The World's Greatest Books — Volume 06 — Fiction

Except that he was born at Sarzeau, in Brittany, on May 8, 1668, and that he was the son of the novelist Claude le Sage, little is known of the youth of Alain René le Sage. Unti...

Count Xavier de Maistre was born in October 1763 at Chambéry, in Savoy. When, in the war and the upheaval that followed on the French Revolution, his country was annexed to Fran...

"It is fortunate for you that the estate is entailed," wrote Dr. Middleton, "or you might soon be a beggar, for there is no saying what debts your father might, in his madness,...

"My accent told her I was from the Basque province, and she began to speak to me in my native tongue. Gipsies, you know, sir, speak all languages. She told me she had been carri...

The place was choke-full, just to excess, and when the curtain was hauled up in came a decent old gentleman in great distress, and implored all the powers of heaven and earth to...

_They_ began the warfare--these boastful men of B----! And what think you was the amount of their innings? These challengers--the famous eleven--how many did they get? Think! Im...

With all this, however, I am sorry to say that I never met with so avaricious and so wicked an old curmudgeon; he allowed me almost daily to die of hunger, without troubling him...

A servant entered, and announced that an old man from Athens desired to see the Caesar on urgent business. Julian ran to meet the newcomer; it was the high-priest of the mysteri...

"Now we have come to it!" cried Mr. Grand. "I thought I should touch the secret spring at last! And you would like us to associate with you as equals--is that it, Joshua? Gentle...

"Take my pocket-book," he whispered; "there is a letter you'll give my sister Marie. There are some five or six thousand francs--they are yours; you must be a pupil at the Polyt...

Godfrey O'Malley sometime previous had lost his wife, and when this new trust was committed to him he resolved never to re-marry, but to rear me as his own child.

Father summoned forth to the Council to take the oathe of supremacie. Having declared his inabilitie to take the oathe as it stoode, they bade him take a turn in the garden to r...

Acknowledgment and thanks for permission to use the following selections are herewith tendered to G.P. Putnam's Sons, New York, for "The Death of the Gods," by Dmitri Merejkowsk...

But Warwick's cup of bitterness was not yet full. The Tower was surrendered to Edward's friends, and on the following day Edward himself entered the capital, to be received by t...

Jack walked on and Kimberley stood rooted to the ground. He was crushed and overwhelmed beneath the sense of his own humiliation. His fineries had been the one thing on which he...

Nadân was an exemplary Mussulman in all outward matters; but I was not long in discovering that he had two ruling passions--jealousy of the chief priest of Tehran, and a hunger...

The Duc and Duchess de Bligny arrived at La Varenne. La Varenne became the scene of numerous fetes, but Claire excused herself from attending on the ground that she was not yet...

"And I think better of the Madonna than you do, for I believe she doesn't wish for promises that injure one's fellow-creatures. Promise her that our first daughter shall be call...

"Do not fly me!" she cried. "You are my beloved; but far is it from Matilda's wish to draw you from the paths of virtue. All I ask is to see you, to converse with you, to adore...

And all was along of two unhappy knights named Sir Agravaine and Sir Mordred, that were brethren unto Sir Gawaine. For these two knights had ever privy hate unto the queen, and...

This story of a legacy Walter was not inclined to believe, but proof of it was forthcoming. Another circumstance in Aram's favour was that his memory was still honoured in the t...

The romances of Charles Robert Maturin mark the transition stage between the old crude "Gothic" tales of terror and the subtler and weirder treatment of the supernatural that ha...

Straight into the turmoil and confusion of the Pit, into the scene of so many of his victories, came the "Great Bull." The news went flashing and flying from lip to lip. The whe...

In came James Casey and half a dozen strong young fellows. Behind them crept a reprobate, degraded priest who got his living and his name of "Couple-Beggar" by performing irregu...

The floor seemed to glide from under him, his feet seemed to move on air, a mighty and unearthly gladness rushed upon his spirit. He felt too buoyant for the earth; he longed fo...

"The foot of the stairway is in the third bookcase on the left of the library door," said Mr. Long. "I dare say that nobody has moved the picture for twenty years."