Fiction Books

INTRODUCTION. OUR generous friends in Georgia and South Carolina will not add among their assumptions that we know nothing of the South and Southern life. A residence of several years in those States, a connection with the press, and associations in public life, gave us opportunities which we did not lose, and have not lost sight of; and if we dipped deeper into the vicissitudes of life and law than... more...

CHAPTER I. I was born in the year one, of the present or Christian hera, and am, in consquints, seven-and-thirty years old. My mamma called me Charles James Harrington Fitzroy Yellowplush, in compliment to several noble families, and to a sellybrated coachmin whom she knew, who wore a yellow livry, and drove the Lord Mayor of London. Why she gev me this genlmn's name is a diffiklty, or rayther the... more...

The Magister Udal sat in the room of his inn in Paris, where customarily the King of France lodged such envoys as came at his expense. He had been sent there to Latinise the letters that passed between Sir Thomas Wyatt and the King's Ministers of France, for he was esteemed the most learned man in these islands. He had groaned much at being sent there, for he must leave in England so many... more...

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCING TO THE READER THE CHIEF PERSONAGE OF THIS NARRATIVE. At that famous period of history, when the seventeenth century (after a deal of quarrelling, king-killing, reforming, republicanising, restoring, re-restoring, play-writing, sermon-writing, Oliver-Cromwellising, Stuartising, and Orangising, to be sure) had sunk into its grave, giving place to the lusty eighteenth; when Mr.... more...

CHAPTER I 'Grandfather! I want to speak to you; please listen.' 'Well, who said I would not listen? But speak up, Biddy.' The old man put his hand to his ear, and his granddaughter leaned over the back of his chair. 'Don't call me Biddy, grandfather. I am Bryda.' 'Bryda! Phew! Your poor mother was called Biddy, and you ain't better than she was that I know... more...

I unpacked my things and went down to await luncheon. It was good to be here again in this little old sleepy hostel by the sea. Hostel I say, though it spelt itself without an "s" and even placed a circumflex above the "o." It made no other pretension. It was very cozy indeed. I had been here just a year before, in mid-February, after an attack of influenza. And now I had returned,... more...

CHAPTER I. FAITHFUL TO THE DEATH. The sun was setting gloriously over the hills which encompass Jerusalem, pouring its streams of golden light on the valleys clothed with the vine, pomegranate, and olive, sparkling on the brook Kedron, casting a rich glow on flat-roofed dwellings, parapets, and walls, and throwing into bold relief from the crimson sky the pinnacles of the Temple, which, at the period... more...

When a book about the literature of the eighteen-nineties was given by Mr. Holbrook Jackson to the world, I looked eagerly in the index for Soames, Enoch. It was as I feared: he was not there. But everybody else was. Many writers whom I had quite forgotten, or remembered but faintly, lived again for me, they and their work, in Mr. Holbrook Jackson's pages. The book was as thorough as it was... more...

A Holy Saint. T is in the Thebaïd, on the heights of a mountain, where a platform, shaped like a crescent, is surrounded by huge stones. The Hermit's cell occupies the background. It is built of mud and reeds, flat-roofed and doorless. Inside are seen a pitcher and a loaf of black bread; in the centre, on a wooden support, a large book; on the ground, here and there, bits of rush-work, a mat or... more...

PREFACE In literature there have been romantic pirates, gentlemanly pirates, kind-hearted pirates, even humorous pirates—in fact, all sorts and conditions of pirates. In life there was only one kind. In this book that kind appears. Several presentations—in the guise of novels—of pirates, the like of which never existed on land or sea, have recently appeared. A perusal of these interesting... more...