Hi legalgazelle,
Here it is! Be forewarned - the following links at the Digital
Library contain images of the entire text and illustrations. If you
don't want your anticipation of waiting for the actual book to arrive
in your mailbox spoiled, don't click on the links!
HARDING'S LUCK By E. NESBIT
Illustrated by H. R. MILLAR
First Published: London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1909.
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html
("Harding's Luck" is actually the sequal to "The House of Arden")
Your clues:
1. it was about a little boy
"DICKIE lived at New Cross. At least the address was New Cross, but
really the house where he lived was one of a row of horrid little
houses built on the slope where once green fields ran down the hill to
the river, and the old houses of the Deptford merchants stood stately
in their pleasant gardens and fruitful orchards. All those good fields
and happy gardens are built over now. "
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html#I
2. who found a bunch of seeds
"Gimme," said Dickie?"Gimme a penn'orth o' that there"
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/4-100.gif
3. they were liek sunflower seeds
"A few poor little pink and yellow flowers showed stunted among the
green where he had sowed the Artistic Bird Seed. And, towering high
above everything else?oh, three times as high as Dickie himself?there
was a flower?a great flower like a sunflower..."
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html#I
3. but the flowers from them were white
"..., only white."
4. so he called them moonflowers
"It IS a Moonflower, of course," he said
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html
5. and when the seeds dropped again he made the seeds into patterns
"He made, with triple lines of silvery seeds, a six-pointed star"
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/72-100.gif
6. and he heard voices talking to him
"But for a policeman, who is usually of quite a large pattern, the
voice was unusually soft and small. It said briskly?
'Now, then, where do you want to go to?'"
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html#IV
7. he got transported into another land -
"Then everything was very quiet, and sleep wrapped Dickie like a soft
cloak. When he awoke his eyelids no longer felt heavy, so he opened
them. "That was a rum dream," he told himself, as he blinked in broad
daylight.
He lay in bed?a big, strange bed?in a room that he had never seen
before. The windows were low and long, with small panes, and the light
was broken by upright stone divisions. The floor was of dark wood,
strewn strangely with flowers and green herbs, and the bed was a
four-post bed like the one he had slept in at Talbot House; and in the
green curtains was woven a white pattern, very like the thing that was
engraved on Tinkler and on the white seal. On the coverlet lavender
and other herbs were laid. And the wall was hung with pictures done in
needlework?tapestry, in fact, though Dickie did not know that this was
its name. All the furniture was heavily built of wood heavily carved.
An enormous dark cupboard or wardrobe loomed against one wall
High-backed chairs with tapestry seats were ranged in a row against
another. The third wall was almost all window, and in the fourth wall
the fireplace was set with a high-hooded chimney and wide, open
hearth."
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/women/nesbit/luck/luck.html#IV
8. please help me I have been wanting to find this book for years...
Well, it was published in 1909! 8-)
---------------
A good summary -
Nesbit, E. [Millar, H. R.; Illus.]
Harding's Luck. Illustrated by H. R. Millar
London: Ernest Benn Limited, [1961]
Octavo, red coloth, gilt letters, 281 pp. Fine (As New), in Very
Good+ dust jacket with light fading and edgewear. "Perhaps you
remember the adventures of Edred and Elfrida in The House of Arden,
when their hunt into the past for the family treasure led them to find
their father and meet Dickie their cousin? Brother and sister appear
again in this tale of exciting adventure, in which Dickie Harding is
the hero. Dickie first meets Edred and Elfrida in the England of 1608,
for by that time he has learnt the secret of the moonflower seeds and
the pattern which is a door into the past. From London slum to
nobleman's luxury, from lameness and loneliness to sound limb and
family love, what a wonderful change it is for him. But Dickie is
passionately loyal, and to help Beale, his ragamuffin companion and
the first person to befriend him, he returns to the present. In the
end, when Beale is well set-up, the Arden treausre found, and Dickie's
inheritance..."
http://cgi.choosebooks.com/SESSz97587561011156851136/cgi-bin/n_showitem.cgi?item=1410199553&mono=&lang=en&lo=gr2&uc=us&shp=0&dcurr=USD
----------------
Now, even though the entire book is available online, and printable,
there's nothing like holding a real book. There have been various
editions published and most are readily available.
Edith Nesbit (1858 - 1924) aka Mrs E Bland
The House of Arden (1908)
(The first book in the House of Arden series)
Harding's Luck (1909)
(The second book in the House of Arden series)
http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/n/edith-nesbit/
Photo 1949 edition
Publisher: Benn
Illustrator: Desmond E. Walduck
http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=650109639
Photo 1961 edition
Publisher: Ernest Benn; Coward-McCann, London & New York
Illustrated by H. R. Millar
"Children's adventure story in which Edred & Elfrida Arden and Dickie
Harding travel back into 1600's England by means of magic moonflower
seeds and find the missing Arden family treasure."
http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=278387912
BookFinder: used books for sale from various booksellers:
http://www.bookfinder.com/search/?author=nesbit&title=harding%27s+luck&submit=Begin+search&new_used=*&destination=us¤cy=USD&binding=*&isbn=&keywords=&minprice=&maxprice=&classic=on&mode=advanced&st=sr&ac=qr
I really enjoyed working on this for you! If you have any questions,
please post a clarification request and wait for me to respond before
closing/rating my answer.
Thank you,
hummer
Search strategy:
I searched used book websites using various combinations of terms,
such as, boy seeds sunflower moonflower, and browsed through the
results until I finally found one that sounded hopeful. I then
searched Google for the title and was able to make a confirmation on
the Digital Library website. |
