“‘St. Ronan's Well’ is not so much my favourite as certain of its predecessors,” Lady Louisa Stuart wrote to Scott on March 26, 1824. “Yet still I see the author's hand in it, et c'est tout dire. Meg Dods, the meeting” (vol. i. chap. ix.), “and the last scene between Clara and her brother, are marked with the true stamp, not to be matched or mistaken. Is the Siege of... more...

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are in themselves exceedingly brief, less than ten pages of large type in the original. Yet they contain the essence of practical wisdom, set forth in admirable order and detail. The theme, if the present interpreter be right, is the great regeneration, the birth of the spiritual from the psychical man: the same theme which Paul so wisely and eloquently set forth in writing... more...

THE GOLDEN BIRD A certain king had a beautiful garden, and in the garden stood a tree which bore golden apples. These apples were always counted, and about the time when they began to grow ripe it was found that every night one of them was gone. The king became very angry at this, and ordered the gardener to keep watch all night under the tree. The gardener set his eldest son to watch; but about twelve... more...

I IN WHICH THE DESTINY THAT PLAYS WITH MEN MOVES THE PIECES ON THE BOARD Dust lay thick along the road that led through the very heart of the native quarter of Mangadone; dust raised into a misty haze which hung in the air and actually introduced a light undernote of red into the effect. Dust, which covered the bare feet of the coolies, the velvet slippers of the Burmese, which encroached everywhere... more...

What sort of world was it, he puzzled, that wouldn't help victims find out whether they had been murdered or had committed suicide? he police counselor leaned forward and tapped the small nameplate on his desk, which said: Val Borgenese. "That's my name," he said. "Who are you?" The man across the desk shook his head. "I don't know," he said indistinctly.... more...

The Cauldron The factory saw-toothed the horizon with its hideous profile as the moon rose in the east. The red glow of the furnaces bathed the tall buildings, the gigantic scaffolds, the cord-like elevated pipelines and the columnar smokestacks in the crimson of anger. Even the moon seemed to fade as the long-fingered smokestacks reached toward it belching their pollution. The air, which should have... more...

I. The first sign of our approach to Lourdes was a vast wooden cross, crowning a pointed hill. We had been travelling all day, through the August sunlight, humming along the straight French roads beneath the endless avenues; now across a rich plain, with the road banked on either side to avert the spring torrents from the Pyrenees; now again mounting and descending a sudden shoulder of hill. A few... more...

BALLADE OF THE PRIMITIVE JEST "What did the dark-haired Iberian laugh at before the tall blondeAryan drove him into the corners of Europe?"—Brander Matthews I am an ancient Jest!Palaeolithic manIn his arboreal nestThe sparks of fun would fan;My outline did he plan,And laughed like one possessed,'Twas thus my course began,I am a Merry Jest! I am an early Jest!Man delved, and built, and... more...

I. THE PROBLEM OF ANÆSTHESIA DURING EYE-MOVEMENT. A first suggestion of the possible presence of anæsthesia during eye-movement is given by a very simple observation. All near objects seen from a fairly rapidly moving car appear fused. No further suggestion of their various contour is distinguishable than blurred streaks of color arranged parallel, in a hazy stream which flows rapidly past toward the... more...

Preface The stories in this Fairy Book come from all quarters of the world. For example, the adventures of 'Ball-Carrier and the Bad One' are told by Red Indian grandmothers to Red Indian children who never go to school, nor see pen and ink. 'The Bunyip' is known to even more uneducated little ones, running about with no clothes at all in the bush, in Australia. You may see... more...