Chapter I: Front Matter

[Transcriber's Note: Bold text is surrounded by =equal signs= and italic text is surrounded by _underscores_.]

Our Little English Cousin

THE

Little Cousin Series

(TRADE MARK)

Each volume illustrated with six or more full-page plates in
tint. Cloth, 12mo, with decorative cover,
per volume, 60 cents

LIST OF TITLES

BY MARY HAZELTON WADE

(unless otherwise indicated)

=Our Little African Cousin=

=Our Little Alaskan Cousin=
By By Mary F. Nixon-Roulet

=Our Little Arabian Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little Armenian Cousin=

=Our Little Australian Cousin=
By Mary F. Nixon-Roulet

=Our Little Brazilian Cousin=
By Mary F. Nixon-Roulet

=Our Little Brown Cousin=

=Our Little Canadian Cousin=
By Elizabeth R. MacDonald

=Our Little Chinese Cousin=
By Isaac Taylor Headland

=Our Little Cuban Cousin=

=Our Little Dutch Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little Egyptian Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little English Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little Eskimo Cousin=

=Our Little French Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little German Cousin=

=Our Little Greek Cousin=
By Mary F. Nixon-Roulet

=Our Little Hawaiian Cousin=

=Our Little Hindu Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little Indian Cousin=

=Our Little Irish Cousin=

=Our Little Italian Cousin=

=Our Little Japanese Cousin=

=Our Little Jewish Cousin=

=Our Little Korean Cousin=
By H. Lee M. Pike

=Our Little Mexican Cousin=
By Edward C. Butler

=Our Little Norwegian Cousin=

=Our Little Panama Cousin=
By H. Lee M. Pike

=Our Little Philippine Cousin=

=Our Little Porto Rican Cousin=

=Our Little Russian Cousin=

=Our Little Scotch Cousin=
By Blanche McManus

=Our Little Siamese Cousin=

=Our Little Spanish Cousin=
By Mary F. Nixon-Roulet

=Our Little Swedish Cousin=
By Claire M. Coburn

=Our Little Swiss Cousin=

=Our Little Turkish Cousin=

L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
New England Building, Boston, Mass.

Our Little
English Cousin

By
Blanche McManus

_Illustrated by_
The Author

Boston
L. C. Page & Company
Publishers

_Copyright, 1905_
BY L. C. PAGE & COMPANY
(INCORPORATED)

_All rights reserved_

Published June, 1905
Fifth Impression, June, 1909

Introduction

THE lives of Our Little English Cousins are not so widely different from our own in America. It is only the more ancient associations with which they are surrounded that changes their manners and customs.

Their speech is the same and their amusements and tasks are to a great extent quite similar.

Certain details of home life vary considerably, and when they "take their walks abroad," "Our Little English Cousins," as often as not, visit some ancient historic shrine from whose associations have been built up the great British nation.

Little English cousins and Little American cousins alike, however, would have the same affections for the same things were they but to change places, therefore things are not so very different after all.

What Washington is to America, London is to Britain; meaning in this case England, Ireland, and Scotland as well, for our little Scotch and Irish cousins by no means like one to talk or write of England alone when one really means Britain.

"Our Little English Cousin" lives in a less rigorous climate than that which prevails for the most part in America. Their winters are in general not so cold (though they are quite as long) and not usually so bright and sunny. The summers are by no means so hot as ours and are accordingly most delightful.

The open-air pleasures of our English cousins, while existent in our own country, are at least more general than with us, and tea out-of-doors, in the garden, or on the banks of the Thames is an institution which is quite unique, and accordingly, as a summer divertisement, is greatly in vogue.

The Associations which link America with England are many and important; indeed they are so numerous that it were futile to attempt to give place to any in this introductory note beyond recalling to the mind of little American cousins that the great Washington himself was of a well-known English family before they settled in America.

To-day, if the English are not emigrating to America to the extent that they formerly were, our American cousins are returning the visits, if only for pleasure or edification, in astonishingly growing numbers each year.

All this makes for a better understanding and appreciation of each other and cements the growing friendship of years, which in our progressive times is a good thing not to overlook.

"Our Little English Cousin," then, extends a cordial hand of welcome, not only to her cousins across the seas who annually make visits to her native land, but to the stay-at-homes as well, who have that pleasure in store for some future time.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE
I. EDITH'S HOME ON THE THAMES 1
II. A DAY AT HAMPTON COURT 13
III. A DRIVE TO RICHMOND AND KEW GARDENS 28
IV. WITH TOM AT WINDSOR CASTLE AND ETON 44
V. LONDON--HYDE PARK AND WESTMINSTER ABBEY 54
VI. THE TOWER OF LONDON 72
VII. MADAME TUSSAUD'S AND THE ZOO 80
VIII. HENLEY WEEK 89
IX. SUMMER HOLIDAYS 95
X. THE LORD MAYOR'S SHOW 103

List of Illustrations

PAGE
EDITH _Frontispiece_
OLDHAM MANOR 8
"IN A FEW MINUTES THEY HAD LANDED" 15
WINDSOR CASTLE 50
"AFTER WATCHING OTHER ANTICS OUR LITTLE FRIENDS BADE
THE 'BEEFEATER' AND HIS PET GOOD-BYE" 76

"SHE WALKED DOWN THE PATH BY THE RIVER AVON" 96

Our Little English Cousin