CHAPTER I The period of Roman history on which we now enter is, like so many that had preceded it, a period of revolt, directly aimed against the existing conditions of society and, through the means taken to satisfy the fresh wants and to alleviate the suddenly realised, if not suddenly created, miseries of the time, indirectly affecting the structure of the body politic. The difference between the social movement of the present and that of the... more...

"SUPREME IRONIC PROCESSION." For six and forty years England had been ruled by German princes. One Elector of Hanover named George had been succeeded by another Elector of Hanover named George, and George the First and George the Second, George the father and George the son, resembled each other in being by nature German rather than English, and by inclination Electors of Hanover rather than Kings of England. Against each of them a Stuart prince... more...

his literary trifle, “A Message to Garcia,” was written one evening after supper, in a single hour. It was on the Twenty-second of February, Eighteen Hundred Ninety-nine, Washington's Birthday, and we were just going to press with the March “Philistine.” The thing leaped hot from my heart, written after a trying day, when I had been endeavoring to train some rather delinquent villagers to abjure the comatose state and get... more...

THEINTRODUCTION. I AM very much concerned when I see young gentlemen of fortune and quality so wholly set upon pleasure and diversions, that they neglect all those improvements in wisdom and knowledge which may make them easy to themselves and useful to the world.  The greatest part of our British youth lose their figure, and grow out of fashion, by that time they are five and twenty.  As soon as the natural gaiety and... more...

CHAPTER I.GAUL. The Frenchman of to-day inhabits a country, long ago civilized and Christianized, where, despite of much imperfection and much social misery, thirty-eight millions of men live in security and peace, under laws equal for all and efficiently upheld. There is every reason to nourish great hopes of such a country, and to wish for it more and more of freedom, glory, and prosperity; but one must be just towards one's own times, and... more...

CHAPTER XXXV.HENRY IV., PROTESTANT KING. (1589-1593.) On the 2d of August, 1589, in the morning, upon his arrival in his quarters at Meudon, Henry of Navarre was saluted by the Protestants King of France. They were about five thousand in an army of forty thousand men. When, at ten o'clock, he entered the camp of the Catholics at St. Cloud, three of their principal leaders, Marshal d'Aumont, and Sires d'Humieres and de Givry, immediately... more...

CHAPTER I EUROPE BEFORE THE GREAT WAR To understand the Great War it is not sufficient to read the daily happenings of military and naval events as they are told in newspapers and magazines. We must go back of the facts of to-day and find in national history and personal ambition the causes of the present struggle. Years of preparation were necessary before German military leaders could convert a nation to their views, or get ready the men,... more...

EDITOR'S PREFACE   hen Mr. Plomer consented at my request to write a short history of English printing which should stop neither at the end of the fifteenth century, nor at the end of the sixteenth century, nor at 1640, but should come down, as best it could, to our own day, we were not without apprehensions that the task might prove one of some difficulty. How difficult it would be we had certainly no idea, or the book would never have... more...

CHAPTER I. No name is more fraught with picturesque and romantic interest than that of the "Spanish Peninsula." After finishing this rare bit of handiwork nature seems to have thrown up a great ragged wall, stretching from sea to sea, to protect it; and the Pyrenees have stood for ages a frowning barrier, descending toward France on the northern side from gradually decreasing heights—but on the Spanish side in wild disorder, plunging down... more...

GEOGRAPHY OF GREECE. Greece is the southern portion of a great peninsula of Europe, washed on three sides by the Mediterranean Sea. It is bounded on the north by the Cambunian mountains, which separate it from Macedonia. It extends from the fortieth degree of latitude to the thirty-sixth, its greatest length being not more than 250 English miles, and its greatest breadth only 180. Its surface is considerably less than that of Portugal. This... more...