Quick Excerpts, from a Library of 492 Titles

Generated 2022-07-28 13:25:57

Excerpt #1, from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, by Mark Twain

…as well at home. And although this expedition was strictly a holiday excursion for the king, he kept some of his business functions going just the same. He touched for the evil, as usual; he held court in the gate at sunrise and tried cases, for he was himself Chief Justice of the King’s Bench. He shone very well in this latter office. He was a wise and humane judge, and he clearly did his honest best and fairest,–according to his lights. That is a large reservation. His lights–I mean his rearing–often colored his decisions. Whenever there was a dispute between a noble or gentleman and a person of lower degree, the king’s leanings and sympathies were for the former class always, whether he suspected it or not. It was impossible that this should be otherwise. The blunting effects of slavery upon the slaveholder’s moral perceptions are known and conceded, the world over; and a privileged class, an aristocracy, is but a band of slaveholders under another name. This has a harsh sound, and yet should not be offensive to any–even to the noble himself–unless the fact itself be an offense: for the statement simply formulates a fact. The repulsive feature of slavery is the thing, not its name. One needs but to hear an aristocrat speak of the classes that are below him to recognize–and in but indifferently modified measure…

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Excerpt #2, from Ocean Steam Navigation and the Ocean Post, by Thomas Rainey

…must go by the Cunard line to England, and thence by English steamers to the British Channel, the Baltic, the White Sea, the Mediterranean, Egypt, Constantinople, or the Black Sea. Those to places along the coast of Africa and to the Cape of Good Hope are dependent on the same English packet transit. For our communication with China, India, Australia, the East-Indies generally, and the Islands of the Pacific, we are entirely and slavishly dependent, as usual, on Great Britain. Instead of sending our letters and passengers direct from Panamá or San Francisco to Honolulu, Hong Kong, Shanghae, Macáo, Calcutta, Ceylón, Bombáy, Madrás, Sydney, Melbourne, Batavia, the Mauritius, and the Gulf of Mozambique, by a short trunk line of our own steamers, and from its terminus only, by the British lines, they now go first to England, as a slavish matter of course, then across the Continent or through the Mediterranean to Egypt, thence by land to the Red Sea, and thence to China and the East-Indies; or from England by her steam lines around the Cape of Good Hope to Australia and the East-Indies; or by slow and uncertain sailing packets direct from our own country, either around Cape Horn or the Cape of Good Hope. It is evident to every reflecting man who has given the subject any attention, that all of these lines of communication would be very desirable, and very highly profitable to our people at large; and that the latter and that…

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Excerpt #3, from The Foolish Dictionary, by Gideon Wurdz

…trait in others is downright idiocy. * * * * =INDORSE= To write on the back of; the best indorsed man in town being the Sandwich-Man. * * * =INFANT= A disturber of the peace. =INFANTRY= A defender of the peace. * * * =INHABITANT= A native of any village, town or city. =OLDEST INHABITANT= The Champion Liar. * * * =INTUITION= A fictitious quality in females–really Suspicion. * * * =IRRITANT= Something which irritates. =COUNTER IRRITANT= A woman shopping. * * * =ISLAND= A place where the bottom of the sea sticks up through the water. * * * * =ISOLATION= From Eng. ice, meaning cold, and Lat. solus, alone. Alone in the cold….

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Excerpt #4, from Norman Ten Hundred, by A. Stanley Blicq

…been married a year, chewin’ each others ‘ead orf. Come yere an’ give me a ’and, Stumpy." And he turned again to the task of clearing a layer of mud from his rifle bolt with a grimy piece of rag an inch square. There is a refreshing originality (sic) in the al fresco meals partaken of in the fresh open air, in a comfortable trench–so comfortable that legs are twelve inches too long, knees in the way of your chin, and somebody’s boots making doormats of your tiny bit of cheese. Water and tea–when you get it–has a most uncommon flavour of petrol due to being transported in petrol cans. Stumpy was of the opinion that the War Office should be advised to utilise rum jars instead. Fritz has a gentlemanly knack of dropping a shell near you and depositing a mighty chunk of black filth in the very midst of your grub. Resultant language unprintable. Slight falls of snow began to take place, the wind increased and nights in the trenches became one long vista of drawn-out agony. Hands and feet froze; maintain circulation was an absolute physical impossibility: but it had to be faced through the long, over long, hours of waiting, and there was no alternative, no remedy. You suffered, Royal Guernseys, men of a warm, sunny isle, who had not hitherto known the harsh winter of miles inland spots. But you stuck it well, rifle grasped in a hand gone stiff, face cut and blistered from the fierce wind; feet aching with…

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Excerpt #5, from Gallipoli Diary, Volume 1, by Ian Hamilton

…sounded (I had not told anyone of my intention) so the swift yet smooth fall-in to danger posts was a feather in Cox’s helmet. Back to main camp and there saw troops not manning the Fort. There were the:– Queen Victoria’s Own Sappers Captain Hogg, R.E., 69th Punjabis Colonel Harding, 89th Punjabis Colonel Campbell, 14th K.G.O. Sikhs Colonel Palin, 1st Bn. 6th Gurkhas Colonel Bruce, 29th Mountain Battery and the Bikaner Camel Corps Major Bruce. Had a second good talk to the Native Officers, shaking hands all round. Much struck with the turn-out of the 29th Mountain Battery which is to come along with the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps to the Dardanelles. From the platform of the Fort the lines of our defences and the way the Turks attacked them stood out very clearly to a pair of field glasses. Why, with so many mounted men some effort was not made to harry the enemy’s retreat, Cox cannot tell me. There were no trenches and the…

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Excerpt #6, from The King James Version of the Bible

…23:9 Moreover Jehoiada the priest delivered to the captains of hundreds spears, and bucklers, and shields, that had been king David’s, which were in the house of God. 23:10 And he set all the people, every man having his weapon in his hand, from the right side of the temple to the left side of the temple, along by the altar and the temple, by the king round about. 23:11 Then they brought out the king’s son, and put upon him the crown, and gave him the testimony, and made him king. And Jehoiada and his sons anointed him, and said, God save the king. 23:12 Now when Athaliah heard the noise of the people running and praising the king, she came to the people into the house of the LORD: 23:13 And she looked, and, behold, the king stood at his pillar at the entering in, and the princes and the trumpets by the king: and all the people of the land rejoiced, and sounded with trumpets, also the singers with instruments of musick, and such as taught to sing praise. Then Athaliah rent her clothes, and said, Treason, Treason. 23:14 Then Jehoiada the priest brought out the captains of hundreds that were set over the host, and said unto them, Have her forth of the ranges: and whoso followeth her, let him be slain with the sword. For the priest said, Slay her not in the house of the LORD. 23:15 So they laid hands on her; and when she was come to the entering…

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Excerpt #7, from The Invasion of 1910, with a full account of the siege of London, by Le Queux

…The 13th Division, under Doppschutz, were evidently advancing by the main Doncaster road. Their advance guard, which had already occupied Rotherham, had also seized the bridge which the invaders had neither time nor material to demolish, and now swept on across it, although exposed to a heavy onslaught from that line of the British position between Tinsley and Brinsworth. Those sturdy, stolid Westphalians and bearded men of Lorraine still kept on. Numbers dropped, and the bridge was quickly strewn with dead and dying. Yet nothing checked the steady advance of that irresistible wave of humanity. Down the River Rother, at Kanklow Bridge, a similar scene was being enacted. The railway bridge at Catcliffe was also taken by storm, and at Woodhouse Mill the 14th Division, under Von Kehler, made a terrific and successful dash, as they also did at Beighton. The river itself was about an average distance of a mile in front of the British position, and although as heavy a fire as possible was directed upon all approaches to it, yet the Germans were not to be denied. Utterly indifferent to any losses, they still swept on in an overwhelming tide, leaving at the most not more than ten per cent. of casualties to be dealt with by the perfectly equipped ambulances in their rear. So, for the most part, the various regiments constituting the divisions of the two German commanders found themselves shaken, but…

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Excerpt #8, from The Art of War, by active 6th century B.C. Sunzi

…troops, and place it secretly in ambuscade. Then your opponent will sally forth to the rescue.“] 12. On open ground, do not try to block the enemy’s way. [Because the attempt would be futile, and would expose the blocking force itself to serious risks. There are two interpretations available here. I follow that of Chang Yu. The other is indicated in Ts’ao Kung’s brief note: "Draw closer together"—i.e., see that a portion of your own army is not cut off.] On ground of intersecting highways, join hands with your allies. [Or perhaps, "form alliances with neighbouring states."] 13. On serious ground, gather in plunder. [On this, Li Ch’uan has the following delicious note:”When an army penetrates far into the enemy’s country, care must be taken not to alienate the people by unjust treatment. Follow the example of the Han Emperor Kao Tsu, whose march into Ch’in territory was marked by no violation of women or looting of valuables. [Nota bene: this was in 207 B.C., and may well cause us to blush for the Christian armies that entered Peking in 1900 A.D.] Thus he won the hearts of all. In the present passage, then, I think that the true reading must be, not ‘plunder,’ but ‘do not plunder.’" Alas, I fear that in this instance the worthy commentator’s feelings outran his judgment. Tu Mu, at least,…

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Excerpt #9, from The Odyssey, by Homer

…but even so, for all my sorrow I would not let her come near the blood till I had asked my questions of Teiresias. “Then came also the ghost of Theban Teiresias, with his golden sceptre in his hand. He knew me and said, ‘Ulysses, noble son of Laertes, why, poor man, have you left the light of day and come down to visit the dead in this sad place? Stand back from the trench and withdraw your sword that I may drink of the blood and answer your questions truly.’ “So I drew back, and sheathed my sword, whereon when he had drank of the blood he began with his prophecy. “‘You want to know,’ said he, ‘about your return home, but heaven will make this hard for you. I do not think that you will escape the eye of Neptune, who still nurses his bitter grudge against you for having blinded his son. Still, after much suffering you may get home if you can restrain yourself and your companions when your ship reaches the Thrinacian island, where you will find the sheep and cattle belonging to the sun, who sees and gives ear to everything. If you leave these flocks unharmed and think of nothing but of getting home, you may yet after much hardship reach Ithaca; but if you harm them, then I forewarn you of the destruction both of your ship and of your men. Even though you may yourself escape, you will return in bad plight after losing all your men, [in another man’s ship, and you will find trouble in your…

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Excerpt #10, from Recollections and impressions of James A. McNeill Whistler, by Arthur Jerome Eddy

…exhibition. “To have seen him, O, my wise Atlas, was my privilege and my misery,–for he stood under one of my own ‘harmonies,’ already with difficulty gasping its gentle breath, himself an amazing ‘arrangement’ in strong mustard-and-cress, with bird’s-eye belcher of Reckitt’s blue, and then and there destroyed absolutely, unintentionally, and once for all, my year’s work!” * * * * * The analogy between the musical scale and the color scale has been many times noted. Helmholtz[37] draws the following analogy: F ♯ End of the red. G Red. G ♯ Red. A Red. A ♯ Orange-red. B Orange. c Yellow. c ♯ Green. d Greenish-blue. d ♯ Cyanogen-blue. e Indigo-blue….

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Excerpt #11, from Behind the Beyond, and Other Contributions to Human Knowledge, by Stephen Leacock

…the table–turns–and stands—- He sees his wife’s attitude and hears her say “Riviera, Amalfi, Orangieri, Contadini and Capello Santo.” It is enough. He drops his parliamentary papers. They fall against the fire irons with a crash. These in falling upset a small table with one leg. The ball of wool that is on it falls to the floor. The noise of this disturbs the lovers. They turn. All three look at one another. For a moment they make a motion as if to ring for tea. Then they stand petrified. “You!” gasps Lady Cicely. She does this awfully well. Everybody says afterward that it was just splendid when she said “You.” Sir John stands gazing in horror. “Him! My God! He!” Mr. Harding says nothing. He looks very weak. Lady Cicely unpetrifies first. She breaks out, speaking through her nostrils. “Yes, I love him, I love him. I’m not ashamed of it. What right have you to deny it me? You gave me nothing. You made me a chattel, a thing—-” You can feel the rustle of indignation through the house at this. To make a woman a thing is the crowning horror of a problem play. “You starved me here. You throttled me.” Lady Cicely takes herself by the neck and throttles herself a little to show how. "You smothered me. I couldn’t breathe–and now I’m going, do you hear,…

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Excerpt #12, from Diego Collado’s Grammar of the Japanese Language, by Diego Collado

…539, Jan. 1929). An English treatment of the grammatical system of the period is to be found in R. L. Spear, “A Grammatical Study of Esopo no Fabulas,” an unpublished doctoral thesis (Michigan, 1966). The phonology has been carefully analyzed by Ōtomo Shin’ichi, Muromachi jidai no kokugo onsei no kenkyū (Tokyo, 1963), with a valuable contribution made in English by J. F. Moran, “A Commentary on the Arte Breve da Lingoa Iapao of João Rodriguez, S.J., with Particular Reference to Pronunciation,” an unpublished doctoral thesis (Oxford, 1971). This latter work presents an exhaustive examination of the phonological system reflected in the Arte Breve of 1620 within the framework of Berhard Bloch’s phonemic theory. Two lexical works have been used as basic references in this translation. The Vocabulario de Lingoa de Iapam (hereafter the Vocabulario) produced by the Jesuit Mission Press at Nagasaki in the years 1603 and 04. In a carefully annotated version by Professor Doi, under the title Nippo jisho (Tokyo, 1960), this work is the most important single source for the vocabulary of the period. The second work is the Dictionarium sive Thesauri Linguae Iaponicae Compendium (hereafter the Dictionarium) which is the companion piece to the present text. This dictionary has been carefully edited and cross-referenced by Ōtsuka Mitsunobu, under the title Koriyaado Ra Su Nichi jiten (Tokyo, 1966). In this form it has served as a constant aid to the translator in the determination of the proper glosses…

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