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- UPLOADED 10-May-1997
- by: "Glenn P.," <C128User@GTI.Net>
-
- Information File:
- ***** THE GOLDEN KEY *****
-
- ABOUT THE AUTHOR: MacDonald, George (b.10-Dec-1824, d.18-Sep-1905):
- ==================================================================
- Scottish novelist and poet, writer of fantasies for children. He served
- briefly as a Congregationalist minister, but spent most of his life in England
- as a lecturer and writer. Among his best-known works for children is "The
- Golden Key" (1868); others include "At the Back of the North Wind" (1871) and
- "The Princess and Curdie" (1883). He also wrote two allegorical fantasies for
- adults: "Phantastes" (1858) and "Lillith" (1895).
-
- * * * * * * * * * * *
-
- FILE DESCRIPTION:
- ================
- I have uploaded to CompuServe, in the Commodore Applications Forum
- (CIS:CBMAPP) the full text to "The Golden Key", in two separate ".SDA" files.
- The first of these, "GKEY-ALL.SDA", is simply the entire text conveyed as a
- Self-Dissolving Archive of one large textfile. The second, "GKEY-IN3.SDA",
- is a Self-Dissolving Archive of almost the exact same text, but split into
- three separae textfiles of a size that is far more likely to fit within the
- average Commodore-based word processor. In both cases the story has been
- stored in ordinary, plain-vanilla 80-column Commodore PETASCII.
-
-
- GENERAL INFORMATION:
- ===================
- The full title of this story is "The Golden Key: A Boy And A Girl In The
- Garden Of Eden", by George MacDonald.
-
- "The Golden Key": TABLE of CONTENTS
- ===================================
- Chapter I: Where The Rainbow Ends
- PART ONE Chapter II: Two Runaways
- Chapter III: The Air-Fish & Grandmother
- Chapter IV: The Language of Nature
- -----------------------------------------
- Chapter V: The Arrival of Mossy
- PART TWO Chapter VI: A Sea of Shadows
- Chapter VII: The Old Man of the Sea
- -----------------------------------------
- Chapter VIII: The Old Man of the Earth
- PART THREE Chapter IX: The Old Man of the Fire
- Chapter X: From Where the Shadows Fall
-
- Take note that if you download "GKEY-ALL.SDA", the file will *NOT* be
- split into parts.
-
-
- FILE STATISTICS:
- ===============
- As is my custom, I have numbered all of the lines in the story for the
- greater convenience of the reader. Chapter headings, introductory material,
- blank lines, etc., are NOT numbered, so the relation between the count of
- STORY lines and the TOTAL number of lines in the file tends to be rather
- tenuous.
-
- Here are the various file statistics:
-
- IN "GKEY-ALL.SDA": The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY-ALL.SDA"
- ================= is: 1585702889.
- Size, Bytes: 37,845
- Disk Blocks: 149
- "GKEY.ALL" The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY.ALL"
- Size, Bytes: 84,596 is: 347128931.
- Disk Blocks: 334
- -------------------
- Story Lines: 1,653
- Other Lines: 326
- Total Lines: 1,979
-
-
- IN "GKEY-IN3.SDA": The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY-IN3.SDA"
- ================= is: 357364718.
- Size, Bytes: 38,353
- Disk Blocks: 151
- "GKEY.PART1" The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY.PART1"
- Size, Bytes: 31,783 is: 2872829618.
- Disk Blocks: 126
- -------------------
- Story Lines: 593
- Other Lines: 152
- Total Lines: 745
-
- "GKEY.PART2" The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY.PART2"
- Size, Bytes: 29,133 is: 2594763542.
- Disk Blocks: 115
- -------------------
- Story Lines: 582
- Other Lines: 100
- Total Lines: 682
-
- "GKEY.PART3" The 32-bit CRC for "GKEY.PART3"
- Size, Bytes: 24,251 is: 3767761762.
- Disk Blocks: 96
- -------------------
- Story Lines: 478
- Other Lines: 94
- Total Lines: 572
-
-
- EXTRACTION:
- ==========
- Although these are COMPRESSED files, you won't need any special program
- or decompressor to extract them; these are "Self-Dissolving" ARChives, or
- ".SDA"'s -- the decompressor program is built in! Just LOAD and RUN each file
- as if it were an ordinary BASIC program. Insert a formatted disk into drive
- Device #8 that has at least 340 blocks free on it, press the RETURN key, when
- ready, and the textfiles will be decompressed and written to that disk, all
- automatically.
-
-
- CRC CHECKSUMS:
- =============
- The CRC checksums given above aren't strictly necessary, since the ARC
- program which compressed these files itself checksums each and every file it
- compresses, and the built-in decompressor verifies each file as it is being
- decompressed. However, for those who desire a more rigorous test of file
- integrity, download or otherwise obtain the "CRC32" program (not included --
- you must obtain it separately) and run it on whichever file you wish to
- verify, then compare the result you get against the appropriate CRC checksum
- given above. If the numbers match, then the file is correct. Otherwise there's
- an error someplace.
-
- IMPORTANT!: Dowloading via XModem will generally add *padding* to the end
- of the file; this invariably CHANGES the CRC that results when the file is
- tested. If you are testing a file AFTER it is dissolved, you don't have to
- worry about padding -- there won't be any. But if you will be testing the
- ".SDA" file itself after downloading, then padding is a concern. If possible,
- always REMOVE any such padding before testing; otherwise your file is just
- about GUARANTEED to generate an erroneous CRC checksum (a "false negative").
- The padding generally consists of a series of repeated Control-Z's (ASCII
- 026, decimal) at the end of the file.
-
-
- MISCELLANEOUS:
- =============
- One editing note -- during the story, a tale by the name of "Silverhair"
- is mentioned. This proves to be simply "Goldilocks And The Three Bears", and
- since I found reading about "Silverhair" instead of "Goldilocks" to be quite
- jarring, I substituted our familiar "Goldilocks" for "Silverhair". Other than
- this, the story comes to you almost verbatim.
-
- A considerably shorter version of this information file precedes the
- first Chapter in both ".SDA" versions of this story.
-
-
- STORY SAMPLE:
- ============
- Here is the FIRST CHAPTER of "The Golden Key"; by it you may judge for
- yourself whether the rest of the story is worth the download.
-
- "The Golden Key: A Boy And A Girl In The Garden Of Eden",
- by George MacDonald.
-
- [SAMPLE: Chapter I Only.]
-
- Chapter I: Where The Rainbow Ends
-
- 0001: There was a boy who used to sit in
- 0002: the twilight and listen to his
- 0003: great-aunt's stories.
-
- 0004: She told him that if he could
- 0005: reach the place where the end of the
- 0006: rainbow stands he would find there a
- 0007: golden key.
-
- 0008: "And what is the key for?" the boy
- 0009: would ask. "What is it the key of? What
- 0010: will it open?"
-
- 0011: "That nobody knows," his aunt
- 0012: would reply. "He has to find that out."
-
- 0013: "I suppose, being gold," the boy
- 0014: once said, thoughtfully, "that I could
- 0015: get a good deal of money for it if I
- 0016: sold it."
-
- 0017: "Better never find it than sell
- 0018: it," returned his aunt.
-
- 0019: And then the boy went to bed and
- 0020: dreamed about the golden key.
-
- 0021: Now all that his great-aunt told
- 0022: the boy about the golden key would have
- 0023: been nonsense, had it not been that
- 0024: their little house stood on the borders
- 0025: of Fairyland. For it is perfectly well
- 0026: known that out of Fairyland nobody ever
- 0027: can find where the rainbow stands. The
- 0028: creature takes such good care of its
- 0029: golden key, always flitting from place
- 0030: to place, lest any one should find it!
- 0031: But in Fairyland it is quite different.
- 0032: Things that look real in this country
- 0033: ook very thin indeed in Fairyland,
- 0034: while some of the things that here
- 0035: cannot stand still for a moment, will
- 0036: not move there. So it was not in the
- 0037: least absurd of the old lady to tell
- 0038: her nephew such things about the
- 0039: golden key.
-
- 0040: "Did you ever know anybody find
- 0041: it?" he asked, one evening.
-
- 0042: "Yes. Your father, I believe,
- 0043: found it."
-
- 0044: "And what did he do with it, can
- 0045: you tell me?"
-
- 0046: "He never told me."
-
- 0047: "What was it like?"
-
- 0048: "He never showed it to me."
-
- 0049: "How does a new key come there
- 0050: always?"
-
- 0051: "I don't know. There it is."
-
- 0052: "Perhaps it is the rainbow's egg!"
-
- 0053: "Perhaps it is. You will be a
- 0054: happy boy if you find the nest."
-
- 0055: "Perhaps it comes tumbling down
- 0056: the rainbow from the sky."
-
- 0057: "Perhaps it does."
-
- [Chapter One Ends Here.]
-
- Are you sufficiently intrigued? What IS this "golden key"? Does the boy
- ever find it? AND WHAT IS IT THE KEY TO...? ;)
-
-
- COPYRIGHT:
- =========
- This E-Text is in the Public Domain.
-
- >>>>> End of Text <<<<<
-
-
-