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Excerpt: Chapter 1. Well, when I had been dead about thirty years I begun to get a little anxious. Mind you, had been whizzing through space all that time, like a comet. Like a comet! Why, Peters, I laid over the lot of them! Of course there weren?t any of them going my way, as a steady thing, you know, because they travel in a long circle like the loop of a lasso, whereas I was pointed as straight as a dart for the Hereafter; but I happened on one every now and then that was going my way for an hour or so, and then we had a bit of a brush together....

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Excerpt: That homely proverb, used on so many occasions in England, viz. ?That what is bred in the bone will not go out of the flesh,? was never more verified than in the story of my Life. Any one would think that after thirty-five years? affliction, and a variety of unhappy circumstances, which few men, if any, ever went through before, and after near seven years of peace and enjoyment in the fullness of all things; grown old, and when, if ever, it might be allowed me to have had experience of every state of middle life, and to know which was most adapted to make a man completely happy; I say, after all this, any one would have thought that the native propensity to rambling which I gave an account of in my first setting out in the world to have been so predominant in my thoughts, should be worn out, and I might, at sixty one years of age, have been a little inclined to stay at home, and have done venturing life and fortune any more....

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Excerpt: An Unprotected Female at the Pyramids by Anthony Trollope.

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After his father’s death Gerard Roylake returns from Germany to take up his inheritance at Trimley Deen. On one evening he meets his childhood friend, Cristel Toller. They fall in love, but there is a crux. A deaf man, called The Lodger is obsessed with Cristel. He invites Gerard to tea with evil intentions… and Gerard accepts the invitation. The book is written in the first person and tells the story from Gerard's point of view. (Summary by Diana Majlinger)...

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Literature, Fiction

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Excerpt: The double sorwe of Troilus to tellen, That was the kyng Priamus sone of Troye, In louynge how his auentures fellen ffro wo to wele, and after out of ioie, My purpos is, er that I parte fro ye. Thesiphone, thow help me for tendite Thise woful vers that wepen as I write. To the clepe I, thow goddesse of torment, Thow cruwel furie, sorwynge evere in peyne, Help me that am the sorwful instrument That helpeth loveres, as I kan, to pleyne; ffor wel sit it, the sothe for to seyne, A woful wight to han a drery feere, And to a sorwful tale a sory chere....

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Table of Contents: Book I, 1 -- Book II, 29 -- Book III, 74 -- Book IV, 121 -- Book V, 165

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Mike’s dream of studying and playing cricket at Cambridge are thwarted as his father runs into financial difficulties. Instead, Mike takes on the job of clerk at the “New Asiatic Bank.” Luckily, school friend Psmith, with his boundless optimism and original views, soon joins his department, and together they endeavour to make the best of their new life in London. (Summary written by Gesine)...

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Comedy

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Excerpt: A Dispersion. ?A telegram! Make haste and open it, Jane; they always make me so nervous! I believe that is the reason Reginald always will telegraph when he is coming,? said Miss Adeline Mohun, a very pretty, well preserved, though delicate-looking lady of some age about forty, as her elder sister, brisk and lively and some years older, came into the room....

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Excerpt: Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac, translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley.

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Excerpt: Paz by Honore de Balzac, translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley.

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Excerpt: Chapter 1. Above Buttons. Long after the hours when tradesmen are in the habit of commencing business, the shutters of a certain shop in the town of Lymport-on-the-Sea remained significantly closed, and it became known that death had taken Mr. Melchisedec Harrington, and struck one off the list of living tailors....

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Preface: As the most striking lines of poetry are the most hackneyed, because they have grown to be the common inheritance of all the world, so many of the most noble deeds that earth can show have become the best known, and enjoyed their full meed of fame. Therefore it may be feared that many of the events here detailed, or alluded to, may seem trite to those in search of novelty; but it is not for such that the collection has been made....

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Excerpt: The Second Part of Henry the Fourth Containing his Death and the Coronation of King Henry the Fifth; Actus Primus -- Scoena Prima -- INDUCTION. Enter Rumour. Open your Eares: For which of you will stop The vent of Hearing, when loud Rumor speakes? I, from the Orient, to the drooping West (Making the winde my Post- horse) still unfold The Acts commenced on this Ball of Earth. Upon my Tongue, continuall Slanders ride, The which, in every Language, I pronounce, Stuffing the Eares of them with false Reports: I speake of Peace, while covert Enmitie (Under the smile of Safety) wounds the World: And who but Rumour, who but onely I Make fearfull Musters, and prepar?d Defence, Whil?st the bigge yeare, swolne with some other griefes, Is thought with childe, by the sterne Tyrant, Warre, And no such matter? Rumour, is a Pipe Blowne by Surmises, Ielousies, Conjectures; And of so easie, and so plaine a stop, That the blunt Monster, with uncounted heads, The still discordant, wavering Multitude, Can play upon it. But what neede I thus My well- knowne Body to Anathomize Among my houshold? Why is Rumour heere? I run before King Harries vict...

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Table of Contents: The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, 1 -- Actus Primus. Scoena Prima., 1 -- Scena Secunda., 2 -- Scena Tertia., 7 -- Scena Quarta., 12 -- Actus Secundus. Scoena Prima., 14 -- Scena Secunda., 18 -- Scena Tertia., 22 -- Scaena Quarta., 24 -- Actus Tertius. Scena Prima., 32 -- Scena Secunda., 35 -- Actus Quartus. Scena Prima., 42 -- Scena Secunda., 53 -- Actus Quintus. Scoena Prima., 62 -- Scena Secunda., 64 -- Scena Tertia., 68 -- Scena Quarta., 71 -- Scena Quinta., 72 -- EPILOGVE., 74...

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Excerpt: The increase of the towns of Manhattan, as, for the sake of convenience, we shall term New York and her adjuncts, in all that contributes to the importance of a great commercial mart, renders them one of the most remarkable places of the present age. Within the distinct recollections of living men, they have grown from a city of the fifth or sixth class to be near the head of all the purely trading places of the known world. That there are sufficient causes for this unparalleled prosperity, will appear in the analysis of the natural advantages of the port, in its position, security, accessories, and scale....

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Excerpt: The Heir of Redclyffe by Charlotte M. Yonge.

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Excerpt: CHORUS. Not marching in the fields of Thrasymene, Where Mars did mate the warlike Carthagens; Nor sporting in the dalliance of love, In courts of kings where state is overturn?d; Nor in the pomp of proud audacious deeds, Intends our Muse to vaunt her heavenly verse: Only this, gentles,--we must now perform The form of Faustus? fortunes, good or bad: And now to patient judgments we appeal, And speak for Faustus in his infancy....

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Excerpt: The malady of the age. On a fine evening in the month of September, 1836, a man about thirty years of age was leaning on the parapet of that quay from which a spectator can look up the Seine from the Jardin des Plantes to Notre-Dame, and down, along the vast perspective of the river, to the Louvre. There is not another point of view to compare with it in the capital of ideas. We feel ourselves on the quarter-deck, as it were, of a gigantic vessel. We dream of Paris from the days of the Romans to those of the Franks, from the Normans to the Burgundians, the Middle-Ages, the Valois, Henri IV., Louis XIV., Napoleon, and Louis-Philippe. Vestiges are before us of all those sovereignties, in monuments that recall their memory....

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Excerpt: The Volsunga Saga translated by William Morris and Eirikr Magnusson (1888).

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Contents INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................5 TRANSLATORS? PREFACE.......................................................................23 THE STORY OF THE VOLSUNGS AND NIBLUNGS.............................26 APPENDIX:.................................................................................................132 EXCERPTS FROM THE POETIC EDDA.............................................................................................................. 132 PART OF THE LAY OF SIGRDRIFA (1)................................................................................................................. 139 THE LAY CALLED .................................................................................................................................................. 142 THE SHORT LAY OF SIGURD.............................................................................................................................. 142 THE HELL-RIDE OF BRYNHILD ............................................................................................................................

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Excerpt: The History of Tom Jones, A Foundling by Henry Fielding: Volume Two, Containing Books IX through XVIII.

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The History of the Standard Oil Company is a book written by journalist Ida Tarbell in 1904. It was an exposé of the Standard Oil Company, run at that time by oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller the richest figure in America's history. Originally serialized in 19 parts in McClure's magazine, the book was a seminal example of muckraking, and inspired many other journalists to write about trusts, large businesses that (in the absence of strong antitrust law in the 19th century) attempted to gain monopolies in various industries. The History of the Standard Oil Company was credited with hastening the breakup of Standard Oil, which came about in 1911. ( Summary by Wikipedia ) Note: This reading does not include any of the 36 Appendices....

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History

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The History of the Standard Oil Company is a book written by journalist Ida Tarbell in 1904. It was an exposé of the Standard Oil Company, run at that time by oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, the richest figure in America's history. Originally serialized in 19 parts in McClure's magazine, the book was a seminal example of muckraking, and inspired many other journalists to write about trusts, large businesses that (in the absence of strong antitrust law in the 19th century) attempted to gain monopolies in various industries. The History of the Standard Oil Company was credited with hastening the breakup of Standard Oil, which came about in 1911. ( Summary by Wikipedia ) Note: This reading does not include any of the Appendices....

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History