CHAPTER I SENT INTO SERVITUDE Knowing this to be a narrative of unusual adventure, and one which may never even be read until long after I have departed from this world, when it will be difficult to convince readers that such times as are herein depicted could ever have been reality, I shall endeavor to narrate each incident in the simplest manner possible. My only purpose is truth, and my only witness... more...

WHAT IS THE IDEA? We have only started on our development of our country—we have not as yet, with all our talk of wonderful progress, done more than scratch the surface. The progress has been wonderful enough—but when we compare what we have done with what there is to do, then our past accomplishments are as nothing. When we consider that more power is used merely in ploughing the soil than is used... more...

CHAPTER I. THE "MONTFORT." A wintry ride—Retrospect—Embarkation—A typical day—"Stables" in rough weather—Las Palmas—The tropics—Inoculation—Journalism—Fashions—"Intelligent anticipation"—Stable-guard—Arrival. With some who left for the War it was "roses, roses, all the way." For us, the scene was the square of St. John's Wood Barracks at 2... more...

Home from the War All of this universe known to me in the year 1864 was bounded by the wooded hills of a little Wisconsin coulee, and its center was the cottage in which my mother was living alone—my father was in the war. As I project myself back into that mystical age, half lights cover most of the valley. The road before our doorstone begins and ends in vague obscurity—and Granma Green's... more...

Our Pretty Dragon Flies Come, children; come with me. Come to a pond I know of. See how the water shines in the sun. Over there is an old log lying on the edge of the pond. It is covered with green moss, and a green frog is sitting on one end of it. Let us go and sit on the other end. Goop! he says, and—plump! he has jumped into the water. That is too bad, frog; we did not mean to disturb you. How... more...

There is sorrow in Beechenbrook Cottage; the dayHas been bright with the earliest glory of May;The blue of the sky is as tender a blueAs ever the sunshine came shimmering through:The songs of the birds and the hum of the bees,As they merrily dart in and out of the trees,—The blooms of the orchard, as sifting its snows,It mingles its odors with hawthorn and rose,—The voice of the brook, as it lapses... more...

PREFACE.Observations extending over a period of twenty-five years, made at Fungus Forays and kindred meetings where Mycologists assemble together, has led to the conviction that familiarity with the Fungi and literature pertaining thereto, of one country only, leads to a false impression as to the significance of the term 'species.' It conveys the idea that species are much more sharply... more...

"THAT SWINNEY." Junius thus wrote to H. S. Woodfall in a private note, to which Dr. Good has affixed the date July 21st, 1769 (vol. i. p. 174.*) "That Swinney is a wretched but dangerous fool. He had the impudence to go to Lord G. Sackville, whom he had never spoken to, and to ask him whether or no he was the author of Junius: take care of him." This paragraph has given rise to a great... more...

Nick felt almost good-humoredly buoyant after his year’s holiday as a college boy. About a second after leaving Earth he slowed his traveling speed down to the medium velocity of light by shifting from fifth dimension to fourth. Though still a million miles above the wastes of Chaos and twice that distance from the gates of Hell, his X-ray eyes were quick to discern a difference in the road far below... more...

Walking home in the dark from an evening spent in mischief, a young man spied coming toward him down the road a person with a lamp. When the wayfarers drew abreast, the play-boy saw that the other traveler was the Blind Man from his village. "Blind Man," the youngster shouted across the road, "what a fool you be! Why, old No-Eyes, do you bear a lantern, you whose midnight is no darker than... more...