A Mountain WomanA Mountain WomanBy Elia Wilkinson PeattieTo My best Friend, and kindest Critic, My Husband.1- Page 2-A Mountain WomanIF Leroy Brainard had not had such a respect for literature, he wouldhave written a book.As it was, he played at being an architect and succeeded in being acharming fellow. My sister Jessica never lost an opportunity of laughing athis endeavors as an architect."You can build an enchanting villa, but what would you do with a...
The Diary of a Goose GirlThe Diary of a GooseGirlby Kate Douglas Wiggin1- Page 2-The Diary of a Goose GirlTHORNYCROFT FARM, nearBarbury Green, July 1, 190-.In alluding to myself as a Goose Girl, I am using only the most modestof my titles; for I am also a poultry-maid, a tender of Belgian hares andrabbits, and a shepherdess; but I particularly fancy the role of Goose Girl,because it recalls the German fairy tales of my early youth, when I always...
A New England Girlhoodby Lucy LarcomI dedicated this sketchTo my girlfriends in general;And in particularTo my namesake-niece,Lucy Larcom Spaulding.Happy those early days, when IShined in my angel-infancy!When on some gilded cloud or flowerMy gazing soul would dwell an hour,And in those weaker glories spySome shadows of eternity:Before I taught my tongue to woundMy conscience by a sinful sound;But felt through all this fleshy dressBright shoots of everlastingness.HENRY VAUGHANThe thought of our past years in me doth breedPerpetual benediction.WORDSWORTHPREFACETHE following sketch was written for the young, at the suggestion of friends....
ADVENTUREADVENTUREby Jack London1- Page 2-ADVENTURECHAPTER ISOMETHING TOBE DONEHe was a very sick white man. He rode pick-a-back on a woolly-headed, black-skinned savage, the lobes of whose ears had been piercedand stretched until one had torn out, while the other carried a circularblock of carved wood three inches in diameter. The torn ear had beenpierced again, but this time not so ambitiously, for the hole accommodated...
The Magic Skinby Honore de BalzacTranslated by Ellen MarriageTo Monsieur Savary, Member of Le Academie des Sciences.ITHE TALISMANTowards the end of the month of October 1829 a young man entered thePalais-Royal just as the gaming-houses opened, agreeably to the lawwhich protects a passion by its very nature easily excisable. Hemounted the staircase of one of the gambling hells distinguished bythe number 36, without too much deliberation."Your hat, sir, if you please?" a thin, querulous voice called out. Alittle old man, crouching in the darkness behind a railing, suddenlyrose and exhibited his features, carved after a mean design.As you enter a gaming-house the law despoils you of your hat a
IN THE CARQUINEZ WOODSIN THE CARQUINEZWOODSby Bret Harte1- Page 2-IN THE CARQUINEZ WOODSCHAPTER I.The sun was going down on the Carquinez Woods. The few shaftsof sunlight that had pierced their pillared gloom were lost in unfathomabledepths, or splintered their ineffectual lances on the enormous trunks of theredwoods. For a time the dull red of their vast columns, and the dull redof their cast-off bark which matted the echoless aisles, still seemed to hold...
ANTHEMANTHEMby Ayn Rand1- Page 2-ANTHEMPART ONEIt is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others think andto put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil. Itis as if we were speaking alone to no ears but our own. And we know wellthat there is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone. We havebroken the laws. The laws say that men may not write unless the Councilof Vocations bid them so. May we be forgiven!...
The Portygeeby Joseph C. LincolnCHAPTER IOverhead the clouds cloaked the sky; a ragged cloak it was, and,here and there, a star shone through a hole, to be obscured almostinstantly as more cloud tatters were hurled across the rent. Thepines threshed on the hill tops. The bare branches of the wild-cherry and silverleaf trees scraped and rattled and tossed. Andthe wind, the raw, chilling December wind, driven in, wet andsalty, from the sea, tore over the dunes and brown uplands andacross the frozen salt-meadows, screamed through the telegraphwires, and made the platform of the dismal South Harniss railwaystation the lonesomest, coldest, darkest and most miserable spot on...
AN INQUIRY INTO THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF THE WEALTH OF NATIONSby Adam Smith1776INTRODUCTION AND PLAN OF THE WORKTHE annual labour of every nation is the fund whichoriginally supplies it with all the necessaries and conveniencesof life which it annually consumes, and which consist alwayseither in the immediate produce of that labour, or in what ispurchased with that produce from other nations.According therefore as this produce, or what is purchasedwith it, bears a greater or smaller proportion to the number ofthose who are to consume it, the nation will be better or worse...
AGNES GREYAGNES GREYBy Anne Bronte1- Page 2-AGNES GREYCHAPTER I - THE PARSONAGEALL true histories contain instruction; though, in some, the treasuremay be hard to find, and when found, so trivial in quantity, that the dry,shrivelled kernel scarcely compensates for the trouble of cracking the nut.Whether this be the case with my history or not, I am hardly competent tojudge. I sometimes think it might prove useful to some, and entertainingto others; but the world may judge for itself. Shielded by my own...
a wild, disorderly way of living, so that they never came home again.The youngest, who was called simpleton, set out to seek his brothers,but when at length he found them they mocked him for thinking that hewith his simplicity could get through the world, when they two couldnot make their way, and yet were so much cleverer.They all three traveled away together, and came to an ant-hill. Thetwo elder wanted to destroy it, to see the little ants creeping aboutin their terror, and carrying their eggs away, but simpleton said,leave the creatures in peace, I will not allow you to disturb them.Then they went onwards and came to a lake, on which a great number ofducks were swimming. The two broth
VisitorsI think that I love society as much as most, and am ready enoughto fasten myself like a bloodsucker for the time to any full-bloodedman that comes in my way. I am naturally no hermit, but mightpossibly sit out the sturdiest frequenter of the bar-room, if mybusiness called me thither.I had three chairs in my house; one for solitude, two forfriendship, three for society. When visitors came in larger andunexpected numbers there was but the third chair for them all, butthey generally economized the room by standing up. It is surprisinghow many great men and women a small house will contain. I have had...