Emile Zola - "The Three Cities Trilogy: Paris, Vol. 4"

William Gardner - "The Life of Stephen A. Douglas"

John Drinkwater - "Preludes 1921 1922"

Charles Ives - "Essays Before a Sonata"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: Pollyanna Grows Up

E >> Eleanor H. Porter >> Pollyanna Grows Up




"But, really, Della, she is impossible. Listen. In the first place she
is wild with delight over the house. The very first day she got here
she begged me to open every room; and she was not satisfied until
every shade in the house was up, so that she might 'see all the
perfectly lovely things,' which, she declared, were even nicer than
Mr. John Pendleton's--whoever he may be, somebody in Beldingsville, I
believe. Anyhow, he isn't a Ladies' Aider. I've found out that much.

"Then, as if it wasn't enough to keep me running from room to room (as
if I were the guide on a 'personally conducted'), what did she do but
discover a white satin evening gown that I hadn't worn for years, and
beseech me to put it on. And I did put it on--why, I can't imagine,
only that I found myself utterly helpless in her hands.

"But that was only the beginning. She begged then to see everything
that I had, and she was so perfectly funny in her stories of the
missionary barrels, which she used to 'dress out of,' that I had to
laugh--though I almost cried, too, to think of the wretched things
that poor child had to wear. Of course gowns led to jewels, and she
made such a fuss over my two or three rings that I foolishly opened
the safe, just to see her eyes pop out. And, Della, I thought that
child would go crazy. She put on to me every ring, brooch, bracelet,
and necklace that I owned, and insisted on fastening both diamond
tiaras in my hair (when she found out what they were), until there I
sat, hung with pearls and diamonds and emeralds, and feeling like a
heathen goddess in a Hindu temple, especially when that preposterous
child began to dance round and round me, clapping her hands and
chanting, 'Oh, how perfectly lovely, how perfectly lovely! How I would
love to hang you on a string in the window--you'd make such a
beautiful prism!'

"I was just going to ask her what on earth she meant by that when down
she dropped in the middle of the floor and began to cry. And what do
you suppose she was crying for? Because she was so glad she'd got eyes
that could see! Now what do you think of that?

"Of course this isn't all. It's only the beginning. Pollyanna has been
here four days, and she's filled every one of them full. She already
numbers among her friends the ash-man, the policeman on the beat, and
the paper boy, to say nothing of every servant in my employ. They seem
actually bewitched with her, every one of them. But please do not
think _I_ am, for I'm not. I would send the child back to you at once
if I didn't feel obliged to fulfil my promise to keep her this winter.
As for her making me forget Jamie and my great sorrow--that is
impossible. She only makes me feel my loss all the more
keenly--because I have her instead of him. But, as I said, I shall
keep her--until she begins to preach. Then back she goes to you. But
she hasn't preached yet.

"Lovingly but distractedly yours,

"RUTH."

"'Hasn't preached yet,' indeed!" chuckled Della Wetherby to herself,
folding up the closely-written sheets of her sister's letter. "Oh,
Ruth, Ruth! and yet you admit that you've opened every room, raised
every shade, decked yourself in satin and jewels--and Pollyanna hasn't
been there a week yet. But she hasn't preached--oh, no, she hasn't
preached!"




CHAPTER IV

THE GAME AND MRS. CAREW


Boston, to Pollyanna, was a new experience, and certainly Pollyanna,
to Boston--such part of it as was privileged to know her--was very
much of a new experience.

Pollyanna said she liked Boston, but that she did wish it was not
quite so big.

"You see," she explained earnestly to Mrs. Carew, the day following
her arrival, "I want to see and know it ALL, and I can't. It's just
like Aunt Polly's company dinners; there's so much to eat--I mean, to
see--that you don't eat--I mean, see--anything, because you're always
trying to decide what to eat--I mean, to see.

"Of course you can be glad there IS such a lot," resumed Pollyanna,
after taking breath, "'cause a whole lot of anything is nice--that is,
GOOD things; not such things as medicine and funerals, of course!--but
at the same time I couldn't used to help wishing Aunt Polly's company
dinners could be spread out a little over the days when there wasn't
any cake and pie; and I feel the same way about Boston. I wish I could
take part of it home with me up to Beldingsville so I'd have SOMETHING
new next summer. But of course I can't. Cities aren't like frosted
cake--and, anyhow, even the cake didn't keep very well. I tried it,
and it dried up, 'specially the frosting. I reckon the time to take
frosting and good times is while they are going; so I want to see all
I can now while I'm here."

Pollyanna, unlike the people who think that to see the world one must
begin at the most distant point, began her "seeing Boston" by a
thorough exploration of her immediate surroundings--the beautiful
Commonwealth Avenue residence which was now her home. This, with her
school work, fully occupied her time and attention for some days.

There was so much to see, and so much to learn; and everything was so
marvelous and so beautiful, from the tiny buttons in the wall that
flooded the rooms with light, to the great silent ballroom hung with
mirrors and pictures. There were so many delightful people to know,
too, for besides Mrs. Carew herself there were Mary, who dusted the
drawing-rooms, answered the bell, and accompanied Pollyanna to and
from school each day; Bridget, who lived in the kitchen and cooked;
Jennie, who waited at table, and Perkins who drove the automobile. And
they were all so delightful--yet so different!

Pollyanna had arrived on a Monday, so it was almost a week before the
first Sunday. She came downstairs that morning with a beaming
countenance.

"I love Sundays," she sighed happily.

"Do you?" Mrs. Carew's voice had the weariness of one who loves no
day.

"Yes, on account of church, you know, and Sunday school. Which do you
like best, church, or Sunday school?"

"Well, really, I--" began Mrs. Carew, who seldom went to church and
never went to Sunday school.

"'Tis hard to tell, isn't it?" interposed Pollyanna, with luminous but
serious eyes. "But you see _I_ like church best, on account of father.
You know he was a minister, and of course he's really up in Heaven
with mother and the rest of us, but I try to imagine him down here,
lots of times; and it's easiest in church, when the minister is
talking. I shut my eyes and imagine it's father up there; and it helps
lots. I'm so glad we can imagine things, aren't you?"

"I'm not so sure of that, Pollyanna."

"Oh, but just think how much nicer our IMAGINED things are than our
really truly ones--that is, of course, yours aren't, because your REAL
ones are so nice." Mrs. Carew angrily started to speak, but Pollyanna
was hurrying on. "And of course MY real ones are ever so much nicer
than they used to be. But all that time I was hurt, when my legs
didn't go, I just had to keep imagining all the time, just as hard as
I could. And of course now there are lots of times when I do it--like
about father, and all that. And so to-day I'm just going to imagine
it's father up there in the pulpit. What time do we go?"

"GO?"

"To church, I mean."

"But, Pollyanna, I don't--that is, I'd rather not--" Mrs. Carew
cleared her throat and tried again to say that she was not going to
church at all; that she almost never went. But with Pollyanna's
confident little face and happy eyes before her, she could not do it.

"Why, I suppose--about quarter past ten--if we walk," she said then,
almost crossly. "It's only a little way."

Thus it happened that Mrs. Carew on that bright September morning
occupied for the first time in months the Carew pew in the very
fashionable and elegant church to which she had gone as a girl, and
which she still supported liberally--so far as money went.

To Pollyanna that Sunday morning service was a great wonder and joy.
The marvelous music of the vested choir, the opalescent rays from the
jeweled windows, the impassioned voice of the preacher, and the
reverent hush of the worshiping throng filled her with an ecstasy that
left her for a time almost speechless. Not until they were nearly home
did she fervently breathe:

"Oh, Mrs. Carew, I've just been thinking how glad I am we don't have
to live but just one day at a time!"

Mrs. Carew frowned and looked down sharply. Mrs. Carew was in no mood
for preaching. She had just been obliged to endure it from the pulpit,
she told herself angrily, and she would NOT listen to it from this
chit of a child. Moreover, this "living one day at a time" theory was
a particularly pet doctrine of Della's. Was not Della always saying:
"But you only have to live one minute at a time, Ruth, and any one can
endure anything for one minute at a time!"

"Well?" said Mrs. Carew now, tersely.

"Yes. Only think what I'd do if I had to live yesterday and to-day and
to-morrow all at once," sighed Pollyanna. "Such a lot of perfectly
lovely things, you know. But I've had yesterday, and now I'm living
to-day, and I've got to-morrow still coming, and next Sunday, too.
Honestly, Mrs. Carew, if it wasn't Sunday now, and on this nice quiet
street, I should just dance and shout and yell. I couldn't help it.
But it's being Sunday, so, I shall have to wait till I get home and
then take a hymn--the most rejoicingest hymn I can think of. What is
the most rejoicingest hymn? Do you know, Mrs. Carew?"

"No, I can't say that I do," answered Mrs. Carew, faintly, looking
very much as if she were searching for something she had lost. For a
woman who expects, because things are so bad, to be told that she need
stand only one day at a time, it is disarming, to say the least, to be
told that, because things are so good, it is lucky she does not HAVE
to stand but one day at a time!

On Monday, the next morning, Pollyanna went to school for the first
time alone. She knew the way perfectly now, and it was only a short
walk. Pollyanna enjoyed her school very much. It was a small private
school for girls, and was quite a new experience, in its way; but
Pollyanna liked new experiences.

Mrs. Carew, however, did not like new experiences, and she was having
a good many of them these days. For one who is tired of everything to
be in so intimate a companionship with one to whom everything is a
fresh and fascinating joy must needs result in annoyance, to say the
least. And Mrs. Carew was more than annoyed. She was exasperated. Yet
to herself she was forced to admit that if any one asked her why she
was exasperated, the only reason she could give would be "Because
Pollyanna is so glad"--and even Mrs. Carew would hardly like to give
an answer like that.

To Della, however, Mrs. Carew did write that the word "glad" had got
on her nerves, and that sometimes she wished she might never hear it
again. She still admitted that Pollyanna had not preached--that she
had not even once tried to make her play the game. What the child did
do, however, was invariably to take Mrs. Carew's "gladness" as a
matter of course, which, to one who HAD no gladness, was most
provoking.

It was during the second week of Pollyanna's stay that Mrs. Carew's
annoyance overflowed into irritable remonstrance. The immediate cause
thereof was Pollyanna's glowing conclusion to a story about one of her
Ladies' Aiders.

"She was playing the game, Mrs. Carew. But maybe you don't know what
the game is. I'll tell you. It's a lovely game."

But Mrs. Carew held up her hand.

"Never mind, Pollyanna," she demurred. "I know all about the game. My
sister told me, and--and I must say that I--I should not care for it."

"Why, of course not, Mrs. Carew!" exclaimed Pollyanna in quick
apology. "I didn't mean the game for you. You couldn't play it, of
course."

"I COULDN'T play it!" ejaculated Mrs. Carew, who, though she WOULD not
play this silly game, was in no mood to be told that she COULD not.

"Why, no, don't you see?" laughed Pollyanna, gleefully. "The game is
to find something in everything to be glad about; and you couldn't
even begin to hunt, for there isn't anything about you but what you
COULD be glad about. There wouldn't BE any game to it for you! Don't
you see?"

Mrs. Carew flushed angrily. In her annoyance she said more than
perhaps she meant to say.

"Well, no, Pollyanna, I can't say that I do," she differed coldly. "As
it happens, you see, I can find nothing whatever to be--glad for."

For a moment Pollyanna stared blankly. Then she fell back in
amazement.

"Why, MRS. CAREW!" she breathed.

"Well, what is there--for me?" challenged the woman, forgetting all
about, for the moment, that she was never going to allow Pollyanna to
"preach."

"Why, there's--there's everything," murmured Pollyanna, still with
that dazed unbelief. "There--there's this beautiful house."

"It's just a place to eat and sleep--and I don't want to eat and
sleep."

"But there are all these perfectly lovely things," faltered Pollyanna.

"I'm tired of them."

"And your automobile that will take you anywhere."

"I don't want to go anywhere."

Pollyanna quite gasped aloud.

"But think of the people and things you could see, Mrs. Carew."

"They would not interest me, Pollyanna."

Once again Pollyanna stared in amazement. The troubled frown on her
face deepened.

"But, Mrs. Carew, I don't see," she urged. "Always, before, there have
been BAD things for folks to play the game on, and the badder they are
the more fun 'tis to get them out--find the things to be glad for, I
mean. But where there AREN'T any bad things, I shouldn't know how to
play the game myself."

There was no answer for a time. Mrs. Carew sat with her eyes out the
window. Gradually the angry rebellion on her face changed to a look of
hopeless sadness. Very slowly then she turned and said:

"Pollyanna, I had thought I wouldn't tell you this; but I've decided
that I will. I'm going to tell you why nothing that I have can make
me--glad." And she began the story of Jamie, the little four-year-old
boy who, eight long years before, had stepped as into another world,
leaving the door fast shut between.

"And you've never seen him since--anywhere?" faltered Pollyanna, with
tear-wet eyes, when the story was done.

"Never."

"But we'll find him, Mrs. Carew--I'm sure we'll find him."

Mrs. Carew shook her head sadly.

"But I can't. I've looked everywhere, even in foreign lands."

"But he must be somewhere."

"He may be--dead, Pollyanna."

Pollyanna gave a quick cry.

"Oh, no, Mrs. Carew. Please don't say that! Let's imagine he's alive.
We CAN do that, and that'll help; and when we get him IMAGINED alive
we can just as well imagine we're going to find him. And that'll help
a whole lot more."

"But I'm afraid he's--dead, Pollyanna," choked Mrs. Carew.

"You don't know it for sure, do you?" besought the little girl,
anxiously.

"N-no."

"Well, then, you're just imagining it," maintained Pollyanna, in
triumph. "And if you can imagine him dead, you can just as well
imagine him alive, and it'll be a whole lot nicer while you're doing
it. Don't you see? And some day, I'm just sure you'll find him. Why,
Mrs. Carew, you CAN play the game now! You can play it on Jamie. You
can be glad every day, for every day brings you just one day nearer to
the time when you're going to find him. See?"

But Mrs. Carew did not "see." She rose drearily to her feet and said:

"No, no, child! You don't understand--you don't understand. Now run
away, please, and read, or do anything you like. My head aches. I'm
going to lie down."

And Pollyanna, with a troubled, sober face, slowly left the room.




CHAPTER V

POLLYANNA TAKES A WALK


It was on the second Saturday afternoon that Pollyanna took her
memorable walk. Heretofore Pollyanna had not walked out alone, except
to go to and from school. That she would ever attempt to explore
Boston streets by herself, never occurred to Mrs. Carew, hence she
naturally had never forbidden it. In Beldingsville, however, Pollyanna
had found--especially at the first--her chief diversion in strolling
about the rambling old village streets in search of new friends and
new adventures.

On this particular Saturday afternoon Mrs. Carew had said, as she
often did say: "There, there, child, run away; please do. Go where you
like and do what you like, only don't, please, ask me any more
questions to-day!"

Until now, left to herself, Pollyanna had always found plenty to
interest her within the four walls of the house; for, if inanimate
things failed, there were yet Mary, Jennie, Bridget, and Perkins.
To-day, however, Mary had a headache, Jennie was trimming a new hat,
Bridget was making apple pies, and Perkins was nowhere to be found.
Moreover it was a particularly beautiful September day, and nothing
within the house was so alluring as the bright sunlight and balmy air
outside. So outside Pollyanna went and dropped herself down on the
steps.

For some time she watched in silence the well-dressed men, women, and
children, who walked briskly by the house, or else sauntered more
leisurely through the parkway that extended up and down the middle of
the Avenue. Then she got to her feet, skipped down the steps, and
stood looking, first to the right, then to the left.

Pollyanna had decided that she, too, would take a walk. It was a
beautiful day for a walk, and not once, yet, had she taken one at
all--not a REAL walk. Just going to and from school did not count. So
she would take one to-day. Mrs. Carew would not mind. Had she not told
her to do just what she pleased so long as she asked no more
questions? And there was the whole long afternoon before her. Only
think what a lot one might see in a whole long afternoon! And it
really was such a beautiful day. She would go--this way! And with a
little whirl and skip of pure joy, Pollyanna turned and walked
blithely down the Avenue.

Into the eyes of those she met Pollyanna smiled joyously. She was
disappointed--but not surprised--that she received no answering smile
in return. She was used to that now--in Boston. She still smiled,
however, hopefully: there might be some one, sometime, who would smile
back.

Mrs. Carew's home was very near the beginning of Commonwealth Avenue,
so it was not long before Pollyanna found herself at the edge of a
street crossing her way at right angles. Across the street, in all its
autumn glory, lay what to Pollyanna was the most beautiful "yard" she
had ever seen--the Boston Public Garden.

For a moment Pollyanna hesitated, her eyes longingly fixed on the
wealth of beauty before her. That it was the private grounds of some
rich man or woman, she did not for a moment doubt. Once, with Dr. Ames
at the Sanatorium, she had been taken to call on a lady who lived in a
beautiful house surrounded by just such walks and trees and
flower-beds as these.

Pollyanna wanted now very much to cross the street and walk in those
grounds, but she doubted if she had the right. To be sure, others were
there, moving about, she could see; but they might be invited guests,
of course. After she had seen two women, one man, and a little girl
unhesitatingly enter the gate and walk briskly down the path, however,
Pollyanna concluded that she, too, might go. Watching her chance she
skipped nimbly across the street and entered the Garden.

It was even more beautiful close at hand than it had been at a
distance. Birds twittered over her head, and a squirrel leaped across
the path ahead of her. On benches here and there sat men, women, and
children. Through the trees flashed the sparkle of the sun on water;
and from somewhere came the shouts of children and the sound of music.

Once again Pollyanna hesitated; then, a little timidly, she accosted a
handsomely-dressed young woman coming toward her.

"Please, is this--a party?" she asked.

The young woman stared.

"A party!" she repeated dazedly.

"Yes'm. I mean, is it all right for me--to be here?"

"For you to be here? Why, of course. It's for--for everybody!"
exclaimed the young woman.

"Oh, that's all right, then. I'm glad I came," beamed Pollyanna.

The young woman said nothing; but she turned back and looked at
Pollyanna still dazedly as she hurried away.

Pollyanna, not at all surprised that the owner of this beautiful place
should be so generous as to give a party to everybody, continued on
her way. At the turn of the path she came upon a small girl and a doll
carriage. She stopped with a glad little cry, but she had not said a
dozen words before from somewhere came a young woman with hurrying
steps and a disapproving voice; a young woman who held out her hand to
the small girl, and said sharply:

"Here, Gladys, Gladys, come away with me. Hasn't mama told you not to
talk to strange children?"

"But I'm not strange children," explained Pollyanna in eager defense.
"I live right here in Boston, now, and--" But the young woman and the
little girl dragging the doll carriage were already far down the path;
and with a half-stifled sigh Pollyanna fell back. For a moment she
stood silent, plainly disappointed; then resolutely she lifted her
chin and went forward.

"Well, anyhow, I can be glad for that," she nodded to herself, "for
now maybe I'll find somebody even nicer--Susie Smith, perhaps, or even
Mrs. Carew's Jamie. Anyhow, I can IMAGINE I'm going to find them; and
if I don't find THEM, I can find SOMEBODY!" she finished, her wistful
eyes on the self-absorbed people all about her.

Undeniably Pollyanna was lonesome. Brought up by her father and the
Ladies' Aid Society in a small Western town, she had counted every
house in the village her home, and every man, woman, and child her
friend. Coming to her aunt in Vermont at eleven years of age, she had
promptly assumed that conditions would differ only in that the homes
and the friends would be new, and therefore even more delightful,
possibly, for they would be "different"--and Pollyanna did so love
"different" things and people! Her first and always her supreme
delight in Beldingsville, therefore, had been her long rambles about
the town and the charming visits with the new friends she had made.
Quite naturally, in consequence, Boston, as she first saw it, seemed
to Pollyanna even more delightfully promising in its possibilities.

Thus far, however, Pollyanna had to admit that in one respect, at
least, it had been disappointing: she had been here nearly two weeks
and she did not yet know the people who lived across the street, or
even next door. More inexplicable still, Mrs. Carew herself did not
know many of them, and not any of them well. She seemed, indeed,
utterly indifferent to her neighbors, which was most amazing from
Pollyanna's point of view; but nothing she could say appeared to
change Mrs. Carew's attitude in the matter at all.

"They do not interest me, Pollyanna," was all she would say; and with
this, Pollyanna--whom they did interest very much--was forced to be
content.

To-day, on her walk, however, Pollyanna had started out with high
hopes, yet thus far she seemed destined to be disappointed. Here all
about her were people who were doubtless most delightful--if she only
knew them. But she did not know them. Worse yet, there seemed to be no
prospect that she would know them, for they did not, apparently, wish
to know her: Pollyanna was still smarting under the nurse's sharp
warning concerning "strange children."

"Well, I reckon I'll just have to show 'em that I'm not strange
children," she said at last to herself, moving confidently forward
again.

Pursuant of this idea Pollyanna smiled sweetly into the eyes of the
next person she met, and said blithely:

"It's a nice day, isn't it?"

"Er--what? Oh, y-yes, it is," murmured the lady addressed, as she
hastened on a little faster.

Twice again Pollyanna tried the same experiment, but with like
disappointing results. Soon she came upon the little pond that she had
seen sparkling in the sunlight through the trees. It was a beautiful
pond, and on it were several pretty little boats full of laughing
children. As she watched them, Pollyanna felt more and more
dissatisfied to remain by herself. It was then that, spying a man
sitting alone not far away, she advanced slowly toward him and sat
down on the other end of the bench. Once Pollyanna would have danced
unhesitatingly to the man's side and suggested acquaintanceship with a
cheery confidence that had no doubt of a welcome; but recent rebuffs
had filled her with unaccustomed diffidence. Covertly she looked at
the man now.

He was not very good to look at. His garments, though new, were dusty,
and plainly showed lack of care. They were of the cut and style
(though Pollyanna of course did not know this) that the State gives
its prisoners as a freedom suit. His face was a pasty white, and was
adorned with a week's beard. His hat was pulled far down over his
eyes. With his hands in his pockets he sat idly staring at the ground.

For a long minute Pollyanna said nothing; then hopefully she began: