The Copybook

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

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KJV Bible

1513

From Wikimedia Commons. Public domain image.

The Character of Horatio Lord Nelson by The Revd Alexander Scott

High praise from someone who knew him better than most.

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1514

By Godfrey Kneller (1646–1723), via the Scottish National Gallery and Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.

The ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688 by Clay Lane

King James II was forced off the throne in favour of his daughter Mary, and a new English constitution was born.

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1515

© John Reavy, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

The Law of the Innocents by Clay Lane

St Adamnán worked tirelessly to secure protection, rights and dignity for the women of Ireland.

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1516

© Norbert Nagel, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 3.0.

St Nicholas and the Luckless Sailor by Clay Lane

After surviving a terrible storm, a crew-member on St Nicholas’s ship met with a tragic accident.

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1517

© milo bostock, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

Queen Charlotte’s Christmas Tree by Clay Lane

Cromwell’s killjoys almost silenced the English Christmas, but thanks to a royal family tradition the message is still being proclaimed.

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1518

© ceridwen, Geograph. Licence: CC-BY-SA 2.0.

Jemima Fawr and the Last Invasion of Britain by Clay Lane

French revolutionaries in a fleet of four ships attempted to spark a revolution in Britain.

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Clay Lane The Copybook
About Clay Lane nicholas@claylane.uk

© Nicholas Armitage / Clay Lane, 2025

May 17 NS

May 4 OS

Signs of Command : Suggest publicly-displayed commands, and say how many of them are sentences.
My Native Notes : Scotsman James Boswell always spoke good English when in England, but he was careful to leave a little Scots in.
Hidden Message : Reveal the hidden message in a letter, and write a coded letter of your own.
The Great and the Good : Daniel Defoe wondered whether goodness was not preferable to greatness.
Statements, Questions and Commands : Choose a word from our list, and then use it in any one of the three basic types of sentence — if possible.
Sentegrams : These sentences, taken from English literature, have been jumbled up like an anagram; see if you can piece them back together.
Good Sense : Rewrite these sentences so that the word ‘unless’ is not used.
The Coronation of Anne Boleyn : The weight of the crown that Anne Boleyn wore proved too heavy to bear.
Abstract : Use these words in sentences as a Noun, Verb or Adjective.
Better By Example : Gregory urged the persecuted Christians of Nazianzus to be the better men.
Speed Clues : Help a friend to guess five words in under a minute.
A Proper Game of Cricket : Mary Mitford makes an appeal for the traditional village cricket match.
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