Fiction Books

CHAPTER I MISS LADY Ah, but it was a sweet and wonderful thing to see Miss Lady dance, a strange and wondrous thing! She was so sweet, so strong, so full of grace, so like a bird in all her motions! Now here, now there, and back again, her feet scarce touching the floor, her loose skirt, held out between her dainty fingers, resembling wings, she swam through the air, up and down the room of the old... more...

THE LAW-BREAKERS I George Colfax was in an outraged frame of mind, and properly so. Politically speaking, George was what might be called, for lack of a better term, a passive reformer. That is, he read religiously the New York Nation, was totally opposed to the spoils system of party rewards, and was ostensibly as right-minded a citizen as one would expect to find in a Sabbath day's journey. He... more...

ACT I. A plain Tradesman's Room, with old fashioned Furniture. Master Clarenbach. (Busied with a design.) Clar. So!--there is my design, and I think it is a pretty good one. It will make a substantial building.--When I am gone, people will say, when they look at the pile, "Master Clarenbach was a man that knew what he was about." SCENE II. Enter Lewis. Lew. Deputy Clarenbach presents his... more...

THE LAY OF MARIE. CANTO FIRST.     The guests are met, the feast is near,    But Marie does not yet appear!    And to her vacant seat on high    Is lifted many an anxious eye.    The splendid show, the sumptuous board,    The long details which feuds afford,    And discontent is prone to hold,    Absorb the factious and the cold;—    Absorb dull minds, who, in... more...

Letter from Professor Albrecht Aigen, University of Brunn, to the Herr General Johann von Steppberg, retired. My dear General von Steppberg: It is with reluctance that I intrude upon your retirement, but at the request of the Government I have undertaken a scientific examination of the causes which brought about The Leader's rise to power, the extraordinary popularity of his regime, the... more...

SIR PERCY EXPLAINS It was not, Heaven help us all! a very uncommon occurrence these days: a woman almost unsexed by misery, starvation, and the abnormal excitement engendered by daily spectacles of revenge and of cruelty. They were to be met with every day, round every street corner, these harridans, more terrible far than were the men. This one was still comparatively young, thirty at most; would have... more...

ACT I. SCENE I.—ARMANDE, HENRIETTE. ARM. What! Sister, you will give up the sweet and enchanting title of maiden? You can entertain thoughts of marrying! This vulgar wish can enter your head! HEN. Yes, sister. ARM. Ah! Who can bear that "yes"? Can anyone hear it without feelings of disgust? HEN. What is there in marriage which can oblige you, sister, to…. ARM. Ah! Fie! HEN. What? ARM. Fie!... more...

THE LEATHERWOOD GOD Already, in the third decade of the nineteenth century, the settlers in the valley of Leatherwood Creek had opened the primeval forest to their fields of corn and tobacco on the fertile slopes and rich bottom-lands. The stream had its name from the bush growing on its banks, which with its tough and pliable bark served many uses of leather among the pioneers; they made parts of... more...

I. "A GREAT CASE" "A deed of dreadful note."—Macbeth. I had been a junior partner in the firm of Veeley, Carr & Raymond, attorneys and counsellors at law, for about a year, when one morning, in the temporary absence of both Mr. Veeley and Mr. Carr, there came into our office a young man whose whole appearance was so indicative of haste and agitation that I involuntarily rose at... more...

A HEREDITARY BEQUEST During the first week of Peter Margerison's first term at school, Urquhart suddenly stepped, a radiant figure on the heroic scale, out of the kaleidoscopic maze of bemusing lights and colours that was Peter's vision of his new life. Peter, seeing Urquhart in authority on the football field, asked, "Who is it?" and was told, "Urquhart, of course," with the... more...