Fiction Books

CHAPTER I A SCRAP OF PAPER It was a dismal, sodden morning, with heavy clouds banked in the western sky. Rain had sloshed down since midnight so that the gutter in front of me was a turbid little river. A chill wind swept across the city and penetrated to the marrow. From the summit of the hill, three blocks above me, my car was sliding down, but I clung to the curb to postpone until the last moment a... more...

PRESENT AND ABSENT. "It shall be exactly as you please, my dear!" said Mr. Montfort. "I have no wish in the matter, save to fulfil yours. I had thought it would be pleasanter, perhaps, to have the rooms occupied; but your feeling is most natural, and there is no reason why you should not keep your present room." "Thank you, uncle!" said the girl whom he addressed as Margaret,... more...

PREFACE. An attempt to present to students a succinct history of the course of French literature compiled from an examination of that literature itself, and not merely from previous accounts of it is, I believe, a new one in English. There will be observed in the parts of this Short History a considerable difference of method; and as such a difference is not usual in works of the kind, it may be well... more...

Ludvig Holberg is generally considered the most remarkable of Danish writers. Though he produced books on international law, finance, and history, as well as satires, biographies, and moral essays, he is chiefly celebrated for his comedies, which still—nearly two hundred years after then composition—delight large audiences in Denmark, and bid fair to be immortal. These comedies were the fruit of... more...

CHAPTER 1 Rome had passed the summits and stood looking into the dark valley of fourteen hundred years. Behind her the graves of Caesar and Sallust and Cicero and Catullus and Vergil and Horace; before her centuries of madness and treading down; round about her a multitude sickening of luxury, their houses filled with spoil, their mouths with folly, their souls with discontent; above her only mystery... more...

OH, the Beautiful Mud! I always leave it on my boots. It is sacred to me. Because in it are the souls of lilies! The Hog should be a sacred beast. Hogs are Beautiful! They are close to the Mire! Oh, to be a Swine! What is more eloquent than a Sneeze? TheSneeze is the protest of the Free Spirit against theSmug Citizen who never exposes himself to a cold.Oh, Beautiful Sneezes! Oh, to make my life oneloud... more...

ABOUT BEING BANISHED I don't know yet whether I'm pleased or not, but I do know that I'm excited—more excited than I've ever been in my life, except perhaps when Miss Mackinstry, my last governess, had hysterics in the schoolroom and fainted among the tea things. I suppose I shan't be able to decide about the state of my feelings until I've had more of them on the same... more...

GOSSIPING HISTORY. "This is the Jew That Shakspeare drew." I do not know by whom or when the above couplet was first imputed to Pope. The following extracts will show how a story grows, and the parasites which, under unwholesome cultivation, adhere to it. The restoration of Shakspeare's text, and the performance of Shylock as a serious part, are told as usual. "In the dumb action of... more...

MY FIRST STAGE At last the tea came up, and soWith that our tongues began to go.Now in that house you’re sure of knowingThe smallest scrap of news that’s going.We find it there the wisest wayTo take some care of what we say. Recreation.  Jane Taylor. I was born on the 2nd September, 1886, in a small, dull, country town.  When I say the town was dull, I mean, of course, that the inhabitants were... more...

The tadpoles of this species have been described by Bragg (Copeia, 1936: 14-20, figs. 1-13; Amer. Midl. Nat., 18:273-284, figs. 1-5, 1937). The drawings and descriptions of the mouthparts, however, appear to have been taken from dried, or immature, or transforming individuals, for they do not agree among themselves nor do they agree with larvae obtained in the field and now in the Museum of Natural... more...