The last letter I had from Harold was from Naples. “We’ve just come back from Pompeii,” he wrote. “On the whole it’s decidedly no go and very tiring. What with the smells and the beggars and the mosqu...

The Peaslake party was most harmonious in its composition. Four out of the five were Peaslakes, which partly accounted for the success, but the fifth, Harold, seemed to have been created to go with th...

Sir Edwin and Lady Peaslake were sitting in the temple of Juno Lacinia and leaning back on a Doric column⁠—which is a form of architecture neither comfortable as a cushion nor adequate as a parasol. T...

There was a dirty little sitting room in the Albergo Empedocle, and Mildred was sitting there after dinner waiting for her father. He had met some friends at the temples, and he and she had agreed to ...

They had a terrible scene with him at the Girgenti railway station next morning when the train came in. However they got him on to it at last, and by the evening he was back at Palermo and had seen th...

For no very intelligible reason, Mr. Lucas had hurried ahead of his party. He was perhaps reaching the age at which independence becomes valuable, because it is so soon to be lost. Tired of attention ...

For no very intelligible reason, Mr. Lucas had hurried ahead of his party. He was perhaps reaching the age at which independence becomes valuable, because it is so soon to be lost. Tired of attention ...

It was breakfast time, but the gas was alight, owing to the fog. Mr. Lucas was in the middle of an account of a bad night he had spent. Ethel, who was to be married in a few weeks, had her arms on the...

Eustace’s career⁠—if career it can be called⁠—certainly dates from that afternoon in the chestnut woods above Ravello. I confess at once that I am a plain, simple man, with no pretensions to literary ...

Eustace’s career⁠—if career it can be called⁠—certainly dates from that afternoon in the chestnut woods above Ravello. I confess at once that I am a plain, simple man, with no pretensions to literary ...

I cannot describe our finish any better than our start; for our fear passed away as it had come, without cause. Suddenly I was able to see, and hear, and cough, and clear my mouth. Looking back, I saw...

But the day was nothing to the night. I suppose I had slept for about four hours, when I woke suddenly thinking I heard a noise in the garden. And, immediately, before my eyes were open, cold terrible...

My pedometer told me that I was twenty-five; and, though it is a shocking thing to stop walking, I was so tired that I sat down on a milestone to rest. People outstripped me, jeering as they did so, b...

“Do you see that mountain just behind Elizabeth’s toque? A young man fell in love with me there so nicely twenty years ago. Bob your head a minute, would you, Elizabeth, kindly.” “Yes’m,” said Elizabe...

“Do you see that mountain just behind Elizabeth’s toque? A young man fell in love with me there so nicely twenty years ago. Bob your head a minute, would you, Elizabeth, kindly.” “Yes’m,” said Elizabe...

Miss Raby’s first novel, The Eternal Moment, was written round the idea that man does not live by time alone, that an evening gone may become like a thousand ages in the courts of heaven⁠—the idea tha...

Miss Raby and Elizabeth were seated together in the lounge of the Hôtel des Alpes. They had walked up from the Biscione to see Colonel Leyland. But he, apparently, had walked down there to see them, a...

It is uncertain how the Faun came to be in Wiltshire. Perhaps he came over with the Roman legionaries to live with his friends in camp, talking to them of Lucretius, or Garganus or of the slopes of Et...

The boy who resided at Agathox Lodge, 28, Buckingham Park Road, Surbiton, had often been puzzled by the old signpost that stood almost opposite. He asked his mother about it, and she replied that it w...

The boy who resided at Agathox Lodge, 28, Buckingham Park Road, Surbiton, had often been puzzled by the old signpost that stood almost opposite. He asked his mother about it, and she replied that it w...

It had two horses, whose sides were still smoking from their journey, and its two great lamps shone through the fog against the alley’s walls, changing their cobwebs and moss into tissues of fairyland...

The boy was in disgrace. He sat locked up in the nursery of Agathox Lodge, learning poetry for a punishment. His father had said, “My boy! I can pardon anything but untruthfulness,” and had caned him,...

“ ‘Quem, whom; fugis, are you avoiding; ab demens, you silly ass; habitarunt di quoque, gods too have lived in; silvas, the woods.’ Go ahead!” I always brighten the classics⁠—it is part of my system⁠—...

“ ‘Quem, whom; fugis, are you avoiding; ab demens, you silly ass; habitarunt di quoque, gods too have lived in; silvas, the woods.’ Go ahead!” I always brighten the classics⁠—it is part of my system⁠—...

Other Kingdom Copse is just like any other beech copse, and I am therefore spared the fatigue of describing it. And the stream in front of it, like many other streams, is not crossed by a bridge in th...

Oh, my goodness! Oh, all ye goddesses and gods! Here’s a mess. Mr. Worters has been reading Ford’s inflammatory notebook. “This my own fault,” said Ford. “I should have labelled it ‘Practically Privat...

The bridge is built, the fence finished, and Other Kingdom lies tethered by a ribbon of asphalt to our front door. The seventy-eight trees therein certainly seem nearer, and during the windy nights th...

Imagine, if you can, a small room, hexagonal in shape, like the cell of a bee. It is lighted neither by window nor by lamp, yet it is filled with a soft radiance. There are no apertures for ventilatio...

Imagine, if you can, a small room, hexagonal in shape, like the cell of a bee. It is lighted neither by window nor by lamp, yet it is filled with a soft radiance. There are no apertures for ventilatio...

By a vestibule, by a lift, by a tubular railway, by a platform, by a sliding door⁠—by reversing all the steps of her departure did Vashti arrive at her son’s room, which exactly resembled her own. She...

During the years that followed Kuno’s escapade, two important developments took place in the Machine. On the surface they were revolutionary, but in either case men’s minds had been prepared beforehan...

The souls of the dead were ascending towards the Judgment Seat and the Gate of Heaven. The world soul pressed them on every side, just as the atmosphere presses upon rising bubbles, striving to vanqui...

“I don’t see the point of it,” said Micky, through much imbecile laughter. Harold went on rowing. They had spent too long on the sand-dunes, and now the tide was running out of the estuary strongly. T...

“I don’t see the point of it,” said Micky, through much imbecile laughter. Harold went on rowing. They had spent too long on the sand-dunes, and now the tide was running out of the estuary strongly. T...

A rotten business. It happened when Michael was twenty-two, and he expected never to be happy again. The sound of his own voice shouting as he was carried out, the doctor’s voice saying, “I consider y...

Micky was still in bed. He was aware of so much through long melancholy dreams. But when he opened his mouth to laugh, it filled with dust. Choosing to open his eyes, he found that he had swollen enor...

“Don’t thump,” said Miss Haddon. “And each run ought to be like a string of pearls. It is not. Why is it not?” “Ellen, you beast, you’ve got my note.” “No, I haven’t. You’ve got mine.” “Well, whose no...

Few things have been more beautiful than my notebook on the Deist Controversy as it fell downward through the waters of the Mediterranean. It dived, like a piece of black slate, but opened soon, discl...