Fiction Books

My dear Dr. Russell,—Now that at length I take the step of printing my name in the Title-Page of this Volume, I trust I shall not be encroaching on the kindness you have so long shown to me, if I venture to follow it up by placing yours in the page which comes next, thus associating myself with you, and recommending myself to my readers by the association. Not that I am dreaming of bringing down upon... more...

CHAPTER I. It was on the last day of summer, 1846, that a large vessel of war lay in the stream of Boston Harbor; presently a dirty little steam tug, all bone and muscle, came burroughing alongside. The boatswain and his mates whistled with their silver pipes, like Canary birds, and the cry went forth, to heave up the anchor. Soon the ponderous grapnell was loosened from its hold, and our pigmy... more...

CHAPTER I A MAKER OF MAPS There was a rustle in the bushes, the sound of twigs snapping, a soft foot-fall on the dead leaves. Marche stopped, took his pipe out of his mouth, and listened. Patter! patter! patter! over the crackling underbrush, now near, now far away in the depths of the forest; then sudden silence, the silence that startles. He turned his head warily, right, left; he knelt noiselessly,... more...

CHAPTER I ELEMENTS OF EDUCATION If anybody cares to read a simple tale told simply, I, John Ridd, of the parish of Oare, in the county of Somerset, yeoman and churchwarden, have seen and had a share in some doings of this neighborhood, which I will try to set down in order, God sparing my life and memory. And they who light upon this book should bear in mind not only that I write for the clearing of... more...

CHAPTER I ELEMENTS OF EDUCATION If anybody cares to read a simple tale told simply, I, John Ridd, of the parish of Oare, in the county of Somerset, yeoman and churchwarden, have seen and had a share in some doings of this neighborhood, which I will try to set down in order, God sparing my life and memory. And they who light upon this book should bear in mind not only that I write for the clearing of... more...

THE WINDOWS You will remember that Socrates considers every soul of us to be at least three persons. He says, in a fine figure, that we are two horses and a charioteer. "The right-hand horse is upright and cleanly made; he has a lofty neck and an aquiline nose; his colour is white and his eyes dark; he is a lover of honour and modesty and temperance, and the follower of true glory; he needs no... more...

The Take-offHigh into air are the great New York buildings lifted by a ray whose source no telescope can find.It seemed only fitting and proper that the greatest of all leaps into space should start from Roosevelt Field, where so many great flights had begun and ended. Fliers whose names had rung—for a space—around the world, had landed here and been received by New York with all the pomp of... more...

CHAPTER I WHEREIN A LAD SEES MAKERS OF HISTORY "Has any one seen Eric Hamilton?" I asked. For an hour, or more, I had been lounging about the sitting-room of a club in Quebec City, waiting for my friend, who had promised to join me at dinner that night. I threw aside a news-sheet, which I had exhausted down to minutest advertisements, stretched myself and strolled across to a group of old... more...

I.—LORD STRANLEIGH ALL AT SEA. A few minutes before noon on a hot summer day, Edmund Trevelyan walked up the gang-plank of the steamship, at that moment the largest Atlantic liner afloat. Exactly at the stroke of twelve she would leave Southampton for Cherbourg, then proceed across to Queenstown, and finally would make a bee-line west for New York. Trevelyan was costumed in rough tweed of subdued... more...

CHAPTER I I Oliver Brand, the new member for Croydon (4), sat in his study, looking out of the window over the top of his typewriter. His house stood facing northwards at the extreme end of a spur of the Surrey Hills, now cut and tunnelled out of all recognition; only to a Communist the view was an inspiriting one. Immediately below the wide windows the embanked ground fell away rapidly for perhaps a... more...