Classics Books

Volume One--Chapter One. And what is this new book the whole world makes such a rout about?—Oh! ’tis out of all plumb, my lord,—quite an irregular thing; not one of the angles at the four corners was a right angle. I had my rule and compasses, my lord, in my pocket.—Excellent critic! Grant me patience, just Heaven! Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world—though the cant of... more...

OH, SUSANNAH! Somewhere in this book I must write a paragraph exclusively about myself. The fact that in the outcome of all these stirring events I have ended as a mere bookkeeper is perhaps a good reason why one paragraph will be enough. In my youth I had dreams a-plenty; but the event and the peculiar twist of my own temperament prevented their fulfilment. Perhaps in a more squeamish age–and yet... more...

PREFACE. There were four of us pilgrims—my Wife, our Boy of ten and a half years, the Doctor, and I. My object in going—the others went for the outing—was to gather "local color" for work in Western history. The Ohio River was an important factor in the development of the West. I wished to know the great waterway intimately in its various phases,—to see with my own eyes what the... more...

Chapter II BUY A FARM ON SIGHT I was sitting at a late hour in my room above the college Yard, correcting daily themes. I had sat at a late hour in my room above the college Yard, correcting daily themes, for it seemed an interminable number of years–was it six or seven? I had no great love for it, certainly. Some men who go into teaching, and of course all men who become great teachers, do have a... more...

INTRODUCTION The ant-eating frog is one of the smallest species of vertebrates on the University of Kansas Natural History Reservation, but individually it is one of the most numerous. The species is important in the over-all ecology; its biomass often exceeds that of larger species of vertebrates. Because of secretive and subterranean habits, however, its abundance and effects on community associates... more...

CHAPTER I A COLD NIGHT "Oh, how red your nose is!" cried little Mabel Blake, one day, as her brother Hal came running out of the school yard, where he had been playing with some other boys. Mabel was waiting for him to walk home with her as he had promised. "So's your's red, too, Mab!" Harry said. "It's as red—as red as some of the crabs we boiled at our... more...

Tensor gazed helplessly at the fine mist sifting down from a hazy, violet sky. "I told you I was having these spells." "But Great Oxy," the administrator sputtered, "can't you control yourself?" "I can't help it, Ruut," Tensor replied. "I just feel sort of funny and—and—" Ruut's hyperimage was chewing on its illusory lip. "Well, you've... more...

he dehydration of the planet had taken centuries in all. The Rell had still been a great race when the process started. Construction of the canals was a prodigious feat but not a truly remarkable one. But what use are even canals when there is nothing to fill them? What cosmic influences might have caused the disaster baffled even the group-mind of the Rell. Through the eons the atmosphere had drifted... more...

CHAPTER I Death leapt upon the Rev. Charles Cardinal, Rector of St. Dreots in South Glebeshire, at the moment that he bent down towards the second long drawer of his washhand-stand; he bent down to find a clean collar. It is in its way a symbol of his whole life, that death claimed him before he could find one. At one moment his mind was intent upon his collar; at the next he was stricken with a wild... more...

THE GREEK SLAVE AND THE LITTLE ROMAN BOY Ariston, the Greek slave, was busily painting. He stood in a little room with three smooth walls. The fourth side was open upon a court. A little fountain splashed there. Above stretched the brilliant sky of Italy. The August sun shone hotly down. It cut sharp shadows of the columns on the cement floor. This was the master's room. The artist was painting... more...