green

The woods of the Lyn Valley climbed to my feet, and I sat down in the shade of the outermost fringe of trees to eat my lunch, and dream and muse, and doze away the first hot hours of the afternoon.  I sat looking down over the valley; below me and to right and left the green spikes of the larches were aflutter in the wind; before me rose a great bare shoulder of hill, outlined sharply against the blue.  Overhead the sun was blazing, but in the wood the sunlight hung mistily among the trunks and branches of oak and birch; it looked as if the wood were filled with tremulous sunlit water, rather than with air and sun.  The air from off the moors was keen and very sweet.  I lay on the dry, clean turf and moss, looking up at the cloudless sky; a solitary swallow hawking far up seemed no bigger than a fly, and a brilliant green fly on a leaf above me, buzzing turbulently, seemed portentously big and important.  I lost my sense of space and time and of the world in relation to men, set, as it were, as the background to men, and I slipped into a world which belongs to the birds and the mice and the moles, and the fish in the clear stream below; I watched the chaffinches and thrushes, and a little grey ash-tree near me which was full of linnets, delicious, sleek, grey, sweet-piping, busy little birds, sliding and skimming in and out of the tree, a little home of song and love-making, of intimate and familiar life.  I heard a cuckoo calling from the thick woods of the valley below, like the note of a

John Presland
Lynton and Lynmouth

A level, grassy plain extended for nearly a mile from the lodge of Wawanosh along the lake shore. Lodges of bark were promiscuously interspersed over this green, and here and there a cluster of trees, or a solitary tall pine. A belt of yellow sand skirted the lake shore in front, and a tall, thick forest formed the background. In the centre of this plain stood a high shattered pine, with a clear space about, renowned as the scene of the war-dance time out of mind. Here the youths assembled, with their tall and graceful leader, distinguished by the feathers of the bald eagle, which he wore on his head. A bright fire of pine wood blazed upon the green. He led his men several times around this fire, with a measured and solemn chant.[59] Then suddenly halting, the war-whoop was raised, and the dance immediately began. An old man, sitting at the head of the ring, beat time upon the drum, while several of the elder warriors shook their rattles, and "ever and anon" made the woods re-echo with their yells. Each warrior chanted alternately the verse of a song, of which the words generally embraced some prominent idea, often repeated.

Henry R. Schoolcraft
The Myth of Hiawatha, and Other Oral Legends, Mythologic and Allegoric, of the North American Indians

A country-house of classic poise and symmetry was designed in 1829, when Eben B. Morehouse purchased a few acres from the Bowers estate, on the side of Mount Vision, at the point where the old state road made its first turn to ascend the mountain, and there erected the dwelling called Woodside Hall. For many years an Indian wigwam stood on the site now occupied by Woodside. This old stone house, set on the hillside against a background of dense pine forest, has an air of singular dignity and repose. Standing at the head of the ascending road which continues the main street of the village, Woodside, with its row of columns gleaming white amid the living green of the forest, may be seen from almost any point along the main thoroughfare of Cooperstown. It is approached from the highway by a rise of ground, where the Egyptian gate-tower adds a fanciful interest to the entrance, with glimpses of the terraced lawn and garden that climb toward the house. In summer, on gaining the porch, one looks back upon a mass of foliage beneath which Cooperstown lies concealed, except for a vista that traverses the length of the village and rises to the pines that crown the hills beyond; while a glance toward the north sweeps across the surface of the lake to its western shore. The woods that come down almost to the house are composed of pines and hemlocks of splendid proportions and great antiquity, lending a shadowy atmosphere of mystery to the environs of Woodside Hall.

Ralph Birdsall
The Story of Cooperstown

The next moment, she stopped, confused, eyes wide, lips parted. For the taller of the two had taken off his cap, and stood towering and smiling in her path. A young man, of about six foot three, magnificently made, thin with the leanness of an athlete in training,—health, power, self-confidence, breathing from his joyous looks and movements—was surveying her. His lifted cap showed a fine head covered with thick brown curls. The face was long, yet not narrow; the cheek-bones rather high, the chin conspicuous. The eyes—very dark and heavily lidded—were set forward under strongly marked eyebrows; and both they, the straight nose with its close nostrils, and the red mouth, seemed to be drawn in firm yet subtle strokes on the sunburnt skin, as certain Dutch and Italian painters define the features of their sitters in a containing outline as delicate as it is unfaltering. The aspect of this striking person was that of a young king of men, careless, audacious, good-humoured; and Constance Bledlow’s expression, as she held out her hand to him, betrayed, much against her will, that she was not indifferent to the sight of him.

The skull was inclined slightly towards the left shoulder and towards an exquisite little doll, carved of oak, which was lying on the scapula, or shoulder-blade. On each side of the head were gold earrings with pearl drops. Mingled with the vertebr of the neck and back were a gold necklace, woven as a chain, with thirty-seven pendants of green jasper, and a brooch with an amethyst intaglio of Greek workmanship, representing the fight of a griffin and a deer. Where the left hand had been lying, we found four rings of solid gold. One is an engagement-ring, with an engraving in red jasper representing two hands clasped together. The second has the name PHILETVS engraved on the stone; the third and fourth are plain gold bands. Proceeding further with our exploration, we discovered, close to the right hip, a box containing toilet articles. The box was made of thin pieces of hard wood, inlaid _alla Certosina_, with lines, squares, circles, triangles, and diamonds, of bone, ivory, and wood of various kinds and colors. The box, however, had been completely disjointed by the action of the water. Inside there were two fine combs in excellent preservation, with the teeth larger on one side than on the other: a small mirror of polished steel, a silver box for cosmetics, an amber hairpin, an oblong piece of soft leather, and a few fragments of a sponge.[140] The most impressive discovery was made after the removal of the water, and the drying of the coffin. The woman had been buried in a shroud of fine white linen, pieces of which

Rodolfo Lanciani
Pagan and Christian Rome

The serpent has ever been a significant emblem in religion and mythology. Being "the most subtle beast of the field," it was naturally accepted as the emblem of wisdom. With its tail in its mouth it formed a circle, which was regarded by the ancients as the emblem of eternity. Moses set up a brazen serpent on a cross in the wilderness as an emblem of healing. Æsculapius, the god of medicine, is seen on ancient statues with a serpent twining around a staff by his side, symbolizing health, prudence and foresight. Hygiea, the goddess of health, is represented in works of art as a virgin dressed in a long robe and feeding a serpent from a cup. Mercury is always shown holding in his right hand a wand with two twined serpents. The nine coiled serpents in the above engraving, correspond with the nine muses in the Grecian mythology. The cobra, whose poison is death, is an emblem of the destroying power, and destruction, or rather change, symbolizes new formation, renovation or creation. Thus eternal formation, proceeds from eternal destruction. The serpent also figures in a beautiful allegory concerning the introduction of knowledge among mankind, _i.e._, "the knowledge of good and evil."--E.

Right opposite our house, on our Mount Clear, is an old oak, the apostle of the primeval forest. Once, when this place was all wildwood, the man who was seeking a spot for the location of the buildings of Phillips Academy climbed this oak, using it as a sort of green watchtower, from whence he might gain a view of the surrounding country. Age and time, since then, have dealt hardly with the stanch old fellow. His limbs have been here and there shattered; his back begins to look mossy and dilapidated; but after all, there is a piquant, decided air about him, that speaks the old age of a tree of distinction, a kingly oak. To-day I see him standing, dimly revealed through the mist of falling snows; to-morrow's sun will show the outline of his gnarled limbs--all rose color with their soft snow burden; and again a few months, and spring will breathe on him, and he will draw a long breath, and break out once more, for the three hundredth time, perhaps, into a vernal crown of leaves. I sometimes think that leaves are the thoughts of trees, and that if we only knew it, we should find their life's experience recorded in them. Our oak! what a crop of meditations and remembrances must he have thrown forth, leafing out century after century. Awhile he spake and thought only of red deer and Indians; of the trillium that opened its white triangle in his shade; of the scented arbutus, fair as the pink ocean shell, weaving her fragrant mats in the moss at his feet; of feathery ferns, casting their silent shadows on the checkerberry leaves,

Harriet Beecher Stowe
The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings

"'From the sweet tone of the girl's voice, I knew that the mistress could not be ready to pay. What a handsome woman it was that I saw in another moment! She had flung an Indian shawl hastily over her bare shoulders, covering herself with it completely, while it revealed the bare outlines of the form beneath. She wore a loose gown trimmed with snowy ruffles, which told plainly that her laundress' bills amounted to something like two thousand francs in the course of a year. Her dark curls escaped from beneath a bright Indian handkerchief, knotted carelessly about her head after the fashion of Creole women. The bed lay in disorder that told of broken slumber. A painter would have paid money to stay a while to see the scene that I saw. Under the luxurious hanging draperies, the pillow, crushed into the depths of an eider-down quilt, its lace border standing out in contrast against the background of blue silk, bore a vague impress that kindled the imagination. A pair of satin slippers gleamed from the great bear-skin rug spread by the carved mahogany lions at the bed-foot, where she had flung them off in her weariness after the ball. A crumpled gown hung over a chair, the sleeves touching the floor; stockings which a breath would have blown away were twisted about the leg of an easy-chair; while ribbon garters straggled over a settee. A fan of price, half unfolded, glittered on the chimney-piece. Drawers stood open; flowers, diamonds, gloves, a bouquet, a girdle, were littered about. The room was full of vague sweet perfume.

Honore de Balzac
Gobseck

One day I was walking over a bit of marshy ground close to Inchy Wood when I felt, all of a sudden, and only for a second, an emotion which I said to myself was the root of Christian mysticism. There had swept over me a sense of weakness, of dependence on a great personal Being somewhere far off yet near at hand. No thought of mine had prepared me for this emotion, for I had been pre-occupied with Aengus and Edain, and with Mannanan, son of the sea. That night I awoke lying upon my back and hearing a voice speaking above me and saying, “No human soul is like any other human soul, and therefore the love of God for any human soul is infinite, for no other soul can satisfy the same need in God.” A few nights after this I awoke to see the loveliest people I have ever seen. A young man and a young girl dressed in olive-green raiment, cut like old Greek raiment, were standing at my bedside. I looked at the girl and noticed that her dress was gathered about her neck into a kind of chain, or perhaps into some kind of stiff embroidery which represented ivy-leaves. But what filled me with wonder was the miraculous mildness of her face. There are no such faces now. It was beautiful, as few faces are beautiful, but it had neither, one would think, the light that is in desire or in hope or in fear or in speculation. It was peaceful like the faces of animals, or like mountain pools at evening, so peaceful that it was a little sad. I thought for a moment that she might be the beloved of Aengus, but how

Out from among the trees now, into the dim starlit glade; down the pine-strewn path, with the noise of falling water from out the beechwood at the right, and the ruined mill looming black before her. Now came the three broken steps. Yes, so far she had no need of the lantern. Round the corner, stepping carefully over the half-buried mill-stone. Groping her way, her hand touched the stone wall; but she drew it back hastily, so damp and cold the stones were. Darker and darker here; she must light the lantern before she ventured down the long flight of steps. The match spurted, and now the tiny yellow flame sprang up and shed a faint light on the immediate space around her. It only made the outer darkness seem more intense. But no matter, she could see two steps in front of her; and holding the lantern steadily before her, she stepped carefully down and down, until she stood on the firm greensward of the glen. Ah! how different everything was now from its usual aspect. The green and gold were turned into black upon black. The laughing, dimpling, sun-kissed water was now a black, gloomy pool, beyond which the fall shimmered white like a water-spirit (Undine,--or was it Khleborn, the malignant and vengeful sprite?). The firs stood tall and gaunt, closing like a spectral guard about the ruined mill, and pointing their long, dark fingers in silent menace at the intruder upon their evening repose. Hildegarde shivered again, and held her lantern tighter, remembering how Bubble had said that the glen was "a tormentin' spooky place after

Laura Elizabeth Howe Richards
Queen Hildegarde

The foregoing yellows and blues are in no wise inimical to each other, and yield the best mixed greens, chemically considered, the palette can afford. In an artistic sense, we confess, the result is not so satisfactory: the list of blues, it must be admitted, being somewhat scant. Among the latter there is no pigment with the wonderful depth, richness, and transparency of Prussian blue, and none consequently which will furnish with yellow a green of similar quality. That the artist, therefore, will dispense with Prussian blue, it would be too much to expect. There is, however, less necessity for it since the introduction of viridian, a green resembling that which is produced by admixture of Prussian blue and yellow, and which may be varied in hue by being compounded with aureolin or ultramarine. Our object in this work is to give precedence to the chemical rather than the artistic properties of pigments, to separate the strictly stable from the semi-stable, and the semi-stable from the fugitive. A colour or a mixture may be chemically bad but artistically good, and vice versa; but the chemist looks upon no pigment or compound with favour unless it be perfectly permanent, and ignores its mere beauty when void of durability. Hence, all artistic considerations are set aside in our lists of permanent pigments: if it be possible to use them alone, so much the better for the permanence of painting; if not, so much the worse will it be, according to the degree of fugacity of the colours employed.

George Field
Field's Chromatography

Our Californian buckeye is closely allied to the horse-chestnuts and buckeyes of the eastern half of the continent. It is usually found upon stream-banks or the side-walls of cañons, and reaches its greatest perfection in the valleys of our central Coast Ranges. It usually branches low into a number of clean, round, light-gray limbs, which widen out into a broad, dense, rounded head. Its leaves are fully developed before the flowers appear. When in full bloom, in May, it is considered one of the most beautiful of all our American species. Its long, white flower-spikes, sprinkled rather regularly over the green mound of foliage, are very suggestive of a neat calico print. Early to come, the leaves are as early to depart, and by midsummer the beautiful skeleton is often bare, its interlacing twigs making a delicate network against the deep azure of the sky.

Mary Elizabeth Parsons
The Wild Flowers of California: Their Names, Haunts, and Habits

I cannot quite state why the tendency toward Orientalism--Oriental dress--all the manner of an Oriental monarch--has taken full possession of me: but so it is: for surely I am hardly any longer a Western, 'modern' mind, but a primitive and Eastern one. Certainly, that cravat in the frame has receded a million, million leagues, ten thousand forgotten aeons, from me! Whether this is a result due to my own personality, of old acquainted with Eastern notions, or whether, perhaps, it is the natural accident to any mind wholly freed from trammels, I do not know. But I seem to have gone right back to the very beginnings, and resemblance with man in his first, simple, gaudy conditions. My hair, as I sit here writing, already hangs a black, oiled string down my back; my scented beard sweeps in two opening whisks to my ribs; I have on the _izar_, a pair of drawers of yomani cloth like cotton, but with yellow stripes; over this a soft shirt, or quamis, of white silk, reaching to my calves; over this a short vest of gold-embroidered crimson, the _sudeyree_; over this a khaftan of green-striped silk, reaching to the ankles, with wide, long sleeves divided at the wrist, and bound at the waist with a voluminous gaudy shawl of Cashmere for girdle; over this a warm wide-flowing torrent of white drapery, lined with ermine. On my head is the skull-cap, covered by a high crimson cap with deep-blue tassel; and on my feet is a pair of thin yellow-morocco shoes, covered over with thick red-morocco

In the lower church of S. Francesco at Assisi, in an arch over the pulpit (there being no other space that was not painted) he wrought the Coronation of Our Lady, with many angels round her, so gracious, so beautiful in the expressions of the faces, and so sweet and delicate in manner, that they show, with the usual harmony of colour which was something peculiar to this painter, that he had proved himself the peer of all who had lived up to that time; and round this arch he made some stories of S. Nicholas. In like manner, in the Monastery of S. Chiara in the same city, in the middle of the church, he painted a scene in fresco, wherein is S. Chiara supported in the air by two angels who appear real; she is restoring to life a child that was dead, while round her are standing many women all full of wonder, with great beauty in the faces and in the very gracious head-dresses and costumes of those times that they are wearing. In the same city of Assisi, over the gate of the city that leads to the Duomo--namely, in an arch on the inner side--he made a Madonna with the Child in her arms, with so great diligence that she appears alive, and a S. Francis and another Saint, both very beautiful; both of which works, although the story of S. Chiara remained unfinished by reason of Tommaso having fallen sick and returned to Florence, are perfect and most worthy of all praise.

Giorgio Vasari
Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects

Toward the close of a May afternoon in the year 1884, Miss Priscilla Batte, having learned by heart the lesson in physical geography she would teach her senior class on the morrow, stood feeding her canary on the little square porch of the Dinwiddie Academy for Young Ladies. The day had been hot, and the fitful wind, which had risen in the direction of the river, was just beginning to blow in soft gusts under the old mulberry trees in the street, and to scatter the loosened petals of syringa blossoms in a flowery snow over the grass. For a moment Miss Priscilla turned her flushed face to the scented air, while her eyes rested lovingly on the narrow walk, edged with pointed bricks and bordered by cowslips and wallflowers, which led through the short garden to the three stone steps and the tall iron gate. She was a shapeless yet majestic woman of some fifty years, with a large mottled face in which a steadfast expression of gentle obstinacy appeared to underly the more evanescent ripples of thought or of emotion. Her severe black silk gown, to which she had just changed from her morning dress of alpaca, was softened under her full double chin by a knot of lace and a cameo brooch bearing the helmeted profile of Pallas Athene. On her head she wore a three-cornered cap trimmed with a ruching of organdie, and beneath it her thin gray hair still showed a gleam of faded yellow in the sunlight. She had never been handsome, but her prodigious size had endowed her with an impressiveness which had passed in her youth, and among an

Ellen Glasgow
Virginia

upon anything save dress and society. Nevertheless, she is admirably endowed intellectually as well as physically, and the charm that she had for me when I first saw her has grown with time. There is something odd and striking about her that rivets one's interest. She is really short in stature, and yet her graceful lithe figure in her long trains seems that of a tall, slender woman; her hair is light brown or golden, according as the light falls on it; her eyes one would call blue, another gray, and a third green, and they would all be right; her smile is that of a child, but in an instant there will be something arch, mocking, even sneering, in it. One moment she will call me awkward, pedantic, the next I am her comfort, her stay, the friend for whom she has been longing. For a moment her whim will be enthusiasm, and on a sudden she will turn herself and everybody else into ridicule. Whether she enjoys doing this or not I cannot say; I suspect she hardly knows herself.

Claire Von Glmer
A Noble Name

_Stuffed._--Remove the outer leaves of either a green, white, or red cabbage, see that it be clean, then put it in a bowl, and pour boiling water on it. Leave it so till the leaves are soft and pliable, when take off and drain. Cut off the stump carefully, place the cabbage on the table, the top upward, then open it gently by spreading the leaves all around without breaking them; then, commencing with the centre leaves, put some sausage-meat between the leaves, finishing with the outer ones and raising them; that is, bringing the cabbage to its original shape as much as possible, and then tie it all around with twine. Put in a saucepan large enough to hold the cabbage easily, but not too large, a little salt pork, cut in small dice, rind of salt pork and trimmings of butcher's meat that you may have, but if none at all, put a little lean salt pork or bacon, and cut in dice also, half a carrot in slices, two onions in slices also, and then the cabbage on the whole. Half cover it with broth; water may be used instead of broth, but it makes a very inferior dish, while with broth it is unquestionably an excellent one for those who like cabbages. Simmer for two or three hours, according to the size of the cabbage. A piece of sausage may be placed on the cabbage also and cooked with it. Then dish the cabbage, remove the twine tying it; place the sausage around and also the salt pork if liked, strain the sauce on the whole, and serve warm. If the water or broth boils away while it is cooking, add more.

Pierre Blot
Hand-Book of Practical Cookery for Ladies and Professional Cooks

Mrs. Henry Goldsmith's newest seaside resort had the artistic charm which characterised everything she selected. It was a straggling, hilly, leafy village, full of archaic relics--human as well as architectural--sloping down to a gracefully curved bay, where the blue waves broke in whispers, for on summer days a halcyon calm overhung this magic spot, and the great sea stretched away, unwrinkled, ever young. There were no neutral tones in the colours of this divine picture--the sea was sapphire, the sky amethyst. There were dark red houses nestling amid foliage, and green-haired monsters of grey stone squatted about on the yellow sand, which was strewn with quaint shells and mimic earth-worms, cunningly wrought by the waves. Half a mile to the east a blue river rippled into the bay. The white bathing-tents which Mrs. Goldsmith had pitched stood out picturesquely, in harmonious contrast with the rich boscage that began to climb the hills in the background.

Israel Zangwill
The Grandchildren of the Ghetto

On one of the pleasant hills round Florence, a little beyond Camerata, there stands a house, so small that an Englishman would probably take it for a lodge of the great villa behind, whose garden trees at sunset cast their shadow over the cottage and its terrace on to the steep white road. But any of the country people could tell him that this, too, is Casa Signorile, spite of its smallness. It stands somewhat high above the road, a square, white house with a projecting roof, and with four green-shuttered windows overlooking the gay but narrow terrace. The beds under the windows would have fulfilled the fancy of that French poet who desired that in his garden one might, in gathering a nosegay, cull a salad, for they boasted little else than sweet basil, small and white, and some tall grey rosemary bushes. Nearer to the door an unusually large oleander faced a strong and sturdy magnolia-tree, and these, with their profusion of red and white sweetness, made amends for the dearth of garden flowers. At either end of the terrace flourished a thicket of gum-cistus, syringa, stephanotis, and geranium bushes, and the wall itself, dropping sheer down to the road, was bordered with the customary Florentine hedge of China roses and irises, now out of bloom. Great terra-cotta flower-pots, covered with devices, were placed at intervals along the wall; as it was summer, the oranges and lemons, full of wonderfully sweet white blossoms and young green fruit, were set there in the sun to ripen.

Various
Tales from Many Sources

"January 20.--Laid up in the litter, and as good as blind, but halting to bait, Lombardy plains burst on me. Oh, Margaret! a land flowing with milk and honey; all sloping plains, goodly rivers, jocund meadows, delectable orchards, and blooming gardens; and though winter, looks warmer than poor beloved Holland at midsummer, and makes the wanderer's face to shine, and his heart to leap for joy to see earth so kind and smiling. Here be vines, cedars, olives, and cattle plenty, but three goats to a sheep. The draught oxen wear white linen on their necks, and standing by dark green olive-trees each one is a picture; and the folk, especially women, wear delicate strawen hats with flowers and leaves fairly imitated in silk, with silver mixed. This day we crossed a river prettily in a chained ferry-boat. On either bank was a windlass, and a single man by turning of it drew our whole company to his shore, whereat I did admire, being a stranger. Passed over with us some country folk. And an old woman looking at a young wench, she did hide her face with her hand, and held her crucifix out like knight his sword in tourney dreading the evil eye.

Charles Reade
The Cloister and the Hearth

Then she shows a desire to dress like white women, and instead of the broadcloth skirt tied around her waist with a string and the short calico sack, and moccasins upon her feet, she appears with a kilt plaiting around her dress skirt, and, what probably in her mind is an improvement upon white woman's taste, the plaiting is headed with two or three rows of bright worsted skirt braid. As she admires the thin and lightly covered head of the white baby, she closely clips her own baby's hair so as to have it as nearly like a white baby as possible. But all this is the mere outside of life--one benefit which Christianity brings to her personally. She begins to show that she has become a missionary at heart and that she has a desire to send this great blessing which has wrought such a change in her home into other homes; and as others like herself, near at hand, have been treasuring up the blessed words of the Lord Jesus, "Go ye and preach my gospel," they begin to think that they can do something to send the good tidings to those who are in the darkness which so recently surrounded themselves.

Various
The American Missionary -- Volume 38, No. 01, January, 1884

It is natural to think that the Basilica and Convent built under the guidance of Elias was as we see it now in its full magnificence of chapels, porch, colonnades and cloisters. Certainly the essential form of the building has not been altered, but in the early days it stood isolated from the town, surrounded by such rocks as jut out among the grass in the ravine outside Porta S. Pietro, and approached by a drawbridge which made it resemble, even more than it does now, a feudal stronghold guarding the Umbrian valley. Later on, as the life of the place centred ever more round the church of the saint, the citizens no longer built their houses near San Rufino or below the castle, but close to San Francesco, until a second town sprang up where once were only rough mountain pastures. It is still possible to form an idea of how it looked by following round the base of the hill by the Tescio, whence a wonderful and unique view of the northern side of church and convent is obtained (see Appendix). Assisi lies hidden, and standing high above us, shutting out the view of the valley, is San Francesco; not the building with great arches we are familiar with, rising high above the vineyards, but a castle, seen clearly defined and strong against the sky, whose bastions clasp the hill top as powerfully as a good rider bestrides his horse. Oak copses cover the slopes from the convent wall straight down to the banks of the Tescio, where little mills are set above deep pools of emerald green water and narrow canals fringed by poplar trees. The minute detail of

Lina Duff Gordon
The Story of Assisi

An herbaceous perennial, of the alpine parts of Europe, and for a long time cultivated in this country. It grows 1ft. high, is much branched in zigzag form, and produces numerous flowers, resembling those of the strawberry, but only about half the size; the leaves are finely cut and of a dark green colour; it is not a plant worth growing for its flowers, but the reason why I briefly speak of it here is that I may more properly introduce that grand old flower of which it is the parent, _R. a. fl.-pl._ (see Fig. 79), the true "English double white Crowfoote," or Bachelor's Buttons; these are the common names which Gerarde gives as borne by this plant nearly 300 years ago, and there can be no mistaking the plant, as he figures it in his "Historie of Plantes," p. 812; true, he gives it a different Latin name to the one it bears at the present time; still, it is the same plant, and his name for it (_R. albus multiflorus_) is strictly and correctly specific. Numerous flowers are called Bachelor's Buttons, including daisies, globe flowers, pyrethrums, and different kinds of ranunculi, but here we have the "original and true;" probably it originated in some ancient English garden, as Gerarde says, "It groweth in the gardens of herbarists & louers of strange plants, whereof we have good plentie, but it groweth not wild anywhere."

John Wood
Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers

Near the opposite end of the constellation from alpha we find the most interesting of triple stars in gamma. The two larger components of this beautiful star are of magnitudes three and six, distance 10", colors golden yellow and deep blue. The three-inch shows them finely. The smaller star is itself double, its companion being of magnitude eight, distance when discovered in 1842 0.5", color bluish green. A few years ago this third star got so close to its primary that it was invisible even with the highest powers of the great Lick telescope, but at present it is widening again. In October, 1893, I had the pleasure of looking at gamma Andromed with the Lick telescope, and at that time it was possible just to separate the third star. The angle seemed too small for certain measurement, but a single setting of the micrometer by Mr. Barnard, to whose kindness I was indebted for my view of the star, gave 0.17" as the approximate distance. In 1900 the distance had increased to 0.4", p. 115. The brilliance of color contrast between the two larger stars of gamma Andromed is hardly inferior to that exhibited in beta Cygni, so that this star may be regarded as one of the most picturesque of stellar objects for small telescopes.

Garrett Serviss
Pleasures of the telescope

"Well, it exactly suits her," Janet began, "only we call her Taffy because she has a mop of hair that looks exactly like taffy candy, the rich yellow kind, and her eyes are green, just the color of the sea, when you look straight down into it on a misty day, and her cheeks are like rose petals, not bright pink, but a soft, delicate tint, and her cheeks are ivory white, like cream. She has long slender hands and the most wonderful voice you ever heard; it's soft and furry; she always drawls; in fact, Taffy always looks and talks as if she were half asleep. Her eyelashes are so long and heavy that they almost cover her eyes. When she opens them wide she looks as if she were surprised at what she saw. She's got the keenest sense of humor you ever heard of, and when she says a thing it sounds twice as funny as if anyone else had said it, because of her queer little laugh."

Dorothy Whitehill
The Twins in the South

The forest was largely fir and pine, and the sunlight glanced down the straight trunks and patterned on the carpet beneath. Hollies gleamed green against the brown background, and in an open space of bare beech trees the littered ground was already pricked with the new green of the wild hyacinth. Now and again the rounded hills gave glimpses of the far Normandy plain across the serpentine river, then would as suddenly close in on them again until the car seemed to dart between the advancing battalions of the forest as though to escape capture. At length, in one such place, they leaped forward up a short rise, then rushed swiftly downhill, swung round a corner, and came out on what had become all but a bare tableland, set high so that one could see distant valleys--Boscherville, Duclair--and yet bare, for the timber had been all but entirely cut down.

A black and white _maitre d'hotel_, picked out with gold, replied to this, and after talking to half a dozen waiters and sending for another chap with a shirt-front like a Mercedes bonnet, they directed me to a little hotel down by Monaco; and there the head waiter received me quite affably, and said, "Certainly, the gentleman was at home."  When I had given my name, but not my business, I was ushered up, perhaps after an interval of ten minutes, to a sitting-room on the first floor, and there I found myself face to face with a fat, red-faced man in evening dress; and if ever there was a martinet down Montey way, this fine gentleman was that same.  He was fat, I say, and forty--but to write that he was fair would be impossible, for he hadn't more than about half a dozen hairs on his head, and those had drifted down his neck to get out of the wind.  When I came in he appeared to be sipping Cognac out of a long green bottle, and to be reading private papers just as fast as he could get through them, but he looked up presently, and a pair of wickeder eyes I do not want to see.

Max Pemberton
The Man Who Drove the Car

P'an Ku is pictured as a man of dwarfish stature clothed in bearskin, or merely in leaves or with an apron of leaves. He has two horns on his head. In his right hand he holds a hammer and in his left a chisel (sometimes these are reversed), the only implements he used in carrying out his great task. Other pictures show him attended in his labours by the four supernatural creatures--the unicorn, phoenix, tortoise, and dragon; others again with the sun in one hand and the moon in the other, some of the firstfruits of his stupendous labours. (The reason for these being there will be apparent presently.) His task occupied eighteen thousand years, during which he formed the sun, moon, and stars, the heavens and the earth, himself increasing in stature day by day, being daily six feet taller than the day before, until, his labours ended, he died that his works might live. His head became the mountains, his breath the wind and clouds, his voice the thunder, his limbs the four quarters of the earth, his blood the rivers, his flesh the soil, his beard the constellations, his skin and hair the herbs and trees, his teeth, bones, and marrow the metals, rocks, and precious stones, his sweat the rain, and the insects creeping over his body human beings, who thus had a lowlier origin even than the tears of Khepera in Egyptian cosmology. [3]

E. T. C. Werner
Myths and Legends of China

'One of the most notable persons who ever came into our bow-windowed drawing-room in Young Street is a guest never to be forgotten by me--a tiny, delicate, little person, whose small hand nevertheless grasped a mighty lever which set all the literary world of that day vibrating.  I can still see the scene quite plainly--the hot summer evening, the open windows, the carriage driving to the door as we all sat silent and expectant; my father, who rarely waited, waiting with us; our governess and my sister and I all in a row, and prepared for the great event.  We saw the carriage stop, and out of it sprang the active well-knit figure of Mr. George Smith, who was bringing Miss Bronte to see our father.  My father, who had been walking up and down the room, goes out into the hall to meet his guests, and then, after a moment's delay, the door opens wide, and the two gentlemen come in, leading a tiny, delicate, serious, little lady, pale, with fair straight hair, and steady eyes.  She may be a little over thirty; she is dressed in a little _barege_ dress, with a pattern of faint green moss.  She enters in mittens, in silence, in seriousness; our hearts are beating with wild excitement.  This, then, is the authoress, the unknown power whose books have set all London talking, reading, speculating; some people even say our father wrote the books--the wonderful books.  To say that we little girls had been given _Jane Eyre_ to read scarcely represents the facts of the case; to say that we had taken it without leave, read bits here and read

Clement K. Shorter
Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle

SLATE, a well-known, neat, convenient, and durable material, for the covering of the roofs of buildings. There are great varieties of this substance; and it likewise differs very greatly in its qualities and colours. In some places it is found in thick lamin, or flakes; while in others it is thin and light. The colours are white, brown, and blue. It is so durable, in some cases, as to have been known to continue sound and good for centuries. However, unless it should be brought from a quarry of well reputed goodness, it is necessary to try its properties, which may be done by striking the slate sharply against a large stone, and if it produce a complete sound, it is a mark of goodness; but if in hewing it does not shatter before the edge of the _sect_, or instrument commonly used for that purpose, the criterion is decisive. The goodness of slate may be farther estimated by its colour: the deep black hue is apt to imbibe moisture, but the lighter is always the least penetrable: the touch also may be in some degree a guide, for a good firm stone feels somewhat hard and rough, whereas an open slate feels very smooth, and as it were, greasy. And another method of trying the goodness of slate, is to place the slate-stone lengthwise and perpendicularly in a tub of water, about half a foot deep, care being taken that the upper or unimmersed part of the slate be not accidentally wetted by the hand, or otherwise; let it remain in this state twenty-four hours; if good and firm stone, it will not draw water more than half an inch above the

Mary Eaton
The Cook and Housekeeper's Complete and Universal Dictionary; Including a System of Modern Cookery, in all Its Various Branches,

Stalk green, surface smooth and somewhat glossy, fleshy, beset with spines which bend back and terminate in brownish somewhat weak points; these appear to have been primarily the stipul, which become thus fleshy and rigid, and from this circumstance not altogether peculiar to this species, it takes the name of _echinatum_; the leaves stand on long footstalks, are somewhat heart-shaped, mostly roundish, divided into three or five lobes, veiny, soft, and downy, especially on the under side, which is of a much lighter colour than the upper, the flowering stem proceeds from the summit of the stalk, and is a foot or more in height; as it advances it throws out its branches, or peduncles, ultimately about five in number, each of which has a leaf at its base, similar to the other leaves of the plant, but smaller, and terminates in an umbel of seven or eight flowers; as the umbels blossom in succession, a period of several months usually intervenes betwixt the blowing of the first and the last; when the flower is expanded, the hindmost leaf of the calyx continues upright, the others are reflexed as in other species of this genus, they are all beset with fine long hairs; the three lowermost petals are pure white, with a little gibbosity at the base of each, the two uppermost are marked each with three irregular spots, of a rich purple colour, inclining to carmine, the two lowermost spots narrowest and of the deepest colour; of the stamina there are six filaments which have anther, and four of which have none; stigma red,

William Curtis
The Botanical Magazine, Vol. 9

"But he is changed in other respects too, in a way that has filled my dear wife's heart with joy.  Of course you are aware that he got no drink during the seven years of his imprisonment.  Now that he is free he refuses to let a drop of anything stronger than water pass his lips. He thinks it is his only chance, and I believe he is right.  He says that nothing but the thought of Nora, and the hope of one day being permitted to return to ask her forgiveness on his knees, enabled him to endure his long captivity with resignation.  I do assure you, father, that it almost brings tears to my eyes to see the way in which that man humbles himself before his daughter.  Nora's joy is far too deep for words, but it is written plainly in her face.  She spent all her spare time with him at first, reading the Bible to him, and trying to convince him that it was not the thought of _her_, but God's mercy and love that had put it into his heart to repent, and desire to reform.  He does not seem quite inclined to take that view of it, but he will come to it, sooner or later, for we have the sure promise that the Lord will finish the good work He has begun.  We have hired a room for him in a little village within half a mile of us.  It is small, but comfortable enough, and he seems to be quite content with it--as well he may be, with Nora and the children going constantly about him!

R.M. Ballantyne
The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands

to follow the wild race of the train and fixes in your eyes forever the memory of its flights of steps, its balcony-rails, its Italian architecture, two rather low stones surmounted by a terrace with little pillars, flanked by two wings with slated roofs, and overlooking the sloping banks, where the water from the cascades rushes down to the river, the network of gravelled paths, the vista formed by hedges of great height with a white statue at the end sharply outlined against the blue sky as against the luminous background of a stained-glass window. Far up, among the vast lawns whose brilliant verdure defies the blazing climate, a gigantic cedar rears, terrace-like, its masses of green foliage, with its swaying dark shadows,--an exotic figure, which makes one think, as he stands before that sometime abode of a farmer-general of the epoch of Louis XIV., of a tall negro carrying a courtier's umbrella.

Alphonse Daudet
The Nabob, Volume 1 (of 2)

Before the leaves appear the Hazel is rendered conspicuous by the male catkins, which are familiar to country children under the name of Lamb's-tails. These may be seen in an undeveloped condition in the autumn, when the nuts are being sought. A cluster of two or three hard, little, grey-green cylinders is all that may then be seen of them; but throughout the winter they lengthen, their scales loosen, and in February they are a couple of inches long, pliant, and yellow with the abundant pollen which blows out of them as they swing. The female flowers are by no means conspicuous, and have to be looked for. They will be found in the form of swollen buds on the upper parts of the shoots and branches, from which issue some fine crimson threads. These are the styles and stigmas, and on dissection of the budlike head, each pair of styles will be seen to spring from a two-celled ovary nestling between the bracts or scales of which the head is composed. It is only rarely that the seed-egg in each cell develops; as a rule one shrivels, and the other develops into the sweet "kernel" of the Hazel-nut. The shell is the ovary that has become woody and hard; the ragged-edged leathery "shuck" is the enlarged bracts that surrounded the minute flower.

Edward Step
Wayside and Woodland Trees

This would have seemed to Bucks mere idle curiosity had he not noticed that some one within the wagon parted the canvas flaps at the rear as it went by and likewise inspected the building with close attention. Even this was no especial incident for wonderment, nor was Bucks surprised when the emigrants, after pursuing their way until they were well out of sight of the station itself, guided their wagon from the trail into a little depression along the creek as if to make camp for the night. The driver, a tall, thin man, wearing a slouch hat, got down from the front of the wagon and walked with a shambling gait to the head of his horses and loosened their bridles. While the horses were drinking, a second man, carrying a rifle, climbed down from the rear of the wagon. He was of a shorter and stockier build, and on one side the brim of his soft hat had been torn away so that it hung loosely over one ear, the other ear being covered only by a shock of dusty hair.

Frank H. Spearman
The Mountain Divide

At the head of his dining-table loaded with flowers and plate, he sat between the Hon. Mrs. Winlow and Mrs. Jaspar Bellew, nor could he have desired more striking and contrasted supporters.  Equally tall, full-figured, and comely, Nature had fixed between these two women a gulf which Mr. Pendyce, a man of spare figure, tried in vain to fill. The composure peculiar to the ashen type of the British aristocracy wintered permanently on Mrs. Winlow's features like the smile of a frosty day. Expressionless to a degree, they at once convinced the spectator that she was a woman of the best breeding.  Had an expression ever arisen upon these features, it is impossible to say what might have been the consequences.  She had followed her nurse's adjuration: "Lor, Miss Truda, never you make a face--You might grow so!"  Never since that day had Gertrude Winlow, an Honourable in her own right and in that of her husband, made a face, not even, it is believed, when her son was born. And then to find on the other side of Mr. Pendyce that puzzling Mrs. Bellew with the green-grey eyes, at which the best people of her own sex looked with instinctive disapproval!  A woman in her position should avoid anything conspicuous, and Nature had given her a too-striking appearance. People said that when, the year before last, she had separated from Captain Bellew, and left the Firs, it was simply because they were tired of one another.  They said, too, that it looked as if she were encouraging the attentions of George, Mr. Pendyce's eldest son.

John Galsworthy
The Country House

If Daniel be beside her, what does she see when she looks at him? A lad well set up but not overtall for his sixteen years, perhaps--for "eye-witnesses" differ in their estimates of Daniel Boone's height--or possibly taller than he looks, because his figure has the forest hunter's natural slant forward and the droop of the neck of one who must watch his path sometimes in order to tread silently. It is Squire Boone's blood which shows in his ruddy face--which would be fair but for its tan--and in the English cut of feature, the straw-colored eyebrows, and the blue eyes. But his Welsh mother's legacy is seen in the black hair that hangs long and loose in the hunter's fashion to his shoulders. We can think of Daniel Boone only as exhilarated by this plunge into the Wild. He sees ahead--the days of his great explorations and warfare, the discovery of Kentucky? Not at all. This is a boy of sixteen in love with his rifle. He looks ahead to vistas of forest filled with deer and to skies clouded with flocks of wild turkeys. In that dream there is happiness enough for Daniel Boone. Indeed, for himself, even in later life, he asked little, if any, more. He trudges on blithely, whistling.

Constance Lindsay Skinner
Pioneers of the Old Southwest

If it were not to be a success it would not be the fault of the man who worked till one o'clock--two o'clock--three o'clock it the morning to perfect the strangely convoluted tool which was to help “do the trick” if it could be done. Part of the work was done in the laboratory, part in the machine shop which occupied a corner of the old red barn, where the Green Imp lent her lamps as aids to the task in hand. At four, the instrument finished, sterilized, and put away as if it were worth its weight in gold--which it might easily have been if it were to prove fitted to the peculiar need--Burns went to bed. At six he was up again, had a cold plunge and a hearty breakfast, and at seven was sending the Imp out of the gateway, his office nurse beside him. If Mrs. Lessing hoped the operation would be a success, Miss Mathewson hoped and feared and longed with all her soul. Beneath the uniform and behind the quiet, plain face of the young woman who had been R. P. Burns's professional assistant for eight years, lived a person than whom none cared more how things went with him. But nobody knew that least of all Burns himself. He only knew that he could not get on without her; that never a suture that she had prepared made trouble for him after an operation: and that none other of the hundred nice details upon which the astounding results of modern surgery depend was likely to go wrong if it were she who was responsible.

The Pieta raised Michelangelo at once to the highest place among the artists of his time, and it still remains unrivalled for the union of sublime aesthetic beauty with profound religious feeling. The mother of the dead Christ is seated on a stone at the foot of the cross, supporting the body of her son upon her knees, gazing sadly at his wounded side, and gently lifting her left hand, as though to say, "Behold and see!" She has the small head and heroic torso used by Michelangelo to suggest immense physical force. We feel that such a woman has no difficulty in holding a man's corpse upon her ample lap and in her powerful arms. Her face, which differs from the female type he afterwards preferred, resembles that of a young woman. For this he was rebuked by critics who thought that her age should correspond more naturally to that of her adult son. Condivi reports that Michelangelo explained his meaning in the following words: "Do you not know that chaste women maintain their freshness far longer than the unchaste? How much more would this be the case with a virgin, into whose breast there never crept the least lascivious desire which could affect the body? Nay, I will go further, and hazard the belief that this unsullied bloom of youth, besides being maintained in her by natural causes, may have been miraculously wrought to convince the world of the virginity and perpetual purity of the Mother. This was not necessary for the Son. On the contrary, in order to prove that the Son

John Addington Symonds
The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti

startles the horse--his ears go back, he snuffs, snorts, then plunges madly. Pad, pad, behind them are the wolves in pursuit--an army of them; every pine tree they pass adds a fiend to the pack; the eldest lead the way, their eyes green-glowing brass. The horse does his best; but the first of the band--that Satan-face--draws so near, his white teeth gleam, he is on the sledge--"perhaps her hands relaxed her grasp of her boy," she says; "for he was gone." The cursed crew fight for their share; they are too busy to pursue. She urges the horse to increased exertion. Alas! the pack is after them again; "Satan-face" is first, as before, and ravening for more. The mother fights with the monster, but the next boy is gone--plucked from the arms she clasped round him for protection. Another respite, while the fiends dispute for their share; but, as they fly over the snow, the leader of the pack tells his companions that their food is escaping; he leaves them to pick the bones, and--pad, pad!--is after the sledge again. All fight's in vain: the green brass points, the dread fiend's eyes, pierce to the woman's brain--she falls on her back in the sledge; but, wedging in and in, past her neck, her breasts, her heart, Satan-face is away with her last, her baby boy. She remembered no more. And now she is at home--childless, but with her life. And Ivn the woodsman sternly looks; the woman kneels. Solemnly he raises his axe, and one blow falls--headless she kneels on still--

Edward Berdoe
The Browning Cyclopdia

The names of Indians are sometimes so peculiar that people are made to wonder how the red men became possessed of them. That of “Sitting Bull,” “Crazy Horse,” “Man Afraid of his Horses,” “Red Cloud,” etc., cause a good deal of thought to those who do not know how the names are given. The fact of the matter is that after a child of the forest is born the medicine man goes to the door and looks out and the first object that attracts his attention is made use of to name the child. When the mother of that great warrior gave birth to her child the medicine man looked out and saw a bull seated on its haunches; hence the name “Sitting Bull.” It is an evidence of our superior civilization that we name children on a different plan, taking the name of some eminent man or woman, some uncle or aunt to fasten on to the unsuspecting stranger. Suppose that the custom that is in vogue among the Indians should be in use among us, we would have, instead of “George Washington” and “Hanner Jane,” and such beautiful names, some of the worst jaw-breakers that ever was. Suppose the attending physician should go the door after a child was born and name it after the first object he saw. We might have some future statesman named “Red Headed Servant Girl with a Rubber Bag of Hot Water” or “Bald-headed Husband Walking Up and Down the Alley with His Hands in His Pockets swearing this thing shall never Happen Again.” If the doctor happened to go the door when the grocery delivery wagon was there he would name the child “Boy from Dixon's Grocery with a

George W. Peck
Peck's Sunshine

He slipped a green carnation into his evening coat, fixed it in its place with a pin, and looked at himself in the glass, the long glass that stood near the window of his London bedroom. The summer evening was so bright that he could see his double clearly, even though it was just upon seven o'clock. There he stood in his favourite and most characteristic attitude, with his left knee slightly bent, and his arms hanging at his sides, gazing, as a woman gazes at herself before she starts for a party. The low and continuous murmur of Piccadilly, like the murmur of a flowing tide on a smooth beach, stole to his ears monotonously, and inclined him insensibly to a certain thoughtfulness. Floating through the curtained window the soft lemon light sparkled on the silver backs of the brushes that lay on the toilet-table, on the dressing-gown of spun silk that hung from a hook behind the door, on the great mass of gloire de Dijon roses, that dreamed in an ivory-white bowl set on the writing-table of ruddy-brown wood. It caught the gilt of the boy's fair hair and turned it into brightest gold, until, despite the white weariness of his face, the pale fretfulness of his eyes, he looked like some angel in a church window designed by Burne-Jones, some angel a little blas from the injudicious conduct of its life. He frankly admired himself as he watched his reflection, occasionally changing his pose, presenting himself to himself, now full face, now three-quarters face, leaning backward or forward, advancing one foot in

Robert Smythe Hichens
The Green Carnation

Similar conditions may be brought about by other causes as well. Take, for instance, the poor workingman or mechanic who has already six or seven children and whose wife is unusually fertile, giving birth to children year after year. The wages of the father do not suffice to properly support them all. The food that can be purchased with the slender means is not at all adequate. Rent and other bills fall behind and the man gets in debt. They are both young yet. What is to be done? If they follow the natural law there will be an increase in the family every year. Moreover, these ever-recurring labors weaken the constitution of the woman and sap away her strength. Starvation? Sexual continence in wedlock? It is strange, indeed, to hear rich men, well-fed clergymen, pious zealots and reformers, leaning back in their comfortable chairs after a sumptuous meal and smoking an expensive Havana cigar, discuss this burning question and bewail the immorality of the common people.

August Forel
The Sexual Question

In the majority of these legends, however, the Apsaras, or cloud-maiden, has a shirt of swan's feathers which plays the same part as the wolfskin cape or girdle of the werewolf. If you could get hold of a werewolf's sack and burn it, a permanent cure was effected. No danger of a relapse, unless the Devil furnished him with a new wolfskin. So the swan-maiden kept her human form, as long as she was deprived of her tunic of feathers. Indo-European folk-lore teems with stories of swan-maidens forcibly wooed and won by mortals who had stolen their clothes. A man travelling along the road passes by a lake where several lovely girls are bathing; their dresses, made of feathers curiously and daintily woven, lie on the shore. He approaches the place cautiously and steals one of these dresses. [90] When the girls have finished their bathing, they all come and get their dresses and swim away as swans; but the one whose dress is stolen must needs stay on shore and marry the thief. It is needless to add that they live happily together for many years, or that finally the good man accidentally leaves the cupboard door unlocked, whereupon his wife gets back her swan-shirt and flies away from him, never to return. But it is not always a shirt of feathers. In one German story, a nobleman hunting deer finds a maiden bathing in a clear pool in the forest. He runs stealthily up to her and seizes her necklace, at which she loses the power to flee. They are married, and she bears seven sons at once, all of whom have gold chains about their

"Stepping over a little mat of green wool, I found myself in a small room with a painted floor and a square of green carpet in the middle; the articles of furniture were few, but all bright and exquisitely clean--order reigned through its narrow limits--such order as it suited my punctilious soul to behold.... Poor the place might be; poor truly it was, but its neatness was better than elegance, and had but a bright little fire shone on that clean hearth, I should have deemed it more attractive than a palace. No fire was there, however, and no fuel laid ready to light; the lace-mender was unable to allow herself that indulgence.... Frances went into an inner room to take off her bonnet, and she came out a model of frugal neatness, with her well-fitting black stuff dress, so accurately defining her elegant bust and taper waist, with her spotless white collar turned back from a fair and shapely neck, with her plenteous brown hair arranged in smooth bands on her temples and in a large Grecian plait behind: ornaments she had none--neither brooch, ring, nor ribbon; she did well enough without them--perfection of fit, proportion of form, grace of carriage, agreeably supplied their place." Frances lights a fire, having fetched wood and coal in a basket.

_

Below us a few miles, indistinctly seen through the haze, a dense forest of masts, and here and there a tower, designate the emporium of commerce--the key of the mighty west. The banks are lined and ornamented with elegant mansions, displaying, in their richly adorned grounds, the wealth and taste of their possessors; while the river, now moving onward like a golden flood, reflecting the mellow rays of the setting sun, is full of life. Vessels of every size are gliding in all directions over its waveless bosom, while graceful skiffs dart merrily about like white-winged birds. Huge steamers are dashing and thundering by, leaving long trains of wreathing smoke in their rear. Carriages filled with ladies and attended by gallant horsemen, enliven the smooth road along the Levee; while the green banks of the Levee itself are covered with gay promenaders. A glimpse through the trees now and then, as we move rapidly past the numerous villas, detects the piazzas, filled with the young, beautiful, and aged of the family, enjoying the rich beauty of the evening, and of the objects upon which my own eyes rest with admiration.

Joseph Holt Ingraham
The South-West

She was dressed for the evening in pure white--delicate, filmy--showing her round white throat and round white wrists. Her eyes were soft and welcoming and full of light; her manner was playful to the point of coquetry; and in sharp contrast, now and then, her face was intense with thought. A faint, pink light was still diffused from the afterglow, and she took him down into her mother's garden, which was old-fashioned and had grass-walks running down through it--bordered with pink beds and hedges of rose-bushes. And they passed under a shadowed grape-arbour and past a dead locust-tree, which a vine had made into a green tower of waving tendrils, and from which came the fragrant breath of wild grape, and back again to the gate, where Judith reached down for an old-fashioned pink and pinned it in his button-hole, talking with low, friendly affection meanwhile, and turning backward the leaves of the past rapidly.

John Fox, Jr.
Crittenden

As stars in the serene expanse of heaven, as in spring-time flowers in the green pastures, so, honourable damsels, in the hour of rare and excellent converse is wit with its bright sallies. Which, being brief, are much more proper for ladies than for men, seeing that prolixity of speech, when brevity is possible, is much less allowable to them; albeit (shame be to us all and all our generation) few ladies or none are left to-day who understand aught that is wittily said, or understanding are able to answer it. For the place of those graces of the spirit which distinguished the ladies of the past has now been usurped by adornments of the person; and she whose dress is most richly and variously and curiously dight, accounts herself more worthy to be had in honour, forgetting, that, were one but so to array him, an ass would carry a far greater load of finery than any of them, and for all that be not a whit the more deserving of honour. I blush to say this, for in censuring others I condemn myself. Tricked out, bedecked, bedizened thus, we are either silent and impassive as statues, or, if we answer aught that is said to us, much better were it we had held our peace. And we make believe, forsooth, that our failure to acquit ourselves in converse with our equals of either sex does but proceed from guilelessness; dignifying stupidity by the name of modesty, as if no lady could be modest and converse with other folk than her maid or laundress or bake-house woman; which if Nature had intended, as we feign she did, she

Giovanni Boccaccio
The Decameron, Volume I

One of the younger women struck Martin as being ultra-fashionable in her paint. Her black shining hair hung like a cloak over her reddish-brown shoulders, and various strange drawings and figures ornamented her face and breast. On each cheek she had a circle, and over that two strokes; under the nose were four red spots; from the corners of her mouth to the middle of each cheek were two parallel lines, and below these several upright stripes; on various parts of her back and shoulders were curiously entwined circles, and the form of a snake was depicted in vermilion down each arm. Unlike the others, she wore no ornament except a simple necklace of monkeys' teeth. This beauty was particularly active in manufacturing the intoxicating drink, which is prepared thus:--A quantity of maize was pounded in the hollow trunk of a tree and put into an earthen pot, where it was boiled in a large quantity of water. Then the woman took the coarsely ground and boiled flour out of the water, chewed it in their mouths for a little, and put it into the pot again! By this means the decoction began to ferment and became intoxicating. It was a very disgusting method, yet it is practised by many Indian tribes in America; and, strange to say, also by some of the South Sea islanders, who, of course, could not have learned it from these Indians.

"Speaking of these buds, Clara," said her governess, "I think I forgot to tell you that the apple tree belongs to the family Rosaceae, and therefore the half-opened blossoms have a right to look like roses. The tree is not a handsome one, being a small edition of the oak in its sturdy outline, but it is less graceful or picturesque-looking, being often broader than it is high and resembling in shape a half globe. The leaves are not pretty except when first unfolded, and their color is then a beautiful light tint known as apple-green. But the foliage soon becomes dusty and shabby-looking. An old apple tree, with its gnarled, and often hollow, trunk, is generally handsomer than a young one, unless in the time of blossoms; for only a young apple-orchard is covered with such a profusion of bloom as that we saw to-day."

At present these vast stretches of rolling hill and dale are the home of the cattle-rancher--a strange and wild life. A suitable site is fixed on, commanding ample water privilege, with some valley-land near by to grow sufficient hay, and to raise the desired quantity of oats and vegetables; here the house is built, the lumber being hauled by wagons perhaps fifty or a hundred miles from the mill. The rancher's family consists of his wife and children, and possibly five or six herdsmen. While looking after cattle, these men almost live in the saddle. Horses abound, and form as good a source of revenue as cattle, in proportion to the capital engaged. The Eastern Oregon horse is taller and bigger-boned than the valley horse, but naturally his education is not so well attended to, and he is apt to be "mean" and to buck. Little recks his rider, and after a bout of bucking, in which the horse has not dislodged the man, but has shaken up every bone in his body till he is sore all over with the constant jar, as the horse comes to the ground all four feet at once after a mighty jump, then it is the man's turn. Driving in the heavy Mexican spurs, with their rowels two or three inches across, the rider starts wildly out, and mile after mile the open country is crossed at a hard-gallop. The herd is soon seen and ridden round, and a close lookout is kept to see if any stragglers have joined the band, and if the calves and yearlings are all right. Branding-time comes twice a year, in spring and autumn, when

Wallis Nash
Two Years in Oregon

He sits down under the shade of the next tree, or on the shady side of his house, and a large quantity of leaves, either of the bread-fruit or banana, is neatly spread before him upon the ground as a table-cloth; a basket is then set by him that contains his provision, which, if fish or flesh, is ready dressed, and wrapped up in leaves, and two cocoa-nut shells, one full of salt water, and the other of fresh: His attendants, which are not few, seat themselves round him, and when all is ready, he begins by washing his hands and his mouth thoroughly with the fresh water, and this he repeats almost continually throughout the whole meal; he then takes part of his provision out of the basket, which generally consists of a small fish or two, two or three breadfruits, fourteen or fifteen ripe bananas, or six or seven apples: He first takes half a bread-fruit, peels off the rind, and takes out the core with his nails; of this he puts as much into his mouth as it can hold, and while he chews it, takes the fish out of the leaves, and breaks one of them into the salt water, placing the other, and what remains of the bread-fruit, upon the leaves that have been spread before him. When this is done, he takes up a small piece of the fish that has been broken into the salt water, with all the fingers of one hand, and sucks it into his mouth, so as to get with it as much of the salt water as possible: In the same manner he takes the rest by different morsels, and between each, at least very frequently, takes a small sup of the salt water, either out

I am still sadly confused, and cannot make up my mind what all this is about. Patience, however, I shall know all at the Htel de Ville. Here we are. The National Guard keeps the ground, and the whole procession files into the Cour d'Honneur. Carried on by the crowd, I find myself near the entrance and can see what is going on inside. The whole of the Commune is out on the balcony, at the top of the grand staircase, in front of the statue of the Republic, which like the Communists wears a red scarf. Great trophies of red flags are waving everywhere. Men bearing the banners of the society are stationed on every step; on each is inscribed, in golden letters, mottos of peace and fraternity. A patriarchal Freemason, wearing his collar and badges, has arrived in a carriage; they help him to alight with marks of the greatest respect. The court is by this time full to overflowing, an enthusiastic cry of "Vive la Franc Maonnerie! Vive la Rpublique Universelle!" is re-echoed from mouth to mouth. Citizen Flix Pyat, member of the Commune, who is on the balcony, comes forward to speak. I congratulate myself on being at last about to hear what all this means. But I am disappointed. The pushing and squeezing is unbearable. I have vigorously to defend my hat, stick, purse, and cigar-case, and am half stifled besides. I almost despair of catching a single word, but at last succeed in hearing a few detached sentences:--"Universal nationality.... liberty, equality, and fraternity.... manifestos of the heart...." (what is that?) "the

John Leighton
Paris under the Commune

My curiosity was now in a way of being satisfied; the Spirit (demon, shall I not rather say?) of Hasheesh had entire possession of me. I was cast upon the flood of his illusions, and drifted helplessly whithersoever they might choose to bear me. The thrills which ran through my nervous system became more rapid and fierce, accompanied with sensations that steeped my whole being in unutterable rapture. I was encompassed by a sea of light, through which played the pure, harmonious colors that are born of light. While endeavoring, in broken expressions, to describe my feelings to my friends, who sat looking upon me incredulously--not yet having been affected by the drug--I suddenly found myself at the foot of the great Pyramid of Cheops. The tapering courses of yellow limestone gleamed like gold in the sun, and the pile rose so high that it seemed to lean for support upon the blue arch of the sky. I wished to ascend it, and the wish alone placed me immediately upon its apex, lifted thousands of feet above the wheat-fields and palm-groves of Egypt. I cast my eyes downward, and, to my astonishment, saw that it was built, not of limestone, but of huge square plugs of Cavendish tobacco! Words cannot paint the overwhelming sense of the ludicrous which I then experienced. I writhed on my chair in an agony of laughter, which was only relieved by the vision melting away like a dissolving view; till, out of my confusion of indistinct images and fragments of images, another and more wonderful vision arose.

Are we not brothers? In the throng that fills These strange enchanted rooms we met. One look Told that we knew each other. Sudden thrills, As of two lovers reading the same book, Ran through our hurried grasp. But when we turned, The scene around was smitten with a change: The lamps with lurid fire-light flared and burned; And through the wreaths and flowers,--oh, mockery strange!-- The prison-walls with ghastly horror frowned; Scarce hidden by vine-leaves and clusters thick, A grim cold iron grating closed around. Then from our silken couches leaping quick, We hurried past the dancers and the lights, Nor heeded the entrancing music then, Nor the fair women scattering delights In flower-like flush of dress,--nor paused till when, Leaning against our prison-bars, we gazed Into the dark, and wondered where we were. Speak to me, brothers, for ye stand amazed! I come, your secret burthen here to share!

Various
The Atlantic Monthly , Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858

So the next morning we walked up to the Pierre Pointue as a preliminary step—a good many and rather arduous steps—towards the object in view. The exertion of toiling up the zigzags or the more rarefied atmosphere had a remarkable effect on one of the party, whose face when we reached the chalet was found to be wreathed in smiles and wearing an expression of great intelligence. He had in fact become possessed of an idea. Bubbling over with self-satisfied chuckles, he suggested that we should ascend the Aiguille du Midi by the face directly in front of us and then descend on the other side, thus making a col of the mountain. The idea found favour instantly, and the intelligent person was so much pleased that he ordered a bottle of wine, plastered over with a very costly variety of label, and regretted it. Investigation of the cellar revealed only two casks of wine, but the “carte” comprised a long list of various vintages. Fired with enthusiasm and inflated with _limonade gazeuse_, we left the chalet and strode vigorously up the hill in order to prospect the route and reconnoitre the rocks. The exertion and the pace soon told upon us, the sooner that it was a hot, enervating day; the kind of day that makes one perforce admire the ingenious benevolence of nature in fashioning out on the grassy slopes rounded inequalities, exactly adapted to those of the human figure in a seated or recumbent position. The heated air rising from the ground gave flickering and distorted views of distant objects, like

Clinton Thomas Dent
Above the Snow Line

A hint was more than sufficient for Aileen, though really it was not needed. On arriving at Chicago she had sought and discovered a French maid. Although she had brought plenty of dresses from Philadelphia, she had been having additional winter costumes prepared by the best and most expensive mistress of the art in Chicago—Theresa Donovan. Only the day before she had welcomed home a golden-yellow silk under heavy green lace, which, with her reddish-gold hair and her white arms and neck, seemed to constitute an unusual harmony. Her boudoir on the night of the dinner presented a veritable riot of silks, satins, laces, lingerie, hair ornaments, perfumes, jewels—anything and everything which might contribute to the feminine art of being beautiful. Once in the throes of a toilet composition, Aileen invariably became restless and energetic, almost fidgety, and her maid, Fadette, was compelled to move quickly. Fresh from her bath, a smooth, ivory Venus, she worked quickly through silken lingerie, stockings and shoes, to her hair. Fadette had an idea to suggest for the hair. Would Madame let her try a new swirl she had seen? Madame would—yes. So there were movings of her mass of rich glinting tresses this way and that. Somehow it would not do. A braided effect was then tried, and instantly discarded; finally a double looping, without braids, low over the forehead, caught back with two dark-green bands, crossing like an X above the center of her forehead and fastened with a diamond sunburst, served admirably. In her

Theodore Dreiser
The Titan