Classics Books

James Young Simpson, who will ever be remembered as the discoverer of the pain-annulling power of chloroform, was born in the year 1811, at a period when there was room for a hero in the practice of the healing art in the British Islands. It is true that in the seventeenth century Harvey had laid bare the great fact of the circulation of the blood and the practical Thomas Sydenham had swept aside the... more...

Chapter One. Auntie and her Darling. “Don’t eat too much marmalade, Sydney dear. It may make you bilious.” “Oh, no, auntie dear, I’ll be careful.” “You have a great deal of butter on your bread, dear?” “Yes, auntie; that’s the beauty of it Miller says—” “Who is Miller, Syd dear?” “Our chemistry chap at Loamborough. He shows us how when you mix acids and alkalis together... more...

THE POLICY OF PEACEFUL PENETRATION IN IRELAND When Pitt and Castlereagh forced through the Act of Union, they forged a weapon with the potentiality of utterly subjecting the Irish nation, of extinguishing wholly its civilisation, its name, and its memory; for they made possible that policy of peaceful penetration which in less than a century brought Ireland lower than she had been brought by five... more...

CHAPTER I The Last Night of Carnival It was Carnival time in the ancient and once imperial, but now provincial and remote, city of Ravenna. It was Carnival time, and the very acme and high-tide of that season of mirth and revel. For the theory of Carnival observance is, that the life of it, unlike that of most other things and beings, is intensified with a constantly crescendo movement up to the last... more...

CHAPTER I "Must I go, must I go,Away into the town?" (Swabian Folk-song.) Franz Vogt was on his way home. He carried a neatly tied-up parcel containing the under-linen and the boots that he had been buying in the town. He had trodden this same road a countless number of times during his life; but now that he must bid good-bye to it so soon, the old familiar surroundings presented themselves to... 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...

JEMMY STUBBINS, OR THE NAILER BOY. Before I left America in 1846, in order to gratify the wish that had long occupied my heart, of visiting the motherland, I formed for myself a plan of procedure to which I hoped to be able rigidly to adhere. I determined that my visit to England should bring me face to face with the people; that I should converse with the artizan in his workshop, and lifting the lowly... more...

"There's the island, Parker!" Retch called. Bill Parker shifted the controls of the 'copter and the big craft swung in the direction Retch was pointing. Squinting his eyes against the sun glare rising from the Pacific, Parker clearly saw the island. It was miles away as yet but it swam like a mirage suspended just above the surface of the sea. The island was not large—Parker guessed... more...

Chapter I: The New World FROM a world of daisies as big as moons and of mountainous green hillocks Michael Fane came by some unrealized method of transport to the thin red house, that as yet for his mind could not claim an individual existence amid the uniformity of a long line of fellows. His arrival coincided with a confusion of furniture, with the tramp of men backwards and forwards from a cavernous... more...

PREFACE "Jean-Christophe" is the history of the development of a musician of genius. The present volume comprises the first four volumes of the original French, viz.: "L'Aube," "Le Matin," "L'Adolescent," and "La Révólte," which are designated in the translation as Part I—The Dawn; Part II—Morning; Part III—Youth; Part IV—Revolt. Parts I and... more...