The boys at the Brooklyn public school which he attended did not know what the "T." stood for. He would never tell them. All he said in reply to questions was: "It don't stand for nothin'. You've gotter have a' 'nitial, ain't you?" His name was, in fact, an almost inevitable school-boy modification of one felt to be absurd and pretentious. His Christian name was Temple, which became "Temp." His surname was Barom, so he was at once "Temp Barom." In the natural tendency to avoid waste of time it was pronounced as one word, ...
Read More
The boys at the Brooklyn public school which he attended did not know what the "T." stood for. He would never tell them. All he said in reply to questions was: "It don't stand for nothin'. You've gotter have a' 'nitial, ain't you?" His name was, in fact, an almost inevitable school-boy modification of one felt to be absurd and pretentious. His Christian name was Temple, which became "Temp." His surname was Barom, so he was at once "Temp Barom." In the natural tendency to avoid waste of time it was pronounced as one word, and the letter p being superfluous and cumbersome, it easily settled itself into "Tembarom," and there remained. By much less inevitable processes have surnames evolved themselves as centuries rolled by. Tembarom liked it, and soon almost forgot he had ever been called anything else. His education really began when he was ten years old. At that time his mother died of pneumonia, contracted by going out to sew, at seventy-five cents a day, in shoes almost entirely without soles, when the remains of a blizzard were melting in the streets. As, after her funeral, there remained only twenty-five cents in the shabby bureau which was one of the few articles furnishing the room in the tenement in which they lived together, Tembarom sleeping on a cot, the world spread itself before him as a place to explore in search of at least one meal a day. There was nothing to do but to explore it to the best of his ten-year-old ability. His father had died two years before his mother, and Tembarom had vaguely felt it a relief. He had been a resentful, domestically tyrannical immigrant Englishman, who held in contempt every American trait and institution. He had come over to better himself, detesting England and the English because there was "no chance for a man there," and, transferring his dislikes and resentments from one country to another, had met with no better luck than he had left behind him. This he felt to be the fault of America, and his family, which was represented solely by Tembarom and his mother, heard a good deal about it, and also, rather contradictorily, a good deal about the advantages and superiority of England, to which in the course of six months he became gloomily loyal. It was necessary, in fact, for him to have something with which to compare the United States unfavorably. The effect he produced on Tembarom was that of causing him, when he entered the public school round the corner, to conceal with determination verging on duplicity the humiliating fact that if he had not been born in Brooklyn he might have been born in England. England was not popular among the boys in the school. History had represented the country to them in all its tyrannical rapacity and bloodthirsty oppression of the humble free-born. The manly and admirable attitude was to say, "Give me liberty or give me death"-and there was the Fourth of July.
Read Less
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Fair. Undated. Hodder and Stoughton. Hardcover. ACCEPTABLE Gilt titles, blue boards. Library binding, rebound, ex library, usual stamps and labels. 7x5.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Very Good. Book With 4 pgs ads. 1925 penned name fr endpaper. Few pgs at back havepink bleed at bottom Charles Chapman artwork. very good, no dj, gold-stamped maroon cloth 518 pgs.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
New. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 166 p. In Stock. 100% Money Back Guarantee. Brand New, Perfect Condition, allow 4-14 business days for standard shipping. To Alaska, Hawaii, U.S. protectorate, P.O. box, and APO/FPO addresses allow 4-28 business days for Standard shipping. No expedited shipping. All orders placed with expedited shipping will be cancelled. Over 3, 000, 000 happy customers.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Very Good. No Jacket. Book. 12mo-over 6¾"-7¾" tall. An early printing of this edition by the author of The Secret Garden. Red boards with gold-color decorations and lettering, frontis. and 7 text illustrations by Charles S. Chapman, 518 pp. 1914 on title page and 1913 on copyright page indicating a probable second printing. Minimal wear with slightly faded spine, no owner names or gift notes, clean text, tight binding.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
PLEASE NOTE, WE DO NOT SHIP TO DENMARK. New Book. Shipped from UK in 4 to 14 days. Established seller since 2000. Please note we cannot offer an expedited shipping service from the UK.
