An Historical Mysteryby Honore de BalzacTranslated by Katharine Prescott WormeleyDEDICATIONTo Monsieur de Margone.In grateful remembrance, from his guest at the Chateau de Sache.De Balzac.AN HISTORICAL MYSTERYPART ICHAPTER IJUDASThe autumn of the year 1803 was one of the finest in the early part ofthat period of the present century which we now call "Empire." Rainhad refreshed the earth during the month of October, so that the treeswere still green and leafy in November. The French people werebeginning to put faith in a secret understanding between the skies and...
My Mark Twainby William Dean HowellsI.It was in the little office of James T. Fields, over the bookstore ofTicknor & Fields, at 124 Tremont Street, Boston, that I first met myfriend of now forty-four years, Samuel L. Clemens. Mr. Fields was thenthe editor of The Atlantic Monthly, and I was his proud and gladassistant, with a pretty free hand as to manuscripts, and an unmanacledcommand of the book-notices at the end of the magazine. I wrote nearlyall of them myself, and in 1869 I had written rather a long notice of abook just winning its way to universal favor. In this review I had...
ENDYMION: A POETIC ROMANCEby John KeatsPREFACE"The stretched metre of an antique song"INSCRIBED TO THE MEMORY OF THOMAS CHATTERTONPREFACEKNOWING within myself the manner in which this Poem has beenproduced, it is not without a feeling of regret that I make it public.What manner I mean, will be quite clear to the reader, who must soonperceive great inexperience, immaturity, and every error denoting afeverish attempt, rather than a deed accomplished. The two first...
ARTAXERXES437-359 B.C.by Plutarchtranslated by John DrydenTHE first Artaxerxes, among all the kings of Persia the mostremarkable for a gentle and noble spirit, was surnamed theLong-handed, his right hand being longer than his left, and was theson of Xerxes. The second, whose story I am now writing, who had thesurname of the Mindful, was the grandson of the former, by hisdaughter Parysatis, who brought Darius four sons, the eldestArtaxerxes, the next Cyrus, and two younger than these, Ostanes and...
The Book of TeaThe Book of Teaby Kakuzo Okakura1- Page 2-The Book of TeaI. The Cup of HumanityTea began as a medicine and grew into a beverage. In China, in theeighth century, it entered the realm of poetry as one of the politeamusements. The fifteenth century saw Japan ennoble it into a religionof aestheticismTeaism. Teaism is a cult founded on the adoration of the...
Tales of Trail and Townby Bret HarteCONTENTSTHE ANCESTORS OF PETER ATHERLYTWO AMERICANSTHE JUDGMENT OF BOLINAS PLAINTHE STRANGE EXPERIENCE OF ALKALI DICKA NIGHT ON THE DIVIDETHE YOUNGEST PROSPECTOR IN CALAVERASA TALE OF THREE TRUANTSTALES OF TRAIL AND TOWNTHE ANCESTORS OF PETER ATHERLYCHAPTER IIt must be admitted that the civilizing processes of Rough andReady were not marked by any of the ameliorating conditions ofother improved camps. After the discovery of the famous "Eureka"...
Hieroby XenophonTranslation by H. G. DakynsXenophon the Athenian was born 431 B.C. He was apupil of Socrates. He marched with the Spartans,and was exiled from Athens. Sparta gave him landand property in Scillus, where he lived for manyyears before having to move once more, to settlein Corinth. He died in 354 B.C.The Hiero is an imaginary dialogue, c. 474 B.C.,between Simonides of Ceos, the poet; and Hieron,of Syracuse and Gela, the despot....
Active Serviceby Steven CraneCHAPTER I.MARJORY walked pensively along the hall. In the cool shadows made by the palms on the window ledge, her face wore the expression of thoughtful melancholy expected on the faces of the devotees who pace in cloistered gloom. She halted before a door at the end of the hall and laid her hand on the knob. She stood hesitating, her head bowed. It was evident that this mission was to require great fortitude.At last she opened the door. " Father," she began at once. There was disclosed an elderly, narrow-faced man seated at a large table and surrounded by manuscr
ConclusionTo the sick the doctors wisely recommend a change of air andscenery. Thank Heaven, here is not all the world. The buckeye doesnot grow in New England, and the mockingbird is rarely heard here.The wild goose is more of a cosmopolite than we; he breaks his fastin Canada, takes a luncheon in the Ohio, and plumes himself for thenight in a southern bayou. Even the bison, to some extent, keepspace with the seasons cropping the pastures of the Colorado onlytill a greener and sweeter grass awaits him by the Yellowstone. Yet...
A LAW BEYOND THE CONSTITUTION_To John B. Colvin__Monticello, September 20, 1810_SIR, Your favor of the 14th has been duly received, and Ihave to thank you for the many obliging things respecting myselfwhich are said in it. If I have left in the breasts of my fellowcitizens a sentiment of satisfaction with my conduct in thetransaction of their business, it will soften the pillow of my reposethrough the residue of life.The question you propose, whether circumstances do notsometimes occur, which make it a duty in officers of high trust, to...
CINDERELLA,OR THE LITTLE GLASS SLIPPERONCE there was a gentleman who married, for hissecond wife, the proudest and most haughty woman thatwas ever seen. She had, by a former husband, twodaughters of her own humor, who were, indeed, exactlylike her in all things. He had likewise, by another wife,a young daughter, but of unparalleled goodness andsweetness of temper, which she took from her mother, who wasthe best creature in the world.No sooner were the ceremonies of the wedding over butthe mother-in-law began to show herself in her true colors....
Erewhon Revisitedby Samuel ButlerErewhon Revisited Twenty Years Later Both by the OriginalDiscoverer of the Country and by his Son.I forget when, but not very long after I had published "Erewhon" in1872, it occurred to me to ask myself what course events in Erewhonwould probably take after Mr. Higgs, as I suppose I may now callhim, had made his escape in the balloon with Arowhena. Given apeople in the conditions supposed to exist in Erewhon, and giventhe apparently miraculous ascent of a remarkable stranger into theheavens with an earthly bridewhat would be the effect on the...
FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSENHOLGER DANSKEby Hans Christian AndersenIN Denmark there stands an old castle named Kronenburg, close bythe Sound of Elsinore, where large ships, both English, Russian, andPrussian, pass by hundreds every day. And they salute the old castlewith cannons, "Boom, boom," which is as if they said, "Good-day."And the cannons of the old castle answer "Boom," which means "Manythanks." In winter no ships sail by, for the whole Sound is coveredwith ice as far as the Swedish coast, and has quite the appearance...
A Smaller History of Greeceby William SmithCONTENTS.CHAPTER I . . Geography of Greece.CHAPTER II . . Origin of the Greeks, and the Heroic Age.CHAPTER III . . General Survey of the Greek People.National Institutions.CHAPTER IV . . Early History of Peloponnesus and Sparta tothe end of the Messenian Wars, B.C. 668.CHAPTER V . . Early History of Athens down to theEstablishment of Democracy by Clisthenes,B.C. 510.CHAPTER VI . . The Greek Colonies.CHAPTER VII . . The Persian Wars.From the Ionic Revolt to...
The Silverado Squattersby Robert Louis StevensonTHE scene of this little book is on a high mountain. Thereare, indeed, many higher; there are many of a nobler outline.It is no place of pilgrimage for the summary globe-trotter;but to one who lives upon its sides, Mount Saint Helena soonbecomes a centre of interest. It is the Mont Blanc of onesection of the Californian Coast Range, none of its nearneighbours rising to one-half its altitude. It looks down onmuch green, intricate country. It feeds in the spring-time...
The Garden PartyThe Garden PartyBy Katherine Mansfield1- Page 2-The Garden Party1. AT THE BAY.Chapter 1.I.Very early morning. The sun was not yet risen, and the whole ofCrescent Bay was hidden under a white sea-mist. The big bush-coveredhills at the back were smothered. You could not see where they ended...