The murder of Monty Paliser, headlined that morning in the papers, shook the metropolis at breakfast, buttered the toast, improved the taste of the coffee. Murdered! It seemed too bad to be false. Moreover, there was his picture, the portrait of a young man obviously high-bred and insolently good-looking. In addition to war news and the financial page, what more could you decently ask for a penny?... more...

APPENDIX AND SUPPLEMENT Whether the author died before the work was complete, whether the concluding volumes were destroyed by himself or his literary executors, or whether the MS. fell into bad hands, seems a matter of uncertainty, and the materials available towards a continuation of the Memoirs are extremely fragmentary. We know, however, that Casanova at last succeeded in obtaining his pardon from... more...

CHAPTER I Jackie was a little boy and he had a little sister named Peggs, and they lived with their Aunt who was very old, maybe thirty-two. And it was so very long since she had been a little girl, that she quite forgot that children need toys to play with and all that. So poor little Jackie and Peggs had no soldiers or dolls but could only play at make-believe all day long. They lived in a little... more...

SANGUINE "The clock indicates the hour but what does enternity indicate?"Whitman Imagine, being told cubism isn't painting. ThatBeardsley didn't die at 26, unheralded as a boy geniusor Corot didn't come to Paris after all. Imagine, The Louvre without a rooftop, theintelligentsia sitting down to a ragged tablesurrounded by sawdust intellects, Proust not beingable to write his... more...

CHAPTER I. A BOARDING SCHOOL. "ARE you for a walk," said Montraville to his companion, as they arose from table; "are you for a walk? or shall we order the chaise and proceed to Portsmouth?" Belcour preferred the former; and they sauntered out to view the town, and to make remarks on the inhabitants, as they returned from church. Montraville was a Lieutenant in the army: Belcour was his... more...

INTRODUCTION. The sixty-fourth volume of this Library contains those papers from the Tatler which were especially associated with the imagined character of Isaac Bickerstaff, who was the central figure in that series; and in the twenty-ninth volume there is a similar collection of papers relating to the Spectator Club and Sir Roger de Coverley, who was the central figure in Steele and Addison’s... more...

FABLE I. THE FOX AND THE GOAT. In the extreme end of a village a Fox one day went to have a peep at a hen-roost. He had the bad luck to fall into a well, where he swam first to this side, and then to that side, but could not get out with all his pains. At last, as chance would have it, a poor Goat came to the same place to seek for some drink. "So ho! friend Fox," said he, "you quaff it off... more...

JONGLEURS. What is the stir in the street?Hurry of feet!And after,A sound as of pipes and of tabers! Men of the conflicts and labors,Struggling and shifting and shoving,Pushing and pounding your neighbors,Fighting for leeway for laughter,Toiling for leisure for loving!Hark, through the window and up to the rafter,Madder and merrier,Deeper and verier,Sweeter, contrarier,Dafter and dafter,A song... more...

JACK CADE—THE PRETENDED MORTIMER. Henry VI. was one of the most unpopular of our English monarchs. During his reign the nobles were awed by his austerity towards some members of their own high estate, and divided between the claims of Lancaster and York; and the peasantry, who cared little for the claims of the rival Roses, were maddened by the extortions and indignities to which they were subjected.... more...

INTRODUCTION There are good things which we want to share with the world and good things which we want to keep to ourselves. The secret of our favourite restaurant, to take a case, is guarded jealously from all but a few intimates; the secret, to take a contrary case, of our infallible remedy for seasickness is thrust upon every traveller we meet, even if he be no more than a casual acquaintance about... more...