Fiction Books

PREFACE. Abraham Lincoln has become the typical character of American institutions, and it is the purpose of this book, which is a true picture in a framework of fiction, to show how that character, which so commanded the hearts and the confidence of men, was formed. He who in youth unselfishly seeks the good of others, without fear or favor, may be ridiculed, but he makes for himself a character fit... more...

A'RON, a Moor, beloved by Tam'ora, queen of the Goths, in the tragedy of Titus Andron'icus, published among the plays of Shakespeare (1593). (The classic name is Andronicus, but the character of this play is purely fictitious.) Aaron (St.), a British martyr of the City of Legions (Newport, in South Wales). He was torn limb from limb by order of Maximian'us Hercu'lius, general... more...

CHAPTER ONE THE timber situation in the Tomah country was surcharged. When Ward Latisan came upon Rufus Craig, one afternoon in autumn, steel struck flint and trouble’s fuse was lighted. Their meeting was on the Holeb tote road just below Hagas Falls. Young Ward was the grandson of old John, a pioneer who was in his day a saw-log baron of the times of pumpkin pine; by heredity Ward was the foremost... more...

CHAPTER I Mrs. Munden had not yet been to my studio on so good a pretext as when she first intimated that it would be quite open to me—should I only care, as she called it, to throw the handkerchief—to paint her beautiful sister-in-law.  I needn’t go here more than is essential into the question of Mrs. Munden, who would really, by the way, be a story in herself.  She has a manner of her own of... more...

CHAPTER I THE HALL BY UNION STREET The orator was not eloquent; but he had told a human story and all listened with respect. When he paused and looked upward it seemed to many that a light of justice shone upon his haggard face while the tears rolled unwiped down his ragged jerkin. His lank, unkempt hair, caught by the draught from the open doors at the far end of the hall, streamed behind him in... more...

BONES AND BIG BUSINESS There was a slump in the shipping market, and men who were otherwisedecent citizens wailed for one hour of glorious war, when Kenyon LineDeferred had stood at 88 1/2, and even so poor an organization asSiddons Steam Packets Line had been marketable at 3 3/8. Two bareheaded men came down the busy street, their hands thrust into their trousers pockets, their sleek, well-oiled heads... more...

THE PROLOGUE I The resistless influences which are one day to reign supreme over our poor hearts, and to shape the sad short course of our lives, are sometimes of mysteriously remote origin, and find their devious ways to us through the hearts and the lives of strangers. While the young man whose troubled career it is here proposed to follow was wearing his first jacket, and bowling his first hoop, a... more...

CHAPTER I No one, probably, ever felt himself to be more alone in the world than our old friend, the Duke of Omnium, when the Duchess died. When this sad event happened he had ceased to be Prime Minister. During the first nine months after he had left office he and the Duchess remained in England. Then they had gone abroad, taking with them their three children. The eldest, Lord Silverbridge, had been... more...

CHAPTER I Death leapt upon the Rev. Charles Cardinal, Rector of St. Dreots in South Glebeshire, at the moment that he bent down towards the second long drawer of his washhand-stand; he bent down to find a clean collar. It is in its way a symbol of his whole life, that death claimed him before he could find one. At one moment his mind was intent upon his collar; at the next he was stricken with a wild... more...

The world is so taken up of late with novels and romances, that it will be hard for a private history to be taken for genuine, where the names and other circumstances of the person are concealed, and on this account we must be content to leave the reader to pass his own opinion upon the ensuing sheet, and take it just as he pleases. The author is here supposed to be writing her own history, and in the... more...