Tacitus on Germanyby TacitusTranslated by Thomas GordonINTRODUCTORY NOTEThe dates of the birth and death of Tacitus are uncertain, but it isprobable that he was born about 54 A. D. and died after 117. He was acontemporary and friend of the younger Pliny, who addressed to himsome of his most famous epistles. Tacitus was apparently of theequestrian class, was an advocate by training, and had a reputation asan orator, though none of his speeches has survived. He held a numberof important public offices, and married the daughter of Agricola, theconqueror of Britain, whose life he wrote.The two chief works of Tacitus, the "Annals" and the "Histories,"...　

An Old Town By The Seaby Thomas Bailey AldrichPISCATAQUA RIVERThou singest by the gleaming isles,By woods, and fields of corn,Thou singest, and the sunlight smilesUpon my birthday morn.But I within a city, I,So full of vague unrest,Would almost give my life to lieAn hour upon upon thy breast.To let the wherry listless go,And, wrapt in dreamy joy,Dip, and surge idly to and fro,Like the red harbor-buoy;To sit in happy indolence,To rest upon the oars,And catch the heavy earthy scentsThat blow from summer shores;To see the rounded sun go down,And with its parting firesLight up the windows of the townAnd burn the tapering spires;...　

Black RockA TALE OF THE SELKIRKSby Ralph ConnorINTRODUCTIONI think I have met "Ralph Conner." Indeed, I am sure I haveoncein a canoe on the Red River, once on the Assinaboine, and twice orthrice on the prairies to the West. That was not the name he gaveme, but, if I am right, it covers one of the most honest and genialof the strong characters that are fighting the devil and doing goodwork for men all over the world. He has seen with his own eyes thelife which he describes in this book, and has himself, for someyears of hard and lonely toil, assisted in the good influences whichhe traces among its wild and often hopeless conditions. He writes...　

Of the Jealousy of Tradeby David HumeHaving endeavoured to remove one species of ill-founded jealousy,which is so prevalent among commercial nations, it may not beamiss to mention another, which seems equally groundless. Nothingis more usual, among states which have made some advances incommerce, than to look on the progress of their neighbours with asuspicious eye, to consider all trading states as their rivals,and to suppose that it is impossible for any of them to flourish,but at their expence. In opposition to this narrow and malignantopinion, I will venture to assert, that the encrease of richesand commerce in any one nation, instead of hurting, commonly...　

The Burning Spearby John GalsworthyBeing the Experiences of Mr. John Lavender in the Time of WarRecorded by: A. R. PM [John Galsworthy][NOTE: John Galsworthy said of this work: "The Burning Spear" was revengeof the nerves. Was it bad enough to have to bear the dreads and strainsand griefs of war." Several years after its first publication headmitted authorship and it was included in the collected edition of hisworks D.W.]"With a heart of furious fancies,Whereof I am commander,With a burning spear and a horse of airIn the wilderness I wander;With a night of ghosts and shadows...　

ALEXANDER356-323 B.C.by Plutarchtranslated by John DrydenIT being my purpose to write the lives of Alexander the king, and of Caesar, by whom Pompey was destroyed, the multitude of their great actions affords so large a field that I were to blame if I should not by way of apology forewarn my reader that I have chosen rather to epitomize the most celebrated parts of their story, than to insist at large on every particular circumstance of it. It must be borne in mind that my design is not to write histories, but lives. And the most glorious exploits do not always furnish us with the clearest discoveries of virtue or vice in men; sometimes a matter of less mo　

The Queen of the Pirate Isleby Bret HarteI first knew her as the Queen of the Pirate Isle. To the best ofmy recollection she had no reasonable right to that title. She wasonly nine years old, inclined to plumpness and good humor,deprecated violence, and had never been to sea. Need it be addedthat she did NOT live in an island and that her name was Polly?Perhaps I ought to explain that she had already known otherexperiences of a purely imaginative character. Part of herexistence had been passed as a Beggar Child,solely indicated by ashawl tightly folded round her shoulders, and chills; as aSchoolmistress, unnecessarily severe; as a Preacher, singularly...　

The Drums Of Jeopardyby Harold MacGrathCHAPTER IA fast train drew into Albany, on the New York Central, from theWest. It was three-thirty of a chill March morning in the firstyear of peace. A pall of fog lay over the world so heavy thatit beaded the face and hands and deposited a fairy diamond dustupon wool. The station lights had the visibility of stars, andlike the stars were without refulgence - a pale golden aureola,perhaps three feet in diameter, and beyond, nothing. The fewpassengers who alighted and the train itself had the same nebulosityof drab fish in a dim aquarium.Among the passengers to detrain was a man in a long black coat.The high collar was up. The man wore a derby ha　

Cressyby Bret HarteCHAPTER I.As the master of the Indian Spring school emerged from the pinewoods into the little clearing before the schoolhouse, he stoppedwhistling, put his hat less jauntily on his head, threw away somewild flowers he had gathered on his way, and otherwise assumed thesevere demeanor of his profession and his mature agewhich was atleast twenty. Not that he usually felt this an assumption; it wasa firm conviction of his serious nature that he impressed others,as he did himself, with the blended austerity and ennui of deep andexhausted experience.The building which was assigned to him and his flock by the Board...　

DEMETRIUS337?-283 B.C.by Plutarchtranslated by John DrydenINGENIOUS men have long observed a resemblance between the arts and the bodily senses. And they were first led to do so, I think, by noticing the way in which, both in the arts and with our senses, we examine opposites. Judgment once obtained, the use to which we put it differs in the two cases. Our senses are not meant to pick out black rather than white, to prefer sweet to bitter, or soft and yielding to hard and resisting objects; all they have to do is to receive impressions as they occur, and report to the understanding the impressions as received. The arts, on the other hand, which reason inst　

450 BCEUMENDIDESby Aeschylustranslated by E. D. A. MorsheadCHARACTERS IN THE PLAYTHE PYTHIAN PRIESTESAPOLLOORESTESTHE GHOST OF CLYTEMNESTRACHORUS OF FURIESATHENAATTENDANTS OF ATHENATWELVE ATHENIAN CITIZENSEUMENDIDES(SCENE:-Before the temple of APOLLO at Delphi. The PYTHIANPRIESTESS enters and approaches the doors of the temple.)THE PYTHIAN PRIESTESFirst, in this prayer, of all the gods I nameThe prophet-mother Earth; and Themis next,...　

A TALE OF THE TONTLAWALDLong, long ago there stood in the midst of a country covered withlakes a vast stretch of moorland called the Tontlawald, on whichno man ever dared set foot. From time to time a few bold spiritshad been drawn by curiosity to its borders, and on their returnhad reported that they had caught a glimpse of a ruined house ina grove of thick trees, and round about it were a crowd of beingsresembling men, swarming over the grass like bees. The men wereas dirty and ragged as gipsies, and there were besides a quantityof old women and half-naked children.One night a peasant who was returning home from a feast wandereda little farther into the Tontlawald, and came back with th