Quick Excerpts, from a Library of 492 Titles

Generated 2022-07-28 13:26:17

Excerpt #1, from Right Ho, Jeeves, by P. G. Wodehouse

…forget about a cousin nearly being chewed by monsters of the deep. The episode was still green in my memory. In a nutshell, what had occurred was this: You know how you aquaplane. A motor-boat nips on ahead, trailing a rope. You stand on a board, holding the rope, and the boat tows you along. And every now and then you lose your grip on the rope and plunge into the sea and have to swim to your board again. A silly process it has always seemed to me, though many find it diverting. Well, on the occasion referred to, Angela had just regained her board after taking a toss, when a great beastly shark came along and cannoned into it, flinging her into the salty once more. It took her quite a bit of time to get on again and make the motor-boat chap realize what was up and haul her to safety, and during that interval you can readily picture her embarrassment. According to Angela, the finny denizen kept snapping at her ankles virtually without cessation, so that by the time help arrived, she was feeling more like a salted almond at a public dinner than anything human. Very shaken the poor child had been, I recall, and had talked of nothing else for weeks. “I remember the whole incident vividly,” I said. "But how did that start…

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Excerpt #2, from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, by Lewis Carroll

…curious song about the whiting!” “Oh, as to the whiting,” said the Mock Turtle, “they—you’ve seen them, of course?” “Yes,” said Alice, “I’ve often seen them at dinn—” she checked herself hastily. “I don’t know where Dinn may be,” said the Mock Turtle, “but if you’ve seen them so often, of course you know what they’re like.” “I believe so,” Alice replied thoughtfully. “They have their tails in their mouths—and they’re all over crumbs.” “You’re wrong about the crumbs,” said the Mock Turtle: “crumbs would all wash off in the sea. But they have their tails in their mouths; and the reason is—” here the Mock Turtle yawned and shut his eyes.—“Tell her about the reason and all that,” he said to the Gryphon. “The reason is,” said the Gryphon, “that they would go with the lobsters to the dance. So they got thrown out to sea. So they had to fall a long way. So they got their tails fast in their mouths. So they couldn’t get them out again. That’s all.” “Thank you,” said Alice, “it’s very interesting. I never knew so much about a whiting before.” “I can tell you more than that, if you like,” said the Gryphon. “Do you know why it’s called a whiting?”…

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Excerpt #3, from The Communist Manifesto, by Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx

…by those means. In either case, it is both reactionary and Utopian. Its last words are: corporate guilds for manufacture, patriarchal relations in agriculture. Ultimately, when stubborn historical facts had dispersed all intoxicating effects of self-deception, this form of Socialism ended in a miserable fit of the blues. C. German, or “True,” Socialism The Socialist and Communist literature of France, a literature that originated under the pressure of a bourgeoisie in power, and that was the expression of the struggle against this power, was introduced into Germany at a time when the bourgeoisie, in that country, had just begun its contest with feudal absolutism. German philosophers, would-be philosophers, and beaux esprits, eagerly seized on this literature, only forgetting, that when these writings immigrated from France into Germany, French social conditions had not immigrated along with them. In contact with German social conditions, this French literature lost all its immediate practical significance, and assumed a purely literary aspect. Thus, to the German philosophers of the eighteenth century, the demands of the first French Revolution were nothing more than the demands of “Practical Reason” in general, and the utterance of the will of the revolutionary French…

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Excerpt #4, from A Floating City, and The Blockade Runners, by Jules Verne

…first.” “He will smoke.” “He will have a pipe in his mouth.” “No! a cigar.” “No!” “Yes!” “No!” And twenty other wagers quite as ridiculous, which found those more absurd still to accept them. [Illustration: A SMALL SCHOONER WAS SIGNALLED TO STARBOARD.] In the meanwhile the little schooner was sensibly approaching the steam-ship, and we could distinguish her graceful proportions. These charming little pilot-boats, of about fifty or sixty tons, are good sea-boats, skimming over the water like sea-gulls. The schooner, gracefully inclined, was bearing windward in spite of the breeze, which had begun to freshen. Her mast and foresails stood out clearly against the dark background of clouds, and the sea foamed beneath her bows. When at two cables’ length from the “Great Eastern,” she suddenly veered and launched a shore-boat. Captain Anderson gave orders to heave-to, and for the first time during a fortnight the wheels of the screw were motionless. A man got into the boat, which four sailors quickly pulled to the steam-ship. A rope-ladder was thrown over the side of the giant down to the pilot in his little nutshell, which the latter caught, and,…

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Excerpt #5, from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources

…=The earth is our workshop. We may not curse it; we are bound to sanctify it.= Mazzini. =The earth is sown with pleasures, as the heavens are studded with stars, wherever the conditions of existence are unsophisticated.= W. R. Greg. =The earth must supply man with the necessaries of life before he has leisure or inclination to pursue more refined enjoyments.= Goldsmith. =The earth, that’s Nature’s mother, is her tomb.= Rom. and Jul., ii. 3. =The earthen pot must keep clear of the brass= 35 =kettle.= Pr. =The ebb’d man, ne’er loved till ne’er worth love, / Comes dear’d by being lack’d.= Ant. and Cleop., i. 4. =The echo of the nest-life, the voice of our modest, fairer, holier soul, is audible only in a sorrow-darkened bosom, as the nightingales…

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Excerpt #6, from Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II, by Thomas Stevens

…dwindled to mere rivulets, and the narrow, miry trail through the melting snow has become dry and smooth enough to ride wherever the grade permits. The hills are verdant with the green young life of early spring, and are clothed in one of nature’s prettiest costumes–a costume of seal-brown rocks and green turf studded with a profusion of blue and yellow flowers. Shahriffabad is reached early in the afternoon, and the threatening aspect of the changed weather forbids going any farther today. Shortly after taking up my quarters in the chapar-khana, a party of Persian travellers appear upon the scene, and with them a fussy little man in big round spectacles and semi-European clothes. Scarcely have they had time to alight and seek out quarters than the little man makes his appearance at my menzil door in all the glory of a crimson velvet dressing-cap and blue slippers, and beaming gladsomely through his moon-like spectacles, he comes forward and without further ceremony shakes hands. “Some queer little French professor, geologist, entomologist, or something, wandering about the country in search of scientific knowledge,” is the instinctive conclusion I arrive at the moment he appears; and my greeting of “bonjour, monsieur,” is quite as involuntary as the conclusion. “Paruski ni?” he replies, arching his eyebrows and smiling. “Paruski ni; Ingilis.”…

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Excerpt #7, from Leviathan, by Thomas Hobbes

…Common-wealth. Nothing Done To A Man, By His Own Consent Can Be Injury Whatsoever is done to a man, conformable to his own Will signified to the doer, is no Injury to him. For if he that doeth it, hath not passed away his originall right to do what he please, by some Antecedent Covenant, there is no breach of Covenant; and therefore no Injury done him. And if he have; then his Will to have it done being signified, is a release of that Covenant; and so again there is no Injury done him. Justice Commutative, And Distributive Justice of Actions, is by Writers divided into Commutative, and Distributive; and the former they say consisteth in proportion Arithmeticall; the later in proportion Geometricall. Commutative therefore, they place in the equality of value of the things contracted for; And Distributive, in the distribution of equall benefit, to men of equall merit. As if it were Injustice to sell dearer than we buy; or to give more to a man than he merits. The value of all things contracted for, is measured by the Appetite of the Contractors: and therefore the just value, is that which they be contented to give. And Merit (besides that which is by Covenant, where the performance on one part, meriteth the performance of the other part, and falls under Justice Commutative, not Distributive,) is not due by Justice; but is rewarded of Grace…

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Excerpt #8, from The Call of the Wild, by Jack London

…grew stronger they enticed him into all sorts of ridiculous games, in which Thornton himself could not forbear to join; and in this fashion Buck romped through his convalescence and into a new existence. Love, genuine passionate love, was his for the first time. This he had never experienced at Judge Miller’s down in the sun-kissed Santa Clara Valley. With the Judge’s sons, hunting and tramping, it had been a working partnership; with the Judge’s grandsons, a sort of pompous guardianship; and with the Judge himself, a stately and dignified friendship. But love that was feverish and burning, that was adoration, that was madness, it had taken John Thornton to arouse. This man had saved his life, which was something; but, further, he was the ideal master. Other men saw to the welfare of their dogs from a sense of duty and business expediency; he saw to the welfare of his as if they were his own children, because he could not help it. And he saw further. He never forgot a kindly greeting or a cheering word, and to sit down for a long talk with them (“gas” he called it) was as much his delight as theirs. He had a way of taking Buck’s head roughly between his hands, and resting his own head upon Buck’s, of shaking him back and forth, the while calling him ill names that to Buck were love names. Buck knew no greater joy than that rough embrace and the sound of murmured oaths, and at each jerk back and forth it seemed that his…

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Excerpt #9, from Bel Ami; Or, The History of a Scoundrel: A Novel, by Guy de Maupassant

…advanced, a glass of liqueur in his hand, and Duroy discreetly withdrew. Mme. de Marelle, who was chatting with her hostess, called him: “So, sir,” she said bluntly, “you are going to try journalism?” That question led to a renewal of the interrupted conversation with Mme. Walter. In her turn Mme. de Marelle related anecdotes, and becoming familiar, laid her hand upon Duroy’s arm. He felt that he would like to devote himself to her, to protect her–and the slowness with which he replied to her questions indicated his preoccupation. Suddenly, without any cause, Mme. de Marelle called: “Laurine!” and the girl came to her. “Sit down here, my child, you will be cold near the window.” Duroy was seized with an eager desire to embrace the child, as if part of that embrace would revert to the mother. He asked in a gallant, yet paternal tone: “Will you permit me to kiss you, Mademoiselle?” The child raised her eyes with an air of surprise. Mme. de Marelle said with a smile: “Reply.” “I will allow you to-day, Monsieur, but not all the time.” Seating himself, Duroy took Laurine upon his knee, and kissed her lips and her fine wavy hair. Her mother was surprised: “Well, that is strange! Ordinarily she only allows ladies to caress her. You are irresistible, Monsieur!”…

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Excerpt #10, from Shakespeare’s Sonnets, by William Shakespeare

…If I could write the beauty of your eyes, And in fresh numbers number all your graces, The age to come would say ‘This poet lies; Such heavenly touches ne’er touch’d earthly faces.’ So should my papers, yellow’d with their age, Be scorn’d, like old men of less truth than tongue, And your true rights be term’d a poet’s rage And stretched metre of an antique song: But were some child of yours alive that time, You should live twice,–in it, and in my rhyme. XVIII Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimm’d, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature’s changing course untrimm’d: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow’st,…

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Excerpt #11, from A Christmas Carol in Prose; Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, by Charles Dickens

…“On the wings of the wind,” replied the Ghost. “You might have got over a great quantity of ground in seven years,” said Scrooge. The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another cry, and clanked its chain so hideously in the dead silence of the night, that the Ward would have been justified in indicting it for a nuisance. “Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed,” cried the phantom, “not to know, that ages of incessant labour by immortal creatures, for this earth must pass into eternity before the good of which it is susceptible is all developed. Not to know that any Christian spirit working kindly in its little sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal life too short for its vast means of usefulness. Not to know that no space of regret can make amends for one life’s opportunity misused! Yet such was I! Oh! such was I!” “But you were always a good man of business, Jacob,” faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself. “Business!” cried the Ghost, wringing its hands…

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Excerpt #12, from Radioisotopes and Life Processes (Revised), by Baserga and Kisieleski

…in Figure 8, the isotope ¹H, or ordinary hydrogen, consists of a nucleus containing a proton (charge: +1; mass: 1) around which revolves an electron (charge: -1; mass: negligible); ²H, known as deuterium, contains an additional nuclear particle, a neutron (charge: 0; mass: 1); ³H, or tritium, contains two neutrons. Since the chemical behavior of an element depends upon the number of its electrons, these three atoms, although differing in weight, behave identically in chemical reactions. For convenience, the atomic weight is written as a superscript to the left of the element’s symbol. For instance ¹⁴C is the isotope of carbon with an atomic weight of 14 (ordinary carbon is the isotope with an atomic weight of 12, and it is written ¹²C). [Illustration: Figure 8 Isotopes of hydrogen.] Hydrogen (¹H) Deuterium (²H) Tritium (³H) Practically all elements have more than one isotope. There are two general classes of isotopes, stable and radioactive. Stable isotopes have no distinguishing characteristic other than their mass; radioactive isotopes not only differ from their brothers in mass but also are characterized by unstable nuclei. When the nucleus of an atom is unstable, because of an unbalanced number of protons and neutrons, a…

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