A FAIR PENITENTA FAIR PENITENTby WILKIE COLLINS1- Page 2-A FAIR PENITENTCharles Pineau Duclos was a French writer of biographies and novels,who lived and worked during the first half of the eighteenth century. Heprospered sufficiently well, as a literary man, to be made secretary to theFrench Academy, and to be allowed to succeed Voltaire in the office ofhistoriographer of France. He has left behind him, in his own country,the reputation of a lively writer of the second class, who addressed the...　

Evergreensby Jerome K. JeromeThey look so dull and dowdy in the spring weather, when the snow dropsand the crocuses are putting on their dainty frocks of white and mauveand yellow, and the baby-buds from every branch are peeping withbright eyes out on the world, and stretching forth soft little leavestoward the coming gladness of their lives. They stand apart, so coldand hard amid the stirring hope and joy that are throbbing all aroundthem.And in the deep full summer-time, when all the rest of nature dons itsrichest garb of green, and the roses clamber round the porch, and thegrass waves waist-high in the meadow, and the fields are gay with...　

Father Damienby Robert Louis StevensonAN OPEN LETTER TO THE REVEREND DR. HYDE OF HONOLULUSYDNEY,FEBRUARY 25, 1890.Sir, - It may probably occur to you that we have met, and visited,and conversed; on my side, with interest. You may remember thatyou have done me several courtesies, for which I was prepared to begrateful. But there are duties which come before gratitude, andoffences which justly divide friends, far more acquaintances. Yourletter to the Reverend H. B. Gage is a document which, in my sight,if you had filled me with bread when I was starving, if you had satup to nurse my father when he lay a-dying, would yet absolve me...　

Of the Balance of Tradeby David HumeIt is very usual, in nations ignorant of the nature of commerce,to prohibit the exportation of commodities, and to preserve amongthemselves whatever they think valuable and useful. They do notconsider, that, in this prohibition, they act directly contrary totheir intention; and that the more is exported of any commodity, themore will be raised at home, of which they themselves will always havethe first offer.It is well known to the learned, that the ancient laws of ATHENSrendered the exportation of figs criminal; that being supposed aspecies of fruit so excellent in ATTICA, that the ATHENIANS deemed ittoo delicious for the palate of any foreigner. And in 　

The Yellow Wallpaperby Charlotte Perkins GilmanIt is very seldom that mere ordinary people like John andmyself secure ancestral halls for the summer.A colonial mansion, a hereditary estate, I would say ahaunted house, and reach the height of romantic felicitybutthat would be asking too much of fate!Still I will proudly declare that there is something queerabout it.Else, why should it be let so cheaply? And why have stoodso long untenanted?John laughs at me, of course, but one expects that inmarriage.John is practical in the extreme. He has no patience withfaith, an intense horror of superstition, and he scoffs openly atany talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in...　

THE MASTER THIEFTHERE was once upon a time a husbandman who had three sons.He had no property to bequeath to them, and no means of puttingthem in the way of getting a living, and did not know what todo, so he said that they had his leave to take to anything they mostfancied, and go to any place they best liked. He would gladlyaccompany them for some part of their way, he said, and that he did.He went with them till they came to a place where three roadsmet, and there each of them took his own way, and the father badethem farewell and returned to his own home again. What becameof the two elder I have never been able to discover, but the youngest...　

The Confessions of a Summer Colonistby William Dean HowellsThe season is ending in the little summer settlement on the Down Eastcoast where I have been passing the last three months, and with eachloath day the sense of its peculiar charm grows more poignant.A prescience of the homesickness I shall feel for it when I go alreadybegins to torment me, and I find myself wishing to imagine some form ofwords which shall keep a likeness of it at least through the winter; someshadowy semblance which I may turn to hereafter if any chance or changeshould destroy or transform it, or, what is more likely, if I shouldnever come back to it. Perhaps others in the distant future may turn to...　

TO BE READ AT DUSKTO BE READ AT DUSKby Charles Dickens1- Page 2-TO BE READ AT DUSKOne, two, three, four, five. There were five of them.Five couriers, sitting on a bench outside the convent on the summit ofthe Great St. Bernard in Switzerland, looking at the remote heights,stained by the setting sun as if a mighty quantity of red wine had beenbroached upon the mountain top, and had not yet had time to sink into thesnow.This is not my simile. It was made for the occasion by the stoutest...　

SHERLOCK HOLMESTHE ADVENTURE OF THE RETIRED COLOURMANby Sir Arthur Conan DoyleSherlock Holmes was in a melancholy and philosophic mood thatmorning. His alert practical nature was subject to such reactions."Did you see him?" he asked."You mean the old fellow who has just gone out?""Precisely.""Yes, I met him at the door.""What did you think of him?""A pathetic, futile, broken creature.""Exactly, Watson. Pathetic and futile. But is not all lifepathetic and futile? Is not his story a microcosm of the whole? Wereach. We grasp. And what is left in our hands at the end? A shadow....　

THE PROCESSION OF LIFELife figures itself to me as a festal or funereal procession. Allof us have our places, and are to move onward under the directionof the Chief Marshal. The grand difficulty results from theinvariably mistaken principles on which the deputy marshals seekto arrange this immense concourse of people, so much morenumerous than those that train their interminable length throughstreets and highways in times of political excitement. Theirscheme is ancient, far beyond the memory of man or even therecord of history, and has hitherto been very little modified bythe innate sense of something wrong, and the dim perception ofbetter methods, that have disquieted all the ages through 　

TWICE-TOLD TALESTHE PROPHETIC PICTURESby Nathaniel HawthorneBUT THIS PAINTER!" cried Walter Ludlow, with animation. "He notonly excels in his peculiar art, but possesses vast acquirements inall other learning and science. He talks Hebrew with Dr. Mather, andgives lectures in anatomy to Dr. Boylston. In a word, he will meet thebest instructed man among us on his own ground. Moreover, he is apolished gentleman- a citizen of the world- yes, a true cosmopolite;for he will speak like a native of each clime and country of the globeexcept our own forests, whither he is now going. Nor is all this...　

The Darwinian Hypothesisby Thomas H. HuxleyDARWIN ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES.THERE is a growing immensity in the speculations of science to which nohuman thing or thought at this day is comparable. Apart from theresults which science brings us home and securely harvests, there is anexpansive force and latitude in its tentative efforts, which lifts usout of ourselves and transfigures our mortality. We may have apreference for moral themes, like the Homeric sage, who had seen andknown much:"Cities of menAnd manners, climates, councils, governments";yet we must end by confession that"The windy ways of menAre but dust which rises up...