Sidney The Adventures of Joel Pepper

1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4553-7216-4
Verlag: Seltzer Books
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 501 Seiten

Novel from the Five Little Peppers series. According to Wikipedia: 'Margaret Sidney was the pseudonym of Harriett Mulford Stone ( 1844- 1924). She was an American author, born in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1878, at the age of 34, she began sending short stories to Wide Awake, a children's magazine in Boston. Two of her stories, 'Polly Pepper's Chicken Pie' and 'Phronsie Pepper's New Shoes', proved to be very popular with readers. Daniel Lothrop, the editor of the magazine, requested that Stone write more. The success of Harriett's short stories prompted her to write the now-famous Five Little Peppers series. This series was first published in 1881, the year that Stone married Daniel Lothrop. Daniel had founded the D. Lothrop Company of Boston, who published Harriett's books under her pseudonym, Margaret Sidney. Harriett and Daniel may have both had an interest in history and in famous authors. In 1883, they purchased the house in which both Louisa May Alcott and Nathaniel Hawthorne lived. Nicknamed The Wayside, the house is located in Concord, Massachusetts.'

Autoren/Hrsg.

Sidney, Margaret

Leseproben

XIII  PASSENGERS FOR THE BOXFORD STAGE
   "I declare, that's fine!" said Ben, the next day. It was dull and cloudy, and he squinted up at the sky. "There isn't a bit of wind. Now Mr. Blodgett'll have that bonfire, I guess; that'll suit you, Joe, as you can't have much fun with that hand."   Joel squealed right out. "That's prime! And I can pile in the sticks and straw just as well with my other hand."  "You aren't goin' to touch that bonfire, once it's lighted," declared Ben, in his most decided way. "Now you remember that, Joe Pepper!"   "There ain't any good in it, if I can't help," cried Joel, horribly disappointed.   "You can see it," said Ben, "same's David."   "Hoh! what's that!" cried Joel; "that won't be any fun."   "Then you can stay at home," said Ben, coolly. "As for having you, Joe, careering round that fire, and cutting up your capers, we ain't goin' to let you. Like enough you'd be half burnt up."   "Phoo!" cried Joel, in high disdain, and snapping the fingers of his well hand, "I wouldn't get afire."   "I wouldn't trust you. You'd be afire before you knew it. You needn't tease, Joe; Mamsie wouldn't allow it." And Ben walked off and shut the door.   "Ben never let's me do anything," howled Joel, twisting his face up into a dreadful knot, and wishing there was something he could do with his left hand, for the other was all tied up in a sling, Mother Pepper wisely concluding that to be the only way to keep it still. "If I tie it up, Joel, you can't use it," she had said, fastening the broad strip of white cloth firmly over his shoulder. And Joel, knowing there was no use in protesting, had borne it as well as he could, making Davie wait on him, and driving Polly almost to despair in her efforts to amuse him, while she did up the morning work, Mother Pepper being away. "Why don't you play stage-coach, Joel?" proposed Polly now, as Joel couldn't vent his disappointment loudly enough.   "That's no fun, with one hand," said Joel, disconsolately, drumming on the window pane.   "Some folks always drive with their left hand," said Polly.   "Mr. Tisbett doesn't," said Joel, gloomily regarding the bunch of white cloth that covered his right hand. "He always drives with this one," sticking it out, "'cept when he takes both."   "Well, you can play there's been an accident, and you got hurt, and so you had to drive with that hand," said Polly.   "So I can," cried Joel, bounding away from the window, "so I can, Polly Pepper. I'll have it right now, and it's to be a perfectly awful one. Come on, Dave, let's fix up the coach, and you get inside, and I'll upset you, and most smash everything to death." And Joel ran hither and thither, dragging the chairs, and Phronsie's little cricket, and everything movable into place as well as he could with one hand.   "Take care, Joe," warned Polly, wondering if she hadn't done wrong in proposing stagecoach, "don't fly round so. You'll hurt your hand. I'd get up on the front seat if I were you, and begin to drive."   "Would you have the horses run into something, Polly, kersmash," cried Joel, tugging at Mamsie's rocking chair to bring it into line, "or make the stage-coach tumble over and roll down hill?"   "Dear me," cried Polly, going into the pantry to mix up her brown bread, and wondering which would be the less of the two evils, "I'm sure I don't know, Joel."   "I'm goin' to have 'em do both," decided Joel. "Dave, pull this up, will you?" So little David ran and gave a lift on the other side of the big rocking chair, to haul it into place. "We'll run into somethin' an' th' horse'll shy, and that'll make the old stage-coach roll down hill. Gee-whickets!" he brought up, in huge delight.   "I shan't let you play it at all," said Polly, from the pantry, "if you say such words, Joel. You'll just have to stop and go and sit down. So remember."   Joel was clambering up into Mr. Tisbett's seat on the box, but he ducked his head at Polly's rebuke. "Get in, Dave," he shouted, recovering himself. "Hurry up. You're the passenger that wants to go to Boxford. You're awful slow. I'll drive off without you if you don't make haste," he threatened, gathering up in his left hand the bits of string that were fastened to a nail in the corner of the shelf.   Little David, feeling it a dreadful calamity to be left behind when he wanted to go to Boxford, hopped nimbly into the opening in the pile of chairs that represented the stage-coach, and off they drove.   "I can't hold my whip," cried Joel in distress, after a minute or so of bowling along on the road to Boxford, accompanied with much shouting to Mr. Tisbett's pair of black horses, and excitement generally as the stage-driver tried to get out of the way of the great number of teams on the turnpike. "O dear, it ain't any fun without the whip!" and the whole establishment came to a dead stop.   "I'll hold the whip," cried the passenger, eagerly, poking his head out of the stage-coach window.   "No, you won't, either," cried Joel. "You're the passenger. O dear me, there ain't any fun without th' whip!"   "Then I can drive," said little David. "Do let me, Joel," he pleaded.   "I won't either," declared Joel, flatly. "I'm Mr. Tisbett, and besides, there won't be anybody inside if you get up here."   "Phronsie might be passenger," said David, reflecting a moment.   "Goody, oh, so she might!" cried Joel, "and Seraphina too. And that'll make more upset. Then you may come up here, Dave," he promised. But when Polly was made acquainted with this fine plan, she refused to allow Phronsie to enter into such a noisy play. And Joel's face dropped so dismally that she was at her wits' end to know how to straighten out the trouble. Just then one of the Henderson boys came up to the door with a little pat of butter in a dish for Mrs. Pepper.   "Here comes Peletiah Henderson," announced Polly, catching sight of him through the window. "Now, p'r'aps he can stop and play with you, Joel."   "He ain't much good to play," answered Joel, who never seemed to be able to wake up the quiet boy to much action.   "Oh, Joel, he'll play real pretty, I guess," said Polly, reprovingly, "and he's such a good boy."   "He might be the passenger," said Joel, thinking busily, as Polly ran to the door to let the Henderson boy in. "We'll play he's the minister goin' over to preach in Boxford, and we'll upset him just before he gets there. Jump out, Dave, and get up here."   "I don't know as we ought to upset him if he's the minister," objected David, doubtfully, as he clambered up to Joel's side. Still, a perfect thrill of delight seized him at his promotion to the seat of honor, and his little hands trembled as Joel laid the precious whip within them.   "No, I guess I'd rather you had the reins," decided Joel, twitching away the whip to lay the bits of string in David's little brown hands. "You can drive first, 'cause I want to crack the whip awful loud as we start. And then I'll take 'em again."   David, who would much rather have cracked the whip, said nothing, feeling it bliss enough to be up there on the box and doing something, as Peletiah, a light-haired, serious boy, walked slowly into the kitchen.   "You're the passenger," shouted Joel at him, and cracking his whip, "and you're going over to Boxford. Hurry up and get into the stage-coach. I'm Mr. Tisbett."   [Illustration: "'YOU'RE THE PASSENGER!' SHOUTED JOEL"]   "And I'm helping, Peletiah," cried David, turning a very pink and happy face down toward him.   "I don't want to go to Boxford," said Peletiah, deliberately, and standing quite still, while Polly ran into the pantry to slip the little pat of butter on to another plate.   "Oh, how good it looks!" she said, longing for just one taste.   "Well, you've got to go," said Joel, obstinately, "so get in."   "I don't want to go to Boxford," repeated Peletiah, not stirring.   Joel cracked the whip angrily, and glared down at him.   "P'r'aps he wants to go somewhere else," said little David, leaning forward and clutching the reins carefully, "and that'll be just as good."   "Do you?" asked Joel, crossly. "Want to go anywheres else, Peletiah?"   Peletiah considered so long over this that Joel, drumming with his heels on the dashboard, got tired out, and shouted, "Hurry up and get in--th' stage-coach's goin'!" which had the desired effect, to make...