"A Young Girl's Wooing" (1884). Another short love-story, with the scene laid in the Catskills, where it was written.
"Nature's Serial Story" was also published in 1884, but Edward had been for several years making studies for it, at each season carefully noting his observations. He was a great lover of birds and knew exactly when each species arrived North in the spring and just when the fall migrations took place. "Song," he says elsewhere, "is the first crop I obtain, and one of the best. The robins know I am a friend of theirs, in spite of their taste for early strawberries and cherries, and when I am at work they are very sociable and familiar. One or two will light on raspberry stakes and sing and twitter almost as incessantly and intelligently as the children in their playhouse under the great oak tree. Yet the robin's first mellow whistle in spring is a clarion call to duty, the opening note of the campaign."
He drew directly from Nature for facts, and the composition of this book gave him genuine pleasure. He says: "My characters may seem shadows to others, but they were real to me. I meet them still in my walks or drives, where in fancy I placed them."
"An Original Belle" (1885). The most dramatic scenes in this book are those connected with the New York Draft Riots. Edward was in the city one day when the riot had reached its height, and personally witnessed many of the incidents described. Portions of the book relating to this time were submitted to the Superintendent of the Metropolitan police force for possible corrections in the statements made.
"Driven Back to Eden." This story for children was published serially in St. Nicholas, in 1885. It was lovingly dedicated to "Johnnie," his pet name for his youngest daughter. In it my brother takes a family from a narrow city flat in a neighborhood that was respectable, but densely populated, and where the children were forced to spend much time upon the streets with very undesirable companions, to a simple country home, surrounded by garden, fields, and woods. Here they enjoy the ideal outdoor life—perhaps as near that of the original "Eden" as can be imagined. Edward places these children among the scenes of his own boyhood and writes of experiences that are fictitious only in detail and characters.
"He Fell in Love with His Wife" (1886). A chance item in a newspaper relative to a man who had married in order to secure a competent housekeeper suggested this story, in which the hero tries a similar experiment.
"The Home Acre" (1887) first appeared serially in Harper's Magazine. It dwells upon the advantages and pleasures of country life, which is particularly recommended for business men as affording rest and diversion of thought after continuous mental strain. Practical hints are given as to the kind of trees to plant and how to plant them, also as to the proper cultivation of vineyards, orchards and the small fruits. He urges the advisability of teaching every boy and girl in the public schools to recognize and protect certain insects, toads, and harmless snakes that are of incalculable value in the culture of plants and fruits because of the warfare they wage against the enemies of vegetable life.
"The Earth Trembled" (1887) was written while at Santa Barbara; but, as in the case of the Chicago fire, Edward went to Charleston before the effects of the earthquake had been removed, and saw the state of the city and its inhabitants for himself. I have been told by people who lived there at the time that my brother's descriptions of the dreadful calamity are very accurate.
"Miss Lou" (1888) was my brother's last book and was left unfinished by his sudden death. The inscription reads:—"In loving dedication to 'little Miss Lou,' my youngest daughter."