Chapter One A Horse in Need He came into the town as a solid, swiftly moving dust cloud. The wind from behind had kept the dust moving forward at a pace just equal to the gallop of his horse. Not until he had brought his mount to a halt in front of the hotel and swung down to the ground did either he or his horse become distinctly visible. Then it was seen that the animal was in the last stages of... more...

PREFACE. Once more I come before the public with a work on the history of a nation which is not mine by birth. It is the ambition of all nations which enjoy a literary culture to possess a harmonious and vivid narrative of their own past history. And it is of inestimable value to any people to obtain such a narrative, which shall comprehend all epochs, be true to fact and, while resting on thorough... more...

ON THE SUFFERINGS OF THE WORLD. Unless suffering is the direct and immediate object of life, our existence must entirely fail of its aim. It is absurd to look upon the enormous amount of pain that abounds everywhere in the world, and originates in needs and necessities inseparable from life itself, as serving no purpose at all and the result of mere chance. Each separate misfortune, as it comes, seems,... more...

TOM dodged hither and thither through lanes until he was well out of the track of returning scholars, and then fell into a moody jog. He crossed a small "branch" two or three times, because of a prevailing juvenile superstition that to cross water baffled pursuit. Half an hour later he was disappearing behind the Douglas mansion on the summit of Cardiff Hill, and the school-house was hardly... more...

CHAPTER I. The Reason for Writing These Memoirs.—Gabrielle d'Estrees. The reign of the King who now so happily and so gloriously rules over France will one day exercise the talent of the most skilful historians. But these men of genius, deprived of the advantage of seeing the great monarch whose portrait they fain would draw, will search everywhere among the souvenirs of contemporaries and base... more...

CHAPTER 1. FROM GANTHEAUME BAY TO THE HUTT RIVER. WRECK OF THE SECOND BOAT IN GANTHEAUME BAY. A few moments were sufficient to enable us all to recollect ourselves: two men endeavoured to keep the boat's stern on to the sea, whilst the rest of us lightened her by carrying everything we could on shore, after which we hauled her up. The custom had always been for the other boat to lie off until I... more...

CHAPTER I THE BURSTING OF THE STORM A group of excited men were gathered in front of the Stock Exchange at Johannesburg. It was evident that something altogether unusual had happened. All wore anxious and angry expressions, but a few shook hands with each other, as if the news that so much agitated them, although painful, was yet welcome; and indeed this was so. For months a war-cloud had hung over the... more...

CHAPTER I A QUARREL AND A FIGHT The Debating Society of the Königsberg University was sitting. The subject for the occasion was of a trivial nature, but lent itself to keen and heated argument. The whole afternoon had been occupied with the speeches of the minor lights of the society, and now only the two opposing leaders remained to make their closing speeches before the division took place. Young... more...

C. Suetonius Tranquillus was the son of a Roman knight who commanded a legion, on the side of Otho, at the battle which decided the fate of the empire in favour of Vitellius. From incidental notices in the following History, we learn that he was born towards the close of the reign of Vespasian, who died in the year 79 of the Christian era. He lived till the time of Hadrian, under whose administration... more...

CHAPTER ONE YESTERDAY AND TO-DAY "Once upon a Time." "Once upon a time,"[1] men and women dwelt in caves and cliffs and fashioned curious implements from the stones of the earth and painted crude pictures upon the walls of their rock dwellings. Archaeologists find such traces in England and along the river valleys of France, among the sands of Egyptian deserts and in India, where armor... more...