Dedication to Ferris Greenslet of Ipswich, Massachusetts The trout that haunts the Beaverkill Will flick the same sarcastic tail, When badly struck, as him my skill Would vainly lure from Tweed or Kal...

This story begins, so far as I am concerned, in the August of 192‒, when I had for the second time a lease of the forest of Machray. Mary and Peter John and the household had gone north at the end of ...

This story begins, so far as I am concerned, in the August of 192‒, when I had for the second time a lease of the forest of Machray. Mary and Peter John and the household had gone north at the end of ...

Laverlaw is a very good imitation of the end of the world. You alight at a wayside station in a Border valley, and drive for eight miles up a tributary glen between high green hills; then, when the st...

I left Laverlaw rather anxious about Sandy, and during our time at Machray I thought a good deal about my friend. He was in an odd, jumpy, unpredictable state of mind, and I didn’t see what was to be ...

The open windows, protected by wire blinds as fine-meshed as gauze, allowed the cool airs from the sea to slip in from the dusk. The big restaurant was in a pleasant gloom broken by patches of candlel...

The open windows, protected by wire blinds as fine-meshed as gauze, allowed the cool airs from the sea to slip in from the dusk. The big restaurant was in a pleasant gloom broken by patches of candlel...

Archie left Janet writing letters and started out next morning to explore the city. The first taste of a foreign town was always to him an intoxication, and, in the hot aromatic sunshine of that month...

On the following evening Janet and Archie dined as Don Alejandro’s guests at the Club de Residentes Extranjeros. The club, situated in one of the squares to the north of the Avenida, was a proof of Ol...

Archie set out on his exploration of Olifa with his nose in the air, like a dog looking for game. The spell of a new country had fallen on him, as had happened fifteen years before when he left school...

On their return to the city they were met by an incensed Don Alejandro. Not only had the permits for the Gran Seco not arrived, they had been definitely refused. It was not the work of the Government⁠...

The Gran Seco has not often appeared in the world’s literature. Francisco de Toledo first entered it in the sixteenth century, but after that there is no mention of it till Calamity Brown wandered thi...

The waiter at the Regina was an exemplary servant. He dispensed the morning meal of fruit and coffee with soft-footed alacrity. At the midday déjeuner, when it was the custom of the Company’s official...

Black slept soundly all night, and next morning rose renewed in body and mind. The party set out down the glen of the stream, one of the Indians carrying food and blankets, while the other remained be...

When Archie and Janet came down to dinner that evening at Veiro they found Don Luis de Marzaniga, a little thinner and browner than before, but spruce and composed as if he were about to dine at his O...

Mr. Sylvester Perry in his Seeing Eyes asked a question which has often been asked by travellers, why the Gran Seco had no other route to the sea except by the three-hundred-mile journey south to the ...

On the third day of the Gobernador’s stay visitors of a different type came to the building in the Avenida. Archie, in a new suit of flannels, limped up the steps, and had his card sent up to the grea...

When the Corinna was beginning to move out of the dusky harbour of Olifa, a wireless message was sent from it to an address in the Gran Seco. That message consisted of two words: Francis First. There ...

About 8 p.m., when the dark had fallen, two men groped their way into a room in the oldest quarter of the city, just above the dusty hollow which separated it from the works area. It was a hut in a ya...

Just about the hour of sunrise a girl sat perched on a rock from which the ground fell westward into an abyss of blue vapour. East of her, after a mile of park-like land, the steep woods rose black as...

Just about the hour of sunrise a girl sat perched on a rock from which the ground fell westward into an abyss of blue vapour. East of her, after a mile of park-like land, the steep woods rose black as...

The wireless station on the plateau received its punctual bulletins of news from the outer world, copies of which were posted up in the mess-hut. From them it appeared that the republic of Olifa was a...

The details of Lossberg’s advance up the railway, when, with overwhelming superiority of numbers and artillery, and after various checks, he drove in the screen of the defence, and on July 19th entere...

In the Courts of the Morning there was still peace. The brooding heats, the dust-storms, the steaming deluges of the lowlands were unknown. The air was that of a tonic and gracious autumn slowly movin...

The new Administration Packard, which a little before midnight on the 18th of July carried six men beyond the northern barricades of the Gran Seco city, did not continue more than a few miles on the r...

It was on the evening of the 9th day of August that D’Ingraville paid his brief visit to the Courts of the Morning. Archie departed at once to report, and returned next day to order certain precaution...

On the evening of August 19th the rain, which had fallen all day, ceased, and a thin fog oozed out of the ground. By six o’clock night had fallen and a small wind had risen, and, since the sky was hea...

Janet’s pistol-shot, and the answering shots from the sentries, awakened the camp effectually, but in the thick night, with a volleying wind, it was hard to locate the trouble. Grayne, who was in comm...

The Seaforth flew first to Loa, where Archie asked for news of Don Luis. He was believed to be on the southern front, somewhere in the Pacheco area, where there was a good deal of activity. Loa itself...

Archie took a good quarter of an hour to disentangle himself from his Absalom-like posture, since, owing to the constriction of his garments, he could not get at his knife, and his hands were numb wit...

The third day after Archie’s departure, the threat to the Courts of the Morning became urgent. The first word came from Escrick’s Intelligence; there had been a succession of small fights in the Loa d...

Barbara interposed. She ran forward and seized Sandy’s hand. “Janet!” she cried. “Have you any news of Janet?” Sandy stood holding her hands, his face a study in perplexity. “I don’t know,” he said. “...

Janet woke with a start from her uneasy sleep. Her nights had been troubled of late, and she was accustomed to waking with a start. The darkness was very thick and close around her, but it was not the...

Janet looked out next morning on a new world. Hitherto her eyes had been turning inward, busy with her own grief. Now she was in a mood of confidence, almost of exhilaration, and the outer scene made ...

General Alexander Lossberg, the Commander-in-Chief of the Olifa Expeditionary Force, was in a good temper as he took the air one morning on his smart little blue roan on the long ridge to the east of ...

General Alexander Lossberg, the Commander-in-Chief of the Olifa Expeditionary Force, was in a good temper as he took the air one morning on his smart little blue roan on the long ridge to the east of ...

The short spring had gone, and it was already early summer at Charcillo. The gnarled tamarisks which lined two sides of the great pebbled courtyard were hung with long lilac blooms, and the poplars an...

The succeeding days were full of bustle and excitement, for the train had been lit and the explosions were beginning. The road and railway to the Gran Seco were destroyed by Blenkiron with the complet...

Half an hour later Blenkiron arrived by aeroplane. He had not been expected, and when he walked into the room where Sandy was giving his final instructions to Rogerson he was greeted with a shout of j...

There was no communication between Castor’s headquarters and the Gran Seco. The revolt had captured early the main wireless station in Olifa, which was on the railway near Alcorta Junction; and since ...

A little before noon Archie brought his plane to a smooth landing in the great dusty amphitheatre which had been the bullring of an older Olifa, and was now sports ground and polo ground. The journey ...

The long-drawn fight on the Santa Ana railway was begun in the Gran Seco itself by Peters and Escrick. There was no communication between them and Castor by wireless or telegraph, but there might have...

That night, as we know, Sandy dispatched Olivarez in company with Don Alejandro Gedd to Olifa city. The following day was spent by the ambassadors in Olifa, and by Sandy at Pecos, in adjusting their p...

That day the life at Veiro had returned to something of its ancient serenity. Castor, indeed, was kept busy with constant telephone calls from the city, and on four occasions messengers came to him by...

The Courts of the Morning had recovered the peace which till a year ago had been theirs since the beginning of time. Where had once been the busy depot was now only shaggy downland, and a few blackene...

See the map of the Republic of Olifa. ↩ See the map of the Gran Seco Railway. ↩ See the map of the Eastern Passes. ↩...