Last spring I almost learned to ride a bicycle. Those who have had a similar struggle will correctly estimate the exact value of that word almost. I was laboring under peculiar difficulties, for I was a whilom inmate of one of those sacred institutions—a young ladies' boarding-school,—where any infringement upon the Spartan law of dignity would have been looked upon as less pardonable than a... more...

THE BOYNERoll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean—roll!Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;Man marks the earth, with ruin—his controlStops with the shore;—upon the watery plainThe wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remainA shadow of man's ravage, save his own,When, for a moment, like a drop of rain,He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,Without a grave, unknell'd,... more...

PREFACE These chapters were begun the day after I got back to New York from the Atlanta penitentiary, and went on from day to day to the end. I did not know, at the start, what the thing would be like at the finish, and I made small effort to make it look shapely and smooth; but the inward impulse in me to write it, somehow, was irresistible, in spite of the other impulse to go off somewhere and rest... more...

I. THE BLIGHT IN THE HILLS High noon of a crisp October day, sunshine flooding the earth with the warmth and light of old wine and, going single-file up through the jagged gap that the dripping of water has worn down through the Cumberland Mountains from crest to valley-level, a gray horse and two big mules, a man and two young girls. On the gray horse, I led the tortuous way. After me came my small... more...

"Flat-chested Faye, flat-chested Faye," chanted the girls on the table next to Faye and Rebecca's. The large hall smelled of cabbages, potatoes and baked beans, and everyone else was talking and eating and moving chairs so loudly that Faye could hardly hear herself think. "Just ignore them," suggested Rebecca. Faye didn't say anything. She opened her lunchbox and fished around... more...

CHAPTER I. SCHOOL BEGINS. Forty years ago Mr. Savory Gray was a prosperous merchant. No gentleman on 'Change wore more spotless linen or blacker broadcloth. His ample white cravat had an air of absolute wisdom and honesty. It was so very white that his fellow-merchants could not avoid a vague impression that he had taken the church on his way down town, and had so purified himself for business.... more...

THE STOKER'S CATECHISM. 1. Question.—How would you proceed to get steam up in a boiler? Answer.—Having filled the boiler with water to the usual height, that is to say, about four inches over the crown of the fire-tube, I throw in several shovelfuls of coal or coke towards the bridge, left and right, keeping the centre clear; then I place the firewood in the centre, throw some coals on it,... more...

MORE than twenty-five years have passed since I began to collect the materials from which this pamphlet has been evolved. As a substantial basis, to begin with, I was an eye-witness of all the fighting in the vicinity of Spring Hill, that amounted to anything, from the time Forrest attacked the 64th Ohio on the skirmish line until Cleburne's Division recoiled from the fire of the battery posted at... more...

Let me begin by informing you, that this new novel does not present the proposed sequel to my last work of fiction—"The Fallen Leaves." The first part of that story has, through circumstances connected with the various forms of publications adopted thus far, addressed itself to a comparatively limited class of readers in England. When the book is finally reprinted in its cheapest form—then,... more...

INTRODUCTORY With the possible exception of the deer family, the bear is the most widely disseminated big game, known to hunters. He makes his home within the Arctic Circle, often living upon the great ice-floe, or dwells within a tropical jungle, and both climates are agreeable to him, while longitudinally he has girdled the world. Of course bruin varies much, according to the climate in which he... more...