Classics Books

CHAPTER I THEY came into the hotel dining-room like young persons making their first entry into life. They carried themselves with an air of subdued audacity, of innocent inquiry. When the great doors opened to them they stood still on the threshold, charmed, expectant. There was the magic of quest, of pure, unspoiled adventure in their very efforts to catch the head-waiter's eye. It was as if... more...

CHAPTER I 1572 Marriages of Henri IV--Marguerite de Valois--Her character--Her marriage with the King of Navarre--Massacre of Saint Bartholomew--Henri, Duc d'Anjou, elected sovereign of Poland--Death of Charles IX--Accession of Henri III--Conspiracy of the Duc d'Alençon--Revealed by Marguerite--Henry of Navarre escapes from the French Court--Henry of Navarre protests against his enforced... more...

We all held our breath as the coach rushed through the semi-darkness of Galloper’s Ridge. The vehicle itself was only a huge lumbering shadow; its side-lights were carefully extinguished, and Yuba Bill had just politely removed from the lips of an outside passenger even the cigar with which he had been ostentatiously exhibiting his coolness. For it had been rumoured that the Ramon Martinez gang of... more...

Bedfordshire. COLMWORTH. Here is a magnificent monument, erected in 1611, by Lady Dyer, in memory of her deceased husband, Sir William Dyer, the inscription upon which tells us that “they multiplied themselves into seven children.”  Beneath are the following quaint lines:— My dearest dust, could not thy hasty dayAfford thy drowsy patience leave to stayOne hour longer, so that we might... more...

POEMS SUBJECTIVE AND REMINISCENT MEMORIES A beautiful and happy girl,With step as light as summer air,Eyes glad with smiles, and brow of pearl,Shadowed by many a careless curlOf unconfined and flowing hair;A seeming child in everything,Save thoughtful brow and ripening charms,As Nature wears the smile of SpringWhen sinking into Summer's arms. A mind rejoicing in the lightWhich melted through its... more...

CHAPTER I.East Anglia in 1837. In 1837 Lord Melbourne was Prime Minister—the handsomest, the most cultivated, the most courteous gentleman that ever figured in a Royal Court.  For his young mistress he had a loyal love, whilst she, young and inexperienced, naturally turned to him as her guide, philosopher and friend.  The Whigs were in office, but not in power.  The popular excitement that had... more...

Chapter I. Foreign Pastoral Poetry In approaching a subject of literary inquiry we are often able to fix upon some essential feature or condition which may serve as an Ariadne's thread through the maze of historical and aesthetic development, or to distinguish some cardinal point affording a fixed centre from which to survey or in reference to which to order and dispose the phenomena that present... more...

CHAPTER I DOCTOR MARY'S PAYING GUEST "Just in time, wasn't it?" asked Mary Arkroyd. "Two days before the—the ceremony! Mercifully it had all been kept very quiet, because it was only three months since poor Gilly was killed. I forget whether you ever met Gilly? My half-brother, you know?" "Only once—in Collingham Gardens. He had an exeat, and... more...

CHAPTER I. A VOICE OUT OF THE DEEP. Once upon a time there was a schooner belonging to Boston which was registered under the somewhat singular name of the "Rev. Amos Adams." This was her formal title, used on state occasions, and was, no doubt, quite as appropriate as the more pretentious one of the "Duke of Marlborough," or the "Lord Warden." As a general thing, however, people... more...

DANTE.[1] On the banks of a little river so shrunken by the suns of summer that it seems fast passing into a tradition, but swollen by the autumnal rains with an Italian suddenness of passion till the massy bridge shudders under the impatient heap of waters behind it, stands a city which, in its period of bloom not so large as Boston, may well rank next to Athens in the history which teaches come... more...