BROWN WOLF She had delayed, because of the dew-wet grass, in order to put on her overshoes, and when she emerged from the house found her waiting husband absorbed in the wonder of a bursting almond-bud. She sent a questing glance across the tall grass and in and out among the orchard trees. "Where's Wolf?" she asked. "He was here a moment ago." Walt Irvine drew himself away with a... more...

WHEN GOD LAUGHS (with compliments to Harry Cowell) "The gods, the gods are stronger; timeFalls down before them, all men's kneesBow, all men's prayers and sorrows climbLike incense toward them; yea, for theseAre gods, Felise." Carquinez had relaxed finally. He stole a glance at the rattling windows, looked upward at the beamed roof, and listened for a moment to the savage roar of the... more...

THE HOUSE OF PRIDE Percival Ford wondered why he had come.  He did not dance.  He did not care much for army people.  Yet he knew them all—gliding and revolving there on the broad lanai of the Seaside, the officers in their fresh-starched uniforms of white, the civilians in white and black, and the women bare of shoulders and arms.  After two years in Honolulu the Twentieth was departing to its... more...

CHAPTER 1 "You hear me, Saxon? Come on along. What if it is the Bricklayers? I'll have gentlemen friends there, and so'll you. The Al Vista band'll be along, an' you know it plays heavenly. An' you just love dancin'—-" Twenty feet away, a stout, elderly woman interrupted the girl's persuasions. The elderly woman's back was turned, and the back-loose,... more...

CHAPTER I Not until Mister Haggin abruptly picked him up under one arm and stepped into the sternsheets of the waiting whaleboat, did Jerry dream that anything untoward was to happen to him.  Mister Haggin was Jerry’s beloved master, and had been his beloved master for the six months of Jerry’s life.  Jerry did not know Mister Haggin as “master,” for “master” had no place in Jerry’s... more...

CHAPTER I—SOMETHING TO BE DONE He was a very sick white man.  He rode pick-a-back on a woolly-headed, black-skinned savage, the lobes of whose ears had been pierced and stretched until one had torn out, while the other carried a circular block of carved wood three inches in diameter.  The torn ear had been pierced again, but this time not so ambitiously, for the hole accommodated no more than a... more...

CHAPTER I The one opened the door with a latch-key and went in, followed by a young fellow who awkwardly removed his cap.  He wore rough clothes that smacked of the sea, and he was manifestly out of place in the spacious hall in which he found himself.  He did not know what to do with his cap, and was stuffing it into his coat pocket when the other took it from him.  The act was done quietly and... more...

CHAPTER I "All ready, Miss Welse, though I'm sorry we can't spare one of the steamer's boats." Frona Welse arose with alacrity and came to the first officer's side. "We're so busy," he explained, "and gold-rushers are such perishable freight, at least—" "I understand," she interrupted, "and I, too, am behaving as though I were perishable.... more...

CHAPTER I Pictures! Pictures! Pictures! Often, before I learned, did I wonder whence came the multitudes of pictures that thronged my dreams; for they were pictures the like of which I had never seen in real wake-a-day life. They tormented my childhood, making of my dreams a procession of nightmares and a little later convincing me that I was different from my kind, a creature unnatural and accursed.... more...

ARGUMENT In the morning of the world, while his tribemakes its camp for the night in a grove, RedCloud, the first man of men, and the first manof the Nishinam, save in war, sings of the dutyof life, which duty is to make life more abundant.The Shaman, or medicine man, sings offoreboding and prophecy. The War Chief, whocommands in war, sings that war is the onlyway to life. This Red Cloud denies,... more...