When I began, in the summer of 1882, to collect among the Passamaquoddy Indians at Campobello, New Brunswick, their traditions and folk-lore, I expected to find very little indeed. These Indians, few in number, surrounded by white people, and thoroughly converted to Roman Catholicism, promised but scanty remains of heathenism. What was my amazement, however, at discovering, day by day, that there... more...

CHAPTER I A LADY IN COMPANY "Madam, you are charming! You have not slept, and yet you smile.No man could ask a better prisoner." She turned to him, smiling faintly. "I thank you. At least we have had breakfast, and for such mercy I am grateful to my jailer. I admit I was famished. What now?" With just the turn of a shoulder she indicated the water front, where, at the end of the dock on... more...

What the Ocean has to Say—Its Whispers—Its Thunders—Its Secrets. There is a voice in the waters of the great sea. It calls to man continually. Sometimes it thunders in the tempest, when the waves leap high and strong and the wild winds shriek and roar, as if to force our attention. Sometimes it whispers in the calm, and comes rippling on the shingly beach in a still, small voice, as if to solicit... more...

THE QUEEN OF HEARTS THE QUEEN OF HEARTS. The Queen of Hearts,She made some Tarts,   All on a Summer's Day: The Knave of Hearts,He stole those Tarts,   And took them right away.   The King of Hearts,Called for those Tarts, And beat the Knave full sore:   The Knave of Hearts,Brought back those Tarts, And vowed he'd steal no more.     Sing a Song for Sixpence, A Pocketful   of Rye;  ... more...

Proem Profiles from China The Hand As you sit so, in the firelight, your hand is the color of    new bronze.I cannot take my eyes from your hand;In it, as in a microcosm, the vast and shadowy Orient    is made visible.Who shall read me your hand? You are a large man, yet it is small and narrow, like the    hand of a woman and the paw of a chimpanzee.It is supple and boneless as the hands... more...

CHAPTER I The period of Roman history on which we now enter is, like so many that had preceded it, a period of revolt, directly aimed against the existing conditions of society and, through the means taken to satisfy the fresh wants and to alleviate the suddenly realised, if not suddenly created, miseries of the time, indirectly affecting the structure of the body politic. The difference between the... more...

ADVERTISEMENT. The following pages were written as an exercise for my leisure hours, while attending the Oneida Conference Seminary during the past winter. As it is the first attempt that, to my knowledge, has ever been made to reduce the Chippeway language to any system, it cannot be expected to be otherwise than imperfect, and perhaps may hereafter be found to be, in some respects, erroneous. It is,... more...

CHAPTER I THE GLADWYNE EXPEDITION Vernon Lisle was fishing with a determination that did not spring altogether from love of the sport. The water of the British Columbian river in which he stood knee-deep was icy cold; his rubber boots were badly ripped and leaky, and he was wet with the drizzle that drove down the lonely valley. It was difficult to reach the slack behind a boulder some distance... more...

THE SEVEN DEVILS It was very warm in the inn room, but it was so much warmer outside, in the waning flames of the late September evening, that the dark room seemed veritably cool to those who escaped into its shelter from the fading sunlight outside. A window was open to let in what little air was stirring, and from that window a spectator with a good head might look down a sheer drop of more than... more...

DANTE AND HIS TIME To know Dante we must know the age which produced Christianity's greatest poet, he whom Ruskin calls "the central man of all the world, as representing in perfect balance the imaginative, moral and intellectual faculties, all at their highest." Other writers are not so dependent upon their times for our clear understanding of their books. Dante to be intelligible to the... more...