INTRODUCTION All whales, dolphins, and porpoises belong to an order or major scientific group called the Cetacea by scientists. They are all mammals (air-breathing animals which have hair in at least some stage of their development, maintain a constant body temperature, bear their young alive, and nurse them for a while) which have undergone extensive changes in body form (anatomy) and function... more...

The accounts prefixed to the different editions of his works, down to the year 1805, are very imperfect; in that year a new, and, in general, far better edition than any of the preceding ones, was published in Paris, to which a sketch of his life was also added; but it contains rather just criticisms on his works, than any very novel or satisfactory anecdote concerning himself. It is not pretended here... more...

FIRE TOWER Throughout Scotland and Ireland there are scattered great numbers of round towers, which have puzzled all antiquarians. They have of late obtained the general name of Fire Towers, and our engraving represents the view of one of them, at Brechin, in Scotland. It consists of sixty regular courses of hewn stone, of a brighter colour than the adjoining church. It is 85 feet high to the cornice,... more...

PREFACE. It has long been a subject of regret that we should have so few remains of so great a writer as the author of the “Analogy,” not only the greatest thinker of his day, but one almost equally remarkable for his personal religion and amiability. The few fragments and letters which remain unpublished, derive from this circumstance a value wholly incommensurate with their extent, though, as to... more...

It is the fashion to call every story controversial that deals with times when controversy or a war of religion was raging; but it should be remembered that there are some which only attempt to portray human feelings as affected by the events that such warfare occasioned. 'Old Mortality' and 'Woodstock' are not controversial tales, and the 'Chaplet of Pearls' is so quite... more...

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THE GREAT TORNADO. The Summer of 1877 has been remarkable in some localities for the severity of its storms. These, in several instances, have partaken of the character of tornadoes. Mt. Carmel, in Illinois, was nearly destroyed about the 20th of June last; Pensaukee, in Wisconsin, was nearly ruined on the 8th of July, and Pittston, in Massachusetts, suffered terribly from a tornado on the same day.... more...

[p5]INTRODUCTION. The Author of the book in hand, having passed through the various scenes through which he would accompany his readers, was prompted to make this offering to the craft and the public in order to relieve his mind of the thoughts had upon the subject of making shoes, as well as to contribute something of a literary character which, in the broad range of possibilities, may become useful... more...

THE INVITATION "Oh, push it harder, much harder, so I can go away up to the tree tops," cried Jerry. "Don't you just love to fly through the air this way?" Mary Lee gave the swing one more push. "There!" she exclaimed, "that's the best I can do, Geraldine White. I'm hot all over now," and she dropped down on the soft grass at the foot of a big tree.... more...

I.—GENERAL. A most distinctive class of ancient Irish literature, and probably the class that is least popularly familiar, is the hagiographical.  It is, the present writer ventures to submit, as valuable as it is distinctive and as well worthy of study as it is neglected.  While annals, tales and poetry have found editors the Lives of Irish Saints have remained largely a mine unworked.  Into the... more...