Classics Books

I. On a January evening of the early seventies, Christine Nilsson was singing in Faust at the Academy of Music in New York. Though there was already talk of the erection, in remote metropolitan distances "above the Forties," of a new Opera House which should compete in costliness and splendour with those of the great European capitals, the world of fashion was still content to reassemble every... more...

CHAPTER ONE The Man in Gray The four-faced clock over the information booth on the Upper Level of the Grand Central Station in New York City showed exactly twenty-five minutes after three. Dave Dawson paused in his restless pacing up and down to look at it for the hundredth time in the last half hour. He glared at it, sighed heavily, and made noises deep in his throat. "Where is that Freddy Farmer... more...

We have before us a volume of autograph letters, chiefly of soldiers and statesmen of the Revolution, and addressed to a good and brave man, General Palmer, who himself drew his sword in the cause. They are profitable reading in a quiet afternoon, and in a mood withdrawn from too intimate relation with the present time; so that we can glide backward some three quarters of a century, and surround... more...

In September, 1958, the author and two colleagues collected a large series of Pseudemys in small ponds and in a river in the basin of Cuatro Ciénegas, Coahuila. The specimens prove to represent a previously unrecognized subspecies of Pseudemys scripta. The subspecies is named in honor of Edward Harrison Taylor who has contributed more than any other person to our present knowledge of the herpetofauna... more...

CHAPTER I ON FURLOUGH IN THE OLD HOME TOWN "My son, Richard. He is home on his furlough from the MilitaryAcademy at West Point." Words would fail in describing motherly pride with which Mrs. Prescott introduced her son to Mrs. Davidson, wife of the new pastor. "I am very glad to meet you, Mr. Prescott," said Mrs. Davidson, looking up, for up she had to glance in order to see the face of... more...

CHAPTER IAN INITIATION A brown dusk filled the long room, for although the windows were shrouded thickly and no lamp burned, some small ray of light percolated from without and made dimly visible the outlines of the company there gathered. The low, quavering notes of an organ sighed through the place. There was the rustle and movement of a crowd. To the neophyte, who had been brought into the hall with... more...

A WORD OF APOLOGY FOR MY TITLE. Before I begin my story, let me crave my reader's indulgence for a brief word of explanation, for which I know no better form than a parable. There is an Eastern tale—I forget exactly where or by whom told—of a certain poor man, who, being in extreme distress, and sorely puzzled as to how to eke out a livelihood, bethought him to give out that he was a great... more...

When Henry Vizetelly, that admirable scholar, historian, and journalist, was sent to prison for publishing Zola's novels mine were taken over by Walter Scott, and all were reprinted except "Spring Days." This book was omitted from the list of my acknowledged works, for public and private criticism had shown it no mercy; and I had lost faith in it. All the welcome it had gotten were a few... more...

THE WORK OF GEORGE GISSING AN INTRODUCTORY SURVEY 'Les gens tout Гѓ  fait heureux, forts et bien portants, sont-ils préparés comme il faut pour comprendre, pénétrer, exprimer la vie, notre vie si tourmentée et si courte?' MAUPASSANT. In England during the sixties and seventies of last century the world of books was dominated by one Gargantuan type of fiction. The terms book and... more...

CHAPTER I HERMIA Titine glanced at the parted curtains and empty bed, then at the clock, and yawned. It was not yet eight o'clock. From the look of things, she was sure that Miss Challoner had arisen and departed for a morning ride before the breaking of the dawn. She peered out of the window and contracted her shoulders expressively. To ride in the cold morning air upon a violent horse when she... more...