Classics Books

Just two weeks before the S. S. Herringbone of the Interstellar Exploration, Examination (and Exploitation) Service was due to start her return journey to Earth, one of her scouts disconcertingly reported the discovery of intelligent life in the Virago System. "Thirteen planets," Captain Iversen snarled, wishing there were someone on whom he could place the blame for this mischance, "and we... more...

CHAPTER I OLD STYLE 1. LOCAL COLOR A study of the American novel of the twentieth century must first of all take stock of certain types of fiction which continue to persist, with varying degrees of vitality and significance, from the last quarter of the century preceding. There is, to begin with, the type associated with the now moribund cult of local color, which originally had Bret Harte for its... more...

INTRODUCTION For what has Virro painted, built, and planted? Only to show, how many Tastes he wanted. What brought Sir Visto's ill got wealth to waste? Some Daemon whisper'd, "Visto! have a Taste." (Pope, Epistle to Burlington) The idea of "taste" and the ideal of the "man of taste" have fallen considerably in critical esteem since the eighteenth century. When F. R.... more...

THE ECONOMIC FUNCTIONS OF VICE FOR some inscrutable reason which she has as yet given no hint of revealing, Nature is wondrously wasteful in the matter of generation. She creates a thousand where she intends to make use of one. Imbued with the maternal instinct, the female cod casts millions of eggs upon the waters, expecting them to return after many days as troops of interesting offspring. Instead,... more...

NUMBER FIVE. We who are Tiverton born, though false ambition may have ridden us to market, or the world's voice incited us to kindred clamoring, have a way of shutting our eyes, now and then, to present changes, and seeing things as they were once, as they are still, in a certain sleepy yet altogether individual corner of country life. And especially do we delight in one bit of fine mental... more...

Although as brash as any other ace newspaper reporter for a high school weekly—and there is no one brasher—Garth was scared. His head crest lifted spasmodically and the rudimentary webbing between his fingers twitched. To answer a dare, Garth was about to attempt something that had never been dared before: a newspaper interview with The Visitor. There had been questions enough asked and answered... more...

THE STORY OF A CONSCRIPT I Those who have not seen the glory of the Emperor Napoleon, during the years 1810, 1811, and 1812, can never conceive what a pitch of power one man may reach. When he passed through Champagne, or Lorraine, or Alsace, people gathering the harvest or the vintage would leave everything to run and see him; women, children, and old men would come a distance of eight or ten leagues... more...

CHAPTER I THE FIRST DAY Michael felt glad to think he would start the adventure of Oxford from Paddington. The simplicity of that railway station might faintly mitigate alarms which no amount of previous deliberation could entirely disperse. He remembered how once he had lightly seen off a Cambridge friend from Liverpool Street and, looking back at the suburban tumult of the Great Eastern Railway, he... more...

Like the sibilant, labored breathing of a dying monster, the tortured ship wailed its death sobs as it floundered in deep hyperstellar space. Clank-sss, clank-sss, went the battered safety valve of the pile cooling system. BOOM ... boom ... BOOM ... boom. A severed and dangling piston rod crashed in monotonous rhythm against a deck beam as the rest of the auxiliary compression unit strained to satisfy... more...

CHAPTER I TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION When Dr. Eugene Duehring, privat docent at Berlin University, in 1875, proclaimed the fact that he had become converted to Socialism, he was not content to take the socialist movement as he found it, but set out forthwith to promulgate a theory of his own. His was a most elaborate and self-conscious mission. He stood forth as the propagandist not only of certain... more...