CHAPTER I The Elephant Herd a Republic An elephant herd is a kind of republic, something like the United States of America, only much smaller and much simpler. So its leader is a sort of president. He is usually the wisest elephant in the herd. You may like to know how the elephants choose their president. I shall tell you how they do that. But you must first consider how the people of the United... more...

PREFACE On a mild February afternoon I was waiting for the train at a wayside station in north-western Banat. So unimportant was that station that it was connected neither by telegraph nor telephone with any other station, and thus there was no means of knowing how long I would have to wait. The movements of the train in those parts could never, so I gathered, be foretold, and on that afternoon it was... more...

With the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian army, the Serbs and Croats and Slovenes saw that one other obstacle to their long-hoped-for union had vanished. The dream of centuries was now a little nearer towards fulfilment. But many obstacles remained. There would presumably be opposition on the part of the Italian and Roumanian Governments, for it was too much to hope that these would waive the... more...

INTRODUCTION Emile Zola was born at Paris on 2nd April, 1840. His father, Francois Zola, was a man whose career up to that time had not been a success, though this was not due to any lack of energy or ability. Zola pere was of mixed nationality, his father being an Italian and his mother a Greek, and it is not unlikely that his unrest and want of concentration were due to the accident of his parentage.... more...

THE WONDER OF LIFE(From His Science Primer, Introduction.)By . Every one has seen a cornfield. If you pluck up one of the innumerable wheat plants which are fixed in the soil of the field, about harvest time, you will find that it consists of a stem which ends in a root at one end and an ear at the other, and that blades or leaves are attached to the sides of the stem. The ear contains a multitude of... more...

PREFACE One of the great thinkers of the world has said that all the sciences are embodied in natural history. Hence natural history should be taught to a child from an early age. Perhaps the best method of teaching it is to set forth the characteristics of animals in the form of a narrative. Then the child reads the narrative with pleasure and almost as a story, not as a tedious "lesson." I... more...

I. Preliminary Observations (1) Sensational Press Reports In the second week of July 1954 various newspapers throughout the Dominion featured reports of proceedings in the Magistrate's Court at Lower Hutt against youths charged with indecent assault upon, or carnal knowledge of, girls under 16 years of age. The prosecuting officer was reported as saying that: The police investigations revealed a... more...

Chapter 1The Approach to the Valley When I set out on the long excursion that finally led to California I wandered afoot and alone, from Indiana to the Gulf of Mexico, with a plant-press on my back, holding a generally southward course, like the birds when they are going from summer to winter. From the west coast of Florida I crossed the gulf to Cuba, enjoyed the rich tropical flora there for a few... more...

POLITICAL MOVEMENTS On or about the latter part of July, 1853, the following document was sent on, and shortly appeared in the columns of "Frederick Douglass' Paper," Rochester, N.Y., and the "Aliened American," published and edited by William Howard Day, Esq., M.A., at Cleveland, Ohio, U.S., which continued in those papers every issue, until the meeting of the Convention: Call For... more...

HISTORY OF THE SEE AND CITY At York the city did not grow up round the cathedral as at Ely or Lincoln, for York, like Rome or Athens, is an immemorial—a prehistoric—city; though like them it has legends of its foundation. Geoffrey of Monmouth, whose knowledge of Britain before the Roman occupation is not shared by our modern historians, gives the following account of its beginning:—"Ebraucus,... more...