Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
© Robert Graham, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.
Seventeenth-century German craftsmen came seeking a land of opportunity, and found it in County Durham.
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By Torii Kiyomine (1787-1869). Photo: Brooklyn Museum. Licence: Public domain.
Hardworking Kichijiro wins Ima’s heart and Kanshichi’s hatred without noticing a thing.
National Portrait Gallery, via Wikimedia Commons. ? Public domain.
The Founder of Singapore established his city on principles of free people and free trade.
By David Wilkie (1785-1841), Apsley House and via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain
The Russians had checked it in the East, but in the West the expansion of Napoleon Bonaparte’s empire was far from over.
Via the Imperial War Museums collection, and Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Gregory Rasputin is tricked into attending a dissolute Moscow soirée, and shares his sadness with Englishman Gerard Shelley.
Via Wikimedia Commons. Public domain.
Stamford Raffles, Lieutenant-Governor of Java, urged London to bypass our European partners and trade directly with Japan.