Fiction Books

KIDD'S TREASURE Captain Kidd is the most ubiquitous gentleman in history. If his earnings in the gentle craft of piracy were frugally husbanded, he has possibly left some pots of money in holes in the ground between Key West and Halifax. The belief that large deposits of gold were made at Gardiner's Island, Dunderberg, Cro' Nest, New York City, Coney Island, Ipswich, the marshes back of... more...

THE BAY OF SEVEN ISLANDS. The volume in which "The Bay of Seven Islands" was published was dedicated to the late Edwin Percy Whipple, to whom more than to any other person I was indebted for public recognition as one worthy of a place in American literature, at a time when it required a great degree of courage to urge such a claim for a pro-scribed abolitionist. Although younger than I, he had... more...

CHAPTER I FROM TAVERN TO THEATRE "Out of question, you were born in a merry hour," says Don Pedro to the blithesome heroine of "Much Ado About Nothing." "No, sure, my lord," answers Beatrice. "My mother cried; but then there was a star danced, and under that was I born." Surely a star, possibly Venus, must have danced gaily on a certain night in the year of grace 1683,... more...

CHAPTER I. St. Albans, Vermont is near the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, and only a short distance south of "Five-and-forty north degrees" which separates the United States from Canada, and some sixty or seventy miles from the great St. Lawrence River and the city of Montreal. Near here it was, on April 6th, 1820, I was born, so the record says, and from this point with wondering eyes of... more...

THE MANAGING PARTNER.   She is neither your partner, nor ours, nor anybody else's in particular. She is in general business, of which matrimony is only a department. How she came to be concerned in so many concerns, is a mystery of nature, like the origin of the Poet—or rather of black Topsy. The latter, you know, was not born at all, she never had no father nor mother, she was not made by... more...

THE SHE-WOLF Leonard Bilsiter was one of those people who have failed to find this world attractive or interesting, and who have sought compensation in an “unseen world” of their own experience or imagination—or invention.  Children do that sort of thing successfully, but children are content to convince themselves, and do not vulgarise their beliefs by trying to convince other people.  Leonard... more...

The country residence of Mr. John Hinckman was a delightful place to me, for many reasons. It was the abode of a genial, though somewhat impulsive, hospitality. It had broad, smooth-shaven lawns and towering oaks and elms; there were bosky shades at several points, and not far from the house there was a little rill spanned by a rustic bridge with the bark on; there were fruits and flowers, pleasant... more...

CHAPTER I Dawn held the world in stillness. In the vast stretches of barren hills and soft sands there was nothing living or stirring but the figure of an Englishman, standing at the door of his tent. At the hour of sunrise and sunset the East is its own. Every suggestion of Western influence and foreign invasion is wiped out. The going and the coming of the sun throws the land of the Pharaohs, the... more...

The sun warmed Mark Howell's back pleasantly. Underfoot, the mosslike stuff was soft and yielding, and there was a fragrance in the air unlike anything he had ever smelled. He was going to like this planet; he knew it. The question was, how would it, and its people, like him? He watched the little figures advancing across the fields from the mound, with the village out of sight on the other end of... more...

Brook and Waterfall California, the land of sunshine and roses, with its genial climate, its skies as blue as the far-famed skies of Venice, and its pure life-giving air, invites the lover of nature to take long tramps over hill and dale, mountain and valley, and to search out new trails in the rugged mountains. It is a common sight to see parties of men and women meet at the ferry building, dressed in... more...