6 h 25 minAudiobook5 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at costPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if doing what is right means telling the very thing you want to hide?
The Children of Wilton Chase by L. T. Meade invites you into a Victorian family tale centred on a country estate. A “chase” is open country kept for hunting; the title places the children within this English country-house world, where home, sibling bonds, and family duty frame the hard choices of growing up.
Meade’s family tales make room for different natures: one child is bold, another careful, another quick to anger. The Children of Wilton Chase centres on siblings, secrets, and moral courage. The challenge is close to home: speaking about a hidden fault or an untold worry, owning a mistake, or standing beside someone who is blamed.
What you’ll discover
- A country house world Enter a setting where home, family, and duty frame the choices of childhood.
- The bonds between siblings Explore family ties tested by boldness, caution, and a temper that rises too quickly.
- The weight of secrets Consider how an untold worry can turn the choice to speak into a struggle.
- A quieter kind of courage Look beyond daring deeds to the resolve needed to tell the truth.
- Warmth with moral purpose Spend time with a gentle tale that takes young people’s choices seriously.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy warm family stories, spirited children, country-house summers and gentle lessons about honour, friendship and kindness. Fans of classic girls' and school-holiday tales will feel at home among the Wilton children.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A Noisy House Full of Children
- One Lie Leads to Another
- A Picture Goes Missing
- Listening at the Cottage Door
- A Midnight Errand and a Locked Door
- Basil Chooses Silence
- Glendower and the Wrong Kind of Friend
- What the Story Is Really About
- How the Story Is Told
Who’s who
- Ermengarde WiltonFourteen years old, pretty and proud, she longs to be treated as grown up and cannot bear to lose her brother Basil's good opinion.
- Marjorie WiltonEleven, plain and round-faced, she serves everyone around her without thanks, and she wants most of all to be a faithful servant.
- Basil WiltonDark, thoughtful and kind, the eldest son holds strict ideas of honour and loves his sister Ermengarde dearly.
- Eric WiltonA small, freckled, mischievous schoolboy who collects ferrets and pigeons and can make even the governess laugh.
- Miss NelsonThe reserved, conscientious governess loves her pupils but cannot show it, and she treasures a miniature of her dead sister.
- Mr. WiltonA witty, affectionate widower who joins his children's fun but turns stern when he thinks his family's honour is at stake.
- Susan CollinsThe gamekeeper's pretty daughter longs to be a lady and wins Ermengarde's friendship with flattery and thrilling stories.
- Lilias RussellA kind, golden-haired girl of fifteen who welcomes Ermengarde to her family's seaside home, Glendower.
Formats and delivery
- eBook
- On your phone, tablet, computer or Kindle, with the type as large as you like.
- Large-print eBook
- The same book in bigger, clearer type, from the first page.
- Audiobook
- 6 h 25 min, complete, read by Lucas Linden.
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas in about 5 minutes, to read or to hear.
- Paperback
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Hardcover
- 6 × 9 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print paperback
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
- Large print hardcover
- 8.5 × 11 in. Printing soon: leave your email under Paperback or Hardcover above.
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Read and hear Les enfants de Wilton Chase in 25 languages and switch at any time. Or read two side by side, paragraph by paragraph: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Les enfants de Wilton Chase
by L. T. Meade · 1891
Eleven-year-old Marjorie gives up her treat while her proud sister Ermengarde hides a secret at Wilton Chase.
Easy read5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
Honour is at the heart of this Victorian family novel by L. T. Meade. The young Wiltons fill a large country house by the sea, under a widowed father, a strict aunt and a governess who loves them more than she shows.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A Noisy House Full of Children
The story opens in late July at Wilton Chase, where two worlds sit under one roof. The grown-ups live at one end. Behind heavy oak doors, the nurseries and schoolroom are ruled by the governess, Miss Nelson. Today the schoolboys Basil and Eric come home for the summer.
Fourteen-year-old Ermengarde declares she will not obey Miss Nelson any more. She is vain and sure she is nearly grown. Her sister Marjorie, plain and sensible, gives up a treat to help Nurse with the baby. No one thanks her, because everyone takes her kindness for granted.
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What is The Children of Wilton Chase about?
It follows the Wilton children at their country house, where Ermengarde's disobedience leads to lies and a missing miniature. Her brother Basil keeps silent to protect her, and her sister Marjorie quietly serves everyone, testing what honour and kindness cost.
Who is Marjorie in The Children of Wilton Chase?
Marjorie is the eleven-year-old Wilton daughter, plain, round-faced and cheerful. She prays to be a faithful servant, helps everyone around her without reward, and becomes the moral heart of the book, inspired by a real child named Marjory.
What does the miniature mean in the story?
The miniature is a small painted portrait of Miss Nelson's dead little sister, the governess's most treasured possession. Its loss and its cracked ivory show how one child's secret can hurt a whole household.
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