General Books

“Let us buy,”Said Sally Fry,“Something nice,”Said Betsy Price,“What shall it be,”Said Kitty Lee,“A nice plum cake,”Said Lucy Wake. Which will you have, the doll, or Noah’s Ark? said mother to Mary one day. The doll, if you please, I think I will take, for then I can prettily play. One day John said, as he made his bow,“Mamma, are you at leisure now?Tell me, for much I wish to... more...

Barter   Life has loveliness to sell,   All beautiful and splendid things,  Blue waves whitened on a cliff,   Soaring fire that sways and sings,  And children's faces looking up  Holding wonder like a cup.   Life has loveliness to sell,   Music like a curve of gold,  Scent of pine trees in the rain,   Eyes that love you, arms that hold,  And for your spirit's still... more...

I PRELUDE: THE TROOPS Dim, gradual thinning of the shapeless gloomShudders to drizzling daybreak that revealsDisconsolate men who stamp their sodden bootsAnd turn dulled, sunken faces to the skyHaggard and hopeless. They, who have beaten downThe stale despair of night, must now renewTheir desolation in the truce of dawn,Murdering the livid hours that grope for peace. Yet these, who cling to life with... more...

In the merry spring time, thus says my song,When the sun shines bright and the days grow long,And the crocuses brilliant, in purple and gold,Bloom in the gardens in numbers untold;When in the fields the grass grows green,And a few early lambs are seen;When daffodils in gaudy gownsLook gay upon the verdant downs,And fair spring flowers of each degreeIn every sheltered nook you see. See image   HOW MANY... more...

TO BELGIUM Our tears, our songs, our laurels—what are these  To thee in thy Gethsemane of loss,Stretched in thine unimagined agonies  On Hell's last engine of the Iron Cross. For such a world as this that thou shouldst die  Is price too vast—yet, Belgium, hadst thou soldThyself, O then had fled from out the earth  Honour for ever, and left only Gold. Nor diest thou—for soon shalt... more...

INTRODUCTION  A mid the many celebrations last Christmas Eve, in various places by different persons, there was one, in New York City, not like any other anywhere. A company of men, women, and children went together just after the evening service in their church, and, standing around the tomb of the author of "A Visit from St. Nicholas," recited together the words of the poem which we all know... more...

IA month without sight of the sunRising or reigning or settingThrough days without use of the day,Who calls it the month of May?The sense of the name is undoneAnd the sound of it fit for forgetting.We shall not feel if the sun rise,We shall not care when it sets:If a nightingale make night's airAs noontide, why should we care?Till a light of delight that is done rise,Extinguishing grey... more...

PREFACE. In this, the third series of Breakfast-Table conversations, a slight dramatic background shows off a few talkers and writers, aided by certain silent supernumeraries. The machinery is much like that of the two preceding series. Some of the characters must seem like old acquaintances to those who have read the former papers. As I read these over for the first time for a number of years, I... more...

Many editions of Gray have been published in the last fifty years, some of them very elegant, and some showing considerable editorial labor, but not one, so far as I am aware, critically exact either in text or in notes. No editor since Mathias ( 1814) has given the 2d line of the Elegy as Gray wrote and printed it; while Mathias's mispunctuation of the 123d line has been copied by his successors,... more...

THE FAIRY CHANGELING Dermod O’Byrne of Omah townIn his garden strode up and down;He pulled his beard, and he beat his breast;And this is his trouble and woe confessed: “The good-folk came in the night, and theyHave stolen my bonny wean away;Have put in his place a changeling,A weashy, weakly, wizen thing! “From the speckled hen nine eggs I stole,And lighting a fire of a glowing coal,I fried the... more...