Fiction Books

CHAPTER I THE ONLY HOPE 'To a large extent the working people of this country do not care any more for the doctrines of Christianity than the upper classes care for the practice of that religion.'—JOHN BRIGHT in the year 1880. It is wonderful how quickly, when a peril is past, men forget about it and straightway compose themselves to slumbrous dreams again. It was so after the Great War; it... more...

INTRODUCTION Conceive the joy of a lover of nature who, leaving the art galleries, wanders out among the trees and wild flowers and birds that the pictures of the galleries have sentimentalised. It is some such joy that the man who truly loves the noblest in letters feels when tasting for the first time the simple delights of Russian literature. French and English and German authors, too, occasionally,... more...

How strange it seems, after this long lapse of time, to look back upon those days, and after all that has come between. When I think of the child whose curious fancies, strange whims, and still stranger life, I am about to portray, I find myself inclining towards what is certainly a feeling of bewilderment, and one that might almost be said to be akin to physical pain. That the little fellow I see in... more...

INTRODUCTION. It has been claimed for James Barron Hope that he was "Virginia's Laureate." He did not deal in "abstractions, or generalized arguments," or vague mysticisms. He fired the imagination purely, he awoke lofty thoughts and presented, through his noble odes that which is the soul of "every true poem, a living succession of concrete images and pictures." James... more...

CHAPTER I With The American Army in France IT was a bright winter day near the middle of November, the ground hard with frost and light flurries of snow in the air.Over the sloping French countryside thousands of brown tents arose like innumerable, giant anthills, while curling above certain portions of the camp were long columns of smoke. American soldiers were walking about in a leisurely fashion, or... more...

THE MYSTERY OF WITCH-FACE MOUNTAIN. I. The beetling crags that hang here and there above the gorge hold in their rugged rock sculpture no facial similitudes, no suggestions. The jagged outlines of shelving bluffs delineate no gigantic profile against the sky beyond. One might seek far and near, and scan the vast slope with alert and expectant gaze, and view naught of the semblance that from time... more...

MANUEL shouldn't have been employed as a census taker. He wasn't qualified. He couldn't read a map. He didn't know what a map was. He only grinned when they told him that North was at the top. He knew better. But he did write a nice round hand, like a boy's hand. He knew Spanish, and enough English. For the sector that was assigned to him he would not need a map. He knew it... more...

THE MOORS IN SPAIN In the seventh century an Arab by the name of Mohammed, or Mahomet, established a new religion in the East. This religion was called Islam, meaning The Faith, and its followers were known as Mohammedans, Mussulmans, or Moslems. The principal article of their belief is expressed in the formula, "There is no God but Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet." The new faith spread... more...

AD LEUCONOENNay, query not, Leuconoë, the finish of the fable;Eliminate the worry as to what the years may hoard!You only waste your time upon the Babylonian Table—(Slang for the Ouija board).And as to whether Jupiter, the final, unsurpassed one,May add a lot of winters to our portion here below,Or this impinging season is to be our very last one—Really, I'd hate to know.Apply yourself to... more...

CHAPTER I. Philip's Arrival in New York. 'Tis not the practice of writers to choose for biography men who have made no more noise in the world than Captain Winwood has; nor the act of gentlemen, in ordinary cases, to publish such private matters as this recital will present. But I consider, on the one hand, that Winwood's history contains as much of interest, and as good an example of... more...