Chapter 36 The Professor's Yarn IT was in the early days. I was not a college professor then. I was a humble-minded young land-surveyor, with the world before me—to survey, in case anybody wanted it done. I had a contract to survey a route for a great mining-ditch in California, and I was on my way thither, by sea—a three or four weeks' voyage. There were a good many passengers, but I had... more...

Chapter 41 The Metropolis of the South THE approaches to New Orleans were familiar; general aspects were unchanged. When one goes flying through London along a railway propped in the air on tall arches, he may inspect miles of upper bedrooms through the open windows, but the lower half of the houses is under his level and out of sight. Similarly, in high-river stage, in the New Orleans region, the... more...

CHAPTER FIRST I am Born. If this simple tale is to be told at all, it may as well begin at the beginning and in the good old-fashioned and best of all ways—thus: Once upon a time in the Canadian city of Toronto, on the 17th of March, the sun rose bright and clear—which was a most surprising thing for the sun to do on St. Patrick's Day, but while the people were yet wondering over it the... more...

Outside, bells were ringing. "Happy New Year!" The mad sound of people crazed for the moment, shouting, echoed the bells. "Happy New Year!" A sound of music, waxing, waning, now joined in wild symphony by the voices, now left alone to counterpoint the noise of human celebration.... For a while, Oliver Symmes heard the raucous music of the crowd. It became a part of him, seemed to come... more...

CHAPTER I Ninon de l'Enclos as a Standard To write the biography of so remarkable a woman as Ninon de l'Enclos is to incur the animadversions of those who stand upon the dogma, that whoso violates one of the Ten Commandments is guilty of violating them all, particularly when one of the ten is conventionally selected as the essential precept and the most important to be observed. It is purely... more...

Introductory. It is undeniably true that the progress of scientific thought and speculative inquiry, both in this country and in Europe, is rapidly tending towards a purely materialistic view of the universe, or one that utterly excludes the ancient and long-predominating metaphysical conceptions of Life, to say nothing of the more regnant and universally prevailing conception of a God. And it is quite... more...

To Melville Best Anderson That is poetry in which truth is expressed in the fewest possible words, in words which are inevitable, in words which could not be changed without weakening the meaning or throwing discord into the melody. To choose the right word and to discard all others, this is the chief factor in good writing. To learn good poetry by heart is to acquire help toward doing this,... more...

PREFACE In Northern India stood a monastery called The Chubara of Dhunni Bhagat. No one remembered who or what Dhunni Bhagat had been. He had lived his life, made a little money and spent it all, as every good Hindu should do, on a work of piety—the Chubara. That was full of brick cells, gaily painted with the figures of Gods and kings and elephants, where worn-out priests could sit and meditate on... more...

THE SON’S VETO CHAPTER I To the eyes of a man viewing it from behind, the nut-brown hair was a wonder and a mystery.  Under the black beaver hat, surmounted by its tuft of black feathers, the long locks, braided and twisted and coiled like the rushes of a basket, composed a rare, if somewhat barbaric, example of ingenious art.  One could understand such weavings and coilings being wrought to last... more...

BOOK the Third. CHAP. I. Shews in what manner anger and revenge operate on the mind, and how ambition is capable of stifling both, in a remarkable instance, that private injuries, how great soever, may seem of no weight, when public grandeur requires they should be looked over. Nothing is so violent as anger in its first emotions, it takes the faculties by surprize, and rushes upon the soul like an... more...