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The king's lone road, his visit, his return,/ Were not unknown to Dalica, nor long/ The wondrous tale from royal ears delayed./ When the young queen had heard who taught the rites/ Her mind was shaken, and what first she asked/ Was, whether the sea-maids were very fair,/ And was it true that even gods were moved/ By female charms beneath the waves profound,/
'My dear Bunny, that's exactly where you make a mistake. To follow crime with reasonable impunity you simply must have a parallel ostensible career - the more public the better. The principle is obvious. Mr Peace, of pious memory, disarmed suspicion by acquiring a local reputation for playing the fiddle and taming the animals, and it's my profound conviction that Jack the Ripper was a really eminent public man, whose speeches were very likely reported alongside his atrocities.
George Cruikshank--William Makepeace Thackeray
There must be no smiling with Cruikshank. A man who does not laugh outright is a dullard, and has no heart; even the old dandy of sixty must have laughed at his own wondrous grotesque image, as they say Louis Philippe did, who saw all the caricatures that were made of himself. And there are some of Cruikshank's designs which have the blessed faculty of creating laughter as often as you see them. As Diggory says in the play, who is bidden by his master not to laugh while waiting at table-"Don't tell the story of Grouse in the Gun- room, master, or I can't help laughing."
George Silverman's Explanation
WHAT do I know of Hoghton Towers? Very little; for I have been gratefully unwilling to disturb my first impressions. A house, centuries old, on high ground a mile or so removed from the road between Preston and Blackburn, where the first James of England, in his hurry to make money by making baronets, perhaps made some of those remunerative dignitaries. A house, centuries old, deserted and falling to pieces, its woods and gardens long since grass-land or ploughed up
George Thurston: Three Incidents in the Life of a Man
When one is tranquilly looking death in the eye and refusing him any concession one naturally has a good opinion of one's self. I don't know if it was this feeling that in Thurston found expression in a stiffish attitude and folded arms; at the mess table one day, in his absence, another explanation was suggested by our quartermaster, an irreclaimable stammerer when the wine was in: "It's h-is w-ay of m-m-mastering a c-c-consti-t-tutional t-tendency to r-un aw-ay."
I am free to confess that I am not a great man, and that, at any rate in the earlier part of my career, I had a hankering after the homage which is paid to greatness. I would fain have been a popular orator, feeding myself on the incense tendered to me by thousands; or failing that, a man born to power, whom those around him were compelled to respect, and perhaps to fear.
Etienne, descendu enfin du terri, venait d'entrer au Voreux; et les hommes auxquels il s'adressait, demandant s'il y avait du travail, hochaient la tête, lui disaient tous d'attendre le maître-porion. On le laissait libre, au milieu des bâtiments mal éclairés, pleins de trous noirs, inquiétants avec la complication de leurs salles et de leurs étages. Après avoir monté un escalier obscur à moitié détruit, il s'était trouvé sur une passerelle branlante, puis avait traversé le hangar du criblage,
Subtitled: A Practical Treatise for Prospectors, Miners and Students. By J. C. F. Johnson
Ghasta, or The Avenging Demon!!!
Horror covers all the sky,/Clouds of darkness blot the moon,/Prepare! for mortal thou must die,/Prepare to yield thy soul up soon -- --by Percy Bysshe Shelley
Mr. Smug, the officer, rolled out this section in a sonorous monotone, without stops, like a clerk of the court. It was his pride to know by heart all the acts relating to his department, and to bring them down upon any obstinate head that he wished to crush. Ginx's head, however, was impervious to an act of parliament. In his then temper, the Commination Service or St. Ernulphus's curse would have been feathers to him.--by Edward Jenkins
If the day is done, if birds sing no more, if the wind has flagged tired, then draw the veil of darkness thick upon me, even as thou hast wrapt the earth with the coverlet of sleep and tenderly closed the petals of the drooping lotus at dusk. --by Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore
Give Me Liberty Or Give Me Death
I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the British ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentlemen have been pleased to solace themselves and the House.
The consequence of this was, as in all tyrannies and persecutions it is, the people fled and scatter'd themselves in their neighbours countries, trade languish'd, manufactures went abroad, and never return'd, confusion reign'd and poverty succeeded.
"There is also a secret room in it, only known to two or at most three individuals, at the same time, who are bound not to reveal it, unless to their successors in the secret. It has been frequently the object of search with the inquisitive, but the search has been in vain. There are no records of the castle prior to the tenth century, when it is first noticed in connection with the death of Malcolm II.
It befell at this period, just before Christmas, that on my having gone under pressure of the season into a great shop to buy a toy or two, my eyes fleeing from superfluity, lighted at a distance on the bright concretion of Flora Saunt, an exhibitability that held its own even against the most plausible pinkness of the most developed dolls.
The countless gold of a merry heart,/ The rubies and pearls of a loving eye,/ The indolent never can bring to the mart,/ Nor the secret hoard up in his treasury.
Who are right, the idealists or the materialists? The question once stated in this way hesitation becomes impossible. Undoubtedly the idealists are wrong and the materialists right. Yes, facts are before ideas; yes, the ideal, as Proudhon said, is but a flower, whose root lies in the material conditions of existence. Yes, the whole history of humanity, intellectual and moral, political and social, is but a reflection of its economic history.
Whom do we find under God's banner! Emperors, kings, the official and the officious world; our lords and our nobles; all the privileged persons of Europe whose names are recorded in the Almana de Gotha; the guinea, pigs of the industrial, commercial and banking world; the patented professors of our universities; the civil service servants; the low and high police officers; the gendarmes; the gaolers; the headsmen or hangmen, not forgetting the priests, who are now the black police enslaving our souls to the State
Now it chanced at that time there were three brothers of the Tuatha de Danaan living together in a place that was called Druim na Teine, the Ridge of the Fire, Goibniu and Samthainn and Cian. Cian was a lord of land, and Goibniu was the smith that had such a great name. Now Clan had a wonderful cow, the Glas Gaibhnenn, and her milk never failed. And every one that heard of her coveted her--arranged and put into English by Lady Augusta Gregory
He was always in love, of course; every human nat'ral phenomenon is. And he was always in love with a large woman; I never knowed the Dwarf as could be got to love a small one. Which helps to keep 'em the Curiosities they are.
"Where do you suppose they be all goin'?" she asked contemptuously. "There ain't many on 'em but what looks kind o' respectable. I'll warrant they've left work to home they'd ought to be doin'. I knowed, if ever I stopped to think, that cars was hived full o' folks, an' wa'n't run to an' fro for nothin'; but these can't be quite up to the average, can they? Some on 'em 's real thrif'less; guess they've be'n shoved out o' the last place, an' goin' to try the next one
Goldsmith's Friend Abroad Again
Just as that comforting thought passed through my mind, some young men set a fierce dog on me. I tried to defend myself, but could do nothing. I retreated to the recess of a closed doorway, and there the dog had me at his mercy, flying at my throat and face or any part of my body that presented itself. I shrieked for help, but the young men only jeered and laughed.
Amy looked relieved, but naughty Jo took her at her word, for during the first call she sat with every limb gracefully composed, every fold correctly draped, calm as a summer sea, cool as a snowbank, and as silent as the sphinx. In vain Mrs. Chester alluded to her `charming novel', and the Misses Chester introduced parties, picnics, the opera, and the fashions. Each and all were answered by a smile, a bow, and a demure "Yes" or "No" with the chill on.
GOSPEL (QUESTIONS) OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW
Mary saith: Thou art the image of Adam: was not he first formed and then Eve? Look upon the sun, that according to the likeness of Adam it is bright. and upon the moon, that because of the transgression of Eve it is full of clay. For God did place Adam in the east and Eve in the west, and appointed the lights that the sun should shine on the earth unto Adam in the east in his fiery chariots, and the moon in the west should give light unto Eve with a countenance like milk. And she defiled the commandment of the Lord.
43 Those men therefore took counsel one with another to go and report these things unto Pilate. And while they yet thought thereabout, again the heavens were opened and a 45 man descended and entered into the tomb. And they that were with the centurion (or the centurion and they that were with him) when they saw that, hasted to go by night unto Pilate and left the sepulchre whereon they were keeping watch, and told all that they had seen, and were in great agony, saying: Of a truth he was the son of God.
GOSPEL OF THOMAS, GREEK TEXT A - infancy II
After that again he went through the village, and a child ran and dashed against his shoulder. And Jesus was provoked and said unto him: Thou shalt not finish thy course (lit. go all thy way). And immediately he fell down and died. But certain when they saw what was done said: Whence was this young child born, for that every word of his is an accomplished work? And the parents of him that was dead came unto Joseph, and blamed him, saying: Thou that hast such a child canst not dwell with us in the village: or do thou teach him to bless and not to curse: for he slayeth our children.
GOSPEL OF THOMAS, GREEK TEXT B (Infancy 3)
And on the morrow he took him by the hand and led him to a certain teacher, Zacchaeus by name, and said unto him: Take this child, O master, and teach him letters. And the other said: Deliver him unto me, my brother, and I will teach him the scripture, and I will persuade him to bless all men and not to curse them. 2 And when Jesus heard that he laughed and said unto them: Ye speak that ye know, but I have knowledge more than you, for I am before the worlds. And I know when the fathers of your fathers were begotten, and I know how many are the years of your life
GOSPEL OF THOMAS, LATIN TEXT (Infancy 4)
And after some days as Jesus walked with Joseph through the city, there ran one of the children and smote Jesus on the arms: but Jesus said unto him: So finish thou thy course. And immediately he fell to the earth and died. But they when they saw this wonder, cried out saying: From whence cometh this child? And they said unto Joseph: It is not right that such a child should be among us. And he departed and took him with him. And they said to him: Depart out of this place; and if thou must be with us, teach him to pray and not to blaspheme: for our sons are put to death by him
Then the Queen turned from love to hate, and the greatness of her passion became the measure of her wrath, for very evilly she spoke of Graelent to the King. So long as the war endured, Graelent remained in that realm. He spent all that he had upon his company, for the King grudged wages to his men. The Queen persuaded the King to this, counselling him that by withholding the pay of the sergeants, Graelent might in no wise flee the country, nor take service with another lord.
Grand'ther Baldwin's Thanksgiving
For the boys may hold high revel, and the girls must have their way;/That's the law at Gran'ther Baldwin's upon each Thanksgiving Day./But the dinner-ah! the dinner-words are feeble to portray/What a culinary triumph is achieved Thanksgiving Day!
"It was news to me, Preston. Nevertheless, I was forced to hear Cowry through. I expected him to demand money; instead, he proposed what seemed to be easier terms in return for his silence. He told me that all would be well if I would take orders from his master-a man whom he called Gray Fist."
As she spoke, the mother drew out a basket from under the blankets and took from it a great pile of beads. These she hung around her daughter's neck till they reached half way up to her ears. Then she hung in her ears silver ear-rings that jingled with every movement of her head. Silver rings were on her fingers and silver bracelets on her arms, and then she was ready to join her friends.
Great Big Treasury of Beatrix Potter
But Peter, who was very naughty, ran straight away to Mr. McGregor's garden, and squeezed under the gate!
Great Catherine (Whom Glory Still Adores)
CATHERINE [rising eagerly]. Yes, the museum. An enlightened capital should have a museum. [She paces the chamber with a deep sense of the importance of the museum.] It shall be one of the wonders of the world. I must have specimens: specimens, specimens, specimens.
Greek Studies: A Series of Essays
I have reserved to the last what is perhaps the daintiest treatment of this subject in classical literature, the account of it which Ovid gives in the Fasti--a kind of Roman Calendar--for the seventh of April, the day of the games of Ceres. He tells over again the old story, with much of which, he says, the reader will be already familiar; but he has something also of his own to add to it, which the reader will hear for the first time; and, like one of those old painters who, in depicting a scene of Christian history, drew from their own fancy or experience its special setting and accessories, he translates the story into something very different from the Homeric hymn.
Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest
But at length, one night, without thinking of Rima's fearful end, it all at once occurred to me that the hated savage whose blood I had shed on the white savannah might have only been practicing his natural deceit when he told me that most pitiful story. If that were so--if he had been prepared with a fictitious account of her death to meet my questions--then Rima might still exist: --by W. H. Hudson
"Then," she returned, hastily, "I will tell Mother; and we will meet thee in the twilight, at the side door under the balcony." She continued to look from the window, and the man sauntered on as if he had no care in the world but to keep the scarlet heels of his shoes from the dust. After a time Grizel arose, changed her loose robe for a more ceremonious dress, bound her brown braids into a prim gilded net, and descended into the drawing-room.
By this time little Chuck came in with big Chuck, as he was too little to put the wood in by himself. They both saw those ashes all over the place, and little Chuck didn't know what had happened. But he seen that big Chuck was getting a look in his eyes that meant a whipping was coming. He knew he hadn't done it, but instead of trying to explain it to his pa he just lain down the wood while his pa was inspecting the damage, and ran to his room before big Chuck could collar him. Big Chuck weren't so mad.
Guido the Gimlet of Ghent--Stephen Leacock
The sun sank and night fell, enwrapping in shadow the frowning castle of Buggensberg, and the ancient city of Ghent at its foot. And as the darkness gathered, the windows of the castle shone out with fiery red, for it was Yuletide, and it was wassail all in the Great Hall of the castle, and this night the Margrave of Buggensberg made him a feast, and celebrated the betrothal of Isolde, his daughter, with Tancred the Tenspot.
The Poinciana station's a couple hundred yards from one end o' the hotel, and that means it's close to five miles from the clerk's desk. By the time we'd registered and been gave our key and marathoned another five miles or so to where our room was located at, I was about ready for the inquest. But the Missus was full o' pep and wild to get down to breakfast and look over our stable mates. She says we would eat without changin' our clo'es; people'd forgive us for not dressin' up on account o' just gettin' there.
Gulliver of Mars--Edwin Lester Linden Arnold
BEYOND THE FIRST flutter of surprise, the Martians had shown no interest in the abrupt termination of the year's divinations. They melted away, a trifle more silently perhaps than usual, when I shattered the magic globe, but with their invariable indifference, and having handed the reviving Heru over to some women who led her away, apparently already half forgetful of the things that had just happened, I was left alone on the palace steps
Gunnlaug the Worm-Tongue and Raven the Skald
Gunnlaug answers, "Neither Onund nor Thorfin are men as good as my father. Nay, thou thyself clearly fallest short of him-or what hast thou to set against his strife with Thorgrim the Priest, the son of Kiallak, and his sons, at Thorsness Thing, where he carried all that was in debate?"
For himself he chose eternal might and patronage. Mighty were his wondrous works, famed far and wide throughout the cities, within the land of Britain; how by the might of God he often healed of sore distress many men sick of heart. Grievously afflicted with disease they sought him out, coming from far, heavy-hearted and sad of soul. And ever they found ready comfort at the hand of that champion of God, and help and healing. There is no one of men who may rehearse or know the number of all those wonders which he wrought for men in the world by the grace of God.
Ay, ay," said the Laird, who had sought Mannering for some time, and now joined him, "there they go-there go the free-traders-there go Captain Dirk Hatteraick, and the Yungfrauw Hagenslaapen, half Manks, half Dutchman, half devil! run out the bowsprit, up mainsail, top and top-gallant sails, royals, and sky-scrapers, and away,-follow who can! That fellow, Mr. Mannering, is the terror of all the excise and custom-house cruisers; they can make nothing of him; he drubs them, or he distances them
H. S. Mauberley (Life and Contacts)
The heavy memories of Horeb, Sinai and the forty years,/ Showed only when the daylight fell/ Level across the face/ Of Brennbaum "The Impeccable".
and if any person or persons shall be or stand committed or detained as aforesaid, for any crime, unless for felony or treason plainly expressed in the warrant of commitment, in the vacation-time, and out of term, it shall and may be lawful to and for the person or persons so committed or detained (other than persons convict or in execution of legal process) or any one on his or their behalf, to appeal or complain to the lord chancellor or lord keeper
Hand and Heart--Elizabeth Gaskell
"I will try and explain myself. You know I have to keep a little shop, and to try and get employment in knitting stockings, and to clean my house, and to mend our clothes, and many other things. Now, do you think I should be doing my duty if I left you in the evenings, when you come home from school, to go out as a waiter at ladies' parties? I could earn a good deal of money by it
Hans Brinker, or The Silver Skates--Mary Mapes Dodge
They had skated but a few moments when Carl Schummel said mockingly to Hilda, "There's a pretty pair just coming upon the ice! The little ragpickers! Their skates must have been a present from the king direct."
Happy Hawkins--Robert Alexander Wason
Just imagine bein' hived up day after day with nothin' to see but walls an' nothin' to do but customers. You first got to be friendly with your visitors to make 'em feel at home, an' then you got to get as much of their money as you can in order to keep on bein' friendly with 'em in order to keep on gettin' as much of their money as you can.
Hard-Hearted Barbary Allen. A Kentucky Mountain Sketch
"But all the world's getting trifling," she complained, "both women and men. Now, maybe you won't believe it when I tell you there's a sight of men nowadays would rather buy a bedstead than make one. Look at them two 'steads there. My man made 'em fifty-three year' gone, and they good as they ever were. T' hain't nary thing in my house that hain't hand-made."
"Don't git sore, chief. Don't shoot," wailed Louis, raising his arms high behind him. "I ain't heeled, I ain't lookin'for trouble, so help me. I ... I told the D. A. office I was comin' here, honest, in case I got bumped off," he added almost hysterically. "Don't shoot, chief!"
Well, said Ryan, if you're really hard up I suppose I might as well come through. Only there's really no mystery at all about it; it's just what I consider the most remarkable piece of scouting ever done. I've been making a mystery of it just to have a little fun with Dick Hodges. You know he's got the Jackson club and he's still so sore about my stealing Waldron he'll hardly speak to me. I'll give you the dope if you want it, though it's a boost for Art Graham, not me .
It is as indubitable as it is incomprehensible to most of us, that, for thousands of years, a great people, quite as intelligent as we are, and living in as high a state of civilisation as that which had been attained in the greater part of Europe a few centuries ago, entertained not the slightest doubt that Anu, Bel, Ea, Istar, and the rest, were real personages, possessed of boundless powers for good and evil. --Essay #7
"It is advisable to wait a little while," stated Doc. "We are in conflict with more than one clever brain. Many nations are in the market for this white light of the haunted ocean. It is a power that would make the smallest of countries absolute."
Havamal (Words of the High one)
Two wooden stakes stood on the plain,/On them I hung my clothes:/ Draped in linen, they looked well born,/But, naked, I was a nobody
Have We Failed with the Indian?--H. L. Dawes
The aggregate of all sums appropriated for this purpose since the first $20,000 in 1877 amounts to $29,352,344. Previous Indian policies had been shifting and ephemeral enough to promise a dozen changes during the period that the present policy has continued. Before this hardly one had outlived the administration that originated it, and sometimes two or three would come and go in a single presidential term.
A more interesting meeting took place at Bonn. Beethoven, then a young man of twenty-two, was still living with his people in the Wenzegasse, but already arrangements had been made by the Elector for his paying a somewhat lengthened visit to Vienna in order to prosecute his studies there. Since the death of Mozart, Haydn had become the most brilliant star in the musical firmament, and it was only natural that the rising genius should look to him for practical help and encouragement. It so happened that the Elector's Band, of which Beethoven was a member, gave a dinner to Haydn at Godesberg.
"Then listen, Doc Savage," said Professor Randolph. "You cannot refuse to help in changing humanity. I tell you I can stop the world on its axis, if necessary. I can change the Arctic region to tropical, multiply the food of the world. I want you, Doc Savage. You will find me where"
"I don't care for this," he said as if he were talking to himself- "at all. Not that I mind your being here- I don't. You're quite a pretty little thing, but I don't like Charlie Moon's sending you up here. Am I a laboratory experiment on which the janitors as well as the chemists can make experiments? Is my intellectual development humorous in any way? Do I look like the pictures of the little Boston boy in the comic magazines? Has that callow ass, Moon, with his eternal tales about his week in Paris, any right to
"The place is quite a wilderness," said Squire Headlong: "for, during the latter part of my father's life, while I was finishing my education, he troubled himself about nothing but the cellar, and suffered everything else to go to rack and ruin. A mere wilderness, as you see, even now in December; but in summer a complete nursery of briers, a forest of thistles, a plantation of nettles, without any livestock but goats, that have eaten up all the bark of the trees. Here you see is the pedestal of a statue, with only half a leg and four toes remaining: there were many here once.
"We were in the main dining-room, and there was a fine-dressed crowd there, all talking loud and enjoyable about the two St. Louis topics, the water supply and the colour line. They mix the two subjects so fast that strangers often think they are discussing water-colours; and that has given the old town something of a rep as an art centre. And over in the corner was a fine brass band playing; and now, thinks I, Solly will become conscious of the spiritual oats of life nourishing and exhilarating his system. But nong, mong frang .
MANGAN [throwing himself into the chair distractedly]. My brain won't stand it. My head's going to split. Help! Help me to hold it. Quick: hold it: squeeze it. Save me. [Ellie comes behind his chair; clasps his head hard for a moment; then begins to draw her hands from his forehead back to his ears]. Thank you. [Drowsily]. That's very refreshing. [Waking a little]. Don't you hypnotize me, though. I've seen men made fools of by hypnotism.
Castle Weelset was not much of a castle: to an ancient round tower, discomfortably habitable, had been added in the last century a rather large, defensible house. It stood on the edge of a gorge, crowning one of its stony hills of no great height. With scarce a tree to shelter it, the situation was very cold in winter, and it required a hardy breeding to live there in comfort.
HECUBA: Ah me! an awful trial is nigh, it seems, fraught with mourning, rich in tears. Yes, I too escaped death where death had been my due, and Zeus destroyed me not but is still preserving my life, that I may witness in my misery fresh sorrows surpassing all before. Still if the bond may ask the free of things that grieve them not nor wrench their heart-strings, 'tis well that thou shouldst make an end and hearken to my questioning.
. She looked around her in astonishment and could not imagine for a while where she was. But her grandfather's deep voice was now heard outside, and then Heidi began to recall all that had happened: how she had come away from her former home and was now on the mountain with her grandfather instead of with old Ursula. --by Johanna Spyri
HELEN Good friends, to what a fate am I united? Did not my mother bear me to be a monster to the world? For no woman, Hellene or barbarian, gives birth to babes in eggs inclosed, as they say Leda bare me to Zeus. My life and all I do is one miracle, partly owing to Hera, and partly is my beauty to blame. Would God I could rub my beauty out like a picture
Hell Fer Sartain and Other Stories
Thar nuver had been nothin' like that afore on Kingdom-Come, an' all along I heerd fellers a-layin' thar guns down; an when the preacher called out fer sinners, blame me ef the fust feller that riz wasn't Mace Day. An' Mace says, ``Stranger, 'f what you say is true, I reckon the Lawd 'll fergive me too, but I don't believe Daws Dillon ever will,'' an' Mace stood thar lookin' around fer Daws.
After this the new admiral Hierax arrived from Lacedaemon. The naval force was transferred into his successor's hands, and under the happiest auspices Teleutias set sail for home. As he descended to the seashore to start on his homeward voyage there was not one among his soldiers who had not a warm shake of the hand for their old admiral. Here one presented him with a crown, and there another with a victor's wreath
Heloise to Abelard: a sonnet--Elizabeth Oakes Smith
Must I not love thee? When the heart would leap,/ With all its thrilling pulses, unto thee,/ Must it be staid? Is not the spirit free?/ Can human bonds or bars its essence keep?
O you chorus of indolent reviewers,/ Irresponsible, indolent reviewers,/ Look, I come to the test, a tiny poem/ All composed in a metre of Catullus,/ All in quantity, careful of my motion,/ Like the skater on ice that hardly bears him,
Thy prime of youth is frozen with thy faults,/thy feast of ioy is finisht with thy fall:/ Thy crop of corne is tares auailing naughts,/thy good God knowes thy hope, thy hap and all./Short were thy daies, and shadowed was thy sun,/T' obscure thy light unluckelie begun.
Full title: Narrative of the life and adventures of Henry Bibb, an American slave, written by himself
"He mourned!" exclaimed Lord Douglas, contemptuously. "He has mourned for all his wives. Even for Anne Boleyn he put on mourning, and in his white mourning apparel, the day after Anne's execution, he led Jane Seymour to the marriage altar! This outward mourning, what does it signify? Anne Boleyn also mourned for Catharine of Aragon, whom she had pushed from the throne. --by Louise Muhlbach, who gets a category tomorrow.
They were crowded on both sides of the stage with the members of the company; the girls were tiptoeing, with their hands on the shoulders of the men, and making futile little leaps into the air to get a better view, and others were resting on one knee that those behind might see over their shoulders. There were over a dozen children before the footlights, with the prima donna in the centre. She was singing the verses of a song, and they were following her movements
Laura passed and gave her the faintest little wink; it made Leila wonder for a moment whether she was quite grown up after all. Certainly her partner did not say very much. He coughed, tucked his handkerchief away, pulled down his waistcoat, took a minute thread off his sleeve. But it didn't matter. Almost immediately the band started and her second partner seemed to spring from the ceiling.
The men about him were no longer the friends of yesterday; in each one he discerned a possible enemy. He attended absently to their talk. He was remembering how she had conducted herself toward this one and that one; striving to recall conversations, subtleties of facial expression that might have meant what he did not suspect at the moment, shades of meaning in words that had seemed the ordinary interchange of social amenities.
Her Majesty's Servants--Rudyard Kipling
IT had been raining heavily for one whole month-raining on a camp of thirty thousand men, thousands of camels, elephants, horses, bullocks,, and mules, all gathered together at a place called Rawalpindi, to be reviewed by the Viceroy of India. He was receiving a visit from the Amir of Afghanistan-a wild king of a very wild country; and the Amir had brought with him for a bodyguard eight hundred men and horses who had never seen a camp or a locomotive before in their lives
Daughter, there may yet be a happy escape from present troubles for me and thee; my son, thy husband, may yet arrive. So calm thyself, and wipe those tears from thy children's eyes, and soothe them with soft words, inventing a tale to delude them, piteous though such fraud be. Yea, for men's misfortunes ofttimes flag, and the stormy wind doth not always blow so strong, nor are the prosperous ever so; for all things change, making way for each other.
Herb of Grace--Rosa Nouchette Carey
"You may as well shut your mouth, Caleb, if you have got nothing better to say than that, and if you have not eyes to see the dear lamb is dwindling more and more every day in this cellar of a place. 'Plenty of fresh air and light,' says the doctor, 'and as much nourishment as you can get her to swallow,' and all the winter we have to burn gas or sit in darkness through the livelong day, and the fog choking the breath out of one."
A new morality has burst upon us with some violence in connection with the problem of strong drink; and enthusiasts in the matter range from the man who is violently thrown out at 12.30, to the lady who smashes American bars with an axe. In these discussions it is almost always felt that one very wise and moderate position is to say that wine or such stuff should only be drunk as a medicine. With this I should venture to disagree with a peculiar ferocity. The one genuinely dangerous and immoral way of drinking wine is to drink it as a medicine.
Hermione and Her Little Group of Serious Thinkers--Don Marquis
"Mr. Finch," I said, "I must have TOLD you that - or else it was just a wild guess. You COULDN'T have gotten it psychically. HOW did you know it?"
EOCHAID AIREMON took the sovereignty over Erin, and the five provinces of Ireland were obedient to him, for the king of each province was his vassal. Now these were they who were the kings of the provinces at that time, even Conor the son of Ness, and Messgegra, and Tigernach Tetbannach, and Curoi, and Ailill the son of Mata of Muresc. And the royal forts that belonged to Eochaid were the stronghold of Frémain in Meath, --Translated by A.H. Leary
All my hexameters fly, like stags pursued by the staghounds,/Breathless and panting, and ready to drop, yet flying still onwards,/ I would full fain pull in my hard-mouthed runaway hunter;/ But our English Spondeans are clumsy yet impotent curb-reins;/ And so to make him go slowly, no way left have I but to lame him.
Hints Towards An Essay On Conversation
Most things pursued by men for the happiness of public or private life our wit or folly have so refined, that they seldom subsist but in idea; a true friend, a good marriage, a perfect form of government, with some others, require so many ingredients, so good in their several kinds, and so much niceness in mixing them, that for some thousands of years men have despaired of reducing their schemes to perfection.
If he HAD been trapped, he was to be excused; for the woman from nowhere, in the dusty shoes, and gray travelling dress, was very lovely, with black hair and great eyes full of tears. She was tall, with a fine figure, and her voice had a running sob in it pitiful to hear. As soon as the Senior Subaltern stood up, she threw her arms round his neck, and called him "my darling," and said she could not bear waiting alone in England
Historical Materialism and the Economics of Karl Marx
The economic axiom is a very general and purely a formal principle of conduct. It is inconceivable that anyone should act without applying, well or ill, the very principle of every action, i.e., the economic principle. --by Benedetto Croce
Historie of the Arrivall of Edward IV
Subtitled: in England and the Finall Recouerye of His Kingdomes from Henry VI.
History of Florence and of the Affairs of Italy
Theodoric possessed great talents both for war and peace; in the former he was always conqueror, and in the latter he conferred very great benefits upon the cities and people under him. He distributed the Ostrogoths over the country, each district under its leader, that he might more conveniently command them in war, and govern them in peace. He enlarged Ravenna, restored Rome, and, with the exception of military discipline, conferred upon the Romans every honor. --by Machiavelli
That eerie yell had come from somewhere near Stage 1, at the end of the row. Noonan and Grace plowed toward it, trained instinct guiding them through the weedy lawn that once had been a carefully kept-up picture plant.
"It is a shame on us that an Indian must teach us who is 'our shield and our buckler," observed Mr. Conant. "To my mind there is more danger of Satan's killing us with the rat's-bane of toleration, than the Lord's taking us off with the Indian arrows. It behoveth the watchmen of Israel to be on their guard, for false prophets and false Christs are abroad in the land. 'One saith he is in the desert, and another saith he is in the secret chambers;' and much reason have the elect to laud the God of Israel, that his right hand upholdeth them in slippery places."
The so-called Countess Piccolomini was a fine example of the adventurers. She was young, tall, well-made, had eyes full of fire, and skin of a dazzling whiteness; not, however, that natural whiteness which delights those who know the value of a satin skin and rose petals, but rather that artificial fairness which is commonly to be seen at Rome on the faces of courtezans, and which disgusts those who know how it is produced.
"I am not in trouble, exactly," Rose stammered, concealing her discomfiture as well as possible. "I am a little unhappy because I have made some one else unhappy; and now that you know it, you will be unhappy too, and angry besides, I suppose, though you've seen everything there was to see."
"The merely scientific explanation, dear, is very simple. I see it all now. The force that was dragging us out of our course was the united pull of two dead stars approaching each other in the same orbit. They may have been doing that for millions of years. The shock of their meeting has transformed their motion into light and heat. They have united to form a single sun and a nebula, which will some day condense into a system of planets like ours.
Alas, none of the actualities of life would ever break down his robust confidence nor his golden dreams! Even before The Country Doctor was published he found himself involved in a law suit with his publisher, and after its appearance the public press criticised it sharply. "Everyone has his knife out for me," he wrote to Mme. Hanska, "a situation which saddened and angered Lord Byron only makes me laugh.--by Albert Keim and Louis Lumet
HOOK MCGUIRE GIVES A BOWLING LESSON
But Hook wasn't thinking about bowling or the new resin the professor was perfecting. He wasn't thinking of the ribbing he would get from Chief Ryan for wasting his time on anything pertaining to bowling. Hook was thinking about the unprotected old professor and the experiment he was making that might change all warfare. -- from the back of Shadow Magazine
The house at Bethel had, both in front and in rear, a portico, or, as it was more humbly, and therefore more appropriately named, a shed; that in the rear, was a sort of adjunct to the kitchen, and one end of it was enclosed for the purpose of a bed-room, and occupied by Magawisca. Everell found Digby sitting at the other extremity of this portico; his position was prudently chosen. The moon was high, and the heavens clear, and there concealed and sheltered by the shadow of the roof, he could, without being seen, command the whole extent of cleared ground that bordered on the forest, whence the foe would come, if he came at all.
Hope Leslie, Volume 2--Catharine Maria Sedgwick
. It was not even surmised by the popular voice, that the bold attempt had been made on account of the Indian woman. The magistrates had very discreetly refrained from disclosing her connection with state affairs, as every alarm about the rising of the Indians, threw the colony, especially the women and children, into a state of the greatest agitation. The imprisonment of Magawisca was, therefore, looked upon as a transient and prudential and domiciliary arrangement, to prevent the possibility of any concert betweenher and the recovered captive, Faith Leslie, who was known to be pining for her Indian friends.
Hopes and Fears for Art--William Morris
For your teachers, they must be Nature and History: as for the first, that you must learn of it is so obvious that I need not dwell upon that now: hereafter, when I have to speak more of matters of detail, I may have to speak of the manner in which you must learn of Nature. As to the second, I do not think that any man but one of the highest genius, could do anything in these days without much study of ancient art, and even he would be much hindered if he lacked it.
Horror: A True Tale--Anonymous
"A strange story I have just been told," said he; "here has been my bailiff to inform me of the loss of four of the choicest ewes out of that little flock of Southdowns I set such store by, and which arrived in the north but two months since. And the poor creatures have been destroyed in so strange a manner, for their carcasses are horribly mangled."
I had met Grimes one day during the spring he was with the Cubs, but I knew he wouldn't remember me. A ball player never recalls a reporter's face on less than six introductions or his name on less than twenty. However, I resolved to speak to him, and had just mustered sufficient courage to open a conversation when he saved me the trouble. "Whose picture have they got there?" he asked, pointing to my paper.
If I were a host, I should ignore those tomes. Being a guest, I sometimes glance into them, but with more of horror, I assure you, than of malicious amusement. I carefully avoid those which treat of hospitality among barbarous races. Things done in the best periods of the most enlightened peoples are quite bad enough. The Israelites were the salt of the earth. But can you imagine a deed of colder-blooded treachery than Jael's?
I was willing to humor the old man's fancy. He had not told us a story for some time; and the dark and solemn swamp around us; the amber-colored stream flowing silently and sluggishly at our feet, like the waters of Lethe; the heavy, aromatic scent of the bays, faintly suggestive of funeral wreaths, -- all made the place an ideal one for a ghost story.
HOW HE LEFT THE HOTEL--Louisa Baldwin
Sometimes, when he was alone in the lift, he'd speak to me. He asked me in what regiment I'd served, and said he knew the officers in it. But I can't say he was comfortable to talk to. There was something stand-off about him, and he always seemed deep in his own thoughts. He never sat down in the lift. Whether it was empty or full he stood bolt upright under the lamp, where the light fell on his pale face and scarred cheek.
Now if you only knew the least little thing about the world, Henry, you'd know that in a large family, though the sisters quarrel with one another like mad all the time, yet let one of the brothers marry, and they all turn on their unfortunate sister-in-law and devote the rest of their lives with perfect unanimity to persuading him that his wife is unworthy of him. They can do it to her very face without her knowing it
"You'll look like a fool standing on his head in a snow-bank if you talk impudent to me," said Hefty epigrammatically, from behind the barrier of his iron mask. What might have happened next did not happen, because at that moment the music sounded for the grand march, and Hefty and the policeman were swept apart by the crowd of Indians, Mexicans, courtiers, negro minstrels, and clowns. Hefty stamped across the waxed floor about as lightly as a safe could do it if a safe could walk.
A third door showed me a plain, dull sitting room, with an old man napping in his easy-chair. I heard voices in the kitchen beyond, and entering there, beheld Puah the fiend. Unfortunately, for the dramatic effect of the tableaux, all I saw was a mild-faced old woman, buttering toast, while she conversed with her familiar, a comfortable gray cat.
How Members of Congress Are Bribed
if such a compound of dangerous and insolent qualities merged in one personality, active, vigilant, unblushing, be a Lobbyist - then Collis P. Huntington is a Lobbyist at the doors of Congress, in its corridors and in its councils, at Washington. --by Joseph Moore
How Slid Made War Against the Gods
And the gods together shouting made the cry of the south calling the south wind to them. And again the gods shouted all together making the cry of the north, calling the north wind to Them; and thus They gathered to Them all Their winds and sent these four down into the low plains to find what thing it was that called with the new cry, and to drive it away from the gods.
The writing was exactly on the ruled lines although written in absolute darkness. The hand and arm, although luminous, did not give out a particle of light. The arm had been at least five feet from the cabinet opening and seven feet from the medium. Surely, it was not he. The message read, the light was again shut down and the music again started.
How the Brigadier Played for a Kingdom--Arthur Conan Doyle
I should not have feared to ride by the road through the wood, for I have learned in Spain that the safest time to pass through a guerilla country is after an outrage, and that the moment of danger is when all is peaceful. When I came to look upon my map, however, I saw that Hof lay further to the south of me, and that I might reach it more directly by keeping to the moors.
How the Enemy Came to Thlunrana
Though her doom was close upon her and the enemy of prophecy should come that very night through the open, southward door that was named the Gate of the Doom, yet that rocky edifice Thlunrana remained mysterious still, venerable, terrible, dark, and dreadfully crowned with her doom. It was not often that anyone dared wander near to Thlunrana by night
HOW THE THIRD FLOOR KNEW THE POTTERIES--Amelia B. Edwards
I drew back for a moment, hesitating whether to knock or ring, when a sound of voices in the passage, and the sudden gleaming of a bright line of light under the door, warned me that someone was coming out. Taken by surprise, and quite unprepared for the moment with anything to say, I shrank back behind the porch, and waited until those within should have passed out. The door opened, and the light streamed suddenly upon the roses and the wet gravel.
Holding the envelope toward the window, he called to my notice the fact that my paper was within, and that I could see it plainly. I could see the shadow of the two papers, which appeared as one, and thus his statement seemed correct. Of course he did not show me the rear side OR FACE of the envelope, with my paper protruding, which was immediately behind the duplicate, so that the shadow of it was also the shadow of the duplicate.
How To Tell a Story and Others
Artemus Ward dealt in numbers three and four a good deal. He would begin to tell with great animation something which he seemed to think was wonderful; then lose confidence, and after an apparently absent-minded pause add an incongruous remark in a soliloquizing way; and that was the remark intended to explode the mine--and it did.
How To Tell Stories To Children And Some Stories To Tell
No one can think of a child and a story, without thinking of the fairy tale. Is this, as some would have us believe, a bad habit of an ignorant old world? Or can the Fairy Tale justify her popularity with truly edifying and educational results? Is she a proper person to introduce here, and what are her titles to merit? --by Sara Cone Bryant
HOW WE GOT UP THE GLENMUTCHKIN RAILWAY--W. E. AYTOUN
"Ah!" said she, "I see you are a congenial spirit. How delightful, and yet how rare it is to meet with any one who thinks in unison with yourself! Do you ever walk in the Necropolis, Mr. Dunshunner? It is my favourite haunt of a morning. There we can wean ourselves, as it were, from life, and, beneath the melancholy yew and cypress, anticipate the setting star. How often there have I seen the procession-the funeral of some very, very little child"--
How Will The World End?--Herbert C. Fyfe
But though we may escape suffocation, there is yet the chance that some day there will be no air for poor humanity to breathe. Mr. Nikola Tesla, of world-wide fame, announces that if we are not cautious we may set light to the atmosphere with our electric discharges of a "few million volts."
But with ``Blackbeard'' it is different, for in him we have a real, ranting, raging, roaring pirate per se - one who really did bury treasure, who made more than one captain walk the plank, and who committed more private murders than he could number on the fingers of both hands; one who fills, and will continue to fill, the place to which he has been assigned for generations, and who may be depended upon to hold his place in the confidence of others for generations to come.
That night after she had gone to bed she thought about it all, and she felt almost angry again with fate, or with Dexter himself, she could scarcely have told which, that the one man who had fallen in love with her had been Dexter Ray and not some one whom she could consider as her equal, and who spoke better English. The position, socially speaking, she did not think of at all.
'My governor's going to make your fortune, Humpy!' cried Leonard. 'He told me so, and when he says a thing he means it. He's going to start you in business when you leave school; most likely you'll go into his own office. How will you like that, Humpy? My governor thinks no end of you; says you're a brick, and so you are. I shan't forget that you pulled me out of that hole, old chap. We shall be friends all our lives, you know. Tell me what you thought of my governor?'
Hunting the Grisly and Other Sketches
The unfortunate man, having finished his packing, had sat down on the spruce log with his face to the fire, and his back to the dense woods, to wait for his companion. While thus waiting, his monstrous assailant, which must have been lurking nearby in the woods, waiting for a chance to catch one of the adventurers unprepared, came silently up from behind, walking with long, noiseless steps, and seemingly still on two legs. --by Theodore Roosevelt
WHEN misty, misty mornings come,/When wild geese low are flying,/And down along the reedy marsh/The mallard drakes are crying;
He was already suspect, and the sight of him back again in Dalquharter would double that suspicion. He must brazen it out, but he distrusted his powers with such tell-tale stuff in his pockets. They might murder him anywhere on the moor road or in an empty railway carriage. An unpleasant memory of various novels he had read in which such things happened haunted his mind.. ..There was just one consolation.
Hymn of Breaking Strain--Rudyard Kipling
But in our daily dealing With stone and steel, we find/The Gods have no such feeling/Of justice toward mankind./To no set gauge they make us
1. When Agni, having entered the waters, burned, where the (gods) who uphold the order (of the universe) rendered homage (to Agni), there, they say, is thy origin on high: do thou feel for us, and spare us, O takman!
1. Hither, for powerful kinship, I call Agni, him who prospers you,/Most frequent at our solemn rites. / 2. May Agni with his pointed blaze cast down each fierce devouring fiend:/May Agni win us wealth by war!/3. Agni, be gracious; thou art great: thou hast approached the pious man,/Hast come to sit on sacred grass.
Hyperion. Volume 1--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"By the way," interrupted the Baron, "did you ever read Hoffmann's beautiful story of Master Martin, the Cooper of Nuremberg? I will read it to you this very night. It is the most delightful picture of that age, which you can conceive. But look! the sun has already set behindthe Alsatian hills. Let us go up to the castle and look for the ghost in Prince Ruprecht's tower. O, what a glorious sunset!"
Hyperion. Volume 2--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Tell me, my soul, why art thou restless? Why dost thou look forward to the future with such strong desire? The present is thine,-and the past;-and the future shall be! O that thou didst look forward to the great hereafter with half the longing wherewith thou longest for an earthly future,-which a few days at most will bring thee! to the meeting of the dead, as to the meeting of the absent! Thou glorious spirit-land!
I wrote to Gordon yesterday, but I didn't say anything about Walter because I don't think it is a thing a person ought to do by letter. I can tell him when he gets to New York and then I will be sure that he doesn't take it too hard and I can promise him that I will be friends with him always and make him promise not to do anything silly, while if I told it to him in a letter there is no telling what he would do, there all alone.
3. In the third NINE, undivided, (we see its subject as) the superior man active and vigilant all the day, and in the evening still careful and apprehensive. (The position is) dangerous, but there will be no mistake.--Note: One of the Five Classics
ICARUS, or The Future of Science
Written by Bertrand Russell as a response to Haldane.
Ida Hauchawout--Theodore Dreiser
But the figure in the coffin, embedded in such voluptuous materiality at so late a date, she who had followed the plow and pitched hay, struck me as remarkable. Her hair was thick and coarse, but smoothly plaited and laid - red hair. The large, bony head, with the wide mouth and small nose, looked tired indeed. But one strong arm held snugly the minute infant that had never known life pressed close to her breast and big yearning face.
Idle Days on the Yann and Other Stories
And now as the sun's last rays were nearly level, we saw the sight that I had come to see, for from two mountains that stood on either shore two cliffs of pink marble came out into the river, all glowing in the light of the low sun, and they were quite smooth and of mountainous altitude, and they nearly met, and Yann went tumbling between them and found the sea.
Almost every people, as we know, has had its legend of a "golden age" and of its return--legends which will hardly be forgotten, however prosaic the world may become, while man himself remains the aspiring, never quite contented being he is. And yet in truth, since we are no longer children, we might well question the advantage of the return to us of a condition of life in which, by the nature of the case, the values of things would, so to speak, lie wholly on their surfaces
Subtitled: THE FIRST EPISTLE OF THE SECOND BOOK OF HORACE: TO AUGUSTUS
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Prince Zilah, complete
The novel is credited to Jules Claretie.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Prince Zilah, v1
In the old castle, with towers painted red in the ancient fashion, where he was born and had grown up, Andras, like all the males of his family and his country, had been imbued with memories of the old wars. A few miles from his father's domain rose the Castle of the Isle, which, in the middle of the sixteenth century, Zringi had defended against the Turks, displaying lofty courage and unconquerable audacity, and forcing Soliman the Magnificent to leave thirty thousand soldiers beneath the walls
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Prince Zilah, v2
Was Michel Menko indeed dead? We left him just as he was turning the key in the little gate in the wall. He walked in boldly, and followed a path leading to an open space where was the pavilion he had spoken of to Marsa. He looked to see whether the windows of the pavilion were lighted, or whether there were a line of light under the door. No: the delicate tracery of the pagoda-like structure showed dimly against the sky; but there was no sign of life. Perhaps, however, Marsa was there in the darkness.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Prince Zilah, v3
His wife! Yes, the beautiful Tzigana he had met at Baroness Dinati's was now his wife! He could punish or pardon. But he had punished, since he had inflicted upon her that living death-insanity. And he asked himself whether he should not pardon Princess Zilah, punished, repentant, almost dying.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Zibeline, complete
Novel by Phillipe de Masa.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Zibeline, v1
"Listen to this!" And he read aloud: "'General Order: An expedition corps, composed of two divisions of infantry, under the command of General Forey, is in process of forming, in order to be sent to Mexico on urgent business. The brigade of the advance guard will be composed of the First Regiment of Zouaves and the Eighteenth Battalion of infantry. As soon as these companies shall be prepared for war, this battalion will proceed by the shortest route to Toulon; thence they will embark aboard the Imperial on the twenty-sixth day of June next.'"
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Zibeline, v2
When this plan was originated, that particular corner was called "the infernal box," but the name has fallen into desuetude since the dedication of the fine monument of M. Gamier. Nevertheless, as it is counted a high privilege to be numbered among these select subscribers, changes are rare among them; besides, the members are not, as a rule, men in their first youth. They have seen, within those walls, the blooming and the renewal of several generations of pretty women; and the number of singers and dancers to whom they have paid court in the coulisses is still greater.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy, Zibeline, v3
A cylindrical hat, a little straight or turned-over collar, a cravat tied in a sailor's knot, a gardenia in the buttonhole, long trousers and varnished boots completed the dress of these modern Amazons, who, having nothing in common with the female warriors of ancient times, are not deprived, as were those unfortunates, of any of their feminine charms.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Romance of Youth, entire
The complete text by Francois Coppee.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Romance of Youth, v1
The quarter had not changed, and it still had the appearance of a suburban faubourg. They had just erected, within gunshot of the house where the Violettes and Gerards lived, a large five-story building, upon whose roof still trembled in the wind the masons' withered bouquets. But that was all. In front of them, on the lot "For Sale," enclosed by rotten boards, where one could always see tufts of nettles and a goat tied to a stake, and upon the high wall above which by the end of April the lilacs hung in their perfumed clusters
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Romance of Youth, v2
The young man's gayety left him suddenly when he looked at his father, who had seated himself on the side of the bed. He had become almost frightful to look at; old before his time, livid of complexion, his eyes bloodshot, the rebellious lock of hair straggling over his right temple. Nothing was more heartbreaking than his senile smile when he placed his bony trembling hands upon his thighs. Amedee, who knew, alas, why his father had reached such a pass, felt his heart moved with pity and shame.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Romance of Youth, v3
This emotion, let it be understood, did not exist except among the literary men. The politicians disdained poets and poetry, and did not trouble them selves over such commonplace matters. They had affairs of a great deal more importance to determine the overthrow of the government first, then to remodel the map of Europe! What was necessary to over throw the Empire? First, conspiracy; second, barricades. Nothing was easier than to conspire. Every body conspired at the Seville.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Romance of Youth, v4
Truly this National Guard did not make a bad appearance. They were a trifle awkward, perhaps, in their dark-blue hooded cloaks, with their tin-plate buttons, and armed with breech-loading rifles, and encumbered with canteens, basins, and pouches, all having an unprepared and too-new look. They all came from the best parts of the city, with accelerated steps and a loud beating of drums, and headed, if you please, by their major on horseback, a truss-maker, who had formerly been quartermaster of the third hussars.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Woodland Queen, Entire
The complete text, by Andre Theuriet.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Woodland Queen, v1
"Yes; and a marvellous good shot," interrupted the justice. "I recognize all that; but even if he had a hundred other good qualities, the grand chasserot, as they call him here, will be on the wrong side of the hedge if Monsieur de Buxieres has unfortunately died intestate. In the eye of the law, as you are doubtless aware, a natural child, who has not been acknowledged, is looked upon as a stranger."
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Woodland Queen, v2
So he shut himself up again in his solitude, with one more illusion destroyed. He asked himself, and his heart became heavy at the thought, whether, in course of time, he also would undergo this stultification, this moral depression, which ends by lowering us to the level of the low- minded people among whom we live.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: A Woodland Queen, v3
Under these conditions it is not to be supposed he was in a mood to relate any of the details of such meagre lovemaking. His self-love was wounded by Reine's coldness. Having always been "cock-of-the-walk," he could not understand why he had such poor success with the only one about whom he was in earnest. He kept quiet, therefore, hiding his anxiety under the mask of careless indifference.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: An Attic Philosopher, entire
The complete text, by Emile Souvestre.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: An Attic Philosopher, v1
All the enjoyment of my walk was gone; I left off looking about me, and retired into my own heart. The animated and moving sight in the streets gave place to inward meditation upon all the painful problems which have been written for the last four thousand years at the bottom of each human struggle, but which are propounded more clearly than ever in our days.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: An Attic Philosopher, v2
Whether it is that the countrywoman saw in this act a determination to escape her claims, or that she was blinded by passion, I cannot say; but she rushed into the next room, where I heard the sounds of quarrelling, with which the cries of the child were soon mingled. The joiner, who was still rummaging in the till, was startled, and raised his head.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: An Attic Philosopher, v3
I remained for some time lost in the sort of insensibility belonging to a first sleep; at last some vague and broken sensations came over me. It seemed to me that the day grew darker, that the air became colder. I half perceived bushes covered with the scarlet berries which foretell the coming of winter. I walked on a dreary road, bordered here and there with juniper-trees white with frost. Then the scene suddenly changed. I was in the diligence; the cold wind shook the doors and windows; the trees, loaded with snow, passed by like ghosts; in vain I thrust my benumbed feet into the crushed straw.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, entire
The complete text, by Alfred de Vigny
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v1
The reign of which we are about to paint a few years-a reign of feebleness, which was like an eclipse of the crown between the splendors of Henri IV and those of Louis le Grand-afflicts the eyes which contemplate it with dark stains of blood, and these were not all the work of one man, but were caused by great and grave bodies. It is melancholy to observe that in this age, still full of disorder, the clergy, like a nation, had its populace, as it had its nobility, its ignorant and its criminal prelates, as well as those who were learned and virtuous.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v2
Behold the Mediterranean, not far distant, washing with its blue waters the sandy shores. Penetrate into that city resembling Athens; and to find him who reigns there, follow that dark and irregular street, mount the steps of the old archiepiscopal palace, and enter the first and largest of its apartments.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v3
In order to appear before the King, Cinq-Mars had been compelled to mount the charger of one of the light horse, wounded in the affair, having lost his own at the foot of the rampart. As the two companies were marching out, he felt some one touch his shoulder, and, turning round, saw old Grandchamp leading a very beautiful gray horse.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v4
Two years! what changes may they not have upon men, upon their families, and, above all, in that great and so troublous family of nations, whose long alliances a single day suffices to destroy, whose wars are ended by a birth, whose peace is broken by a death! We ourselves have beheld kings returning to their dwelling on a spring day; that same day a vessel sailed for a voyage of two years. The navigator returned. The kings were seated upon their thrones; nothing seemed to have taken place in his absence, and yet God had deprived those kings of a hundred days of their reign.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v5
"Yes, it would have been better. I intended to have said nothing to you on the subject. It was a painful task to keep silence; but hitherto I have succeeded. I wished to have conducted the whole enterprise without you; to show you only the finished work. I wished to keep you beyond the circle of my danger; but shall I confess my weakness? I feared to die, if I have to die, misjudged by you. I can well sustain the idea of the world's malediction, but not of yours; but this has decided me upon avowing all to you."
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cinq Mars, v6
The archbishops of Lyons, as the temporal lords of the city, had built and formerly resided in this castle. It afterward became a fortress, and during the reign of Louis XIII a State prison. One colossal tower, where the daylight could only penetrate through three long loopholes, commanded the edifice, and some irregular buildings surrounded it with their massive walls, whose lines and angles followed the form of the immense and perpendicular rock.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Conscience, entire
The complete text, by Hector Malot.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Conscience, v1
Behold my situation! I am desperate because there is no one to whom I can apply; those whom I have asked for money have not listened to me; I have told you that I have no relatives, and neither have I any friends-perhaps because I am not amiable. And then I thought of you. You know me. You know that people say I have a future before me. At the end of three months I shall be a doctor in the hospitals; my competitors admit that I shall not miss admission; I have undertaken some experiments that will, perhaps, give me fame. Will you give me your hand?"
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Conscience, v2
His first thought was to endeavor to explain to himself how he felt, and he found that it was an immense relief; something, doubtless, analogous to the returning to life after being in a state of asphyxiation. Physically, he was calm; morally, he felt no remorse. He was right, therefore, in his theory when he told Phillis that in the intelligent man remorse precedes the action, instead of following it.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Conscience, v3
He had not a second of doubt; Madame Dammauville did not wish a professional visit from him. She wished to speak to him of Caffie, and, in the coming crisis, he said to himself that perhaps it was fortunate that it was so; at least he would be first to know what she had decided to do, and he could defend himself. Nothing is hopeless as long as a struggle is possible.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Conscience, v4
Decidedly, to make others happy was the best thing in the world, and as long as one could have this satisfaction there was no fear of being unhappy. To create an atmosphere of happiness for others is to profit by it at the same time.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cosmopolis, entire
The complete text, by Paul Bourget.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cosmopolis, v1
There is an intelligent man, who never questions his ideas, " said Dorsenne to himself, when the Marquis had left him. "He is like the Socialists. What vigor of mind in that old wornout machine!" And for a brief moment he watched, with a glance in which there was at least as much admiration as pity, the Marquis, who was disappearing down the Rue de la Propagande, and who walked at the rapid pace characteristic of monomaniacs. They follow their thoughts instead of heeding objects.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cosmopolis, v2
Dorsenne was, on formulating that fantastic thought, upon the point of retiring. He took up, as was his habit, one of the books on his table, in order to read a few pages, when once in bed. He had thus within his reach the works by which he strengthened his doctrine of intransitive intellectuality; they were Goethe's Memoirs; a volume of George Sand's correspondence, in which were the letters to Flaubert; the 'Discours de la Methode' by Descartes, and the essay by Burckhart on the Renaissance.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cosmopolis, v3
It was almost six o'clock before Maud Gorka really regained consciousness. A very common occurrence aroused her from the somnambulism of suffering in which she had wandered for two hours. The storm which had threatened since noon at length broke. Maud, who had scarcely heeded the first large drops, was forced to seek shelter when the clouds suddenly burst, and she took refuge at the right extremity of the colonnade of St. Peter's. How had she gone that far?
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Cosmopolis, v4
Her friend's tears had relieved sad Alba's heart while she held that friend in her arms, quivering with sorrow and pity; but when she was gone, and Madame Steno's daughter was alone, face to face with her thoughts, a greater distress seized her. The pity which her companion in misery had shown for her-was it not one more proof that she was right in mistrusting her mother? Alas! The miserable child did not know that while she was plunged in despair, there was in Rome and in her immediate vicinity a creature bent upon realizing a mad vow.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Fromont and Risler, entire
The complete text by Alphonse Daudet.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Fromont and Risler, v1
Cousin Georges, whose guardian M. Fromont was, had entered college some time before. Claire in her turn took her departure for the convent with the outfit of a little queen; and at that very time the Chebes were discussing the question of apprenticing Sidonie to some trade. They promised to love each other as before and to meet twice a month, on the Sundays that Claire was permitted to go home.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Fromont and Risler, v2
Celibates both, they were bound together by an equal hatred of marriage. The sister abhorred all men, the brother looked upon all women with suspicion; but they adored each other, each considering the other an exception to the general perversity of the sex.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Fromont and Risler, v3
The doctors declare that she is dying of pneumonia; she must have contracted it in her wet clothes. The doctors are mistaken; it is not pneumonia. Is it her love, then, that is killing her? No. Since that terrible night she no longer thinks of Frantz, she no longer feels that she is worthy to love or to be loved. Thenceforth there is a stain upon her spotless life, and it is of the shame of that and of nothing else that she is dying.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Fromont and Risler, v4
It was broad daylight when Fromont Jeune awoke. All night long, between the drama that was being enacted below him and the festivity in joyous progress above, he slept with clenched fists, the deep sleep of complete prostration like that of a condemned man on the eve of his execution or of a defeated General on the night following his disaster; a sleep from which one would wish never to awake, and in which, in the absence of all sensation, one has a foretaste of death.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Gerfaut, entire
The complete text, by Charles de Bernard.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Gerfaut, v1
Madame de Bergenheim had one of those faces which other women would call not at all remarkable, but which intelligent men ardently admire. At the first glance she seemed hardly pretty; at the second, she attracted involuntary admiration; afterward, it was difficult to keep her out of one's thoughts. Her features, which taken separately might seem irregular, were singularly harmonious, and, like a thin veil which tempers a too dazzling light, softened the whole expression.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Gerfaut, v2
"The open volcano beneath our feet," continued Marillac, who still stuck to his point, "warned us by deep rumblings of the hot lava which was about to gush forth. The excitement of the people was intense. Several engagements with the soldiers had already taken place at different points. I stood on the Boulevard Poissonniere, where I had just taken my luncheon, and was gazing with an artist's eye upon the dramatic scene spread out before me.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Gerfaut, v3
For several days, Gerfaut followed, with unrelenting perseverance, the plan which he had mapped out in that eventful night. The most exacting woman could but appear satisfied with the politeness he displayed toward Madame de Bergenheim, but nothing in his conduct showed the slightest desire for an explanation. He was so careful of every look, gesture, and word of his, that it would have been impossible to discover the slightest difference in his actions toward Mademoiselle de Corandeuil, and the manner in which he treated Clemence.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Gerfaut, v4
"I swear to you, Monsieur," said Octave, with increasing emotion, "that she is above all seduction and should be sheltered from all insult; I swear to you-What oath can I take that you will believe? I swear that Madame de Bergenheim never has betrayed any of her duties toward you; that I never have received the slightest encouragement from her; that she is as innocent of my folly as the angels in heaven."
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Jacqueline, entire
The complete text, by Therese Bentzon.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Jacqueline, v1
In all other ways Madame de Nailles did her best to assist in the success of the surprise. On the second of June, the eve of Ste.-Clotilde's day, she went out, leaving every opportunity for the grand plot to mature. Had she not absented herself in like manner the year before at the same date-thus enabling an upholsterer to drape artistically her little salon with beautiful thick silk tapestries which had just been imported from the East? Her idea was that this year she might find a certain lacquered screen which she coveted.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Jacqueline, v2
Time, whatever may be said of it by the calendars, is not to be measured by days, weeks, and months in all cases; expectation, hope, happiness and grief have very different ways of counting hours, and we know from our own experience that some are as short as a minute, and others as long as a century. The love or the suffering of those who can tell just how long they have suffered, or just how long they have been in love, is only moderate and reasonable.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Jacqueline, v3
Rubbing his hands affably, he came into the little parlor where Madame de Talbrun was waiting for him. There was probably no ecclesiastic in all Paris who had a salon so full of worked cushions, each of which was a keepsake-a souvenir of some first communion. The Abbe did not know his visitor, but the name Talbrun seemed to him connected with an honorable and well-meaning family. The lady was probably a mother who had come to put her child into his hands for religious instruction.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: L'Abbe Constantin, entire
The complete text by Ludovic Halevy.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: L'Abbe Constantin, v1
This vicarage of Longueval was far from being a palace. The same apartment on the ground floor served for dining and drawing-room, communicating directly with the kitchen by a door, which stood always wide open. This room was furnished in the most scanty manner; two old arm chairs, six straw chairs, a sideboard, a round table. Pauline had already laid the cloth for the dinner of the Abbe and Jean.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: L'Abbe Constantin, v2
Those times are no more. Other countries still have their frontiers; there are now none to France. Paris has become an immense Babel, a universal and international city. Foreigners do not only come to visit Paris; they come there to live. At the present day we have in Paris a Russian colony, a Spanish colony, a Levantine colony, an American colony. The foreigners have already conquered from us the greater part of the Champs-Elysees and the Boulevard Malesherbes; they advance, they extend their outworks; we retreat, pressed back by the invaders; we are obliged to expatriate ourselves.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: L'Abbe Constantin, v3
Jean is no longer tranquil; Jean is no longer happy. He sees approach with impatience, and at the same time with terror, the moment of his departure. With impatience-for he suffers an absolute martyrdom, he longs to escape from it; with terror-for to pass twenty days without seeing her, without speaking to her, without her in a word-what will become of him? Her! It is Bettina; he adores her!
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Madame Chrysantheme, entire
The complete text, by Pierre Loti.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Madame Chrysantheme, v1
Nagasaki, as yet unseen, must be at the extremity of this long and peculiar bay. All around us was exquisitely green. The strong sea- breeze had suddenly fallen, and was succeeded by a calm; the atmosphere, now very warm, was laden with the perfume of flowers. In the valley resounded the ceaseless whirr of the cicalas, answering one another from shore to shore; the mountains reechoed with innumerable sounds; the whole country seemed to vibrate like crystal.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Madame Chrysantheme, v2
She was quite young, rather fat, and fairly pretty, and she strummed her guitar and sang, rolling her eyes fiercely, like a virtuoso executing feats of difficulty. She lowered her head, stuck her chin into her neck, in order to draw deeper notes from the furthermost recesses of her body; and succeeded in bringing forth a great, hoarse voice-a voice that might have belonged to an aged frog, a ventriloquist's voice, coming whence it would be impossible to say (this is the best stage manner, the last touch of art, in the interpretation of tragic pieces).
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Madame Chrysantheme, v3
For my part, I have not the least idea of giving them a cold reception; on the contrary, the meeting amuses me. It even strikes me that it is rather pretty of Chrysantheme to come around in this way, and to bring Bambou-San to the festival; though it savors somewhat of her low breeding, to tell the truth, to carry him on her back, as the poorer Japanese women carry their little ones.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Madame Chrysantheme, v4
Mingled with the song is a noise I can not understand: Chink! chink! a clear metallic ring as of coins flung vigorously on the floor. I am well aware that this vibrating house exaggerates every sound during the silence of night; but all the same, I am puzzled to know what my mousme can be doing. Chink! chink! is she amusing herself with quoits, or the 'jeu du crapaud', or pitch-and-toss?
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur de Camors, entire
The complete text by Octave Feuillet.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur de Camors, v1
Instead of leaving him a fortune, he left him only embarrassments, for he was three fourths ruined. The disorder of his affairs had begun a long time before, and it was to repair them that he had married; a process that had not proved successful. A large inheritance on which he had relied as coming to his wife went elsewhere-to endow a charity hospital. The Comte de Camors began a suit to recover it before the tribunal of the Council of State, but compromised it for an annuity of thirty thousand francs. This stopped at his death.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur de Camors, v2
But there exists, nevertheless, in this code one article, as to which M. de Camors could not deceive himself, and it was that which forbade his attempting to assail the honor of the General under penalty of being in his own eyes, as a gentleman, a felon and foresworn. He had accepted from this old man confidence, affection, services, benefits-everything which could bind one man inviolably to another man-if there be beneath the heavens anything called honor. He felt this profoundly.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur de Camors, v3
She loved him because he was her only hope of human happiness hereafter. She loved him because she found him as beautiful as the day. And it was true he was so; for he resembled his father-and she loved him also on that account. She tried to concentrate her heart and all her thoughts on this dear creature, and at first she thought she had succeeded.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, Entire
Don't say that it is not pretty," added my aunt, brushing the firedog with the tip of her tiny boot. "It lends an especial charm to the look, I must acknowledge. A cloud of powder is most becoming, a touch of rouge has a charming effect, and even that blue shadow that they spread, I don't know how, under the eye. What coquettes some women are! Did you notice Anna's eyes at Madame de Sieurac's last Thursday? Is it allowable?
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, v1--Gustave Droz
I had, in this dream, the honor to belong, as senior curate, to one of the most frequented parish churches in Paris. What could be more ridiculous! I was, moreover, respectably stout, possessed a head decked with silver locks, well-shaped hands, an aquiline nose, great unction, the friendship of the lady worshippers, and, I venture to add, the esteem of the rector.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, v2
Toward midnight mamma made a sign to me with her eyes, and under cover of a lively waltz we slipped out of the drawing-room. In the hall the servants, who were passing to and fro, drew aside to let us go by them, but I felt that their eyes were fixed upon me with the curiosity which had pursued me since the morning.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Monsieur, Madame and Bebe, v3
When the baby reaches three or four years of age, when his sex shows itself in his actions, his tastes and his eyes, when he smashes his wooden horses, cuts open his drums, blows trumpets, breaks the castors off the furniture, and evinces a decided hostility to crockery; in a word, when he is a man, it is then that the affection of a father for his son becomes love. He feels himself invaded by a need of a special fondness, of which the sweetest recollections of his past life can give no idea.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Serge Panine, complete
The full text of Georges Ohnet's work.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Serge Panine, v1
On reaching Paris, Pierre Delarue experienced a strange feeling. In his feverish haste he longed for the swiftness of electricity to bring him near Micheline. As soon as he arrived in Paris, he regretted having travelled so fast. He longed to meet his betrothed, yet feared to know his fate.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Serge Panine, v2
Thank heaven! she was about to leave. Travelling, and the sight of strange places other than those where she had lived near Serge, would draw her attention from the persecution she suffered. Her husband was about to take her away, to defend her. It was his duty, and she would help him with energy. With all the strength of her will she summoned Cayrol. She clung violently to him as a drowning person catches at a straw, with the vigor of despair.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Serge Panine, v3
Thus, Herzog was projecting a still grander scheme to be based on the European Credit. Cayrol, less sanguine, and more practical, was afraid of the new scheme, and when Herzog spoke to him about it, said that things were well enough for him as they were, and that he would not be implicated in any fresh financial venture however promising.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: Serge Panine, v4
The night seemed long to Madame Desvarennes. Agitated and feverish, she listened through the silence, expecting every moment to hear some fearful news. In fancy she saw Cayrol entering his wife's room like a madman, unawares. She seemed to hear a cry of rage, answered by a sigh of terror; then a double shot resounded, the room filled with smoke, and, struck down in their guilty love, Serge and Jeanne rolled in death
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Confessions of A Child of a Century, entire
The complete tale, by Alfred de Musset.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Confessions of A Child of a Century, v1
There remained then the present, the spirit of the time, angel of the dawn which is neither night nor day; they found him seated on a lime-sack filled with bones, clad in the mantle of egoism, and shivering in terrible cold. The anguish of death entered into the soul at the sight of that spectre, half mummy and half foetus; they approached it as does the traveller who is shown at Strasburg the daughter of an old count of Sarvenden, embalmed in her bride's dress: that childish skeleton makes one shudder, for her slender and livid hand wears the wedding-ring and her head decays enwreathed in orange-blossoms.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Confessions of A Child of a Century, v2
I have now to recount what happened to my love, and the change that took place in me. What reason can I give for it? None, except as I repeat the story and as I say: "It is the truth." For two days, neither more nor less, I was Madame Pierson's lover. One fine night I set out and traversed the road that led to her house. I was feeling so well in body and soul that I leaped for joy and extended my arms to heaven. I found her at the top of the stairway leaning on the railing, a lighted candle beside her. She was waiting for me, and when she saw me ran to meet me.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Confessions of A Child of a Century, v3
What obstacle was this that had so suddenly come between us and the realization of our fondest hopes? If it was merely some ordinary event or even an actual misfortune, such as an accident or the loss of a friend, why that obstinate silence? After all that Brigitte had done, when our dreams seemed about to be realized, what could be the nature of a secret that destroyed our happiness and could not be confided to me? What! to conceal it from me!
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Ink-Stain, entire
The complete text, by Rene Bazin
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Ink-Stain, v1
I still believe that there are scattered up and down in nature voices that speak, but which few hear; just as there are millions of flowers that bloom unseen by man. It is sad for those who catch a hint of it. Perforce they come back and seek the hidden springs. They waste their youth and vigor upon empty dreams, and in return for the fleeting glimpses they have enjoyed, for the perfect phrase half caught and lost again, will have given up the intercourse of their kind, and even friendship itself. Yes, it is sad for the schoolboys who open their windows to gaze at the moon, and never drop the habit! They will find themselves, all too soon, solitaries in the midst of life, desolate as I am desolate tonight, beside my dead fire.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Ink-Stain, v2
Still, Law has had her revenge. Abandoned at Bourges, she has recaptured me at Paris, for a time. I realized that it was impossible for me to live on an income of fourteen hundred francs. The friends whom I discreetly questioned, in behalf of an unnamed acquaintance, as to the means of earning money, gave me various answers. Here is a fairly complete list of their expedients:
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Ink-Stain, v3
I was watching Lampron, who was plainly angered at this brusque introduction. He left the chair which he had begun to push forward, let it stand in the middle of the studio, and went and sat down on his engraving-stool in the corner, with a somewhat haughty look, and a defiant smile lurking behind his beard. He rested his elbow on the table and began to drum with his fingers.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Red Lily, Complete
She no longer knew why the idea had come to her to spend a month with Miss Bell. Truly, she never had known. The idea had been like a spring, at first hidden by leaves, and now forming the current of a deep and rapid stream. She remembered that Tuesday night at dinner she had said suddenly that she wished to go, but she could not remember the first flush of that desire.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Red Lily, v1
The reminiscence of this little path where she walked alone moved him, troubled him, made him live again the enchanted hours of his first desires and hopes. He tried to find her hand in her muff and pressed her slim wrist under the fur.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Red Lily, v2
And now, in the intoxication of her visions, she forgot the care of the day before, the importunate letters, the distant reproaches, and thought of nothing in the world but cloisters chiselled and painted, villages with red roofs, and roads where she saw the first blush of spring. Dechartre had modelled for Miss Bell a waxen figure of Beatrice. Vivian was painting angels. Softly bent over her, Prince Albertinelli caressed his beard and threw around him glances that appeared to seek admiration.
Immortals Crowned by the French Academy: The Red Lily, v3--Anatole France
After her return to Paris, for six weeks Therese lived in the ardent half sleep of happiness, and prolonged delightfully her thoughtless dream. She went to see Jacques every day in the little house shaded by a tree; and when they had at last parted at night, she took away with her adored reminiscences. They had the same tastes; they yielded to the same fantasies. The same capricious thoughts carried them away.
Imogen: A Pastorial Romance From the Ancient British--William Godwin
THE song of Llewelyn was heard by the shepherds with reverence and mute attention. Their blameless hearts were lifted to the skies with the sentiment of gratitude; their honest bosoms overflowed with the fervour of devotion. They proved their sympathy with the feelings of the bard, not by licentious shouts and wild huzzas, but by the composure of their spirits, the serenity of their countenances' and the deep and unutterable silence which universally prevailed.
Imperishable Fiction--Richard Le Gallienne
Subtitled: Imperishable Fiction: An Inquiry into the Short Life of the 'Best Sellers' Reveals the Methods Which Brought into Being the Novels that Endure
Impressions of an Indian Childhood
My mission done, I ran back, skipping and jumping with delight. All out of breath, I told my mother almost the exact words of the answers to my invitation. Frequently she asked, "What were they doing when you entered their tepee?" This taught me to remember all I saw at a single glance. Often I told my mother my impressions without being questioned.
Why not continue with my coffee in the morning, my kings and cabinets and national chess at noon, my opera at night, and let the poor devil go? Why, but that justice is brought home to every member of society, - that naked duty requires no shirking of such responsibility, - that, had I failed here, the crime might, with reason, lie at my door and multiply, the criminal increase himself?
The darkness was absolute. He could discern nothing, but, after a short search, he caught hold of the handle and turned it slowly. The door remained immovable. By another exploration he discovered a large key suspended from a nail near the centre of the door. This he inserted in the lock, and turned with all the caution he could command. It was not enough, for it snapped loudly.
"We're in for a storm. That means I'm boxed up here all day. Well, there's one blessing; it'll clear the air." He heard the servant girl rushing importantly round the house, slamming windows. Then he caught a glimpse of her in the garden, unpegging tea towels from the line across the lawn. She was a worker, there was no doubt about that. He took up a book, and wheeled his arm-chair over to the window. But it was useless. Too dark to read; he didn't believe in straining his eyes, and gas at ten o'clock in the morning seemed absurd.
If I could only see a herd of Arab horses/Galloping,/Their manes and tails pulled straight/By the speed of their going;/Their bodies sleek and round/Like bellying sails.
In Darkest England and The Way Out
Some seven years ago a great outcry was made concerning the Housing of the Poor. Much was said, and rightly said--it could not be said too strongly--concerning the disease-breeding, manhood-destroying character of many of the tenements in which the poor herd in our large cities. But there is a depth below that of the dweller in the slums. It is that of the dweller in the street--by General William Booth
I have committed sins, of course; but I have not committed enough of them to entitle me to the punishment of reduction to the bread and water of ordinary literature during six years when I might have been living on the fat diet spread for the righteous in Professor Dowden's Life of Shelley, if I had been justly dealt with.
"Bear thou my word: I am of all most blest;/Nor marvel that I am Eurydice. I stood and watched those slow feet go from me/Farther and farther; in the light afar,/All clear the figure grew -- then suddenly/Into my dark his face flashed like a star!--
'Oh, I would take it at once if I had the least prospect of being able to live. But what is the use of settling down anywhere with thirty pounds? To write my book I need at least two years, and a quiet mind --'
Cogswell desired to make himself agreeable, and had no difficulty in doing so. Presently he was talking with a cluster of people, suavely, facetiously; and though no one would reply in plain terms to a plain question, he learnt that, beyond doubt, Peter's Passage was still occupied by mere squatters, some of whom, apparently, had held their houses for a good many years. All the time, he assiduously made notes in his pocket-book.
In Provence and Lyrical Epigrams
Ah, how I pity the young dead who gave/ All that they were, and might become, that we/ With tired eyes should watch this perfect sea/ Re-weave its patterning of silver wave/ Round scented cliffs of arbutus and bay.
The further they dropped towards the rings the more certain it became that the theory of the great English astronomer was the correct one. Seen through the telescopes at a distance of only thirty or forty thousand miles, it became perfectly plain that the outer or darker ring as seen from the Earth, was composed of myriads of tiny bodies so far separated from each other that the rayless blackness of Space could be seen through them.
In Sight Of The Blue Wall Once More
THAT night I climbed carefully out of the window, and so down the corner of the house to the ground. It was starlight, and a waning moon hung in the sky. I made my way through the drive between the black shadows of the forest, and came at length to the big gates at the entrance, locked for the night. A strange thought of their futility struck me as I climbed the rail fence beside them, and pushed on into the main road, the mud sucking under my shoes as I went.
"And that's the man," he meditated, astounded, "who must have planned the robbery of the Hotel St. James! And I never suspected it! I never suspected that his gendarme was a sham! I wonder whether his murder of me would have been as leisurely and artistic as his method of trapping me! I wonder! . . . Well, this time I have certainly enjoyed myself."
I thought the comet no more than a nuisance then because I wanted to talk of other matters. But Parload was full of it. My head was hot, I was feverish with interlacing annoyances and bitterness, I wanted to relieve my heart by some romantic rendering of my troubles -- and I gave but little heed to the things he told me. It was the first time I had heard of this new speck among the countless specks of heaven, and I did not care if I never heard of the thing again.
In the Face of His Constituents
"This page," the Senator from Maxwell was saying, lifting the little fellow to the desk, "is just eleven years of age, and he is within three pounds of Alfred Williams's size when he committed the murder. I ask you, gentlemen, if this little fellow should be guilty of a like crime to-night, to what extent would you, in reading of it in the morning, charge him with the moral discernment which is the first condition of moral responsibility?
I felt the hair lift at the back of my head, and my heart thump like a thermantidote paddle. Luckily, the seal-cutter betrayed himself by his most impressive trick and made me calm again. After he had finished that unspeakable triple crawl, he stretched his head away from the floor as high as he could, and sent out a jet of fire from his nostrils. Now, I knew how fire-spouting is done--I can do it myself--so I felt at ease.
In The Reign Of Terror--G. A. Henty
"Oh, but it is such a long way, and to live among those French people, who have been doing such dreadful things, attacking the Bastille, and, as I have heard you say, passing all sorts of revolutionary laws, and holding their king and queen almost as prisoners in Paris!"
All along the valley, stream that flashest white,/ Deepening thy voice with the deepening of the night,/ All along the valley, where thy waters flow,/ I walk'd with one I loved two and thirty years ago./
In the Wake of War--Hallie Erminie Rives
The effect upon the huddled figure opposite him was instantaneous and terrible. It cringed backward, with a shrinking gesture of fear and agony. Its palsied arms, shaking and uncertain, wavered before its face. A shriek came from its lips, but this time not the monotonous, wordless wail of habit, but an articulate cry: "My God! My head! Don't strike me again!"
Tarrant, meanwhile, having drunk a cup of tea, and touched his moustache with a silk handkerchief, transferred himself from the camp-stool to the basket chair vacated by Jessica. He was now further from Nancy, but facing her. 'I have been talking with Mrs Bellamy,' fell from him, in the same tone of idle good nature. 'Do you know her? She has but one subject of conversation; an engrossing topic, to be sure; namely, her servants.
"He's quite right to do nothing in a hurry - to take advice and compare ideas and points of view - to collect and classify his material in advance," Halidon argued, in answer to a taunt of mine about Paul's perpetually reiterated plea that he was still waiting for So-and-so's report; "but now that the plan's mature - and such a plan! You'll grant it's magnificent? - I should think he'd burn to see it carried out, instead of pottering over it till his enthusiasm cools and the whole business turns stale on his hands."
Such was the Indian's wild life! When game was to be had and the sun shone, they easily forgot the bitter experiences of the winter before. Little preparation was made for the future. They are children of Nature, and occasionally she whips them with the lashes of experience, yet they are forgetful and careless. Much of their suffering might have been prevented by a little calculation.
Indian Heroes and Great Chieftains
IT is not easy to characterize Sitting Bull, of all Sioux chiefs most generally known to the American people. There are few to whom his name is not familiar, and still fewer who have learned to connect it with anything more than the conventional notion of a bloodthirsty savage. The man was an enigma at best. He was not impulsive, nor was he phlegmatic. He was most serious when he seemed to be jocose. --by Charles A. Eastman.
A PRINCE there was, named Nala, Virasen's noble breed,/Goodly to see, and virtuous; a tamer of the steed/ As Indra 'midst the gods, so he of kings was kingliest one,/Sovereign of men, and splendid as the golden, glittering sun;/Pure, knowing scripture, gallant; ruling nobly Nishadh's lands;/-- selections (by a Westerner) from the MAHABHARATA--as is The Bhagavad-Gita.
When my songs are glowing/ As an almond thicket/ With the bloom upon it,/ Lies my heart in ambush/ All amid my singing;/ Come not near my songs,/ You who are not my lover!
Indian Why Stories--Frank B. Linderman
"Old-man then dried the dirt in his hands, rubbing it slowly and singing a queer song. Finally it was dry; then he settled the hand that held the dirt in the water slowly, until the water touched the dirt. The dry dirt began to whirl about and then Old-man blew upon it. Hard he blew and waved his hands, and the dirt began to grow in size right before their eyes. Old-man kept blowing and waving his hands until the dirt became real land, and the trees began to grow. So large it grew that none could see across it. Then he stopped his blowing and sang some more.
"I was just going to do it, monsieur; but I saw a woman meet him. At that moment I said to myself: 'Perhaps it's monsieur and madame, who have taken a fancy to walk a bit before daybreak;' and I went back to bed. But this morning I heard Lelievre talking about a thief whose tracks he had seen in the park, and I said to myself: 'There's something under this.' "
The jeweller, a stout, comfortable man, leaned on the counter and fingered lovingly the bracelet which he had lifted out of its nest of blue plush. Archie, leaning on the other side of the counter, inspected the bracelet searchingly, wishing that he knew more about these things; for he had rather a sort of idea that the merchant was scheming to do him in the eyeball.
Instructions for the Virginia Colony
But if you choose your place so far up as a bark of fifty tuns will float, then you may lay all your provisions ashore with ease, and the better receive the trade of all the countries about you in the land; and such a place you may perchance find a hundred miles from the river's mouth, and the further up the better.
Now we see why the bourgeois socialists demand only a little education for the people, a soupcon more than they currently receive; whereas we socialist democrats demand, on the people's behalf, complete and integral education, an education as full as the power of intellect today permits, So that, henceforth, there may not be any class over the workers by virtue of superior education and therefore able to dominate and exploit them.
The ladies men admire, I've heard,/ Would shudder at a wicked word./ Their candle gives a single light;/ They'd rather stay at home at night.
Foamless and swift thy winding waters follow/ To find, unbosomed to the wind-swept skies,/ The great lake lapping in a tideless hollow,/ Wanton to each day's changes as they rise, -/ Purpling to meet the splendor of their mornings,
CHORUS/The furious Mimas/Here blazes in the volley'd fires: and there/Another earth-born monster falls beneath/The wand of Bacchus wreathed with ivy round,/No martial spear. But, as 'tis thine to tend/This temple, let me ask thee, is it lawful,/Leaving our sandals, its interior parts/ To visit?
CLYTAEMNESTRA: I am not so void of sense; bethink thee, I shall go through this as well, when I lead the maiden from the chamber to the sound of the marriage-hymn; wherefore I chide thee not; but custom will combine with time to make the smart grow less.
IPHIGENIA (singing)/The Atreidae are no more;/Extinct their sceptre's golden light;/My father's house from its proud height/Is fallen: its ruins I deplore./Who of her kings at Argos holds his reign,/Her kings once bless'd? But Sorrow's train/Rolls on impetuous for the rapid steeds/
ULYSSE/ Je suis père, Seigneur. Et faible comme un autre,/ Mon coeur se met sans peine en la place du vôtre;/ Et frémissant du coup qui vous fait soupirer,/ Loin de blâmer vos pleurs, je suis prêt de pleurer./ Mais votre amour n'a plus d'excuse légitime,/
Subtitled: A NARRATIVE OF THE EXPEDITION TO CENTRAL AFRICA FOR THE SUPPRESSION OF THE SLAVE TRADE --by Samuel White Baker
ISRAEL POTTER: His 50 Years of Exile
When chair-bottoming would fail, resort was had to matchmaking. That business being overdone in turn, next came the cutting of old rags, bits of paper, nails, and broken glass. Nor was this the last step. From the gutter he slid to the sewer. The slope was smooth. In poverty,-"Facilis descensus Averni."
Ivanhoe and the German Measles
As the fateful day approached his excitement grew more and more intense. His laughing, little gray eyes gleamed with a breathless interest in every detail, and his thin little hands ached with pulling and hauling on the home-made scenery, and with much manufacture of armor from wire-ring dish-cloths. His unfettered originality had seen the possibilities in these clanking implements of the cook at a time when chain-armor had seemed an unattainable ideal.
On cherchait donc dans la maison, on examinait les écritures, c'était comme une affaire de famille, un traître à surprendre dans les bureaux mêmes, pour l'en expulser. Et, sans que je veuille refaire ici une histoire connue en partie, le commandant du Paty de Clam entre en scène, dès qu'un premier soupçon tombe sur Dreyfus. A partir de ce moment, c'est lui qui a inventé Dreyfus, l'affaire devient son affaire, il se fait fort de confondre le traître, de l'amener à des aveux complets.
I agreed readily to this request, and went up alone. The hill was at most but fifty ells high, and there was absolutely nothing interesting about it. All around and under me was sand, nothing but sand to be seen in all directions. What could have given rise to the absurd legend that this was the mouth of hell? There were many burial-places around Siout; perhaps some here had been opened and had swallowed up investigators, and hence the legend.
Mrs. Budd now looked more than interested, for she looked a little confused, and Rose began to tremble for her aunt. It was evident that the parties most conspicuous in this scene were not at all conscious that they were overheard, the intensity of their attention being too much concentrated on what was passing to allow of any observation without their own narrow circle. What may be thought still more extraordinary, but what in truth was the most natural of all, each of the parties was so intently bent on his, or her, own train of thought, that neither in the least suspected any mistake.
Spike, for a seaman of his degree of education, was not particularly addicted to the weakness to which we have just alluded. Nevertheless, he was not altogether free from it; and recent circumstances contributed to dispose him so much the more to admit a feeling which, like sin itself, is ever the most apt to insinuate itself at moments of extraordinary moral imbecility, and through the openings left by previous transgression. As his brig stood off from the light, the captain paced the deck, greatly disturbed by what had just passed, and unable to account for it.
James Otis, The Pre-Revolutionist
By this time, Otis had become not only a man eminent in his profession in Boston, but a powerful factor in the public life of the city. The New England commonwealth was then beginning to be greatly exercised over the aggressions of the Motherland, and this was keenly watched by Otis, who took a lively and patriotic interest in Colonial affairs. Beyond his profession, which had closely engrossed him, he had heretofore taken little part in public life; his leisure, indeed, he had employed more as a student of books rather than of national affairs
Jane Murray's Thanksgiving Story
"Successor? I should say so! The girls must have no more of such fancy training; they must go thru the regular textbooks to make ready for the college exams. I tried them last spring on a page of dates -- births and deaths of English writers -- and they all flunked by a dozen years. On which Mrs. Murray remarked: 'It is not as important that the girls should know when these men lived as why they lived.' But what about her salary? What provision has she?"
It is really surprising that young ladies should not be thought competent to the same curriculum as young gentlemen. I observe that their powers of sarcasm are quite equal; and if there had been a genteel academy for young gentlemen at Milby, I am inclined to think that, notwithstanding Euclid and the classics, the party spirit there would not have exhibited itself in more pungent irony, or more incisive satire, than was heard in Miss Townley's seminary.
Japanese Fairy Tales--Yei Theodora Ozaki
Long, long ago in Kyoto, the people of the city were terrified by accounts of a dreadful ogre, who, it was said, haunted the Gate of Rashomon at twilight and seized whoever passed by. The missing victims were never seen again, so it was whispered that the ogre was a horrible cannibal, who not only killed the unhappy victims but ate them also. Now everybody in the town and neighborhood was in great fear, and no one durst venture out after sunset near the Gate of Rashomon.
The end of it was that Jeremy received six strokes on the hand with a ruler. Mr. Cole was not good at this kind of thing, and twice he missed Jeremy's hand altogether, and looked very foolish. It was not an edifying scene. Jeremy left the room, his head high, his spirit obstinate; and his father remained, puzzled, distressed, at a loss, anxious to do what was right, but unable to touch his son at all. --by Hugh Walpole
Next morning, as soon as the court was open, Jerry Stokes was in his place again, craning his bull neck eagerly. All day long he craned that bull neck and listened. The public was scandalized now. Jerry Stokes in court! He ought to have kept away! This was really atrocious!
JERUSALEM: The Emanation of The Giant Albion
Awake! awake O sleeper of the land of shadows, wake! expand!/ I am in you and you in me, mutual in love divine:/ Fibres of love from man to man thro Albions pleasant land./ In all the dark Atlantic vale down from the hills of Surrey/ A black water accumulates, return Albion! return!/
Let the word go forth from this time and place. . .to friend and foe alike. . . that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans. . . born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage. . .and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today
JIM, THE STORY OF A BACKWOODS POLICE DOG--Charles G.D. Roberts
Down through the last race of the rapids came a canoe paddle, and began revolving slowly in the eddies. Blackstock pointed it out to Jim, and sent him in after it. The dog swam for it gaily, grabbed it by the top so that it could trail at his side, and brought it to his master's feet. It was a good paddle, of clean bird's-eye maple and Melicite pattern, and Tug Blackstock wondered who could have been so careless as to lose it. Carelessness is a vice regarded with small leniency in the backwoods.
"I've always had a bit of a philosophical turn, and I dare say I spent the best part of five minutes in such thoughts before I went below to find where the blessed dust was stored. It was slow work hunting, feeling it was for the most part, pitchy dark, with confusing blue gleams down the companion. And there were things moving about, a dab at my glass once, and once a pinch at my leg. Crabs, I expect. I kicked a lot of loose stuff that puzzled me, and stooped and picked up something all knobs and spikes. What do you think? Backbone!
All nice and warm for a July day, but received with delight nevertheless. Ted and Josie immediately 'dressed up', learned the war-whoop, and proceeded to astonish their friends by a series of skirmishes about the house and grounds, with tomahawks and bows and arrows, till weariness produced a lull.
Joe Wilson and His Mates--Henry Lawson
There it stood, behind a calico screen that the coach-painters used to keep out the dust when they were varnishing. It was a first-class piece of work - pole, shafts, cushions, whip, lamps, and all complete. If you only wanted to drive one horse you could take out the pole and put in the shafts, and there you were. There was a tilt over the front seat; if you only wanted the buggy to carry two, you could fold down the back seat, and there you had a handsome, roomy, single buggy. It would go near fifty pounds
Dress any Englishman in such a garb and he will at once give you the idea of a hog in armour. In the first place he will lack the proper spirit to carry it off, and in the next place the motion of his limbs will disgrace the ornaments they bear. "And so best," most Englishmen will say. Very likely; and, therefore, let no Englishman try it. But my Spaniard did not look at like a hog in armour.
BROADBENT [scared and much upset]. On my word I believe I am, Miss Reilly. If you say that to me again I shan't answer for myself: all the harps of Ireland are in your voice. [She laughs at him. He suddenly loses his head and seizes her arms, to her great indignation]. Stop laughing: do you hear? I am in earnest-- in English earnest. When I say a thing like that to a woman, I mean it.
A murmur from the church announced them; out they came. Byles was right. John Charrington did not look himself. There was dust on his coat, his hair was disarranged. He seemed to have been in some row, for there was a black mark above his eyebrow. He was deathly pale. But his pallor was not greater than that of the bride, who might have been carved in ivory--by E. Nesbit
Having collected several thousand dollars' worth of furs he shipped them to London and embarked as a passenger in the steerage. The trip showed him that ability to sell was quite as necessary as the ability to buy--a point which with all of his shrewdness Bowne had never guessed. --by Elbert Hubbard
John Leech's Pictures of Life and Character--William Makepeace Thackeray
There is no blinking the fact that in Mr. Punch's cabinet John Leech is the right-hand man. Fancy a number of Punch without Leech's pictures! What would you give for it? The learned gentlemen who write the work must feel that, without him, it were as well left alone. Look at the rivals whom the popularity of Punch has brought into the field; the direct imitators of Mr. Leech's manner-the artists with a manner of their own-how inferior their pencils are to his in humor, in depicting the public manners, in arresting, amusing the nation.
John Maynard: A Ballad of Lake Erie
No terror pales the helmsman's cheeks,/Or clouds his dauntless eye,/As, in a sailor's measured tone/His voice responds "Ay! Ay!"/Three hundred souls, the steamer's freight,/Crowd forward, wild with fear,
As the sun got up in the heavens and the wind fell, the cupola became a bake-oven. But I scarcely felt the heat. My whole soul was out in the bay, pent up with the men in the fort. How long could they hold out? Why were they not all killed by the shot that fell like hail among them? Yet puff after puff sprang from their guns, and the sound of it was like a storm coming nearer in the heat. But at noon it seemed to me as though some of the ships were sailing.
Johnnie and Billie Bushytail--Howard Roger Garis
"No," said Jennie, "these are Christmas nuts, they are not adventure nuts. Some little boy or girl hung this stocking by the fireplace for Santa Claus to fill, but something happened, and they did not take the nuts out. Maybe the family had to move away in a hurry, and forgot them, or maybe the little boy or girl got sick on candy, and was not allowed to eat the nuts. Anyway, here are the nuts, and I think we ought to take some home to Grandma and Grandpa."
And suddenly, with a contraction at his heart, a fear and dread of Jonah swept through Paasch, the vague, primeval distrust and suspicion of the deformed that lurks in the normal man, a survival of the ancient hostility that in olden times consigned them to the stake as servants of the Evil One.--by Louis Stone
The odor of flowers-the sound of distant music, every thing that could intoxicate the senses, was there. It was one of those orgies which Kaunitz alone knew how to devise, and into which all the lesser libertines of Vienna longed to be initiated; for once admitted there, they were graduates in the school of vice.
Julian and Maddalo: A Conversation.
In strong and black relief. 'What we behold/ Shall be the madhouse and its belfry tower,'/ Said Maddalo; 'and ever at this hour/ Those who may cross the water hear that bell,/ Which calls the maniacs each one from his cell / To vespers.'-'As much skill as need to pray/ In thanks or hope for their dark lot have they
"Unto thee will I speak truth; as I live, I will not work a lie. In no wise do I fear me for thy judgments, neither are thy tortures grievous unto me, nor the terrors of death which thou with malice dost threaten against me; nor ever shalt thou work it by thy snares that thou turn me from the love of Christ."
Julius Caesar's Civil War Commentaries
And now the Pompeians, after great havoc of our troops, were approaching Marcellinus's camp, and had struck no small terror into the rest of the cohorts, when Marcus Antonius, who commanded the nearest fort, being informed of what had happened, was observed descending from the rising ground with twelve cohorts. His arrival checked the Pompeians, and encouraged our men to recover from their extreme affright.
Julius Caesar's Civil War Commentaries--Book I
. Several officers belonging to the two legions, which had been delivered up by Caesar, were sent for. The city and the comitium were crowded with tribunes, centurions, and veterans. All the consul's friends, all Pompey's connections, all those who bore any ancient enmity to Caesar, were forced into the senate house. By their concourse and declarations the timid were awed, the irresolute confirmed, and the greater part deprived of the power of speaking their sentiments with freedom.
Julius Caesar's Civil War Commentaries--Book II
When the battle was begun, no effort of valor was wanting to the Massilians, but, mindful of the instructions which they had a little before received from their friends, they fought with such spirit as if they supposed that they would never have another opportunity to attempt a defense, and as if they believed that those whose lives should be endangered in the battle would not long precede the fate of the rest of the citizens
Julius Caesar's Civil War Commentaries--Book III
Wherefore, they should have pity on themselves, and the republic: for, from their own misfortunes, they had sufficient experience of what fortune can effect in war. That this was the only time to treat for peace; when each had confidence in his own strength, and both seemed on an equal footing. Since, if fortune showed ever so little favor to either, he who thought himself superior, would not submit to terms of accommodation
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book 8
Gaul being entirely reduced, when Caesar having waged war incessantly during the former summer, wished to recruit his soldiers after so much fatigue, by repose in winter quarters, news was brought him that several states were simultaneously renewing their hostile intention, and forming combinations.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Five
Therefore, having stayed about twenty-five days in that place, because the north wind, which usually blows a great part of every season, prevented the voyage, he exerted himself to keep Dumnorix in his allegiance [and] nevertheless learn all his measures: having at length met with favorable weather, he orders the foot soldiers and the horse to embark in the ships. But, while the minds of all were occupied
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Four
To these remarks Caesar replied in such terms as he thought proper; but the conclusion of his speech was, "That he could make no alliance with them, if they continued in Gaul; that it was not probable that they who were not able to defend their own territories, should get possession of those of others, nor were there any lands lying waste in Gaul, which could be given away, especially to so great a number of men, without doing wrong
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book One
After his death, the Helvetii nevertheless attempt to do that which they had resolved on, namely, to go forth from their territories. When they thought that they were at length prepared for this undertaking, they set fire to all their towns, in number about twelve - to their villages about four hundred - and to the private dwellings that remained; they burn up all the corn, except what they intend to carry with them
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Seven
Having quickly collected an army by their punishments, he sends Lucterius, one of the Cadurci, a man the utmost daring, with part of his forces, into the territory of the Ruteni; and marches in person into the country of the Bituriges. On his arrival, the Bituriges send embassadors to the Aedui, under whose protection they were, to solicit aid in order that they might more easily resist the forces of the enemy.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Six
Constrained by these circumstances the Menapii send embassadors to him for the purpose of suing for peace. He, after receiving hostages, assures them that he will consider them in the number of his enemies if they shall receive within their territories either Ambiorix or his embassadors. Having determinately settled these things, he left among the Menapii, Commius the Atrebatian, with some cavalry as a guard; he himself proceeds toward the Treviri.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Three
When they had now been fighting for more than six hours, without cessation, and not only strength, but even weapons were failing our men, and the enemy were pressing on more rigorously, and had begun to demolish the rampart and to fill up the trench, while our men were becoming exhausted, and the matter was now brought to the last extremity
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Book Two
The Gauls' mode of besieging is the same as that of the Belgae: when after having drawn a large number of men around the whole of the fortifications, stones have begun to be cast against the wall on all sides, and the wall has been stripped of its defenders, forming a testudo, they advance to the gates and undermine the wall: which was easily effected on this occasion; for while so large a number were casting stones and darts, no one was able to maintain his position upon the wall.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries--Complete Version
Caesar having quickly completed the levy by means of his lieutenants, after three regiments had been both formed and brought to him before the winter [had] expired, and the number of those cohorts which he had lost under Q. Titurius had been doubled, taught the Gauls, both by his dispatch and by his forces what the discipline and the power of the Roman people could accomplish.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries: Later Campaigns
Collection of accounts covering Caesar in Alexandria, Spain and Africa; attributed to Aulus Hirtius, but nobody's sure.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries: The African Wars
Thence he removed and came before Leptis, a free city and governed by its own laws. Here he was met by deputies from the town, who, in the name of the inhabitants, offered their free submission. Whereupon, placing centurions and a guard before the gates, to prevent the soldiers from entering, or offering violence to any of the inhabitants, he himself encamped toward the shore, not far distant from the town.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries: The Alexandrian Wars
With this view he began a great and difficult work; for having stopped up all the canals by which his own cisterns were supplied, he drew vast quantities of water out of the sea, by the help of wheels and other engines, pouring it continually into the canals of Caesar's quarter. The cisterns in the nearest houses soon began to taste salter than ordinary, and occasioned great wonder among the men, who could not think from what cause it proceeded.
Julius Caesar's War Commentaries: The Spanish Wars
Ulia being relieved, Caesar, to draw Pompey from the siege, marched toward Corduba; sending the cavalry before, with a select body of heavy-armed foot; who, as soon as they came within sight of the place, got up behind the troopers. By this stratagem they could not possibly be perceived by those of Corduba. Upon their approach to the walls, the enemy sallied in great numbers to attack our cavalry
Kagekiyo: I have heard of him indeed. But I am blind, and have not seen him. I have heard such sad tales of his plight that I needs must pity him. Go further; ask elsewhere.
Kavanagh--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"Ungrateful people! Could you not watch with me one hour?" exclaimed he, in that excited and bitter moment; as if he had thought that on that solemn night the whole parish would have watched, while he was writing his farewell discourse. He pressed his hot brow against the window-pane to allay its fever; and across the tremulous wavelets of the river the tranquil moon sent towards him a silvery shaft of light, like an angelic salutation. And the consoling thought came to him, that not only this river, but all rivers and lakes, and the great sea itself, were flashing with this heavenly light
I left my light burning all night, as he had predicted; but it was chiefly because, till near dawn, I was absorbed in my reading. The account of the trial of Anne de Cornault, wife of the lord of Kerfol, was long and closely printed. It was, as my friend had said, probably an almost literal transcription of what took place in the court-room; and the trial lasted nearly a month. Besides, the type of the book was detestable
KETIRA THE GIPSY--Mrs. Henry Wood
"It is sad to see the child," he said to me, as I sat in his room listening to the news. "She is no more like the bonnie Kettie that we knew here, than a dead girl's like a living one. Worn out, bent and silent, she sits, day after day and week after week, and her mother cannot rouse her. She has sat so all along."
Brown cliffs with deep green lakes in the hollows, flat, blade-like trees that waved from root to tip, round boulders of grey stone, vast crumpled surfaces of a thin crackling texture-all these objects lay across the snail's progress between one stalk and another to his goal. Before he had decided whether to circumvent the arched tent of a dead leaf or to breast it there came past the bed the feet of other human beings.
Several Confederate officers and men came out to meet them, and with uncovered heads assisted them to take up their sacred burden. As it was borne toward us we heard beyond the hostile works fifes and a muffled drum - a dirge. A generous enemy honored the fallen brave. Amongst the dead man's effects was a soiled Russia-leather pocketbook. In the distribution of mementos of our friend, which the general, as administrator, decreed, this fell to me.
The little fellow's clothes were half ripped from his body, as though someone had made a frantic search. Whether or not tbe searcher had foand what he wanted was a question. But there was no question about the knife in Benny Smith's throat.
My mind jumped around like drops of water on a hot griddle. I didn't know what I should do, but I knew I had to do something. We had two murders in the house, now, and the Sea View patrons wouldn't stay at the pavilion dance all night. I had to clean up those murders and get things running smoothly before they got back-or else.
The second and third deaths showed technical knowledge and had been effective enough to make more deaths unnecessary for the past week. A city councilman and the man on night duty at the sewage-disposal plant had been found down in a manhole overcome by both sewer and chlorine gas; the exit for the sewage was too small to let the bodies wash out into Puget Sound. There was no doubt that these men had died a horrible and revolting death.
WHEN he emerged from the spruce wood and entered the orchard his heart gave a sudden leap, and he felt that the blood rushed madly to his face. She was there, bending over the bed of June lilies in the centre of the garden plot. He could only see her profile, virginal and white.
"It brings in seven dollars a year to the town," said Pap, "an' that's better than payin' out good money for statuary. I'm agin high taxes every time. It costs too much to live, anyhow, especially when you've got a daughter to support, and no money comin' in, to speak of. And just when some does come in, along comes a pesky book agent or somethin' and fools the women out of the money.
KING BILLY OF BALLARAT--MORLEY ROBERTS
The mind of King Billy was not a big mind; it would no more have taken in an abstract idea than his gunyah would have accommodated a grand piano. He was as simple as sunlight, and to resolve his intellect into seven colours would want the most ingenious spectroscope. But he could make an inference from a positive fact, and, having made it, he did not allow more remote deductions to trouble his legitimate conclusion.
King James Bible: New Testament
By request, a much smaller download than the complete version.
Fear or no fear, Khyber-mouth is haunted after dark by the men whose blood-feuds are too reeking raw to let them dare go home and for whom the British hangman very likely waits a mile or two farther south. It is one of the few places in the world where a pistol is better than a thick stick.
"The answer's full of bullets down at the morgue, Redsie. Flannigan ate dinner with him at some joint on Eighth Street, called Andre's. Favorite hangout of Pete's. That was seven-thirty or thereabouts. Flannigan finished ahead of Pete and came on uptown to his night desk. Nobody's located a trace of Brophy after that, until--until the patrol boat--"
"He parried us at every point. We searched his place, barn, house, and outbuildings and found nothing. Yet I was morally certain we had our man. As I sat in the shade by the barn I gazed idly at the stretch of cleared land running down to the creek. I noticed a place or two where the sod had been turned recently. It is the little things that point the way to big results. A signboard a foot long often tells you the road for the next forty miles.
Knights of Industry--Vsevolod Vladimirovitch Krestovski
It will be remembered that, as a result of Natasha's act of vengeance, the elder Princess Chechevinski left behind her only a fraction of the money her son expected to inherit. And this fraction he by no means hoarded, but with cynical disregard of the future he poured money out like water, gambling, drinking, plunging into every form of dissipation. Within a few months his entire inheritance was squandered.
Knowledge is Power--Freeman Tilden
But the thing that most envenomed Mr. Coppins's former associates of the stuffy room at the rear of the barber-shop was the fact that Caleb had gained no small credit with the feminine part of Brookfield society. Local hostesses who had run short of attractions took him up. He became a lion.
Listen! I thought you were taking me to where there would be a chapel, so that I could begin my prayers. But here I can see no painted picture nor carven image that I could put up. There is nothing on the wall but a great pike,--no handstaff, but only an iron crowbar; and other weapons of war are nailed up. What is the reason of this?
L'Allegro, Il Penseroso, Comus, and Lycidas
But, hail! thou Goddess sage and holy!/Hail, divinest Melancholy!/Whose saintly visage is too bright/To hit the sense of human sight,/And therefore to our weaker view/O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue;--by Milton
Mais, sur le trottoir, il fut surpris par le vent aigre qui soufflait un brusque retour de l'hiver, dans ce mai si doux la veille encore. Il ne pleuvait pourtant pas, de gros nuages montaient à l'horizon. Et il ne prit pas de fiacre, pour se réchauffer en marchant ; il se dit qu'il descendrait d'abord à pied chez Mazaud, l'agent de change, rue de la Banque ; car l'idée lui était venue de le sonder sur Daigremont, le spéculateur bien connu, l'homme heureux de tous les syndicats, seulement, rue Vivienne, du ciel envahi de nuées livides, une telle giboulée creva, mêlée de grêle, qu'il se réfugia sous une porte cochère.
VALERE Hé quoi ? charmante Elise, vous devenez mélancolique, après les obligeantes assurances que vous avez eu la bonté de me donner de votre foi ? Je vous vois soupirer, hélas ! au milieu de ma joie. Est-ce du regret, dites-moi, de m'avoir fait heureux, et vous repentez-vous de cet engagement où mes feux ont pu vous contraindre ?
CHRYSALDE/ Nous sommes ici seuls, et l'on peut, ce me semble,/ Sans craindre d'être ouïs, y discourir ensemble./ Voulez-vous qu'en ami je vous ouvre mon coeur?/ Votre dessein, pour vous, me fait trembler de peur,/ Et, de quelque façon que vous tourniez l'affaire,/ Prendre femme est à vous un coup bien téméraire.
En sortant de mon cachot, n'ayant que la peau sur les os, je rencontrai un homme joufflu et vermeil dans un carrosse à six chevaux; il avait six laquais, et donnait à chacun d'eux pour gages le double de mon revenu. Son maître d'hôtel, aussi vermeil que lui, avait deux mille francs d'appointements, et lui en volait par an vingt mille. Sa maîtresse lui coûtait quarante mille écus en six mois; je l'avais connu autrefois dans le temps qu'il était moins riche que moi: il m'avoua, pour me consoler, qu'il jouissait de quatre cent mille livres de rente.
DORANTE./ Ce mage, qui d'un mot renverse la nature,/ N'a choisi pour palais que cette grotte obscure./ La nuit qu'il entretient sur cet affreux séjour,/ N'ouvrant son voile épais qu'aux rayons d'un faux jour,/ De leur éclat douteux n'admet en ces lieux sombres/ Que ce qu'en peut souffrir le commerce des ombres.
Avant tout, l'important était de montrer à la galerie l'excès de ses souffrances. Ceci ne pouvait s'indiquer que par la force des distractions auxquelles il aurait recours. Cette considération excluait naturellement l'idée d'un voyage sur les bords du Rhin, en Suisse, en Angleterre et même en Italie. De telles promenades ne sauraient appeler sur ceux qui les exécutent aucune espèce d'intérêt.
Maxime resta au collège de Plassans jusqu'aux vacances de 1854. Il avait treize ans et quelques mois, et venait d'achever sa cinquième. Ce fut alors que son père se décida à le faire venir à Paris. Il songeait qu'un fils de cet âge le poserait, l'installerait définitivement dans son rôle de veuf remarié, riche et sérieux. Lorsqu'il annonça son projet à Renée, à l'égard de laquelle il se piquait d'une extrême galanterie, elle lui répondit négligemment:
Noë rêvait. Le ciel était plein de nuées./On entendait au loin les chants et les huées/Des hommes malheureux qu'un souffle allait courber./ Un nuage muet soudain laissa tomber/Une goutte de pluie au front du patriarche.
And thus she walked her path through the world, a stern, hard, solemn old woman, not without gusts of passionate explosion; but honest withal, and not without some inward benevolence and true tenderness of heart. Children she had had many, some seven or eight. One or two had died, others had been married; she had sons settled far away from home, and at the time of which we are now speaking but one was left in any way subject to maternal authority.
In that white formation shot up from the earth's bowels, arbitrary and irrelevant amid the surrounding alien layers of slate, four black stones were lodged as if built into the wall by some hand - four small stones shaping a cross, black against the white, symmetrical and plain beyond need of imagination.
Oh Zeus! Oh Diane! Oh Hellebore! Oh Absalom! Oh Piscary Right! What shall I do with it! To have been the First , that alone would have gifted me! As it is, shall I not pour ashes upon my Head, gird me in Sackcloth, covering my Nothing and Despair under a Mountain of Cinders, and thus become a Monument to No-Ability for her sake?
Lady Betty's Indiscretion--Anonymous
He looked after her, partly because there was something odd in her manner--she kept her face averted; and partly because she was wearing a new and striking gown, and he admired her; and he noticed, as she passed through the doorway, that she had some papers held down by her side. But, of course, he thought nothing of this.
Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land--Rosa Praed
If purgatory could hold worse torture than life held on that last evening Lady Bridget spent at Moongarr, then neither she nor her husband would have been required to do any long expiation there. It would be difficult to say which of the two suffered the most. Probably McKeith, because he was the strongest. Equally, he showed it the least when the breaking moment had passed. Yet both husband and wife seemed to have covered their faces, hearts and souls with unrevealing masks.
The complete collection of Lady Molly stories by Baroness Orczy
Lahoma--John Breckenridge Ellis
It came over him with disconcerting suddenness that he had lost a great deal of time, and that every moment spent in the covered wagon was fraught with imminent danger. It was not in his mind that the hand of highwaymen might discover his hiding-place. Knowing them as he did, he was sure they would not come so far from their haunts or from the Sante Fe train in pursuit of him.
I never lov'd a tree or flow'r,/ But 'twas the first to fade away./ I never nurs'd a dear gazelle/ To glad me with its soft black eye,/ But when it came to know me well/ And love me, it was sure to die!
By the North Gate, the wind blows full of sand,/ Lonely from the beginning of time until now!/ Trees fall, the grass goes yellow with autumn./ I climb the towers and towers to watch out/ the barbarous land:
Monk sprayed mercy bullets at random. Hoarse voices squawked. Ham had loosened his sword blade. He punched at shadows. Then a light flashed; Monk and Ham were ringed in by dark faces. They saw dancing heads with grotesque ears. A dozen short swords slashed at their feet.
The flute he loved to play lay idle by him,/But for his comforting the hermit thrush/Flung once his liquid song upon the silence/And left to stars and night the perfumed hush.
But in Europe everything is permanent, and in America everything is provisional. This is the great distinction which, if always kept in mind, will save a great deal of idle astonishment. It is in nothing more apparent than in the preparation here at Scheveningen for centuries of summer visitors, while at our Long Island hotel there was a losing bet on a scant generation of them.
Last Night When You Kissed Blanche Thompson
Katherine it was who took upon herself the complete charge of his speech. Not an insignificant "have went" nor an infinitesimal "I seen" ever escaped the keen ears of his elder sister, who immediately corrected him. Mother sometimes thought Katherine a little severe when, in the interest of proper-speaking, she would stop him in the midst of an exciting account of a home-run.
No light had we: for that we do repent;/ And learning this, the bridegroom will relent./ Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now./
"Lord, indeed! are ye daft or dreamin'? Those fine folk, what were they? I'll tell ye flobies and fairies; and if ye don't du as yer bid, they'll tak ye, and ye'1l never git out o' their hands again while grass grows," said the old woman grimly.
And when the scarlet, flattened globe would lower, Lazarus would set out for the desert and walk straight toward the sun, as though striving to reach it. He always walked straight toward the sun and those who tried to follow him and to spy upon what he was doing at night in the desert, retained in their memory the black silhouette of a tall stout man against the red background of an enormous flattened disc.
DON DIÈGUE/ Agréable colère!/ Digne ressentiment à ma douleur bien doux!/ Je reconnais mon sang à ce noble courroux;/ Ma jeunesse revit en cette ardeur si prompte./ Viens, mon fils, viens, mon sang, viens réparer ma honte;/ Viens me venger.
Le Diable amoureux--Jacques Cazotte
- Non, non, répliqua-t-elle vivement, Biondetta ne doit pas te suffire : ce n'est pas là mon nom : tu me l'avais donné : il me flattait ; je le portais avec plaisir : mais il faut que tu saches qui je suis... Je suis le Diable, mon cher Alvare, je suis le Diable..."
Et s'aucun me vouloit reprendre/ Et dire que je le mauldiz,/ Non faiz, se bien me scet comprendre;/ En riens de luy je ne mesdiz./ Vecy tout le mal que j'en dis:/ S'il m'a esté misericors,/ Jhesus, le roy de paradis,/ Tel luy soit a l'ame et au corps.
Quelle journée admirable ! J'ai passé toute la matinée étendu sur l'herbe, devant ma maison, sous l'énorme platane qui la couvre, l'abrite et l'ombrage tout entière. J'aime ce pays, et j'aime y vivre parce que j'y ai mes racines, ces profondes et délicates racines, qui attachent un homme à la terre où sont nés et morts ses aïeux, qui l'attachent à ce qu'on pense et à ce qu'on mange, aux usages comme aux nourritures, aux locutions locales, aux intonations des paysans, aux odeurs du sol, des villages et de l'air lui-même.
Pour obvier a ses dangiers,/ Mon mieulx est, ce croy, de partir./ A Dieu! Je m'en vois a Angers,/ Puis qu'el ne me veult impartir/ Sa grace ne me departir./ Par elle meurs, les membres sains;/ Au fort, je suys amant martir,/ Du nombre des amoureux sains.
Cependant le soleil approchait du haut de sa carrière. Babouc devait aller dîner à l'autre bout de la ville, chez une dame pour laquelle son mari, officier de l'armée, lui avait donné des lettres. Il fit d'abord plusieurs tours dans Persépolis; il vit d'autres temples mieux bâtis et mieux ornés, remplis d'un peuple poli, et retentissants d'une musique harmonieuse; il remarqua des fontaines publiques, lesquelles, quoique mal placées, frappaient les yeux par leur beauté; des places où semblaient respirer en bronze les meilleurs rois qui avaient gouverné la Perse
"Oh!" returned Renard, shrugging his shoulders, "we did not give it to him. It was an awkward servant who dubbed him so at first. She was new to her position, and forgot his name, and being asked who had arrived, stumbled upon this bon mot: `Un monsieur, Madame -- le monsieur de la petite dame,' -- and, being repeated and tossed lightly from hand to hand, it has become at last an established witticism, albeit bandied under breath."
'Well, I managed to write a line to W. F. with my own hand, which, as you will gather, was not very badly wounded; it was simply this third finger that was split and in splints; the next morning the doctor packed me off on a bovine beast that would have done for an ambulance. Half the team came up to see me start; the rest were rather sick with me for not stopping to see the match out, as if I could help them to win by watching them. They little knew the game I'd got on myself, but still less did I know the game I was going to play.
The French expedition to Egypt had called the attention of learned men to the wonderful store of antiquities in that country, and there had been brought back to France numerous mummified corpses of the animals which the ancient Egyptians revered and preserved, and which, at a reasonable computation, must have lived not less than three or four thousand years before the time at which they were thus brought to light. --This is Essay #3
According to some legends, the skies pressed so closely and so heavily upon the earth that when the plants began to grow, all the leaves were necessarily flat. According to other legends, the plants had to push up the clouds a little, and thus caused the leaves to flatten out into larger surface, so that they could better drive the skies back and hold them in place. Thus the leaves became flat at first, and have so remained through all the days of mankind.--by W.D. Westervelt
Those were the legend-making ages when great things occurred to make the traditions we repeat to our children today. Perhaps the greatest of these traditions is the story of 'The Two Sisters,' for they are known to us as 'The Chief's Daughters,' and to them we owe the Great Peace in which we live, and have lived for many countless moons. --by E. Pauline Johnson
The Collogue opened a small door with a key which she had secreted, about her, and urged the young lady to hurry on. Anne advanced to the postern, and stood there irresolute and trembling like a timid swimmer on the bank of an unknown stream. It was a dark autumnal evening; a heavy wind sighed among the woods of the Castle, and bowed the branches of the lower trees almost to the waves of the Liffey
We had been in Newport two weeks when Mr. Van Horn, Aunt Eliza's lawyer, came. He said that he would see Mr. Edward Uxbridge. Between them they might delay a term, which he thought would be best. "Would Miss Huell ever be ready for a compromise?" he jestingly asked. --by Elizabeth Drew Stoddard
Les Chansons des rues et des bois
Je ne me mets pas en peine/Du clocher ni du beffroi;/Je ne sais rien de la reine,/Et je ne sais rien du roi;
Les Contes du jour et de la nuit--Le vieux
Puis ils se turent. Le père avait les yeux fermés, le visage couleur de terre, si sec qu'il semblait en bois. Sa bouche entrouverte laissait passer son souffle clapotant et dur; et le drap de toile grise se soulevait sur sa poitrine à chaque aspiration.
Quand tous ces mille soins de misère ou de fête/Qui remplissent nos jours, cercle aride et borné,/Ont tenu trop longtemps, comme un joug sur ma tête,/Le regard de mon âme à la terre tourné;
Non, non, non, non, ce n'est personne. Il faut, dis-je, que vous vous mettiez là-dedans, et que vous vous gardiez de remuer en aucune façon. Je vous chargerai sur mon dos comme un paquet de quelque chose, et je vous porterai ainsi, au travers de vos ennemis, jusque dans votre maison, où, quand nous serons une fois, nous pourrons nous barricader et envoyer quérir main-forte contre la violence
Par votre ange envolée ainsi qu'une colombe!/ Par ce royal enfant, doux et frêle roseau!/ Grâce encore une fois! grâce au nom de la tombe!/ Grâce au nom du berceau!
It did not take the news long to go through the length and breadth of 'Steenth street that Lesie was "doin' de heavy down at St. Stephen's." For a day, he was regarded with scorn unspeakable, and he went his way alone, fierce and contemptuous. Frank Smith, however, was unwise enough to groan and strike an attitude as Lesie passed. The issue was short, sharp and decisive.
"Those are they," he said. "The long one opens the first door at the bottom of the steps which go down against the outside wall of the church hard by the sword graven in the wall. The second opens (but it is hard of opening and of shutting) the iron door within the passage leading to the crypt itself. My son, is it necessary to your treatise that you should enter this crypt?" -- by Mary Cholmondeley
Letter from John Allan to Edgar Allan Poe
While you are in Maryland, ascertain & get Certificate of the fact whether your Grandfather was in the Service during the revoly war. where he served.1 Rank & &. it may be of service & cannot do you any harm. I cover a Bank check of Virga on the union Bank of Maryland (this date) of Baltimore for one Hundred Dollars payable to your order be prudent and careful
Letter from John Allan to Edgar Allan Poe
It is true and you will not deny it, that the charge of eating the Bread of idleness, was to urge you to perseverance & industry in receiving the classics, in perfecting yourself in the mathematics, mastering the French [unclear: &c.. &c..] how far I succeeded in this you can best tell, but for one who had conceived so good an opinion of himself, this future instruction I hesitate not to say, that you have not evinced the smallest disposition to comply with my wishes
Letter to the King and Queen of Spain
That none of the colonists shall go to seek gold without a license from the governor or alcalde of the town where he lives; and that he must first take oath to return to the place whence he sets out, for the purpose of registering faithfully all the gold he may have found, and to return once a month, or once a week, as the time may have been set for him, to render account and show the quantity of said gold--by Columbus
Letters Found in the Ruins of Fort Braddock
Collection compiled by John Gardiner Calkins Brainard
Letters from England 1846-1849
My dear Sons: . . . Yesterday we dined at Macready's and met quite a new, and to us, a most agreeable circle. There was Carlyle, who talked all dinner-time in his broad Scotch, in the most inimitable way. He is full of wit, and happened to get upon James I., upon which topic he was superb. Then there was Babbage, the great mathematician, Fonblanc, the editor of the EXAMINER, etc., etc.--by Elizabeth Davis Bancroft
Throndhjem (pronounced Tronyem) looked very pretty and picturesque, with its red-roofed wooden houses sparkling in the sunshine, its many windows filled with flowers, its bright fiord covered with vessels gaily dressed in flags, in honour of the Crown Prince's first visit to the ancient capital of the Norwegian realm. Tall, pretentious warehouses crowded down to the water's edge, like bullies at a public show elbowing to the foremost rank
But now the glorious African summer is come, and I believe this is the weather of Paradise. I got up at four this morning, when the Dutchmen who had slept here were starting in their carts and waggons. It was quite light; but the moon shone brilliantly still, and had put on a bright rose-coloured veil, borrowed from the rising sun on the opposite horizon. --by Lady Duff Gordon
Letters of a Woman Homesteader
Are you thinking I am lost, like the Babes in the Wood? Well, I am not and I'm sure the robins would have the time of their lives getting leaves to cover me out here. I am 'way up close to the Forest Reserve of Utah, within half a mile of the line, sixty miles from the railroad. I was twenty-four hours on the train and two days on the stage, and oh, those two days! The snow was just beginning to melt and the mud was about the worst I ever heard of.
YES, I do write to you less often than I might, because, though I am always wretched, yet when I write to you or read a letter from you, I am in such floods of tears that I cannot endure it. Oh, that I had clung less to life! I should at least never have known real sorrow, or not much of it, in my life. Yet if fortune has reserved for me any hope of recovering at any time any position again, I was not utterly wrong to do so
Letters of George Borrow to the British and Foreign Bible Society
In reply to your inquiries respecting my progress in the Mandchou language, I have to observe that for some time past I have taken lessons from a person who was twelve years in Pekin, and who speaks Mandchou and Chinese with fluency. I pay him about six shillings English for each lesson, which I grudge not, for the perfect acquirement of Mandchou is one of my most ardent wishes;(he gets around here)
And he did another yet more mighty work, which had been strange even among our gods, he raised from the dead one Lazarus, who had been dead four days,commanding by a word alone that the dead man should be raised, when his body was already corrupted by worms which bred in his wounds. And he commanded the fetid body, which lay in the grave, to run, and as bridegroom from his chamber so he went forth from his grave, full of sweet perfume.
Letters on Literature--Andrew Lang
Dear Gifted,-If you will permit me to use your Christian, and prophetic, name-we improved the occasion lately with the writers of light verse in ancient times. We decided that the ancients were not great in verses of society, because they had, properly speaking, no society to write verses for. Women did not live in the Christian freedom and social equality with men, either in Greece or Rome-at least not "modest women," as Mr. Harry Foker calls them in "Pendennis." About the others there is plenty of pretty verse in the Anthology.
Letters on Sweden, Norway, and Denmark
They were overflowing with civility; but, to prevent their almost killing my babe with kindness, I was obliged to shorten my visit; and two or three of the girls accompanied us, bringing with them a part of whatever the house afforded to contribute towards rendering my supper more plentiful; and plentiful in fact it was, though I with difficulty did honour to some of the dishes, not relishing the quantity of sugar and spices put into everything. --by Mary Wollstonecraft
Letters on the English; or Lettres Philosophiques
But all these wonders are merely but the opening of his discoveries. He found out the secret to see the vibrations or fits of light which come and go incessantly, and which either transmit light or reflect it, according to the density of the parts they meet with. He has presumed to calculate the density of the particles of air necessary between two glasses, the one flat, the other convex on one side, set one upon the other--Voltaire (on Newton)
In what bower, oh Lucian, of your rediscovered Islands Fortunate are you now reclining; the delight of the fair, the learned, the witty, and the brave? In that clear and tranquil climate, whose air breathes of 'violet and lily, myrtle, and the flower of the vine,'--by Andrew Lang
Cependant, quoique chacun puisse ici servir Dieu à sa mode, leur véritable religion, celle où l'on fait fortune, est la secte des épiscopaux, appelée l'Église anglicane, ou l'Église par excellence. On ne peut avoir d'emploi, ni en Angleterre ni en Irlande, sans être du nombre des fidèles anglicans ; cette raison, qui est une excellente preuve, a converti tant de non-conformistes, qu'aujourd'hui il n'y a pas la vingtième partie de la nation qui soit hors du giron de l'Église dominante.
LEVELLING WITH ELISHA--Charles E. Van Loan
"Hah!" ejaculated the presiding judge, tugging at his stubby grey moustache. "Old Man Curry put one over on the boys, or I miss my guess. Yes, sir, he beat the good thing and spilled the beans. Elisha, first; Broadsword, second; that thing of Engle's, third. Serve' 'em right! Hah!"
She recalled his question, the whispered question, to her, in the happiest part of the day. He asked Libbie, 'Is Dunham like heaven? the people here are as kind as angels, and I don't want heaven to be more beautiful than this place. If you and mother would but die with me, I should like to die, and live always there!'
Liber Aleph vel CXI (The BOOK of WISDOM or FOLLY)
Yes, thou in ragged Raiment, with the Staff of Priapus and the Wineskin! thou standest up on the Crocodile, like Hoor-pa-Kraat; and the Great Cat leapeth upon thee! Yea, and more also I have known Thee who Thou art, Bacchus Diphues, none and two, in thy Name IAO ! Now at the End of all do I come to the Being of Thee, beyond By-coming, and I cry aloud my Word--Crowley
Liber Amoris, or, The New Pygmalion
Not really sure where to put this one, but it kind of fits in here (sort of a drama; sort of a series of letters)
There fore with faith and confidence do I who was -- in a certain mystical sense -- the Priest of the Princes, Ankh-f-na-khonsu, child of Ta-nech, the holy and mighty one, and of Bes-na-Maut, priestess of the Starry One, set myself to tell myself the strange things that befell me in that life.--Aleister Crowley
Life at an Indian Agency--Rufus F. Zogbaum
We have ample time to look about us here, for it is Monday, the busiest day of the week, and while the agent is engaged in listening to the various recitals of his tawny charges and in answering their questions, we sit back in the easychair by the side of his desk and leisurely "take in" the scene before us. A number of the Indians have evidently come in for a "talk," for they are crowded into the room, some seated on the chairs lining the walls
But the struggle she'd had to bring up those six little children and keep herself to herself. Terrible it had been! Then, just when they were old enough to go to school her husband's sister came to stop with them to help things along, and she hadn't been there more than two months when she fell down a flight of steps and hurt her spine. And for five years Ma Parker had another baby-and such a one for crying!-to look after.
'I should say so. I fancy we shan't run any of the river this trip as you've ever seen it run before--so to speak. If the river begins to rise again, we'll go up behind bars that you've always seen standing out of the river, high and dry like the roof of a house; we'll cut across low places that you've never noticed at all, right through the middle of bars that cover three hundred acres of river
Lincoln's First Inaugural Address
I now reiterate these sentiments; and, in doing so, I only press upon the public attention the most conclusive evidence of which the case is susceptible, that the property, peace, and security of no section are to be in any wise endangered by the now incoming administration. I add, too, that all the protection which, consistently with the Constitution and the laws, can be given, will be cheerfully given to all the States when lawfully demanded, for whatever cause
But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate. . .we cannot consecrate. . . we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here.
Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address
On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago, all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it-- all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war-- seeking to dissolve the Union, and divide effects, by negotiation.
LINDA CONDON--JOSEPH HERGESHEIMER
"You may be smarter than I was," she went on, "but what good it does you who can say? And if you expect to get something for nothing you're fooled before you start." She shook out the airy breadths of a vivid echo of past daring. "From the way you act a person might think you were pretty, but you are too thin and pulled out. I've heard your looks called peculiar, and that was, in a manner of speaking, polite.
But the orderly seemed even more terrified than before. His eyes, previously centered on Nolan, were looking over the detective's shoulder, now. Nolan heard the floor squeak behind him. He started to turn. Something was dropped over his head and fastened there. He tried to get himself free; but blinded, and weakened now from the shock of the attack, he reeled across the room, tripped and fell heavily.
Lines Written Among the Euganean Hills
Day and night, and night and day,/ Drifting on his dreary way,/ With the solid darkness black/ Closing round his vessel's track;/ Whilst above the sunless sky,/ Big with clouds, hangs heavily,
Five minutes passed. No waiter had appeared. Ping's shifting eyes caught sight of a tall man in tuxedo, walking toward the doorway--an elderly face; a bald head fringed with gray hair. Ping recognized Karl Durmsted, the night club proprietor. He watched. Durmsted passed through the doorway. Rising immediately, Ping picked up his hat and coat and strolled in the same direction.
The first time I saw Whittier was in Fields's room at the publishing office, where I had come upon some editorial errand to my chief. He introduced me to the poet: a tall, spare figure in black of Quaker cut, with a keen, clean-shaven face, black hair, and vivid black eyes. It was just after his poem, 'Snow Bound', had made its great success, in the modest fashion of those days
Some writers have told us a part of the process by which their stories came into existence. Miss Wilkins and Dr. Conan Doyle select their climax first and then lead up to it. But that climax? How did they come to think of that, is what a curious public wants to know?
The large majority of our fellow-citizens care as much about literature as they care about aeroplanes or the programme of the Legislature. They do not ignore it; they are not quite indifferent to it. But their interest in it is faint and perfunctory; or, if their interest happens to be violent, it is spasmodic.--By Arnold Bennett (check out his library selection)
Literary Workers of the South--Anna Leach
It is the men and women who inherited this talent, along with the old letters, who are telling their stories today. The war brought changed conditions to the South, and made it necessary to utilize what was at hand, what was left to it, for money making. There was an untold wealth of material for literary work, and the adaptable Southerners used it. Instead of telling their stories to each other, they sold them in the open market for the world to enjoy.
The good old king, notwithstanding that he had lived eighty-two years, had all at once given up the ghost; another king had mounted the throne; a royal duke had died suddenly,--another, in France, had been murdered; there had been radical meetings in all parts of the kingdom; the bloody scenes at Manchester; the great plot of Cato Street; and above all, the queen had returned to England! All these sinister events are recounted by Mr. Skryme, with a mysterious look,
Little Friend Coyote--George Bird Grinnell
The Blackfeet looked on at this terrible butchery of their friend with horror, but in stolid silence, all save Su-ye-sai-pi, who gave a frightened cry when she saw the poor fellow struck down, and clasping her husband by the arm, buried her face in his breast. The chief smiled but did not speak. Presently another one of the young Blackfeet was led out, and met the fate of the first one. One after another, when his turn came, each arose and accompanied his captors without struggle or cry, and met his death as a true warrior should.
It was dark night when we reached our village, and I observed at once that a light was still burning in the sexton's house, where they usually went to bed with the chickens. At our own house, too, there was unusual commotion; my mother came out to meet us with a very disturbed face, and said something in a low tone to my father, whereat he cast a pitying glance at me and sent me at once to bed.
Little Songs--Eliza Lee Follen
When children are hungry,/ O, who can tell how/ They love the fresh milk/ From the good moolly cow!/
And suddenly your author changes. He changes into what perhaps he might have been--under different circumstances. His inky fingers become large, manly hands, his drooping scholastic back stiffens, his elbows go out, his etiolated complexion corrugates and darkens, his moustaches increase and grow and spread, and curl up horribly; a large, red scar, a sabre cut, grows lurid over one eye. --by HG Wells
So, in accordance with infallible psychic laws, Little Wolf became what he was considered and fulfilled his wild name to the letter. One day in one of his most vulpine moods, while trotting among the hills on all fours, stopping now and then to sit upon his haunches and give forth a series of howls, in imitation of his namesakes, he had discovered a deserted hole in the hillside, of which he immediately made himself the growling possessor. And to make this play metempsychosis the more real, he had spirited from the tepee of his father a complete wolf's hide
He thought about her a great deal for the next day or two; he scolded himself for being so foolish as to think of her, and then fell to with fresh vigour, and thought of her more than ever. He tried to depreciate her: he told himself she was not pretty, and then made indignant answer that he liked her looks much better than any beauty of them all.
The row of officials at the controle took the expensive gilt card from Cecil, examined it, returned it, and bowed low with an intimation that he should turn to the right and climb two floors; and the party proceeded further into the interior of the great building. The immense corridors and foyers and stairs were crowded with a collection of the best-known people and the best-dressed people and the most wealthy people in Paris. It was a gathering of all the renowns.
Many a night I saw the Pleiads, rising thro' the mellow shade,/ Glitter like a swarm of fire-flies tangled in a silver braid./ Here about the beach I wander'd, nourishing a youth sublime/ With the fairy tales of science, and the long result of Time;
That they would have done each other deadly injury seemed more than probable, but there were cool heads and hands as strong as their own in the room and in a few minutes they had been dragged apart and stood, each held back by the arms, staring at each other and panting. The lank peace-maker in blue jeans who held Dave Humes shook him gently and with amiable toleration of his folly.
'Cousin Lois may go out and meet Satan by the brookside, if she will; but, if thou goest, Faith, I will tell mother-ay, and I will tell Pastor Tappau, too. Hold thy stories, Cousin Lois; I am afeared of my very life. I would rather never be wed at all, than feel the touch of the creature that would take the apple out of my hand, as I held it over my left shoulder.'
London In 1731--Don Manoel Gonzales
21. Farringdon Ward within the walls, so called to distinguish it from Farringdon Ward without, was anciently but one ward, and governed by one alderman, receiving its name of William Farendon, goldsmith, alderman thereof, and one of the sheriffs of London who purchased the aldermanry of John le Feure, 7 Edward I., anno 1279.
I found her sitting up in her bed; she looked about forty-five, and still preserved traces of her former beauty; her countenance bore the imprint of sadness, but had no marks of sickness whatsoever. Her brilliant and expressive eyes, her intellectual face, and a suggestion of craft about her, all bade me be on my guard, and a sort of false likeness to the Charpillon's mother made me still more cautious, and fortified me in my resolution to give no heed to the appeals of pity.
Then came the day of Miss Filkins's marriage. Having been twitted on this subject by many of his old friends - to whom he had spoken of the lady with premature confidence - he resolved to be present at the ceremony. And not for this reason only. He wished to observe the countenance of the bridegroom - if possible, of the bride. With feminine assistance, Lord Dunfield had concocted and manufactured two anonymous letters: one addressed to Miss Filkins, containing information with regard to her future husband; the other, for that gentleman's own perusal, professing to throw light on certain points of Miss Filkins's history and character.
Everything was fresh to them; even familiar posters acquired a new interest seen in the light of holiday. A wrestling lion and a boxing kangaroo, large and vivid on hoardings by the railway, excited them to enthusiasm. 'Look at it landin' 'im one in the jawr!' cried Liz, pointing out the kangaroo to Jacky, with educational fervour. And the monkey-faced little fellow seemed to understand, for he leapt on his mother's knee, and smote his sticky little hands together.
Louisa of Prussia and Her Times
"Let me ask you, then, what all this means? Why did you excuse the chief of police, who evidently had not done his duty and been guilty of a lack of vigilance? And why did you let these rascals go, instead of having them whipped to death?" --by L. Muhlbach
Had it been human, its breath would have suffocated him, so close was its invisible countenance to his. He could not move his legs or feet, or his left arm, but his right elbow, pushed out across the wideish arm of the char, had a little margin still. He drove his elbow out farther, then strained up a tense forearm and dug the lighted cigarette into the air directly in front of his own face. So complete was his consciousness of this terrible imponderable thing that he expected it to feel pain
Beside the ruined tower./ The moonshine, stealing o'er the scene/Had blended with the lights of eve;/ And she was there, my hope, my joy,/
Nevertheless, I crawled into the bushes and administered to Aunt Elizabeth a prod in the lower ribs-if hens have lower ribs. The more I study hens, the more things they seem able to get along without- which abruptly disturbed her calm detachment. She shot out at the spot where Mr. Chase was waiting with his coat off, and was promptly enveloped in that garment and captured.
"I cannot blame you, Jean; it was my usual forgetfulness of others which so misled you. I was tired of the world, and came hither to find peace in solitude. Effie cheered me with her winsome ways, and I learned to look on her as the blithe spirit whose artless wiles won me to forget a bitter past and a regretful present."
I would do anything to make them definitely decide to take the place before they left me. I trembled to think of her going elsewhere and giving other householders a chance to tempt her. She had looked at a good many country houses, but it was quite plain that none of them had pleased her so well as mine.
"Lady! How do you know it was a lady? Just like a woman making up a romance out of nothing. Yes, there's the delusion, which is bad. Keep his mind off it as much as possible, and tell him some of your own in your best brogue. I'll come and examine him to-morrow morning."
Etext creator Dagny says this is her favorite Wodehouse tale of all.
He is jubilant as a flag unfurled -/ Oh, a girl, she'd not forget him./ My own dear love, he is all my world, -/ And I wish I'd never met him./
I would postpone the sweets of your first kiss,/And let you, too, feed on expectancy./ You write you love me. Ay, and I love you!/I love you with a love as delicate/ As moon-gold on a tropic sea, or/Webs of gossamer in the morning sun
"Your silence, sirs, tells me that in this matter your judgement runs parallel with mine. And you are wise, for in such a case there can be but one course. My cousin has uttered words to-day which no man has ever said to a prince and lived. Nor shall we make exception to that rule. My Lord of Aquila's head must pay the price of his temerity."
I seem, in the midst of the crowd,/ The lightest of all;/ My laughter rings cheery and loud,/ In banquet and ball./ My lip hath its smiles and its sneers,/ For all men to see;/ But my soul, and my truth, and my tears,/ Are for thee, are for thee!
Now, Gentlemen, I beg you again to consider, that none of these Persons above-named, can ever suffer the loss of one Farthing by all the Miseries under which the Kingdom groans at present. For, first, until the Kingdom be intirely Ruined the Lord Lieutenant and Lords-Justices must have their Salaries.
Yet this inconstancy is such,/As you too shall adore;/I could not love thee, dear, so much,/Lov'd I not Honour more.--by Richard Lovelace
Except for a faint glow from the embers of the bearers' fire we were in complete darkness, little starlight struggled through the trees, the river made but a faint murmur. We could hear the two voices together and then suddenly the creaking voice changed into a razor-edged, slicing whistle, indescribably cutting, continuing right through Stone's grumbling torrent of croaking words.
Mabel Martin: A Harvest Idyl--John Greenleaf Whittier
Young Mabel from her mother's grave/ Crept to her desolate hearth-stone,/ And wrestled with her fate alone;/ With love, and anger, and despair,/ The phantoms of disordered sense,/ The awful doubts of Providence!
"He didn't have nothin' nowhere!" rapped out Inspector Higgins. "He just stood in the middle of this room an' looked around. He was yellin' about two big copper globes an' some ten tons of electrical machinery havin' been grabbed off them concrete foundations. We checked up, an' that stuff must have been taken out of here before to-night. It couldn't have been done!"
Madame de Malrive heard the confession calmly; she had been too prepared for it not to have prepared a countenance to receive it. Her first comment was: "I have never known them to declare themselves so plainly - " and Durham's baffled hopes fastened themselves eagerly on the words. Had she not always warned him that there was nothing so misleading as their plainness?
Madame Sara--L. T. Meade and Robert Eustace
She turned red as she spoke, and the worried, uneasy expression became more marked on her face. I had noticed for some time that she had been looking both nervous and depressed. I had first observed this peculiarity about her on board the Norham Castle, but, as time went on, instead of lessening it grew worse. Her face for so young a woman was haggard; she started at each sound, and Madame Sara's name was never spoken in her presence without her evincing almost undue emotion.
L'évanouissement s'était dissipé comme tout se dissipe, mais en laissant à la jeune fille une torpeur physique et une sorte de désolation dont on pouvait aisément se rendre compte en la regardant. Elle était beaucoup plus pâle que d'ordinaire, et ses yeux avaient perdu l'éclat particulier dont tout le monde avait été surpris autour d'elle depuis quelque temps.
Mae Madden--Mary Murdoch Mason
The rich life in Mae's blood was surging in her veins and must be let off in some way. If she had had her music and a piano she might have thrown her soul into some great flood-waves of harmony. The Farnesina frescoes of Cupid and Psyche over across the Tiber would have helped her, but here she was alone, and so she did what so many "fervent souls" do-scribbled her heart out in a colorful, barbarous rhyme. Mae had ordinarily too good sense for this, too deep a reverence for that world of poetry, at the threshold of which one should bow the knee, and loose the shoe from his foot, and tread softly. She didn't care for this to-day.
Mahanirvana Tantra (Tantra of the Great Liberation)
Draw a triangle with the Maya Vija within it, and around it two concentric circles (the one outside the other). In the space between the two circumferences of the circles draw in pairs the sixteen filaments, and outside these the eight petals of the lotus, and outside them the Bhu-pura, which should be made of straight lines with four entrances, and be of pleasing appearance
Main-Travelled Roads--Hamlin Garland
"But I'll see her-just once more. And then-" And again the mighty significance, responsibility of life fell upon him. He felt as young people seldom do the irrevocableness of living, the determinate, unalterable character of living. He determined to begin to live in some new way-just how he could not say.
Malbone: An Oldport Romance--Thomas Wentworth Higginson
PHILIP MALBONE had that perfectly sunny temperament which is peculiarly captivating among Americans, because it is so rare. He liked everybody and everybody liked him; he had a thousand ways of affording pleasure, and he received it in the giving. He had a personal beauty, which, strange to say, was recognized by both sexes,-for handsome men must often consent to be mildly hated by their own. He had travelled much, and had mingled in very varied society; he had a moderate fortune, no vices, no ambition, and no capacity of ennui.
And the power of God is stronger than the power of the devil, so divine works are more true than demoniac operations. Whence inasmuch as evil is powerful in the world, then it must be the work of the devil always conflicting with the work of God. Therefore as it is unlawful to hold that the devil's evil craft can apparently exceed the work of God, so it us unlawful to believe that the noblest works of creation, that is to say, man and beast, can be harmed and spoiled by the power of the devil.
OCTAVIUS. You see, under this new arrangement, you and Ramsden are her guardians; and she considers that all her duty to her father is now transferred to you. She said she thought I ought to have spoken to you both in the first instance. Of course she is right; but somehow it seems rather absurd that I am to come to you and formally ask to be received as a suitor for your ward's hand.
I said that the noise of the wind in the rigging was real, as if the other wasn't, for I felt that it wasn't, though I heard it. But it was, all the same; for the captain heard it, too. When I came to relieve the wheel, while the men were clearing up decks, he was swearing. He was a quiet man, and I hadn't heard him swear before, and I don't think I did again, though several queer things happened after that.
The nature of the "deeds" might be vaguely inferred from the inflection of Mrs. Dorman's voice - which was enough to make one's blood run cold. I was glad that Laura was not in the room. She was always nervous, as highly-strung natures are, and I felt that these tales about our house, told by this old peasant woman, with her impressive manner and contagious credulity, might have made our home less dear to my wife.
The body of the theatre now resembled a mad surf amid rocks, but the hero did not look at it. He was filled with fury at the stupidity of the two brutal warders, in forgetting that they were leaving him manacled. Calling loudly, he hobbled off stage L, taking steps four inches long.
Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains;/They crown'd him long ago/On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds,/ With a diadem of snow./Around his waist are forests braced,/The Avalanche in his hand;/--by Lord Byron
"Although I was delighted to find him so determined, I called M. de T----, and informed him of the project, and of the only difficulty in the way. He thought it not so easy of execution. He allowed the possibility of escaping thus: `But if she be recognised,' continued he, `if she be stopped in the attempt, all hope will be over with her, perhaps for ever. Besides, you would be obliged to quit Paris instantly, for you could never evade the search that would be made for you--by the Abbe Prevost
In the turmoil, the charging forms struck hard against the door, slapping it wide against the wall. From the corner where he had landed on hands and knees, groping for his gun on the floor beside him, Stan Wilford was a witness to the sudden fray that his own impulse had produced.
However innumerable beings are, I vow to save them;/However inexhaustible the passions are, I vow to extinguish them;/ However immeasurable the Dharmas are, I vow to master them;/However incomparable the Buddha-truth is, I vow to attain it.
Many Swans: Sun Myth of the North American Indians--Amy Lowell
Then Grass-Bush-and-Blossom wrapped her cedar-bark skirt about her and sprang up, and her silver and copper ornaments rang sweetly with her moving. The-One-Who-Walks-All-Over-the-Sky looked at Many Swans. "You have not waited," she said. "Alas! It is an evil beginning. My son, my son, I wished to love you." But he was glad and thought: "It is a querulous old woman, I shall heed her no more than the snapping of a fire of dead twigs." (
I reach my hand to thee!/ Stoop; take my hand in thine;/ Lead me where I would be,/ Father divine./ I do not even know/ The way I want to go,/ The way that leads to rest:
Ears full of throbbing, a babe awakens startled,/ Sends a tiny whimper to the still gaunt room./ Arms of the mother tighten round it gently,/ Deaf to the patter in the far-flung gloom./
THE girl followed a street that ran parallel to Canal. After a few blocks, she took a side street that led back toward the main thoroughfare. She did not, however, continue to Canal Street. Instead, she entered a quaint arcade that led into the heart of an old-fashioned building.
How I have toiled and prayed and scourged and striven,/ Mothered the orphan, waked beside the sick,/ Gone empty that mine enemy might eat,/ Given bread for stones in famine years, and channelled/ With vigilant knees the pavement of this cell,/ Till I constrained the Christ upon the wall
Margret Howth: A Story of To-Day
Now that I have come to the love part of my story, I am suddenly conscious of dingy common colors on the palette with which I have been painting. I wish I had some brilliant dyes. I wish, with all my heart, I could take you back to that Once upon a time'' in which the souls of our grandmothers delighted, -- the time which Dr. Johnson sat up all night to read about in "Evelina"
Maria Chapdelaine; a Tale of the Lake St. John country--Louis Hemon
His face was still smooth as a child's, with immature features and guileless eyes, and one not knowing him would probably have been surprised to hear him speak with all the deliberation of an older and experienced man, and to see him everlastingly charging his wooden pipe; but in the Province of Quebec the boys are looked upon as men when they undertake men's work, and as to their precocity in smoking there is always the excellent excuse that it afford some protection in summer against the attacking swarms of black-flies, mosquitos and sand-flies.
Fly, ye steeds, fly! Bear the Queen of France away from the stiff, proud Versailles; from the palaces of kings, where every thing breathes of exaltation, greatness, and unapproachableness; bear her to little, simple, pretty Trianon, to the dream of paradise, where all is innocence, simplicity, and peace; where the queen may be a woman, and a happy one, too--by Louise Muhlbach
THAT almost morbid religious idealism, and his healthful love of the country, were both alike developed by the circumstances of a journey, which happened about this time, when Marius was taken to a certain temple of Aesculapius, among the hills of Etruria, as was then usual in such cases, for the cure of some boyish sickness. The religion of Aesculapius, though borrowed from Greece, had been naturalised in Rome in the old republican times; but had reached under the Antonines the height of its popularity throughout the Roman world.
But supplementing these older official observances, the very wildest gods had their share of worship,-strange creatures with strange secrets startled abroad into open daylight. The delirious sort of religion of which Marius was a spectator in the streets of Rome, during the seven days of the Lectisternium, reminded him now and again of an observation of Apuleius: it was "as if the presence of the gods did not do men good, but disordered or weakened them."
I lie from morning till night on a lounge, staring into the hot street. Everybody is out of town enjoying himself. The brown-stone- front houses across the street resemble a row of particularly ugly coffins set up on end. A green mould is settling on the names of the deceased, carved on the silver door-plates. Sardonic spiders have sewed up the key-holes. All is silence and dust and desolation.--by Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Well, of course, I wrote Doctor Holmes and told him I hadn't meant to steal, and he wrote back and said in the kindest way that it was all right and no harm done; and added that he believed we all unconsciously worked over ideas gathered in reading and hearing, imagining they were original with ourselves. He stated a truth, and did it in such a pleasant way, and salved over my sore spot so gently and so healingly, that I was rather glad I had committed the crime
Kent had an idea they were talking to hold his attention. Half a second later he was sure of it. Glass smashed and a gun roared! The bullet glanced off the barrel of Kent's rifle, knocking it from his hand. He whirled, his hand darting toward the service pistol. The holster flap was open and he got that gun out faster than an old-time Western road agent.
Suddenly, from the street outside, a very jovial gentleman began to beat with a staff on the shop door, accompanying his blows with shouts and railleries in which the dealer was continually called upon by name. Markheim, smitten into ice, glanced at the dead man. But no! he lay quite still; he was fled away far beyond ear-shot of these blows and shoutings; he was sunk beneath seas of silence; and his name, which would once have caught his notice above the howling of a storm, had become an empty sound.
The exquisite freshness of Isabel! When he had been a little boy, it was his delight to run into the garden after a shower of rain and shake the rose-bush over him. Isabel was that rose-bush, petal-soft, sparkling and cool. And he was still that little boy. But there was no running into the garden now, no laughing and shaking. The dull, persistent gnawing in his breast started again. He drew up his legs, tossed the papers aside, and shut his eyes.
That marriage is a failure none but the very stupid will deny. One has but to glance over the statistics of divorce to realize how bitter a failure marriage really is. Nor will the stereotyped Philistine argument that the laxity of divorce laws and the growing looseness of woman account for the fact that: first, every twelfth marriage ends in divorce; second, that since 1870 divorces have increased from 28 to 73 for every hundred thousand population
Description of canals and oases of Mars by astronomer Perceval Lowell, placed here because, hey, at least he meant well.
Th : I humbly ask pardon, my lord, but so it was. And I took upon me, thinking no harm, to ask Squire Martin to lend me his knife to cut my tobacco. And he felt first of one pocket and then of another and it was not there at all. And says I, 'What! have you lost your knife, Squire?' And up he gets and feels again and he sat down, and such a groan as he gave. 'Good God!' he says, 'I must have left it there.'
Marxism, Freedom and the State
Its principal point is the conquest of political power by the working class. One can understand that men as indispensable as Marx and Engels should be the partisans of a programme which, consecrating and approving political power, opens the door to all ambitions. Since there will be political power there will necessarily be subjects, got up in Republican fashion, as citizens, it is true, but who will none the less be subjects, and who as such will be forced to obey
Father calls me Mary. Mother calls me Marie. Everybody else calls me Mary Marie. The rest of my name is Anderson. I'm thirteen years old, and I'm a cross-current and a contradiction. That is, Sarah says I'm that. (Sarah is my old nurse.) She says she read it once - that the children of unlikes were always a cross-current and a contradiction.
"The Connection of the Physical Sciences" and the "Physical Geography" are the later works of Mrs. Somerville. These volumes have probably been more read in our country than in Europe; for it is a common remark of the scientific writers of Great Britain, that their "readers are found in the United States." They contain vast collections of facts in all branches of Physical Science, connected together by the delicate web of Mrs. Somerville's own thought
Mateo Falcone--Prosper Merimee
Some minutes later six men with brown uniform with yellow collars, commanded by an adjutant, stood before Mateo's door. This adjutant was a distant relative of the Falcones. (It is said that further degrees of relationship are recognized in Corsica than anywhere else.) His name was Tidora Gamba; he was an energetic man, greatly feared by the banditti, and had already hunted out many of them.
Mates at Billabong--Mary Grant Bruce
"If the Doctor ever gives me anything barring the length of his tongue, I'll have apoplexy!" remarked Wally. "We don't twin-soul a bit better than we did. He caught me beautifully the other day. Three or four of us were going to have a supper. I'd been into town to the dentist, and was bringing home a lobster. Coming out, that idiot Bob Greenfield was next me on the train, and he amused himself by rubbing the lobster gently until the thin brown paper they wrap 'em in had worn through in places. I was talking cricket for all I was worth, and never noticed him.
The medium has provided himself with TWO rings exactly alike; one of these the audience is free to examine, the other the medium is wearing on his right arm, under his coat. When the two hands are clasped together, therefore, it is a simple thing for the medium, under cover of the enveloping cloth, to slip the duplicate ring down his sleeve, and on to his own hand, and that part of the "miracle" is accomplished!
Since the afternoon when he had heard from Madeleine Wade who this was, he had not advanced a step nearer making her acquaintance; though a couple of weeks had passed, though he now knew two people who knew her, and though his satisfaction at learning her name had immediately yielded to a hunger for more. And now, hardly a day went by, on which he did not see her. His infatuation had made him keen of scent
Pulling her cloak close about her Edith darted across the Avenue. She started nervously as a solitary man passed her and said in a hoarse whisper -"Where bound, kid do?" She was reminded of a night in her childhood when she had walked around the block in her pajamas and a dog had howled at her from a mystery-big back yard.
McAndrew's Hymn--Rudyard Kipling
That storm blew by but left behind her anchor-shiftin' swell./thou knowest all my heart an' mind, Thou knowest, Lord, I fell --/Third on the Mary Gloster then, and first that night in Hell!/Yet was Thy Hand beneath my head, about my feet Thy Care --/Fra' Deli clear to Torres Strait, the trial o' despair,/
Medicine Song: To Be Sung in Time of Evil Fortune
Overshadowed by evil adventures;/Meanness, betrayal, and spite/Flock under heaven/To make me aware/ Of sickness and death within me.
Return, O Dreams of my heart,/ And sing in the Summer twilight,/By the creek and the almond thicket/And the field that is bordered with lupins!
When I carefully consider the curious habits of dogs,/ I am compelled to admit/ That man is the superior animal.
The wolf set off running full swiftly to the place where he saw the stag lie; forthwith he set himself upon the track,-now great will be the strife before he hath taken and caught it, and had its flesh. Meantime the lady saith to the squire: "Now let us leave him to take his fill of the chase." Therewith she got her to horseback; no whit did she tarry, but she took with her the squire, and straightway turned her towards Ireland, her own land.
Stanton was thinking thus, when all power of thought was suspended, by seeing two persons bearing between them the body of a young, and apparently very lovely girl, who had been struck dead by the lightning. Stanton approached, and heard the voices of the bearers repeating, "There is none who will mourn for her!"
Memoirs of a Southerner--Edward J. Thomas
The dogs were docile and obedient, only intended to trail the outlaws, not to injure them. We were much interested in their welfare, for were they not our own?
Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Volume 1
By the caprice of fortune many mistakes of mine have turned to my credit, and I very much doubt whether it would be prudent in me to remove the veil with which some of them are covered. But as I am resolved to give you a naked, impartial account of even the most minute passages of my life ever since I have been capable of reflection, so I most humbly beg you not to be surprised at the little art, or, rather, great disorder, with which I write my narrative
Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Volume 2
Had I been wise I should have stopped there, because a man ought in prudence to make his peace with the Court upon any terms consistent with honour. But I was young, and the more provoked because I perceived that all the fair words given me at Fontainebleau were but a feint to gain time to write about the affair to my uncle, then at Angers.
Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Volume 3
One of the greatest mischiefs which the despotic authority of ministers has occasioned in the world in these later times is a practice, occasioned by their own private mistaken interests, of always supporting superiors against their inferiors. It is a maxim borrowed from Machiavelli, whom few understand, and whom too many cry up for an able man because he was always wicked.
Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Volume 4
Pray indulge me with a short pause here to consider the scandalous arts which ministers palliate with the name and sacred word of a great King, and with which the most august Parliament of the kingdom--the Court of Peers--expose themselves to ridicule by such manifest inconsistencies as are more becoming the levity of a college than the majesty of a senate.
Memoirs of Louis XIV. and the Regency, V1
She [Madame de Montespan] was more of an ambitious than a libertine woman, but as wicked as the devil himself. Nothing could stand between her and the gratification of her ambition, to which she would have made any sacrifice. Her figure was ugly and clumsy, but her eyes bespoke great intelligence, though they were somewhat too bright. Her mouth was very pretty and her smile uncommonly agreeable.
Memoirs of Louis XIV. and the Regency, V2
The Marechale d'Uxelles hated my son mortally;, but after the King's death he played the fawning dog so completely that my son forgave him and took him into favour again. In the latter affair he was disposed once more to follow his natural inclination, but my son, having little value for whatever he could do, said, "Well, if he will not sign he may let it alone."
Memoirs of Louis XIV. and the Regency, V3
The Queen-mother of England had not brought up her children well: she at first left them in the society of femmes de chambre, who gratified all their caprices; and having afterwards married them at a very early age, they followed the bad example of their mother. Both of them met with unhappy deaths; the one was poisoned, and the other died in child-birth.
Memoirs of Louis XIV. and the Regency, V4
When jealousy is once suffered to take root, it is impossible to extirpate it--therefore it is better not to let it gain ground. My daughter pretends not to be affected by hers, but she often suffers great affliction from it. This is not astonishing, because she is very fond of her children; and the woman with whom the Duke is infatuated, together with her husband, do not leave him a farthing; they completely ruin his household.
Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois
As soon as I reached my own closet, I threw myself upon my knees and prayed to God to take me into his protection and save me; but from whom or what, I was ignorant. Hereupon the King my husband, who was already in bed, sent for me. I went to him, and found the bed surrounded by thirty or forty Huguenots, who were entirely unknown to me; for I had been then but a very short time married.
Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois, Volume 2
I appeared to give way to their persuasions, and, after hearing mass and taking a hasty dinner, I left my lodgings, escorted by two or three hundred armed citizens, some of them engaging Barlemont and Du Bois in conversation. We all took the way to the gate which opens to the river, and directly opposite to that leading to Namur. Du Bois and his colleague told me I was not going the right way, but I continued talking, and as if I did not hear them.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v1
"These secret excursions, and his too habitual intercourse with ladies more distinguished for their personal charms than for the advantages of education, were no doubt the means by which the King acquired many vulgar expressions which otherwise would never have reached his ears.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v2
Such was the state of the public mind when the young Archduchess Marie Antoinette arrived at the Court of Versailles, just at the moment when the party which brought her there was about to be overthrown.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v3
Marie Antoinette took little pains to promote literature and the fine arts. She had been annoyed in consequence of having ordered a performance of the "Connstable de Bourbon," on the celebration of the marriage of Madame Clotilde with the Prince of Piedmont. The Court and the people of Paris censured as indecorous the naming characters in the piece after the reigning family, and that with which the new alliance was formed.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v4
Marie Antoinette had then no direct influence over State affairs until after the deaths of M. de Maurepas and M. de Vergennes, and the retirement of M. de Calonne. She frequently regretted her new situation, and looked upon it as a misfortune which she could not avoid.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v5
After the 14th of July, by a manoeuvre for which the most skilful factions of any age might have envied the Assembly, the whole population of France was armed and organised into a National Guard. A report was spread throughout France on the same day, and almost at the same hour, that four thousand brigands were marching towards such towns or villages as it was wished to induce to take arms.
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v6
On my arrival at Paris on the 25th of August I found the state of feeling there much more temperate than I had dared to hope. The conversation generally ran upon the acceptance of the constitution, and the fetes which would be given in consequence. The struggle between the Jacobins and the constitutionals on the 17th of July, 1791, nevertheless had thrown the Queen into great terror for some moments
Memoirs of Marie Antoinette, v7
The King and Queen said nothing to me at the Feuillans about the portfolio which had been deposited with me; no doubt they expected to see me again. The minister Roland and the deputies composing the provisional government were very intent on a search for papers belonging to their Majesties. They had the whole of the Tuileries ransacked. The infamous Robespierre bethought himself of M. Campan, the Queen's private secretary, and said that his death was feigned
Memoirs of Miss Sidney Bidulph--Frances Sheridan
Most sure it is, every place will be delightful to me where I can enjoy his company, and have my dear little babes with me; but methinks two country houses are an unnecessary charge, and more than suits our fortune. I pray God this tender husband may not have a strong and prudent reason for this conduct, which out of kindness he conceals; perhaps he thinks this little spot at South-park may some time hence be the whole of our dependance, and he has a mind to be before-hand with ill fortune
Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush
I spose Mr. Frederic looked black, for I was ONLY listening, and he said, in a voice hagitated by emotion, "Mary," said he, "if you love me, ask me this no more: let it be sfishnt for you to know that I am a honest man, and that a secret, what it would be misery for you to larn, must hang over all my actions-that is from ten o'clock till six."
One day, it being Bonaparte's turn to enjoy this indulgence, some of the professors who were at table designedly made some disrespectful remarks on Paoli, of whom they knew the young Corsican was an enthusiastic admirer. "Paoli," observed Bonaparte, "was a great man; he loved his country; and I will never forgive my father, who was his adjutant, for having concurred in the union of Corsica with France.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Entire
"What! you a colonel, an Emperor, before me, who have so long been a general?" howled Liebeau, who was no longer able to speak. "I would sooner knock your brains out with this bottle than suffer such a precedence; and my wife a lady of your wardrobe! she who has possessed from her birth the soul of an Empress! No, sir! never will I take the oath to you, nor suffer anybody else to take it."
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v1
Bonaparte does not in general pay much attention to the opinions of others when they do not agree with his own views and interests, or coincide with his plans of reform or innovation; but having in his public career professed himself by turns an atheist and an infidel, the worshipper of Christ and of Mahomet, he could not decently silence those who, after deserting or denying the God of their forefathers and of their youth, continued constant and firm in their apostasy.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v2
During the repast the bottle went freely round, and as soon as they had drunk their coffee and liqueurs, Talleyrand rang a bell, and Hauterive presented himself with a large bundle of papers. The pretended original letters of Mr. Drake were handed about with the commentaries of the Minister and his secretary. Their heads heated with wine, it was not difficult to influence their minds, or to mislead their judgment,
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v3
MY LORD:--Joseph Bonaparte leads a much more retired life, and sees less company, than any of his brothers or sisters. Except the members of his own family, he but seldom invites any guests, nor has Madame Joseph those regular assemblies and circles which Madame Napoleon and Madame Louis Bonaparte have. His hospitality is, however, greater at his countryseat Morfontaine than at his hotel here.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v4
Beyond a doubt the enmity of the Ottoman Porte can do more mischief than its friendship can do service. Its neutrality is always useful, while its alliance becomes frequently a burden, and its support of no advantage. It is, therefore, more from a view of preventing evils than from expectation of profit, that all other Powers plot, cabal, and bribe. The map of the Turkish Empire explains what maybe though absurd or nugatory in this assertion.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v5
MY LORD:--Nobody here, except his courtiers, denies that Bonaparte is vain, cruel, and ambitious; but as to his private, personal, or domestic vices, opinions are various, and even opposite. Most persons, who have long known him, assert that women are his aversion; and many anecdotes have been told of his unnatural and horrid propensities. On the other hand, his seeming attachment to his wife is contradictory to these rumours
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v6
MY LORD:--A general officer, who has just arrived from Italy, has assured me that, so far from Bonaparte's subjects on the other side of the Alps being contented and attached to his person and Government, were a victorious Austrian army to enter the plains of Lombardy a general insurrection would be the consequence. During these last nine years the inhabitants have not enjoyed a moment's tranquillity or safety.
Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, v7
MY LORD:--In a military empire, ruled by a military despot, it is a necessary policy that the education of youth should also be military. In all our public schools or prytanees, a boy, from the moment of entering, is registered in a company, and regularly drilled, exercised, and reviewed, punished for neglect or fault according to martial law, and advanced if displaying genius or application.
Then, suddenly, there was a commotion in the hall without, loud voices, and a hurrying here and there. The black knight half arose, grasping a heavy iron mace that lay upon the bench beside him, and the next moment Sir John Dale himself, as pale as death, walked into the antechamber. He stopped in the very middle of the room. "I yield me to my Lord's grace and mercy," said he to the black knight, and they were the last words he ever uttered in this world.
Crump married Miss Budge, so well known to the admirers of the festive dance on the other side of the water as Miss Delancy; and they had one daughter, named Morgiana, after that celebrated part in the "Forty Thieves" which Miss Budge performed with unbounded applause both at the "Surrey" and "The Wells." Mrs. Crump sat in a little bar, profusely ornamented with pictures of the dancers of all ages, from Hillisberg, Rose, Parisot, who plied the light fantastic toe in 1805, down to the Sylphides of our day.
Menog-i Khrad ('The Spirit of Wisdom')
'And, for the same reason, he made many devotions and improper creeds current in the world. 12. And, on account of men's not knowing of duty and good works, every one believes that most, and considers it as good, which his teaching in devotion has included. 13. And that devotion, in particular, is more powerful, with which sovereignty exists. 14. But that one is the lordship and sovereignty of Vishtasp, the king of kings
"But," said cheerful Jeanne, somewhat dryly, "Laure's mother is not dead yet, so let us congratulate ourselves that to go to Paris has brought luck to one of our number at least, and let us deal charitably with Mere Giraud, who certainly means well, and is only naturally proud of her daughter's grandeur. For my part, I can afford to rejoice with her."
And many a moving candle, in whose light/The prisoned wizard, mirrored in amazement,/Saw fronting him a stranger, falcon-eyed,/Firm-featured, of a negligible age,/And fair enough to look upon, he fancied,/Though not a warrior born, nor more a courtier.--by Edwin Arlington Robinson
Face by face, Cardona looked over the various suspects, listing each name on a pad as though to emphasize exactly which persons were to regard themselves liable to instant arrest. Paying no attention to the varying expressions, Cardona finished the list and planked it in front of Weston, who read the names:
With a swift movement the beautiful girl sought to withdraw the small silver-mounted revolver without which she never left the ranch. But Snake le Vasquez, with a muttered oath, was too quick for her. He seized the toy and contemptuously hurled it across his vile den. --by Harry Leon Wilson
DRIVEN back by the acid fumes, the witnesses to the final disaster had retreated to the reception room by the time the brownish smoke cleared. Gregg Garland was wheezing to his companions, urging them to make a new attempt at a rescue that now seemed useless. Commissioner Weston was blinking his eyes as he pointed helplessly toward the glazite barrier, where he thought that Cranston lay with Dunstan.
Nature seemed to have started out with the idea of making two faces and then to have decided to use all the material for one. A vast jaw was its principal feature. This was surmounted by a grin that must have measured many inches. Curiously enough, the man reminded me instantly of someone I knew quite well, though at the moment I could not name him. -- Special thanks to Dagny and the Blandings Group for providing this text.
Clementine had conquered me in the space of a few hours. True, I was an inflammable subject, but hitherto no beauty had committed such ravages upon me in so short a time. I did not doubt of success, and I confess that there was a certain amount of vanity in this assurance; but at the same time I was modest, for I knew that at the slightest slip the enterprise would miscarry.
He gave most marvelous exhibitions to prove his strange and miraculous power. My friend stated that he thought he had at last found a person with at least some queer psychical gift, if not even possessing the power that he claimed. He had watched the exhibition most carefully, and had even served on a committee on the psychic's stage; and he could find no evidence of trickery of any kind.
The individual educator imbued with honesty of purpose, the artist or writer of original ideas, the independent scientist or explorer, the non-compromising pioneers of social changes are daily pushed to the wall by men whose learning and creative ability have become decrepit with age.
Some men, created for destruction, come/ Into the world, and make the world their home./ Be they as vile and base as e'er they can,/ They'll still be callèd `The World's Honest Man.'
I beg to say, that I use those last expressions advisedly, sir, and not in the sense in which they are now used by Jackanapeses. There were no Jackanapeses when I was a boy, Mr. Hood. England was Old England when I was young. I little thought it would ever come to be Young England when I was old. But everything is going backward.
The death of Christ giveth us the best discovery of ourselves; in what condition we were, so that nothing could help us but that; and the most clear discovery of the dreadful nature of our sins. For if sin be such a dreadful thing as to wring the heart of the Son of God, how shall a poor wretched sinner be able to bear it? -- by John Bunyan
Adieu to kindred hearts and home,/ To pleasure, joy, and mirth,/ A fitter foot than mine to roam/ Could scarcely tread the earth;/ For they are now so few indeed/ (Not more than three in all),
Hence the splendour, the space, the novelty, of the great French cathedrals in the first Pointed style, monuments for the most part of the artistic genius of laymen, significant pre-eminently of that Queen of Gothic churches at Amiens. In most cases those early Pointed churches are entangled, here or there, by the constructions of the old round-arched style, the heavy, Norman or other, Romanesque chapel or aisle, side by side, though in strong contrast with, the soaring new Gothic of nave or transept. But of that older [111] manner of the round arch, the plein-cintre, Amiens has nowhere, or almost nowhere, a trace.
BILLY did not leave the Strata this time. Before twenty-four hours had passed, the last cherished fragment of Mr. William Henshaw's possessions had been carefully carried down the imposing steps of the Beacon Hill boarding-house under the disapproving eyes of its bugle-adorned mistress, who found herself now with a month's advance rent and two vacant "parlors" on her hands.
"It's her fu-ur which is so funny," giggled the girl. "It's exactly like a fried whiting."
ALICE: No. I'm not quite used to that. (To HARRY) Excuse me, but aren't you getting tired holding that big pistol? Don't you think you might put it down now, and help me serve this supper?--by Richard Harding Davis
Miss Cubbidge and the Dragon of Romance
It was not by chains that the dragon kept her there, but by one of the spells of old. To one to whom the facilities of the daily Press had for so long been accorded spells would have palled--you would have said--and galleons after a time and all things out-of-date. After a time. But whether the centuries passed her or whether the years or whether no time at all, she did not know.
There was quiet for an hour or more. At something after midnight, when Miss Rodney had just finished writing half a dozen letters, there sounded a latch-key in the front door, and some one entered. This person, whoever it was, seemed to stumble about the passage in the dark, and at length banged against the listener's door. Miss Rodney started up and flung the door open. By the light of her lamp she saw a moustachioed face, highly flushed, and grinning.
Miss Sarah Jack, of Spanish Town, Jamaica
Miss Jack was a person in whom I think we may say that the good predominated over the bad. She was often morose, crabbed, and self- opinionated. but then she knew her own imperfections, and forgave those she loved for evincing their dislike of them. Maurice Cumming was often inattentive to her, plainly showing that he was worried by her importunities and ill at ease in her company.
Mrs. Crowe met her look with a serious face. "It ain't so easy for me to give as it is for some," she said simply, but with an effort which was made possible only by the occasion. "I should like to say, while Tempy is laying here yet in her own house, that she has been a constant lesson to me. Folks are too kind, and shame me with thanks for what I do. I ain't such a generous woman as poor Tempy was, for all she had nothin' to do with, as one may say."
They saw as much of Mr. Ruskin's Florence as the brief time permitted; he met them in the Pitti Gallery and went round with them, chatting brightly, and evidently very grateful for their recognition. He knew a great deal about art, and all four enjoyed the morning immensely. It was fine to go round recognising old favourites and finding new beauties, especially while so many people fumbled helplessly with Baedeker. Nor was he a bit of a prig, Miss Winchelsea said, and indeed she detested prigs.
Down the broad oak staircase--through the silent hall--into the drawing-room runs Lilian, singing as she goes. The room is deserted; through the half-closed blinds the glad sunshine is rushing, turning to gold all on which its soft touch lingers, and rendering the large, dull, handsome apartment almost comfortable. . . --by Dana Gatlin
He heaved a hollow sigh, glared at La Martinière with a terrible expression, and grasped his dagger. She silently commended her soul to God, but stood firm and looked him straight in the face, pressing herself more firmly against the door through which he would have to pass in order to reach her mistress.
It is rather too abrupt a turn from the deep pathos of the faithful love implied by this superstition, to a story of something of a similar kind, which fell under the observation of a country minister in Lancashire, well known to some friends of mine. A poor man lay a-dying, but still perfectly sensible and acute.
MODERN SUPERSTITION--Lafcadio Hearn
One unfortunate result of superstitious fear is that it actually invites the calamity dreaded; and the arrival of the calamity itself is an example that begets superstition. The evil multiplies with astonishing fecundity. If Carmen sees a priest crossing the road, and in consequence of the incident provokes her lover to kill her, the tragedy itself confirms the traditional belief of the provincials that to meet a priest is unlucky.
The two walk stealthily and rapidly down the garden-path. Osman listens to their retreating footsteps, and, as they die away in the distance, he draws a breath of relief. They are good, zealous servants, and will obey his instructions faithfully. He listens again eagerly, and again looks over toward the harem, where be sees the lights still flitting about and shadows passing the windows. --by Louise Muhlbach
Monday or Tuesday--Virginia Woolf
Yet, the moment after, if the door was opened, spread about the floor, hung upon the walls, pendant from the ceilingwhat? My hands were empty. The shadow of a thrush crossed the carpet; from the deepest wells of silence the wood pigeon drew its bubble of sound. "Safe, safe, safe" the pulse of the house beat softly. "The treasure buried; the room . . ." the pulse stopped short. Oh, was that the buried treasure?
The conversation was carried on in tiny voices, for fear of disturbing the householders. "I don't know," said Joe, turning. He looked full at Albert, the two men looked straight into each other's eyes. There was a lurking grin in each of them. "Well I'm-blamed!" said Albert at last, throwing the telegram down emphatically on the bed.
The host conducted the pair to a room above, leaving the company in a state of mingled excitement and derision, to await the result of this odd experiment. Within the feebly lighted bedchamber which the landlord had assigned to them, Delamort bade his companion be seated, and approached him with eyes riveted on his, and hands busy at mesmeric passes. He had hopes of gaining sufficient influence over Grosjean to be able to mentally suggest to him that he saw the spirit of his dead father.
He literally flew over the ground, and strange to say he no longer experienced any fatigue from the labors of the preceding night. Never had he felt so strong and alert, either in body or mind. He was very hopeful of success. He had every confidence in himself, and his happiness would indeed have been complete if he had had another judge to deal with. But M. d'Escorval overawed him to such a degree that he became almost paralyzed in his presence.
The everlasting universe of things/ Flows through the mind, and rolls its rapid waves,/ Now dark-now glittering-now reflecting gloom-/ Now lending splendour, where from secret springs/ The source of human thought its tribute brings
The Eagle seeks its daily bread./How aptly fact to fact replies:/Heroes and eagles, hills and skies./Ye who contemn the fatted slave/Look on this emblem, and be brave.--by Robert Louis Stevenson
Wilbur had imagined that the fight would be hardly more than a wild rush down the slope of the beach, a dash over the beach- combers' breastworks of sand, and a brief hand-to-hand scrimmage around the old cabin. In all accounts he had ever read of such affairs, and in all ideas he had entertained on the subject, this had always been the case. The two bodies had shocked together like a college rush, there had been five minutes' play of knife and club and gun, a confused whirl of dust and smoke, and all was over before one had time either to think or be afraid. But nothing of the kind happened that morning.
The woman was not long a widow when she married a second time, and had two daughters. These two daughters hated their half-sister, thought she was not so wise as another, and nicknamed her Smallhead. When the elder of the two sisters was fourteen years old their father died. The mother was in great grief then, and began to pine away. She used to sit at home in the corner and never left the house.
The victim, a Beetle, is covered at all points with a suit of armour which the sting is unable to penetrate. The joints alone will allow the poisoned lancet to pass. Those of the legs do not in any way comply with the conditions imposed: the result of stinging them would be merely a partial disorder which far from subduing the insect, would render it more dangerous by irritating it yet further. --by J Henri Fabre
Has it feet like water-lilies?/Has it feathers like a bird?/Is it brought from famous countries/Of which I have never heard?
What sprightly bands/ Have chac'd the waves uncheck'd by fear?/ Whoe'er they were they fled from morn,/ For now, all silent and forlorn,/ These tide-forsaken sands appear--/ Return, sweet sprites! the scene to cheer!
She comes in her Aetherial car,/ Involv'd in many a varying hue;/ And thro' the azure shoots afar,/ Spirit-light-and life anew!
'It serves me right,' she said. 'I wedded one of my father's enemies; one of those who would have hunted the old man to death. I gave my father's enemy house and lands, when he came as a beggar to my door; I followed my wicked, wayward heart in this, instead of minding my dying father's words. Strike again, and avenge him yet more!'
Mother's Excitement Over Father's Old Sweetheart
So Marcia and Mother journeyed to Capital City and chose a navy blue tailored suit, and a stunning black and white silk, and a soft gray chiffon gown, "in which she looks perfectly Astorbiltish," Marcia afterward told the assembled family. These, with hat and gloves and a pair of expensive gray suede shoes that hurt her feet, but made them look like a girl's, came to a ghastly sum in three figures, so that Mother felt almost ill when she wrote on the check
The room was close, and for some reason smelled strongly of shoe blacking. Two gendarmes and the village police commissioner, Ryskin, their heavy tread resounding on the floor, removed the books from the shelves and put them on the table before the officer. Two others rapped on the walls with their fists, and looked under the chairs. One man clumsily clambered up on the stove in the corner. Nikolay's pockmarked face became covered with red patches, and his little gray eyes were steadfastly fixed upon the officer.
Mother: A Story--Kathleen Norris
But when Margaret began to grow up, she grasped the situation with all the keenness of a restless and ambitious nature. Weston, detested Weston, it must apparently be. Very well, she would make the best of Weston. Margaret called on her mother's old friends; she was tireless in charming little attentions. Her own first dances had not been successful; she and Bruce were not good dancers,
MOXON'S MASTER--Ambrose Bierce
"Doubtless you do not hold with those (I need not name them to a man of your reading) who have taught that all matter is sentient, that every atom is a living, feeling, conscious being. I do. There is no such thing as dead, inert matter: it is all alive; all instinct with force, actual and potential; all sensitive to the same forces in its environment and susceptible to the contagion of higher and subtler ones residing in such superior organisms as it may be brought into relationship with, as those of man when he is fashioning it into an instrument of his will. It absorbs something of his intelligence and purpose
A comet's journey from this place, drifting in long shafts from the centremost sun, were other creatures, very wonderful and of potential loveliness, known to all the stars as Harmonies. They, likewise, waited for the lifting of the stillness. They watched with holy eagerness for souls to voice that which broke from them against the Walls of Silence in impetuous waves.
Mozart: The Man and the Artist, as Revealed in his own Words
Compiled by Friedrich Kerst.
But at the same time, to his immense surprise, Reggie heard himself saying, "Lord, Thou knowest, Thou hast not done much for me. . . ." That pulled him up; that made him realize again how dead serious it was. Too late. The door handle turned. Anne came in, crossed the shadowy space between them, gave him her hand, and said, in her small, soft voice, "I'm so sorry, father is out. And mother is having a day in town, hat-hunting. There's only me to entertain you, Reggie."
"She lived at 'ome with 'er father and mother, quite the lady, in a very nice little 'ouse with a garden-and remarkable respectable people they was. Rich you might call 'em a'most. They owned their own 'ouse-got it out of the Building Society, and cheap because the chap who had it before was a burglar and in prison-and they 'ad a bit of free'old land, and some cottages and money 'nvested-all nice and tight: they was what you'd call snug and warm. I tell you, I was On. Furniture too.
In the opinion of many of his father's friends whom he met from time to time he had made a good-sized stride towards ruin, and they did not hesitate to tell him so--Mr. Chipman, president of the Ripton National Bank; Mr. Greene, secretary and treasurer of the Hawkeye Paper Company, who suggested with all kindness that, however noble it may be, it doesn't pay to tilt at windmills.
The Honourable Brush Bascom, as we know, was a clever man; and although it had never been given him to improve on the "Book of Arguments," he had ideas of his own. On reading Mr. Crewe's defiance that morning, he had, with characteristic promptitude and a desire to be useful, taken the first train out of Putnam for Ripton, to range himself by the side of the Honourable Hilary in the hour of need.
"It is Mr. Vane I wanted to speak to you about. He is an intimate friend, I believe, of your father's, as well as Mr. Flint's right-hand man in--in a business way in this State. Mr. Vane himself will not listen to reason. I have told him plainly that if he does not drop all business at once, the chances are ten to one that he will forfeit his life very shortly.
Even dirty Dame Fripp, who was a very rare church-goer, had been to Mrs Hackit to beg a bit of old crape, and with this sign of grief pinned on her little coal-scuttle bonnet, was seen dropping her curtsy opposite the reading-desk. This manifestation of respect towards Mr Gilfil's memory on the part of Dame Fripp had no theological bearing whatever. It was due to an event which had occurred some years back, and which, I am sorry to say, had left that grimy old lady as indifferent to the means of grace as ever.
I am a simple-minded person, wholly devoid of subtlety of intellect, so that I willingly admit that there may be depths of alternative meaning in these propositions out of all soundings attainable by my poor plummet. Still there are a good many people who suffer under a like intellectual limitation; and, for once in my life, I feel that I have the chance of attaining that position of a representative of average opinion which appears to be the modern ideal of a leader of men--Essay #5
MR. GRAY'S STRANGE STORY--Louisa Murray
"It was no accident; she drowned herself in her madness. When I got to the swamp I saw a bit of ribbon hanging on the reeds, and I went on till I came to the deep water; there I found her. She had not sunk very far down because her skirt had caught on a stake that stood up there, and I got her out easily enough. But she was dead; and you, Leonard Mason, will have to answer to me for her death."
'"I'm glad to hear it, sir," he answered, "very glad. It requires some explanation, however. Mrs. Rose has been congratulated, and has acknowledged the truth of the report. It is confirmed by many facts. The work-table you bought, confessing your intention of giving it to your future wife, is given to her. How do you account for these things, sir?"
Mr. Humphries and His Inheritance
'Guide your eye by my stick here, and follow out the line directly opposite to the spot where we're standing now, and I'll engage, Mr Humphreys, that you'll catch the archway over the entrance. You'll see it just at the end of the walk answering to the one that leads up to this very building. Did you think of going there at once?
The bloated and gouty old man, in his horror, considered the question of resistance. But his athletic days were long over. This moor was a desert. There was no help to be had. He was in the hands of strange servants, even if his recognition turned out to be delusion, and they were under the command of his captors. There was nothing for it but submission, for the present.
"WHAT a day!" he said. "Good Lord!" and blew again, and Mr. Ledbetter inclined to believe that the person was mopping his face. His boots were good stout boots; the shadows of his legs upon the valance suggested a formidable stoutness of aspect. After a time he removed some upper garments-a coat and waistcoat, Mr. Ledbetter inferred- and casting them over the rail of the bed remained breathing less noisily, and as it seemed cooling from a considerable temperature.
As Captain Wilson truly said, he was too busy, even to hear Jack's story that night, for they were anxious to have both vessels ready to make sail as soon as a breeze should spring up, for the Spaniards had vessels of war at Carthagena, which was not ten miles off, and had known the result of the action--by Captain Marryat
And out upon all this it was that Skelmersdale wandered, being troubled in his earlier love affair, and as he says, "not caring WHERE he went." And there he sat down to think it over, and so, sulking and grieving, was overtaken by sleep. And so he fell into the fairies' power.
So when I went to put up my purse, as God would have it, my smock was unripped,/And instead of putting it into my pocket, down it slipped;/ Then the bell rung, and I went down to put my lady to bed;/And, God knows, I thought my money was as safe as my maidenhead.
MRS. BOTHERBY'S STORY: THE LEECH OF FOLKESTONE
Meanwhile Master Thomas Marsh and his man Ralph were threading the devious paths-then, as now, most pseudonymously dignified with the name of roads-that wound between Marston Hall and the frontier of Romney Marsh. Their progress was comparatively slow; for, though the brown mare was as good a roadster as a man might back and the gelding no mean nag of his hands, yet the tracks, rarely traversed save by the rude wains of the day,miry in the 'bottoms,' and covered with loose and rolling stones on the higher grounds, rendered barely passable the perpetual alternation of hill and valley.
"It is the air which we breathe that fills our lungs and gives us life and light. It is that which refreshes us if pure, or sinks us into stagnation if it be foul. Let me for awhile inhale the breath of an invigorating literature. Sit down, Mr. Mackinnon; I have a question that I must put to you." And then she succeeded in carrying him off into a corner. As far as I could see he went willingly enough at that time
Mrs. Helen Jackson ("H.H.")--Thomas Wentworth Higginson
Includes a biography as well as Mrs. Jackson's last works.
Mrs. Knollys--Frederic J. Stimson
"Triple blockhead!" said he; "triple blockhead, thou art so bad as Splüthner." No self-condemnation could have been worse to him than this. Thinking again of Mrs. Knollys, he gave one deep, gruff sob. Then he took his hat, and going out, wandered by the shore of the glacier in the night, repeating to himself the Englishwoman's words: "They said that they hoped he could be recovered."
She was, indeed, not quite lonely, for a few friends still toiled up now and then to her room; but their visits grew rare as the years went by. Mrs. Manstey had never been a sociable woman, and during her husband's lifetime his companionship had been all- sufficient to her. For many years she had cherished a desire to live in the country, to have a hen-house and a garden; but this longing had faded with age, leaving only in the breast of the uncommunicative old woman a vague tenderness for plants and animals. It was, perhaps, this tenderness which made her cling so fervently to her view from her window, a view in which the most optimistic eye would at first have failed to discover anything admirable.
The gray morning was in Pocklington Square as she drove away in her fly. So did the other people go away. How green and sallow some of the girls looked, and how awfully clear Mrs. Colonel Bludyer's rouge was! Lady Jane Ranville's great coach had roared away down the streets long before. Fred Minchin pattered off in his clogs: it was I who covered up Miss Meggot, and conducted her, with her two old sisters, to the carriage. Good old souls! They have shown their gratitude by asking me to tea next Tuesday.
Full title: A MOST PLEASANT COMEDY OF MUCEDORUS THE KING'S SON OF VALENTIA, AND AMADINE, THE KING'S DAUGHTER OF ARRAGON
Having seen his portmanteaus safely housed in the hotel he chose, and having appointed his dinner hour, Barbox Brothers went out for a walk in the busy streets. And now it began to be suspected by him that Mugby Junction was a Junction of many branches, invisible as well as visible, and had joined him to an endless number of by-ways. For, whereas he would, but a little while ago, have walked these streets blindly brooding, he now had eyes and thoughts for a new external world.
He was talking to the center of the room and his eyes were insane. "You've followed me long enough! I won't have it! Death is sweeter than life! 'For what are these when the race is run and ye pause at the farthest door. Ah, better be dead than alive; but best is ne'er to be born'!"
"That funny guy, Brent," snorted Lundig, steadying himself against the desk. "Every night, when the sun goes down, he goes out into the marsh. Kind of sneaks into the mist, he does. Guess he's after butterflies. Looked funny, he did. Pretended he didn't see me."
Doc and his men were not aware of it, but some of the devices that had been aboard the plane near the Aleutians were in Zoro's hands. As the Narwhal moved away from shore into the Columbia, the earth near by trembled slightly. The shock was communicated to the hull of the ship.
Inspector Carnahan meant by that it was his belief "Whitey" Jano had become a crook of a little higher order. His record showed he had been brought in twice, charged with forms of extortion that savored of a shrewd confidence game. And Whitey Jano had moved from a hangout on the lower East Side to a luxurious penthouse in the vicinity of Central Park.
"I don't know how you found out," he said finally. "I've been keeping figures on construction jobs for years. What the city bought and what it got. The difference is straight graft, and I've got all the names and a couple of canceled checks. You seem to know, Tony, but why should I hand any of it over to you?"
Heart of France for a hundred years,/Passionate, sensitive, proud, and strong,/Quick to throb with her hopes and fears,/Fierce to flame with her sense of wrong!/You, who hailed with a morning song/Dream-light gilding a throne of old:/You, who turned when the dream grew cold,--by Henry van Dyke
Lady Bothwell listened to her sister without attempting to console her. Probably she might be of opinion that even the worst intelligence which could be received from Flanders might not be without some touch of consolation; and that the Dowager Lady Forester, if so she was doomed to be called, might have a source of happiness unknown to the wife of the gayest and finest gentleman in Scotland. This conviction became stronger as they learned from inquiries made at headquarters that Sir Philip was no longer with the army-though whether he had been taken or slain in some of those skirmishes which were perpetually occurring
"Oh, that part's easy!" I assured him. "The fitting-out part you can safely leave to me." I assumed a confidence that I hoped he might believe was real. "There's always a tramp steamer in the Erie Basin," I said, "that one can charter for any kind of adventure, and I have the addresses of enough soldiers of fortune, filibusters, and professional revolutionists to man a battle-ship, all fine fellows in a tight corner.
In fact you will find that, just as with us in America, the benefit of prohibition is intended to fall on the poorer classes. There is no desire to interfere with the rich.--by Stephen Leacock
The story told me by the bakers of their election experiences had the quality of our own Wild West during its pioneer days. Tchekists with loaded guns were in the habit of attending gatherings of the unions and they made it clear what would happen if the workers should fail to elect a Communist. But the bakers, a strong and militant organization, would not be intimidated. They declared that no bread would be baked in Moscow unless they were permitted to elect their own candidate.
With this I drew from my deep sailor's pocket my seaman's protection, as before described. The merest glance at the paper satisfied him, and he took my fare and went on about his business. This moment of time was one of the most anxious I ever experienced. Had the conductor looked closely at the paper, he could not have failed to discover that it called for a very different-looking person from myself
His former lessons had been held in such high esteem by those who were privileged to receive them, that he was soon sought after on all sides. The schools of the two principal county towns put forward their claims, and considered it a favour to receive his instructions. Morning, noon, and night he was engaged; even if he had not proudly withdrawn himself from all merely society engagements, he would have had no leisure for them.
There is a common notion that animals are better meteorologists than men, and I have little doubt that in immediate weather-wisdom they have the advantage of our sophisticated senses (though I suspect a sailor or shepherd would be their match), but I have seen nothing that leads me to believe their minds capable of erecting the horoscope of a whole season, and letting us know beforehand whether the winter will be severe or the summer rainless. --by James Russell Lowell
Before I had seen the background of a great lady's life, I had thought it all play and fine doings. But whatever other grand people are, my lady was never idle. For one thing, she had to superintend the agent for the large Hanbury estate. I believe it was mortgaged for a sum of money which had gone to improve the late lord's Scotch lands; but she was anxious to pay off this before her death, and so to leave her own inheritance free of incumbrance to her son
"But, bless my heart, is he an old fool after all?" This exclamation was drawn from me by the fact that a moment had scarcely elapsed after Miss Perkins' disappearance from the street, when the old fellow trotted out from his door, and looked keenly in the direction she had taken. And he looked more than keenly - he looked vicious and determined, and like a man who had made up his mind to a certain thing, and would go through with it, even if all sorts of obstacles should be encountered on the way
We had a jubilant fortnight in working the particulars of these things out. It was not possible for Clemens to write like anybody else, but I could very easily write like Clemens, and we took the play scene and scene about, quite secure of coming out in temperamental agreement. The characters remained for the most part his, and I varied them only to make them more like his than, if possible, he could.
My Memories of Eighty Years--Chauncey M. Depew
As secretary of state it was my duty to have the papers all prepared for execution as soon as the college had voted, and to attach to them the great seal of the State, and then they were sent by special messenger to Washington to be delivered to the House of Representatives. Mr. Greeley, at the opening of the session, said to me: "Chauncey, as I am not very familiar with parliamentary law, I wish you would take a seat on the steps beside me here
MY NEW YEAR'S EVE AMONG THE MUMMIES--J. Arbuthnot Wilson
'I beg ten thousand pardons for my intrusion,' I answered apologetically: 'but I did not know that this Pyramid was inhabited, or I should not have entered your residence so rudely. As for the points you wish to know, I am an English tourist, and you will find my name upon this card;' saying which I handed her one from the case which I had fortunately put into my pocket, with conciliatory politeness. The princess examined it closely, but evidently did not understand its import.
My Own True Ghost Story--Rudyard Kipling
For bleak, unadulterated misery that dak-bungalow was the worst of the many that I had ever set foot in. There was no fireplace, and the windows would not open; so a brazier of charcoal would have been useless. The rain and the wind splashed and gurgled and moaned round the house, and the toddy palms rattled and roared. Half a dozen jackals went through the compound singing, and a hyena stood afar off and mocked them.
I guess he'd about made up his mind to do it; but that afternoon they had us three to one in the ninth, and we got the bases full, with two down and Larry's turn to hit. Elliott had been sittin' on the bench sayin' nothin'. "Do you think you can hit one today? says John. "I can hit one any day, says Elliott.
It was not long before I perceived that the slanting of my bed was becoming less and less, and also I was quite sure that the house was moving more slowly. Then the crackings and snappings before my front wall ceased altogether. The bed resumed its ordinary horizontal position, and although I did not know at what moment the house had ceased sliding and had come to a standstill, I was sure that it had done so.
Brake came no more. I said nothing to Elsie about his prohibition, and his name was never mentioned. It seemed strange to me that she should not speak of his absence, and I was very much puzzled by her silence. Her moodiness seemed to have increased, and, what was most remarkable, in proportion as she grew more and more reserved, the intenser were the bursts of affection which she exhibited for me.
She had lain there an hour perhaps when she was startled from a slow reverie by a sharp cry which seemed to proceed from the adjoining room. She sat up in bed and listened, and in a minute it was repeated. It sounded exactly like the plaint of a weary child stopped summarily by the placing of a hand over its mouth. In the dark silence her bewilderment shaded gradually off into uneasiness. She waited for the cry to recur, but straining her ears she heard only the intense crowded stillness of three o'clock. She wondered where Knowleton slept, remembered that his bedroom was over in the other wing just beyond his mother's.
After they had departed, there was no stirring in the shadow to indicate Doc Savage had also moved. But he had changed position; doing so with the almost uncanny stealth of which he was capable. He was, in fact, now not more than a score of feet from Captain Flamingo and his two comrades. He could hear the trio quarreling.
Fair and Brown had new dresses, and went to church every Sunday. Trembling was kept at home to do the cooking and work. They would not let her go out of the house at all; for she was more beautiful than the other two, and they were in dread she might marry before themselves.--by Jeremiah Curtain
Myths and Legends of the Celtic Race
In his time was the glory of the "Red Branch" in Ulster, who were the offspring of Ross the Red, King of Ulster, with collateral relatives and allies, forming ultimately a kind of warlike Order. Most of the Red Branch heroes appear in the Ultonian Cycle of legend, so that a statement of their names and relationships may be usefully placed here before we proceed to speak of their doings.--by Thomas Rolleston
Myths and Legends of the Sioux--Marie McLaughlin
The two brothers lashed their ponies and came back to camp. They told their story, but were not believed. "The woman has killed herself and my brothers will not tell me," said the husband. However, the whole village broke camp and came back to the place where they had left the woman. Sure enough, she sat there still, a block of stone.