Experiment "The first time machine, gentlemen," Professor Johnson proudly informed his two colleagues. "True, it is a small-scale experimental model. It will operate only on objects weighing less than three pounds, five ounces and for distances into the past and future of twelve minutes or less. But it works." The small-scale model looked like a small scale—a postage scale—except... more...

LAMENT I Come, Heraclitus and Simonides,Come with your weeping and sad elegies:Ye griefs and sorrows, come from all the landsWherein ye sigh and wail and wring your hands:Gather ye here within my house todayAnd help me mourn my sweet, whom in her MayUngodly Death hath ta'en to his estate,Leaving me on a sudden desolate.'Tis so a serpent glides on some shy nestAnd, of the tiny nightingales... more...

“The land where I was born” was, in my childhood, a great battleground. War—as we then thought the vastest of all wars, not only that had been, but that could ever be—swept over it. I never knew in those days a man who had not been in the war. So, “The War” was the main subject in every discussion and it was discussed with wonderful acumen. Later it took on a different relation to the new... more...

An Explosion "Are you all ready, Tom?" "All ready, Mr. Sharp," replied a young man, who was stationed near some complicated apparatus, while the questioner, a dark man, with a nervous manner, leaned over a large tank. "I'm going to turn on the gas now," went on the man. "Look out for yourself. I'm not sure what may happen." "Neither am I, but I'm ready... more...

NERO CLAUDIUS CAESAR. (337) I. Two celebrated families, the Calvini and Aenobarbi, sprung from the race of the Domitii. The Aenobarbi derive both their extraction and their cognomen from one Lucius Domitius, of whom we have this tradition: —As he was returning out of the country to Rome, he was met by two young men of a most august appearance, who desired him to announce to the senate and people a... more...

CHAPTER I Peter Van Hoosen was a result of Dutch Calvinism, and Dutch industry and thrift; also, of a belief in the Day of Judgment. The first motives were inherited tendencies, carefully educated; the last one, a conscious principle, going down to the depths of his nature and sharply dividing whatever was just and right from whatever was false and wrong. People whose religion was merely religiosity... more...

CHAPTER I. "Hold, Stranger!" The words fell from beautiful lips under the most exciting circumstances. A boat rocked upon the calm water that murmured along the shore, when a young man came down from the upper bank of white drift sand, and seized the tiller rope. He had the rope in his hand, his arm was upraised to draw the boat to his feet, when he was startled by hearing the words with which... more...

Chapter I THE CARPET-KNIGHT AND THE LADY The girl paused and steadied herself for a moment against a field gate. Her breath came fast in little sobbing pants. Her dainty shoes were soiled with dust and there was a great tear in her skirt. Very slowly, very fearfully, she turned her head. Her cheeks were the colour of chalk, her eyes were filled with terror. If a cart were coming, or those labourers in... more...

I. What Southey says of Cottle's shop is true of the little bookstore in a certain old town of New England, which I used to frequent years ago, and where I got my first peep into Chaucer, and Spenser, and Fuller, and Sir Thomas Browne, and other renowned old authors, from whom I now derive so much pleasure and solacement. 'Twas a place where sundry lovers of good books used to meet and... more...

THET R I A LOF THEWITNESSESOF THEResurrection of Jesus We were, not long since, some Gentlemen of the inns of court together, each to other so well known, that no man's presence was a confinement to any other, from speaking his mind on any subject that happened to arise in conversation. The meeting was without design, and the discourse, as in like cases, various. Among other things we fell upon... more...