In a single volume Ernest Thompson Seton, renowned naturalist, writer, artist, and founding leader of the Boy Scouts of America, presents one of the most comprehensive guides to the outdoors ever written. Originally published in 1922 as The Book of Woodcraft, this work represents the culmination of years of observation and experience in the wilderness. Within these pages lie instructions and anecdotes—some expected, some delightfully unanticipated—regarding literally hundreds of arts, crafts, skills, and games. Here one can learn to distinguish edible plants from poisonous ones; start a fire using only a jackknife; build a four-store birdhouse out of a wooden box; communicate in sign language; tie a variety of essential knots; identify trees, wildflowers, animals, birds, and constellations; and much, much more. Abundantly illustrated with the author's own handsome pen-and-ink drawings, this classic outdoor handbook is both a cherished piece of American history and a useful tool in preserving and communing with nature.

In the spring of 1991, Noel Perrin flew from Vermont to California to pick up his new electric car. He planned to bring it home over the Sierras and the Rockies, a 3100-mile drive. It would not be easy. An electric car like his can go about 50 miles; then you have to stop for six to eight hours and recharge. When he got back to Vermont, he put the car into daily service as a commuter vehicle - thus driving to and from his job at Dartmouth College without causing any pollution. This book tells the story of both the trip and the commuting. From the time Perrin gets taken to a flying saucer factory in Davis, California, to the time he meets a man with four electric cars in Rotterdam, New York, here are his adventures on the road. Eventually he did get home, though not quite in the way he expected. The car, by now named Solo, turns to commuting and is a complete success. Among other things, it wins its owner one of the rare reserved parking places at Dartmouth. "There's going to be a boom in electric cars around here", predicts a cynical colleague. "People will do anything for a parking place". Interwoven with Solo's story is the larger story of electric cars in America. Scarce now, they have a distinguished past and a bright future. Ninety years ago they were the favorite vehicle of city aristocrats. In 1903, for example, the six wealthy Guggenheim brothers in New York owned nine electric cars - and employed chauffeurs. The first 50 women drivers, without exception, drove electrics. Tiffany's bought electric delivery trucks. President Woodrow Wilson took drives from the White House in his electric car, with a Secret Service agent chugging along behind in a gasoline vehicle. Henry Fordowned three. No wonder. Electric cars were cleaner, quieter, and more reliable than early gasoline cars. After a 70-year hiatus, electrics are now making a major comeback. Aristocrats - including Prince Philip of England - are again driving them. General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler are all gearing up to produce them. So is every car company in Japan. In Europe, Fiat and Peugot are currently selling electrics - and a dozen other companies are racing to join them. Some of these cars will be hybrids, with a virtually unlimited range. Others will be pure electrics. But most will have improved batteries that provide a range of 100 or even 200 miles. There's a good chance you will be driving an electric car, two or five or at most ten years from now. What's it going to be like? This lively book will tell you.

One of America's finest essayists writes about 40 literary masterpieces that have been wrongfully forgotten or were ignored in the first place.

Any parent dismayed by the rows of Goosebumps books dominating the children's sections of most bookstores, any grandparent concerned about the Nintendo induced glaze over a grandchild's eyes, and any loving adult wishing a child to know good books will celebrate Noel Perrin's latest collection of essays. His earlier guide to neglected adult literature, A Reader's Delight, achieved the status of a classic, and now he has written a companion volume dedicated to children's fiction. Perrin's wit and engaging prose are, as always, in constant evidence, but it is his intuitive grasp of what makes a story work for children that renders this new book an essential resource for any home where books are valued.
Limiting his scope to those works already overlooked or in danger of slipping from view, Perrin leads us through a wide spectrum of fiction, ranging from stories for the very youngest listeners to nuanced novels for the adolescent reader. There is something here for every child: dolls and their houses; animals of varied talents and personalities; travels through time and space; romances promised, sometimes failed, sometimes realized; castles and battling warriors; magic of familiar as well as alien worlds; historical bits woven into textured stories. Richard Adams, Leslie Brooke, Arthur Conan Doyle, Wanda Gag, Rumer Godden, Anne Lindbergh, Hugh Lofting, Jean Merrill, Ernest Thompson Seton, Margery Sharp, Dodie Smith, and others know what it feels like to be a kid in an adult world. As does Noel Perrin -- and so will the readers of A Child's Delight.

Noel Perrin's delightful account of building a sugarhouse and making maple sugar in Vermont first appeared twenty years ago. Like a sturdy New England farmhouse, Perrin has added to it over the years to reflect his subsequent sugaring experiences, and includes in this latest edition a "postpostpostscript." His celebration of simple, hard work to produce a "quite wonderful, maybe even sacred article" has not been diminished by plastic tubing, thrip infestations, and the strange new market for Vermont sap water.