E-text prepared by Mark C. Orton and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this file which includes the original illustrations. See 15597-h.htm or 15597-h.zip: (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/9/15597/15597-h/15597-h.htm) or (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/5/5/9/15597/15597-h.zip) STORIES OF AMERICAN LIFE AND ADVENTURE by EDWARD EGGLESTON Author of _Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans_, _A First Book in American History_, and _A History of the United States and its People for the Use of Schools_ American Book Company New York : Cincinnati : Chicago 1895, 1923 [Illustration: Grand Canyon.] PREFACE. This book is intended to serve three main purposes. One of these is to make school reading pleasant by supplying matter simple and direct in style, and sufficiently interesting and exciting to hold the reader's attention in a state of constant wakefulness; that is, to keep the mind in the condition in which instruction can be received with the greatest advantage. A second object is to cultivate an interest in narratives of fact by selecting chiefly incidents full of action, such as are attractive to the minds of boys and girls whose pulses are yet quick with youthful life. The early establishment of a preference for stories of this sort is the most effective antidote to the prevalent vice of reading inferior fiction for mere stimulation. But the principal aim of this book is to make the reader acquainted with American life and manners in other times. The history of life has come to be esteemed of capital importance, but it finds, as yet, small place in school instruction. The stories and sketches in this book relate mainly to earlier times and to conditions very different from those of our own day. They will help the pupil to apprehend the life and spirit of our forefathers. Many of them are such as make him acquainted with that adventurous pioneer life, which thus far has been the largest element in our social history, and which has given to the national character the traits of quick-wittedness, humor, self-reliance, love of liberty, and democratic feeling. These traits in combination distinguish us from other peoples.