Fiction Books

Times are altered since Gray spoke of the young Etonians as a set of dirty boys playing at cricket. There are no such things as boys to be met with now, either at Eton or elsewhere; they are all men from ten years old upwards. Dirt also hath vanished bodily, to be replaced by finery. An aristocratic spirit, an aristocracy not of rank but of money, possesses the place, and an enlightened young gentleman... more...

Daptine is the secret of it. Adaptine, they called it first; then it got shortened to daptine. It let us adapt. They explained it all to us when we were ten years old; I guess they thought we were too young to understand before then, although we knew a lot of it already. They told us just after we landed on Mars. "You're home, children," the Head Teacher told us after we had gone into the... more...

INTRODUCTION. Dear Reader: Please look through this "Introduction" before beginning with the regular chapters. It is always well to know the object, aim, and mode of treatment of a book before reading it, so as to be able to look at it from the author's view-point. First: A word about the title—"Nature's Miracles." Some may claim that it is unscientific to speak of the... more...

CHAPTER I.           "O that sweet gleam of sunshine on the lake!"          WILSON'S City of the Plague If, reader, you have ever looked through a solar microscope at the monsters in a drop of water, perhaps you have wondered to yourself how things so terrible have been hitherto unknown to you—you have felt a loathing at the limpid element you hitherto deemed so... more...

CHAPTER I THE PERFECT BOARDING HOUSE It is queer, but Captain Cy himself doesn't remember whether the day was Tuesday or Wednesday. Asaph Tidditt's records ought to settle it, for there was a meeting of the board of selectmen that day, and Asaph has been town clerk in Bayport since the summer before the Baptist meeting house burned. But on the record the date, in Asaph's handwriting,... more...

ergeant Major Andrew McCloud ignored the jangling telephones and the excited jabber of a room full of brass, and lit a cigarette. Somebody had to keep his head in this mess. Everybody was about to flip. Like the telephone. Two days ago Corporal Bettijean Baker had been answering the rare call on the single line—in that friendly, husky voice that gave even generals pause—by saying, "Good... more...

The Tragedy. The river swirled on through the heat, the sweltering, fever-breathing heat. The long, deep reach made but scant murmur, save where the boughs of a luxuriant vegetation dipped on its surface. Above, on either hand, masses of rolling verdure, tall forest trees, undergrowth in rich profusion, and, high up against the blue sky, battlemented rock walls. Two dark objects relieved the shimmering... more...

Chapter One     Looking down from the cafe window at the man he'd just shot, Ed Cade saw the brilliant overhead flash reflected in the windows of the hotel across the street and realized that something -- likely the car -- had exploded above the city.    Some guy dressed as a knight was standing smack in the middle of the street, aiming a camera of some sort straight up at the sky. The light... more...

PART I. "Have I not in my time heard lions roar? Have I not heard the sea, puft up with wind, Rage like an angry boar chafed with sweat? Have I not heard great ordnance in the field, And heaven's artillery thunder in the skies? Have I not in the pitched battle heard Loud 'larums, neighing steeds, and trumpets clang?" SHAKSPEARE Why I give the world a sketch of my career through it, is... more...

"Such as I am, sir—no great subject for a boaster, I admit—you see in me a product of my time, sir, and of very worthy parents, I assure you."—Ezekiel Joy. As a very small lad, at home in Tarn Regis, I had but one close chum, George Stairs, and he went off with his father to Canada, while I was away for my first term at Elstree School. Then came Rugby, where I had several friends, but the... more...