Innocent : her fancy and his fact

There are still a few old houses left in rural England which are as yet happily unmolested by the destroying ravages of modern improvement, and Briar Farm was one of these. Hist...

That evening the fitful and gusty wind increased to a gale which swept the land with devastating force, breaking down or uprooting great trees that had withstood the storms of c...

As early as six o'clock the next morning Innocent was up and dressed, and, hastening down to the kitchen, busied herself, as was her usual daily custom, in assisting Priscilla w...

In London, the greatest metropolis of the world, the smallest affairs are often discussed with more keenness than things of national importance,--and it is by no means uncommon...

The swinging open of a great gate at the further end of the field disturbed the momentary silence which followed his words. The returning haymakers appeared on the scene, leadin...

That night Innocent made an end of all her hesitation. Resolutely she put away every thought that could deter her from the step she was now resolved to take. Poor old Priscilla...

Returning to the room where he had sat alone before supper, he sank heavily into the armchair he had previously occupied. The window was still open, and the scent of roses stole...

The news of Farmer Jocelyn's sudden death was as though a cloud-burst had broken over the village, dealing utter and hopeless destruction. To the little community of simple work...

Upstairs, shut in her own little room with the door locked, Innocent opened the sealed packet. She found within it a letter and some bank-notes. With a sensitive pain which thri...

No more impressive scene was ever witnessed in a country village than the funeral of "the last of the Jocelyns,"--impressive in its solemnity, simplicity and lack of needless ce...

To be whirled along through the crowded streets of London in a taxi-cab for the first time in one's life must needs be a somewhat disconcerting, even alarming experience, and In...

It was a gusty September afternoon in London, and autumn had given some unpleasing signs of its early presence in the yellow leaves that flew whirling over the grass in Kensingt...

Some weeks later on, when the London season was at its height, and Fashion, that frilled and furbelowed goddess, sat enthroned in state, controlling the moods of the Elect and S...

The old by-road went rambling down into a dell of deep green shadow. It was a reprobate of a road,--a vagrant of the land,--having long ago wandered out of straight and even cou...

Lord Blythe stood at the open window of his sitting-room in the Grand Hotel at Bellaggio--a window opening out to a broad balcony and commanding one of the most enchanting views...

"When I think about love," she began presently, in a soft dreamy voice--"I'm quite sure that very few people ever really feel it or understand it. It must be the rarest thing in...

Chance and coincidence play curious pranks with human affairs, and one of the most obvious facts of daily experience is that the merest trifle, occurring in the most haphazard w...

In affairs of love a woman is perhaps most easily ensnared by a man who can combine passion with pleasantry and hot pursuit with social tact and diplomacy. Amadis de Jocelyn was...

Lord Blythe was sitting alone in his library. He was accustomed to sit alone, and rather liked it. It was the evening after that of the Duchess of Deanshire's reception; his wif...

She answered nothing--she was flushed, and breathing quickly from the excitement of the dance, and he paused on his way to pick up a light wrap he found on one of the sofas, and...

Fame, or notoriety, whichever that special noise may be called when the world like a hound "gives tongue" and announces that the quarry in some form of genius is at bay, is apt...

The supper was a very silent meal. Old Hugo was evidently not inclined to converse,--he ate his food quickly, almost ravenously, without seeming to be conscious that he was eati...

Startled and completely taken aback, she let her hands remain passively in his for a moment,--then quietly withdrew them. A hot colour rushed swiftly into her cheeks and as swif...

One of the advantages or disadvantages of the way in which we live in these modern days is that we are ceasing to feel. That is to say we do not permit ourselves to be affected...