illness, all made life difficult, indeed almost impossible.

The book is told through the eyes of a boy, as he grows to adulthood. His family, also Mr. Tidey, who acted as family tutor, or Dominie, and Dio, a runaway slave to whom they give a home, form the principal actors in this tale, but there are many others, such as the wicked Bracher, and a mysterious hunter who appears several times in the book in the guise of a rescuer.

Well into the last chapter we are presented with all sorts of dreadful happenings, which the hero feels to be like the imagined happenings of a bad dream. But suddenly it all sorts out and we have an unexpectedly happy conclusion to the tale.

The first edition of this book is dated 1865. The edition used is dated 1865. The publisher was Sampson Low, Marston & Co., London. The number of pages is 382.

This novel is written as a biography of a seaman, whose life at sea starts as an illiterate boy-seaman, and whose career spans the last twenty years of the eighteenth century and the first third of the nineteenth. We learn much of how ships were managed in those days, the press-gangs, the training, and the life of the common sailor in the fo’cstle. We experience the life aboard a man-of-war, a merchantman, a whaler, and even spend a few years ashore among the cannibals of the Feejee islands. There is a lot of meat in this book (not intended as a pun), and the reader will finish it with his or her eyes filled with wonderment. We now give the preface which Kingston himself wrote for the book.

Preface, by W.H.G. Kingston

I had more than once, in my rambles in the neighbourhood of Blackheath, Greenwich and Woolwich, met an old man walking briskly along, whose appearance struck me as unusual; but we never even exchanged salutations. One day, however, when I was in company with my friend Captain N— of the Navy, seeing the stranger, he stopped and addressed a few words to him, from which I gleaned that he had been a sailor. My friend told me, as we moved on, that he often had conversations on religious subjects with the old man, who had for long been in a South Sea whaler, and had seen many parts of the world. My interest was much excited. I took an early opportunity of making the acquaintance of Old Jack—for such, he told me, was the name by which he was best known; and without reluctance he gave me his history. This I now present to the public with certain emendations, with which I do not think my younger readers will find fault. W.H.G.K

The publisher was Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd. The number of pages is 464.