INTRODUCTION. o have attempted in former times a work of this description, would have seemed, we cannot deny, to savour either of presumption or of idiotcy, or more probably of both. And rightly. But we live in times of progress. The mystery of yesterday is the common-place of to-day; the Bible, which was Newton's oracle, is Professor Huxley's jest-book; and students at the University now... more...

HOPEDALE. I will content myself with a few explanations of the accompanying view of the station from the bay. In winter the aspect of the whole landscape would be very much whiter, and the foreground not water, but ice. The bare, rocky ship hill which forms the background still had considerable patches of snow when we arrived early in August, but it melted from day to day during our stay, for the... more...

From Fitzgerald's exquisite version of the Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám, I take the following quatrains which may serve as a text for what I have to say: So when the angel of the darker DrinkAt last shall find you by the river-brink,And offering you his cup, invite your SoulForth to your lips to quaff, you shall not shrink. Why, if the soul can fling the Dust aside,And naked on the air of Heaven... more...

IN WHICH IT IS ALL DONE OVER AGAIN All morning she had gazed on the shining reaches of the Hudson, their colour deepening to blue as she neared the sea. A gold-bound volume of Shelley, with his name on the fly-leaf, lay in her lap. And two lines she repeated softly to herself—two lines that held a vision:        "He was as the sun in his fierce youth,        As terrible and lovely... more...

THE GOD FROM THE MACHINE Hit a man an' help a woman, an' ye can't be far wrong anyways.— Maxims of Private Mulvaney. The Inexpressibles gave a ball. They borrowed a seven-pounder from the Gunners, and wreathed it with laurels, and made the dancing-floor plate-glass, and provided a supper, the like of which had never been eaten before, and set two sentries at the door of the room to... more...

The first specimens of Myotis velifer from California were taken in 1909 by C. L. Camp at Needles, San Bernardino County (Grinnell, Univ. California Publ. Zool., 12:266, March 20, 1914), and subsequently this bat was recorded from farther south in the lower Colorado River Valley at the Riverside Mountains, Riverside County (Stager, Jour. Mamm., 20:226, May 14, 1939). West of the Rocky Mountains the... more...

THE cave had been their hiding-place as children; it was a secret refuge now against hunger or darkness when they were hunting in the woods. The primitive meal was finished; ashes were raked over the red coals; the slice of bacon and the little bag of meal were hung high against the rock wall; and the two stepped from the cavern into a thicket of rhododendrons. Parting the bushes toward the dim light,... more...

CHAPTER I It was very early in the morning, it was scarcely dawn, when the young man started upon a walk of twenty-five miles to reach Alton, where he was to be assistant to the one physician in the place, Doctor Thomas Gordon, or as he was familiarly called, "Doc." Gordon. The young man's name was James Elliot. He had just graduated, and this was to be his first experience in the practice... more...

CHAPTER I. The Appalling News. On the advent of Summer, June 1st, the country was horror-stricken by the announcement that a terrible calamity had overtaken the inhabitants of Johnstown, and the neighboring villages. Instantly the whole land was stirred by the startling news of this great disaster. Its appalling magnitude, its dreadful suddenness, its scenes of terror and agony, the fate of thousands... more...

CHAPTER I BEFORE SOCRATES Philosophical Interpreters of the Universe, of the Creation and Constitution of the World. PHILOSOPHY.—The aim of philosophy is to seek the explanation of all things: the quest is for the first causes of everything, and also how all things are, and finally why, with what design, with a view to what, things are. That is why, taking "principle" in all the senses of the... more...