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Little Women
Louisa May Alcott 试读
The four March sisters--Meg, Amy, Beth, and feisty Jo--sharethe joys and sorrows of growing up while their father is away at war. Thefamily is poor in worldly goods, but rich in love and character.
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ANNA KARENINA安娜卡列尼娜
列夫·托尔斯泰 试读
Tolstoy's tumultuous tale of passion and self-discovery marks a turning point in the author's career. His compelling, emotional saga recounts the effects of nonconformist behavior — a society woman's adulterous affair and a landowner's unconventional quest for a meaningful existence — against a backdrop of late 19th-century Russia.
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VANITY FAIR
William Makepeace Thackeray 试读
The incomparable Miriam Margolyes applies her story-telling and histrionic gifts to this classic satire of two young English women,one bad but clever and the other good but stupid,who come to no good during the Napoleonic Wars.The abridgers have cut a bit too much at the expense of the characterizations.Although sounding somewhat forced,Margolyes,as always,gives an excellent performance.Y.R.© AudioFile 2001,Portland,Maine—Copyright © AudioFile,Portland,Maine —This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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WOMEN IN LOVE
David Herbert Lawrence 试读
D.H. Lawrence's magnificent exploration of human sexuality in the days surrounding World War I. "Let us hesitate no longer to announce that the sensual passions and mysteries are equally sacred with the spiritual mysteries and passions," wrote D.H. Lawrence in "Women In Love, a masterpiece that heralded the erotic consciousness of the twentieth century. Echoing elements of Lawrence's own life, "Women In Love delves into the mysteries between men and women as two couples strive for love against a haunting backdrop of coal mines, factories, and a beleaguered working class.
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Intentions
Deborah Heiligman 试读
Rachel thought she was grown up enough to accept that no one is perfect. Her parents argue, her grandmother has been acting strangely, and her best friend doesn't want to talk to her. But none of that could have prepared her for what she overheard in her synagogue's sanctuary.Now Rachel's trust in the people she loves is shattered, and her newfound cynicism leads to reckless rebellion. Her friends and family hardly recognize her, and worse, she can hardly recognize herself. But how can the adults in her life lecture her about acting with kavanah, intention, when they are constantly making such horribly wrong decisions themselves? This is a witty, honest account of navigating the daunting line between losing innocence and entering adulthoodandmdash;all while figuring out who you really want to be.
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Across China on Foot
Edwin John Dingle 试读
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
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Bartleby the Scrivener A Story of Wall-Street
Herman Melville 试读
Bartleby is a kind of clerk, a copyist,who obstinately refuses to go on doing the sort of writing demanded of him; During the spring of 1851, Melville felt similarly about his work on Moby Dick. Thus, Bartleby can be seen to represent Melville's frustration with his own situation as a writer, and the story itself is about a writer who forsakes conventional modes because of an irresistible preoccupation with the most baffling philosophical questions Bartleby can also be seen to represent Melville's relation to his commercial, democratic society.
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Black Beauty
Anna Sewell 试读
One of the best loved animal stories ever written, the dramatic and heartwarming Black Beauty is told by the magnificent horse himself, from his idyllic days on a country squire's estate to his harsh fate as a London cab horse. No one can ever forget the gallant Black Beauty, a horse with a white star on his forehead and a heart of unyielding courage.
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East of the Sun and West of the Moon
Peter Christen Asbjornsen 试读
These Scandinavian fairy tales have had many interpretations through the years, but never have they been so beautifully illustrated as in this sumptuous edition. Golden Age artist Kay Nielsen, a master of fantasy, lavished the text with 25 intricately detailed color and numerous black-and-white images that glow with his phantasmagorical style. With 15 stories that include the popular "Billy Goat's Gruff," this is one of the most stunning children's books ever produced.
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Emma
简·奥斯汀 试读
As daughter of the richest, most important man in the small provincial village of Highbury, Emma Woodhouse is firmly convinced that it is her right--perhaps even her "duty"--to arrange the lives of others. Considered by most critics to be Austen's most technically brilliant achievement, "Emma" sparkles with ironic insights into self-deception, self-discovery, and the interplay of love and power.
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Evelina Or the History of a Young Ladys Entrance into the World
Frances Burney 试读
Leaving the secluded home of her guardian for the first time, beautiful Evelina Anville is captivated by her new surroundings in London's beau monde--and in particular by the handsome, chivalrous Lord Orville. But her enjoyment soon turns to mortification at the hands of her vulgar and capricious grandmother, and the rakish Sir Clement Willoughby, who torments the naive young woman with his unwanted advances. And while her aristocratic father refuses to acknowledge her legitimacy, Evelina can hold no hope of happiness with the man she loves. Published anonymously in 1778, Frances Burney's epistolary novel brought her instant fame when the secret of its authorship was revealed. With its ingenious combination of romance and satire, comedy and melodrama, Evelina is a sparkling depiction of the dangers and delights of fashionable society.
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Gitanjali
泰戈尔 试读
Moving, heart-felt prose poems by the beloved and much admired Bengali poet and mystic who first achieved international fame (and a Nobel Prize) in 1913 with his translation of these moving poems. Reminiscent of Blake and Gibran, they include many works that are almost biblical in their rhythms, phrasing and images. Introduction by William Butler Yeats.
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In Freedoms Cause – a Story of Wallace and Bruce
G.A.Henty 试读
This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original.Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks,notations,marginalia and flawed pages.Because we believe this work is culturally important,we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting,preserving,and promoting the world's literature in affordable,high quality,modern editions that are true to the original work.
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Walden
Henry David Thoreau 试读
By virtue of its casual, off-handedly brilliant wisdom and the easy splendor of its nature writing, Thoreau's account of his adventure in self-reliance on the shores of a pond in Massachusetts is one of the signposts by which the modern mind has located itself in an increasingly bewildering world. Deeply sane, invigorating in its awareness of humanity's place in the moral and natural order, Walden represents the progressive spirit of nineteenth-century America at its eloquent best. (Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)
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Sons and Lovers
David Herbert Lawrence 试读
Lawrence's first major novel was also the first in the English language to explore ordinary working-class life from the inside. Using the first edition text, which Lawrence approved, this edition also offers a fresh and stimulating introduction - particularly in its treatment of Lawrence's language and imagery.
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The Adventures of Unc Billy Possum
Thornton Waldo Burgess 试读
When Unc' Billy Possum learns how easy it is to get into trouble, it takes some doin' to get himself out of his predicament. Master storyteller Thornton Burgess beguiles young readers and nature lovers with another tale about the delightful creatures of the Green Forest and the Green Meadows.
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The Blue Fairy Book
Andrew Lang 试读
Once upon a time there lived a king who was deeply in love with a princess, but she could not marry anyone, because she was under an enchantment. So the King set out to seek a fairy, and asked what he could do to win the Princess's love .The Blue Fairy Book is the first in a series of fairy-tale anthologies beloved of children in the last century. Each fairy book is a veritable treasure trove of stories for children and adults alike, spellbinding and special. Hesperus is very proud to present the first anthology, The Blue Fairy Book, which includes wonderful renditions of the old favourites such as Cinderella and Hansel and Gretel, as well as some intriguing fairy tales that modern audiences have yet to discover such as Why the Sea is Salt, Prince Hyacinth and The Dear Little Princess.
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The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe(1808)
Daniel Defoe 试读
Daniel Defoe (1659 1661-1731) was an English writer, journalist and spy, who gained enduring fame for his novel Robinson Crusoe (1719). Defoe is notable for being one of the earliest practitioners of the novel and helped popularise the genre in Britain. In some texts he is even referred to as one of the founders, if not the founder, of the English novel. A prolific and versatile writer, he wrote over five hundred books, pamphlets, and journals on various topics (including politics, crime, religion, marriage, psychology and the supernatural). He is also a pioneer of economic journalism. His most famous novel, Robinson Crusoe (1719), tells of a man's shipwreck on a desert island and his subsequent adventures. He also wrote Captain Singleton (1720), which portrays the redemptive power of one man's love for another and Moll Flanders (1722), a picaresque first-person narration of the fall and eventual redemption of a lone woman in 17th century England.
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The Mayor of Casterbridge
Thomas Hardy 试读
From its spectacular opening–the astonishing scene in whichdrunken Michael Henchard sells his wife and daughter to a passingsailor at a county fair–to the breathtaking series of discoveriesat its conclusion, The Mayor of Casterbridge claims a unique placeamong Thomas Hardy’s finest and most powerful novels. Rooted in an actual case of wife-selling in earlynineteenth-century England, the story build into an awesomeSophoclean drama of guilt and revenge, in which the strong, willfulHenchard rises to a position of wealth and power–only to suffer amost bitter downfall. Proud, obsessed, ultimately committed to hisown destruction, Henchard is, as Albert Guerard has said, “Hardy’sLord Jim…his only tragic hero and one of the greatest tragic heroesin all fiction.
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The Mill on the Floss
George Eliot 试读
If life had no love in it, what else was there for Maggie?Tragic and moving, The Mill on the Floss is a novel of grand passions and tormented lives. As the rebellious Maggie's fiery spirit and imaginative nature bring her into bitter conflict with her narrow provincial family, most painfully with her beloved brother Tom, their fates are played out on an epic scale. George Eliot drew on her own frustrated rural upbringing to create one of the great novels of childhood, and one of literature's most unforgettable heroines.
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The Mystery
Samuel Hopkins Adams 试读
The late afternoon sky flaunted its splendour of blue and gold like a banner over the Pacific, across whose depths the trade wind droned in measured cadence. On the ocean's wide expanse a hulk wallowed sluggishly, the forgotten relict of a once brave and sightly ship, possibly the Sphinx of some untold ocean tragedy, she lay black and forbidding in the ordered procession of waves. Half a mile to the east of the derelict hovered a ship's cutter, the turn of her crew's heads speaking expectancy. As far again beyond, the United States cruiser Wolverine outlined her severe and trim silhouette against the horizon. In all the spread of wave and sky no other thing was visible. For this was one of the desert parts of the Pacific, three hundred miles north of the steamship route from Yokohama to Honolulu, five hundred miles from the nearest land, Gardner Island, and more than seven hundred northwest of the Hawaiian group.
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The Princess of Cleves
Madame de La Fayette 试读
The text of this Norton Critical Edition is that of Thomas Sargent Perry's 1892 translation, indisputably the translation that has best served readers in English. Reprinted repeatedly over the last one hundred years, the Perry translation is a classic in its own right. After careful review, the editor has corrected minor infelicities of translation (necessary to remain true to Lafayette's text) and updated vocabulary. To experience the innovation of Lafayette's writing, it is necessary to understand the critical resistance it met with in seventeenth-century France. "Contemporary Reactions" includes five assessments of The Princess of Cleves by Marie-Madeleine de Lafayette herself, Roger de Bussy-Rabutin and Marie de Sevigne, Jean-Baptiste-Henry du Trousset de Valincour, Jean-Antoine de Charnes, and Du Plaisir following its controversial publication. John Lyons's translations for this Norton Critical Edition make these reactions available in English for the first time. "Criticism" includes eleven modern studies of the novel, five of which appear here in English for the first time, by Jean Fabre, Michel Butor, Jean Rousset, Helen Karen Kaps, Gerard Genette, Roger Francillon, Kurt Weinberg, Peggy Kamuf, Erica Harth, Joan DeJean, and Laurence Gregario. A Glossary of Characters and a Selected Bibliography are also included.
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The Scarlet Letter
Nathaniel Hawthorne 试读
Hailed by Henry James as "the finest piece of imaginative writing yet put forth in the country," Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter reaches to our nation's historical and moral roots for the material of great tragedy. Set in an early New England colony, the novel shows the terrible impact a single, passionate act has on the lives of three members of the community: the defiant Hester Prynne; the fiery, tortured Reverend Dimmesdale; and the obsessed, vengeful Chillingworth.With The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne became the first American novelist to forge from our Puritan heritage a universal classic, a masterful exploration of humanity's unending struggle with sin, guilt and pride.
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The Secret Garden
Frances Hodgson Burnett 试读
The story of an unhappy little girl, her invalid cousin, andthe healing power of friendship and love.
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The Yellow Wallpaper
Charlotte Perkins Gilman 试读
The story is written in the first person as a series of journal entries, the narrator a woman whose physician husband has confined her to the upstairs bedroom of a house he has rented for the summer. She is forbidden from working, and has to hide her journal entries from him, so she can recuperate from what he calls a "temporary nervous depression—a slight hysterical tendency," a diagnosis common to women in that period. The windows of the room are barred, and there is a gate across the top of the stairs, allowing her husband to control her access to the rest of the house.
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Through the Looking-Glass
Lewis Carroll 试读
"I wish I could get through into looking-glass house,"Alice said. "Let's pretend that the glass has gone soft and . . . Why, I do believe it has! It's turning into a kind of cloud!" A moment later Alice is inside the looking-glass world. There she finds herself part of a great game of chess, travelling through forests and jumping across brooks. The chess pieces talk and argue with her, give orders and repeat poems . . . It is the strangest dream that anyone ever had......
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Venus and Adonis
William Shakespeare 试读
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) was an English poet and playwright, now widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon" (or simply "The Bard"). His surviving works consist of 38 plays, 154 sonnets, two long narrative poems, and several other poems. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. Between 1585 and 1592 he began a successful career in London as an actor, writer, and part owner of the playing company the Lord Chamberlain's Men, later known as the King's Men. He produced most of his known work between 1590 and 1613. His early plays were mainly comedies and histories, genres he raised to the peak of sophistication and artistry by the end of the sixteenth century. Next he wrote mainly tragedies until about 1608, producing plays, such as Hamlet, King Lear, and Macbeth, considered some of the finest in the English language. In his last phase, he wrote tragicomedies and collaborated with other playwrights.
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Doc. Gordon
Mary Eleanor Wilkins Freeman 试读
Originally published in 1936, here is a charming novel of a rural doctor's life, trials, and tribulations. Barter, conniving horse traders, and more face "Doc." Gordon on his rural rounds MARY E. WILKINS FREEMAN (1852-1930) was born in Randolph, Massachusetts and died in Metuchen, New Jersey. Among her published regional short fiction and novels are A Humble Romance and Other Stories, A New England Nun and Other Stories, Jane Field, and The Portion of Labor. In 1926 she received the William Dean Howells Medal of the American Academy of Arts and Letters for distinction in fiction. That same year, she and Edith Wharton were among the first women to be elected to membership in the National Institute of Arts and Letters.
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Fairy Tales from the Arabian Nights
E.Dixon 试读
There once was a king of Persia who at the beginning of his reign had distinguished himself by many glorious and successful conquests and had afterwards enjoyed such profound peace and tranquillity as rendered him the happiest of monarchs.
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Persuasion
简·奥斯汀 试读
This volume, first published in 2006, is a comprehensive scholarly edition of Jane Austen's innovative final novel.
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Poems and Songs of Robert Burns
Robert Burns 试读
Robert Burns (1759-1796) (also known as Rabbie Burns, Scotland's favourite son, the Ploughman Poet, the Bard of Ayrshire and in Scotland as simply The Bard), was a poet and a lyricist. He is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide. He is the bestknown of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a 'light' Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland. He is regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic Movement and after his death became an important source of inspiration to the founders of both liberalism and socialism. Burns also worked to collect and preserve Scottish folk songs, sometimes revising, expanding, and adapting them. His poem (and song) Auld Lang Syne is often sung at Hogmanay (New Year), and Scots Wha Hae served for a long time as an unofficial national anthem of the country. Other poems and songs of Burns that remain well-known across the world today, include A Red, Red Rose, A Man's A Man for A' That, To a Louse, To a Mouse, The Battle of Sherramuir, and Ae Fond Kiss.
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Ragged Dick, Or, Street Life in New York with the Boot-Blacks
Horatio Alger 试读
Part of a series of rags to riches stories of boys achieving the American dream of wealth through hard work, these works can also be seen as helpful in understanding the development of American cultural and social ideals.
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Tales Of Hearsay
Joseph Conrad 试读
Joseph Conrad, born Jozef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski, (1857-1924) was a Polish-born novelist who spent most of his adult life in Britain. He is regarded as one of the greatest English novelists, which is even more notable because he did not learn to speak English well until he was in his 20s. He is recognized as a master prose stylist. Some of his works have a strain of romanticism, but more importantly he is recognized as an important forerunner of modernist literature. His narrative style and anti-heroic characters have influenced many writers, including Ernest Hemingway, D.H. Lawrence and Graham Greene. Writing during the apogee of the British Empire, Conrad drew upon his experiences in the British Merchant Navy to create novels and short stories that reflected aspects of a world-wide empire while also plumbing the depths of the human soul. Amongst his best known works are Heart of Darkness (1899), Lord Jim (1900), Under Western Eyes (1911), Victory (1915) and The Rescue (1920).
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The Green Fairy Book
Andrew Lang 试读
The Green Fairy Book collects more fairy tales from around the world, including "The Blue Bird," The Three Little Pigs," "The Golden Mermaid," "The Story of the Fisherman and His Wife," and many more.
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Oedipus Trilogy
Sophocles Montrose Jonas Moses 试读
Oedipus was the son of King Laius and Queen Jocasta. Before he was born, his parents consulted the Oracle at Delphi. The Oracle prophesied that Oedipus would murder his father and marry his mother. In an attempt to prevent this prophecy's fulfillment, Laius ordered Oedipus's feet to be bound together, and pierced with a stake. Afterwards, the baby was given to a herdsman who was told to kill him. Unable to go though with his orders, he instead gave the child to a second herdsman who took the infant, Oedipus, to the king of Corinth, Polybus. Polybus adopted Oedipus as his son. Oedipus was raised as the crown prince of Corinth. Many years later Oedipus was told that Polybus was not his real father. Seeking the truth, he sought counsel from an Oracle and thus started the greatest tragedy ever written.
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Fairy Book
Sophie May 试读
Rebecca Sophia Clarke (1833-1906) was an American author of children's fiction. She wrote under the penname Sophie May and had 45 published works between 1860 and 1903. The most successful were the Little Prudy characters which made their first appearance in short stories for the children's periodicals, The Little Pilgrim and the Congregationalist. The series was later published into books. Her sister Sarah Jones Clarke (1840- 1929) was also an author of children's books. She wrote under the penname Penn Shirley. Rebecca attended a "female academy" in Norridgewock and taught for a while, but she never married. Amongst her works are: Little Prudy (1863), Little Prudy's Sister Susy (1864), Little Prudy's Captain Horace (1864), Little Prudy's Dotty Dimple (1868), Dotty Dimple Out West (1868), Dotty Dimple at Play (1869), Little Folks Astray (1870) and The Twin Cousins (1880).
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Back to Billabong
Mary Grant Bruce 试读
Mary Grant Bruce (1878-1958), also known as Minnie Bruce, was an Australian children's author and journalist. While all her thirty-seven books enjoyed popular success in Australia and overseas, particularly in the United Kingdom, she was most famous for the Billabong series, focussing on the adventures of the Linton family on Billabong Station in Victoria and in England and Ireland during World War I. Her writing was considered influential in forming concepts of Australian national identity, especially in relation to visions of the Bush. It was characterised by fierce patriotism, vivid descriptions of the beauties and dangers of the Australian landscape, and humorous, colloquial dialogue celebrating the art of yarning. Her books were also notable and influential through championing of what Bruce held up as the quintessentially Australian Bush values of independence, hard physical labour (for women and children as well as men), mateship, the ANZAC spirit and Bush hospitality against more decadent, self-centred or stolid urban and British values. Among her most famous works are: A Little Bush Maid (1910), Mates at Billabong (1911) and Back to Billabong (1921).
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Odysseus, the Hero of Ithaca Adapted from the Third Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece
Homer 试读
This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor ictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturaly important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.
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I, Thou, and the Other One A Love Story
Amelia 试读
Beyond Thirsk and Northallerton, through the Cleveland Hills to the sea eastward, and by Roseberry Topping, northward, there is a lovely, lonely district, very little known even at the present day. The winds stream through its hills, as cool and fresh as living water; and whatever beauty there is of mountain, valley, or moorland, Farndale and Westerdale can show it; while no part of England is so rich in those picturesque manor-houses which have been the homes of the same families for twenty generations.
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Queen Mary and Harold
Alfred Tennyson Tennyson 试读
Alfred Lord Tennyson, 1st Baron Tennyson (1809-1892) was Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom and is one of the most popular English poets. Much of his verse was based on classical mythological themes. One of Tennyson's most famous works is Idylls of the King (1859), a series of narrative poems based entirely on King Arthur and the Arthurian tales. During his career, Lord Tennyson attempted drama, but his plays enjoyed little success even in his lifetime. His first publication entitled Poems by Two Brothers was published in 1827. He published his first solo collection of poems, Poems Chiefly Lyrical in 1830. In 1833, Tennyson published his second book of poetry, which included his well-known poem, The Lady of Shalott. In 1842 Tennyson published two volumes of Poems. The Princess, a satire of women's education, which came out in 1847, was also popular. It was in 1850 that Tennyson reached the pinnacle of his career, being appointed Poet Laureate until his death. Amongst his other works are Becket and Other Plays (1884) and Lady Clare (1884).
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Baldy of Nome
Esther Birdsall Darling 试读
At all events, Tom had resented the entrance of the Eskimo, Wolf, into the Kennel; and never failed, when "Scotty" was not about, to manifest an enmity that would have told a civilized dog not to attempt any liberties with him. But Wolf was only an ignorant puppy, taken from a native igloo, where all of the dogs and all of the family lived in happy harmony; and so, one day when he was particularly joyous, he nipped, in a spirit of mischief, the end of Tom's wagging stump of a tail. Tom wheeled instantly, his hair bristling and his jaws apart, but the timely arrival of Matt made further demonstration impossible; and Tom's instinctive dislike for Wolf grew into an obsession after that direct and personal insult.
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Richard Vandermarck
Miriam Coles Harris 试读
American novel first published in 1871, by Mrs Sidney S. (Miriam) Harris, nee Coles.
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Real Ghost Stories
William Thomas Stead 试读
Real Ghost Stories -How can there be real ghost stories when there are no real ghosts? But are there no real ghosts? You may not have seen one, but it does not follow that therefore they do not exist. How many of us have seen the microbe that kills? There are at least as many persons who testify they have seen apparitions as there are men of science who have examined the microbe. You and I, who have seen neither, must perforce take the testimony of others. The evidence for the microbe may be conclusive, the evidence as to apparitions may be worthless; but in both cases it is a case of testimony, not of personal experience.
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Household Papers and Stories
Harriet Beecher Stowe 试读
This book was converted from its physical edition to the digital format by a community of volunteers. You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.
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The Island of Doctor Moreau
赫伯特·乔治·威尔斯 试读
Adrift in a dinghy, Edward Prendick, the single survivor from the good ship Lady Vain, is rescued by a vessel carrying a profoundly unusual cargo: a menagerie of savage animals. Tended to recovery by their keeper Montgomery, who gives him dark medicine that tastes of blood, Prendick soon finds himself stranded upon an uncharted island in the Pacific with his rescuer and the beasts.Here, he meets Montgomery's master, the sinister Dr. Moreau a brilliant scientist whose notorious experiments in vivisection have caused him to abandon the civilised world. It soon becomes clear he has been developing these experiments with truly horrific results.
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Chess History and Reminiscences
Henry Edward Bird 试读
Of all the claims which have been advanced to the invention and origin of chess, that of the Hindu Game the Chaturanga is the most ancient, and its accounts contain the earliest allusion worthy of serious notice to anything partaking of the principles and form of chess. The description of it is taken from the Sanskrit text, and our first knowledge of it is obtained through the works of Dr. Hyde, 1693, and Sir William Jones, 1784, Professor Duncan Forbes in a History of Chess, dedicated to Sir Frederic Madden and Howard Staunton, published in 1860, further elaborated the researches of his predecessors and claims by the aid of his better acquaintance with chess, and improved knowledge of the Sanskrit to have proved the Chaturanga as the first form of chess beyond a shadow of doubt.
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Glenloch Girls
Grace M. Remick 试读
You haven’t lost all your money, have you? That would be so romantic and interesting. I think I should go out as a cook, and perhaps you could get a place as butler in the same house.
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The Climbers A Play in Four Acts
Clyde Fitch 试读
The main issue involves an examination of ethics and the stockmarket as we find that Hunter went broke in a copper deal and his son-in-law Sterling who is an investment broker runs through family fortunes like water on one speculative deal after the next. By the final curtain when he finally overdoses, we almost stand and applaud his demise. The themes of ethics and investment still seemed relevant today. As we become increasingly familiar and care about the characters, we become more concerned for their financial well-being which goes down the tubes with Sterling's abuse of their investments.
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Lady Mary and her Nurse
Catharine Parr Strickland Traill 试读
The nurse smiled, and said, "It is not a fish at all, my dear;it is a dried beaver's tail. I brought it from the back lakes whenI was at home, that you might see it. See, my lady, how curiouslythe beaver's tail is covered with scales; it looks like some sortof black leather, stamped in a diaper pattern. Before it is dried,it is very heavy, weighing three or four pounds. I have heard mybrothers and some of the Indian trappers say, that the animal makesuse of its tail to beat the sides of the dams and smoothe the mudand clay, as a plasterer uses a trowel.
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By Shore and Sedge
Bret Harte 试读
On October 10, 1856, about four hundred people were camped in Tasajara Valley, California. It could not have been for the prospect, since a more barren, dreary, mono-tonous, and uninviting landscape never stretched before human eye it could not have been for convenience or contiguity, as the nearest settlement was thirty miles away it could not have been for health or salubrity, as the breath of the ague-haunted tules in the outlying Stockton marshes swept through the valley it could not have been for space or comfort, for, encamped on an unlimited plain, men and women were huddled together as closely as in an urban tenement-house, without the freedom or decency of rural isolation it could not have been for pleasant companionship, as dejection, mental anxiety, tears, and lamentation were the dominant expression it was not a hurried flight from present or impending calamity, for the camp had been deliberately planned, and for a week pioneer wagons had been slowly arriving it was not an irrevocable exodus, for some had already returned to their homes that others might take their places. It was simply a religious revival of one or two denominational sects, known as a "camp-meeting."
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Mrs. Warrens Profession
George Bernard Shaw 试读
Written in 1893, Mrs. Warren's Profession skewers the hypocrisy of British society. The wealthy, respectable title character's "profession" is the world's oldest, but Mrs. Warren is unprepared for the reaction of her daughter Vivie when she discovers her mother's occupation. Shaw brings new life to the woman-with-a-past theme with wit and a defense of his heroine.
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The Black Tulip
Alexandre Dumas 试读
A deceptively simple story and the shortest of Dumas's most famous novels, The Black Tulip (1850) weaves historical events surrounding a brutal murder into a tale of romantic love. Set in Holland in 1672, this timeless political allegory draws on the violence and crimes of history, making a case against tyranny and creating a symbol of justice and tolerance: the fateful tulipa negra.
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Jack Hinton The Guardsman
Charles James Lever 试读
Author's intention was to depict, in the early experiences of a young Englishman in Ireland, some of the almost inevitable mistakes incidental to such a character.
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Romola
Edward Dicey 试读
George Eliot, the pen named used by Mary Anne Evans, wrote popular works that mirrored the settings and ideology of contemporary Victorian England. She was brought up in the Church of England, where she developed strong moral convictions that carried over into her fiction. During a visit to Florence in 1860 it was suggested to Eliot that the historical Fra Girolamo Savonarola would make a good subject for a novel, so Eliot spent her visit, and many months after, exhaustively researching Florentine history and culture. Her effort is undeniably evident within the pages of "Romola," however Eliot has been criticized for using a 15th Century setting to deal with the 19th Century issues of Victorian England. Romola is the female protagonist through which the story is rendered; her intellectual and religious growth, often painful, reflects the religious and cultural transitions of the Italian Renaissance in Florence.
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On the Choice of Books
Thomas Carlyle 试读
ADDRESS DELIVERED TO THE STUDENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH. Gentlemen, I have accepted the office you have elected me to, and have now the duty to return thanks for the great honour done me. Your enthusiasm towards me, I admit, is very beautiful in itself, however undeserved it may be in regard to the object of it. It is a feeling honourable to all men, and one well known to myself when I was in a position analogous to your own. I can only hope that it may endure to the end? that noble desire to honour those whom you think worthy of honour, and come to be more and more select and discriminate in the choice of the object of it; for I can well understand that you will modify your opinions of me and many things else as you go on. (Laughter and cheers.) There are now fifty-six years gone last November since I first entered your city, a boy of not quite fourteen?fifty-six years ago? to attend classes here and gain knowledge of allkinds, I know not what, with feelings of wonder and awe-struck expectation; and now, after a long, long course, this is what we have come to. (Cheers.) There is something touching and tragic, and yet at the same time beautiful, to see the third generation, as it were, of my dear old native land, rising up and saying, " Well, you are not altogether an unworthy labourer in the vineyard: you have toiled through a great variety of fortunes, and have had many judges." As the old proverb says, " He that builds by the wayside has many masters." We must expect a variety of judges; but the voice of young Scotland, through you, is really of some value to me, and I return you many thanks for it, though I cannot describe my emotions to, you, and perhaps they will be much more conceivable if expressed in silence. (Cheers.) When this office was first p...
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Many Ways for Cooking Eggs
Sarah Tyson Heston Rorer 试读
The philosophy of a sauce, when understood, enables even an untrained cook to make a great variety of every day sauces from materials usually found in every household; to have them uniform, however, flavorings must be correctly blended, and measurements must be rigidly observed. Two level tablespoonfuls of butter or other fat, two level tablespoonfuls of flour, must be used to each half pint of liquid. If the yolks of eggs are added, omit one tablespoonful of flour or the sauce will be too thick. Tomato sauce should be flavored with onion, a little mace, and a suspicion of curry. Brown sauce may be simply seasoned with salt and pepper, flavored and colored with kitchen bouquet. Spanish sauce should also be flavored with mushrooms, or if you can afford it, a truffle, a little chopped ham, a tablespoonful of chives, shallot and garlic. Water sauce, drawn butter and simple sauce Hollandaise, when they are served with fish, must be flavored with a dash of tarragon vinegar, salt and pepper.
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My Brilliant Career
Miles Franklin 试读
The story of a young girl's dreams, aspirations and melodramas told with zest and verve by the 16-year-old author.