Fiction Books

Coqueville is a little village planted in a cleft in the rocks, two leagues from Grandport. A fine sandy beach stretches in front of the huts lodged half-way up in the side of the cliff like shells left there by the tide. As one climbs to the heights of Grandport, on the left the yellow sheet of sand can be very clearly seen to the west like a river of gold dust streaming from the gaping cleft in the... more...

PREFACE In publishing this poem, the Author feels that some apology is needed. It deals with matters of a kind not usually treated in modern verse, and which ask to be approached, if at all, with dignity and reverence. He trusts that he will not be found lacking on this essential point. Nevertheless, he cannot expect but that he may wound by his plain speaking the feelings of those among his readers... more...

To all profound thinkers in the realms of Science who may chance to read Skylark Three, greetings: I have taken certain liberties with several more or less commonly accepted theories, but I assure you that those theories have not been violated altogether in ignorance. Some of them I myself believe sound, others I consider unsound, still others are out of my line, so that I am not well enough informed... more...

PREFACE. This book closes the series of the Littlepage Manuscripts, which have been given to the world, as containing a fair account of the comparative sacrifices of time, money and labour, made respectively by the landlord and the tenants, on a New York estate; together with the manner in which usages and opinions are changing among us; as well as certain of the reasons of these changes. The... more...

CHAPTER I THREE GIRLS It was a very cold blustering day in early January, and even brilliant thronged Broadway felt the influence of winter's harshest frown. There had been a heavy fall of snow which, though in the main cleared from the sidewalks, lay in the streets comparatively unsullied and unpacked. Fitful gusts of the passing gale caught it up and whirled it in every direction. From roof,... more...

PREFACE. THIS FOURTH READER is designed to pass the pupil from the comparatively easy ground occupied by the THIRD to the more difficult course embraced in THE UNION FIFTH READER, which is next higher in the series. It is, therefore, carefully graded to this intermediate position. In one sense, however, it is the most important in the set; since the great mass of pupils, in our common schools, are... more...

The sight of an Earthman on Vega III, where it was impossible for an outlander to be, brought angry crowds to surround John Crownwall as he strode toward the palace of Viceroy Tronn Ffallk, ruler of Sector XII of the Universal Holy Empire of Sunda. He ignored the snarling, the spitting, the waving of boneless prehensile fingers, as he ignored the heavy gravity and heavier air of the unfamiliar planet.... more...

BY THE BABE UNBORN If trees were tall and grasses short,  As in some crazy tale,If here and there a sea were blue  Beyond the breaking pale, If a fixed fire hung in the air  To warm me one day through,If deep green hair grew on great hills,  I know what I should do. In dark I lie: dreaming that there  Are great eyes cold or kind,And twisted streets and silent doors,  And living men behind.... more...

I A flash of lightning. t the stair-foot the landlord stopped me. "Here, lad, take a candle. The stairs are dark, and, since I like your looks, I would not have you break your neck." "And give the house a bad name," I said. "No fear of that; my house has a good name. There is no fairer inn in all Paris. And your chamber is a good chamber, though you will have larger, doubtless, when... more...

 hope, Carnes," said Dr. Bird, "that we get good fishing." "Good fishing? Will you please tell me what you are talking about?" "I am talking about fishing, old dear. Have you seen the evening paper?" "No. What's that got to do with it?" Dr. Bird tossed across the table a copy of the Washington Post folded so as to bring uppermost an item on page three. Carnes... more...