Colonel Fred Burnaby of the Blues, six feet four inches tall and with a riding weight of over twenty stone, was one of the most recognisable soldier/adventurers of the late Victorian period. As a young officer he became famous as an athlete, gymnast, swordsman and pugilist, reputed to be the strongest man in the British army.

Personal diaries provide rare glimpses into those aspects of the past that are usually hidden from view, and the diary of Elizabeth Lee (1868-?) is no exception to this rule. Elizabeth's father was a draper and outfitter in Birkenhead and during the twenty-five year span of Lee's diary which began in 1884, she lived at home with her family while simultaneously traveling to both sides of the Mersey without supervision, making the diary an unusually revealing portrait of middle-class female life in Victorian society. Accompanied by a detailed introduction and an analysis of the diary itself, as well as a glossary relating to key people mentioned in its pages, "The Diary of Elizabeth Lee "is a rare firsthand account of adolescent life in Victorian Britain.

Horatio Nelson was a vivid and frank letter writer and his collection of letters has been compared with those of Pepys, Byron and Keats. The one edition of these letters was first published between 1844 and 1846 and is here reprinted in seven volumes. Volume IV covers the years 1799 to 1801.

Colonel Fred Burnaby of the Blues, six feet four inches tall and with a riding weight of over twenty stone, was one of the most recognisable soldier/adventurers of the late Victorian period. As a young officer he became famous as an athlete, gymnast, swordsman and pugilist, reputed to be the strongest man in the British army. In working his way to the command of the Blues, the country's most prestigious cavalry regiment, he made some notable friends and not a few enemies. He also found time for numerous journeys involving considerable hardship. He was a brilliant modern linguist and spoke seven languages fluently. Born into the landed gentry, he increased his financial independence by marrying a young heiress, who produced an heir and promptly decamped to climb mountains in Switzerland. In 1882 he became the first person to make a solo balloon crossing of the English Channel. As his army …