THE HILL READERS

BOOK FIVE

BLAIR'S DARING LEAP1

THOMAS NELSON PAGE

THOMAS NELSON PAGE (1853- ), an American writer of fiction, was born at Oakland Plantation, Hanover County, Virginia. He was graduated from Washington and Lee University in 1872, and from the law department of the University of Virginia in 1874. He then opened a law office in Richmond.

While at school he had begun to write stories in the negro dialect, and he kept up the practice. This writing was usually done at night after his office duties were finished.

Mars Chan, a negro dialect story that was kept in the safe of the Century Magazine for four years after it was paid for, won 10 instant popularity on its publication in 1884. In 1887 Mr. Page collected a volume of his short stories and published them under the title In Ole Virginia. Two Little Confederates, Among the Camps, A Captured Santa Claus, all war-time stories, were written for children. Red Rock, a story of reconstruction days, is Page's 15 most elaborate work.

Jacquelin Gray-the one who figures in these pages was born while his father was in Mexico,

1 From Red Rock. Copyright, 1898. Charles Scribner's Sons, Publishers.