Fiction Books

CHAPTER I I had always suspected the geographical authorities did not know what they were talking about when they located the battlefield of Munda in the county of the Bastuli-Poeni, close to the modern Monda, some two leagues north of Marbella. According to my own surmise, founded on the text of the anonymous author of the Bellum Hispaniense, and on certain information culled from the excellent... more...

CHAPTER I "Drusilla Doane, O Drusilla Doane!" came waveringly around the corner; and the quavering voice was followed by a little old woman who peered at the line of old ladies sitting in the sun. "Is Drusilla Doane here?" she inquired, darting quick birdlike glances from her old eyes at the curious faces that looked up at her approach. A little white-haired woman stopped the darning of... more...

INTRODUCTION "The Prairie" was the third in order of Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales. Its first appearance was in the year 1827. The idea of the story had suggested itself to him, we are told, before he had finished its immediate forerunner, "The Last of the Mohicans." He chose entirely new scenes for it, "resolved to cross the Mississippi and wander over the desolate... more...

CHAPTER 1. Amory, Son of Beatrice Amory Blaine inherited from his mother every trait, except the stray inexpressible few, that made him worth while. His father, an ineffectual, inarticulate man with a taste for Byron and a habit of drowsing over the Encyclopedia Britannica, grew wealthy at thirty through the death of two elder brothers, successful Chicago brokers, and in the first flush of feeling that... more...

My Dear Elena, We had a conversation once, walking on your terrace, with the wind-rippled olives above and the quietly nodding cypress tufts below—about such writings as you chose to compare with carved cherry-stones. We disagreed, for it seemed to me that the world needed cherry-stone necklaces as much as anything else; and that the only pity was that most of its inhabitants could not afford such... more...

CHAPTER I MARJORIE'S HOME In the Maynards' side yard at Rockwell, a swingful of children was slowly swaying back and forth. The swing was one of those big double wooden affairs that hold four people, so the Maynards just filled it comfortably. It was a lovely soft summer day in the very beginning of June; the kind of day that makes anybody feel happy but a little bit subdued. The kind of day... more...

CHAPTER I he scene was an actress's dressing-room at the Odéon. Félicie Nanteuil, her hair powdered, with blue on her eyelids, rouge on her cheeks and ears, and white on her neck and shoulders, was holding out her foot to Madame Michon, the dresser, who was fitting on a pair of little black slippers with red heels. Dr. Trublet, the physician attached to the theatre, and a friend of the... more...

The eastern pipistrelle, Pipistrellus subflavus (Cuvier) in the western part of its range, occurs along the Río Grande and its tributaries as far west as northern Coahuila and Val Verde County, Texas. Specimens from those places represent a heretofore undescribed subspecies which may be named and described as follows: Type.—Female, adult, skin and skull; No. 48270, Univ. Kansas Mus. Nat. Hist.;... more...

Foreword       Anyone who examinesthe Zen arts is immediately struck by how modern they seem. Many of the most famous stone gardens are abstract expressionism pure and simple, created out of found objects. The ceramics of the sixteenth-century Zen artists could be interchanged with the rugged pots of our own contemporary crafts movement and few people would notice a difference. Ancient Zen... more...

A Charm Take of English earth as muchAs either hand may rightly clutch.In the taking of it breathePrayer for all who lie beneath—Not the great nor well-bespoke,But the mere uncounted folkOf whose life and death is noneReport or lamentation.Lay that earth upon thy heart,And thy sickness shall depart! It shall sweeten and make wholeFevered breath and festered soul;It shall mightily restrainOver-busy... more...