sword

The espada, or man of death, now stands _alone_ with his victim, and having bowed to the royal box, he throws his _montero_, or cap, among the audience, and swears to do his duty. In his right hand is the long Toledan blade _la espada_, while in his left he holds the _muleta_, or small red flag about a foot square, which is his weapon of defence, and on the skill of using which his safety depends. The now maddened bull's first tactic was to charge furiously at the red flag, which the espada held at arm's length, and so wonderfully skilled was Frascuelo that he never moved an inch, while the animal rushed by him beneath his arm. Gradually decoying him along the edge of the ring with the _muleta_, Frascuelo paused in front of the royal box with his victim, and played him for a while, preparing in the meantime to give him the _coup de grace_. This is done when the bull is preparing for the final charge; the espada meeting him with his sword, plunges it hilt deep, just at the back of the head, and severing the dorsal column. The bull is now stationary for a few seconds, hardly knowing what to make of it, the espada holding up his hand to enjoin silence, till at length the brute sways slowly from side to side, and falls down dead, amid the jeers and applause of the populace, while the victorious espada withdraws, and wipes his sword, and walks slowly round the ring, the spectators throwing him cigars, packets of cigarettes, and--this last a great honour--their hats, a compliment he returns by throwing them

Harry de Windt
On the Equator

Realizing the truth of his comment, yet muttering over my shoulder a word of caution, I began crawling forward into the interior.  No sign of human presence appeared, and I ventured to stand upright.  The cavern possessed a wide opening, with a broad platform of rock extending well out beyond the face of the cliff.  Along the edge I could observe the rather dim outlines of an immense altar, built of detached stones, rising to a considerable height, and partially blocking the entrance.  From below it might serve to conceal the mouth of the cave.  This obstruction shut off much of the moon's light, rendering the interior intensely dark.  We were compelled to grope our way forward with hands pressed against the walls.  I had not advanced more than thirty feet, my every nerve tingling, when I saw the ruddy reflection of a fire, hitherto completely concealed by a sharp turn in the tunnel.  Rounding this abrupt point we found ourselves in a large room capable of containing upwards of three hundred persons.  This chamber was partly natural in formation, but, as I discovered later, had been considerably enlarged by artificial means.  So high was it that, in the dim light, I could scarcely distinguish its vaulted roof, while its length was hidden in the darkness.  In the very centre of this apartment arose a great pile of irregular rock, flattened and hollowed along the top, where was burning a vast log, the smoke ascending straight upward, evidently finding outlet above.  The light,

Randall Parrish
Prisoners of Chance

There is yet another hour, at once joyous and melancholy, a little later when twilight falls, when the sky seems one vast veil of yellow, against which stand the clear-cut outlines of jagged mountains and lofty, fantastic pagodas. It is the hour at which, in the labyrinth of little gray streets down below, the sacred lamps begin to twinkle in the ever-open houses, in front of the ancestors' altars and the familiar Buddhas; while outside, darkness creeps over all, and the thousand and one indentations and peaks of the old roofs are depicted, as if in black festoons, on the clear golden sky. At this moment, there suddenly passes over merry, laughing Japan a somber shadow, strange, weird, a breath of antiquity, of savagery, of something indefinable, which casts a gloom of sadness. And then the only gayety that remains is the gayety of the population of young children, of little mouskos and little mousmes, who spread themselves like a wave through the streets filled with shadow, as they swarm out from schools and workshops. On the dark background of all these wooden buildings, the little blue and scarlet dresses stand out in startling contrast,--drolly bedizened, drolly draped; and the fine loops of the sashes, the flowers, the silver or gold top-knots stuck in these baby chignons, add to the vivid effect.

Pierre Loti
Madame Chrysantheme

Indeed the 'brass-instrument psychologists,' who do such admirable work in their laboratories, have invented an experiment on the effect of significant words which every one may try for himself. Let him get a friend to write in large letters on cards a series of common political terms, nations, parties, principles, and so on. Let him then sit before a watch recording tenths of seconds, turn up the cards, and practise observation of the associations which successively enter his consciousness. The first associations revealed will be automatic and obviously 'illogical.' If the word be 'England' the white and black marks on the paper will, if the experimenter is a 'visualiser,' produce at once a picture of some kind accompanied by a vague and half conscious emotional reaction of affection, perhaps, or anxiety, or the remembrance of puzzled thought. If the experimenter is 'audile,' the marks will first call up a vivid sound image with which a like emotional reaction may be associated. I am a 'visualiser,' and the picture in my case was a blurred triangular outline. Other 'visualisers' have described to me the picture of a red flag, or of a green field (seen from a railway carriage), as automatically called up by the word England. After the automatic picture or sound image and its purely automatic emotional accompaniment comes the 'meaning' of the word, the things one knows about England, which are presented to the memory by a process semi-automatic at first, but requiring before it is exhausted a severe

An hour later we saw Fora and its light, at the extreme east of Madeira, and could soon distinguish the mountains in the centre of the latter island. As we rapidly approached the land, the beauty of the scenery became more fully apparent. A mass of dark purple volcanic rocks, clothed on the top with the richest vegetation, with patches of all sorts of colour on their sides, rises boldly from the sea. There are several small detached rocks, and one curious pointed little island, with an arch right through the middle of it, rather like the Perce Rock on the coast of Nova Scotia. We steamed slowly along the east coast, passing many pretty hamlets, nestled in bays or perched on the side of the hills, and observing how every possible nook and corner seemed to be terraced and cultivated. Sugar-canes, Indian corn, vines, and many varieties of tropical and semi-tropical plants, grow luxuriantly in this lovely climate. Nearly all the cottages in the island are inhabited by a simple people, many of whom have never left their native villages, even to look at the magnificent view from the top of the surrounding mountains, or to gaze on the sea, by which they are encompassed.

Annie Allnut Brassey
A Voyage in the 'Sunbeam'

In the midst of them, the blackest and largest jewel in that dark setting, reclined James Hook, or as he wrote himself, Jas. Hook, of whom it is said he was the only man that the Sea-Cook feared. He lay at his ease in a rough chariot drawn and propelled by his men, and instead of a right hand he had the iron hook with which ever and anon he encouraged them to increase their pace. As dogs this terrible man treated and addressed them, and as dogs they obeyed him. In person he was cadaverous and blackavized, and his hair was dressed in long curls, which at a little distance looked like black candles, and gave a singularly threatening expression to his handsome countenance. His eyes were of the blue of the forget-me-not, and of a profound melancholy, save when he was plunging his hook into you, at which time two red spots appeared in them and lit them up horribly. In manner, something of the grand seigneur still clung to him, so that he even ripped you up with an air, and I have been told that he was a _raconteur_ of repute. He was never more sinister than when he was most polite, which is probably the truest test of breeding; and the elegance of his diction, even when he was swearing, no less than the distinction of his demeanour, showed him one of a different caste from his crew. A man of indomitable courage, it was said of him that the only thing he shied at was the sight of his own blood, which was thick and of an unusual colour. In dress he somewhat aped the attire associated with the name of Charles II., having heard it

James Matthew Barrie
Peter and Wendy

before the world grew sick with our modern disease of doubt. Certainly these centuries produced saints whose arresting examples and haunting words must always be the glory of Christianity, and it is equally certain that the offices and doctrines of the Church entered far more intimately into the lives of the common folk than they do to-day. But side by side with faith there was a "spirit of rebellion and revolt against the moral and religious ideas of the time." It may be found in many strangely different shapes: in the life of Abelard; in the extraordinary spread of witchcraft; and--in its supreme literary expression, perhaps--in a famous passage of "Aucassin and Nicolette." And, to take a third illustration of the same difficulty, were the Middle Ages years of sheer lyric beauty, or rather years of inexpressible ugliness and filth? "If you love the very words 'Middle Age'; if they conjure up to your mind glowing old folios of black letter with gilt and florid initials; crimson and green and blue pages in which slim ladies with spiked head-dresses walk amid sparse flowers and trees like bouquets, or where men-at-arms attack walled cities no bigger than themselves, or long-legged youths with tight waists and frizzed hair kiss girls under apple-trees; or a king is on a dais with gold lilies for his background, minstrels on their knees before him, lovers in the gallery"--well, if you accept all this dainty circumstance, you get sheer lyric beauty, and nothing else. Only there is another side, a side not very pleasant to dwell upon, and it may

Aucassin & Nicolette

In the village proper (Pl. XIV) are two distinctly traceable kivas. One of these, situated in the court, is detached and appears to have been partly underground. The other, located in the southeast end of the village, has also, like the first, apparently been sunk slightly below the surface. There is a jog in the standing wall of this kiva which corresponds to that usually found in the typical Tusayan kivas (see Figs. 22 and 25). On the promontory and east of the village is a single room of more than average length, with a well formed door in the center of one side. This room has every appearance of being contemporary with the rest of the village, but its occurrence in this entirely isolated position is very unusual. Still farther east there is a mass of debris that may have belonged to a cluster of six or eight rooms, or it may possibly be the remains of temporary stone shelters for outlooks over crops, built at a later date than the pueblo. As may be seen from the illustration (Pl. XV), the walls are roughly built of large slabs of sandstone of various sizes. The work is rather better than that of modern Tusayan, but much inferior to that seen in the skillfully laid masonry of the ruins farther north. In many of these walls an occasional sandstone slab of great length is introduced. This peculiarity is probably due to the character of the local material, which is more varied than usual. All of the stone here used is taken from ledges in the immediate vicinity. It is usually light in color and of loose

Various
Eighth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution,

The night was dark, though sometimes a faint star A little while a little space made bright. The night was dark and still the dawn seemed far, When, o'er the muttering and invisible sea, Slowly, within the East, there grew a light Which half was starlight, and half seemed to be The herald of a greater.  The pale white Turned slowly to pale rose, and up the height Of heaven slowly climbed.  The gray sea grew Rose-colored like the sky.  A white gull flew Straight toward the utmost boundary of the East Where slowly the rose gathered and increased. There was light now, where all was black before: It was as on the opening of a door By one who in his hand a lamp doth hold (Its flame being hidden by the garment's fold), - The still air moves, the wide room is less dim. More bright the East became, the ocean turned Dark and more dark against the brightening sky - Sharper against the sky the long sea line. The hollows of the breakers on the shore Were green like leaves whereon no sun doth shine, Though sunlight make the outer branches hoar. From rose to red the level heaven burned; Then sudden, as if a sword fell from on high, A blade of gold flashed on the ocean's rim.

Burton Egbert Stevenson
The Home Book of Verse, Volume 3

Ned bit his tongue hard, and gazed to right and left at the swarthy courtiers of the monarch, six of whom were squatted down in the front row, some in little military caps, others in brilliant kerchiefs tied turban fashion about their heads, and all wearing brilliant silken sarongs.  These were the rajah's sword-bearers, and each held by the ornamental sheath a kris or parang of singular workmanship, with the hilt resting against the right shoulder.  The rest of the rajah's people were picturesquely arranged, and in their native dress looked to a man far better than their ruler, who was the incongruous spot in the group, which was impressive enough to an English lad, with its lurid fierce-looking faces and dark oily eyes peering from the mass of yellow and scarlet, while everywhere, though with the hilt covered by the folds of the sarong, could be made out the fact that each man carried at his waist a deadly-looking kris.

George Manville Fenn
The Rajah of Dah

"This so much desired reputation is nearly always crowned prostitution. Yes; the poorest kind of literature is the hapless creature freezing at the street corner; second-rate literature is the kept-mistress picked out of the brothels of journalism, and I am her bully; lastly, there is lucky literature, the flaunting, insolent courtesan who has a house of her own and pays taxes, who receives great lords, treating or ill-treating them as she pleases, who has liveried servants and a carriage, and can afford to keep greedy creditors waiting. Ah! and for yet others, for me not so very long ago, for you to-day--she is a white-robed angel with many-colored wings, bearing a green palm branch in the one hand, and in the other a flaming sword. An angel, something akin to the mythological abstraction which lives at the bottom of a well, and to the poor and honest girl who lives a life of exile in the outskirts of the great city, earning every penny with a noble fortitude and in the full light of virtue, returning to heaven inviolate of body and soul; unless, indeed, she comes to lie at the last, soiled, despoiled, polluted, and forgotten, on a pauper's bier. As for the men whose brains are encompassed with bronze, whose hearts are still warm under the snows of experience, they are found but seldom in the country that lies at our feet," he added, pointing to the great city seething in the late afternoon light.

Honore de Balzac
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris

"Yet another company there came to the mound in Slane of Meath," said macRoth. "Stately, in beautiful colours, gleaming-bright they came to the mound. Not fewer than an army-division, as a glance might judge them. A bold, fair-cheeked youth in the van of that troop; light-yellow hair has he; though a bag of red-shelled nuts were spilled on his crown, not a nut of them would fall to the ground because of the twisted, curly locks of his head. Bluish-grey as harebell is one of his eyes; as black as beetle's back is the other; the one brow black, the other white; a forked, light-yellow beard has he; a magnificent red-brown mantle about him; a round brooch adorned with gems of precious stones fastening it in his mantle over his right shoulder; a striped tunic of silk with a golden hem next to his skin; an ever-bright shield he bore; a hard-smiting, threatening spear he held over him; a very keen sword with hilt-piece of red gold on his thigh." "Who might that be, O Fergus?" asked Ailill. "I know, then," replied Fergus: "it is battle against foes; it is the inciting of strife; it is the rage of a monster; it is the madness of a lion; it is the cunning of a snake; it is the rock of the [W.5558.] Badb; it is the sea over dikes; it is the shaking of rocks; it is the stirring of a wild host, namely Conall Cernach ('the Victorious'), the high-glorious son of Amargin, that is come hither."[12]

Unknown
The Ancient Irish Epic Tale Tin B Calnge

The more I have searched for pictorial records of bow in old prints and drawings, the more disappointed I have become. It is extraordinary how artists of genius have literally "scamped" the poor unfortunate "fiddle-stick" in such works. In the small room of prints and drawings at the British Museum is a drawing of a violinist attributed to Corregio. It is merely a slight sketch, but the violin is beautifully drawn; the corners are well expressed and the perspective is good, but the bow would be unrecognisable as such were it not for the close proximity of the violin. Even in more highly-finished productions the same thing obtains. I have found drawings of crowders, violists and fiddlers where every little detail of dimple, crease and nail has been almost photographically rendered in a hand holding what one knows must be a bow, but if the other hand held a shield, or a newspaper, or a child's whip-top would be accepted with equal readiness by the judicious observer as a sword, paper knife or whip respectively.

Henry Saint-George
The Bow, Its History, Manufacture and Use

Hasjelti stands to the north end in the illustration, holding the emblem of the concentrated winds. The square is ornamented at the corners with eagle plumes, tied on with cotton cord; an eagle plume is attached to the head of Hasjelti with cotton cord. The upper horizontal lines on the face denote clouds; the perpendicular lines denote rain; the lower horizontal and perpendicular lines denote the first vegetation used by man. Hasjelti's chin is covered with corn pollen, the head is surrounded with red sunlight, the red cross lines on the blue denote larynx; he wears ear rings of turquoise, fringed leggings of white buckskin, and beaded moccasins tied on with cotton cord. The figure to the south end is Hostjoghon; he too has the eagle plume on the head, which is encircled with red sunshine. His earrings are of turquoise; he has fox-skin ribbons attached to the wrists; these are highly ornamented at the loose ends with beaded pendants attached by cotton strings; he carries wild turkey and eagle feather wands, brightened with red, blue, and yellow sunbeams. The center figure is one of the Hostjobokon, and upon this figure the invalid for whom the ceremonial is held sits. The four footprints are made of meal. These the invalid steps upon as he advances and takes his seat, with knees drawn up, upon the central figure. After dark the invalid walked over the line of meal, being careful to step upon the footprints in order that his mental and moral qualities might be strengthened. The invalid removed his clothing

Various
Eighth Annual Report

It is still dark. The dew lies thick on everything; myriads of frogs and night insects yet hold their croaking concert; and the fire-fly cucullo, with its phosphorescent lantern, darts about here and there, like falling stars and fireworks. A stony stream has now to be forded. Into it splash the gigs; our horses following willingly, for they are thirsty, poor beasts, and the cool spring water is inviting. The roads are, so far, favourable to our march; but we have arrived at a piece of ground where muddy puddles lie horse-leg deep. A bridle road invites, but the thoroughfare being intercepted by brushwood and overhanging branches, it is not easy to effect a passage. Our leader, Don Severiano, accordingly unsheathes the long machete, which he wears like a sword, and hacks him an avenue for self and followers. The thicket is even darker than the high-road we have deserted, and our leader curbs his horse with caution while he lights a taper of brown wax; for the ground is slippery, and abounds in deep holes and unexpected crevices. From my position in the rear, the effect produced by the rays of the solitary illumination is agreeable to the sight. The dark outlines of the riders who precede me, appear like black silhouettes against a background of green and brown, and nature by candle-light looks like stage scenery.

Walter Goodman
The Pearl of the Antilles, or An Artist in Cuba

His books occupy each of the four rooms which form the suite of his dwelling. Of course I include the bed room. They are admirably selected: chiefly historical, and including a very considerable number in the ecclesiastical department. He has all the historians relating to our own country. In short, it is with tools like these, and from original MSS. lent him from the Royal Library--which his official situation authorizes--- that he carries on the herculean labour of the _Recueil des Historiens des Gaules, &c._ commenced by BOUQUET and other editors, and of which he shewed me a great portion of the XVIIth volume--as well as the commencement of the XVIIIth--already printed. Providence may be graciously pleased to prolong the life of this learned and excellent old man till the _latter_ volume be completed; but _beyond_ that period, it is hardly reasonable or desirable to wish it; for if he die, he will then have been gathered to his fathers in a good old age.[156] But the labours of Dom Brial are not confined to the "Recueil," just mentioned. They shine conspicuous in the "_Histoire Litteraire de la France_," of which fifteen goodly quarto volumes are already printed; and they may be also traced in the famous work entitled _L'Art de, Verifier les Dates_, in three large folio volumes, published in 1783, &c. "Quand il est mort, il n'a point son eleve"[157]--says his old and intimate friend the ABBE BETENCOURT; an observation, which, when I heard it, filled me with mingled regret and surprise--for why is this

Thomas Frognall Dibdin
A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume Two

"Oh! all three," replied Mrs. Atmore. "We have been furnishing our new house, and I told Mr. Atmore that he need not get any pictures for the front parlour, as I would much prefer having them all painted by Marianne. She has been four quarters with Miss Julia,[72] and has worked Friendship and Innocence, which cost, altogether, upwards of a hundred dollars. Do you know the piece, Mr. Gummage? There is a tomb with a weeping willow, and two ladies with long hair, one dressed in pink, the other in blue, holding a wreath between them over the top of the urn. The ladies are Friendship. Then on the right hand of the piece is a cottage, and an oak, and a little girl dressed in yellow, sitting on a green bank, and putting a wreath round the neck of a lamb. Nothing can be more natural than the lamb's wool. It is done entirely in French knots. The child and the lamb are Innocence."

Eliza Leslie
Pencil Sketches

“Markandeya continued, ‘Skanda was adorned with a golden amulet and wreath, and wore a crest and a crown of gold; his eyes were golden-coloured, and he had a set of sharp teeth; he was dressed in a red garment and looked very handsome; he had a comely appearance, and was endowed with all good characteristics and was the favourite of the three worlds. He granted boons (to people who sought them) and was brave, youthful, and adorned with bright ear-rings. Whilst he was reposing himself, the goddess of fortune, looking like a lotus and assuming a personal embodiment, rendered her allegiance to him. When he became thus possessed of good fortune, that famous and delicate-looking creature appeared to all like the moon at its full. And high-minded Brahmanas worshipped that mighty being, and the Maharshis (great rishis) then said as follows to Skanda, ‘O thou born of the golden egg, mayst thou be prosperous and mayst thou become an instrument of good to the universe! O best of the gods, although thou wast born only six nights (days) ago, the whole world has owned allegiance to thee (within this short time), and thou hast also allayed their fears. Therefore do thou become the Indra (lord) of the three worlds and remove their cause of apprehension.’ Skanda replied, ‘You gentlemen of great ascetic wealth (tell me) what Indra does with all three worlds and how that sovereign of the celestials protects the hosts of gods unremittingly.’ The Rishis replied, ‘Indra is the giver of strength, power, children and happiness to all creatures and

The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 1

Beyond this corner of the cemetery as yet untenanted, at the end of lateral Avenue No. 3, a train was passing along the high embankment of the circular railway which overlooked the graveyard. The grassy slope rose up, and a number of geometrical lines, as it were, stood out blackly against the grey sky; there were telegraph-posts, connected by thin wires, a superintendent's box, and a red signal plate, the only bright throbbing speck visible. When the train rolled past, with its thunder-crash, one plainly distinguished, as on the transparency of a shadow play, the silhouettes of the carriages, even the heads of the passengers showing in the light gaps left by the windows. And the line became clear again, showing like a simple ink stroke across the horizon; while far away other whistles called and wailed unceasingly, shrill with anger, hoarse with suffering, or husky with distress. Then a guard's horn resounded lugubriously.

Emile Zola
His Masterpiece

Overhead is seen to swell the fine vault of the roof, with its rich tracery, and its central line, and orbs at the junction of its timbers, embossed with bold armorial shields of the houses of Tudor, Lancaster, and Castile, as united in John of Gaunt and Beaufort, with those of various episcopal sees, and stretching on to the splendid east window in that direction, emblazoned with "the several implements of our Savior's Passion--the cross, crown of thorns, nails, hammer, pillar, scourges, reed, sponge, lance, sword, with the ear of Malchus upon it, lantern, ladder, cock, and dice; also the faces of Pilate and his wife, of the Jewish high priest, with a great many others, too numerous to be described, but worthy of notice for the ingenuity of design," and the richness of their tints. They are, indeed, emblazoned in the most gorgeous colors--scarlet, blue and gold; and, to a fanciful eye, may resemble, many of them, huge sacred beetles of lordly shapes and hues.

According to M. E. Rogovsky, the high "albedo of Jupiter, the appearance of the clear (red) and dark spots on its surface and their continual variation, the different velocity of rotation of the equatorial and other zones of its surface, and particularly its small density (133, water as unity), all these facts afford irrefragable proofs of the high temperature of this planet. The dense and opaque atmosphere hides its glowing surface from our view, and we see therefore only the external surface of its clouds. The objective existence of this atmosphere is proved by the bands and lines of absorption in its spectrum. The interesting photograph obtained by Draper, September 27, 1879, in which the blue and green parts are more brilliant for the equatorial zone than for the adjacent parts of the surface, appears to show that _Jupiter_ emits its proper light. It is possible that the constant red spot noticed on its surface by several observers, as Gledhill, Lord Rosse, and Copeland (1873), Russel and Bredikhin (1876), is the summit of a high glowing mountain. G. W. Hough considers Jupiter to be gaseous, and A. Ritter inferred from his formul that in this case the temperature at the centre would be 600,000 C."[133]

J. Ellard Gore
Astronomical Curiosities

So King Arthur and his army came to Sandwich, where they found awaiting them a great multitude of galleys and vessels of all sorts, on which they embarked and set out to sea. That night, as the King lay asleep in his cabin, he dreamed a marvelous dream. A dreadful dragon appeared, flying out of the west. Its head was all enameled with azure enamel. Its wings and its claws glistened like gold. Its feet were black as jet. Its body was sheathed in scales that shone as armor shines after it has been polished, and it had a very great and remarkable tail. Then there came a cloud out of the east. The grimmest beast man ever saw rode upon this cloud; it was a wild boar, roaring and growling so hideously that it was terrifying to hear it. The dragon flew down the wind like a falcon and struck at this boar; but it defended itself with its grisly tusks, and wounded the dragon in the breast so severely that its blood, pouring into the sea in torrents, made all the waves red. Then the dragon turned and flew away, and having mounted up to a great height, again swooped down upon the boar and fastened its claws in the beast's back. The boar struggled, and raged, and writhed, but all in vain. It was at the mercy of its foe, and so merciless was the dragon that it never loosened its grip till it had torn the boar limb from limb and bone from bone, and scattered it piecemeal upon the surface of the sea.

Various
Young Folks Treasury, Volume 2 (of 12)

Simply and solemnly now proceeded the Christian service, Singing and prayer, and at last an ardent discourse from the old man. Many a moving word and warning, that out of the heart came Fell like the dew of the morning, like manna on those in the desert. Afterwards, when all was finished, the Teacher reentered the chancel, Followed therein by the young.  On the right hand the boys had their places Delicate figures, with close-curling hair and cheeks rosy-blooming. But on the left-hand of these, there stood the tremulous lilies, Tinged with the blushing light of the morning, the diffident maidens,-- Folding their hands in prayer, and their eyes cast down on the pavement. Now came, with question and answer, the catechism.  In the beginning Answered the children with troubled and faltering voice, but the old man's Glances of kindness encouraged them soon, and the doctrines eternal Flowed, like the waters of fountains, so clear from lips unpolluted. Whene'er the answer was closed, and as oft as they named the Redeemer, Lowly louted the boys, and lowly the maidens all courtesied. Friendly the Teacher stood, like an angel of light there among them, And to the children explained he the holy, the highest, in few words, Thorough, yet simple and clear, for sublimity always is simple, Both in sermon and song a child can seize on its meaning. Even as the green-growing bud is unfolded when Spring-tide approaches Leaf by leaf is developed, and, warmed by the radiant sunshine, Blushes with purple and gold, till at last the perfected blossom

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The Song of Hiawatha

By way of a finial, there was displayed on the ball at the center of the cupola a proud and spirited figure of Monarchy--armed gracefully but heavily with breastplate, shoulder-plate, greaves, cuisses, gorgets, and bracelets; and wearing skirts of bronze color edged with gold. Her head was encased in a morion surmounted by waving plumes and beautiful crests. Over her breast was a rich sash that hung loosely with airy grace and splendor. She was clad in a military cloak, flowing in beautiful lines, and ornamented here and there with embroidery in silver. In her right hand she gracefully held a general's baton subduing with it by the jaw a rampant lion of wonderful fierceness. With the left hand she clasped an escutcheon of the royal arms, bound about with many spirals of gold edging and beautiful ornaments. Massed about her feet were various military instruments, and at her side were the standards and devices of her glorious triumphs. All that variety composed a collection of beauties which was the crown of the entire work. Two finely carved pyramids arose gloriously at the two extremes of the socle, which they confronted. They were as high as the catafalque, and were painted in various colors, and spangled with bits of crystal, and on them were many rows of candle-sockets. There were, besides, other triumphal obelisks which were erected upon the cupola, and garlanded the upper structure, which accompanied Monarchy as glorious monuments. Many escutcheons of the royal arms and of the city were

"The friends looked, and saw a wonderfully beautiful creature approaching, with hesitating steps, looking backwards over her shoulder. She seemed to be looking for some one whom she was anxious to see, or perhaps had noticed in passing. Almost immediately a young fellow came gliding up to her through the crowd, and slipped a note into her hand, which she quickly concealed in her breast. Meanwhile, the old gentleman had taken possession of a table which some people had just left, and was telling the flying waiter (whom he had checked in his flight, and was holding tight by the flap of his jacket) at much length, and with great minuteness, what he was to go and bring. The lady was occupied in dusting the chairs, and consequently they did not observe the loitering of their daughter, who, without taking any notice of Severin (who still stood politely holding the chair to allow her to pass), made haste to rejoin her people. She sat down so that the friends were able to look straight into her wonderfully beautiful face, and dark, exquisitely 'appealing' eyes. There was something immensely attractive and irresistible in her whole being, and in all her movements. She was beautifully dressed in the latest fashions, a trifle too much dressed, perhaps, for the promenade, but still in perfect taste. The mother recognised a lady sitting a short distance off, and they rose and talked to each other; the old gentleman lighted his pipe. The young lady took advantage of this chance to take the letter from

Ernst Theodor Wilhelm Hoffmann
The Serapion Brethren,

"Slaves, slaves, just like slaves," she would think, watching the muffled-up figures continually bending over their work; "and they're digging graves, graves." And she would think of Annie, and the grave Will had been digging for her while he dug for gold. A red sun, dull as copper, hung above them, and sometimes the great Northern Lights would send up a red flame behind the horizon; and to Katrine it seemed like a blood-covered sword held up by Nature to warn them off a land not fit for men. One afternoon, when the sun looked more sullen and the sky more threatening than ever, and the men moving at the end of the claim looked no more than mere blots in the cold mist, she stood watching the steady red blade shoot up in the ashen sky, and began comparing its colour to other things. "It's as red," she said to herself softly, "as Hearts and Diamonds;" and then her thought wandered to the cards themselves, and she thought of the hot saloons at nights crowded with faces, and the tobacco smoke in the air, and the jabber of voices, and the laughter of the miners, and their oaths and jokes and stories, and their friendly ways to her, and the admiration on their rough and sometimes honest faces, and the long tables and the spat, spat of the falling cards as they were dealt, and the chink of the glasses and the hot spirits burning your throat, and then the feeling of jollity, and then the warmth and life and cheeriness of it all. Her eyes brightened and her chest heaved a little as she leaned against the lintel. If she

Victoria Cross
A Girl of the Klondike

Therewith grey-eyed Athene departed over the unharvested seas, and left pleasant Scheria, and came to Marathon and wide-wayed Athens, and entered the good house of Erechtheus. Meanwhile Odysseus went to the famous palace of Alcinous, and his heart was full of many thoughts as he stood there or ever he had reached the threshold of bronze. For there was a gleam as it were of sun or moon through the high-roofed hall of great-hearted Alcinous. Brazen were the walls which ran this way and that from the threshold to the inmost chamber, and round them was a frieze of blue, and golden were the doors that closed in the good house. Silver were the door-posts that were set on the brazen threshold, and silver the lintel thereupon, and the hook of the door was of gold. And on either side stood golden hounds and silver, which Hephaestus wrought by his cunning, to guard the palace of great-hearted Alcinous, being free from death and age all their days. And within were seats arrayed against the wall this way and that, from the threshold even to the inmost chamber, and thereon were spread light coverings finely woven, the handiwork of women. There the Phaeacian chieftains were wont to sit eating and drinking, for they had continual store. Yea, and there were youths fashioned in gold, standing on firm-set bases, with flaming torches in their hands, giving light through the night to the feasters in the palace. And he had fifty handmaids in the house, and some grind the yellow grain on the millstone, and others weave webs and turn the yarn as they

In the first of the Esthonian stories, the cock that crows is a spy over the old woman.[429] In the third Esthonian story, a woman gives her husband three eggs of a black hen to eat in order to obtain three dwarf heroes. In the twenty-second Esthonian story, the shepherds that watch over the son of the persecuted king, seeing the knowingness of the boy, recognise the truth of the proverb that "the egg is more cunning than the hen." In the ninth Esthonian story, a young man, after having made a compact with the devil, cheats him, giving him the blood of a cock instead of his own. In the fourth Esthonian story, when three strokes are given with a golden rod upon a rock, a large golden cock comes out and perches upon the top of it; it beats its wings and crows; at each crowing a marvel comes out of the stone, a tablecloth that spreads itself and a porringer that fills itself. In the twenty-fourth Esthonian story, an old fairy gives to the queen a little basket with a bird's egg inside; the queen must hatch it for three months, like a pearl, in her bosom; first a little living doll will be born, which, when warmed in a basket covered with wool, will become a real girl; at the same time that the doll becomes a real girl, the queen will give birth to a beautiful male child. Linda, the wife of Kalew, in Finnish mythology, is also born of the egg of a woodcock or a heathcock.

Angelo de Gubernatis
Zoological Mythology (Volume II)

scudi; a pair of woollen stockings, a pair of white linen hose, and a pair of light-blue hose, worth 5 scudi; a snuff-coloured worsted bodice with petticoat, ornamented with white and red pawns, worth 3 scudi; a blue and white coat of yarn and linen, adorned with scarlet and other coloured ornaments, worth 10 scudi; a worsted petticoat of light-blue and orange colour, striped lengthwise, with yellow lines and with various colours at the feet, worth 14 scudi; an embroidered petticoat worth 9 scudi; a silk cuff worth 5 scudi; four linen smocks for women worth 14 scudi; a pair of shoes with silver buckles worth 8 scudi; many tassels and tapes of various sorts worth 14 scudi; six fine napkins worth 7 scudi; a collar of crumpled silk worth 7 scudi; two pairs of gloves of a value of 4 scudi; four handkerchiefs worth 5 scudi; a little silver snuff-box with the arms of the Franceschini house upon it worth 16 scudi; a coat of her husband Guido, rubbed and rent by the lock of a chest where he kept part of the aforesaid clothing. And they had converted the whole to their own uses against the will of the same, the first Accused and Canon Caponsacchi having scaled the walls of the city in company with the second Accused, as soon as she had committed adultery with them. And the said third Accused had given opportunity for flight to the said second Accused along with the Canon, in the manner told.

Anonymous
The Old Yellow Book

That year the _Champs de Mars_ was occupied by one of the series of _Expositions Universelles_. Under the trees, in the heat and dust, crowds were swarming towards the entrance. Jean passed the turnstiles and entered the palace of glass and iron. He was still pursuing his passion, for he associated the being he loved with all manifestations of art and luxury. He made for the park and went straight to the Egyptian pavilion. Egypt had filled his dreams from the day when all his thoughts had been centred on one woman. In the avenue of sphinxes and before the painted temple he fell under the glamour that women of olden days and strange lands exercise on the senses,--on those of lovers with especial force. The sanctuary was venerable in his eyes, despite the vulgar use it was put to as part of the Exhibition. Looking at the jewels of Queen Aahotep, who lived and was lovely in the days of the Patriarchs, he pondered sadly over all that had been in the world and was no more. He pictured in fancy the black locks that had scented this diadem with the sphinx's head, the slim brown arms these, beads of gold and lapis lazuli had touched, the shoulders that had worn these vulture's wings, the peaked bosoms these chains and gorgets had confined, the breast that had once communicated its warmth to yonder gold scarabaeus with the blue wing-cases, the little royal hand that once held that poniard by the hilt wrought over with flowers and women's faces. He could not conceive how what was a dream to

Anatole France
The Aspirations of Jean Servien

It was above asserted that J. D. Harding is, after Turner, the greatest master of foliage in Europe; I ought, however, to state that my knowledge of the modern landscape of Germany is very limited, and that, even with respect to France and Italy, I judge rather from the general tendency of study and character of mind visible in the annual Exhibition of the Louvre, and in some galleries of modern paintings at Milan, Venice, and Florence, than from any detailed acquaintance with the works of their celebrated painters. Yet I think I can hardly be mistaken. I have seen nothing to induce me to take a closer survey; no life knowledge or emotion in any quarter; nothing but the meanest and most ignorant copyism of vulgar details, coupled with a style of conception resembling that of the various lithographic ideals on the first leaves of the music of pastoral ballads. An exception ought, however, to be made in favor of French etching; some studies in black and white may be seen in the narrow passages of the Louvre of very high merit, showing great skill and delicacy of execution, and most determined industry; (in fact, I think when the French artist fails, it is never through fear of labor;) nay, more than this, some of them exhibit acute perception of landscape character and great power of reaching simple impressions of gloom, wildness, sound, and motion. Some of their illustrated works also exhibit these powers in a high degree; there is a spirit, fire, and sense of reality about some of the

John Ruskin
Modern Painters Volume I (of V)

On the morning after, July twenty-fifth, the great day of the feast, anniversary of the Apostle's martyrdom, these same overgrown dolls played a prominent part in the solemn cathedral service. The Chapter passed in stately progress to the archbishop's palace to fetch his Eminence, and later to the ancient portals where the silver-workers once displayed their wares, to greet the Royal Delegate. At their head strutted this absurd array of giants. The High Mass was superb with orchestral music and the most sumptuous robes of the vestiary. The "King of Censers," the splendid _botafumeiro_ of fourteenth-century date, made so large, six feet high, with the view of purifying the cathedral air vitiated by the hordes of pilgrims who were wont to pass the night sleeping and praying on the holy pavements, flashed its majestic curves, a mighty fire bird, from roof to floor and from transept to transept. It is swung from the ceiling by an ingenious iron mechanism, and the leaping, roaring flames, as the huge censer sweeps with ever augmenting speed from vault to vault, tracing its path by a chain of perfumed wreaths, make the spectacle uniquely beautiful. Knights of Santiago, their white raiment marked by crimson sword and dagger, received from the Royal Delegate "a thousand crowns of gold," the annual state donation, instituted by Rameiro, to the patron saint. The Delegate, kneeling before the image of Santiago, prayed fervently that the Apostle would accept this offering of the regent, a queen no less devout than the famous mother of San Fernando,

Katharine Lee Bates
Spanish Highways and Byways

DESCRIPTION.--According to Mr. Hodgson "the pigmy hog is about the size of a large hare, and extremely resembles both in form and size a young pig of the ordinary wild kind of about a month old, except in its dark and unstriped pelage. The likeness of the limbs and members to those of the common hog is so close that every purpose of general description of the pigmy hog is served by pointing to that resemblance, desiring only that heed should be taken by the observer of the shorter jaws, and eye consequently placed midway between the snout and ear; of the much shorter tail, nude, straight, and not extending so far as the bristles of the rump, and lastly of the smallness of the inner hind toe. The ears also are quite nude, and the abdominal surface of the neck, as well as the insides of the limbs and the belly, are nearly so, but the upper and lateral external parts are covered thickly with bristles, even longer and more abundant than those of the wild or tame hog--save upon the ridge of the neck, where the common hog has more or less of, and generally a conspicuous mane, but the pigmy hog little or none"--"the colour of the animal is a black brown, shaded vaguely with dirty amber or rusty red."

Robert A. Sterndale
Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon

The parts of the canal lying between the locks are called "levels." On long levels we could often see one or two boats far ahead of us and going in the same direction. Nothing could be prettier than the thin blue streamer of wood-smoke trailing out from the stovepipe of the cabin-roof against the bright green of the foliage along the banks. It told us the cheery news that the fragrant coffee or tea was a-making in the cozy little cabin below. And now, when supper is done, the captain brings up his guitar and plays sweet plaintive airs as we glide through the quiet evening shadows. Night deepens: the stars come out one by one, and are reflected in the smooth dark water below in dreamy, dusky splendor. We brush the dew from the heavy foliage as we pass along. Lithe alders and heavy vines trail in the cool flood, and the fresh evening air is filled with grateful harvest-scents and the perfume of unseen flowers. And now our pretty painted lamp-board is fixed in its place in the bow. The bright lamp throws its rich golden splendor before us. The lamp is hid from us by the board which holds it. We stand behind in the dark, and watch the overhanging sprays of foliage making strange, grotesque shadows that move fantastically and sport and clutch and writhe like wanton fiends, while the solid banks of foliage themselves, reflected in the water below, look, one fancies, like hanging gardens in the weird world to which the water is but a window, and far, far down upon whose dusky floor the flowers are golden stars.

Various
Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, September 1880

The soire was horrible to Neale, a nightmare, a glittering wall through which he could by no means break to reach her, over which he could scarcely see at an immense distance her slim figure, dressed in yellow, a thin gold fillet binding her smooth dark head. She was talking, smiling, animated, at ease; and after she had played, much acclaimed. There was nothing surprising about _that_, thought Neale, applauding with all his might. Heavens, how beautifully she made music, how beautifully, how intelligently, with such a clear, sure certainty of her own powers! Of course everybody there admired her, paid court to her, made her the center of one group after another--always except the group where he stood! He felt heart-sick to be so cut off from her. As a matter of fact he was not in the least literally cut off from her. She kept relentlessly introducing him to one person after another whom he did not wish to meet. She kept coming up to him every time he had succeeded in shaking off a tiresome companion and was standing alone at last in a corner, looking everywhere over the curled, powdered, bobbing, restless, grinning crowd to catch a glimpse of her. There she would be at his elbow, gliding up from nowhere. He restrained an impulse to snatch at her and hold her there, because each time she melted away after she had said, "Won't you let me take you to Donna Antonia Pierleoni," or "to Miss Mills," or "to Signor Ambrogi," or to somebody or other with whom it was necessary to talk and on whom it was necessary

Dorothy Canfield
Rough-Hewn

Though not a painter, Mr. William Hyde works 'to colour' in his illustrations, and is generally successful in rendering both colour and atmosphere. He has done little with the pen, and it is in wash drawings, reproduced by photogravure, that he is best to be studied. Of his early training as an engraver there is little to be seen in his work, though his appreciation of the range of tone existing between black and white may have developed from working within restrictions of monotone, when the colour sense was growing strong in him. At all events he can gradate from black to white with remarkable minuteness and ease. His earliest work of any importance after giving up engraving, was in illustration of 'L'Allegro' and 'Il Penseroso,' 1895, and shows his talent already well controlled. There are thirteen illustrations, and the opportunities for rendering aspects of light, from the moment of the lark's morning flight against the dappled skies of dawn, to the passing of whispering night-winds over the darkened country, given in the verse of a poet sensitive as none before him to the gradations of lightness and dark, are realized. So are the hawthorns in the dale, and the towered cities. But it is as an illustrator of another towered city than that imagined by Milton, that some of Mr. Hyde's most individual work has been produced. In the etchings and pictures in photogravure published with Mrs. Meynell's 'London Impressions,' London beneath the strange great sky that smoke and weather make over the gray roofs, London when the dawn is low in

Rose Esther Dorothea Sketchley
English Book-Illustration of To-day

Adjoining the cathedral, on the south side, is all that is left of the original Benedictine monastery. The celebrated cloisters, of which we speak, are more Arab than Norman, and more infidel than Christian in their architecture. The two flat members of the Moorish arches are decorated with black _tufa_ lozenges and spearheads. The coupled columns are nowhere approached in beauty and delicacy, save in S. Paolo fuori at Rome. Arabesques cover some of them; all were at one time richly inlaid with mosaic. Some are chevroned, others of lozenge pattern, or billeted, or twisted and spiral. Their capitals are one and all of extreme interest. One shows on its carved surface Norman knights in chain mail engaged in combat with Saracens; another, Roman gladiators slaying Christian victims. Birds, beasts, and subjects from the Old Testament, intricate foliage and vines add to a variety which is not to be found anywhere else in the cloistered courts of Italy. The illustration gives a corner of this beautiful spot where a fountain splashes and plays, adding to the delights of a well-kept garden and the sweet scent of flowers.

William Wiehe Collins
Cathedral Cities of Italy

I have left my letter for a long while.  You will not wonder--for after some ten days' fever, my poor guest Mohammed Er-Rasheedee died to-day. Two Prussian doctors gave me help for the last four days, but left last night.  He sank to sleep quietly at noon with his hand in mine, a good old Muslim sat at his head on one side and I on the other.  Omar stood at his head and his black boy Khayr at his feet.  We had laid his face to the Kibleh and I spoke to him to see if he knew anything and when he nodded the three Muslims chanted the _Islamee La Illaha_, etc., etc., while I closed his eyes.  The 'respectable men' came in by degrees, took an inventory of his property which they delivered to me, and washed the body, and within an hour and a half we all went out to the burial place; I following among a troop of women who joined us to wail for 'the brother who had died far from his place.'  The scene as we turned in between the broken colossi and the pylons of the temple to go to the mosque was over-powering.  After the prayer in the mosque we went out to the graveyard, Muslims and Copts helping to carry the dead, and my Frankish hat in the midst of the veiled and wailing women; all so familiar and yet so strange.  After the burial the Imam, Sheykh Abd-el-Waris, came and kissed me on the shoulders and the Shereef, a man of eighty, laid his hands on my shoulders and said, 'Fear not my daughter, neither all the days of thy life nor at the hour of thy death, for God is with thee.'  I kissed the old man's hand and turned to go, but numberless men came and

Lucie Duff Gordon
Letters from Egypt

Though the opinion of Lichtenstein, with many others, was against this plan, fearing the army would be exposed to the fire of artillery from the surrounding heights, Ulerich would not be dissuaded from it, and ordered the army to march accordingly. Having arranged his order of battle close to the town of Tuerkheim, he there awaited his enemy. Albert von Sturmfeder was directed to remain near him with the cavalry, which had been entrusted to his command, to be ready to strike a decisive blow, and at the same time to form his body guard; whilst Lichtenstein, with four-and-twenty other knights, joined themselves to this mounted body of burghers, ready to support them in the event of an attack of cavalry. In those days a battle was often an affair of so many single-handed combats. The knights who followed an army seldom fought in solid masses; but with a quick eye, they marked out an adversary from among the ranks of the enemy, rode at him, and fought him with lance and sword. Such a band of gallant men, headed by old Lichtenstein, was that which now closed with Albert's troop. The Duke himself, burning with the desire of wielding his powerful arm, and proving the renown of his far-famed prowess in single combat, was only controlled in this romantic idea by the pressing exhortations of his friends. A most extraordinary figure was seen to keep his station by the side of the Duke, in appearance more like a tortoise on horseback, than a human being. A helmet, with a large feather, protruded high

Wilhelm Hauff
The Banished

While this action was fought upon the extreme right of the British position another as severe had occurred with much the same result upon the extreme left, where the 2nd Wiltshire Regiment was stationed. Some companies of this regiment were isolated upon a kopje and surrounded by the Boer riflemen when the pressure upon them was relieved by a desperate attack by about a hundred of the Victorian Rifles. The gallant Australians lost Major Eddy and six officers out of seven, with a large proportion of their men, but they proved once for all that amid all the scattered nations who came from the same home there is not one with a more fiery courage and a higher sense of martial duty than the men from the great island continent. It is the misfortune of the historian when dealing with these contingents that, as a rule, by their very nature they were employed in detached parties in fulfilling the duties which fall to the lot of scouts and light cavalry--duties which fill the casualty lists but not the pages of the chronicler. Be it said, however, once for all that throughout the whole African army there was nothing but the utmost admiration for the dash and spirit of the hard-riding, straight-shooting sons of Australia and New Zealand. In a host which held many brave men there were none braver than they.

Arthur Conan Doyle
The Great Boer War

Instantaneously half a hundred lights were aflare.  Red tongues of fire darted from the loop-holes.  Two lads were obeying our leader's call to run--run--run, blowing fife, beating drum like an army's band, while streams of boiling grease poured down from bastions and lookout. Helmets, hats, and caps sticking round on the poles were lighted up like the heads of a battalion; and oft as any of us showed himself he displayed fresh cap.  One Indian, I mind, got a stockade off and an arm inside the wall.  That arm was never withdrawn, for M. Radisson's broadsword came down, and the Indian reeled back with a yelping scream. Then the smoke cleared, and I saw what will stay with me as long as memory lasts--M. Radisson, target for arrows or shot, long hair flying and red doublet alight in the flare of the torches, was standing on top of the pickets with his right arm waving a sword.

Agnes C. Laut
Heralds of Empire

When the heroes had left the maiden on the island of Artemis, according to the covenant, both sides ran their ships to land separately. And Jason went to the ambush to lie in wait for Apsyrtus and then for his comrades. But he, beguiled by these dire promises, swiftly crossed the swell of the sea in his ship, and in dark night set foot on the sacred island; and faring all alone to meet her he made trial in speech of his sister, as a tender child tries a wintry torrent which not even strong men can pass through, to see if she would devise some guile against the strangers. And so they two agreed together on everything; and straightway Aeson's son leapt forth from the thick ambush, lifting his bare sword in his hand, and quickly the maiden turned her eyes aside and covered them with her veil that she might not see the blood of her brother when he was smitten. And Jason marked him and struck him down, as a butcher strikes down a mighty strong-horned bull, hard by the temple which the Brygi on the mainland opposite had once built for Artemis. In its vestibule he fell on his knees; and at last the hero breathing out his life caught up in both hands the dark blood as it welled from the wound; and he dyed with red his sister's silvery veil and robe as she shrank away. And with swift side-glance the irresistible pitiless Fury beheld the deadly deed they had done. And the hero, Aeson's son, cut off the extremities of the dead man, and thrice licked up some blood and thrice spat the pollution from his teeth, as it is

Timothy made his way along the street past many whitewashed cottages, all curiously striped with cross beams of black oak, and looking very sweet and cosy with their thatched roofs and their smoking chimneys. A turn in the road brought him within a few yards of the village well. About a dozen curly-headed boys and girls stood round it, and in their midst, sitting on the stone parapet that encircled the fountain, was Jacob Hartop. He was easily known by the fact that he still wore Gilbert Oglander's cloak, with its badge of the Oglanders on the shoulder. The old man's back was towards Timothy, and the lad went quietly up behind him until he came within sound of his voice. Jacob was holding forth to his juvenile audience on the precious virtues of pure water, a cup of which liquid he held in his right hand, resting on his knee.

Robert Leighton
The Golden Galleon

The storm had held off unconscionably long; the air within the lodge was stifling, and without the garden waited, breathless. Everything seemed pervaded by a poignant distress; the hush of feverish, intolerable expectation. The still earth, the heavy flowers, even the growing darkness, breathed the exhaustion of protracted waiting. Caroline felt that she ought to go; that it was wrong to stay; that the hour and the place were as treacherous as her own reflections. She rose and began to pace the floor, stepping softly, as though in fear of awakening someone, her figure, in its thin drapery, diaphanously vague and white. Still unable to shake off the obsession of the intense stillness, she sat down at the piano and began to run over the first act of the _Walkure_, the last of his roles they had practiced together; playing listlessly and absently at first, but with gradually increasing seriousness. Perhaps it was the still heat of the summer night, perhaps it was the heavy odors from the garden that came in through the open windows; but as she played there grew and grew the feeling that he was there, beside her, standing in his accustomed place. In the duet at the end of the first act she heard him clearly: _“Thou art the Spring for which I sighed in Winter's cold embraces.”_ Once as he sang it, he had put his arm about her, his one hand under her heart, while with the other he took her right from the keyboard, holding her as he always held _Sieglinde_ when he drew her toward the window. She had been wonderfully the mistress of

Willa Cather
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories

The mode of germination and development in the Mucors has been studied by several observers, but most recently by Van Tieghem and Le Monnier.[N] In one of the common forms, the _Mucor phycomyces_ of some authors, and the _Phycomyces nitens_ of others, the process is given in detail. In this species germination will not take place in ordinary water, but it readily takes place in orange juice and other media. The spore loses colour, swells, and absorbs fluid around it until double its original size and ovoid. Then a thick thread is emitted from one or both extremities, which elongates and becomes branched in a pinnate manner. Sometimes the exospore is ruptured and detached loosely from the germinating spore. After about forty-eight hours from the first sowing, the mycelium will send branches into the air, which again become abundantly branched; other short submerged branches will also remain simple, or have tuft-like ramifications, each terminating in a point, so as to bristle with spiny hairs. In two or three days abruptly swollen branches, of a club shape, will make their appearance on the threads both in the air and in the fluid. Sometimes these branches are prolonged into an equal number of sporangia-bearing threads, but most frequently they divide first at their swollen summits into numerous branches, of which usually one, sometimes two or three, develop into sporangia-bearing threads, while the rest are short, pointed, and form a tuft of rootlets. Sometimes these rootlets

Sometimes she herself would slip away across the notch to see Mrs. McChesney and the children. She never took me with her on these journeys, but nearly always when she came back at nightfall her eyes would be red, and I knew the two women had been weeping together. There came a certain hot Sunday in July when she went on this errand, and Grandpa Ripley having gone to spend the day at old man Winn’s, I was left alone. I remember I sat on the squared log of the door-step, wondering whether, if I were to make my way to Salisbury, I could fall in with a party going across the mountains into Kentucky. And wondering, likewise, what Polly Ann would do without me. I was cleaning the long rifle,--a labor I loved,--when suddenly I looked up, startled to see a man standing in front of me. How he got there I know not. I stared at him. He was a young man, very spare and very burned, with bright red hair and blue eyes that had a kind of laughter in them, and yet were sober. His buckskin hunting shirt was old and stained and frayed by the briers, and his leggins and moccasins were wet from fording the stream. He leaned his chin on the muzzle of his gun.

Winston Churchill
The Crossing

"It's the very last scream," Lise was saying. "And say, if I owned a ball dress like that I'd be somebody's Lulu all right! Can I have the pleasure of the next maxixe, Miss Bumpus?" With deft and rapid fingers she lead parted her hair far on the right side and pulled it down over the left eyebrow, twisted it over her ear and tightly around her head, inserting here and there a hairpin, seizing the hand mirror with the cracked back, and holding it up behind her. Finally, when the operation was finished to her satisfaction she exclaimed, evidently to the paragon in the picture, "I get you!" Whereupon, from the wardrobe, she produced a hat. "You sure had my number when you guessed the feathers on that other would get draggled," she observed in high good humour, generously ignoring their former unpleasantness on the subject. When she had pinned it on she bent mockingly over her sister, who sat on the bed. "How d'you like my new toque? Peekaboo! That's the way the guys rubberneck to see if you're good lookin'."

Winston Churchill
The Dwelling Place of Light, Volume 2

LXIII. After this, Alexander wishing to see the outer ocean,[423] caused many rafts and vessels managed with oars to be built, and proceeded in a leisurely manner down the Indus. His voyage, however, was not an idle one, nor was it unaccompanied with danger, for as he passed down the river, he disembarked, attacked the tribes on the banks, and subdued them all. When he was among the Malli, who are said to be the most warlike tribe in India, he very nearly lost his life. He was besieging their chief city, and after the garrison had been driven from the walls by volleys of missiles, he was the first man to ascend a scaling ladder and mount the walls. The ladder now broke, so that no more could mount, and as the enemy began to assemble inside at the foot of the wall and shoot up at him from below, Alexander, alone against a host, leaped down amongst them, and by good luck, alighted on his feet. His armour rattled loudly as he leaped, and made the natives think that a bright light was emitted from his body; so that at first they gave way and fled from him. But when they saw that he was attended by only two followers, some of them attacked him at close quarters with swords and spears, while one standing a little way off shot an arrow at him with such force and with such good aim, that it passed through his corslet and imbedded itself in the bones of his breast. As he shrank back when the arrow struck him, the man who had shot it ran up to him with a drawn sword in his hand. Peukestas and

But that which most attracts the eye is, opposite the Lion d'Or inn, the chemist's shop of Monsieur Homais. In the evening especially its argand lamp is lighted, and the red and green jars that embellish his shop-front throw far across the street their two streams of color; then across them, as if in Bengal lights, is seen the shadow of the chemist leaning over his desk. His house from top to bottom is placarded with inscriptions written in large hand, round hand, printed hand: "Vichy, Seltzer, Barge waters, blood purifiers, Raspail patent medicine, Arabian racahout, Darcet lozenges, Regnault paste, trusses, baths, hygienic chocolate," &c. And the signboard, which takes up all the breadth of the shop, bears in gold letters, "Homais, Chemist." Then at the back of the shop, behind the great scales fixed to the counter, the word "Laboratory" appears on a scroll above a glass door, which about half-way up once more repeats "Homais" in gold letters on a black ground.

Gustave Flaubert
Madame Bovary

Meanwhile Nana had cherished her latest caprice. Once more exercised by the notion that her room needed redoing, she fancied she had hit on something at last. The room should be done in velvet of the color of tea roses, with silver buttons and golden cords, tassels and fringes, and the hangings should be caught up to the ceiling after the manner of a tent. This arrangement ought to be both rich and tender, she thought, and would form a splendid background to her blonde vermeil-tinted skin. However, the bedroom was only designed to serve as a setting to the bed, which was to be a dazzling affair, a prodigy. Nana meditated a bed such as had never before existed; it was to be a throne, an altar, whither Paris was to come in order to adore her sovereign nudity. It was to be all in gold and silver beaten work--it should suggest a great piece of jewelry with its golden roses climbing on a trelliswork of silver. On the headboard a band of Loves should peep forth laughing from amid the flowers, as though they were watching the voluptuous dalliance within the shadow of the bed curtains. Nana had applied to Labordette who had brought two goldsmiths to see her. They were already busy with the designs. The bed would cost fifty thousand francs, and Muffat was to give it her as a New Year's present.

Emile Zola
Nana, The Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille

Let us examine a little further this "babble of green fields" and of bare nature in general as superior to artificial imagery, for the poetical purposes of the fine arts. In landscape painting, the great artist does not give you a literal copy of a country, but he invents and composes one. Nature, in her actual aspect, does not furnish him with such existing scenes as he requires. Even where he presents you with some famous city, or celebrated scene from mountain or other nature, it must be taken from some particular point of view, and with such light, and shade, and distance, &c. as serve not only to heighten its beauties, but to shadow its deformities. The poetry of nature alone, _exactly_ as she appears, is not sufficient to bear him out. The very sky of his painting is not the _portrait_ of the sky of nature; it is a composition of different _skies_, observed at different times, and not the whole copied from any _particular_ day. And why? Because nature is not lavish of her beauties; they are widely scattered, and occasionally displayed, to be selected with care, and gathered with difficulty.

Thomas Moore
Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 6 (of 6)

Of embroidery there was such profusion that it is indeed no exaggeration to say that the needle vied with the sword. There were not only wall and bed hangings, embroidered with flowers to brighten winter days, cloaks, gowns, and tunics patterned with gold thread and coloured silks, and beaver hats wrought with gold lace and pearls and sometimes precious stones, but also girdles, satchels, purses, and pennons resplendent with heraldic device, and caparison and harness for the horses. From the East were brought velvets, silks, and stuffs interwoven with gold and silver thread, and used not only for personal adornment, but also for vestments, Church-hangings, and the coverings of litters. As regards tapestry as we understand it--_i.e._ woven in a _high_ warp loom--there is apparently no definite mention of its being made at Arras before 1313, so that the numerous allusions to tapestry must refer to stuffs woven in the _low_ warp loom. These stuffs would seem to have been of two kinds, the one woven with some simple pattern, the other with heraldic designs of animals or other conventional forms copied from Oriental models. Hence the term "Saracenic" applied to both the workers and their handiwork.

Alice Kemp-Welch
Of Six Medival Women

Meanwhile Nana had cherished her latest caprice.  Once more exercised by the notion that her room needed redoing, she fancied she had hit on something at last.  The room should be done in velvet of the color of tea roses, with silver buttons and golden cords, tassels and fringes, and the hangings should be caught up to the ceiling after the manner of a tent.  This arrangement ought to be both rich and tender, she thought, and would form a splendid background to her blonde vermeil-tinted skin.  However, the bedroom was only designed to serve as a setting to the bed, which was to be a dazzling affair, a prodigy.  Nana meditated a bed such as had never before existed; it was to be a throne, an altar, whither Paris was to come in order to adore her sovereign nudity.  It was to be all in gold and silver beaten work--it should suggest a great piece of jewelry with its golden roses climbing on a trelliswork of silver.  On the headboard a band of Loves should peep forth laughing from amid the flowers, as though they were watching the voluptuous dalliance within the shadow of the bed curtains.  Nana had applied to Labordette who had brought two goldsmiths to see her.  They were already busy with the designs.  The bed would cost fifty thousand francs, and Muffat was to give it her as a New Year's present.

We walked far down the dusty road beyond the city walls, and then struck out from the highway across the wild meadows of the Campagna. They were weedy and desolate, seamed by shaggy grass-grown ditches, and deeply pitted with holes made in search for catacombs. There was here and there a farm-house amid the wide lonesomeness, but oftener a round, hollow, roofless tomb, from which the dust and memory of the dead had long been blown away, and through the top of which--fringed and overhung with grasses, and opening like a great eye--the evening sky looked marvelously sad. One of the fields was full of grim, wide-horned cattle, and in another there were four or five buffaloes lying down and chewing their cuds,--holding their heads horizontally in the air, and with an air of gloomy wickedness which nothing could exceed in their cruel black eyes, glancing about in visible pursuit of some object to toss and gore. There were also many canebrakes, in which the wind made a mournful rustling after the sun had set in golden glitter on the roofs of the Roman churches and the transparent night had fallen upon the scene.

Battles and wounds, death and destruction, and all the other concomitants of warfare, may be interesting matters to read about, but the reality is very far from pleasant or desirable.  Even Jack Rogers and Paddy Adair could not help coming to this conclusion during the night they spent off Lagos, surrounded by their wounded, and dead, and dying companions.  They were also not a little anxious about Murray, of whom they could obtain no information.  The stars kept shining forth from the dark sky, the surface of the river was smooth as glass, on either side around them was the squadron of steamers and boats, while in the distance could be observed the lights of the black city, from which every now and then a flash might be seen as a negro took it into his head to fire off his musket, or perhaps, while handling it, let it explode unintentionally.  At length daylight returned.  Directly everybody was on the alert, but as yet no signal was made to recommence the attack.  Whatever heroes of romance might have done, modern warriors require rest and refreshment, so the men set to work to cook and eat their breakfasts.  While this was going on, a boat was seen approaching the squadron.  She was the gig Murray commanded.  He himself was on board.  His shipmates warmly welcomed him.

W.H.G. Kingston
The Three Midshipmen

The road from Thebes to Lebadea (Livadia) leads along the foot of Helicon all the way--Helicon, which, like all celebrated Greek mountains, is not a summit, but a system of summits, or even a chain. Looking in the morning from the plain, the contrast of the dark Cithaeron and the gentle sunny Helicon strikes the traveller again and again. After the ridge, or saddle, is passed which separates the plain of Thebes from that of Orchomenus, the richness of the soil increases, but the land becomes very swampy and low, for at every half-mile comes a clear silver river, tumbling from the slopes of Helicon on our left, crossing the road, and flowing to swell the waters of Lake Copais--a vast sheet with undefined edges, half-marsh, half-lake--which for centuries had no outlet to the sea, and which was only kept from covering all the plain by evaporation in the heats of summer. Great fields of sedge and rushes, giant reeds, and marsh plants unknown in colder countries, mark each river course as it nears the lake; and, as might be expected in this lonely fen country, all manner of insect life and all manner of amphibia haunt the sites of ancient culture. Innumerable dragon-flies, of the most brilliant colors, were flitting about the reeds, and lighting on the rich blades of grass which lay on the water's surface; and now and then a daring frog would charge boldly at so great a prize, but retire again in fear when the fierce insect dashed against him in its impetuous start. Large land tortoises, with their high-arched shells,

J. P. Mahaffy
Rambles and Studies in Greece

When the Emperor Napoleon assumed the sovereignty of Elba he had a special flag made. It will be recollected that he was allowed to retain the title of emperor, and although the island which comprised his dominions was only sixty miles in circumference, the inhabitants barely 12,000, his household 35 persons, and his entire army only 700 infantry and 60 cavalry, he considered it necessary to have a "national flag." According to Sir Walter Scott, it bore on a white field a bend charged with three bees. But the emperor was preparing another and very different flag for his small army, of which I am able to give a representation from a very rare coloured engraving.[46] It was the tricolour of France, composed of the richest silk with the ornaments elaborately embroidered in silver. It bore the imperial crown with the letter N, and the eagle, on each of the blue and red portions, with the imperial bees; and over all the inscription, "L'Empereur Napoleon a la Garde Nationale de L'lle d'Elbe." To the staff, the top of which was surmounted by a golden eagle, was suspended a tricoloured sash also richly embroidered in silver. This splendid standard was presented by Napoleon to his guards in Elba shortly before his invasion of France in 1815. On the reverse side there was subsequently embroidered the inscription, "Champ de Mai"--the flag having been a second time presented by the emperor to his guards at that celebrated meeting, a short time before they marched for Waterloo. The standard was captured

Andrew Macgeorge
Flags:

In the middle of the sixteenth century, when the spirit of the Renaissance was everywhere, and people had begun to look back with distaste on the works of the middle age, the old Gothic manner had still one chance more, in borrowing something from the rival which was about to supplant it. In this way there was produced, chiefly in France, a new and peculiar phase of taste with qualities and a charm of its own, blending the somewhat attenuated grace of Italian ornament with the general outlines of Northern design. It produced the Chateau de Gaillon, as you may still see it in the delicate engravings of Israel Silvestre--a Gothic donjon veiled faintly by a surface of dainty Italian traceries--Chenonceaux, Blois, Chambord, and the church of Brou. In painting, there came from Italy workmen like Maitre Roux and the masters of the school of Fontainebleau, to have their later Italian voluptuousness attempered by the naive and silvery qualities of the native style; and it was characteristic of these painters that they were most successful in painting on glass, an art so essentially medieval. Taking it up where the middle age had left it, they found their whole work among the last subtleties of colour and line; and keeping within the true limits of their material, they got quite a new order of effects from it, and felt their way to refinements on colour never dreamed of by those older workmen, the glass-painters of Chartres or Le Mans. What is called the Renaissance in France is thus not so much the introduction of

Walter Pater
The Renaissance

It was an easy climb, and could have been made without the rope, probably, though the rope was a great help in making speed. After a long grade up a shale slide, and across a snow-field, they reached the base of a rough, jagged cliff, and by picking out upward slanting ledges on this cliff, Tom led the way rapidly upward, Mills keeping the rear of the rope anchored, while Tom anchored the upper end, thus making a rope railing on the outer edge of each ledge. In less than an hour they reached the spine of the Divide, at a col between two higher peaks. This spine was a knife blade, not over ten feet wide, and directly on the east side, with its upper edge so close you could step off on to it, lay Chaney Glacier, a vast field of snow now, with little ice showing, a mile in extent, and sloping downward till the lower end disappeared over the rim of a precipice. Out beyond this precipice, they saw the Belly River Caon, looking straight down it, over the green waters of Glenns Lakes, to the spot where they had camped, and beyond that to the green ocean of the prairies. From here, too, they got a superb view of Cleveland, rearing up, still snow covered, a great pyramid of white.

Walter Prichard Eaton
Boy Scouts in Glacier Park