Non-Classifiable Books

PREFACE Of making selections of ballads there is no end. As a subject for the editor, they seem to be only less popular than Shakespeare, and every year sees a fresh output. But of late there has sprung up a custom of confusing the old with the new, the genuine with the imitation; and the products of civilised days, ‘ballads’ by courtesy or convention, are set beside the rugged and hard-featured... more...

Introduction. Of all writers of speculative philosophy, both ancient and modern, there is probably no one who has attained so eminent a position as Plato. What Homer was to Epic poetry, what Cicero and Demosthenes were to oratory, and what Shakespeare was to the drama of England, Plato was to ancient philosophy, not unapproachable nor unapproached, but possessing an inexplicable but unquestioned... more...

IN PRESENTING this history of the San Francisco Earthquake Horror and Conflagration to the public, the publishers can assure the reader that it is the most complete and authentic history of the great disaster published. The publishers set out with the determination to produce a work that would leave no room for any other history on this subject, a task for which they had the best facilities and the... more...

AN ARCTIC JOURNAL. The evils attendant on a hurried outfit and departure, as is the usual man-of-war custom, were in no wise mitigated in the case of the Royal Naval Expedition, fitted out at Woolwich, in 1850, to search for Sir John Franklin's Squadron; and a general feeling of joy at our departure prevailed amongst us, when, one fine morning, we broke ground from Greenhithe. The... more...

The symptoms of cutaneous disease may be objective, subjective or both; and in some diseases, also, there may be systemic disturbance. What do you mean by objective symptoms? Those symptoms visible to the eye or touch. What do you understand by subjective symptoms? Those which relate to sensation, such as itching, tingling, burning, pain, tenderness, heat, anæsthesia, and hyperæsthesia. What do you... more...

AUTHOR'S PREFACE The position which the military post holds in western history is sometimes misunderstood. So often has a consideration of it been left to the novelist's pen that romantic glamour has obscured the permanent contribution made by many a lonely post to the development of the surrounding region. The western fort was more than a block-house or a picket. Being the home of a handful... more...

CHAPTER I BARTOLOMÉ THE YOUTH Whenever we hear of a famous man,—whether he be artist, author, statesman, soldier, scientist, great traveler, or missionary,—we like to know what sort of a boy he was. We are curious about his home, his school, his parents, his friends, and all the various influences that helped to make him the man he was. Such knowledge gives us a better understanding of his after... more...

Extent and condition of the fishery in 1895 and 1896. While the number of nets operated in these two years was practically the same, the catch in 1896 was much greater than in 1895, and was one of the largest in the recent history of the fishery. A comparatively large number of fishermen reported that they took more salmon than in any previous year. The salmon, however, were smaller than usual, and... more...

CHAPTER I. NATURE OF THE ARGUMENT.Aim and line of argumentMy aim is to criticise from a purely English point of view the policy of Home Rule, or the proposal to create a more or less independent Parliament in Ireland; and as a result of such criticism to establish the truth, and develop the consequences, of this proposition—namely, that any system of Home Rule, whatever be the form it takes, is less... more...

Since the time when man's mind first busied itself with subjects beyond his own self-preservation and the satisfaction of his bodily appetites, the anomalous and curious have been of exceptional and persistent fascination to him; and especially is this true of the construction and functions of the human body. Possibly, indeed, it was the anomalous that was largely instrumental in arousing in the... more...