883
A faithful feline bides his time until two criminals are brought to justice.
It is usual to suppose that cats are not loyal like dogs, or especially concerned with what does not directly affect them. But Victorian cartoonist Charles Ross tells us about a French cat whose sense of justice was truly single-minded.
Posted May 3 2018
884
After two years in South Africa, a Scottish civil servant began turning out best-selling adventure tales.
John Buchan (1875-1940), 1st Baron Tweedsmuir, was a man of many talents: classicist, barrister, writer of serious history and rattling adventure yarns, influential member of the Church of Scotland, high-flying Westminster MP, and from 1935, Governor-General of Canada.
Posted April 29 2018
885
The first setbacks for the German Empire in the Great War came courtesy of ANZAC troops.
ANZAC (Australian and New Zealand Army Corps) troops were involved from the very beginning of the Great War on August 4th, 1914, not because they were summoned to Europe to protect Britain but because Germany’s growing colonial presence in the South Pacific was a direct threat to their independence.
Posted April 25 2018
886
Manto Mavrogenous hoped that her fellow women might show more solidarity with Greece than many men had done.
On August 12th, 1824, Manto Mavrogenous wrote an open letter to the Ladies of England, soliciting donations to the cause of Greek independence from Ottoman rule. Above all, she needed funds to take Euboia, and make it into a safe island for children and women displaced by the fighting.
Posted April 23 2018
887
In 1822, a rich and beautiful young woman took the cause of Greek independence into her capable hands.
The Greek war of independence lasted from 1821 to 1827, and resulted in a partial liberation from the oppressive rule of the Ottoman Turks which had begun with the fall of Constantinople in 1453. Manto Mavrogenous (1796-1848) was one of the struggle’s most romantic and most tragic figures.
Posted April 23 2018
888
A traveller went into a Shropshire pub looking for information about a patch of grass with peculiar properties.
Oswald was King of Northumbria from 634 to 642, when he was defeated, aged 38, in battle by the pagan King Penda at Maserfield near modern-day Oswestry in Shropshire. He was soon venerated as a saint, for his own piety, and for bringing St Aidan over from Iona to preach Christianity with a simple kindness others had not shown.
Posted April 22 2018