AMONG THE "COOLIES." They found the city one blaze of lanterns, banners, and many-colored fire-works. All the ships in the harbor were gay with brilliant bunting, and the air echoed with the boom of cannon and the snapping of firecrackers, in honor of the Chinese New-Year. In fact, it was quite a Fourth-of-July celebration; and at night there began such a burst of sky-rockets and fire-balloons... more...

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FOREWORD There are two immortal imbecilities that I have no patience for. The other one is the treatment of little towns as if they were essentially different from big towns. Cities are not "Ninevehs" and "Babylons" any more than little towns are Arcadias or Utopias. In fact we are now unearthing plentiful evidence of what might have been safely assumed, that Babylon never was a... more...

THE FIRST CHAPTER. MULMUCIUS. Matth. West. Polyd. Now to proceede with the aforesaid authors, Mulmucius DunwallГ…ВЌ, or as other saie Dunuallo Mulmucius, the sonne of Cloton (as testifieth th'english chronicle and also Geffrey of Monmouth) got the vpper hand of the other dukes or rulers: and after his fathers deceasse began his reigne ouer the whole monarchie of Britaine, in the... more...

CHAPTER I. "Cast thy bread upon the waters." The room was very full. Children, large and small, boys and girls, and some looking almost old enough to be called men and women, filled the seats. The scholars had just finished singing their best-loved hymn, "Happy Land;" and the superintendent was walking up and down the room, spying out classes here and there which were without teachers,... more...

THE DAWN OF THE MOVEMENT The sources of the Canadian Dominion must be sought in the period immediately following the American Revolution. In 1783 the Treaty of Paris granted independence to the Thirteen Colonies. Their vast territories, rich resources, and hardy population were lost to the British crown. From the ruins of the Empire, so it seemed for the moment, the young Republic rose. The issue of... more...

DUNHEVED CASTLE, CORNWALL. These mouldering ruins occupy the crest of the hill, upon which stands the town of Launceston, near the centre of the eastern side of the county of Cornwall. They are the works of a thousand years since, when might triumphed over right with an unsparing hand, and when men perpetrated by fire and sword millions of murders, which, through the ignorance and credulity of their... more...

CHAPTER I. Education is a kind of lottery in which there are good and evil chances, and some men draw blanks and other men draw prizes. And in saying this I do not use the word education in any restricted sense, as applying exclusively to the course of study in school or college; nor certainly, when I speak of prizes, am I thinking of scholarships, exhibitions, fellowships. By education I mean the... more...

PREFACE It is probable that every book contains, besides misprints, some statements which the author would be glad to modify if he could.  In Chapter V of Diversions in Sicily it is stated that the seating arrangements of the marionette theatre in Catania would be condemned by the County Council, which I believe to be correct, but, on visiting the theatre since, I find I was wrong in saying that there... more...

THE MOUND-BUILDERS. One of the most learned writers on American antiquities, a Frenchman, speaking of discoveries in Peru, exclaims, “America is to be again discovered! We must remove the veil in which Spanish politics has sought to bury its ancient civilization!” In this case, quite as much is due to the ignorance, indifference, unscrupulous greed, and religious fanaticism of the Spaniards, as to... more...