In the purely cerebral sense, there was no particular point-of-sequence at which Gral could have been said to Know. The very causality of his existence was a succession of brute obedience to brute awareness, for it was only thus that one survived. There was the danger-sense on those days when the great-toothed cats roamed the valley, and the males-who-will-bring remained huddled and sullen in the caves... more...

PROLOGUE The Frenchman beside me had been dead since dawn. His scarred and shackled body swayed limply back and forth with every sweep of the great oar as we, his less fortunate bench-fellows, tugged and strained to keep time to the stroke. Two men had I seen die beside me, yet Death ever passed me by, nay, it seemed rather that despite the pain of stripes, despite the travail and hardship, my strength... more...

THE IMPORTANCE AND NATURE OF REFORMATION FROM SIN. This know also, that in the last days perilous times shall come; for men shall be lovers of themselves, covetous, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, without natural affection, truce breakers, false accusers, incontinent, fierce, despisers of those who are good, traitors, heady, high-minded, lovers of pleasure more... more...

NANCY HANSON'S PROJECT. BY HOWARD PYLE. It was in the old Quaker town of Wilmington, Delaware, and it was the evening of the day on which the battle of Brandywine had been fought. The country people were coming into town in sledges, and in heavy low carts with solid wheels made of slices from great tree trunks, loaded with butter, eggs, milk, and vegetables; for the following day was market-day.... more...

he red tennis robot scooted desperately across the court, its four wide-set wheels squealing. For a moment, Robert's hard-hit passing shot seemed to have scored. Then, at the last instant, the robot whipped around its single racket-equipped arm. Robert sprawled headlong in a futile lunge at the return. "Game and set to Red Three," announced the referee box from its high station above the... more...

NARRATIVE OF A JOURNEY, &c. Geneva, July, 1819. You, my dear friend, who are well acquainted from my infancy with my clambering disposition, which, within these few months, has carried me to the top of both Vesuvius and Ætna, will not be much surprised to learn, that I have attempted, with success, to mount to the summit of Mont Blanc; an aerial journey which the sight of this mountain has... more...

JOHN THE BAPTIST. I. The Interest of his Biography.   "John, than which man a sadder or a greater    Not till this day has been of woman born;  John, like some iron peak by the Creator    Fired with the red glow of the rushing morn.   "This, when the sun shall rise and overcome it,    Stands in his shining, desolate and bare;  Yet not the less the inexorable... more...

INTRODUCTION. Few women have worked so faithfully for the cause of humanity as Mary Wollstonecraft, and few have been the objects of such bitter censure. She devoted herself to the relief of her suffering fellow-beings with the ardor of a Saint Vincent de Paul, and in return she was considered by them a moral scourge of God. Because she had the courage to express opinions new to her generation, and the... more...

I THE GARDEN CLUB The door opened. A gust of wind and rain literally swept five boys, wet and breathless, into the room. The man at the big oak table in front of a huge open fire looked up, smiled, and said, "Off with your duds, boys! Bar the door securely, Jay, for it's a wild night. Throw a fresh log on the fire, Albert. And all line up." For a few moments the big cheerful room seemed... more...

CHAPTER I. Eliph' Hewlitt Eliph' Hewlitt, book agent, seated in his weather-beaten top buggy, drove his horse, Irontail, carefully along the rough Iowa hill road that leads from Jefferson to Clarence. The Horse, a rusty gray, tottered in a loose-jointed manner from side to side of the road, half asleep in the sun, and was indolent in every muscle of his body, except his tail, which thrashed... more...