General Books

THE BELLS. In the steeple of an old church was a beautiful chime of bells, which for many years had rung out joyous peals at the touch of the sexton's hand upon the rope. "I'll make the air full of music to-morrow," said the white-haired man, as he lay down to his slumbers. "To-morrow is Christmas, and the people shall be glad and gay. Ah, yes! right merry will be the chimes I... more...

CHAPTER I The first time I met her I was a reporter in the embryonic state and she was a girl in short dresses. It was in a garden, surrounded by high red brick walls which were half hidden by clusters of green vines, and at the base of which nestled earth-beds, radiant with roses and poppies and peonies and bushes of lavender lilacs, all spilling their delicate ambrosia on the mild air of passing May.... more...

OH, the Beautiful Mud! I always leave it on my boots. It is sacred to me. Because in it are the souls of lilies! The Hog should be a sacred beast. Hogs are Beautiful! They are close to the Mire! Oh, to be a Swine! What is more eloquent than a Sneeze? TheSneeze is the protest of the Free Spirit against theSmug Citizen who never exposes himself to a cold.Oh, Beautiful Sneezes! Oh, to make my life oneloud... more...

MY FIRST STAGE At last the tea came up, and soWith that our tongues began to go.Now in that house you’re sure of knowingThe smallest scrap of news that’s going.We find it there the wisest wayTo take some care of what we say. Recreation.  Jane Taylor. I was born on the 2nd September, 1886, in a small, dull, country town.  When I say the town was dull, I mean, of course, that the inhabitants were... more...

CHAPTER I In the dusk of an October evening, a sensible looking woman of forty came out through an oaken door to a broad landing on the first floor of an old English country-house. A braid of her hair had fallen forward as if she had been stooping over book or pen; and she stood for a moment to smooth it, and to gaze contemplatively—not in the least sentimentally—through the tall, narrow window.... more...

"Pshaw! pshaw! child," he would reply, "that's nothing. It does almost as well to walk on, and that's all legs are for. I'd have had forty legs shot off rather than not have helped drive out those damned British rascals." Not even for sake of Hetty's young ears could the old Squire mention the British rascals without his favorite expletive. Here, also, came in... more...

Castle Barfield, Heydon Hey, and Beacon Hargate form the three points of a triangle. Barfield is a parish of some pretensions; Heydon Hey is a village; Beacon Hargate is no more than a hamlet. There is not much that is picturesque in Beacon Hargate, or its neighbourhood. The Beacon Hill itself is as little like a hill as it well can be, and acquires what prominence it has by virtue of the extreme... more...

HOW SIR TOM BECAME A GREAT PERSONAGE. Sir Thomas Randolph had lived a somewhat stormy life during the earliest half of his career. He had gone through what the French called a jeunesse orageuse; nothing very bad had ever been laid to his charge; but he had been adventurous, unsettled, a roamer about the world even after the period at which youthful extravagances cease. Nobody ever knew when or where he... more...

THE ENCHANTED RING. One of the most imposing buildings in Boston twenty years ago was a granite hotel, whose western windows looked upon a graveyard. Passing up a flight of steps, and beneath a portico of dignified granite columns, and so through an embarrassing pair of swinging-doors to the roomy vestibule,—you would there pause a moment to spit upon the black-and-white tessellated pavement. Having... more...

CHAPTER I "Filth," grunted Trent—"ugh! I tell you what it is, my venerable friend—I have seen some dirty cabins in the west of Ireland and some vile holes in East London. I've been in some places which I can't think of even now without feeling sick. I'm not a particular chap, wasn't brought up to it—no, nor squeamish either, but this is a bit thicker than anything... more...