"Hast committed a crime, and think'st thou to escape? Alas, my father!"—Old Play. "Evil deeds do not die," and the handsome young man stretched out in an easy chair by the fire raised his curly black head and gazed into the farthest corner of the comfortably furnished room as if challenging a denial of this statement. No one contradicted him, for he was alone, and with a slightly satirical smile he went on. "One fellow sows the seeds, and another has to reap them—no, you don't reap seeds, you reap what springs up. Deadly plants, we will say, nightshades and that sort of thing; and the surprised and inoffensive descendants of sinful sires have to drop their ordinary occupations and seize reaping-hooks to clean out these things that shoot up in their paths.

Based on the true story of Joe, an abused mutt named from in Meaford, Ontario, at the end of the nineteenth century, Beautiful Joe is the moving tale of a dog's rescue from a cruel owner.Beautiful Joe was written as an autobiography from the perspective of Joe himself, much like Anna Sewell's novel, Black Beauty, which inspired author Margaret Marshall Saunders' (pen name Marshall Saunders) approach to telling Joe's story. Saunders first encountered the story of Beautiful Joe when paying a visit to her sister-in-law, who was rehabilitating the real Joe after her father had rescued him from his abusive owner.HarperPerennial Classics brings great works of literature to life in digital format, upholding the highest standards in ebook production and celebrating reading in all its forms. Look for more titles in the HarperPerennial Classics collection to build your digital library.