FAIR MAID AND FOUL FOOL The girl stood on the summit of the hill looking down the white highway that stretched to Syracuse. The morning sun shone hotly; sky and sea and earth seemed to kindle and quicken in the ecstasy of heat, setting free spirits of air and earth and water, towards whom the girl’s spirit stirred in sympathy. All about her beauty flamed luxuriant. At her feet the secrets of the... more...

This treatise is one of those ten distinct works, which the author had prepared for the press, when he was so suddenly summoned to the Celestial City. Well did his friends in the ministry, Ebenezer Chandler and John Wilson, call it "an excellent manuscript, calculated to assist the Christian that would grow in grace, and to win others over to Jesus Christ." It was first published, with a... more...

CHAPTER I. "THE BLIND-EYED CHILDREN." "You is goin' off, Dotty Dimpwil." "Yes, dear, and you must kiss me." "No, not now; you isn't gone yet. You's goin' nex' day after this day." Miss Dimple and Horace exchanged glances, for they had an important secret between them. "Dotty, does you want to hear me crow like Bantie? 'Cause," added... more...

In a certain sort fragile is written all over our colony; as far as the visible body of it is concerned it is inexpressibly perishable; a fire and a high wind could sweep it all away; and one of the most American of all American things is the least fitted among them to survive from the present to the future, and impart to it the significance of what may soon be a "portion and parcel" of our... more...

My Dear Sir, Many thanks for your interesting and kind letter, in which you do me the honour to ask my opinion respecting the pedigree of your island goblin, le feu follet Belenger; that opinion I cheerfully give, with a promise that it is only an opinion; in hunting for the etymons of these fairy names we can scarcely expect to arrive at any thing like certainty. I suppose you are aware that the name... more...

THE SHADOW SHOWTrains with wheels and clouds of smoke,Funny crowds of dodging folk,Trams that run along with sparks,Sofa games and pillow larks,Grubs and ponies, worms and tigers,Sparrows on the tree,Oh!What a lot of lots of thingsFor little boys to see!Aeroplanes and paper darts,Woodmen driving broken carts,Minahs on the chimney tops,Swallows dodging near the shops,Barking pups that make the... more...

RELIEF OF THE ADMIRAL There was no further difficulty about provisions, which were punctually brought by the natives on the old terms; but the familiar, spirit of sedition began to work again among the unhappy Spaniards, and once more a mutiny, led this time by the apothecary Bernardo, took form—the intention being to seize the remaining canoes and attempt to reach Espanola. This was the point at... more...

CHAPTER I I Go on Commando as a Private Burgher In the month of September, 1899, the burghers of the Orange Free State were notified, under the Commando Law, to hold themselves in readiness to go on active service at the shortest possible notice. Before proceeding any further I should like to explain that portion of the Commando Law which dealt with commandeering. It stipulated that every burgher... more...

THE BROTHER AVENGED I stood before my master’s board,   The skinker’s office plying;The herald-men brought tidings then   That my brother was murdered lying. I followed my lord unto his bed,   By his dearest down he laid him;Then my courser out of the stall I led,   And with saddle and bit arrayed him. I sprang upon my courser’s back,   With the spur began to goad him;And ere I drew his... more...

SALLY CREIGHTON. The frost outside was bitter, and the prairie, which rolled back from Lander's in long undulations to the far horizon, gleamed white beneath the moon, but there was warmth and brightness in Stukely's wooden barn. It stood at one end of the little, desolate settlement, where the trail that came up from the railroad thirty miles away forked off into two wavy ribands that melted... more...