Classics Books

THE TOWER OF OBLIVION I I think it is Edgar Allan Poe who says that while a plain thing may on occasion be told with a certain amount of elaboration of style, one that is unusual in its very nature is best related in the simplest terms possible. I shall adopt the second of these methods in telling this story of my friend, Derwent Rose. And I will begin straight away with that afternoon of the spring of... more...

Youth PRECOCIOUS TALENTS MANIFESTED — MLLE. VIGÉE'S FATHER AND MOTHER — DEATH OF HER FATHER — A FRIEND OF HER GIRLHOOD — HER MOTHER REMARRIES — MLLE. VIGÉE'S FIRST PORTRAIT OF NOTE (COUNT SCHOUVALOFF) — ACQUAINTANCE WITH MME. GEOFFRIN — THE AUTHORESS'S PURITANICAL BRINGING-UP — MALE SITTERS ATTEMPT FLIRTATION — PUBLIC RESORTS OF PARIS BEFORE THE REVOLUTION. I will... more...

MAY FLOWERS Being Boston girls, of course they got up a club for mental improvement, and, as they were all descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers, they called it the Mayflower Club. A very good name, and the six young girls who were members of it made a very pretty posy when they met together, once a week, to sew, and read well-chosen books. At the first meeting of the season, after being separated all... more...

1. Freddie Rooke gazed coldly at the breakfast-table. Through a gleaming eye-glass he inspected the revolting object which Parker, his faithful man, had placed on a plate before him. "Parker!" His voice had a ring of pain. "Sir?" "What's this?" "Poached egg, sir." Freddie averted his eyes with a silent shudder. "It looks just like an old aunt of mine," he... more...

CHAPTER I. AN ALARM IN THE CAMP. "Hey, Bandy-legs, what d'ye suppose ails Toby there?" "He sure looks like he'd just seen a ghost, for a fact, Steve. Where areMax and his cousin Owen just now?" "Oh, they walked down along the river bank to look for signs of fresh-water clams. So we'll just have to run things ourselves, Bandy. Hello! there, Toby, what under the sun are... more...

THE POLICE CAMP The velvety darkness of a southern night, with its sense of rich, luscious, breathing intensity, lay over that romantic spot in Southern Rhodesia where the grey walls of the Zimbabwe ruins, with a sublime, imperturbable indifference, continue to baffle the ingenuity and ravish the curiosity of all who would read their story. Scientists, archæologists, tourists come and go, but the... more...

EMMA GOLDMAN ANARCHIST REBEL The hanging of several anarchists in 1887 as a consequence of the Haymarket bombing in Chicago caused many Americans to sympathize with the gibbeted radicals. Youths swathed in bright idealism, men and women rooted in equalitarian democracy, workers trusting in the rectitude of their government—all doubted the guilt of the condemned prisoners and were deeply perturbed by... more...

In the autumn of 1952, I obtained a southern bog lemming, Synaptomys cooperi, at Rock Creek State Fish Hatchery, Dundy County, in extreme southwestern Nebraska. This locality of record is the westernmost for the species in North America. Subsequently, I reported this specimen in the literature (Univ. Kansas Publ., Mus. Nat. Hist., 7:486, 1954), provisionally assigning it to Synaptomys cooperi gossii,... more...

THE HIGHLAND FEUD. Why should I, Murdoch M'Crimman of Coila, be condemned for a period of indefinite length to the drudgery of the desk's dull wood? That is the question I have just been asking myself. Am I emulous of the honour and glory that, they say, float halo-like round the brow of the author? Have I the desire to awake and find myself famous? The fame, alas! that authors chase is but... more...

What I'm getting at is that you don't ever have to worry about being bored stiff in Solar Exploitations field work. It never gets dull—and in some pretty strange places, at that. Take the S.E.2100's discovery of Balak, which is a little planet circling 70 Ophiuchi some 20,000 light-years from Earth, for example. You'd never expect to run across the greatest race of surgeons in the... more...