CHAPTER1 MIDNIGHT AT THE GATE After a long, tiring climb, the two friends, Penny Parker and Jerry Livingston, had reached the summit of Knob Hill, far above the city of Riverview. Now as they paused in the moonlight to catch their breath, the slim, golden-haired girl bent to adjust the irons of her skis before making a swift descent to the clearing below. “We’ll not have many more glorious skiing... more...

DOCTOR MARIGOLD I am a Cheap Jack, and my own father’s name was Willum Marigold.  It was in his lifetime supposed by some that his name was William, but my own father always consistently said, No, it was Willum.  On which point I content myself with looking at the argument this way: If a man is not allowed to know his own name in a free country, how much is he allowed to know in a land of... more...

Chapter I EN ROUTE Likely enough, I would not have remained in Gafsa more than a couple of days. For it was my intention to go from England straight down to the oases of the Djerid, Tozeur and Nefta, a corner of Tunisia left unexplored during my last visit to that country—there, where the inland regions shelve down towards those mysterious depressions, the Chotts, dried-up oceans, they say, where in... more...

CHAPTER I IN WHICH KEZIAH HEARS TWO PROPOSALS AND THE BEGINNING OF A THIRD Trumet in a fog; a fog blown in during the night by the wind from the wide Atlantic. So wet and heavy that one might taste the salt in it. So thick that houses along the main road were but dim shapes behind its gray drapery, and only the gates and fences of the front yards were plainly in evidence to the passers-by. The beach... more...

TRAGEDIES Vol. IV (392) Most of the notes which the present editor has subjoined to this play were published by him in a small pamphlet in 1745. I.i (393,*) Enter three Witches] In order to make a true estimate of the abilities and merit of a writer, it it always necessary to examine the genius of his age, and the opinions of his contemporaries. A poet who should now make the whole action of his... more...

ACT THE FIRST. SCENE I. A Grove before the Temple of Diana. IPHIGENIA.Beneath your leafy gloom, ye waving boughsOf this old, shady, consecrated grove,As in the goddess' silent sanctuary,With the same shudd'ring feeling forth I step,As when I trod it first, nor ever hereDoth my unquiet spirit feel at home.Long as the mighty will, to which I bow,Hath kept me here conceal'd, still, as at... more...

ON THE VICE OF NOVEL READING. Ever since the Novel reached the stage of development where it was demonstrated to be the most ingenious vehicle yet designed for conveying the protean thought and fancy of man, there has stood in the judgment book of Public Opinion the decree that novel-reading was a vice. Of course, that judgment did not apply exclusively to the reading of novels. It was a sort of... more...

CHAPTER I. MR. FALKIRK. "We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help knowingThat skies are clear and grass is growing." When one has in charge a treasure which one values greatly, and which, if once made known one is pretty sure to lose, I suppose the impulse of most men would be towards a hiding- place. So, at any rate, felt one of the men in this history. Schools had done their secluding work... more...

WHISTLER STORIES The studios of Chelsea are full of Whistler anecdotes. One tells of a female model to whom he owed some fifteen shillings for sittings. She was a Philistine of the Philistines who knew nothing of her patron's fame and was in no way impressed with his work. One day she told another artist that she had been sitting to a little Frenchman called Whistler, who jumped about his studio... more...

April 14, 1920. "Hat-pins to match the colour of the eyes are to be very fashionable this year," according to a Trade journal. This should be good news to those Tube-travellers who object to having green hat-pins stuck in their blue eyes. Enterprise cannot be dead if it is really true that a well-known publisher has at last managed to persuade Mr. Winston Churchill to write a few words... more...