CHAPTER I BIBLICAL OPERAS Whether or not the English owe a grudge to their Lord Chamberlain for depriving them of the pleasure of seeing operas based on Biblical stories I do not know. If they do, the grudge cannot be a deep one, for it is a long time since Biblical operas were in vogue, and in the case of the very few survivals it has been easy to solve the difficulty and salve the conscience of the... more...

Towards the close of the First French Revolution, Joseph Leopold SigisbertHugo, son of a joiner at Nancy, and an officer risen from the ranks in theRepublican army, married Sophie Trébuchet, daughter of a Nantes fitter-outof privateers, a Vendean royalist and devotee. Victor Marie Hugo, their second son, was born on the 26th of February, 1802, at Besançon, France. Though a weakling, he was carried,... more...

Introductory. The meditation on human life—on the contrast between what is, and what might be, on supposing a general concurrence to make the best of things-yields emotions both painful and pleasing;—painful for the demonstrations every where presented, of a love of darkness, rather than light; pleasing, that the worst evils are seen to be so remediable; and so clear the proofs of a gradual, but... more...

CHAPTER I. THE APPARATUS. To a proper comprehension of the succeeding chapters, it is necessary first of all to be familiar with the apparatus employed in carrying out electro-balneological treatment, and I therefore proceed to give a description of this. It may conveniently be divided as follows, viz. a. The tub; b. The electrodes and connections; c. The water; d. Chemicals; e. The batteries. (a) The... more...

PROLOGUE. The girl came into the room with a darting movement like a swallow, looked round her with the same birdlike quickness, and then ran across the polished floor to where a young man sat on a sofa with one leg laid along it. "I have saved you this dance, Quentin," she said, pronouncing the name with a pretty staccato. "You must be lonely not dancing, so I will sit with you. What shall... more...

ACT I. SCENE I.—LIEUTENANT O'CONNOR's Lodgings. Enter SERJEANT TROUNCE, CORPORAL FLINT, and four SOLDIERS. 1 Sol. I say you are wrong; we should all speak together, each for himself, and all at once, that we may be heard the better. 2 Sol. Right, Jack, we'll argue in platoons. 3 Sol. Ay, ay, let him have our grievances in a volley, and if we be to have a spokesman, there's the... more...

CHAPTER I To the door of an inn in the provincial town of N. there drew up a smart britchka—a light spring-carriage of the sort affected by bachelors, retired lieutenant-colonels, staff-captains, land-owners possessed of about a hundred souls, and, in short, all persons who rank as gentlemen of the intermediate category. In the britchka was seated such a gentleman—a man who, though not handsome,... more...

CHAPTER I.THE DAWN OF A CENTURY OF DISCOVERY.Slackness of discovery during the struggles of the Republic and Empire—Seetzen's voyages in Syria and Palestine—Hauran and the circumnavigation of the Dead Sea—Decapolis—Journey in Arabia—Burckhardt in Syria—Expeditions in Nubia upon the two branches of the Nile—Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina—The English in India—Webb at the Source of... more...

I THE QUEST OF FREEDOM THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY Expectancy of freedom is the dominant note of to-day. Amid the crash of armies and the clash of systems we await some liberating stroke which shall release us from the old dreary thralldoms. As Nietzsche says, "It would seem as though we had before us, as a reward for all our toils, a country still undiscovered, the horizons of which no one has yet... more...

THE ISLE OF THE HAPPY (From the Early Irish) Once when Bran, son of Feval, was with his warriors in his royal fort, they suddenly saw a woman in strange raiment upon the floor of the house. No one knew whence she had come or how she had entered, for the ramparts were closed. Then she sang these quatrains of Erin, the Isle of the Happy, to Bran while all the host were listening:A branch I bear from... more...