CHAPTER I. THE BIRTH OF THE TELEPHONE In that somewhat distant year 1875, when the telegraph and the Atlantic cable were the most wonderful things in the world, a tall young professor of elocution was desperately busy in a noisy machine-shop that stood in one of the narrow streets of Boston, not far from Scollay Square. It was a very hot afternoon in June, but the young professor had forgotten the heat and the grime of the workshop. He was... more...

INTRODUCTION. The most valuable part of a nation's history portrays its institutions of learning and religion. The alumni of a college which has moulded the intellectual and moral character of not a few of the illustrious living, or the more illustrious dead,—the oldest college in the valley of the Connecticut, and the only college in an ancient and honored State,—would neglect a most fitting and beautiful service, should they... more...

Preface The kindly reception accorded to the first volume of the Historical Nights Entertainment, issued in December of 1917, has encouraged me to prepare the second series here assembled. As in the case of the narratives that made up the first volume, I set out again with the same ambitious aim of adhering scrupulously in every instance to actual, recorded facts; and once again I find it desirable at the outset to reveal how far the... more...

PREFACE In approaching "The Historical Nights' Entertainment" I set myself the task of reconstructing, in the fullest possible detail and with all the colour available from surviving records, a group of more or less famous events. I would select for my purpose those which were in themselves bizarre and resulting from the interplay of human passions, and whilst relating each of these events in the form of a story, I would compel that story... more...

INTRODUCTION. § 1. Industrial Science, its Standpoint and Methods of Advance. § 2. Capital as Factor in Modern Industrial Changes. § 3. Place of Machinery in Evolution of Capitalism. § 4. The Monetary Aspect of Industry. § 5. The Literary Presentment of Organic Movement. § 1. Science is ever becoming more and more historical in the sense that it becomes more studiously anxious to show that the laws or... more...

INTRODUCTION The enclosure movement—the process by which the common-field system was broken down and replaced by a system of unrestricted private use—involved economic and social changes which make it one of the important subjects in English economic history. When it began, the arable fields of a community lay divided in a multitude of strips separated from each other only by borders of unplowed turf. Each landholder was in... more...

INTRODUCTORY NOTE.   he repulse of a British squadron, at Stonington, by a few undisciplined volunteers, having only two effective guns, imperfectly protected by a low earth-work,—and this repulse accomplished without the loss of a single life,—was not the least glorious achievement of the War of 1812-14. The fiftieth anniversary of the action is close at hand. Few who witnessed,—only three or four who participated in it,... more...

PREFACE. In preparing the pages that follow, the writer has had in view the desirability of familiarizing the youth of Georgia with the salient facts of the State's history in a way that shall make the further study of that history a delight instead of a task. The ground has been gone over before by various writers, but the narratives that are here retold, and the characterizations that are here attempted, have not been brought together... more...

CHAPTER I THE COURTS AND BUILDINGS S t. John's College was founded in 1511, in pursuance of the intentions of the Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of King Henry VII. Approaching the College from the street we enter by the Great Gate. The gateway with its four towers is the best example of the characteristic Cambridge gate, and dates from the foundation of the College. It is built of red brick (the eastern counties marble), dressed with stone.... more...

THE SCIENCE OF HISTORY: A LECTURE DELIVERED AT THE ROYAL INSTITUTION February 5, 1864. Ladies and Gentlemen,—I have undertaken to speak to you this evening on what is called the Science of History. I fear it is a dry subject; and there seems, indeed, something incongruous in the very connection of such words as Science and History. It is as if we were to talk of the colour of sound, or the longitude of the rule-of-three. Where it is so... more...