Books with author John Chambers

Excerpt from Chambers's Pocket Miscellany, Vol. 23Amongst the feathered tribes there are also numerous traces of comicality. The choler of the turkey-cock never fails to excite mirth. Domesticated ravens come to enter into the humours Of the families they live with, and some times prove amazingly funny. The whole race Of parrots is amusing. Not altogether mechanical is that power they have of repeating droll expressions, under the instruction of human masters and mistresses. By timing their jokes, they Often shew that they enjoy them. This tribe, as well as the monkeys and mocking-birds, is unquestionably possessed of that same power of imitation which men employ to the excitement of mirth in mimicry and comic theatricals. The mocking-bird is the very Monsieur Alexandre of American ornithology. It can Simulate the cry of almost all birds, and the name we give it expresses the purposes for which it employs the gift. One Of its favourite waggeries, as is well known, is to gather other birds near it by imitating their cries, and then to disperse them, like a set of school boys at the approach of the master, by uttering the cry Of the bird of which they stand most in fear.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1901 edition. Excerpt: ... the Armada fight. In August 1591 he commanded the Revenge in Lord Thomas Howard's squadron of six vessels, when they fell in with a Spanish fleet of fifty-three sail off Flores, in the Azores. Grenville took off his ninety sick men from the island, and, while the admiral made good his escape, refused with splendid disobedi ence 'to turn from the enemy, alleging that he would rather choose to die than to dishonour himself, his country, and her majesty's ship.' The great San Philip, of 1500 tons, towering in height above the Revenge, soon took the wind from her, and now she found herself in the midst of a ring of enemies, and a battle almost unequalled in the history of the world began. From three in the afternoon, and all through the night till morning the battle raged, the stars above blotted out by the sulphurous canopy of smoke, while as many as fifteen several Spanish ships were beaten on in turns, and no less than 800 shot of great artillery endured. Two ships were sunk by her side, two more so disabled that they soon foundered, while as many as 2000 men were slain or drowned. But the Revenge was by this time a helpless wreck, all her powder spent, the pikes broken, forty of her 100 sound men slain, and the most part of the rest hurt, the vice-admiral himself sore wounded, both in the body and in the head. Sir Richard would have had the master-gunner to blow up the ship, but was overborne by his surviving men, and earned on board one of the Spanish ships, where he died of his wounds the second or third day after, with the words on his lips, according to Linschoten's account: 'Here die I, Richard Grenville, with a joyful and quiet mind: for that I have ended my life as a true soldier ought to do, that hath fought for his country, queen,...