Chapter 1 of Not Without Thorns is here in full — 405 sentences across 81 reading sections, with audio for every sentence and word.
A keeper or guardian of historical records and memories.
Chapter I
Chapter 1 of Not Without Thorns is here in full — 405 sentences across 81 reading sections, with audio for every sentence and word.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE. SWEET SEVENTEEN. There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!" Crying, "Oh, what a happy place!" _The Bird_.
Chapter 1 of Not Without Thorns is here in full — 405 sentences across 81 reading sections, with audio for every sentence and word.
Reading 1/81 · 5 reading units · Lines 1–5
These definitions explain words found in the current reading and keep every example grounded in its original sentence.
Oxford-style entry order: headword, part of speech, US IPA, concise definition, contextual example, and audio.
warm-blooded egg-laying vertebrates characterized by feathers and forelimbs modified as wings
an orange of low brightness and saturation
From this reading “There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"”
a subdivision of a written work; usually numbered and titled
From this reading “VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.”
demanding attention
From this reading “There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"”
plural of “lock” — a fastener fitted to a door or drawer to keep it firmly closed
From this reading “There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"”
being one more than sixteen
From this reading “SWEET SEVENTEEN.”
having or denoting the characteristic taste of sugar
From this reading “SWEET SEVENTEEN.”
the amount of 3-dimensional space occupied by an object
From this reading “VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.”
English keeps certain words together, and knowing the pair is worth more than knowing each word alone. Every partnership below was counted across our whole published library, and earns its place by appearing far more often than two unrelated words of the same frequency would.
Shown as this reading writes them, with the form the library counts, what kind of pairing it is, and how often it occurs.
Every word in these five lines is listed here, and every one of them can be played on its own.
Dictionary details are shown only when verified; these are not licensed Oxford entries.
used before a singular noun to mean one of a group, when it is not a particular one
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
used to join words or parts of a sentence that go together
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
delighting the senses or exciting intellectual or emotional admiration
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
warm-blooded egg-laying vertebrates characterized by feathers and forelimbs modified as wings
From this reading _The Bird_.
an orange of low brightness and saturation
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
a subdivision of a written work; usually numbered and titled
From this reading VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.
plural of “come” — the thick white fluid containing spermatozoa that is ejaculated by the male genital tract
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
demanding attention
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
Dictionary entry pending editorial verification. Tap Listen to hear the word.
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
the front of the human head from the forehead to the chin and ear to ear
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
a person you know well and regard with affection and trust
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
a young female
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
enjoying or showing or marked by joy or pleasure
From this reading Crying, "Oh, what a happy place!"
plural of “lock” — a fastener fitted to a door or drawer to keep it firmly closed
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
belonging to the person speaking
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
a midwestern state in north central United States in the Great Lakes region
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
used to mean any person in general, including the speaker
From this reading VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.
a point located with respect to surface features of some region
From this reading Crying, "Oh, what a happy place!"
being one more than sixteen
From this reading SWEET SEVENTEEN.
having or denoting the characteristic taste of sugar
From this reading SWEET SEVENTEEN.
exchange thoughts; talk with
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
used before a noun that is already known, already mentioned, or the only one of its kind
From this reading _The Bird_.
in or at that place or location
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
used before the base form of a verb to make the infinitive
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
the amount of 3-dimensional space occupied by an object
From this reading VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.
the speaker together with one or more other people
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
used to ask for information about something
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
in the company of; together with
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
everything that exists anywhere
From this reading There a girl comes with brown locks curl'd, My friend and we talk face to face; Crying, "Oh, what a beautiful world!"
Chapter 1 of Not Without Thorns by Mrs. Molesworth holds 405 sentences, grouped into 81 reading sections of at most 5 sentences. The text is the source edition, unabridged, and the chapter records which sentences cover which part of the work so that nothing is dropped. Every word can be tapped for its pronunciation and dictionary entry.
Chapter 1 holds 405 sentences of Not Without Thorns, unabridged, divided into 81 reading sections.
This page carries chapter 1 of Not Without Thorns by Mrs. Molesworth exactly as it stands in the source edition, without abridgement. It runs to 405 sentences, grouped into 81 sections of at most 5 sentences so that a reader can take the chapter in steady, finishable pieces. The chapter also stores a coverage record mapping every one of its sentences to a part of the work, which is how the edition demonstrates that no line was dropped.
Work through the 81 sections in order, replaying any sentence and tapping unfamiliar words for their entries.
Each of the 81 sections in this chapter is short enough to read once, hear once, and then re-read with the vocabulary in view. Tapping a word plays it alone and opens its dictionary entry with IPA, part of speech and meaning, so the reader is never forced to guess a pronunciation from spelling. Working section by section keeps a long chapter from becoming an undifferentiated wall of text, which is the usual reason a reader abandons a work of this period.
Yes — every sentence and every individual word in chapter 1 can be played aloud in United States English.
Audio covers the whole chapter: any sentence can be played, and any single word within it can be played on its own. The voice uses United States English. For a work of this period that matters, because spelling is an unreliable guide to pronunciation for vocabulary that has fallen out of daily use, and a learner who guesses wrong tends to keep the error. Hearing the word in its own sentence, and then alone, settles it.
Common questions about reading Not Without Thorns by Mrs. Molesworth on this page, its source edition and its audio.
Yes. All 7781 sentences of Project Gutenberg eBook #43106 are kept, with a record of which sentences cover which part.
Project Gutenberg eBook #43106, unabridged. The Project Gutenberg header, footer and licence are removed.
About 600 minutes of reading across 1557 sections of 5 sentences each, at an unhurried pace.
How to work through Not Without Thorns section by section, using the audio and the tap-to-define vocabulary.
Choose one of the 19 chapters of Not Without Thorns to begin.
Each section holds 5 sentences; read it once through.
Play the section aloud, then tap any unfamiliar word for its entry.
Words and structures a reader meets early in Not Without Thorns, each tappable for pronunciation and meaning.
