Classics Books

INTRODUCTION In one sense this book stands by itself. It is like nothing else I have written, and if one should seek to give it the name of a class, it might be called an historical fantasy. It followed The Trail of the Sword and preceded The Seats of the Mighty, and appeared in the summer of 1895. The critics gave it a reception which was extremely gratifying, because, as it seemed to me, they... more...

THE TRADE UNION WOMAN I EARLY TRADE UNIONS AMONG WOMEN 1825-1840 The earliest factory employment to engage large numbers of women was the cotton industry of New England, and the mill hands of that day seem to have been entirely native-born Americans. The first power loom was set up in Waltham, Massachusetts, in 1814, and the name of the young woman weaver who operated it was Deborah Skinner. In 1817... more...

Mason was nervous. It was the nervousness of cold apprehension, not simply that which had become indigenous to his high-strung make-up. He was, in his way, afraid; afraid that he'd again come up with a wrong answer. He'd brought the tiny Scout too close to the Rim. Facing the facts squarely, he knew, even as he fingered the stud that would wrench them out of their R-curve, that he'd not... more...

M A B E L,A Sketch. DRAMATIS PERSONAE.      ORAN, a Speculative Philosopher.      MABEL, his Wife.      HER FATHER.     MAURICE, }     ROGER, } her brothers. MABEL. SCENE I—A Study. Books, pictures, and sculpture about the room, interspersed with chemical and other instruments, globes, &c.; a singular blending of science with art, indicating a delicate and... more...

INTRODUCTION The following narrative, written over eighty years ago, and now at last given to the world in 1906, is remarkable in many respects. It is remarkable for its subject, for its style, and for its literary history. The subject—a deathbed scene—might seem at first sight to be a trite and common one. The mise-en-scène—the Field of Waterloo—alone however redeems it from such a charge;... more...

CHAPTER I A WONDERFUL STORY "Well, what do you think of it, Mark?" asked Jack Darrow, as he laid aside a portion of a newspaper, covered with strange printed characters. "Great; isn't it?" "You don't mean to tell me that you believe that preposterous story, do you, Jack?" And Mark Sampson looked across the table at his companion in some astonishment. "Oh, I... more...

A HIDDEN LIFE. Proudly the youth, by manhood sudden crowned,Went walking by his horses to the plough,For the first time that morn. No soldier gayFeels at his side the throb of the gold hilt(Knowing the blue blade hides within its sheath,As lightning in the cloud) with more delight,When first he belts it on, than he that dayHeard still the clank of the plough-chains againstThe horses' harnessed... more...

CHAPTER ONE—THE TRYING-OUT OF ONE RODNEY PARKER, ASSISTANT ENGINEER All at once the stump-dotted, rocky hillside became clamorous and animated. From the little shacks sheathed with tarred paper, from the sodded huts, from burrows sunk into the hillside men suddenly came popping out with shrill cries. Three men, shouldering surveying instruments, stopped in their tracks on the freshly-heaped soil of a... more...

CHAPTER I. Hawkins is part inventor and part idiot. Hawkins has money, which generally mitigates idiocy; but in his case it also allows free rein to his inventive genius, and that is a bad thing. When I decided to build a nice, quiet summer home in the Berkshires, I paid for the ground before discovering that the next villa belonged to Hawkins. Had I known then what I know now, my country-seat would be... more...

CHAPTER I Between the smoke-darkened walls of the mountain cabin still murmured the last echoes of the pistol's bellowing, and it seemed a voice of everlasting duration to the shock-sickened nerves of those within. First it had thundered with the deafening exaggeration of confined space, then its echo had beaten against the clay-chink wall timbers and rolled upward to the rafters. Now, dwindled to... more...