Classics Books

CHAPTER I On the precise day on which this story opens—some sixty or more years ago, to be exact—a bullet-headed, merry-eyed, mahogany-colored young darky stood on the top step of an old-fashioned, high-stoop house, craning his head up and down and across Kennedy Square in the effort to get the first glimpse of his master, St. George Wilmot Temple, attorney and counsellor-at-law, who was expected... more...

CHAPTER I. "Put into a small preserving pan three ounces of fresh butter, and, as soon as it is just melted, add one pound of brown sugar of moderate quality—" "Not moderate; the browner the better," interpolates Algy. "Cannot say I agree with you. I hate brown sugar—filthy stuff!" says Bobby, contradictiously. "Not half so filthy as white, if you come to that,"... more...

The conscious water saw its Lord and blushed. Abraham Cowley is now less remembered for his poetry than for his pleasant volume of essays, published after the Restoration; but he was thought in his own time a better poet than Milton. His collection of love songs—the Mistress—is a mass of cold conceits, in the metaphysical manner; but his elegies on Crashaw and Harvey have much dignity and natural... more...

CHAPTER I. The inner room of a tobacconist's shop is not perhaps the spot which a writer of fiction would naturally choose as the theatre of his play, nor does the inventor of pleasant romances, of stirring incident, or moving love-tales feel himself instinctively inclined to turn to Munich as to the city of his dreams. On the other hand, it is by no means certain that, if the choice of a stage... more...

CHAPTER I "I'm sure of one thing," said Aralia to her little sister Pansy, as they sat together one lovely summer afternoon on the garden seat, and gazed away and away far over the North Sea. "I'm quite sure of one thing. Nobody ever could have so good an uncle as our uncle. Now, could anybody, Pansy?" "Oh no!" answered Pansy, shaking her pretty head. Pansy was hardly... more...

IFor myself, (1) I hold to the opinion that not alone are the serious transactions of "good and noble men" (2) most memorable, but that words and deeds distinctive of their lighter moods may claim some record. (3) In proof of which contention, I will here describe a set of incidents within the scope of my experience. (4) (1) See Aristid. ii. foll. (2) Or, "nature's noblemen." (3)... more...

CHAPTER ITHE CAVERNS OF SELEUCIA A savage, barren, inhospitable region lies before us, the cavernous valley of Seleucia—a veritable home for an anchorite, for there is nothing therein to remind one of the living world; the whole district resembles a vast ruined tomb, with its base overgrown by green weeds. Here is everything which begets gloom—the blackest religious fanaticism, the darkest... more...

CHAPTER I.PROLOGUE—THE WANDERER. Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy Autumn fields, And thinking of the days that are no more. Tennyson’s . Not much of a picture, certainly! Only a stretch of wide sunny road, with a tamarisk hedge and a clump of shadowy elms; a stray sheep... more...

Jonah 1:1 Now the word of Yahweh came to Jonah the son of Amittai, saying, 1:2 "Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach against it, for their wickedness has come up before me." 1:3 But Jonah rose up to flee to Tarshish from the presence of Yahweh. He went down to Joppa, and found a ship going to Tarshish; so he paid its fare, and went down into it, to go with them to Tarshish from the... more...

VISIT TO LAXTON. My route, after parting from Lord Westport at Birmingham, lay, as I have mentioned in the "Autobiographic Sketches," through Stamford to Laxton, the Northamptonshire seat of Lord Carbery. From Stamford, which I had reached by some intolerable old coach, such as in those days too commonly abused the patience and long-suffering of Young England, I took a post-chaise to Laxton.... more...