Classics Books

CHAPTER I. Colonel Burr's study of the law [1] has been already briefly noticed. He brought to that study a classic education as complete as could, at that time, be acquired in our country; and to this was added a knowledge of the world, perhaps nowhere better taught than in the camp, as well as a firmness and hardihood of character which military life usually confers, and which is indispensable... more...

Ferdinand Lopez  It is certainly of service to a man to know who were his grandfathers and who were his grandmothers if he entertain an ambition to move in the upper circles of society, and also of service to be able to speak of them as of persons who were themselves somebodies in their time. No doubt we all entertain great respect for those who by their own energies have raised themselves in the... more...

APPENDIX I. It seems impossible to separate by any exact line the genuine writings of Plato from the spurious. The only external evidence to them which is of much value is that of Aristotle; for the Alexandrian catalogues of a century later include manifest forgeries. Even the value of the Aristotelian authority is a good deal impaired by the uncertainty concerning the date and authorship of the... more...

Chapter I."What, shall this speech be spoke for our excuse?Or shall we on without apology." The fine estuary which penetrates the American coast, between the fortieth and forty-first degrees of latitude, is formed by the confluence of the Hudson, the Hackensack, the Passaic, the Raritan, and a multitude of smaller streams; all of which pour their tribute into the ocean, within the space named.... more...

THE GHOST IN THE MILL "Come, Sam, tell us a story," said I, as Harry and I crept to his knees, in the glow of the bright evening firelight; while Aunt Lois was busily rattling the tea-things, and grandmamma, at the other end of the fireplace, was quietly setting the heel of a blue-mixed yarn stocking. In those days we had no magazines and daily papers, each reeling off a serial story. Once a... more...

. Councillor Krespel was one of the strangest, oddest men I ever met with in my life. When I went to live in H—— for a time the whole town was full of talk about him, as he happened to be just then in the midst of one of the very craziest of his schemes. Krespel had the reputation of being both a clever, learn lawyer and a skilful diplomatist. One of the reigning princes of Germany—not, however,... more...

FOREWORD I take up pen for this foreword with the fear of one who knows that he cannot do justice to his subject, and the trembling of one who would not, for a good deal, set down words unpleasing to the eye of him who wrote Green Mansions, The Purple Land, and all those other books which have meant so much to me. For of all living authors—now that Tolstoi has gone I could least dispense with W. H.... more...

The use of the term preparation herein is intended to indicate partially the limitation of the problem attempted. The following discussion will be concerned only with such attributes of the successful teacher as are the direct result, or at least greatly enhanced by thorough preparation. A sufficiently comprehensive and difficult problem remains after still further restriction of the field so as to... more...

CHAPTER I. The managing editor of the New York Argus sat at his desk with a deep frown on his face, looking out from under his shaggy eyebrows at the young man who had just thrown a huge fur overcoat on the back of one chair, while he sat down himself on another. 'I got your telegram,' began the editor. 'Am I to understand from it that you have failed?' 'Yes, sir,'... more...

AFFGHANISTAN. There are those persons now living who would give their own weight in sovereigns, though drawing against thirteen to sixteen stone, that all of this dreadful subject might be swallowed up by Lethe; that darkness might settle for ever upon the insanities of Cabool; and the grave close finally over the carnage of Tezeen. But it will not be. Blood will have blood, they say. The madness which... more...