The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Black-Bearded Barbarian (George Leslie
Mackay), by Mary Esther Miller MacGregor, AKA Marion Keith

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Title: The Black-Bearded Barbarian (George Leslie Mackay)

Author: Mary Esther Miller MacGregor, AKA Marion Keith

Posting Date: September 21, 2008 [EBook #1759]
Release Date: May, 1999

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLACK-BEARDED BARBARIAN ***

THE BLACK-BEARDED BARBARIAN

by Mary Esther Miller MacGregor (AKA Marion Keith)

THE BLACK BEARDED BARBARIAN (1)

(1) The name by which George Leslie Mackay was
known among the Chinese of north Formosa.

CHAPTER I. SPLITTING ROCKS

Up in the stony pasture-field behind the barn the boys had been working
all the long afternoon. Nearly all, that is, for, being boys, they had
managed to mix a good deal of fun with their labor. But now they were
tired of both work and play, and wondered audibly, many times over, why
they were not yet called home to supper.

The work really belonged to the Mackay boys, but, like Tom Sawyer, they
had made it so attractive that several volunteers had come to their aid.
Their father was putting up a new stone house, near the old one down
there behind the orchard, and the two youngest of the family had been
put at the task of breaking the largest stones in the field.

It meant only to drag some underbrush and wood from the forest skirting
the farm, pile them on the stones, set fire to them, and let the heat do
the rest. It had been grand sport at first, they all voted, better than
playing shinny, and almost as good as going fishing. In fact it was a
kind of free picnic, where one could play at Indians all day long.
But as the day wore on, the picnic idea had languished, and the
stone-breaking grew more and more to resemble hard work.

The warm spring sunset had begun to color the western sky; the
meadow-larks had gone to bed, and the stone-breakers were tired and
ravenously hungry--as hungry as only wolves or country boys can be. The
visitors suggested that they ought to be going home. "Hold on, Danny,
just till this one breaks," said the older Mackay bo