Adventures of Prince Charles, and she tells the story of Grace Darling; the contemporary account is, unluckily, rather meagre. Miss Alleyne did 'The Kidnapping of the Princes,' Mrs. Plowden the 'Story of Kaspar Hauser.' Miss Wright reduced the Adventures of Cortes from Prescott, and Mr. Rider Haggard has already been mentioned in connection with Isandhlwana. Here the editor leaves _The True Story Book_ to the indulgence of children, explaining, once more, that his respect for their judgment is very great, and that he would not dream of imposing _lessons_ on _them_, in the shape of a Christmas book. No, lessons are one thing, and stories are another. But though fiction is undeniably stranger and more attractive than truth, yet true stories are also rather attractive and strange, now and then. And, after all, we may return once more to Fairyland, after this excursion into the actual workaday world. CONTENTS PAGE _A Boy among the Red Indians_ 1 _Casanova's Escape_ 16 _Adventures on the Findhorn_ 29 _The Story of Grace Darling_ 41 _The 'Shannon' and the 'Chesapeake'_ 48 _Captain Snelgrave and the Pirates_ 52 _The Spartan Three Hundred_ 64 _Prince Charlie's Wanderings_ 68 _Two Great Matches_ 105 _The Story of Kaspar Hauser_ 113 _An Artist's Adventure_ 122 _The Tale of Isandhlwana and Rorke's Drift_ 132 _How Leif the Lucky found Vineland the Good_ 153 _The Escapes of Cervantes_ 161 _The Worthy Enterprise of John Foxe_ 168 _Baron Trenck_ 176 _The Adventure of John Rawlins_ 186 _The Chevalier Johnstone's Escape from Culloden_ 193 _The Adventures of Lord Pitsligo_ 207 _The Escape of Caesar Borgia from the Castle of Medina del Campo_ 213 _The Kidnapping of the Princes_ 219 _The Conquest of Montezuma's Empire_ 224 _Adventures of Bartholomew Portugues, a Pirate_ 326 _The Return of the French Freebooters_ 330 PLATES _Montezuma greets the Spaniards_ _Frontispiece_ _The Findhorn_ _To face_ 36 _Grace Darling_ " 44 _'Some of the Pirates . . . had thrown several Buckets of Claret upon him'_ " 60 _The Ball hit the Middle Stump_ " 108 _He prepared to attack the Sentry_ " 126 _Montezuma greets the Spaniards_ " 270