De Profundisby Oscar Wilde. . . Suffering is one very long moment. We cannot divide it byseasons. We can only record its moods, and chronicle their return.With us time itself does not progress. It revolves. It seems tocircle round one centre of pain. The paralysing immobility of alife every circumstance of which is regulated after an unchangeablepattern, so that we eat and drink and lie down and pray, or kneelat least for prayer, according to the inflexible laws of an ironformula: this immobile quality, that makes each dreadful day in...　

The Essays of Montaigne, V15by Michel de MontaigneTranslated by Charles CottonEdited by William Carew Hazilitt1877CONTENTS OF VOLUME 15.V. Upon Some verses of Virgil.CHAPTER VUPON SOME VERSES OF VIRGILCHAPTER V.By how much profitable thoughts are more full and solid, by so much arethey also more cumbersome and heavy: vice, death, poverty, diseases, aregrave and grievous subjects. A man should have his soul instructed inthe means to sustain and to contend with evils, and in the rules ofliving and believing well: and often rouse it up, and exercise it in this...　

Caesar and Cleopatraby George Bernard ShawACT IAn October night on the Syrian border of Egypt towards the end ofthe XXXIII Dynasty, in the year 706 by Roman computation,afterwards reckoned by Christian computation as 48 B.C. A greatradiance of silver fire, the dawn of a moonlit night, is risingin the east. The stars and the cloudless sky are our owncontemporaries, nineteen and a half centuries younger than weknow them; but you would not guess that from their appearance.Below them are two notable drawbacks of civilization: a palace,and soldiers. The palace, an old, low, Syrian building of...　

The Complete Anglerby Izaak WaltonTo the Right worshipfulJohn Offleyof Madeley Manor, in the County of Stafford Esquire, My most honoured FriendSir, I have made so ill use of your former favours, as by them to be encouraged to entreat, that they may be enlarged to the patronage and protection of this Book: and I have put on a modest confidence, that I shall not be denied, because it is a discourse of Fish and Fishing, which you know so well, and both love and practice so much.You are assured, though there be ignorant men of another belief, that Angling is an Art: and you know that Art better 　

Main Street and Other Poemsby Joyce KilmerTo Mrs. Edmund LeamyContentsMain StreetRoofsThe Snowman in the YardA Blue ValentineHousesIn MemoryApologyThe Proud PoetLionel JohnsonFather Gerard Hopkins, S. J.Gates and DoorsThe Robe of ChristThe Singing GirlThe AnnunciationRosesThe VisitationMultiplicationThanksgivingThe ThornThe Big TopQueen Elizabeth SpeaksMid-ocean in War-timeIn Memory of Rupert BrookeThe New SchoolEaster WeekThe Cathedral of Rheims...　

THE FROZEN DEEPby Wilkie CollinsFirst SceneThe Ball-roomChapter 1.The date is between twenty and thirty years ago. The place is anEnglish sea-port. The time is night. And the business of themoment isdancing.The Mayor and Corporation of the town are giving a grand ball, incelebration of the departure of an Arctic expedition from theirport. The ships of the expedition are two in numberthe_Wanderer_ and the _Sea-mew_. They are to sail (in search of theNorthwest Passage) on the next day, with the morning tide.Honor to the Mayor and Corporation! It is a brilliant ball. The...　

SHERLOCK HOLMESTHE ADVENTURE OF THE COPPER BEECHESby Sir Arthur Conan DoyleThe Adventure of the Copper Beeches"To the man who loves art for its own sake," remarked SherlockHolmes, tossing aside the advertisement sheet of the DailyTelegraph, "it is frequently in its least important and lowliestmanifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived. It ispleasant to me to observe, Watson, that you have so far grasped thistruth that in these little records of our cases which you have been...　

The Black Death and The Dancing Maniaby J. F. C. Hecker (translated by B. G. Babington)INTRODUCTIONJustus Friedrich Karl Hecker was one of three generations of distinguished professors of medicine. His father, August Friedrich Hecker, a most industrious writer, first practised as a physician in Frankenhausen, and in 1790 was appointed Professor of Medicine at the University of Erfurt. In 1805 he was called to the like professorship at the University of Berlin. He died at Berlin in 1811.Justus Friedrich Karl Hecker was born at Erfurt in January, 1795. He went, of coursebeing then ten years 　

FAIRY TALES OF HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSENTHE WILD SWANSby Hans Christian AndersenFAR away in the land to which the swallows fly when it iswinter, dwelt a king who had eleven sons, and one daughter, namedEliza. The eleven brothers were princes, and each went to schoolwith a star on his breast, and a sword by his side. They wrote withdiamond pencils on gold slates, and learnt their lessons so quicklyand read so easily that every one might know they were princes.Their sister Eliza sat on a little stool of plate-glass, and had a...　

The Land of the Changing Sunby William N. HarbenChapter I.The balloon seemed scarcely to move, though it was slowly sinking toward the ocean of white clouds which hung between it and the earth.The two inmates of the car were insensible; their faces were bloodless, their cheeks sunken. They were both young and handsome. Harry Johnston, an American, was as dark and sallow as a Spaniard. Charles Thorndyke, an English gentleman, had yellow hair and mustache, blue eyes and a fine intellectual face. Both were tall, athletic in build and well-proportioned.Johnston was the first to come to consciousn　

The Wreck of the Golden Maryby Charles DickensTHE WRECKI was apprenticed to the Sea when I was twelve years old, and I haveencountered a great deal of rough weather, both literal andmetaphorical. It has always been my opinion since I first possessedsuch a thing as an opinion, that the man who knows only one subjectis next tiresome to the man who knows no subject. Therefore, in thecourse of my life I have taught myself whatever I could, andalthough I am not an educated man, I am able, I am thankful to say,to have an intelligent interest in most things....　

The Sequel of Appomattox, A Chronicle of the Reunion of the Statesby Walter Lynwood FlemingCHAPTER I. THE AFTERMATH OF WARWhen the armies of the Union and of the Confederacy were disbanded in 1865, two matters had been settled beyond further dispute: the Negro was to be free, and the Union was to be perpetuated. But, though slavery and state sovereignty were no longer at issue, there were still many problems which pressed for solution. The huge task of reconstruction must be faced. The nature of the situation required that the measures of reconstruction be first formulated in Washington by th　

The Lady, or the Tiger?by Frank R. StocktonIn the very olden time there lived a semi-barbaric king, whoseideas, though somewhat polished and sharpened by theprogressiveness of distant Latin neighbors, were still large,florid, and untrammeled, as became the half of him which wasbarbaric. He was a man of exuberant fancy, and, withal, of anauthority so irresistible that, at his will, he turned his variedfancies into facts. He was greatly given to self-communing, and,when he and himself agreed upon anything, the thing was done.When every member of his domestic and political systems moved...　

Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christby Lew Wallaceto THE WIFE OF MY YOUTH who still abides with meBOOK FIRSTCHAPTER IThe Jebel es Zubleh is a mountain fifty miles and more in length, and so narrow that its tracery on the map gives it a likeness to a caterpillar crawling from the south to the north. Standing on its red-and-white cliffs, and looking off under the path of the rising sun, one sees only the Desert of Arabia, where the east winds, so hateful to vinegrowers of Jericho, have kept their playgrounds since the beginning. Its feet are well covered by sands tossed from the Euphrates, there to l　

EARLY LITERARY EXPERIMENTSTRANSFORMATIONMine eyes are so confused,My cheek it is so pale,My head is so bemused,A realm of fairy-tale.I wanted, boldly daring,Sea-going ways to follow,Where a thousand crags rise soaring,And Floods flow bleak and hollow.I clung to Thought high-soaring,On its two wings did ride,And though storm winds were roaring,...　

April Hopesby William Dean HowellsFrom his place on the floor of the Hemenway Gymnasium Mr. Elbridge G.Mavering looked on at the Class Day gaiety with the advantage which hisstature, gave him over most people there. Hundreds of these were prettygirls, in a great variety of charming costumes, such as the eclecticismof modern fashion permits, and all sorts of ingenious compromises betweenwalking dress and ball dress. It struck him that the young men on whosearms they hung, in promenading around the long oval within the crowd ofstationary spectators, were very much younger than students used t