Hector Macintosh was a young man about five-and-twenty, who, with the proclivities of the Celt, inherited also some of the consequent disabilities, as well as some that were accidental. Among the rest was a strong tendency to regard only the ideal, and turn away from any authority derived from an inferior source. His chief delight lay in the attempt to embody, in what seemed to him the natural form of... more...

CHAPTER 1 Curdie was the son of Peter the miner. He lived with his father and mother in a cottage built on a mountain, and he worked with his father inside the mountain. A mountain is a strange and awful thing. In old times, without knowing so much of their strangeness and awfulness as we do, people were yet more afraid of mountains. But then somehow they had not come to see how beautiful they are as... more...

CHAPTER I. CASTLE WARLOCK. A rough, wild glen it was, to which, far back in times unknown to its annals, the family had given its name, taking in return no small portion of its history, and a good deal of the character of its individuals. It lay in the debatable land between highlands and lowlands; most of its inhabitants spoke both Scotch and Gaelic; and there was often to be found in them a notable... more...

WITHIN AND WITHOUT PART I.   Go thou into thy closet; shut thy door;  And pray to Him in secret: He will hear.  But think not thou, by one wild bound, to clear  The numberless ascensions, more and more,  Of starry stairs that must be climbed, before  Thou comest to the Father's likeness near,  And bendest down to kiss the feet so dear  That, step by step, their mounting flights... more...

THE MAN OF SONGS. "Thou wanderest in the land of dreams,  O man of many songs!To thee what is, but looks and seems;  No realm to thee belongs!" "Seest thou those mountains, faint and far,  O spirit caged and tame?""Blue clouds like distant hills they are,  And like is not the same." "Nay, nay; I know each mountain well,  Each cliff, and peak, and dome!In that... more...

A HIDDEN LIFE. Proudly the youth, by manhood sudden crowned,Went walking by his horses to the plough,For the first time that morn. No soldier gayFeels at his side the throb of the gold hilt(Knowing the blue blade hides within its sheath,As lightning in the cloud) with more delight,When first he belts it on, than he that dayHeard still the clank of the plough-chains againstThe horses' harnessed... more...

CHAPTER I. THE LANE. The rector sat on the box of his carriage, driving his horses toward his church, the grand old abbey-church of Glaston. His wife was inside, and an old woman—he had stopped on the road to take her up—sat with her basket on the foot-board behind. His coachman sat beside him; he never took the reins when his master was there. Mr. Bevis drove like a gentleman, in an easy,... more...

CHAPTER I. HOMILETIC. Dear Friends,—I am beginning a new book like an old sermon; but, as you know, I have been so accustomed to preach all my life, that whatever I say or write will more or less take the shape of a sermon; and if you had not by this time learned at least to bear with my oddities, you would not have wanted any more of my teaching. And, indeed, I did not think you would want any more.... more...

CHAPTER I. A WALK WITH MY WIFE. The autumn was creeping up on the earth, with winter holding by its skirts behind; but before I loose my hold of the garments of summer, I must write a chapter about a walk and a talk I had one night with my wife. It had rained a good deal during the day, but as the sun went down the air began to clear, and when the moon shone out, near the full, she walked the heavens,... more...

Chapter I My Boyhood. My father belonged to the widespread family of the Campbells, and possessed a small landed property in the north of Argyll. But although of long descent and high connection, he was no richer than many a farmer of a few hundred acres. For, with the exception of a narrow belt of arable land at its foot, a bare hill formed almost the whole of his possessions. The sheep ate over it,... more...