Literary Collections Books

THE OLD MAN OF THE MOUNTAIN.     The name of Herr Balthasar was well known throughout the whole hill-country: not a child but had heard of his vast riches, and had some story to tell of him. Everybody too loved and honoured him; for his bounty was as great as his wealth: but at the same time he was viewed with fear; for he harast both himself and others by a number of strange whims which no one could... more...

CHAPTER I   O sing us a song of days that are gone—  Of men and happenings—of war and peace;  We love to yarn of "th' times that was"  As our hair grows gray, and our years increase.  So—revert we again to our ancient lays—  Fill we our pipes, and our glasses raise—  "Salue! to those stirring, bygone days!"  Cry the old non-coms of the Mounted Police.... more...

EVE AND DAVID Lucien had gone to Paris; and David Sechard, with the courage and intelligence of the ox which painters give the Evangelist for accompanying symbol, set himself to make the large fortune for which he had wished that evening down by the Charente, when he sat with Eve by the weir, and she gave him her hand and her heart. He wanted to make the money quickly, and less for himself than for... more...

CHAPTER I. PRO AND CON Monsieur de Manerville, the father, was a worthy Norman gentleman, well known to the Marechael de Richelieu, who married him to one of the richest heiresses of Bordeaux in the days when the old duke reigned in Guienne as governor. The Norman then sold the estate he owned in Bessin, and became a Gascon, allured by the beauty of the chateau de Lanstrac, a delightful residence owned... more...

EMERSON AND HIS JOURNALS I Emerson's fame as a writer and thinker was firmly established during his lifetime by the books he gave to the world. His Journals, published over a quarter of a century after his death, nearly or quite double the bulk of his writing, and while they do not rank in literary worth with his earlier works, they yet throw much light upon his life and character and it is a... more...

CHAPTER I A cloud floated slowly above the mountain peak. Vast, fleecy and white as the crested foam of a sea-wave, it sailed through the sky with a divine air of majesty, seeming almost to express a consciousness of its own grandeur. Over a spacious tract of Southern California it extended its snowy canopy, moving from the distant Pacific Ocean across the heights of the Sierra Madre, now and then... more...

CHAPTER 1 At eight o'clock on Sunday morning, Arthur Peachey unlocked his front door, and quietly went forth. He had not ventured to ask that early breakfast should be prepared for him. Enough that he was leaving home for a summer holiday—the first he had allowed himself since his marriage three years ago. It was a house in De Crespigny Park; unattached, double-fronted, with half-sunk basement,... more...

CHAPTER I. A Mail-coach by Night, and a Bit of Moonshine. It has been long observed, that every season sent by the Almighty has its own peculiar beauties; yet, although this is felt to be universally true—just as we know the sun shines, or that we cannot breathe without air—still we are all certain that even the same seasons have brief periods when these beauties are more sensibly felt, and diffuse... more...

CORRESPONDENCE OF CARLYLE AND EMERSON LXXVI. Emerson to Carlyle Concord, 1 July, 1842 My Dear Carlyle,—I have lately received from our slow friends, James Munroe & Co., $246 on account of their sales of the Miscellanies,—and I enclose a bill of Exchange for L51, which cost $246.50. It is a long time since I sent you any sketch of the account itself, and indeed a long time since it was posted,... more...

CHAPTER I For half an hour there had been perfect silence in the room. The cat upon the hearthrug slept profoundly; the fire was sunk to a still red glow; the cold light of the autumn afternoon thickened into dusk. Lilian seemed to be reading. She sat on a footstool, her arm resting on the seat of a basket-chair, which supported a large open volume. But her hand was never raised to turn a page, and it... more...