The Russian soldier made his way nervously up the ragged side of the hill, holding his gun ready. He glanced around him, licking his dry lips, his face set. From time to time he reached up a gloved hand and wiped perspiration from his neck, pushing down his coat collar. Eric turned to Corporal Leone. “Want him? Or can I have him?” He adjusted the view sight so the Russian’s features squarely... more...

THE SIOUX WARNING The scene cast a singular spell, uncanny and exciting, over young Clarke. The sweep of plains on one side, and on the other the dim outline of mountains behind which a blood-red sun was sinking, gave it a setting at once majestic and full of menace. The horizon, as the twilight spread over its whole surface, suggested the wilderness, the unknown and many dangers. The drama passing... more...

Usage and Custom are the Rules and Measures of every Language, and the Rules of Grammar have nothing more to do, than to teach it. The Grammar is to be fashioned from the particular Language, it treats of, and not the Language from the Grammar. For want of following this regular Plan, our Modern GRAMMARIANS have introduced the Grammar Rules of other Languages into their own; as if all Language was... more...

Preface. Sir Alexander Mackenzie was one of the most energetic and successful of the discoverers who have traversed the vast wilderness of British America. He did his work single-handed, with slender means, and slight encouragement, at a time when discovery was rare and the country almost terra incognita. The long and difficult route, so recently traversed by the Red River Expedition, was, to Sir... more...

CHAPTER I If you go to Southampton and search the register of the Walloon Church there, you will find that in the summer of '57, "Madame Vefue de Montgomery with all her family and servants wereadmitted to the Communion"—"Tous ceux ce furent Recus la a Cene du'57, comme passans, sans avoir Rendu Raison de la foj, mes sur latesmognage de Mons. Forest, Ministre de Madame, quj... more...

LIFE OF PLUTARCH. Plutarch was born probably between A.D. 45 and A.D. 50, at the little town of Chaeronea in Boeotia. His family appears to have been long established in this place, the scene of the final destruction of the liberties of Greece, when Philip defeated the Athenians and Boeotian forces there in 338 B.C. It was here also that Sulla defeated Mithridates, and in the great civil wars of Rome... more...

CHAPTER I. CHEVALIERS D'INDUSTRIE, OR POLITE SHARPERS. Chevaliers d'industrie, or polite and accomplished sharpers, have always existed in every city, from the earliest times to the present. The ordinary progress of these interesting gentlemen is as follows. Their debut is often difficult, and many of them are stopped short in their career. They only succeed by means of great exertion and... more...

CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. Our distance from the old world, and the favorable circumstances in which we have been placed with respect to the other nations of the new world, have made it so easy for our government to adhere to a pacific policy, that, in the sixty-two years that have elapsed since the acknowledgment of our national independence, we have enjoyed more than fifty-eight of general peace; our... more...

PREFACE. In the literature of all countries there will be found a certain number of works treating especially of love. Everywhere the subject is dealt with differently, and from various points of view. In the present publication it is proposed to give a complete translation of what is considered the standard work on love in literature, and which is called the 'Vatsyayana Kama Sutra,' or... more...

PART FIRST. "What are you, where did you come from, and whither are you bound?"—the question which from Homer's days has been put to the wayfarer in strange lands—is likewise the all-absorbing question which man is ever asking of the universe of which he is himself so tiny yet so wondrous a part. From the earliest times the ultimate purpose of all scientific research has been to elicit... more...