Tales and Fantasiesby Robert Louis StevensonContentsThe Misadventures of John NicholsonThe Body-SnatcherThe Story of a LieTHE MISADVENTURES OF JOHN NICHOLSONCHAPTER I - IN WHICH JOHN SOWS THE WINDJOHN VAREY NICHOLSON was stupid; yet, stupider men than heare now sprawling in Parliament, and lauding themselves asthe authors of their own distinction. He was of a fat habit,even from boyhood, and inclined to a cheerful and cursoryreading of the face of life; and possibly this attitude of...　

For the Term of His Natural Lifeby Marcus ClarkeDEDICATIONTOSIR CHARLES GAVAN DUFFYMy Dear Sir Charles, I take leave to dedicate this work to you, not merely because your nineteen years of political and literary life in Australia render it very fitting that any work written by a resident in the colonies, and having to do with the history of past colonial days, should bear your name upon its dedicatory page; but because the publication of my book is due to your advice and encouragement.The convict of fiction has been hitherto shown only at the beginning or at the end of his career. Either hi　

The Relics of General Chasseby Anthony TrollopeThat Belgium is now one of the European kingdoms, living by its ownlaws, resting on its own bottom, with a king and court, palaces andparliament of its own, is known to all the world. And a very nicelittle kingdom it is; full of old towns, fine Flemish pictures, andinteresting Gothic churches. But in the memory of very many of uswho do not think ourselves old men, Belgium, as it is now calledinthose days it used to be Flanders and Brabantwas a part ofHolland; and it obtained its own independence by a revolution. In...　

To-morrowby Joseph ConradWhat was known of Captain Hagberd in the littleseaport of Colebrook was not exactly in his favour.He did not belong to the place. He had come tosettle there under circumstances not at all myste-rioushe used to be very communicative aboutthem at the timebut extremely morbid and un-reasonable. He was possessed of some little moneyevidently, because he bought a plot of ground, andhad a pair of ugly yellow brick cottages run upvery cheaply. He occupied one of them himself...　

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 　

The Scouts of the Valleyby Joseph A. AltshelerCHAPTER ITHE LONE CANOEA light canoe of bark, containing a single human figure, moved swiftly up one of the twin streams that form the Ohio. The water, clear and deep, coming through rocky soil, babbled gently at the edges, where it lapped the land, but in the center the full current flowed steadily and without noise.The thin shadows of early dusk were falling, casting a pallid tint over the world, a tint touched here and there with living fire from the sun, which was gone, though leaving burning embers behind. One glowing shaft, piercing straig　

The Life of Charlotte Bronte - Volume 1by Elizabeth Claghorn GaskellCHAPTER IThe Leeds and Skipton railway runs along a deep valley of the Aire; a slow and sluggish stream, compared to the neighbouring river of Wharfe. Keighley station is on this line of railway, about a quarter of a mile from the town of the same name. The number of inhabitants and the importance of Keighley have been very greatly increased during the last twenty years, owing to the rapidly extended market for worsted manufactures, a branch of industry that mainly employs the factory population of this part of Yorkshire, w　

PAUL THE PEDDLEROR THE FORTUNES OF A YOUNG STREET MERCHANTBY HORATIO ALGER, JR.BIOGRAPHY AND BIBLIOGRAPHYHoratio Alger, Jr., an author who lived among and for boys andhimself remained a boy in heart and association till death, wasborn at Revere, Mass., January 13, 1834. He was the son of aclergyman, was graduated at Harvard College in 1852, and at itsDivinity School in 1860 and was pastor of the Unitarian Church atBrewster, Mass., in 1862-66.In the latter year he settled in New York and began drawing...　

The Club of Queer Tradesby G.K.ChestertonChapter 1The Tremendous Adventures of Major BrownRabelais, or his wild illustrator Gustave Dore, must have had something to do with the designing of the things called flats in England and America. There is something entirely Gargantuan in the idea of economising space by piling houses on top of each other, front doors and all. And in the chaos and complexity of those perpendicular streets anything may dwell or happen, and it is in one of them, I believe, that the inquirer may find the offices of the Club of Queer Trades. It may be thought at the first 　

THE GOLDEN BRANCHONCE upon a time there was a King who was so morose anddisagreeable that he was feared by all his subjects, and withgood reason, as for the most trifling offences he would have theirheads cut off. This King Grumpy, as he was called, had oneson, who was as different from his father as he could possibly be.No prince equalled him in cleverness and kindness of heart, butunfortunately he was most terribly ugly. He had crooked legs andsquinting eyes, a large mouth all on one side, and a hunchback.Never was there a beautiful soul in such a frightful little body, but...　

The Well of the Saintsby J. M. SyngeA Comedy in Three ActsSCENESome lonely mountainous district in the east of Ireland one ormore centuries ago.THE WELL OF THE SAINTS was first produced in the Abbey Theatre inFebruary, 1905, by the Irish National Theatre Society, under thedirection of W. G. Fay, and with the following cast.Martin Doul W. G. FAYMary Doul EMMA VERNONTimmy GEORGE ROBERTSMolly Byrne SARA ALLGOODBride MAIRE NIC SHIUBHLAIGHMat Simon P. MAC SHIUBHLAIGHThe Saint F. J. FAY...　

TOM SWIFT AND HIS SKY RACER or The Quickest Flight on RecordTOM SWIFT AND HISSKY RACER or TheQuickest Flight on RecordVICTOR APPLETON1- Page 2-TOM SWIFT AND HIS SKY RACER or The Quickest Flight on RecordCHAPTER OneThe Prize Offer"Is this Tom Swift, the inventor of several airships?"The man who had rung the bell glanced at the youth who answered his...　

Weir of Hermistonby Robert Louis StevensonTO MY WIFEI saw rain falling and the rainbow drawnOn Lammermuir. Hearkening I heard againIn my precipitous city beaten bellsWinnow the keen sea wind. And here afar,Intent on my own race and place, I wrote.Take thou the writing: thine it is. For whoBurnished the sword, blew on the drowsy coal,Held still the target higher, chary of praiseAnd prodigal of counsel - who but thou?So now, in the end, if this the least be good,If any deed be done, if any fireBurn in the imperfect page, the praise be thine....　

FINALE.Every limit is a beginning as well as an ending. Who can quit younglives after being long in company with them, and not desire to knowwhat befell them in their after-years? For the fragment of a life,however typical, is not the sample of an even web: promises maynot be kept, and an ardent outset may be followed by declension;latent powers may find their long-waited opportunity; a past errormay urge a grand retrieval.Marriage, which has been the bourne of so many narratives,is still a great beginning, as it was to Adam and Eve, who kept...　

Benthamby John Stuart MillLondon and Westminster Review, Aug. 1838, revised in 1859 in Dissertations and Discussion, vol. 1.There are two men, recently deceased, to whom their country is indebted not only for the greater part of the important ideas which have been thrown into circulation among its thinking men in their time, but for a revolution in its general modes of thought and investigation. These men, dissimilar in almost all else, agreed in being closet-students secluded in a peculiar degree, by circumstances and character, from the business and intercourse of the world: and both were,　

The Black Tulipby Alexandre Dumas, PereChapter 1A Grateful PeopleOn the 20th of August, 1672, the city of the Hague, alwaysso lively, so neat, and so trim that one might believe everyday to be Sunday, with its shady park, with its tall trees,spreading over its Gothic houses, with its canals like largemirrors, in which its steeples and its almost Easterncupolas are reflected, the city of the Hague, the capitalof the Seven United Provinces, was swelling in all itsarteries with a black and red stream of hurried, panting,and restless citizens, who, with their knives in their...