Fabre, Poet of Scienceby DR. G.-V. LEGROS."De fimo ad excelsa."J.-H. Fabre.WITH A PREFACE BY JEAN-HENRI FABRE.TRANSLATED BY BERNARD MIALL.PREFACE.The good friend who has so successfully terminated the task which he felt avocation to undertake thought it would be of advantage to complete it bypresenting to the reader a picture both of my life as a whole and of thework which it has been given me to accomplish.The better to accomplish his undertaking, he abstracted from mycorrespondence, as well as from the long conversations which we have sooften enjoyed together, a great number of those memories of varying...¡¡

The Professor at the Breakfast Tableby Oliver Wendell HolmesPREFACE TO REVISED EDITION.The reader of to-day will not forget, I trust, that it is nearly aquarter of a century since these papers were written. Statementswhich were true then are not necessarily true now. Thus, the speedof the trotting horse has been so much developed that the record ofthe year when the fastest time to that date was given must be veryconsiderably altered, as may be seen by referring to a note on page49 of the "Autocrat." No doubt many other statements and opinionsmight be more or less modified if I were writing today instead ofhaving written before the war, when the world and I were both more...¡¡

An Open-Eyed ConspiracyAn Idyl of Saratogaby William Dean HowellsCHAPTER IThe day had been very hot under the tall trees which everywhereembower and stifle Saratoga, for they shut out the air as well asthe sun; and after tea (they still have an early dinner at all thehotels in Saratoga, and tea is the last meal of the day) I strolledover to the pretty Congress Park, in the hope of getting a breath ofcoolness there. Mrs. March preferred to take the chances on theverandah of our pleasant little hotel, where I left her with theother ladies, forty fanning like one, as they rocked to and frounder the roof lifted to the third story by those lofty shafts...¡¡

THE SKETCH BOOKRURAL LIFE IN ENGLANDby Washington IrvingOh! friendly to the best pursuits of man,Friendly to thought, to virtue, and to peace,Domestic life in rural pleasures past!COWPER.THE stranger who would form a correct opinion of the Englishcharacter must not confine his observations to the metropolis. He mustgo forth into the country; he must sojourn in villages and hamlets; hemust visit castles, villas, farm-houses, cottages; he must wanderthrough parks and gardens; along hedges and green lanes; he must...¡¡

Ernest HemingwayWith a variety of themes and moods, dynamic action scenes andunexpectedlya rich and ribald sense of humor, ISLANDS IN THE STREAM tells a story closely resembling Hemingway¡¦s life.¡@Thomas Hudson is ¡§a good painter.¡¨ His solitary life of artistic self-discipline on the lush Caribbean island of Bimini is interrupted by a visit from his three lively sons. In a thrilling descriptive scene, David, the middle boy, shows his courage when attacked by a shark and his endurance while fighting a thousand-pound swordfish. It is an initiation into manhood.¡@Years later, Hudson is in Cuba mourning the death of his oldest son. A chance encounter with his first wife renews their passionate co¡¡

A Cumberland Vendettaby John Fox Jr.TO MINERVA AND ELIZABETHA Cumberland VendettaITHE cave had been their hiding-place as children; it was a secret refuge now against hunger or darkness when they were hunting in the woods. The primitive meal was finished; ashes were raked over the red coals; the slice of bacon and the little bag of meal were hung high against the rock wall; and the two stepped from the cavern into a thicket of rhododendrons.Parting the bushes toward the dim light, they stood on a massive shoulder of the mountain, the river girding it far below, and the afternoon shadows at their feet. Both carried guns-the tall mountaineer, a Winchester; the boy, a squirrel rifle longer th¡¡

Riders of the Purple Sageby Zane GreyCHAPTER I. LASSITERA sharp clip-crop of iron-shod hoofs deadened and died away, and clouds of yellow dust drifted from under the cottonwoods out over the sage.Jane Withersteen gazed down the wide purple slope with dreamy and troubled eyes. A rider had just left her and it was his message that held her thoughtful and almost sad, awaiting the churchmen who were coming to resent and attack her right to befriend a Gentile.She wondered if the unrest and strife that had lately come to the little village of Cottonwoods was to involve her. And then she sighed, remembering that her father had founded this remotest border settlement of southern Utah and that he ha¡¡

Carmenby Prosper MerimeeTranslated by Lady Mary LoydCHAPTER II had always suspected the geographical authorities did not know what they were talking about when they located the battlefield of Munda in the county of the Bastuli-Poeni, close to the modern Monda, some two leagues north of Marbella.According to my own surmise, founded on the text of the anonymous author of the /Bellum Hispaniense/, and on certain information culled from the excellent library owned by the Duke of Ossuna, I believed the site of the memorable struggle in which Caesar played double or quits, once and for all, with the champions of the Republic, should be sought in the neighbourhood of Montilla....¡¡

Alcibiades IIby Platonic ImitatorTranslated by Benjamin JowettAPPENDIX II.The two dialogues which are translated in the second appendix are notmentioned by Aristotle, or by any early authority, and have no claim to beascribed to Plato. They are examples of Platonic dialogues to be assignedprobably to the second or third generation after Plato, when his writingswere well known at Athens and Alexandria. They exhibit considerableoriginality, and are remarkable for containing several thoughts of the sortwhich we suppose to be modern rather than ancient, and which therefore havea peculiar interest for us. The Second Alcibiades shows that the...¡¡

Wessex Talesby Thomas HardyContents:PrefaceAn Imaginative WomanThe Three StrangersThe Withered ArmFellow-TownsmenInterlopers at the KnapThe Distracted PreacherPREFACEAn apology is perhaps needed for the neglect of contrast which isshown by presenting two consecutive stories of hangmen in such asmall collection as the following. But in the neighbourhood ofcounty-towns tales of executions used to form a large proportion ofthe local traditions; and though never personally acquainted withany chief operator at such scenes, the writer of these pages had asa boy the privilege of being on speaking terms with a man who...¡¡

"POLIKUSHKA;"OR,The Lot of a Wicked Court Servant.CHAPTER I.Polikey was a court manone of the staff of servants belongingto the court household of a boyarinia (lady of the nobility).He held a very insignificant position on the estate, and lived ina rather poor, small house with his wife and children.The house was built by the deceased nobleman whose widow he stillcontinued to serve, and may be described as follows: The fourwalls surrounding the one izba (room) were built of stone, andthe interior was ten yards square. A Russian stove stood in thecentre, around which was a free passage. Each corner was fencedoff as a separate inclosure to the extent of several feet, and...¡¡

OF THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESSDavid Hume1741NOTHING is more apt to surprize a foreigner, than theextreme liberty, which we enjoy in this country, ofcommunicating whatever we please to the public, and ofopenly censuring every measure, entered into by the king orhis ministers. If the administration resolve upon war, it isaffirmed, that, either wilfully or ignorantly, they mistake...¡¡