Now, Hargate, what a fellow you are! I've been looking for you everywhere. Don't you know it's the House against the Town boys. It's lucky that the Town have got the first innings; they began a quarter of an hour ago. "How tiresome!" Frank Hargate said. "I was watching a most interesting thing here. Don't you see this little chaffinch nest in the bush, with a newly hatched brood. There was a small black snake threatening the nest, and the mother was defending it with quivering wings and open beak. I never saw a prettier thing. I sat quite still and neither of them seemed to notice me. Of course I should have interfered if I had seen the snake getting the best of it. When you came running up like a cart horse, the snake glided away in the grass, and the bird flew off. Oh, dear! I am sorry. I had forgotten all about the match." "I never saw such a fellow as you are, Hargate. Here's the opening match of the season, and you, who are one of our best bats, poking about after birds and snakes. Come along; Thompson sent me and two or three other fellows off in all directions to find you. We shall be half out before you're back. Wilson took James's wicket the first ball." Frank Hargate leaped to his feet, and, laying aside for the present all thoughts of his favorite pursuit, started off at a run to the playing field. His arrival there was greeted with a mingled chorus of welcome and indignation. Frank Hargate was, next to Thompson the captain of the Town eleven, the best bat among the home boarders. He played a steady rather than a brilliant game, and was noted as a good sturdy sticker. Had he been there, Thompson would have put him in at first, in order to break the bowling of the House team. As it was, misfortunes had come rapidly. Ruthven and Handcock were bowling splendidly, and none of the Town boys were making any stand against them. Thompson himself had gone in when the fourth wicket fell, and was still in, although two wickets had since fallen, for only four runs, and the seventh wicket fell just as Frank arrived, panting, on the ground.

Reprint of the original, first published in 1883.

Reproduction of the original. The publishing house Megali specialises in reproducing historical works in large print to make reading easier for people with impaired vision.

'A Complete Identity' is an examination of the hero figure in the works of G.A. Henty (1832-1902) and George MacDonald (1824-1905) and a reassessment of oppositional critiques of their writing. It demonstrates the complementary characteristics of the hero figure, which construct a complete identity commensurate with the Victorian ideal hero. The relationship between the expansion of the British Empire and youthful heroism is established through investigation of the Victorian political, social, and religious milieu, the construct of the child, and the construct of the hero. A connection between the exotic geographical space of empire and the unknown psychological space is drawn through examination of representation of the other in the work of Henty and MacDonald. This book demonstrates that Henty's work is more complex than the stereotypically linear, masculine, imperialistic critique of his stories that historical realism allows, and that MacDonald's work displays more evidence of historical embedding and ideological interpellation than the critical focus on his work as fantasy and fairy tale considers.