The Island of Fantasy: A Romance

Like statues fair the naked runners stand, Poised for the start on Elis’ sacred plain, Their limbs resplendent shine with fragrant oil, And every eager athlete is fain To win th...

The theatre of Melnos was crowded the next day to witness the one performance of the year, and the whole semicircle of seats was occupied by a chattering throng, resembling, dou...

Dark storm-clouds spread from pole to pole, The lightnings flash, the thunders roll, And lo, the sea, in mountains high, With giant billows storms the sky, While all the vast di...

Roylands Rectory was a comfortable-looking house, distant about a mile from the Grange, and near the village, which was an extremely small one. Indeed, although the parish was l...

I hear the noise of battle tumultuous! It is not on the earth, nor do spectral hosts contend in the cloudy sky; Under my feet it is raging, in the heart of the globe skirmish th...

Courage, my poet! The age of iron is not yet supreme, For youth still throbs in the old veins of Mother Earth, wan and weary with sorrowful centuries. Tho’ girdled our world by...

In olden days folks mostly stayed at home, Nor e’er in quest of unknown lands departed, And tho’ some ne’er-do-weels at times would roam, They came back poorer than the day they...

Oh, goddess wise, Disdainful of the sultry sun, Thou waitest till his course is run Then stealing where Endymion In slumber lies, With am’rous sighs Awake him in that secret nes...

If you this question strange decide, This way, that way, at your pleasure, It surely cannot be denied, If you this question strange decide, That Fate’s prerogative’s defied, And...

“What is truth?” asked Pilate, but to this perplexing question received no answer, not even from the Divine Man, who was best able to give a satisfactory reply. In the same way...

Your Eastern drugs, your spices, your perfumes, Are all in vain; They cannot snatch my soul from out its glooms, Nor soothe the brain. My mind is dark as cycle-sealèd tombs, And...

In all good faith I do believe That sons-in-law their wives deceive; So, seeing marriage is a snare, My daughter needs her mother’s care; And if this couple young be wise, Their...

Sir! there are three degrees of robbery, With different names, but meanings similar: For he who does his thievish work himself Is but a common foot-pad! quite unfit To mix in ge...

Two weeks passed since the departure of Caliphronas to stir up war against Melnos. Yet Alcibiades made no sign of attacking the island, so doubtless his plans had not yet mature...

Oh, I know naught of the work-a-day world! This is the land of eternal quiet, Where I can nestle in indolence curled, Far from the clamor of modern riot. Here are my wings of am...

The next morning neither Helena nor Caliphronas was present at breakfast, as the girl, in company with Zoe, had gone up the mountain shortly after sunrise in quest of flowers, a...

Things went along very smoothly for the next two days, as there was no sign of the pirates returning, nor did the volcano hint at any near outbreak of fire. Gradually the dimini...

Clash of cymbals, beat of drum, O’er the mountain peaks we come, Far from parchèd Hindostan To these laughing realms of Pan. Nymphs and satyrs reel about, Frenzied in the frenzi...

The day is ended, the night is near— That’s how I look at my end. The night is over, the day breaks clear— Such is your creed, my friend. But, yours or mine, does it matter much...

To rose-red sky, from rose-red sea, At rose-red dawn she came, A fiery rose of earth to be, And light the dark with flame; Then earth and sky triumphantly Rang loud with men’s a...

Hence, ye mortals! hence away! Dare not on this isle to stay; For in grim seclusion here I a mighty forge would rear, So that in this sea-girt grove I can work for mighty Jove....

The studio which Maurice had fitted up for himself at the Grange was a very workmanlike apartment, as it was quite barren of the artistic frippery with which painters love to de...

O Moon! thou risest from the western seas, A virgin Aphrodite fair and chaste, And by thy votaress on bended knees These stainless flowers are on thine altar placed: Pale lilies...

The smallest actions in a life Betray the calm or inward strife: From idle straws, as persons know, One learns the way the breezes blow; You love those Florentine mosaics, Yet t...

The cross of St. Andrew, the cross of St. George, Are blent in the folds which are flung to the air, And proud floats the flag at the head of the gorge, Proclaiming the presence...

To-day the story we repeat: A woman wins or loses all; She plucks the fruit for us to eat, We taste and find the apples sweet, And then we fall.

Woman’s a weathercock, Full of frivolity. Men may together mock At her heart’s quality. But if a heart she steals, Worth all the smart she feels, There then her place is; Lo, th...

In the gap say fifty fighters waiting for the coming shock, Guns and sabres, pikes and bayonets holding tight, And two hundred stormers dashing up, like surges on a rock, With a...

The snake is scotched, but is not dead, Beware! the snare! Soon will it lift again its head, Beware! nor dare! The fangs contain their poison still, The wounded creature yet may...

When anything marvellous occurs in real life, wiseacres shake their heads, and say, “Wonderful! extraordinary! Truth is stranger than fiction.” But when a novel contains any inc...

’Tis difficult, when dealing with a knave, To know what course of conduct to pursue, Yet if to win the victory you crave, Strict honesty you must perforce eschew; Like him, all...

Magic isles of beauty glowing Far in tideless sapphire seas; Wanton winds, low breathing, blowing Perfumes from balsamic trees. Here no wintry waters freeze; But the streamlets...

We all have histories. The meanest hind Who turns the steaming furrow can unfold Some story in his uneventful life, Which stirs the wonderment of him who hears, To thoughts bewi...

The pride of the human Does nature diminish, With spiteful acumen, She roughly will finish A man or a woman, He stout and she thinnish, Till one is not fair, nor the other a tru...

From distant isles of tropic blooms, Enthroned on seas of hyaline, Across the waters smaragdine, The weak winds waft us faint perfumes Of incense, musk, and fragrant balms, That...

What! wouldst thou force me to thine evil will, And bear me far away in benchèd ships, A second Helen to a second Troy, Whose flight would raise a second ten years’ war? Nay, si...

I’ve seen you before But where I forget, Yet somewhere of yore I’ve seen you before; You meet me once more, A stranger—and yet I’ve seen you before, But where I forget.

The night is dark, The cliff is high, No moon illumes The cloudy sky; Below we mark The fearful glooms Which in their night Hide sombrely the way of flight.

The saying, “It never rains but it pours,” was fully exemplified by the series of calamities which had befallen the once peaceful Isle of Fantasy and its inhabitants. First the...

Why should I call mankind my brothers, Or live but for the good of others? ’Twould bring me neither pain nor pleasure, Nor give me comfort, joy, or treasure. Myself by Nature’s...

Compound words which appear on page or line breaks either retain or forgo the hyphen depending on usage elsewhere in the text. Inconsistencies of hyphenation in words appearing...