Fiction Books

INTRODUCTION Now that this book is printed, and about to be given to the world, a sense of its shortcomings both in style and contents, weighs very heavily upon me. As regards the latter, I can only say that it does not pretend to be a full account of everything we did and saw. There are many things connected with our journey into Kukuanaland that I should have liked to dwell upon at length, which, as... more...

The mantle of evening is veiling the sky,And over the landscape its soft shadows lie;The old year is passing, a new year will reign,Ere earth shall awaken to day-dawn again. Dear Grandma has folded her knitting away,And muses alone at the close of the day;While the old clock ticks solemnly off, one by one,The moments yet left to the year almost done. Out from the shadows fast filling the room,Out from... more...

CHAPTER I A GATHERING AT A CLUB That story of love and crime which figures in the records of the New York Detective Bureau as “The Yacht Mystery” has little to do with yachts and is no longer a mystery. It is concerned far more intimately with the troubles and trials of pretty Winifred Bartlett than with the vagaries of the restless sea; the alert, well-groomed figure of Winifred’s true lover,... more...

CHAPTER 1. A DESERT MEETING An automobile shot out from a gash in the hills and slipped swiftly down to the butte. Here it came to a halt on the white, dusty road, while its occupant gazed with eager, unsated eyes on the great panorama that stretched before her. The earth rolled in waves like a mighty sea to the distant horizon line. From a wonderful blue sky poured down upon the land a bath of... more...

ELLEN OF VILLENSKOV. There lies a wold in Vester Haf,   There builds a boor his hold;And thither he carries hawk and hound,   He’ll stay through winter’s cold. He takes with him both hound and cock,   He means there long to stay;The wild deer in the wood that are   For his arrival pay. He hews the oak and poplar tall,   He fells the good beech tree;Then fill’d was the laidly Trold with... more...

NORTH AMERICA, SIBERIA, AND RUSSIA. The circumnavigation of the world is now a matter of ordinary occurrence to our bold mariners: and after a few years it will be a sort of summer excursion to our steamers. We shall have the requisitions of the Travellers' Club more stringent as the sphere of action grows wider; and no man will be eligible who has not paid a visit to Pekin, or sunned himself in... more...

I A black bang was, but not ultimately, the most notable feature of her uncommon personality—straight and severe and dense across her clear pale brow and eyes. Her eyes were the last thing to remember and wonder about; in shade blue, they had a velvet richness, a poignant intensity of lovely color, that surprised the heart. Aside from that she was slim, perhaps ten years old, and graver than gay. Her... more...

"MARTIN OF NITENDI" Half-way up the side of the mountain which overlooked the waters of the little land-locked harbour there was a space clear of timber. Huge, jagged rocks, whose surfaces were covered with creepers and grey moss, protruded from the soil, and on the highest of these a man was lying at full length, looking at the gunboat anchored half a mile away. He was clothed in a girdle of... more...

CHAPTER. I The house stood on rising ground, and the nursery was at the top of the house—except of course for the attics above—so there was a good view from the two large windows. This was a great comfort to the children during the weeks they were busy getting better from a long, very long, illness, or illnesses. For they had been so unwise as to get measles, and scarlet fever, and something... more...

JANUARY.—THE BIRTH OF THE YEAR. Some poet has observed, that if any man would write down what has really happened to him in this mortal life, he would be sure to make a good book, though he never had met with a single adventure from his birth to his burial. How much more, then, must I, who HAVE had adventures, most singular, pathetic, and unparalleled, be able to compile an instructive and... more...