The Copybook

Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.

583

© DrStew82, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.

The Lost Colony of Roanoke D. H. Montgomery

In 1585, Sir Walter Raleigh’s first attempt to found an English colony in the New World failed, but two years later he was keen to try again.

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584

By Thomas Harriot (?1560-1621), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Man Who Mapped the Moon Science (Journal)

In 1609, Englishman Thomas Harriot turned his new-fangled telescope on the moon, and sketched for the first time the face of another world.

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585

By Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-1770), from the National Gallery of Art via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

‘To Thine Own Self Be True’ William Shakespeare

Standing on the dockside with Laertes, who is eager to board ship for Paris, Polonius takes a moment to share some fatherly wisdom.

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586

By William Anderson (1757-1837), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The Ordeal of Harry Demane Granville Sharp

After word came that Harry Demane had been lured aboard a slave-ship, Granville Sharp had only a few hours in which to make sure he did not sail.

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587

© Peter K. Burian, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.

A Nation of Shopkeepers Napoleon Bonaparte

The great French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte protested that in calling England ‘a nation of shopkeepers’ he had paid us a compliment.

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588

From the Illustrated London News (December 4, 1847), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

Through Russian Eyes (William) John Birkbeck

After a visit to England in 1847, Aleksey Khomyakov published his impressions of our country and our people in a Moscow magazine.

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