My Literary Zoo

by Kate Sanborn

Poor Matthias.

Poor Matthias! Found him lying

Fallen beneath his perch and dying?

Found him stiff, you say, though warm,

All convulsed his little form?

Poor canary, many a year

Well he knew his mistress dear;

Now in vain you call his name,

Vainly raise his rigid frame.

Vainly warm him in your heart,

Vainly kiss his golden crest,

Smooth his ruffled plumage fine,

Touch his trembling beak with wine.

One more gasp, it is the end,

Dead and mute our tiny friend.

Poor Matthias, wouldst thou have

More than pity? Claim’st a stave?

Friends more near us than a bird

We dismissed without a word.

Rover with the good brown head,

Great Attossa, they are dead;

Dead, and neither prose nor rhyme

Tells the praises of their prime.

---

Thou hast seen Attossa sage

Sit for hours beside thy cage;

Thou wouldst chirp, thou foolish bird,

Flutter, chirp, she never stirred.

What were now these toys to her?

Down she sank amid her fur;

Eyed thee with a soul resigned,

And thou deemedst cats were kind.

Cruel, but composed and bland,

Dumb, inscrutable and grand,

So Tiberius might have sat

Had Tiberius been a cat.

Fare thee well, companion dear,

Fare forever well, nor fear,

Tiny though thou art, to stray

Down the uncompanioned way.

We without thee, little friend,

Many years have yet to spend;

What are left will hardly be

Better than we spent with thee.

Maclise was one of the intimate associates, if we may use the expression, of Dickens’s celebrated Raven. The letter in which the bereaved owners announced to Maclise the death of this interesting bird has been published, but the reply of the artist is now printed for the first time:

“March 13, 1841.

“My dear Dickens: I received the mournful intelligence of our friend’s decease last night at eleven, and the shock was great indeed. I have just dispatched the announcement to poor Forster, who will, I am sure, sympathize deeply with our bereavement.

“I know not what to think is the probable cause of his death—I reject the idea of the Butcher Boy, for the orders he must have in his (the Raven’s) lifetime received on acct. of the Raven himself must have been considerable—I rather cling to the notion of felo de se, but this will no doubt come out upon the post mortem. How blest we are to have such an intelligent coroner in Mr. Wakely! I think he was just of those grave, melancholic habits which are the noticeable signs of your intended suicide—his solitary life—those gloomy tones, when he did speak—which was always to the purpose, witness his last dying speech—‘Hallo, old girl!’ which breathes of cheerfulness and triumphant resignation—his solemn suit of raven black which never grew rusty—altogether his character was the very prototype of a Byron Hero and even of a Scott—a master of Ravenswood——We ought to be glad he had his family, I suppose; he seems to have intended it, however, for his solicitude to deposit in those Banks in the Garden his savings, were always very touching—I suppose his obsequies will take place immediately—It is beautiful—the idea of his return soon after death to the scene of his early youth and all his joyful associations, to lie with kindred dusts amid his own ancestral groves, after having come out and made such a noise in the world, having clearly booked his place in that immortality coach driven by Dickens.

“Yes, he committed suicide, he felt he had done it and done with life—the hundreds of years!! What were they to him? There was nothing near to live for—and he committed the rash act.

“Sympathizingly yours,

“D. Maclise.”

The pet dove of Thurlow Weed seemed inconsolable after his death. When any gentleman called at the house the bird would alight on his shoulder, coo, and peer into his face. Then finding it was not his dear friend, he would sadly seek some other perch. Miss Weed writes: “Since the day that father’s remains were carried away, the affectionate creature has been seeking for his master. He flies through every room in the house, and fairly haunts the library. Many times every day the mourning bird comes and takes a survey of the room. He will tread over every inch of space on the lounge, and then go to the rug, over which he will walk repeatedly, as if in expectation of his dead master’s coming. Does not this seem akin to human grief?”

Whittier wrote a good deal about his pet parrot. Read his poem called “The Bird’s Question.” After his tragic end, the Quaker bard wrote of him: “I have met with a real loss. Poor Charlie is dead. He has gone where the good parrots go. He has been ailing and silent for some time, and he finally died. Do not laugh at me, but I am sorry enough to cry if it would do any good. He was an old friend. Lizzie liked him. And he was the heartiest, jolliest, pleasantest old fellow I ever saw.” He used to perch upon the back of his master’s chair at meal time; at times disgracefully profane, especially when in moments of extreme excitement he would climb to the steeple by way of the lightning rod, and there he would dance and sing and swear on a Sunday morning, amusing the passer-by and shocking his owner. At last he fell down the chimney, and was not discovered for two days. He was rescued in the middle of the night, and, although he partially recovered, he soon died. Whittier said: “We buried poor Charlie decently. If there is a parrot’s paradise he ought to go there.” He also had a pet Bantam rooster which would perch on his shoulder, and liked to be buttoned up in his coat. Grace Greenwood in Heads or Tails speaks of a diplomatic parrot belonging to Seward, at Washington, taking part in political discussion, trying to scream Sumner down, and so sympathetic that when his master had a cough he had symptoms of bronchitis.

In a trustworthy collection of epitaphs may be found this quaint tribute with old-fashioned formality to a pet bird:

“Here lieth, aged three months, the body of Richard Acanthus, a young person of unblemished character. He was taken in his callow infancy from the wing of a tender parent by the rough and pitiless hand of a two-legged animal without feathers.

“Though born with the most aspiring disposition and unbending love of freedom he was closely confined in a grated prison, and scarcely permitted to view those fields of which he had an undoubted charter.

“Deeply sensible of this infringement of his natural rights, he was often heard to petition for redress in the most plaintive notes of harmonious sorrow. At length his imprisoned soul burst the prison which his body could not, and left a lifeless heap of beauteous feathers.

“If suffering innocence can hope for retribution, deny not to the gentle shade of this unfortunate captive the humble though uncertain hope of animating some happier form; or trying his new-fledged pinions in some happy Elysium, beyond the reach of Man, the tyrant of this lower world.”

Few women are so fond of pets as Sarah Bernhardt. She carries five or six with her in all her travels. When in New York the French actress has apartments at the Hoffman House. When the writer last visited her there he was received, upon entering the sitting room, by half a dozen dogs, ranging in size and species from the massive St. Bernard to the tiny, shivering black and tan.

The actress rose from a low divan and extended one hand to her guest while she pressed two very small snakes to her bosom with the other. After she had resumed her seat upon the divan, and while conversing, she fondled the snakes or allowed them to squirm at will over her person.

In reply to questions, Madame Bernhardt said that the snakes were used in the famous scene where Cleopatra presses the asp to her bosom and dies. The actress explained that the snakes with which she was playing were presented to her by a gentleman in Philadelphia. She spoke regretfully of the death of the snakes which she had brought with her from France, and which had succumbed to the hardships of the ocean voyage.

Emily Crawford tells some good stories about “The Elder Dumas,” the most dashingly picturesque character, surely, in the whole range of literature. We quote a paragraph showing Dumas’s fondness for animals:

“At his architectural folly of Monte Cristo, near Saint-Germain-en-Laye, which he built at a cost of upward of seven hundred thousand francs, and sold for thirty-six thousand francs in 1848, Dumas had uninclosed grounds and gardens, which, with the house, afforded lodgings and entertainment not only to a host of Bohemian ‘sponges,’ but to all the dogs, cats, and donkeys that chose to quarter themselves in the place. It was called by the neighbours ‘la Maison de Bon Dieu.’ There was a menagerie in the park, peopled by three apes; Jugurtha, the vulture, whose transport from Africa, whence Dumas fetched him, cost forty thousand francs (it would be too long to tell why); a big parrot called Duval; a macaw named Papa, and another christened Everard; Lucullus, the golden pheasant; Cæsar, the game-cock; a pea-fowl and a guinea-fowl; Myeouf II, the Angora cat, and the Scotch pointer, Pritchard. This dog was a character. He was fond of canine society, and used to sit in the road looking out for other dogs to invite them to keep him company at Monte Cristo. He was taken by his master to Ham to visit Louis Napoleon when a prisoner there. The latter wished to keep Pritchard, but counted without the intelligence of the animal in asking Dumas before his face to leave him behind. The pointer set up a howl so piteous that the governor of the prison withdrew the authorization he had given his captive to retain him.”

It is difficult to think of any created thing that has not been found sufficiently interesting to be petted by some one!

Pliny tells us of a cow that followed a Pythagorean philosopher on all his travels. Proud Wolsey was on familiar terms with a venerable carp. St. Anthony had a fondness for pigs. Frank Buckland took to rats. Buffon’s toad has become historical. Clive owned a pet tortoise. Gautier wrote of his lizards, magpie, and chameleon. Butterflies and crickets have been domesticated and found responsive. Rosa Bonheur used to be always escorted by two great dogs, one on either side, while in her home a favourite monkey played upon her staircase, and amused visitors with its gambols and pranks. Cowper doffed his melancholy to play with hares, and immortalized his rather ungrateful pensioners in verse:

Well—one at least is safe. One sheltered hare

Has never heard the sanguinary yell

Of cruel man, exulting in her woes,

Innocent partner of my peaceful home,

Whom ten long years’ experience of my care

Has made at last familiar; she has lost

Much of her vigilant instinctive dread,

Not needful here, beneath a roof like mine.

Yes—thou mayst eat thy bread, and lick the hand

That feeds thee; thou mayst frolic on the floor

At ev’ning, and at night retire secure

To thy straw couch, and slumber unalarmed;

For I have gained thy confidence, have pledged

All that is human in me, to protect

Thine unsuspecting gratitude and love.

If I survive thee, I will dig thy grave;

And, when I place thee in it, sighing say,

I knew at least one hare that had a friend.

James M. Hoppin, in his Old England, tells of his visit to Olney, where Cowper lived. He went to the rooms where he kept his hares, Puss, Bess, and Tiny; of the veteran survivor of this famous trio he says Cowper wrote:

Though duly from my hand he took

His pittance every night,

He did it with a jealous look,

And when he could, would bite.

Dr. John Hall was seen trudging through Central Park last winter, followed by a troop of frisky little gay squirrels. He had been feeding nuts to them, and they scattered the snow in clouds as they scampered along hoping to get more.

It would be interesting to quote from very many distinguished persons who believe in the immortality of the lower animals.

Lord Shaftesbury says: “I have ever believed in a happy future for animals. I can not say or conjecture how or where, but sure I am that the love so manifested, by dogs especially, is an emanation from the Divine essence, and as such it can, or rather it will, never be extinguished.”

Frances Power Cobbe wrote: “I entirely believe in a higher existence hereafter, both for myself and for those whose less happy lives on earth entitle them far more to expect it, from eternal love and justice.”

Mr. Somerville said: “The dear animals I believe we shall meet. They suffer so often here they must live again! Pain seems a poor proof of immortality, but it is used by theologians, and we find many great souls who believe and hope that animals may also have another life. Agassiz believed in this firmly. Bishop Butler saw no reason why the latent powers and capacities of the lower animals should not be developed in the future, and in his Analogy of Religion he endeavoured to carry out this train of thought, and to show that the lower animals do possess those mental and moral characteristics which we admit in ourselves to belong to the immortal spirit and not to the perishable body.”

The Rev. J. G. Wood has written a most interesting book on Man and Beast: Here and Hereafter, with the especial aim of proving the immortality of the brute creation, showing that they share with man the attributes of reason, language, memory, a sense of moral responsibility, unselfishness, and love, all of which belong to the spirit and not to the body.

Bayard Taylor says, “If one should surmise a lower form of spiritual being yet equally indestructible, who need take alarm?” “Yea, they have all one breath, so that a man hath no pre-eminence above a beast, for all is vanity,” said the Preacher, more than two thousand years ago. In Taylor’s poem to an old horse, Ben Equus, which died on the farm when he was a young man, he uses the same idea:

For I may dream fidelity like thine,

May save some essence in thee from decay,

That, not neglected by the Soul Divine,

Thy being rises on some unknown way.

Some intermediate heaven, where fields are fresh,

And golden stables littered deep with fern;

Where fade the wrongs that horses knew in flesh,

And all the joys that horses felt return.

Mrs. Charles writes:

Is all this lost in nothingness,

Such gladness, love, and hope, and trust,

Such busy thought our thoughts to guess,

All trampled into common dust?

Or is there something yet to come

From all our science all concealed,

About the patient creatures dumb

A secret yet to be revealed?

Writing of the death of a favourite spaniel, Southey expresses the same faith:

... Mine is no narrow creed,

And he that gave thee being did not frame

The mystery of life to be the sport

Of merciless man. There is another world

For all that live and move—a better one,

Where the proud bipeds who would fain confine

Infinite Goodness to the little bounds

Of their own charity, may envy thee.

Mrs. Mary Somerville wrote these words at the age of eighty-nine: “If animals have no future, the existence of many is most wretched. Multitudes are starved, cruelly beaten, and loaded during life; many die under a barbarous vivisection. I can not believe that any creature was created for uncompensated misery; it would be contrary to the attributes of God’s mercy and justice. I am sincerely happy to find that I am not the only believer in the immortality of the lower animals.” Lamartine has the same thought in an address to his dog, and many other wise men have hoped that such a future was a reality.

The Rev. Henry Storrs says it is wisest to treat animals kindly, because, if we are ever to meet them again, it will be pleasanter to have them on our side.

Henry Ward Beecher many times owned his love for horses, as in his one novel, Norwood:

“I tell you,” said Hiram, turning slightly toward the doctor, “these horses are jest as near human as is good for ’em. A good horse has sense jest as much as a man has; and he’s proud, too, and he loves to be praised, and he knows when you treat him with respect. A good horse has the best p’ints of a man without his failin’s.”

“What do you think becomes of horses, Hiram, when they die?” said Rose.

“Wal, Miss Rose, it’s my opinion that there’s use for horses hereafter, and that you’ll find there’s a horse-heaven. There’s Scripture for that, too.”

“Ah!” said Rose, a little surprised at these confident assertions. “What Scripture do you mean?”

“Why, in the Book of Revelation! Don’t it give an account of a white horse, and a red horse, and black horses, and gray horses? I’ve allers s’posed that when it said Death rode on a pale horse, it must have been gray, ’cause it had mentioned white once already. In the ninth chapter, too, it says there was an army of two hundred thousand horsemen. Now, I should like to know where they got so many horses in heaven, if none of ’em that die off here go there? It’s my opinion that a good horse’s a darned sight likelier to go to heaven than a bad man!”

When we see the superiority of a noble horse to his brutal or drunken driver, it seems at least possible, and most of us have lost some pet that we would rather meet again than the majority of our acquaintances.

Helen Barron Bostwick, after “burying her pretty brown mare under the cherry tree,” inquires:

Is this the end?

Do you know?

and closes her poem as follows:

Is there aught of harm believing,

That, some newer form receiving,

They may find a wider sphere,

Live a larger life than here?

That the meek, appealing eyes,

Haunted by strange mysteries,

Find a more extended field,

To new destinies unsealed;

Or, that in the ripened prime

Of some far-off summer time,

Ranging that unknown domain,

We may find our pets again.

Sir Edwin Arnold has translated much that is touching about those who are devoted to animals. A sinful woman led out to die by stoning was pardoned by the king, because of her pity, even at that terrible crisis, for a dying dog:

Glaring upon the water out of reach,

And praying succor in a silent speech,

So piteous were its eyes which, when she saw,

This woman from her foot her shoe did draw,

Albeit death-sorrowful, and looping up

The long silk of her girdle, made a cup

Of the heel’s hollow, and thus let it sink

Until it touched the cool, black water’s brink,

So filled the embroidered shoe and gave a draught

To the spent beast.

This brute beast

Testifies for thee, sister! whose weak breast

Death could not make ungentle. I hold rule

In Allah’s stead, who is the merciful,

And hope for mercy; therefore go thou free—

I dare not show less pity unto thee!

We send missionaries to the East to teach those who in some respects are well fitted by their pure lives, exalted aims, and mercy toward the brute creation to instruct us. How exquisite the story of the man who would not enter heaven and leave his dog behind!

But the king answered: “O thou Wisest One,

Who knowest what was, and is, and is to be,

Still one more grace: this hound hath ate with me,

Followed me, loved me: must I leave him now?”

“Monarch,” spake Indra, “thou art now as we—

Deathless, divine—thou art become a god;

Glory and power and gifts celestial,

And all the joys of heaven are thine for aye.

What hath a beast with these? Leave here thy hound.”

Yet Yudhishthira answered: “O Most High,

O thousand-eyed and wisest; can it be

That one exalted should seem pitiless?

Nay, let me lose such glory: for its sake

I would not leave one living thing I loved.”

Then sternly Indra spake: “He is unclean,

And into Swarga such shall enter not.

The Krodhavasha’s hand destroys the fruits

Of sacrifice, if dogs defile the fire.

Bethink thee, Dharmaraj, quit now this beast;

That which is seemly is not hard of heart.”

Still he replied: “’Tis written that to spurn

A suppliant equals in offence to slay

A twice-born; wherefore, not for Swarga’s bliss

Quit I, Mahendra, this poor clinging dog.

So without any hope or friend save me,

So wistful, fawning for my faithfulness,

So agonized to die, unless I help

Who among men was called steadfast and just.”

Quoth Indra: “Nay, the altar flame is foul

Where a dog passeth; angry angels sweep

The ascending smoke aside, and all the fruits

Of offering, and the merit of the prayer

Of him whom a hound toucheth. Leave it here;

He that will enter heaven must enter pure.

Why didst thou quit thy brethren on the way,

And Krishna, and the dear-loved Draupadi,

Attaining firm and glorious, to this mount

Through perfect deeds, to linger for a brute?

Hath Yudhishthira vanquished self, to melt

With one poor passion at the door of bliss?

Stay’st thou for this, who didst not stay for them—

Draupadi, Bhima?”

But the king yet spake:

“’Tis known that none can hurt or help the dead.

They, the delightful ones, who sank and died,

Following my footsteps, could not live again

Though I had turned, therefore I did not turn;

But could help profit, I had turned to help.

There be four sins, O Sakra, grievous sins:

The first is making suppliants despair,

The second is to slay a nursing wife,

The third is spoiling Brahmans’ goods by force,

The fourth is injuring an ancient friend.

These four I deem but equal to one sin,

If one, in coming forth from woe to weal,

Abandon any meanest comrade then.”

Straight as he spake, brightly great Indra smiled;

Vanished the hound, and in its stead stood there

The Lord of Death and Justice, Dharma’s self.

Sweet were the words that fell from those dread lips,

Precious the lovely praise: “O thou true king,

Thou that dost bring to harvest the true seed

Of Pandu’s righteousness; thou that hast ruth

As he before, on all which lives! O son,

I tried thee in the Dwaita wood, what time

They smote thy brothers, bringing water; then

Thou prayed’st for Nakula’s life, tender and just,

Not Bhima’s nor Arjuna’s, true to both,

To Madri as to Kunti, to both queens.

Hear thou my word: Because thou didst not mount

This car divine, lest the poor hound be shent

Who looked to thee—lo! there is none in heaven

Shall sit above thee, King Bharata’s son!

Enter thou now to the eternal joys,

Living and in thy form. Justice and love

Welcome thee, monarch; thou shalt throne with them.”

As a farmer and butter-maker I want to condense a dissertation on The Intellectual Cow, taken from the London Spectator:

The writer resents the general impression that the cow is merely a food machine, and proves that she never yet has had justice done to her mental qualities, and is entitled to more respectful consideration.

Cows certainly possess decided individuality, and in every herd will be found a master mind which leads and domineers over the rest or acts as ringleader in mischief. They soon learn their own names, and will answer to them, and seldom make mistakes as to their own stalls. They are also undoubtedly influenced by affection, and will give down milk more freely to a friend than to one who is brutal in his manner.

Moreover, they enjoy petting just as much as humans, and will greet with delight those who bring offerings of potatoes or apple-parings or bits of bread, or who will give their heads and necks the luxury of a good rub.

Charles Dudley Warner, in Being a Boy, pays a glowing tribute to the Martial Turkey:

“Perhaps it is not generally known that we get the idea of some of our best military manœuvres from the turkey. The deploying of the skirmish line in advance of an army is one of them. The drum major of our holiday militia companies is copied exactly from the turkey gobbler: he has the same splendid appearance, the same proud step, and the same martial aspect. The gobbler does not lead his forces in the field, but goes behind them, like the colonel of a regiment, so that he can see every part of the line and direct its movements. This resemblance is one of the most singular things in natural history. I like to watch the gobbler manœuvring his forces in a grasshopper field. He throws out his company of two dozen turkeys in a crescent-shaped skirmish line, the number disposed at equal distances, while he walks majestically in the rear. They advance rapidly, picking right and left, with military precision, killing the foe and disposing of the dead bodies with the same peck. Nobody has yet discovered how many grasshoppers a turkey will hold; but he is very much like a boy at a Thanksgiving dinner—he keeps on eating as long as the supplies last. The gobbler, in one of these raids, does not condescend to grab a single grasshopper—at least, not while anybody is watching him. But I suppose he makes up for it when his dignity can not be injured by having spectators of his voracity; perhaps he falls upon the grasshoppers when they are driven into a corner of the field. But he is only fattening himself for destruction; like all greedy persons, he comes to a bad end. And if the turkeys had any Sunday school, they would be taught this.”

Josh Billings, in his Animile Statistix, proved that he had been a close observer. He says in this comical medley:

“Kats are affectionate, they luv young chickens, sweet kream, and the best place in front of the fireplace.

“Dogs are faithful; they will stick to a bone after everybody haz deserted it.

“The ox knoweth hiz master’s krib, and that iz all he duz kno or care about hiz master.

“Munkeys are imitatiff, but if they kan’t imitate some deviltry they ain’t happy.

“The goose is like all other phools—alwuss seems anxious to prove it.

“Ducks are only cunning about one thing: they lay their eggs in sitch sly places that sumtimes they kan’t find them again themselfs.

“The mushrat kan foresee a hard winter and provide for it, but he kan’t keep from gittin ketched in the sylliest kind ov a trap.

“Hens know when it is a going to rain, and shelter themselfs, but they will try to hatch out a glass egg just az honest az they will one ov their own.

“The cuckcoo iz the greatest ekonemist among the birds, she lays her eggs in other birds’ nests, and lets them hatch them out at their leizure.

“Rats hav fewer friends and more enemies than anything ov the four-legged purswashun on the face ov the earth, and yet rats are az plenty now az in the palmyest days ov the Roman Empire.

“The horse alwuss gits up from the ground on his fore legs first, the kow on her hind ones, and the dog turns round 3 times before he lies down.

“The kangaroo he jumps when he walks, the coon paces when he trots, the lobster travels backwards az fast az he does forward.

“The elephant has the least, and the rabbit the most eye for their size, and a rat’s tale is just the length ov hiz boddy.”

The very latest item of interest to dog-lovers is the announcement that Bismarck has purchased a two-pound King Charles spaniel from the dog show in Boston.

My collection is now as complete as the limitations of time and the publishers will allow. As proprietor, I beg leave to announce my Literary Zoo as now open at all hours (for a moderate fee) to those interested in what we call, with conceit and possibly ignorance, the inferior orders of creation, and the dumb brutes.

THE END.

D. APPLETON & CO.’S PUBLICATIONS.

SLEEPING FIRES. By George Gissing, author of “In the Year of Jubilee,” “Eve’s Ransom,” etc. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

In this striking story the author has treated an original motive with rare self-command and skill. His book is most interesting as a story, and remarkable as a literary performance.

STONEPASTURES. By Eleanor Stuart. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

“This is a strong bit of good literary workmanship.... The book has the value of being a real sketch of our own mining regions, and of showing how, even in the apparently dull round of work, there is still material for a good bit of literature.”—Philadelphia Ledger.

COURTSHIP BY COMMAND. By M. M. Blake. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

“A bright, moving study of an unusually interesting period in the life of Napoleon, ... deliciously told; the characters are clearly, strongly, and very delicately modeled, and the touches of color most artistically done. ‘Courtship by Command’ is the most satisfactory Napoleon bonne-bouche we have had.”—New York Commercial Advertiser.

THE WATTER’S MOU’. By Bram Stoker. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

“Here is a tale to stir the most sluggish nature.... It is like standing on the deck of a wave-tossed ship; you feel the soul of the storm go into your blood.”—New York Home Journal.

MASTER AND MAN. By Count Leo Tolstoy. With an Introduction by W. D. Howells. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

“Crowded with these characteristic touches which mark his literary work.”—Public Opinion.

“Reveals a wonderful knowledge of the workings of the human mind, and it tells a tale that not only stirs the emotions, but gives us a better insight into our own hearts.”—San Francisco Argonaut.

THE ZEIT-GEIST. By L. Dougall, author of “The Mermaid,” “Beggars All,” etc. 16mo. Cloth, 75 cents.

“One of the best of the short stories of the day.”—Boston Journal.

“One of the most remarkable novels of the year.”—New York Commercial Advertiser.

“Powerful in conception, treatment, and influence.”—Boston Globe.

THE ONE WHO LOOKED ON. By F. F. Montrésor, author of “Into the Highways and Hedges.” 16mo. Cloth, special binding, $1.25.

“The story runs on as smoothly as a brook through lowlands; it excites your interest at the beginning and keeps it to the end.”—New York Herald.

“An exquisite story.... No person sensitive to the influence of what makes for the true, the lovely, and the strong in human friendship and the real in life’s work can read this book without being benefited by it.”—Buffalo Commercial.

“The book has universal interest and very unusual merit.... Aside from its subtle poetic charm, the book is a noble example of the power of keen observation.”—Boston Herald.

CORRUPTION. By Percy White, author of “Mr. Bailey-Martin,” etc. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25.

“There is intrigue enough in it for those who love a story of the ordinary kind, and the political part is perhaps more attractive in its sparkle and variety of incident than the real thing itself.”—London Daily News.

“A drama of biting intensity, a tragedy of inflexible purpose and relentless result.”—Pall Mall Gazette.

A HARD WOMAN. A Story in Scenes. By Violet Hunt. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25.

“An extremely clever work. Miss Hunt probably writes dialogue better than any of our young novelists.... Not only are her conversations wonderfully vivacious and sustained, but she contrives to assign to each of her characters a distinct mode of speech, so that the reader easily identifies them, and can follow the conversations without the slightest difficulty.”—London Athenæum.

“One of the best writers of dialogue of our immediate day. The conversations in this book will enhance her already secure reputation.”—London Daily Chronicle.

AN IMAGINATIVE MAN. By Robert S. Hichens, author of “The Green Carnation,” etc. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25.

“One of the brightest books of the year.”—Boston Budget.

“Altogether delightful, fascinating, unusual.”—Cleveland Amusement Gazette.

“A study in character.... Just as entertaining as though it were the conventional story of love and marriage. The clever hand of the author of ‘The Green Carnation’ is easily detected in the caustic wit and pointed epigram.”—Jeannette L. Gilder, in the New York World.

TWO REMARKABLE AMERICAN NOVELS.

THE RED BADGE OF COURAGE. An Episode of the American Civil War. By Stephen Crane. 12mo. Cloth, $1.00.

“Mr. Stephen Crane is a great artist, with something new to say, and consequently with a new way of saying it.... In ‘The Red Badge of Courage’ Mr. Crane has surely contrived a masterpiece.... He has painted a picture that challenges comparison with the most vivid scenes of Tolstoy’s ‘La Guerre et la Paix’ or of Zola’s ‘La Débácle.’”—London New Review.

“In its whole range of literature we can call to mind nothing so searching in its analysis, so manifestly impressed with the stamp of truth, as ‘The Red Badge of Courage.’... A remarkable study of the average mind under stress of battle.... We repeat, a really fine achievement.”—London Daily Chronicle.

“Not merely a remarkable book: it is a revelation.... One feels that, with perhaps one or two exceptions, all previous descriptions of modern warfare have been the merest abstractions.”—St. James Gazette.

“Holds one irrevocably. There is no possibility of resistance when once you are in its grip, from the first of the march of the troops to the closing scenes.... Mr. Crane, we repeat, has written a remarkable book. His insight and his power of realization amount to genius.”—Pall Mall Gazette.

IN DEFIANCE OF THE KING. A Romance of the American Revolution. By Chauncey C. Hotchkiss. 12mo. Paper, 50 cents; cloth, $1.00.

“The whole story is so completely absorbing that you will sit far into the night to finish it. You lay it aside with the feeling that you have seen a gloriously true picture of the Revolution.”—Boston Herald.

“The story is a strong one—a thrilling one. It causes the true American to flush with excitement, to devour chapter after chapter until the eyes smart; and it fairly smokes with patriotism.”—N. Y. Mail and Express.

“The heart beats quickly, and we feel ourselves taking part in the scenes described.... Altogether the book is an addition to American literature.”—Chicago Evening Post.

“One of the most readable novels of the year.... As a love romance it is charming, while it is filled with thrilling adventure and deeds of patriotic daring.”—Boston Advertiser.

“This romance seems to come the nearest to a satisfactory treatment in fiction of the Revolutionary period that we have yet had.”—Buffalo Courier.

“A clean, wholesome story, full of romance and interesting adventure.... Holds the interest alike by the thread of the story and by the incidents.... A remarkably well-balanced and absorbing novel.”—Milwaukee Journal.

GILBERT PARKER’S BEST BOOKS.

THE SEATS OF THE MIGHTY. Being the Memoirs of Captain Robert Moray, sometime an Officer in the Virginia Regiment, and afterward of Amherst’s Regiment. 12mo. Cloth, illustrated, $1.50.

For the time of his story Mr. Parker has chosen the most absorbing period of the romantic eighteenth-century history of Quebec. The curtain rises soon after General Braddock’s defeat in Virginia, and the hero, a prisoner in Quebec, curiously entangled in the intrigues of La Pompadour, becomes a part of a strange history, full of adventure and the stress of peril, which culminates only after Wolfe’s victory over Montcalm. The material offered by the life and history of old Quebec has never been utilized for the purposes of fiction with the command of plot and incident, the mastery of local color, and the splendid realization of dramatic situations shown in this distinguished and moving romance. The illustrations preserve the atmosphere of the text, for they present the famous buildings, gates, and battle-grounds as they appeared at the time of the hero’s imprisonment in Quebec.

THE TRAIL OF THE SWORD. A Novel. l2mo. Paper, 50 cents; cloth, $1.00.

“Mr. Parker here adds to a reputation already wide, and anew demonstrates his power of pictorial portrayal and of strong dramatic situation and climax.”—Philadelphia Bulletin.

“The tale holds the reader’s interest from first to last, for it is full of fire and spirit, abounding in incident, and marked by good character-drawing.”—Pittsburg Times.

THE TRESPASSER. 12mo. Paper, 50 cents; cloth, $1.00.

“Interest, pith, force, and charm—Mr. Parker’s new story possesses all these qualities.... Almost bare of synthetical decoration, his paragraphs are stirring because they are real. We read at times—as we have read the great masters of romance—breathlessly.”—The Critic.

“Gilbert Parker writes a strong novel, but thus far this is his masterpiece.... It is one of the great novels of the year.”—Boston Advertiser.

THE TRANSLATION OF A SAVAGE. 16mo. Flexible cloth, 75 cents.

“A book which no one will be satisfied to put down until the end has been matter of certainty and assurance.”—The Nation.

“A story of remarkable interest, originality, and ingenuity of construction.”—Boston Home Journal.

New York: D. APPLETON & CO., 72 Fifth Avenue.

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TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

1. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling.
2. Archaic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as printed.