The Project Gutenberg EBook of Charley Laurel, by W. H. G. Kingston

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Title: Charley Laurel
A Story of Adventure by Sea and Land

Author: W. H. G. Kingston

Illustrator: Savile Lumley

Release Date: May 15, 2007 [EBook #21458]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CHARLEY LAUREL ***

Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

Charley Laurel, A Story of Adventure by Sea and Land, by W H G Kingston.

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Here Kingston gives us a story of a young boy who had been handed to a
British seaman, Dick, at a place in the West Indies which had just been
attacked by the British. The boy's nurse, a coloured woman, had
received a fatal wound. The boy is brought up by Dick on board ship,
but there are all sorts of misadventures, such as being cast away on a
raft, being picked up by what turns out to be a pirate ship, escaping
and then being rescued by a privateer.

It is at this point that the story gets a bit serious. Dick and Charley
find themselves on an island in the South Pacific, having been captured
by savage tribes, and being kept apart. Charley plays a trick on his
captors, which enables him to travel to where Dick is, and bring him
back. They escape from the island, and are picked up by a British ship.

Charley is taken back to England, where the shipowner's family take a
liking to him, and he is sent to a boarding school, where he does very
well. He is then sent back to sea by the kindly shipowner, in one of
his vessels. I will not tell you more than this, but there is a rather
surprising end.

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CHARLEY LAUREL, A STORY OF ADVENTURE BY SEA AND LAND, BY W H G KINGSTON.

CHAPTER ONE.

VALUABLE BOOTY.

A good many years ago, before, indeed, I can remember, His Majesty's
Ship _Laurel_, a corvette of eighteen guns and a hundred and thirty men,
commanded by Captain Blunt, formed one of the West India squadron.

She, with another corvette, and a brig in company, came one fine morning
off a beautiful island, then in possession of the Fren