"...Showing Curious ways in which the English Language may be made to convey Ideas or obscure them." A collection of unintentionally humorous uses of the English language. Sections of the work: How she is wrote by the Inaccurate, By Advertisers and on Sign-boards, For Epitaphs, By Correspondents, By the Effusive, How she can be oddly wrote, and By the Untutored.

Excerpted anecdotes from the biographies of Swift, Curran, O'Leary and O'Connell, relating humorous snippets of politics in 18th and 19th century Ireland. For some these may be poignant in addition to being humorous and for others they may be humorous in addition to being poignant. (

37 short pieces perfect for newer recorders. These one page Stories of (mostly) Wonderful Deeds were written for Little Folk to teach them about famous incidents in their history. Bonnie Prince Charlie, Nelson and Hardy, Bruce and the Spider, David Livingston, Canute, Sir Philip Sydney, and Elizabeth and Raleigh are just some of the well known people and incidents covered in short stories.

"The Curtezan unmasked or, the Whoredomes of Jezebel Painted to the Life: With Antidotes against them, or Heavenly Julips to cool Men in the Fever of Lust" is a fire-and-brimstone polemic by "A Spiritual Physician" to persuade young men not to succumb to harlotry and its accompanying perils. (Introduction by Denny Sayers)

A catechism is a summary of the principles of Christian religion and articles of the faith. The Baltimore Catechism specifically was the de facto standard Catholic school text in the United States from 1885 to the late 1960s. It was the first such catechism written for Catholics in North America, replacing a translation of Bellarmine's Small Catechism. The Baltimore Catechism remained in use in nearly all Catholic schools until many moved away from catechism-based education, though it is still used up to this day in some. (Summary by Wikipedia)

The title is, I think, self explanatory. The nurse in question went out to France at the beginning of the war and remained there until May 1915 after the second battle of Ypres when she went back to a Base Hospital and the diary ceases. Although written in diary form, it is clearly taken from letters home and gives a vivid if sometimes distressing picture of the state of the casualties occasioned during that period. After a time at the General Hospital in Le Havre she became one of the three or four sisters working on the ambulance trains which fetched the wounded from the Clearing Hospitals close to the front line and took them back to the General Hospitals in Boulogne, Rouen and Le Havre.

Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43BC) was an orator, statesman, philosopher and prolific correspondent, who rose as a ‘new man’ in Rome in the turbulent last years of its republican government. Anthony Trollope, best known as a novelist, admired Cicero greatly and wrote this biography late in life in order to argue his virtues against authors who had granted him literary greatness but questioned his strength as a politician and as a man. He takes a personal approach, affording us an insight into his own mind and times as well as those of his subject...

Anthony Trollope's autobiography will delight you whether or not you've read (or listened to) any of his many works. His honest if self-deprecating tone is at times hilarious and at times piteously moving. His detailed descriptions of his writing process and his philosophy of writing as work rather than art are fascinating. Fans of Trollope will enjoy learning the man's perceptions of his novels' shortcomings and triumphs. Anyone will appreciate learning about his years devoted to churning out literature for profit while working full time with the post office.

The Author sings the praises of Chocolate. “By the wise and Moderate use whereof, Health is preserved, Sicknesse Diverted, and Cured, especially the Plague of the Guts; vulgarly called _The New Disease_; Fluxes, Consumptions, & Coughs of the Lungs, with sundry other desperate Diseases. By it also, Conception is Caused, the Birth Hastened and facilitated, Beauty Gain’d and continued.”

The First Anglo–Afghan War was fought between British India and Afghanistan from 1839 to 1842. It was one of the first major conflicts during the Great Game, the 19th century competition for power and influence in Central Asia between the United Kingdom and Russia, and also marked one of the worst setbacks inflicted on British power in the region after the consolidation of British Raj by the East India Company.

Aristotle’s Poetics from the 4th century B.C. aims to give a short study of storytelling. It discusses things like unity of plot, reversal of situation, and character in the context of Greek tragedy, comedy and epic poetry. But it still applies today. It is especially popular with screenwriters as seen in many script gurus’ how-to books.

This book is a classic piece on self improvement teaching you to live to the fullest. Judging from the title of the book, the reader might expect that the book is a manual on how to manage your time better. Nothing could be further from the truth, this book is a flowery and witty self help book aimed at helping readers improve the quality of their lives, in fact it is one of the firsts of its kind in the world. Bennett describes the twenty four hours in a day as a miracle and that it should be used for the betterment of health, wealth, respect, pleasure and contentment...

Mental Efficiency and Other Hints to Men and Women is one of the many self help books that Bennett wrote, the most famous of these being How to Live 24 Hours a Day. It is highly readable, amusing and offers wisdom in an extremely palatable form. Bennett's gift for analysis and his knowledge of philosophy and psychology make this book a valuable treasure trove of handy hints to improve our lives. Though it was first published in 1911, it remains as relevant, wise and useful as it did more than a hundred years ago...

Arnold Bennett describes a method for enjoying literature, and suggests the contents of a comprehensive library. Chapters 1-10 and 14 describe his method for learning to enjoy literature. Chapters 11, 12, and 13 contain detailed lists of the 337 volumes required to complete a comprehensive library of English works. This reading is from the 1913 version at Project Gutenberg, and so does not contain the revisions made by Swinnerton for the 1939 edition, which included authors of the early Twentieth Century. Swinnerton’s revisions are available from Wikipedia.

Bennett asks us to consider our brains as the most wonderful machine, a machine which is the only thing in this world that we can control. As he writes: "I am simply bent on calling your attention to a fact which has perhaps wholly or partially escaped you -- namely, that you are the most fascinating bit of machinery that ever was."As ever, his prose is honeyed, his thoughts inspired, and his advice as relevant today as when it was written. (Introduction by Ruth Golding)

Arthur Guy Empey was an American who responded to the sinking of the Lusitania by enlisting with the British Army to fight in France. His experiences in the trenches, including his ultimate wounding and convalescence, became this book. When published in 1917, it was a major hit and helped the recruiting effort when America entered the Great War. If you’ve heard of the horror of trench warfare in WWI and want to see it from below dirt level, Empey offers it all here. Also included is Empey’s popular “Tommy’s Dictionary of the Trenches” which humorously demistifies the slang used by the British soldier.

After all, tea is the drink! Domestically and socially it is the beverage of the world. There may be those who will come forward with their figures to prove that other fruits of the soil—agriculturally and commercially—are more important. Perhaps they are right when quoting statistics. But what other product can compare with tea in the high regard in which it has always been held by writers whose standing in literature, and recognized good taste in other walks, cannot be questioned? (From the Preface) A Little Tea Book is a clever book about all things tea- Eastern and Western tea history, stories, culture, quotes, and even poetry. A good little read for tea lovers everywhere.

Arthur Schopenhauer, an early 19th century philosopher, made significant contributions to metaphysics, ethics, and aesthetics. His work also informed theories of evolution and psychology, largely through his theory of the will to power – a concept which Nietzsche famously adopted and developed. Despite this, he is today, as he was during his life, overshadowed by his contemporary, Hegel. Schopenhauer’s social/psychological views, put forth in this work and in others, are directly derived from his metaphysics, which was strongly influenced by Eastern thought...

As that heavenly bit of chocolate melts in our mouths, we give little thought as to where it came from, the arduous work that went in to its creation, and the complex process of its maturation from a bean to the delicacy we all enjoy. This “little book” details everything you have ever wanted to know (and some things you never knew you wanted to know) about cocoa and chocolate from how the trees are planted and sustained to which countries produce the most cacao beans. Do cacao beans from various...

LINEAGE LIFE AND LABORS of JOSE RIZAL PHILIPPINE PATRIOTBY AUSTIN CRAIGINTRODUCTION In writing a biography, the author, if he be discriminating, selects, with great care, the salient features of the life story of the one whom he deems worthy of being portrayed as a person possessed of preeminent qualities that make for a character and greatness. Indeed to write biography at all, one should have that nice sense of proportion that makes him instinctively seize upon only those points that do advance his theme...

In 1770, Baron D'Holbach published his masterpiece, "Systeme de la Nature", which for a long time passed as the posthumous work of M. de Mirabaud. That text-book of "Atheistical Philosophy" caused a great sensation, and two years later, 1772, the Baron published this excellent abridgment of it, freed from arbitrary ideas; and by its clearness of expression, facility, and precision of style, rendered it most suitable for the average student. This text is based on an undated English translation of "Le Bon Sens" published c. 1900. The name of the translator was not stated.

PRINCE HENRY THE NAVIGATORBy Evelyn Abbot, M.A.INTRODUCTION.The Greek And Arabic Ideas Of The World, As The Chief Inheritance Of The Christian Middle Ages In Geographical Knowledge. Arabic science constitutes one of the main links between the older learned world of the Greeks and Latins and the Europe of Henry the Navigator and of the Renaissance. In geography it adopted in the main the results of Ptolemy and Strabo; and many of the Moslem travellers and writers gained some additional hints from Indian, Persian, and Chinese knowledge; but, however much of fact they added to Greek cartography, they did not venture to correct its postulates...

One of the earliest works of this Italian philosopher and literary critic, Aesthetic as Science of Expression and General Linguistic marks the beginning of Croce's elaboration of his highly influential ideas of aesthetics. Croce defines art in terms of intuition and expression, thus replacing beauty as the primary criterion for aesthetic evaluation.

The Ethics is a philosophical book written by Baruch Spinoza. It was written in Latin. Although it was published posthumously in 1677, it is his most famous work, and is considered his magnum opus.In The Ethics, Spinoza attempts to demonstrate a "fully cohesive philosophical system that strives to provide a coherent picture of reality and to comprehend the meaning of an ethical life. Following a logical step-by-step format, it defines in turn the nature of God, the mind, human bondage to the emotions, and the power of understanding -- moving from a consideration of the eternal, to speculate upon humanity's place in the natural order, freedom, and the path to attainable happiness...

Inventor, author, printer, scientist, politician, diplomat—all these terms do not even begin to fully describe the amazing and multitalented, Benjamin Franklin who was of course also one of the Founding Fathers of America. At the age of 75, in 1771 he began work on what he called his Memoirs. He was still working on it when he died in 1790 and it was published posthumously, entitled An Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. The book had a complicated and controversial publication history. Strangely enough, the first volume only was first published in French, in Paris in 1791...

Cellini’s autobiographical memoirs, which he began writing in Florence in 1558, give a detailed account of his singular career, as well as his loves, hatreds, passions, and delights, written in an energetic, direct, and racy style. They show a great self-regard and self-assertion, sometimes running into extravagances which are impossible to credit. He even writes in a complacent way of how he contemplated his murders before carrying them out. He writes of his time in Paris: Parts of his tale recount...

Published in 1912, The Problems of Philosophy by Bertrand Russell is one of his most popular books. It renders philosophical issues and questions in a way in which they become relevant and accessible to the man or woman on the street, provoking them to devote time and effort into thinking about these aspects of life. Here, the great philosopher and humanist thinker Bertrand Russell examines the importance of empirical (that which can be verified by observation or experience rather than deduced from logic or reasoning) thinkers like David Hume and George Berkeley the Anglo-Irish philosopher and scientist...

Bertrand Russell, 3rd Earl Russell (1872 – 1970) was a British philosopher, logician, mathematician, political activist and Nobel laureate. He led the British “revolt against idealism” in the early 1900s and is considered one of the founders of analytic philosophy along with his predecessor Gottlob Frege and his protégé Ludwig Wittgenstein. In this book, written in 1918, he offers his assessment of three competing streams in the thought of the political left: Marxian socialism, anarchism and syndicalism.

For American journalist and humorist Edgar Wilson Nye who wrote under the pen name Bill Nye in the late 19th century, facts are not to be presented in their newborn, bare state. They should be properly draped and embellished before they can be presented before the public. Hence, in the Comic History of the United States published in 1894, he gives his readers the facts. But in a bid to make the historical figures more human he describes them as “people who ate and possibly drank, people who were born, flourished and died, not grave tragedians posing perpetually for their photographs...

If you thought history was dull, dry and boring, you haven't read Bill Nye's books! He brings wit, humor, satire, irony and sheer nonsensical fun into the subject, making it both entertaining and memorable. The Comic History of England was published posthumously in 1896 after the writer's tragic and untimely death half-way through the project. Hence it remains incomplete and covers the history of the island nation only up to the Tudor period. However, beginning with Julius Caesar, the Roman invasion of Britain, the Druids and Stonehenge, this book is still a rib-tickling ride through the centuries...

Fishing with a Worm by Bliss Perry includes the poignant and philisophical observations of a fly fisherman lured by the worm. Bliss Perry was a professor of literature at Princeton and Harvard Universities and spent time in Vermont writing and fly fishing.

This recording was released to coincide with National Cheese Lovers’ Day 2010 in the United States. Robert Carlton Brown (1886 – 1959), after living thirty years in as many foreign lands and enjoying countless national cheeses at the source, returned to New York and summed them all up in this book. After majoring in beer and free lunch from Milwaukee to Munich, Bob celebrated the end of Prohibition with a book called Let There Be Beer! and then decided to write another about Beer’s best friend, Cheese...

Up From Slavery is the 1901 autobiography of Booker T. Washington detailing his slow and steady rise from a slave child during the Civil War, to the difficulties and obstacles he overcame to get an education at the new Hampton University, to his work establishing vocational schools—most notably the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama—to help black people and other disadvantaged minorities learn useful, marketable skills and work to pull themselves, as a race, up by the bootstraps. He reflects on the generosity of both teachers and philanthropists who helped in educating blacks and native Americans...

This is a series of late-19th Century essays about Florida’s flora & fauna written by a Massachusetts-based naturalist.

The Riot Act was passed by the British Parliament in 1714, the first year of the reign of George I, and came into effect in August 1715. This was a time of widespread social disturbance, as the preamble describes; the Act sought to put an end to this. A group of twelve or more people, “being unlawfully, riotously and tumultuously assembled”, would be read a proclamation; they must disperse within an hour, on pain of death. The same fate would befall anyone preventing the reading of the proclamation, or damaging buildings while on a riot...

Brooks Adams (1848- 1927), was an American historian and a critic of capitalism. He believed that commercial civilizations rise and fall in predictable cycles. First, masses of people draw together in large population centers and engage in commercial activities. As their desire for wealth grows, they discard spiritual and creative values. Their greed leads to distrust and dishonesty, and eventually the society crumbles. In The Law of Civilisation and Decay (1895), Adams noted that as new population centers emerged in the west, centers of world trade shifted from Constantinople to Venice to Amsterdam to London...

This is a nice collection of 52 kid-aimed sermons by missionary Wright while he served in the Philippines in the World War I era. Each offers a slice-of-life reference point, an appropriate Bible verse, and hymn.

When a bunch of apparently non-practicing Musalmans headed by Mohamed Atta launched that fidayeen attack on New York’s World Trade Centre that Sep 11, the world at large, by then familiar with the ways of the Islamic terrorism, was at a loss to fathom the unthinkable source of that unexpected means of the new Islamist scourge. The symptoms of a latent terrorist in the Muslim youth can be traced to the sublimity of Muhammad's preaching’s in Mecca and the severity of his Medina sermons make Islam a Janus-faced faith that forever bedevils the mind of the Musalmans...

This paper takes the reader through the early settlement from 1783 to the modern period of 1888-1912. We see how farming and farm industries developed and how the population was distributed during these times. We see the trends of settlers moving into the Urban centers instead of rural and how the farm industries (making cheese, butter, wool, etc) move off the farm to the city factories. Excerpt: “The farmer’s wife in those days was perhaps the most expert master of trades ever known. She could spin and weave, make a carpet or a rug, dye yarns and clothes, and make a straw hat or a birch broom...

Wolf's essay considers the homeopathic medicine Apis Mellifica, or the poison of the honey bee, as a therapeutic agent based on his experience as a practicing physician.

In this biography for young people, Calista McCabe Courtenay takes the reader from George Washington the surveyor to his early military career, first as a colonel in the Virgina militia and then as a member of General Braddock'a staff during the French and Indian War. He later commanded the Virginia forces before joining the First Continental Congress. Much of the book is devoted to his campaigns during the American Revolution. At the end, we see him as President for two terms.

A collection of memoirs about the Peninsular War, the Battle of Waterloo, and society and personalities of Regency London and 19th century Paris, by a sometime Grenadier Guards officer, unsuccessful parliamentarian, and dandy. Gronow displays social attitudes of the day which would now be regarded as unacceptable, but is a clever raconteur who brings to life both the horrors of war and the gaiety of high society.

Unknown MexicoA Record of Five Years' Exploration Among the Tribes of the Western Sierra Madre; In the Tierra Caliente of Tepic and Jalisco; and Among the Tarascos of Michoacan By Carl Lumholtz, M.A. PREFACE In the course of my travels in Australia, and especially after my arrival at Upper Herbert River in Northern Queensland, I soon perceived that it would be impracticable for me to hunt for zoological specimens without first securing the assistance of the natives of the country. Thus it came about...

A classic work on military strategy by a veteran of the Napoleonic Wars. The author's style is dialectical: he makes two strong but opposing statements and then draws them together to describe many facets of war. Free of technical jargon, and suitable for modern readers. This audiobook is based on a 1909 English translation.

The author, who fought as a private in the Army of Northern Virginia during the Civil War, describes the Confederate soldier’s daily struggles with hunger, illness, fear, and the perils of combat; as well as his pride of service, love of comrades, and courage in the face of overwhelming odds