This is a story about two young girls' who have just moved to a seaside town. They experience a magical adventure with their dog Flossie, during a particularly dull wet English summer. Returning from a shopping trip they stumble upon a small antique shop in the older part of town. Curiosity leads them to enter and discover the owner is a wizard called Beerfroth. He is enchanted by the children and they make him laugh, so he gives them a small box as a gift. They return home to discover it has a secret drawer containing a ring with magical properties. With the ring the children are able to visit Rasnaucty Island, a safe haven for threatened animals, hidden in another dimension governed by the Laird, Archie McBear. But there's trouble on the island and Beerfroth needs their help. The mine at Cold Mountain has collapsed and the ice cream bears have gone on strike. Can the two girls help repair the mine and restore peace and harmony to the troubled island?

"I am very thankful to the crew of HMS Lightning for the hospitality we were met with and the way they treated us ...after being adrift for seven days in the lifeboats Although it was night time when they picked us up, they gave us food and hot drinks as much as we could swallow and tried in every way to make us feel comfortable, which they did with great success They shall never be forgotten by us Norwegians" John Dann born and educated in Wales. He enjoyed a career in the travel industry, served briefly in the RNR at HMS President and Drake enjoys maritime history, now a writer, living and sailing in Cornwall.

Growing up in Sussex during the turbulent 17th century, John became involved in the illegal 'owling' trade, where he learnt his seamanship. Whilst carousing in a Rye inn he was unexpectedly pressed into the Royal Navy. In 1694, disgruntled with the ill-fated Spanish Expedition, he joined 'Long Ben' Every's mutiny setting sail as his coxswain to the Indian Ocean in the Fancy, a ship of 46 guns,...'and bound to seek our fortunes' as they declared. It made Henry Every the richest pirate in the world, and was said, the most profitable raid in history. A popular ballad of the time proclaimed: "Here's to gentlemen at sea tonight, and a toast to all free men And when the devil comes to take us home, he'll drink With old Long Ben!" After the hue and cry, the slippery Every changed his name and disappeared. On returning to England John was caught and lost his fortune. Escaping the hangman, he emerges later as a respectable partner to John Coggs a London goldsmith banker, trading from the sign of the Kings Head in the Strand. Unfortunately he became disastrously embroiled in a massive bankruptcy fraud that shook the city.

Four years after the Sports Club was formed - are the time of Edward VII's Coronation, Thomas Cook was reckoned to be among the `three most competent organisations in the world' the other two being the Roman Catholic Church and the Prussian Army.

Thomas Henry Morgan was born into a musical mining family at end of the nineteenth century. At twelve he followed his father down the pit, and at sixteen fought as a boy soldier in the First World War. Adding to the astonishing fact that more boys under eighteen (like Tom) were serving at the end of 1915, than in the entire force Wellington took to Waterloo! Serving as a Colour Sergeant in the Second, he was captured in North Africa at the fall of Tobruk imprisoned with some top ranking generals in Castello di Vincigliata near Florence. He escaped but later captured and transported to Stalag VIIA in Bavaria where he met the actor Derek Bond. Pre-war he wrote the music to the Welsh standard a Wea ll keep a Welcomea and posta "war sang in the chorus of Idloes Owena s fledgling Welsh National Opera Company. Another WNO artist Mollie Hair Russell, one-time principal dancer and soprano, recalled Tom fifty years later as a a big, rugged, handsome mana |great fun to work witha . He summed up his own philosophy as: a Life aina t all yer wants but, ita s all yer a aves, Stick a geranium in yer a at and be a appya

An anthology of historical rugby trivia with nostalgic reflections on the amateur game. The thinking man's game - New (velvet) caps A rugby match - not a cattle sale! The 'Great Game' 1914-1918 'Johnnie' foreigner's very welcome Goals, ties, miinor points of perhaps rouges? The Welsh and English innovators Before hymns and arias - Ladies, behind closed doors The rise and fall of corporate Old Boys An Afternoon at Muriel's some of the short stories within this book