Short Stories (single author) Books

"Pigs Is Pigs" Butler quite surpasses himself in this story. The intricacies in radio are so great, and the changes occur so quickly that no one can afford to make a will wherein a radio provision figures. Once we thought of having a radio loud speaker installed in our coffin to keep us company and make it less lonesome. After reading this story we quickly changed our mind. The possibilities... more...

How Deacon Tubman and Parson Whitney Kept New Year's I ew Year's, eh?" exclaimed Deacon Tubman, as he lifted himself to his elbow and peered through the frosty window pane toward the east, where the colorless morning was creeping shiveringly into sight. "New Year's, eh?" he repeated, as he hitched himself into an upright position and straightened his night-cap, that had... more...

A LIGHT MAN. BY Henry James.[1]   "And I—what I seem to my friend, you see—     What I soon shall seem to his love, you guess.  What I seem to myself, do you ask of me?     No hero, I confess." A Light Woman.—Browning's Men and Women. April 4, 1857.—I have changed my sky without changing my mind. I resume these old notes in a new world. I hardly know of what use they... more...

THE FALSE GEMS Monsieur Lantin had met the young girl at a reception at the house of the second head of his department, and had fallen head over heels in love with her. She was the daughter of a provincial tax collector, who had been dead several years. She and her mother came to live in Paris, where the latter, who made the acquaintance of some of the families in her neighborhood, hoped to find a... more...

CICELY There was a noisy whir of sewing-machines in Madame Levaney's large dressmaking establishment. Cicely Leeds's head ached as she bent over the ruffles she was hemming. She was the youngest seamstress in the room, and wore her hair hanging in two long braids. It seemed a pity that such girlish shoulders should be learning to stoop, and that her eyes had to bear such a constant strain.... more...

CHAPTER I THE VIRTUOUS HYPOCRITES AT first sight they had as little reason for being unhappy as it is possible to have in a world half full of sorrow. They were young and healthy; half a dozen times they had each declared the other more than common good-looking; they both had, and never knew what it was not to have, money enough for comfort and, in addition that divine little superfluity wherefrom joys... more...

It is a village street, with great elms on either side, while along the middle stands another row set in a narrow strip of grassy common, so that the street and roadway are in reality double. The dwellings on either side are not only widely parted by the broad street, but are still further isolated, each in its large garden of ancient fruit trees. It is four o'clock of a sunny August afternoon,... more...

The woman in the doorway looked like Mom in the homier political cartoons. She was plump, apple-cheeked, white-haired. She wore a fussy, old-fashioned nightgown, and was busily clutching a worn house-robe around her expansive middle. She blinked at Sol Becker's rain-flattened hair and hang-dog expression, and said: "What is it? What do you want?" "I'm sorry—" Sol's... more...

My unfortunate friend P. has lost the thread of his life by the interposition of long intervals of partially disordered reason. The past and present are jumbled together in his mind in a manner often productive of curious results, and which will be better understood after the perusal of the following letter than from any description that I could give. The poor fellow, without once stirring from the... more...

CHRISTMAS REVIVED. It was six o'clock in the morning of last Thursday (Christmas morning), when Nathan Stoddard, a young saddler, strode through the vacant streets of one of our New England towns, hastening to begin his work. The town is an old-fashioned one, and although the observance of the ancient church festival is no longer frowned upon, as in years past, yet it has been little regarded,... more...