Dear Mr. Smithers, By every right I ought to choose you to edit and bring out Sir Richard Burton's translation of Catullus, because you collaborated with him on this work by a correspondence of many months before he died. If I have hesitated so long as to its production, it was because his notes, which are mostly like pencilled cobwebs, strewn all over his Latin edition, were headed, "NEVER... more...

When Gerrit woke that morning, his head felt misty and tired, as though weighed down by a mountain landscape, by a whole stack of mist-mountains that bore heavily upon his brain. His eyes remained closed; and, though he was waking, his nightmare still seemed to cast an after-shadow: a nightmare that he was being crushed by great rocky avalanches, which he felt pressing deep down inside his head, though... more...

CHAPTER I "I always thought that you, Pegler, were such a very sensible woman." The words were said in a good-natured, though slightly vexed tone; and a curious kind of smile flitted over the rather grim face of the person to whom they were addressed. "I've never troubled you before in this exact way, have I, ma'am?" "No, Pegler. That you certainly have not." Miss... more...

TROTTY VECK AND HIS DAUGHTER MEG."TROTTY" seems a strange name for an old man, but it was given to Toby Veck because of his always going at a trot to do his errands; for he was a ticket porter or messenger and his office was to take letters and messages for people who were in too great a hurry to send them by post, which in those days was neither so cheap nor so quick as it is now. He did not... more...

IMPERFECT RESPECTABILITIES.   Everybody must have had some trouble in his time with imperfect respectabilities. Nice, well-dressed, well-housed, civil, agreeable people are they. No fault to find with them but that there is some little flaw in their history, for which the very good (rigid) don't visit them. The degree to which one is incommoded with imperfect respectabilities, depends of course a... more...

PART I.  HOW TO CLEAR RATS FROM WAREHOUSES, OFFICES, STOREROOMS, ETC. In the first place my advice is—never poison Rats in any enclosed buildings whatever.  Why?  Simply because the Rats that you poison are Drain Rats, or what you call Black Rats, and you can depend upon it that the Rats that you poison will not get back into the drains, but die under the floor between the laths and plaster, and... more...

REVERENCE TO GANESHA!"The sky is clouded; and the wood resemblesThe sky, thick-arched with black Tamâla boughs;O Radha, Radha! take this Soul, that tremblesIn life's deep midnight, to Thy golden house."So Nanda spoke,—and, led by Radha's spirit,The feet of Krishna found the road aright;Wherefore, in bliss which all high hearts inherit,Together taste they Love's divine delight.... more...

CHAPTER I. THE DUBOIS HOUSE. "Well, verily, I didn't expect to find anything like this, in such a wild region", said Mr. Norton, as he settled himself comfortably in a curiously carved, old-fashioned arm-chair, before the fire that blazed cheerily on the broad hearth of the Dubois House. "'Tis not a Yankee family either", added he, mentally. "Everything agreeable and tidy,... more...

Dear JoanThe Far North calls and I am on my way:—There lies the port; the vessel puffs her sail.There gloom the dark broad seas.      *       *       *       *       *The lights begin to twinkle from the rocks. Why write as if I had taken a lifelong vow of separation from the British Isles and all things civilized, when after all it is only one short year out of my allotted span of... more...

Chapter One. The Ghosts’ Pass. “Well, old man, what do we do next?” The speaker, a fine young fellow of some five-and-twenty summers, reclining on the rough grass, with clouds of tobacco-smoke filtering through his lips, looked the picture of comfort, his appearance belying in every way the discontent expressed in his tones as he smoked his pipe in the welcome shade of a giant rock, which... more...