Fiction Books

CHAPTER I THE QUARREL WITH THE ENGLISH Writing in 1725, the French naval commander, the Chevalier d'Albert, tells us that the three most handsome towns on the Ganges were Calcutta, Chandernagore, and Chinsurah, the chief Factories of the English, French, and Dutch. These towns were all situated within thirty miles of each other. Calcutta, the latest founded, was the greatest and the richest, owing... more...

IRENE "I suppose I am old-fashioned"—there was a murmur of polite dissent from all the ladies present, except the one addressed—"Oh, I take it as a compliment nowadays, I assure you; but when I was a girl a young lady would have no more thought of flying than of"—she paused almost on a note of pained surprise at finding the familiar comparison of a lifetime cut... more...

A DEFENCE OF PENNY DREADFULS One of the strangest examples of the degree to which ordinary life is undervalued is the example of popular literature, the vast mass of which we contentedly describe as vulgar. The boy's novelette may be ignorant in a literary sense, which is only like saying that a modern novel is ignorant in the chemical sense, or the economic sense, or the astronomical sense; but... more...

Epicurus's great confidant and familiar, Colotes, set forth a book with this title to it, that according to the tenets of the other philosophers it is impossible to live. Now what occurred to me then to say against him, in the defence of those philosophers, hath been already put into writing by me. But since upon breaking up of our lecture several things have happened to be spoken afterwards in... more...

The little man had a head like an old-fashioned light bulb and a smile that seemed to say he had secrets from the rest of the world. He didn't talk much, just an occasional "Oh," "Mm" or "Ah." Krayton figured he must be all right, though. After all he'd been sent to Computer City by the Information Department itself, and his credentials must have been checked in a... more...

A small collection of Mexican reptiles and amphibians recently acquired by the University of Kansas Natural History Museum contains five specimens of a species of the genus Hyla (sensu lato) which is here described as new. Hyla proboscidea sp. nov. Type.—University of Kansas Museum of Natural History, No. 23626, collected 2 km. west of Jico, Veracruz, Mexico, at an elevation of 4,200 ft., Oct. 28,... more...

The performance in itself was crude and commonplace, but the demonstration in regard to it was unusual. Although this scene had been enacted both afternoon and evening for the past six weeks, the audience at the Vaudeville was showing its appreciation by an intent silence. The curtain had risen upon a street scene in the metropolis at night. Snow was falling, dimming the gas jets at the corner and... more...

In Search of the “Barbara.” “What’s the name of the craft you want to get aboard, sir?” asked old Bob, the one-legged boatman, whose wherry I had hired to carry me out to Spithead. “The Barbara,” I answered, trying to look more at my ease than I felt; for the old fellow, besides having but one leg, had a black patch over the place where his right eye should have been, while his left arm... more...

CHAPTER I."The sailor ploughs the raging main,"In hopes a competence to gain,"And when his toil and danger's o'er,"Safe anchors on his native shore."Sloop Rover.About the middle of May, in the year 1813, having a great desire to engage in some adventure; and hoping that fortune would smile upon my undertakings, I purchased of Messrs. Coddington & Thorp, of New-York,... more...

CHAPTER I. THE KINZER FARM, THE NEW SUIT, AND THE WEDDING. Between the village and the inlet, and half a mile from the great "bay," lay the Kinzer farm. Beyond the bay was a sandbar, and beyond that the Atlantic Ocean; for all this was on the southerly shore of Long Island. The Kinzer farm had lain right there—acre for acre, no more, no less—on the day when Hendrik... more...