History Books

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. MY DEAR CHILDREN,—All of you who read this little book have doubtless heard more or less of slavery. You know it is the system by which a portion of our people hold their fellow-creatures as property, and doom them to perpetual servitude. It is a hateful and accursed institution, which God can not look upon but with abhorrence, and which no one of his children should for a... more...

THE GREAT TORNADO. The Summer of 1877 has been remarkable in some localities for the severity of its storms. These, in several instances, have partaken of the character of tornadoes. Mt. Carmel, in Illinois, was nearly destroyed about the 20th of June last; Pensaukee, in Wisconsin, was nearly ruined on the 8th of July, and Pittston, in Massachusetts, suffered terribly from a tornado on the same day.... more...

CHAPTER I. BRAZILIAN AND PORTUGUESE FACTIONS—DON PEDEO ORDERED TO QUIT BRAZIL—APPOINTED "PERPETUAL PROTECTOR"—PROCLAIMED EMPEROR OF BRAZIL—EFFORTS TO OBTAIN FOREIGN OFFICERS AND SEAMEN—THE NAVAL COMMAND OFFERED TO ME—ACCEPTATION THEREOF—ARRIVAL AT RIO DE JANEIRO—VISIT OF INSPECTION TO THE SQUADRON—CONDITION OF THE VESSELS—INFERIORITY OF SEAMEN—IMPERIAL AFFABILITY—ATTEMPT... more...

1. Now as to Hades, wherein the souls of the of the good things they see, and rejoice in the righteous and unrighteous are detained, it is necessary to speak of it. Hades is a place in the world not regularly finished; a subterraneous region, wherein the light of this world does not shine; from which circumstance, that in this region the light does not shine, it cannot be but there must be in it... more...

CHAPTER I The topography of a country is to some extent a prophecy of its future. Had there been no Mississippi coursing for three thousand miles through the North American Continent, no Ohio and Missouri bisecting it from east to west, no great inland seas indenting and watering it, no fertile prairies stretching across its vast areas, how different would have been the history of our own land. Russia... more...

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives: At the period of our last meeting I had the satisfaction of communicating an adjustment with one of the principal belligerent nations, highly important in itself, and still more so as presaging a more extended accommodation. It is with deep concern I am now to inform you that the favorable prospect has been over-clouded by a refusal of the... more...

THE TUDOR PERIOD, 1485-1603 [Sidenote: An era of Revolutions] The historian of the future will, perhaps, affirm that the nineteenth century, with the last years of the eighteenth, has been a period more fraught with momentous events in the development of the nations than any equal period since the Christian era commenced. Yet striking as are the developments witnessed by the last four generations, the... more...

Chapter I.—PRELIMINARY: HOW THE MOMENT ARRIVED. Battle being once seen to be inevitable, it was Friedrich's plan not to wait for it, but to give it. Thanks to Friedrich Wilhelm and himself, there is no Army, nor ever was any, in such continual preparation. Military people say, "Some Countries take six months, some twelve, to get in motion for war: but in three weeks Prussia can be across the... more...

Chapter I. — FIFTH CRISIS IN THE KAISER'S SPECTRE-HUNT. The Crown-Prince's young Life being, by perverse chance, involved and as it were absorbed in that foolish question of his English Marriage, we have nothing for it but to continue our sad function; and go on painfully fishing out, and reducing to an authentic form, what traces of him there are, from that disastrous beggarly... more...

CHAPTER 1. NORTH FROM NEW HOLLAND FOR WATER. THE AUTHOR'S DEPARTURE FROM THE COAST OF NEW HOLLAND, WITH THE REASONS OF IT. I had spent about 5 weeks in ranging off and on the coast of New Holland, a length of about 300 leagues: and had put in at 3 several places to see what there might be thereabouts worth discovering; and at the same time to recruit my stock of fresh water and provisions for the... more...