| 483 | Author: | Lang, John | Requires cookie* | | Title: | Stories of the Border Marches | | | Published: | 2001 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | Among the old castles and peel towers of the Border, there are few to
which some tale or other of the supernatural does not attach itself. It
may be a legend of buried treasure, watched over by a weeping figure,
that wrings its hands; folk may tell of the apparition of an ancient
dame, whose corpse-like features yet show traces of passions unspent; of
solemn, hooded monk, with face concealed by his cowl, who passes down
the castle's winding stair, telling his beads; they whisper, it may be,
of a lady in white raiment, whose silken gown rustles as she walks. Or
the tale, perhaps, is one of pitiful moans that on the still night air
echo through some old building; or of the clank of chains, that comes
ringing from the damp and noisome dungeons, causing the flesh of the
listener to creep. | | Similar Items: | Find |
484 | Author: | Lang, Andrew | Requires cookie* | | Title: | Letters to Dead Authors | | | Published: | 2001 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | Sir,--There are many things that stand in the way of the critic when he has a
mind to praise the living. He may dread the charge of writing rather to vex a
rival than to exalt the subject of his applause. He shuns the appearance of
seeking the favour of the famous, and would not willingly be regarded as one
of the many parasites who now advertise each movement and action of
contemporary genius. 'Such and such men of letters are passing their summer
holidays in the Val d'Aosta,' or the Mountains of the Moon, or the Suliman
Range, as it may happen. So reports our literary 'Court Circular,' and all our
Pre'cieuses read the tidings with enthusiasm. Lastly, if the critic be quite
new to the world of letters, he may superfluously fear to vex a poet or a
novelist by the abundance of his
eulogy. No such doubts perplex us when, with
all our hearts, we would commend the departed; for they have passed almost
beyond the reach even of envy; and to those pale cheeks of theirs no
commendation can bring the red. | | Similar Items: | Find |
487 | Author: | Lang, Andrew | Requires cookie* | | Title: | The Making of Religion | | | Published: | 2001 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | The modern Science of the History of Religion has attained conclusions
which already possess an air of being firmly established. These
conclusions may be briefly stated thus: Man derived the conception of
'spirit' or 'soul' from his reflections on the phenomena of sleep, dreams,
death, shadow, and from the experiences of trance and hallucination.
Worshipping first the departed souls of his kindred, man later extended
the doctrine of spiritual beings in many directions. Ghosts, or other
spiritual existences fashioned on the same lines, prospered till they
became gods. Finally, as the result of a variety of processes, one of
these gods became supreme, and, at last, was regarded as the one only God.
Meanwhile man retained his belief in the existence of his own soul,
surviving after the death of the body, and so reached the conception of
immortality. Thus the ideas of God and of the soul are the result of early
fallacious reasonings about misunderstood experiences. | | Similar Items: | Find |
488 | Author: | Lang, Andrew, 1844-1912 | Requires cookie* | | Title: | The Violet Fairy Book | | | Published: | 1996 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | LONG, long ago there stood in the midst of a country
covered with lakes a vast stretch of moorland called the
Tontlawald, on which no man ever dared set foot.
From time to time a few bold spirits had been drawn by
curiosity to its borders, and on their return had reported
that they had caught a glimpse of a ruined house in a
grove of thick trees, and round about it were a crowd of
beings resembling men, swarming over the grass like
bees. The men were as dirty and ragged as gipsies,
and there were besides a quantity of old women and half-naked children. | | Similar Items: | Find |
490 | Author: | Leach, Anna | Requires cookie* | | Title: | Literary Workers of the South | | | Published: | 1996 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | UNTIL a comparatively recent date, there were almost no men and
women in the South who made a profession of literature. Before the
war, there was here and there a man who amused himself by writing a
book. William Gilmore Simms, indeed, was a professed literary man; so
was Poe, but he left the South early in his career. The books of John
Pendleton Kennedy, secretary of the navy under Fillmore,
Eliza J. Nicholson.From a photograph by Simon, New
Orleans.
A portrait of Eliza J. Nicholson, from a photograph by Simon
of New Orleans
are still sold; and few Southern sketches surpass those of Judge
Longstreet. There was no end to the verse makers. Still, as a
generality, it is true to say that literature as a serious business of
life was not known. Every man and woman of education was taught to
express himself or herself on paper with force and elegance; but it
was considered as an accomplishment in the woman, and as a necessary
adjunct to his position in life
in the man. The heavy bundles of old letters which belong to every
old Southern family will show that there was enough talent in those
days to have made an American literature, had it been directed into
the proper channels. | | Similar Items: | Find |
492 | Author: | Leroux, Gaston | Requires cookie* | | Title: | The Phantom of the Opera | | | Published: | 1994 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | The Opera ghost really existed. He was not, as was long
believed, a creature of the imagination of the artists, the
superstition of the managers, or a product of the absurd and
impressionable brains of the young ladies of the ballet, their
mothers, the box-keepers, the cloak-room attendants or the
concierge. Yes, he existed in flesh and blood, although he
assumed the complete appearance of a real phantom; that is to
say, of a spectral shade. | | Similar Items: | Find |
497 | Author: | Lewis, Sinclair | Requires cookie* | | Title: | Our Mr. Wrenn: The Romantic Adventures of a Gentle Man | | | Published: | 2000 | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | | | Description: | THE ticket-taker of the Nickelorion Moving-Picture Show is a
public personage, who stands out on Fourteenth Street, New York,
wearing a gorgeous light-blue coat of numerous brass buttons.
He nods to all the patrons, and his nod is the most cordial
in town. Mr. Wrenn used to trot down to Fourteenth Street,
passing ever so many other shows, just to get that cordial nod,
because he had a lonely furnished room for evenings, and for
daytime a tedious job that always made his head stuffy. | | Similar Items: | Find |
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