Fiction Books

I.OF THE SOWER.Behold a sower going forthTo scatter o'er his field,The seed that in the harvest timeA rich return will yield.And as he sow'd some precious seeds,Were by the way-side thrown;The fowls of heaven descried them there,And soon the seed were gone.And other seeds fell from his handOn stony places round,And forthwith they sprung up, becauseThey had no depth of ground.But when the sun... more...

EARLY DAYS It may be remembered that in the last pages of his diary, written just before his death, Allan Quatermain makes allusion to his long dead wife, stating that he has written of her fully elsewhere. When his death was known, his papers were handed to myself as his literary executor. Among them I found two manuscripts, of which the following is one. The other is simply a record of events wherein... more...

CHAPTER I. WAR CLOUDS.   Now lower the dreadful clouds of war;  Its threatening thunder rolls afar;  Near and more near the rude alarms  Of conflict and the clash of arms  Advance and grow, till all the air  Rings with the brazen trumpet blare. Towards the close of a sultry day in July, in the year 1812, might have been seen a young man riding along the beautiful west bank of the Niagara... more...

Directly below the old fort of San Cristobal, in San Juan, Porto Rico, projecting out over the sea from a corner of the sea wall, is a sentry box. Years ago a sentry, placed on duty at this lonely post, utterly disappeared, leaving behind only his musket and side-arms. His disappearance was so mysterious that it was attributed to sea-devils, and the sentry box has ever since been given a wide berth by... more...

CHAPTER I. Just where the red track of the Los Gatos road streams on and upward like the sinuous trail of a fiery rocket until it is extinguished in the blue shadows of the Coast Range, there is an embayed terrace near the summit, hedged by dwarf firs. At every bend of the heat-laden road the eye rested upon it wistfully; all along the flank of the mountain, which seemed to pant and quiver in the... more...

ETIQUETTE AND ITS USES. THERE are a great many people, in other respects perfectly estimable (which makes the complaint against them the more grievous) who maintain that the laws of nature are the only laws of binding force among the units which compose society. They do not assert their doctrine in so many words, but practically they avow it, and they are not slow to express their contempt for the... more...

CHAPTER I "I love Nunsmere," said the Literary Man from London. "It is a spot where faded lives are laid away in lavender." "I'm not a faded life, and I'm not going to be laid away in lavender," retorted Zora Middlemist. She turned from him and handed cakes to the Vicar. She had no desire to pet the Vicar, but he was less unbearable than the Literary Man from London... more...

PREFACE This book is intended to be used as a supplementary historical reader for the sixth and seventh grades of our public schools, or for any other pupils from twelve to fifteen years of age. It is also designed for collateral reading in connection with the study of a formal text-book on American history. The period here included is the first fifty years of our national life. No attempt has been... more...

AN OUTCAST. CHAPTER I. CHARLESTON. This simple story commences on a November evening, in the autumn of 185-. Charleston and New York furnish me with the scenes and characters. Our quaint old city has been in a disquiet mood for several weeks. Yellow fever has scourged us through the autumn, and we have again taken to scourging ourselves with secession fancies. The city has not looked up for a month.... more...

I. ESTHER[*] [* From the Old Testament, Authorized Version.] AUTHOR UNKNOWN [Setting. The events take place in Susa, the capital of Persia, in the reign of Ahasuerus, or Xerxes (485-465 B.C.). This foreign locale intensifies the splendid Jewish patriotism that breathes through the story from beginning to end. If the setting had been in Jerusalem, Esther could not have preached the noble doctrine,... more...