Non-Classifiable Books

I. To W. M. Thackeray. Sir,—There are many things that stand in the way of the critic when he has a mind to praise the living. He may dread the charge of writing rather to vex a rival than to exalt the subject of his applause. He shuns the appearance of seeking the favour of the famous, and would not willingly be regarded as one of the many parasites who now advertise each movement and action of... more...

INTRODUCTION. This collection of epitaphs was started in a very modest fashion about thirty-five years ago, when the compiler found great pleasure in searching all the graveyards near her Vermont home for quaint inscriptions upon old tombstones. It was neither a morbid curiosity nor a spirit of melancholy that attracted her to the weather-beaten slabs of marble and slate, but rather a fondness for... more...

CHAPTER I. Chopin—Style and Improvements—The Adagio of the Second Concerto—Funeral March—Psychological Character of the Compositions of Chopin, &c., &c. Deeply regretted as he may be by the whole body of artists, lamented by all who have ever known him, we must still be permitted to doubt if the time has even yet arrived in which he, whose loss is so peculiarly deplored by ourselves,... more...

INTRODUCTION Thirty years ago and more those who read and valued good books in this country made the acquaintance of Mr. Warner, and since the publication of "My Summer In a Garden" no work of his has needed any other introduction than the presence of his name on the title-page; and now that reputation has mellowed into memory, even the word of interpretation seems superfluous. Mr. Warner wrote... more...

CHAPTER I. ORIGIN, GROWTH, AND CHIEF CULTIVATED SPECIES OF COTTON PLANT. In the of this little work is a picture of a cotton field showing the plants bearing mature pods which contain ripe fibre and seed, and in stands a number of bobbins or reels of cotton thread, in which there is one having no less than seventeen hundred and sixty yards of sewing cotton, or one English mile of thread, on it. As both... more...

INTRODUCTION I. ON VAN DYCK'S CHARACTER AS AN ARTIST. The student of Van Dyck's art naturally classifies the painter's works into four groups, corresponding chronologically to the four successive periods of his life. There was first the short period of his youth in Antwerp, when Rubens was the dominating influence upon his work. The portrait of Van der Geest, in the National Gallery,... more...

CHAPTER I. The Highlanders of Scotland. A range of mountains forming a lofty and somewhat shattered rampart, commencing in the county of Aberdeen, north of the river Don, and extending in a southwest course across the country, till it terminates beyond Ardmore, in the county of Dumbarton, divides Scotland into two distinct parts. The southern face of these mountains is bold, rocky, dark and... more...

Chapter First. Probabilities of an Ordinance for Children. 'Tis aye a solemn thing to meTo look upon a babe that sleeps,Wearing in its spirit-deepsThe unrevealed mysteryOf its Adam's taint and woe.—Miss Barrett. Heaven lies about us in our infancy.—Wordsworth. It is generally believed that, of those who have gone to heaven from this world, by far the larger part have been infants and... more...

CHAP. I.THAT ONE MUST BE MERRY. If on one hand I have reason to fear that the title of this book will offend the delicate ears of a great many, and make them say, that no vice ever wanted its advocate, Nullo vitio unquam defuit advocatus; I am not, perhaps, less exposed on the other to the criticisms of as many folks, who will probably apply to me that which was said heretofore to one in Lacedemonia,... more...

CHAPTER I WANTED: A MAN—THE MAN FOUND Just at the most severe crisis of the war between France and Germany, over thirty years ago, a London newspaper, in describing the situation, remarked that France wanted not men, but a Man. During a whole generation which followed after the close of the gigantic and sanguinary conflict between the Northern and Southern States of the American Republic, a similar... more...