Classics Books

IRON BRIDGES, AND THEIR CONSTRUCTION. "ASSEMBLING" BRIDGE UNDER SHED. In a graveyard in Watertown, a village near Boston, Massachusetts, there is a tombstone commemorating the claims of the departed worthy who lies below to the eternal gratitude of posterity. The inscription is dated in the early part of this century (about 1810), but the name of him who was thus immortalized has faded like the... more...

CHAPTER I. UNCLE JOHN'S FARM. "How did I happen to own a farm?" asked Uncle John, interrupting his soup long enough to fix an inquiring glance upon Major Doyle, who sat opposite. "By virtue of circumstance, my dear sir," replied the Major, composedly. "It's a part of my duty, in attending to those affairs you won't look afther yourself, to lend certain sums of your... more...

The life of a female prisoner! It is so uniformly dull that I fear to weary you, friends, in repeating its history; while for me, even now, outside of some few days only too memorable, the twenty-seven months spent in the fortress are like a great hole, empty and badly lighted, at the bottom of which sometimes passed human shadows and some few phantasmagorical scenes. In these scattered remembrances,... more...

CHAPTER I Peter was still poring over his ledger one dark afternoon in December, his bald head glistening like a huge ostrich egg under the flare of the overhead gas jets, when Patrick, the night watchman, catching sight of my face peering through the outer grating, opened the door of the Bank. The sight so late in the day was an unusual one, for in all the years that I have called at the Bank—ten,... more...

On the veranda of the Bella Union Hotel, San Francisco, a man sat enjoying his morning pipe. The Bella Union overlooked the Plaza of that day, a dusty, unkempt, open space, later to be swept and graded and dignified into Portsmouth Square. The man was at the younger fringe of middle life. He was dressed neatly and carefully in the fashionable costume of the time, which was the year of grace 1852. As to... more...

THE CASTLE OF VAUTSBERG ON THE RHINE. A chamber in a tower. PRINCE HENRY, sitting alone, ill and restless.  Prince Henry. I cannot sleep! my fervid brainCalls up the vanished Past again,And throws its misty splendors deepInto the pallid realms of sleep!A breath from that far-distant shoreComes freshening ever more and more,And wafts o'er intervening seasSweet odors from the Hesperides!A wind,... more...

IF ENGLAND KNEW No sane person can deny that England is in grave danger of invasion by Germany at a date not far distant. This very serious fact I endeavoured to place vividly before the public in my recent forecast, The Invasion of 1910, the publication of which, in Germany and in England, aroused a storm of indignation against me. The Government, it will be remembered, endeavoured to suppress its... more...

I. For the student of sexual inversion, ancient Greece offers a wide field for observation and reflection. Its importance has hitherto been underrated by medical and legal writers on the subject, who do not seem to be aware that here alone in history have we the example of a great and highly-developed race not only tolerating homosexual passions, but deeming them of spiritual value, and attempting to... more...

CHAPTER I For the audacity of the title of this book I offer no apology. I have had it pointed out, not altogether facetiously, that it is impossible to determine with accuracy what one woman, much less what any number of women, wants. I sympathize with the first half of the tradition. The desires, that is to say, the ideals, of an individual, man or woman, are not always easy to determine. The... more...

CHAPTER I SHEILA'S LEGACY Just before his death, Marcus Arundel, artist and father of Sheila, bore witness to his faith in God and man. He had been lying apparently unconscious, his slow, difficult breath drawn at longer and longer intervals. Sheila was huddled on the floor beside his bed, her hand pressing his urgently in the pitiful attempt, common to human love, to hold back the resolute soul... more...