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Kent Knowles: Quahaug By: Joseph Crosby Lincoln (1870-1944) |
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By Joseph C. Lincoln 1914 CONTENTS
CHAPTER I. Which is not a chapter at all II. Which repeats, for the most part, what Jim Campbell said to me and
what I said to him III. Which, although it is largely family history, should not be skipped
by the reader IV. In which Hephzy and I and the Plutonia sail together V. In which we view, and even mingle slightly with, the upper classes VI. In which we are received at Bancroft's Hotel and I receive a letter VII. In which a dream becomes a reality VIII. In which the pilgrims become tenants IX. In which we make the acquaintance of Mayberry and a portion of
Burgleston Bogs X. In which I break all previous resolutions and make a new one XI. In which complications become more complicated XII. In which the truth is told at last XIII. In which Hephzy and I agree to live for each other XIV. In which I play golf and cross the channel XV. In which I learn that all abbeys are not churches XVI. In which I take my turn at playing the invalid XVII. In which I, as well as Mr. Solomon Cripps, am surprised XVIII. In which the pilgrimage ends where it began XIX. Which treats of quahaugs in general KENT KNOWLES: QUAHAUG CHAPTER I Which is Not a Chapter at All
It was Asaph Tidditt who told me how to begin this history. Perhaps I
should be very much obliged to Asaph; perhaps I shouldn't. He has gotten
me out of a difficulty or into one; I am far from certain which. Ordinarily I am speaking now of the writing of swashbuckling
romances, which is, or was, my trade I swear I never have called it
a profession the beginning of a story is the least of the troubles
connected with its manufacture. Given a character or two and a
situation, the beginning of one of those romances is, or was, pretty
likely to be something like this: "It was a black night. Heavy clouds had obscured the setting sun and
now, as the clock in the great stone tower boomed twelve, the darkness
was pitchy." That is a good safe beginning. Midnight, a stone tower, a booming clock,
and darkness make an appeal to the imagination. On a night like that
almost anything may happen. A reader of one of my romances and
readers there must be, for the things did, and still do, sell to some
extent might be fairly certain that something WOULD happen before the
end of the second page. After that the somethings continued to happen as
fast as I could invent them. But this story was different. The weather or the time had nothing to do
with its beginning. There were no solitary horsemen or strange wayfarers
on lonely roads, no unexpected knocks at the doors of taverns, no
cloaked personages landing from boats rowed by black browed seamen with
red handkerchiefs knotted about their heads and knives in their
belts. The hero was not addressed as "My Lord"; he was not "Sir
Somebody or other" in disguise. He was not young and handsome; there was
not even "a certain something in his manner and bearing which hinted of
an eventful past." Indeed there was not. For, if this particular yarn or
history or chronicle which I had made up my mind to write, and which I
am writing now, had or has a hero, I am he. And I am Hosea Kent Knowles,
of Bayport, Massachusetts, the latter the village in which I was born
and in which I have lived most of the time since I was twenty seven
years old. Nobody calls me "My Lord." Hephzy has always called me
"Hosy" a name which I despise and the others, most of them, "Kent" to
my face and "The Quahaug" behind my back, a quahaug being a very common
form of clam which is supposed to lead a solitary existence and to
keep its shell tightly shut. If anything in my manner had hinted at a
mysterious past no one in Bayport would have taken the hint. Bayporters
know my past and that of my ancestors only too well. As for being young and handsome well, I was thirty eight years old last
March. Which is quite enough on THAT subject... Continue reading book >>
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