Here is a book no Christmas stocking should be without, a book that positively distils the spirit of the season. The title poem, familiar to children and adults the world over, introduces a collection of stories and verse with a Christmas theme, guaranteed to engage and amuse readers young and old.

Likely to provoke laughter and sometimes to bring a sentimental tear to the driest eye, this festive treasure trove is ideal for reading aloud or curling up with in a comfy corner. Scrooge himself would have found it difficult to resist distributing copies on Christmas morning!

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This edition is beautifully illustrated in black and white by the great Arthur Rackham, and has an introduction by G.K. Chesterton.

Fables include:

• The Fox & the Grapes
• The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs
• The Fox & the Stork
• The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing
• The Shepherd’s Boy & the Wolf
• The Hare & the Tortoise
• The Lion & the Ass
• The Town Mouse & the Country Mouse
• The Ass & His Masters
• Prometheus & the Making of Man

And many more…

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Tweedledum and Tweedledee, the Mad Hatter, the Cheshire Cat, the Red Queen and the White Rabbit all make their appearances, and are now familiar figures in writing, conversation and idiom. So too are Carroll’s delightful verses such as The Walrus and the Carpenter and the inspired jargon of that masterly Wordsworthian parody, The Jabberwocky.

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This collection of over forty of Andersen’s most popular stories includes The Mermaid, The Real Princess, The Red Shoes, The Little Match Girl, The Snow Queen, The Tinder Box, The Ugly Duckling and many more.

It is delightfully illustrated in black-and white by those remarkable brothers, Charles, Thomas and William Heath Robinson

• The Mermaid
• Hans Clodhopper
• The Flying Trunk
• The Rose Elf
• The Wild Swans
• The Elf-Hill
• The Real Princess
• A Picture from the Ramparts
• The Red Shoes
• Thumbelisa
• The Goblin and the Huckster
• The Bottle Neck
• The Steadfast Tin Soldier
• The Angel
• The Butterfly
• Psyche
• The Snail and the Rose-bush
• The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf
• The Nightingale
• The Storks
• The Little Match Girl
• Great Claus and Little Claus
• The Garden of Paradise
• Little Tuk
• The Wind’s Tale about Waldemar Daa and his Daughters
• The Snow Queen: A Tale in Seven Stories
• A Rose from Homer’s Grave
• The Emperor’s New Clothes
• The Naughty Boy
• Holger the Dane
• What the Moon Saw
• The Tinder Box
• The Story of a Mother
• The Marsh King’s Daughter
• The Galoshes of Fortune
• The Bronze Boar
• The Bell
• Olé Luköié, the Dustman
• The Swineherd
• The Travelling Companions
• The Ugly Duckling

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Anne of Avonlea continues Anne’s story. Now half-past sixteen but as strong-headed and romantic as ever, Anne becomes a teacher at her old school and dreams of its improvement. But her responsible position and mature ambitions do not prevent her entanglement in the scrapes that still seem to beset her in spite of her best intentions.

Thoroughly charming and amusing, with a supporting cast of colourful and endearing characters, both books will enchant and entertain readers, guaranteeing that Anne’s adventures capture their affections as well as their imaginations.

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The books in Volume One:

The Tale of Peter Rabbit
The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin
The Tailor of Gloucester
The Tale of Benjamin Bunny
The Tale of Two Bad Mice
The Tale of the Pie and the Patty Pan
The Tale of Mr Jeremy Fisher
The Story of A Fierce Bad Rabbit
The Story of Miss Moppet
The Tale of Tom Kitten
The Tale of Jemima Puddle-Duck
Appley Dapply’s Nursery Rhymes

The books in Volume Two:

The Tale of Mrs Tiggy-Winkle
The Tale of Samuel Whiskers
or, The Roly-Poly Pudding
The Tale of the Flopsy Bunnies
The Tale of Ginger & Pickles
The Tale of Mrs Tittlemouse
The Tale of Timmy Tiptoes
The Tale of Mr Tod
The Tale of Pigling Bland
The Tale of Johnny Town-Mouse
Cecily Parsley’s Nursery Rhymes
The Tale of Little Pig Robinson

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Black Beauty is a horse with a fine black coat, a white foot and a silver star on his forehead. Seen through his eyes, the story tells of his idyllic upbringing and the hardship and cruelty he suffers subsequently, before finding security and happiness in a new home.

Black Beauty is one of the most popular children’s books ever written.

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This is the first enduring historical novel for children, which conjures up as much magic today as it did on first publication. The freedom from adult constraint allied with the necessary disciplines to survive in a hostile world make for a gripping read.

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But at Christmas three ghosts come to visit him, scare him into mending his ways, and he finds, as he celebrates with Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim and their family, that geniality brings its own reward.

This finest of all Christmas stories is beautifully illustrated with Arthur Rackham’s superb line drawings.

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But wishes granted are not always wishes wanted, so the children find themselves grappling with invisibility, dinosaurs, a ghost and the fearsome Ugli-Wuglies before it is all resolved.

This edition of The Enchanted Castle has forty-seven evocative illustrations by H.R. Millar.

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Favourites such as Jack the Giant-killer, Jack and the Beanstalk, Dick Whittington, The Three Little Pigs and The Babes in the Wood are all here among many others, but stories from different traditions also make their appearance, including The Three Bears and Little Red Hiding Hood.

Other Fairy Tales include:

• St George of Merrie England
• Tom-Tit-Tot
• The Golden Snuff-Box
• Tattercoats
• The Three Feathers
• Lazy Jack
• The Three Sillies
• The Golden Ball
• The Two Sisters
• The Laidly Worm
• Titty Mouse and Tatty Mouse
• The Black Bull of Norroway
• Catskin
• Nix Naught Nothing
• Mr and Mrs Vinegar
• The True History of Sir Thomas Thumb
• Henny-Penny
• The Three Heads of the Well
• Mr Fox
• The Old Woman and Her Pig
• The Wee Bannock
• How Jack Went Out to Seek His Fortune
• The Bogey-Beast
• Childe Rowland
• The Wise Men of Gotham
• Caporushes
• The Red Ettin
• The Fish and the Ring
• Lawkamercyme
• Master of All Masters
• Molly Whuppie and the Double-Faced Giant
• The Ass, the Table and the Stick
• The Well of the World’s End
• The Rose Tree

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‘It’ was the Psammead, the grumpy sand-fairy that could, if in the mood, grant a wish a day. When the five children befriend him they find that each wish granted often has a sting in its tail. Golden guineas are too difficult to spend, wings let them down in a most inconvenient way, and when they wish for Red Indians, the children forget that they can sometimes be a little warlike.

Generations of children have come to love the fantasy and the whimsy of the stories in the classic book from the author of The Railway Children.

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This selection of their folk tales was made and translated by Lucy Crane, and includes firm favourites such as Rapunzel, The Goose Girl, Sleeping Beauty, Hansel and Gretel and Snow White. It is illustrated throughout by Walter Crane’s charming line drawings.

Tales Include:

• The Frog Prince
• Rapunzel
• Hansel and Grethel
• Cinderella
• Little Red-cap (Little Red Riding Hood)
• The Bremen Town Musicicians
• Tom Thumb
• Tom Thumb’s Travels
• The Sleeping Beauty
• Snow-white
• Rumpelstiltskin

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As well as The Nightingale and the Rose, The Devoted Friend and The Remarkable Rocket, this collection contains The Selfish Giant, a remarkable story of the redemptive power of love.

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It tells of the orphan Heidi and her idyllic existence with her gruff grandfather in the mountains. When she is sent to live in a city, comic chaos ensues, and eventually it is arranged that Heidi should return to the mountains. Together she and her friend Peter, the goat-herd, achieve wondrous changes in the community in which they live.

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The captivating Irish stories collected in this new edition include both comic tales such as Paddy O’Kelly and the Weasel, and tales of heroes from ancient literature such as How Cormac Mac Art went to Faery.

By turns funny, fantastical and mysterious, the stories are matched in liveliness by the original illustrations of John D. Batten. It would be hard to find a better introduction for children to the special magic of Celtic storytelling.

The stories in this book are taken from Joseph Jacob’s classic two-volume collection Celtic Fairy Tales (1891-2) and More Celtic Fairy Tales (1894)

Fairy Tales include:

• Connla and the Fairy Maiden
• Guleesh
• The Field of Boliauns
• The Horned Women
• Hudden and Dudden and Donald O’Neary
• The Story of Deirdre
• Munachar and Manachar
• King O’Toole and his Goose
• Jack and his Comrades
• The Shee an Gannon and the Gruagach Gaire
• The Storyteller at Fault
• A Legend of Knockmany
• Fair, Brown and Trembling
• Jack and his Master
• Andrew Coffey

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The Second Jungle Book contains some of the most thrilling of the Mowgli stories. It includes Red Dog, in which Mowgli forms an unlikely alliance with the python Kaa, How Fear Came and Letting in the Jungle as well as The Spring Running, which brings Mowgli to manhood and the realisation that he must leave Bagheera, Baloo and his other friends for the world of man.

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Generations of children have delighted to learn how the Leopard got his spots, how the Elephant’s Child on the banks of the great grey-green Limpopo acquired his trunk with the help of the Crocodile, and the beginning of the Armadillos.

Beautifully illustrated in black-and-white by the author, these delightful tales will hold the reader and listener spellbound.

Stories include:

• How the Whale got his Throat
• How the Camel got his Hump
• How the Rhinoceros got his Skin
• How the Leopard got his Spots
• The Elephant’s Child
• The Sing-Song of Old Man Kangaroo
• The Beginning of the Armadillos
• How the First Letter was Written
• How the Alphabet was Made
• The Crab that Played with the Sea
• The Cat that Walked by Himself
• The Butterfly that Stamped

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Catriona, the lesser-known sequel, immediately continues David’s story. Back in Edinburgh, he is caught up in the aftermath of the Appin murder; certain of the accused man’s innocence, David’s determination to testify on his behalf is impeded by a series of adventures, not least of which is hid passionate but problematic romance with Catriona, granddaughter of Rob Roy MacGregor. Alan Breck features again, becoming involved in the thrilling attempt to reunite the lovers.

One of his own favourites, Stevenson said of Catriona that he would ‘never do a better book’.

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In Allan Quatermain, the trio undertake the search for the kingdom of a warlike ‘white’ race, another expedition fraught with danger. A hazardous canoe journey along an underground river leads them to Zu-Vendi, a land ruled by two beautiful queens. Both queens fall in love with Sir Henry and this explosive situation leads to civil war, several battles, many funerals and a wedding.

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Jo’s Boys revisits the one-time members of that ‘wilderness of boys’ ten years later when they are making their ways in the world with varying degrees of triumph and disaster.

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The Little Prince is a classic tale of equal appeal to children and adults. On one level it is the story of an airman’s discovery, in the desert, of a small boy from another planet – the Little Prince of the title – and his stories of intergalactic travel, while on the other hand it is a thought-provoking allegory of the human condition.First published in 1943, the year before the author’s death in action, this translation contains Saint-Exupery’s delightful illustrations.

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Her strong character enables her to fight successfully against her new-found poverty and the scorn of her fellows.

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The story of their domestic adventures, their attempts to increase the family income, their friendship with the neighbouring Lawrence family, and their later love affairs remains as fresh and beguiling as ever.

Good Wives takes up the story of the March sisters, some three years later, when, as young adults, they must face up to the inevitable trials and traumas of everyday life in their search for individual happiness.

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This dashing tale of eighteenth-century Dorset smugglers will be enjoyed by all who love stories of derring-do written in the tradition of Treasure Island.

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It is a wonderful collection of old favourites from Jack and Jill, Baa, Baa, Black Sheep and Who Killed Cock Robin? to comic alphabets and the fearful fate of Anthony Rowley.

It is illustrated with Rackham’s beautiful pen and ink drawings, and is one of his finest books.

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The leader of the pirates is the sinister Captain Hook. His hand was bitten off by a crocodile, who, as Captain Hook explains ‘liked me arm so much that he has followed me ever since, licking his lips for the rest of me’. After lots of adventures, the story reaches its exciting climax as Peter, Wendy and the children do battle with Captain Hook and his band.

This edition also includes Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens which is the magical tale that first introduces Peter Pan, the little boy who never grows any older. He escapes his human form and flies to Kensington Gardens, where all his happy memories are, and meets the fairies, the thrushes, and Old Caw the crow. The fairies think he is too human to be allowed to stay in after Lock-out time, so he flies off to an island which divides the Gardens from the more grown-up Hyde Park – Peter’s adventures, and how he eventually meets Mamie and the goat, are delightfully illustrated by Arthur Rackham.

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The story of the walking and talking puppet Pinocchio is one of the best-loved children’s tales of all time. Carved by old Gepetto, Pinocchio has an enormous nose which grows even longer whenever he tells a lie. Pinocchio is such a scamp that he gets into all sorts of mischief. He runs away to join a puppet show, he teams up with a rascally fox and wily cat, and plays truant from school which has dreadful consequences. Eventually the conscience of a talking cricket and Pinocchio’s guardian fairy restore him to good behaviour, obedience and care for others.

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However, Pollyanna’s sunny nature and good humour prove to have an astonishing effect on all around her, and this wonderful tale of how cheerfulness can conquer adversity has remained one of the world’s most popular children’s books since its first publication in 1913.

In Pollyanna Grows Up, the only sequel written by Porter herself, Pollyanna finds that, despite being cured of her health problems, adulthood brings fresh challenges to be overcome.

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However, they soon come to love the railway that runs near their cottage, and they make a habit of waving to the Old Gentleman who rides on it. They befriend the porter, Perks, and through him learn railway lore and much else.

They have many adventures, and when they save a train from disaster, they are helped by the Old Gentleman to solve the mystery of their father’s disappearance, and the family is happily reunited.

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In this edition, Henry Gilbert tells of the adventures of the Merry Men of Sherwood Forest – Robin himself, Little John, Friar Tuck, Will Scarlet, and Alan-a-Dale, as well as Maid Marian, good King Richard, and Robin’s deadly enemies Guy of Gisborne and the evil Sheriff of Nottingham.

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She meets and befriends a local boy, the talented Dickon, and comes across her sickly cousin Colin who had been kept hidden from her. Between them, the three children work astonishing magic in themselves and those around them.

The Secret Garden is one of the best-loved stories of all time.

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The Arthurian legends are the most potent of the thrilling and mist-enshrouded tales of adventure to be passed down from pre-recorded history, and they have as much appeal today as they did in the age of the troubadours.

Tales include:

• The Drawing of the Sword
• The Questing Beast
• The Sword Excalibur
• The Story of Sir Balin
• How the Round Table Began
• The Passing of Merlin
• How Morgan le Fay Tried to Kill King Arthur
• What Beaumains Asked of the King
• The Quest of the Holy Grail
• The Fight for the Queen
• The Fair Maid of Astolat
• Lancelot and Guenevere
• The End of It All

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This edition contains the delightful pen-and-ink drawings of Arthur Rackham.

Tales include:

• The Tempest
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream
• The Winter’s Tale
• Much Ado About Nothing
• As You Like It
• The Two Gentlemen of Verona
• The Merchant of Venice
• Cymbeline
• King Lear
• Macbeth
• All’s Well That Ends Well
• The Taming of the Shrew
• The Comedy of Errors
• Measure for Measure
• Twelfth Night or What You Will
• Timon of Athens
• Romeo and Juliet
• Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
• Othello
• Pericles, Prince of Tyre

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This is the background to the Arabian Nights. In this selection made by that master of folklore and fairy-tale Andrew Lang, the reader meets Aladdin with his wonderful lamp, the Enchanted Horse, the Princess Badoura, Sinbad the Sailor, and the great Caliph of Bagdad, Haroun-al-Raschid.

The stories are beautifully illustrated by H.J. Ford.

Tales include:

• The Story of the Merchant and the Genius
• The Story of the First Old Man and of the Hind
• The Story of the Second Old Man and of the Two Black Dogs
• The Story of the Fisherman
• The Story of the Greek King and the Physician Douban
• The Story of the Husband and the Parrot
• The Story of the Vizir who was Punished
• The Story of the Young King of the Black Isles
• The Story of the Three Calenders, Sons of Kings, and of Five Ladies of Bagdad
• The Story of the First Calender, Son of a King
• The Story of the Second Calender, Son of a King
• The Story of the Envious Man and of Him who was Envied
• The Story of the Third Calender, Son of a King
• The Seven Voyages of Sindbad the Sailor
• The First Voyage of Sindbad
• The Second Voyage of Sindbad
• The Third Voyage of Sindbad
• The Fourth Voyage of Sindbad
• The Fifth Voyage of Sindbad
• The Sixth Voyage of Sindbad
• The Seventh and Last Voyage
• The Little Hunchback
• The Story of the Barber’s Fifth Brother
• The Story of the Barber’s Sixth Brother
• The Adventures of Prince Camaralzaman and the Princess Badoura
• Noureddin and the Fair Persian
• Aladdin and the Wonderful Lamp
• The Adventures of Haroun-al-Raschid, Caliph of Bagdad
• The Story of the Blind Baba-Abdalla
• The Story of Sidi-Nouman
• The Story of Ali Cogia, Merchant of Bagdad
• The Enchanted Horse
• The Story of Two Sisters who were Jealous of their Younger Sister

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The book describes Tom’s time at Rugby School from his first football match, through his troubled adolescence when he is savagely bullied by the unspeakable Flashman, to his departure for a wider world as a confident young man. This classic tale of a boy’s schooldays under the benevolent eye of the renowned Dr Arnold still retains the appeal for which it was acclaimed on its first publication in 1857.

In its less well-known sequel, Tom Brown at Oxford, we follow our hero to St Ambrose’s College, and, in sharing his undergraduate experiences, gain a vivid impression of university life in the mid-nineteenth century.

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Treasure Island is a tale of pirates and villains, maps, treasure and shipwreck, and is perhaps the best adventure story ever written.

When young Jim Hawkins finds a packet in Captain Flint’s sea chest, he could not know that the map inside it would lead him to unimaginable treasure. Shipping as cabin boy on the Hispaniola, he sails with Squire Trelawney, Captain Smollett, Dr Livesey, the sinister Long John Silver and a frightening crew to Treasure Island. There, mutiny, murder and mayhem lead to a thrilling climax.

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In his new life, he meets all sorts of aquatic creatures, including an engaging old lobster, other water babies, and at last reaches St Branden’s Isle where he encounters the fierce Mrs Bedonebyeasyoudid and the motherly Mrs Doasyouwouldbedoneby. After a long and arduous quest to the Other-end-of-Nowhere young Tom achieves his heart’s desire.

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What Katy Did at School is a compelling tale of the intrigues of life at the New England girls’ boarding school which Katy attends. Her trials and adventures are all interwoven with a sense of fun and gently ironic good humour.

What Katy Did Next describes a tour by Katy of Europe, as she evolves from the child of earlier books into a spirited young woman, and brings to a satisfying close this delightful trilogy.

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Illustrated by Arthur Rackham.

Far from fading with time, Kenneth Grahame’s classic tale of fantasy has attracted a growing audience in each generation. Rat, Mole, Badger and the preposterous Mr Toad (with his ‘Poop-poop-poop’ road-hogging new motor-car), have brought delight to many through the years with their odd adventures on and by the river, and at the imposing residence of Toad Hall.

Grahame’s book was later dramatised by A. A. Milne, and became a perennial Christmas favourite, as Toad of Toad Hall. It continues to enchant and, above all perhaps, inspire great affection.

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In Glinda of Oz, the last of the original ‘Oz’ books, Dorothy and Princess Ozma seek the help of Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, when they find themselves in peril on the Magic Isle of the Skeezers

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