History Books

INTRODUCTION. The publication of the text of the Sarmiento manuscript in the Library of Göttingen University, has enabled the Council to present the members of the Hakluyt Society with the most authentic narrative of events connected with the history of the Incas of Peru. The history of this manuscript, and of the documents which accompanied it, is very interesting. The Viceroy, Don Francisco de... more...

PREFACE The rise of the Dutch Republic must ever be regarded as one of the leading events of modern times. Without the birth of this great commonwealth, the various historical phenomena of: the sixteenth and following centuries must have either not existed; or have presented themselves under essential modifications.—Itself an organized protest against ecclesiastical tyranny and universal empire, the... more...

PREFACE I send out this little and fragmentary book with the consciousness that it calls for apology. I have had to write it hastily during a short period of leave. Yet it touches upon great subjects which deserve the reverence of leisurely writing. Ought I not, then, to have waited for the leisure of days after the war? I think not. Such days may never come. And, in any case, now is the time for the... more...

SKETCH OF CYRUS THE YOUNGER. (Introductory to the Retreat of the Ten Thousand Greeks.) In the year 423 B.C. Darius Nothus ascended the throne of Persia. That country was then the greatest empire in the world, and had an area nearly equal to that of the United States. The capital of this seemingly powerful realm was the ancient city of Babylon on the lower Euphrates. Here the Great King, as he was... more...

THE INVENTION OF A NEW RELIGION (1) (Note 1) The writer of this pamphlet could butskim over a wide subject. For full information seeVolume I. of Mr. J. Murdoch's recently-published"History of Japan," the only critical work on thatsubject existing in the English language. Voltaire and the other eighteenth-century philosophers, who held religions to be the invention of priests, have been... more...

CAPVT. 38. De territorio Cathay, et moribus Tartarorum. Totum Imperium Imperatoris Grand Can distinctum est in 12. magnas prouincias, iuxta numerum duodecim filiorum primi Genitoris Can, quarum quælibet in se continet circiter 6. millia ciuitatum, præter villas non numeratas quæ sunt Velut ábsque numero. Habent et singulæ prouinciæ regem principalem, hoc est 12. reges prouinciales, et horum... more...

Chapter I October 1786 to September 1787 The ships destined for Botany-Bay rendezvous at the Mother-Bank.--Leave that place, and proceed on the voyage.--The convicts on board one of the transports attempt an insurrection.--Are timely discovered, and the ring-leaders punished.--Arrived at Santa Cruz.--Transactions there.--Attempt of a convict to escape.--Description of Laguna, and the adjacent country.... more...

Mr. Speaker, Mr. President, my colleagues in the Congress, our distinguished guests and my fellow Americans: To address a joint session of the Congress in this great Chamber in which I was once privileged to serve is an honor for which I am deeply grateful. The State of the Union Address is traditionally an occasion for a lengthy and detailed account by the President of what he has accomplished in the... more...

CHAPTER I.BRIEF HISTORY OF NEGRO SLAVERY.—ITS INEVITABLE EFFECT UPON ALL CONCERNED IN IT.The lot is wretched, the condition sad,Whether a pining discontent survive,And thirst for change; or habit hath subduedThe soul depressed; dejected—even to loveOf her dull tasks and close captivity.Wordsworth.My ear is pained,My soul is sick with every day's reportOf wrong and outrage, with which this... more...

The colony had been established many years before any successful attempt had been made to penetrate into the interior of the country, by crossing the range of hills, known to the colonists as the Blue Mountains: these mountains were considered as the boundary of the settlements westward, the country beyond them being deemed inaccessible. The year 1813 proving extremely dry, the grass was nearly all... more...