Fiction Books

SMAÏN "When the African is in love he plays upon the pipe." Sahara Saying. Far away in the desert I heard the sound of a flute, pure sound in the pure air, delicate, sometimes almost comic with the comicality of a child who bends women to kisses and to nonsense-words. We had passed through the sandstorm, Safti and I, over the wastes of saltpetre, and come into a land of palm gardens where... more...

Muirtown Seminary was an imposing building of the classical order, facing the north meadow and commanding from its upper windows a fine view of the river Tay running rapidly and cleanly upon its gravel bed. Behind the front building was the paved court where the boys played casual games in the breaks of five minutes between the hours of study, and this court had an entrance from a narrow back street... more...

CHAPTER I. The beauty of a farm yard on a Sabbath day, and what a difference a single letter will sometimes make in the legal signification of a sentence. It was during the Long Vacation—that period which is Paradise to the Rich and Purgatory to the Poor Lawyer—to say nothing of the client, who simply exists as a necessary evil in the economy of our enlightened system of Legal Procedure: it was... more...

I THE ROAD TO VARICKS' We drew bridle at the cross-roads; he stretched his legs in his stirrups, raised his arms, yawned, and dropped his huge hands upon either thigh with a resounding slap. "Well, good-bye," he said, gravely, but made no movement to leave me. "Do we part here?" I asked, sorry to quit my chance acquaintance of the Johnstown highway. He nodded, yawned again, and... more...

CHAPTER ONE         New York, New York. Friday, early September, dusk. Heading uptown on Madison. Sheets of icy rain washed the pavement, heralding the onslaught of autumn and the miserable winter to come. The city was poised for its cruelest months, that twilight of the spirit when strangers arm-wrestle for taxis, nobody has time to hold a door, and you cherish every fleeting human kindness.... more...

CHAPTER I. DR. SINGLETARY is dead! Well, what of it? All who live die sooner or later; and pray who wasDr. Singletary, that his case should claim particular attention? Why, in the first place, Dr. Singletary, as a man born to our common inheritance of joy and sorrow, earthly instincts and heavenward aspirations,—our brother in sin and suffering, wisdom and folly, love, and pride, and vanity,—has a... more...

1795-1881. CRITICISM AND BIOGRAPHY. The now famous biography of Thomas Carlyle, by Mr. Froude, shed a new light on the eccentric Scotch essayist, and in some respects changed the impressions produced by his own "Reminiscences" and the Letters of his wife. It is with the aid of those two brilliant and interesting volumes on Carlyle's "Earlier Life" and "Life in London,"... more...

AN UNSUITABLE FRIENDSHIP. Janetta was the music governess—a brown little thing of no particular importance, and Margaret Adair was a beauty and an heiress, and the only daughter of people who thought themselves very distinguished indeed; so that the two had not, you might think, very much in common, and were not likely to be attracted one to the other. Yet, in spite of differing circumstances, they... more...

enesee felt excitement surge like a living tide about him as he came with the other directors into the vast Tribunal Hall. Sixty years ago, inexcusable carelessness had deprived Earth of its first chance to obtain a true interstellar drive. Now, within a few hours, Earth, or more specifically, the upper echelons of that great political organization called the Machine which had controlled the affairs of... more...

THE OUPHE OF THE WOOD "An Ouphe!" perhaps you exclaim, "and pray what might that be?" An Ouphe, fair questioner,—though you may never have heard of him,—was a creature well known (by hearsay, at least) to your great-great-grandmother. It was currently reported that every forest had one within its precincts, who ruled over the woodmen, and exacted tribute from them in the shape of... more...