General Books

INTRODUCTION On a topographical map of Literature Nonsense would be represented by a small and sparsely settled country, neglected by the average tourist, but affording keen delight to the few enlightened travellers who sojourn within its borders. It is a field which has been neglected by anthologists and essayists; one of its few serious recognitions being in a certain "Treatise of Figurative... more...

The Inn of Dreams           Sweet Laughter! Sweet Delight!My heart is like a lighted Inn that waitsYour swift approach . . . and at the open gatesWhite Beauty stands and listens like a flower.She has been dreaming of you in the night,O fairy Princes; and her eyes are bright.Spur your fleet horses, this is Beauty's hour!Even as when a golden flame up-curledQuivers and flickers out in a... more...

POCAHONTAS.Where yonder moss-grown ruinlonely stands,Which from the James, the Pilgrim may survey,Stretch alway forth its old, forsaken handsAs if to beg some friend its fall to stay,And now the wild vine flaunts in greenness gay;Erst rose a Castle, known to deathless fame,Though now the mournful rampart falls away,Hither Virginia's hero-father came,To found a glorious state, and give these... more...

They who maintained their rights,Through storm and stress,And walked in all the waysThat God made known,Led by no wandering lights,And by no guess,Through dark and desolate daysOf trial and moan:Here let their monumentRise, like a wordIn rock commemorativeOf our Land's youth;Of ways the Puritan went,With soul love-spurredTo suffer, die, and liveFor faith and truth.Here they the corner-stoneOf... more...

THE LITTLE HERO OF HAARLEM. At an early period in the history of Holland, a boy was born in Haarlem, a town remarkable for its variety of fortune in war, but happily still more so for its manufactures and inventions in peace. His father was a sluicer,—that is, one whose employment it was to open and shut the sluices, or large oak-gates, which, placed at certain regular distances, close the entrance... more...

POETRY FOR POETRY'S SAKE One who, after twenty years, is restored to the University where he was taught and first tried to teach, and who has received at the hands of his Alma Mater an honour of which he never dreamed, is tempted to speak both of himself and of her. But I remember that you have come to listen to my thoughts about a great subject, and not to my feelings about myself; and, of... more...

GREEN FIELDS AND RUNNING BROOKS   Ho! green fields and running brooks!  Knotted strings and fishing-hooks  Of the truant, stealing down  Weedy backways of the town.   Where the sunshine overlooks,  By green fields and running brooks,  All intruding guests of chance  With a golden tolerance,   Cooing doves, or pensive pair  Of picnickers, straying there—  By green fields and... more...

CHRISTMAS IN LEGEND AND STORY According to tradition, on the Holy Night there fell upon Bethlehem of Judea a strange and unnatural calm; the voices of the birds were hushed, water ceased to flow and the wind was stilled. But when the child Jesus was born all nature burst into new life; trees put forth green leaves, grass sprang up and bright flowers bloomed. To animals was granted the power of human... more...

CANTO I IN the midway of this our mortal life,I found me in a gloomy wood, astrayGone from the path direct: and e'en to tellIt were no easy task, how savage wildThat forest, how robust and rough its growth,Which to remember only, my dismayRenews, in bitterness not far from death.Yet to discourse of what there good befell,All else will I relate discover'd there.How first I enter'd it I... more...

The source code for this HTML page contains only Latin-1 characters, but it directs the browser to display some special characters. The original work contained a few phrases or lines of Greek text. These are represented here as Greek letters, for example Οá¿–μοι. If the mouse is held still over such phrases, a transliteration in Beta-code pops up. Aside from Greek letters, the only... more...