Fiction Books

CHAPTER ISNOW ROSES A blizzard is covering the roads with a thick coating of snow. The horses are up to their fetlocks in it. The dark-green firs bend beneath its weight, and what has melted in the midday sun already hangs from the slender branches of the undergrowth in thick masses of icicles; and as the wind sweeps through the forest the ice-covered leaves and branches ring and jingle like fairy... more...

I. SPIRIT AND MATTER. In commencing a course of lectures on Mental Science, it is somewhat difficult for the lecturer to fix upon the best method of opening the subject. It can be approached from many sides, each with some peculiar advantage of its own; but, after careful deliberation, it appears to me that, for the purpose of the present course, no better starting-point could be selected than the... more...

The Naturalization of Foreign Words. There is no point on which usage is more uncertain and fluctuating than in regard to the words which we are always borrowing from foreign languages. Expression generally lags behind thought, and we are now more than ever handicapped by the lack of convenient terms to describe the new discoveries, and new ways of thinking and feeling by which our lives are enriched... more...

In order to deal effectively with pauperism, it is necessary to know the causes which lead to the impoverishment of individuals and masses of individuals, and to be familiar with the condition, manners, customs, habits, prejudices, feelings, and superstitions of the poor. We do not propose to institute an elaborate inquiry into the causes of pauperism, or to make the topic a subject of separate... more...

CHAPTER I. CHILDREN OF LIGHT. It was Sunday evening, and on Sundays Max Schurz, the chief of the London Socialists, always held his weekly receptions. That night his cosmopolitan refugee friends were all at liberty; his French disciples could pour in from the little lanes and courts in Soho, where, since the Commune, they had plied their peaceful trades as engravers, picture-framers,... more...

INTRODUCTION Ever since 1759, when Voltaire wrote "Candide" in ridicule of the notion that this is the best of all possible worlds, this world has been a gayer place for readers. Voltaire wrote it in three days, and five or six generations have found that its laughter does not grow old. "Candide" has not aged. Yet how different the book would have looked if Voltaire had written it a... more...

CHAPTER I THE LADY IN THE LIMOUSINE West, still attired in khaki uniform, but wearing the red chevron of honourable discharge on his left sleeve, sat in the Club writing room, his feet comfortably elevated, endeavouring to extract some entertainment from the evening paper. The news was not particularly interesting, however, and finally, obsessed with the feeling that it would soon be time for him to... more...

FOR BETTER OR WORSE Mr. George Wotton, gently pushing the swing doors of the public bar of the "King's Head" an inch apart, applied an eye to the aperture, in the hope of discovering a moneyed friend. His gaze fell on the only man in the bar a greybeard of sixty whose weather-beaten face and rough clothing spoke of the sea. With a faint sigh he widened the opening and passed through.... more...

THE TOWER OF OBLIVION I I think it is Edgar Allan Poe who says that while a plain thing may on occasion be told with a certain amount of elaboration of style, one that is unusual in its very nature is best related in the simplest terms possible. I shall adopt the second of these methods in telling this story of my friend, Derwent Rose. And I will begin straight away with that afternoon of the spring of... more...

Destroying the spirit of the enemy is the goal of war and the aliens had the best way! They never did discover whose fault it was. Fannia pointed out that if Donnaught had had the brains of an ox, as well as the build, he would have remembered to check the tanks. Donnaught, although twice as big as him, wasn't quite as fast with an insult. He intimated, after a little thought, that Fannia's... more...