The Secret Garden

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The Secret Garden

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Secret Garden, by Frances
Hodgson Burnett This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no
cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give
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Title: The Secret Garden
Author: Frances Hodgson Burnett
Illustrator: MB Kork
Release Date: December 26, 2005 [EBook #17396]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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SECRET GARDEN ***

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[Illustration: "IT SEEMED SCARCELY BEARABLE TO LEAVE

SUCH DELIGHTFULNESS"--_Page 231_]

THE SECRET GARDEN
BY FRANCES HODGSON BURNETT
Author of "The Shuttle," "The Making of a Marchioness," "The
Methods of Lady Walderhurst," "_That Lass o' Lowries_," "Through
One Administration," "_Little Lord Fauntleroy_" "A Lady of Quality,"
etc.
[Illustration]
NEW YORK FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY PUBLISHERS
_Copyright, 1911, by_ FRANCES HODGSON BURNETT
_Copyright, 1910, 1911, by_ THE PHILLIPS PUBLISHING CO.
_All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign languages,
including the Scandinavian._
_August, 1911._

CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THERE IS NO ONE LEFT 1 II MISTRESS MARY QUITE
CONTRARY 10 III ACROSS THE MOOR 23 IV MARTHA 30 V
THE CRY IN THE CORRIDOR 55 VI "THERE WAS SOME ONE
CRYING--THERE WAS!" 65 VII THE KEY OF THE GARDEN 75
VIII THE ROBIN WHO SHOWED THE WAY 85 IX THE
STRANGEST HOUSE ANY ONE EVER LIVED IN 97 X DICKON
111 XI THE NEST OF THE MISSEL THRUSH 128 XII "MIGHT I
HAVE A BIT OF EARTH?" 140 XIII "I AM COLIN" 153 XIV A

YOUNG RAJAH 172 XV NEST BUILDING 189 XVI "I WON'T!"
SAID MARY 207 XVII A TANTRUM 218 XVIII "THA' MUNNOT
WASTE NO TIME" 229 XIX "IT HAS COME!" 239 XX "I SHALL
LIVE FOREVER--AND EVER--AND EVER!" 255 XXI BEN
WEATHERSTAFF 268 XXII WHEN THE SUN WENT DOWN 284
XXIII MAGIC 292 XXIV "LET THEM LAUGH" 310 XXV THE
CURTAIN 328 XXVI "IT'S MOTHER!" 339 XXVII IN THE
GARDEN 353

THE SECRET GARDEN
CHAPTER I
THERE IS NO ONE LEFT
When Mary Lennox was sent to Misselthwaite Manor to live with her
uncle everybody said she was the most disagreeable-looking child ever
seen. It was true, too. She had a little thin face and a little thin body,
thin light hair and a sour expression. Her hair was yellow, and her face
was yellow because she had been born in India and had always been ill
in one way or another. Her father had held a position under the English
Government and had always been busy and ill himself, and her mother
had been a great beauty who cared only to go to parties and amuse
herself with gay people. She had not wanted a little girl at all, and when
Mary was born she handed her over to the care of an Ayah, who was
made to understand that if she wished to please the Mem Sahib she
must keep the child out of sight as much as possible. So when she was
a sickly, fretful, ugly little baby she was kept out of the way, and when
she became a sickly, fretful, toddling thing she was kept out of the way
also. She never remembered seeing familiarly anything but the dark
faces of her Ayah and the other native servants, and as they always
obeyed her and gave her her own way in everything, because the Mem
Sahib would be angry if she was disturbed by her crying, by the time
she was six years old she was as tyrannical and selfish a little pig as
ever lived. The young English governess who came to teach her to read
and write disliked her so much that she gave up her place in three

months, and when other governesses came to try to fill it they always
went away in a shorter time than the first one. So if Mary had not
chosen to really want to know how to read books she would never have
learned her letters at all.
One frightfully hot morning, when she was about nine years old, she
awakened feeling very cross, and she became crosser still when she
saw that the servant who stood by her bedside was not her Ayah.
"Why did you come?" she said to the strange woman. "I will not let you
stay. Send my Ayah to me."
The woman looked frightened, but she only stammered that the Ayah
could not come and when Mary threw herself into a passion and beat
and kicked her, she looked only more frightened and repeated that