Detective Sergeant Fitzgerald found a package before his door that morning, along with the milk. He took it inside and opened it. It was a remarkably fine meerschaum pipe, such as the sergeant had longed irrationally to own for many years. There was no message with it, nor any card. He swore bitterly. On his way to Headquarters he stopped in at the orphanage where he usually left such gifts. On other... more...

CHAPTER I. SIXTY-THREE YEARS SINCE. The 24th of May, 1819, was a memorable and happy day for England, though like many such days, it was little noticed at the time. Sixty-three years since! Do many of us quite realise what England was like then; how much it differed from the England of to-day, even though some of us have lived as many years? It is worth while devoting a chapter to an attempt to recall... more...

JIM WAINRIGHT'S KID As I put down my name and the number of the crack engine of America—as well as the imprint of a greasy thumb—on the register of our roundhouse last Saturday night, the foreman borrowed a chew of my fireman's fine-cut, and said to me: "John, that old feller that's putting on the new injectors wants to see you." "What does he want, Jack?" said I.... more...

CHAPTER I. IN WHICH BOBBY GOES A FISHING, AND CATCHES A HORSE. "By jolly! I've got a bite!" exclaimed Tom Spicer, a rough, hard-looking boy, who sat on a rock by the river's side, anxiously watching the cork float on his line. "Catch him, then," quietly responded Bobby Bright, who occupied another rock near the first speaker, as he pulled up a large pout, and, without any... more...

LECTURE I INTRODUCTORY WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 25, 1916 I In the third book of the "Ethics", and in the second chapter, Aristotle, dealing with certain actions which, though bad in themselves, admit of pity and forgiveness because they were committed involuntarily, through ignorance, instances 'the man who did not know a subject was forbidden, like Aeschylus with the Mysteries,' and... more...

I The American Troops have set words to one of their bugle calls. These words are indicative of their spirit—of the calculated determination with which they have faced up to their adventure: an adventure unparalleled for magnitude in the history of their nation. They fall in in two ranks. They tell off from the right in fours. "Move to the right in fours. Quick March," comes the order. The... more...

OLDPORT IN WINTER. Our August life rushes by, in Oldport, as if we were all shot from the mouth of a cannon, and were endeavoring to exchange visiting-cards on the way. But in September, when the great hotels are closed, and the bronze dogs that guarded the portals of the Ocean House are collected sadly in the music pavilion, nose to nose; when the last four-in-hand has departed, and a man may drive a... more...

CHAPTER I THE DAY BEFORE It was the last day of February, the extra day, dead still, and biting cold, with thick, lead-colored skies shading down to inky blue at the western horizon. In the ravine below John Watson's house trees cracked ominously in the frost, and not even a rabbit was stirring. The hens had not come out, though an open door had extended an invitation, and the tamworths had... more...

BIBLIOGRAPHY OF GENERAL WORKS A large bibliography of standard works on the American Theatre was given in Volume I of the present collection. A very few of the titles have been repeated here, with the additional inclusion of books which will present the essential spirit of modern American playwriting. Some of these works mentioned contain further bibliographies, and these will enable the student to go... more...

MiceI seethe broken bodies of women and men,Temples of God ruined; I see the clawsOf sinister Fate, from the reach of whose feline pawsNever are safe the bodies of women and men.Almighty Cat, it sits on the Throne of the World,With paw outstretched, grinning at us, the mice,Who play our trivial games of virtue and vice,And pray—to That which sits on the Throne of the World!From our beginning till all... more...