Classics Books

PRELUDE. The heroic deeds of Highlanders, both in these islands and elsewhere, have been told in verse and prose, and not more often, nor more loudly, than they deserve. But we must remember, now and then, that there have been heroes likewise in the lowland and in the fen. Why, however, poets have so seldom sung of them; why no historian, save Mr. Motley in his "Rise of the Dutch Republic," has... more...

CHAPTER I A pretty girl looked out of the low-silled coffee-room window of the Quorn Arms at Great Bunbury, and threw a glance of roguish invitation at a watchful young man who was pretending to be busy in the courtyard. Then she disappeared. The young man lost no time in throwing down his broom, and, with a manifestly assumed air of indifference, approached the window. He looked in warily, then... more...

Chapter I The long, long road over the moors and up into the forest—who trod it into being first of all? Man, a human being, the first that came here. There was no path before he came. Afterward, some beast or other, following the faint tracks over marsh and moorland, wearing them deeper; after these again some Lapp gained scent of the path, and took that way from field to field, looking to his... more...

LECTURE I. It is my privilege to address you this afternoon on a subject in which science and poetry are blended in a happy conjunction. If there be a peculiar fascination about the earlier chapters of any branch of history, how great must be the interest which attaches to that most primeval of all terrestrial histories which relates to the actual beginnings of this globe on which we stand. In our... more...

PARTURITION WITHOUT PAIN. For some time past, my attention has been directed to the use of anæsthetics in parturition. I had often been requested by patients to administer chloroform to them during labour, but I had seen the ill effects of this drug in one instance so strongly and almost fatally developed, that I shrank from its use. After considerable reflection on the subject, I thought that if a... more...

CHAPTER I. A HALF STORY. When La Motte Cadillac first sailed up the Strait of Detroit he kept his impressions for after travelers and historians, by transcribing them in his journal. It was not only the romantic side, but the usefulness of the position that appealed to him, commanding the trade from Canada to the Lakes, "and a door by which we can go in and out to trade with all our allies."... more...

CHAPTER I. THE FESTIVAL. The sufferings of the long war still continued; still stood Frederick the Great with his army in the field; the tremendous struggle between Prussia and Austria was yet undecided, and Silesia was still the apple of discord for which Maria Theresa and Frederick II. had been striving for years, and for which, in so many battles, the blood of German brothers had been spilt.... more...

CHAPTER IA RATIONAL VOCAL METHODSong, so far as voice-production is concerned, is the result of physiological action, and as voice-production is the basis of all song, it follows that a singing method, to be correct, must be based on the correct physiological use of the vocal organs. The physiology of voice-production lies, therefore, at the very foundation of artistic singing. The proper physiological... more...

CHAPTER I "Faith, there's no man says more and knows less than yerself, I'm thinkin'." "About Ireland, yer riverence?" "And everything else, Mr. O'Connell." "Is that criticism or just temper, Father?" "It's both, Mr. O'Connell." "Sure it's the good judge ye must be of ignorance, Father Cahill." "And what might that... more...

The Sword of Welleran Where the great plain of Tarphet runs up, as the sea in estuaries, among the Cyresian mountains, there stood long since the city of Merimna well-nigh among the shadows of the crags. I have never seen a city in the world so beautiful as Merimna seemed to me when first I dreamed of it. It was a marvel of spires and figures of bronze, and marble fountains, and trophies of fabulous... more...