Unconscious Comediansby Honore de BalzacTranslated by Katharine Prescott WormeleyDEDICATIONTo Monsieur le Comte Jules de Castellane.UNCONSCIOUS COMEDIANSLeon de Lora, our celebrated landscape painter, belongs to one of thenoblest families of the Roussillon (Spanish originally) which,although distinguished for the antiquity of its race, has been doomedfor a century to the proverbial poverty of hidalgos. Coming,light-footed, to Paris from the department of the Eastern Pyrenees,with the sum of eleven francs in his pocket for all viaticum, he hadin some degree forgotten the miseries and privations of his childhood...
On a ridge above Texas Flat upon a rock shaped like flame, a hand moved upon the lava. The hand moved and then was still. In all that vast beige-gray silence there was no other movement and no sound. A buzzard swinging in lazy circles above the serrated ridge had glimpsed that moving hand. Swinging lower, he saw a man who lay among the rocks atop the ridge. He was a long-bodied man in worn boots and jeans, a man with wide shoulders and a lean tough face. It was the face of a hunter but now of a man hunted. A man who lay with his rifle beside him and who wore a belted gun; but the man still lived and the buzzard could wait. Below and stretching away from the very foot of the ridge to lose i
A Ward of the Golden Gateby Bret HartePROLOGUE.In San Francisco the "rainy season" had been making itself areality to the wondering Eastern immigrant. There were short daysof drifting clouds and flying sunshine, and long succeeding nightsof incessant downpour, when the rain rattled on the thin shinglesor drummed on the resounding zinc of pioneer roofs. The shiftingsand-dunes on the outskirts were beaten motionless and sodden bythe onslaught of consecutive storms; the southeast trades broughtthe saline breath of the outlying Pacific even to the busy hauntsof Commercial and Kearney streets; the low-lying Mission road was aquagmire; along the City Front, despite of piles and pier and...
Chapter IX of Volume II (Chap. 32)ELIZABETH was sitting by herself the next morning, and writing to Jane, while Mrs. Collins and Maria were gone on business into the village, when she was startled by a ring at the door, the certain signal of a visitor. As she had heard no carriage, she thought it not unlikely to be Lady Catherine, and under that apprehension was putting away her half-finished letter that she might escape all impertinent questions, when the door opened, and to her very great surprise, Mr. Darcy, and Mr. Darcy only, entered the room.He seemed astonished too on finding her alone, and apologised for his intrusion by letting her know that he had understood all the ladies to be w
Creatures That Once Were Menby Maxim GorkyTranslated from the Russian by J. M. SHIRAZI and OthersIntroduction by G. K. CHESTERTONCONTENTSINTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . VCreatures That Once were Men . . . . 13Twenty-Six Men and a Girl . . . . .104Chelkash . . . . . . . . . . . . . .125My Fellow-Traveller . . . . . . . .178On a Raft . . . . . . . . . . . . .229INTRODUCTIONBy G. K. CHESTERTONIt is certainly a curious fact that so many of the voices ofwhat is called our modern religion have come from countrieswhich are not only simple, but may even be called barbaric....
MOTHER HOLLEONCE upon a time there was a widow who had two daughters;one of them was pretty and clever, and the other ugly andlazy. But as the ugly one was her own daughter, she liked her farthe best of the two, and the pretty one had to do all the work of thehouse, and was in fact the regular maid of all work. Every day shehad to sit by a well on the high road, and spin till her fingers wereso sore that they often bled. One day some drops of blood fell onher spindle, so she dipped it into the well meaning to wash it, but, asluck would have it, it dropped from her hand and fell right in. Sheran weeping to her stepmother, and told her what had happened,...
THE MERCHANT OF VENICETHE MERCHANT OFVENICEWilliam Shakespeare15971- Page 2-THE MERCHANT OF VENICEDRAMATIS PERSONAETHE DUKE OF VENICE THE PRINCE OF MOROCCO, suitor toPortia THE PRINCE OF ARRAGON, " " " ANTONIO, a merchant ofVenice BASSANIO, his friend, suitor to Portia SOLANIO, friend toAntonio and Bassanio SALERIO, " " " " " GRATIANO, " " " " "LORENZO, in love with Jessica SHYLOCK, a rich Jew TUBAL, a Jew,...
Manaliveby G. K. ChestertonTable of ContentsPart I: The Enigmas of Innocent SmithI. How the Great Wind Came to Beacon HouseII. The Luggage of an OptimistIII. The Banner of BeaconIV. The Garden of the GodV. The Allegorical Practical JokerPart II: The Explanations of Innocent SmithI. The Eye of Death; or, the Murder ChargeII. The Two Curates; or, the Burglary ChargeIII. The Round Road; or, the Desertion ChargeIV. The Wild Weddings; or, the Polygamy ChargeV. How the Great Wind went from Beacon House...
His Own Peopleby Booth TarkingtonI. A Change of LodgingThe glass-domed "palm-room" of the Grand Continental Hotel Magnifiquein Rome is of vasty heights and distances, filled with a mellow greenlight which filters down languidly through the upper foliage of tallpalms, so that the two hundred people who may be refreshing ordisplaying themselves there at the tea-hour have something the lookof under-water creatures playing upon the sea-bed. They appear,however, to be unaware of their condition; even the ladies, most likeanemones of that gay assembly, do not seem to know it; and when theHungarian band (crustacean-like in costume, and therefore wellwithin the picture) has sheathed its flying te
Adventure IXThe Greek InterpreterDuring my long and intimate acquaintance with Mr.Sherlock Holmes I had never heard him refer to hisrelations, and hardly ever to his own early life.This reticence upon his part had increased thesomewhat inhuman effect which he produced upon me,until sometimes I found myself regarding him as anisolated phenomenon, a brain without a heart, asdeficient in human sympathy as he was pre-eminent inintelligence. His aversion to women and hisdisinclination to form new friendships were bothtypical of his unemotional character, but not more sothan his complete suppression of every reference to...
Personal Memoirs of P.H.Sheridan V1 of 2by Philip Henry SheridanPREFACEWhen, yielding to the solicitations of my friends, I finally decidedto write these Memoirs, the greatest difficulty which confronted mewas that of recounting my share in the many notable events of thelast three decades, in which I played a part, without entering toofully into the history of these years, and at the same time withoutgiving to my own acts an unmerited prominence. To what extent I haveovercome this difficulty I must leave the reader to judge.In offering this record, penned by my own hand, of the events of mylife, and of my participation in our great struggle for national...
Wessex Talesby Thomas HardyContents:PrefaceAn Imaginative WomanThe Three StrangersThe Withered ArmFellow-TownsmenInterlopers at the KnapThe Distracted PreacherPREFACEAn apology is perhaps needed for the neglect of contrast which isshown by presenting two consecutive stories of hangmen in such asmall collection as the following. But in the neighbourhood ofcounty-towns tales of executions used to form a large proportion ofthe local traditions; and though never personally acquainted withany chief operator at such scenes, the writer of these pages had asa boy the privilege of being on speaking terms with a man who...