CHAPTER I. Looking-Glass house One thing was certain, that the WHITE kitten had had nothing to do with it:—it was the black kitten's fault entirely. For the white kitten had been having its face washed by the old cat for the last quarter of an hour (and bearing it pretty well, considering); so you see that it COULDN'T have had any hand in the mischief. The way Dinah washed her... more...

Standing braced—or, as it seemed to him, crucified—against the length of the blackboard, John Ward tried to calculate his chances of heading off the impending riot. It didn't seem likely that anything he could do would stop it. "Say something," he told himself. "Continue the lecture, talk!" But against the background of hysterical voices from the school yard, against the brass... more...

CHAPTER I ADVICE "Of course," said Kenneth Boyd, with the abrupt conviction of one whose argument is off the point at issue, "it's absolutely obvious. You ought to marry." The man who ought to marry was no more pleased to hear it than most of his kind. He scowled angrily: then smiled, as though contempt were a more fit reply. He was tall, broad, firm-looking, with smooth dark hair... more...

HOW IS THE WORLD USING YOU?   This is a very common question, usually put and answered with more or less levity. We seldom hear of any one answering very favourably as to the usage he experiences from the world. More generally, the questioned seems to feel that his treatment is not, and never has been, quite what it ought to be. It has sometimes occurred to me, that a great oversight is committed in... more...

THE DALBY BEAR There goes a bear on Dalby moors,Oxen and horses he devours. The peasants are in deep distressThe laidly bear should them oppress. Their heads together at length they lay,How they the bear might seize and slay. They drove their porkers through the wood,The bear turn’d round as he lay at food. Outspoke as best he could the bear:“What kind of guests approach my lair?” Uprose the bear... more...

CARBOONA'S SECRET In an old badger-hole among a maze of bramble-brakes and ancient thickets of thorn and juniper covering the foot of one of Carboona's eastern spurs, one morning very early, as Little-Sweet-Voice, the white-throated sparrow, was singing his earliest song, a great event took place. It was twilight in the badger-hole, and only persons accustomed to odds and ends of day-light... more...

THE WORK OF GEORGE GISSING AN INTRODUCTORY SURVEY 'Les gens tout Гѓ  fait heureux, forts et bien portants, sont-ils préparés comme il faut pour comprendre, pénétrer, exprimer la vie, notre vie si tourmentée et si courte?' MAUPASSANT. In England during the sixties and seventies of last century the world of books was dominated by one Gargantuan type of fiction. The terms book and... more...

When Henry Vizetelly, that admirable scholar, historian, and journalist, was sent to prison for publishing Zola's novels mine were taken over by Walter Scott, and all were reprinted except "Spring Days." This book was omitted from the list of my acknowledged works, for public and private criticism had shown it no mercy; and I had lost faith in it. All the welcome it had gotten were a few... more...

CHAPTER IAN INITIATION A brown dusk filled the long room, for although the windows were shrouded thickly and no lamp burned, some small ray of light percolated from without and made dimly visible the outlines of the company there gathered. The low, quavering notes of an organ sighed through the place. There was the rustle and movement of a crowd. To the neophyte, who had been brought into the hall with... more...

California Romantic and Resourceful One of the most important acts of the Grand Parlor of the Native Sons of the Golden West which met at Lake Tahoe in 1910 was the appropriation of approximately fifteen hundred dollars for the creation of a traveling fellowship in Pacific Coast history at the State University. In pursuance of the resolution adopted, a committee of five was appointed by the head of the... more...