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 provinces by the Arabs, who embraced the religion of Mahomet; the revolt of the Roman people against the feeble princes of Constantinople; and the elevation of Charlemagne, who, in the year 800, established the second, or German empire of the west.

III. The last and longest of these periods includes about six centuries and a half; from the revival of the western empire, till the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, and the extinction of a degenerate race of princes, who continued to assume the titles of Cæsar and Augustus, after their dominions were contracted to the limits of a single city; in which the language, as well as manners, of the ancient Romans, had been long since forgotten. The writer who should undertake to relate the events of this period, would find himself obliged to enter into the general history of the crusades, as far as they contributed to the ruin of the Greek empire; and he would scarcely be able to restrain his curiosity from making some enquiry into the state of the city of Rome during the darkness and confusion of the middle ages.

As I have ventured, perhaps too hastily, to commit to the press a work which, in every sense of the word, deserves the epithet of imperfect, I consider myself as contracting an engagement to finish, most probably in a second volume, the first of these memorable periods; and to deliver to the public the complete history of the decline and fall of Rome, from the age of the Antonines to the subversion of the western empire. With regard to the subsequent periods, though I may entertain some hopes, I dare not presume to give any assurances. The execution of the extensive plan which I have described, would connect the ancient and modern history of the world; but it would require many years of health, of leisure, and of perseverance.


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Rh P. S. The entire history, which is now published, of the decline and fall of the Roman empire in the west, abundantly discharges my engagements with the public. Perhaps their favourable opinion may encourage me to prosecute a work, which, however laborious it may seem, is the most agreeable occupation of my leisure hours.

, March 1, 1781.

author easily persuades himself that the public opinion is still favourable to his labours; and I have now embraced the serious resolution of proceeding to the last period of my original design, and of the Roman empire, the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, in the year 1453. The most patient reader, who computes that three ponderous volumes have been already employed on the events of four centuries, may, perhaps, be alarmed at the long prospect of nine hundred years. But it is not my intention to expatiate with the same minuteness on the whole series of the Byzantine history. At our entrance into this period, the reign of Justinian, and the conquests of the mahometans, will deserve and detain our attention; and the last age of Constantinople (the crusades and the Turks) is connected with the revolutions of modern Europe. From the seventh to the eleventh century, the obscure interval will be supplied by a concise narrative of such facts as may still appear either interesting or important.

, March 1, 1782.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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title: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/5


text: Author:Jennie Maria Arms

title: Author:Jennie Maria Arms


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title: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/6


text: Author:Charles Sumner Ashley

title: Author:Charles Sumner Ashley


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title: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/7


text: Author:George Bretherton Barron

title: Author:George Bretherton Barron


text: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/8

title: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/8


text: Author:John Shaw Billings

title: Author:John Shaw Billings


text: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/9

title: Page:Red Riding Hood.ogv/9


text: Author:William Francis Allen

title: Author:William Francis Allen


text: Author:Francis H. Baker

title: Author:Francis H. Baker


text: Author:James Barr (1849-1938)

title: Author:James Barr (1849-1938)


text: Author:L. Barré

title: Author:L. Barré


text: Author:Henry Welchman Bartol

title: Author:Henry Welchman Bartol


text:
Author:Wilhelm Julius Behrens

Articles in Popular Science Monthly

 * 1.

title: Author:Wilhelm Julius Behrens


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Page:Dio's Roman History, tr. Cary - Volume 1.djvu/24

 quotations from Dio, they are of value in filling out both his account and that of Xiphilinus.

The Excerpts De Legationibus—Embassies (a) of Foreign Nations to the Romans (UG), and (b) of the Romans to Foreign Nations (UR)—appear in nine Mss., all derived from a Spanish archetype (since destroyed by fire) owned by Juan Paez de Castro in the sixteenth century. First published by Fulvio Orsini in 1582, and hence called Excerpta Ursiniana.

The three collections thus far named are known collectively as the Excerpta Constantiniana. They formed a small part of a great encyclopedia of more than fifty subjects, compiled under the direction of Constantine VII. Porphyrogennetus (A.D. 912—59). They have recently been reedited by Boissevain, de Boor, and Büttner-Wobst (Berhn, 1903-06).

The Florilegium (Flor.) of Maximus the Confessor contains excerpts from various authors, arranged under seventy-one categories, the first of which is Virtue and Vice. Mai first published a number of fragments of Dio from this collection (from a Vatican Ms.), but inserted several which have since been rejected. There are at least six Mss. of the Florilegium containing excerpts from Dio. From one of these (Parisinus 1169, of the fourteenth or fifteenth century) Boissevain adds to the previous fragments No. 55, 3a and 3b.


text: Author:Wayland Richardson Benedict

title: Author:Wayland Richardson Benedict


text:
Author:Joel Benton

Poems

 * "The Kodak Fiend", in Century Magazine, Volume 47, Issue 5 (March 1894)

Articles in Popular Science Monthly

 * 1.
 * 2.

Other Articles

 * "The Feminine Nom de Plume" in Lippincott's Monthly Magazine, 1887

title: Author:Joel Benton


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and accuracy are the only merits which an historical writer may ascribe to himself; if any merit, indeed, can be assumed from the performance of an indispensable duty. I may therefore be allowed to say, that I have carefully examined all the original materials that could illustrate the subject which I had undertaken to treat. Should I ever complete the extensive design which has been sketched out in the preface, I might perhaps conclude it with a critical account of the authors consulted during the progress of the whole work; and however such an attempt might incur the censure of ostentation, I am persuaded that it would be susceptible of entertainment as well as information.

At present I shall content myself with a single observation. The biographers who, under the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine, composed, or rather compiled, the lives of the emperors, from Hadrian to the sons of Carus, are usually mentioned under the names of Ælius Spartianus, Julius Capitolinus, Ælius Lampridius, Vulcatius Gallicanus, Trebellius Pollio, and Flavins Vopiscus. But there is so much perplexity in the titles of the manuscripts, and so many disputes have arisen among the critics (see Fabricius, Biblioth. Latin. 1. iii. c. 6.) concerning their number, their names, and their respective property, that for the most part I have quoted them without distinction, under the general and well known title of the Augustan History.

History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is now delivered to the public in a more convenient form. Some alterations and improvements had presented themselves to my mind; but I was unwilling to injure or offend the purchasers of the preceding editions. The accuracy of the corrector of the press has been already tried and approved; and perhaps I may stand excused, if, amidst the avocations of a busy winter, I have preferred the pleasures of composition and study to the minute diligence of revising a former publication.

, April 20, 1783.


text:
Portal:Van Beuren Studios

Works

 * Red Riding Hood

title: Portal:Van Beuren Studios


text:
Author:Fanny Dickerson Bergen

Articles in Popular Science Monthly

 * 1.
 * 2.
 * 3.
 * 4.
 * 5.

title: Author:Fanny Dickerson Bergen


text: Author:W. Bernhardt

title: Author:W. Bernhardt


text:
Author:Pierre Eugène Marcellin Berthelot

Works about Berthelot

 * Berthelot, in Biographies of Scientific Men (1912)
 * Berthelot, in Biographies of Scientific Men (1912)


text:
Acre

 * articles in 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica:

title: Acre


text:
Wilson, John

 * articles in the Dictionary of National Biography:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:
 * articles in A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature:

title: Wilson, John


text:
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318 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER river Zebeé, or Kibbeé, surrounds a great part of the kingdom of Gingiro. It has been mistaken for the river El Aice, which runs into Egypt in a course parallel to the Nile, but to the west of it.

seems to be the highest land in the peninsula of Africa, so that here the rivers begin to run alternately towards the Cape of Good Hope and Mediterranean; but the descent at first is very small on either side. In the adjoining latitudes, that is 4° on each side of the Line, it rains perpetually, so that these rivers, though not rapid, are yet kept continually full.

of Zebeé, is universally allowed by the merchants of this country to be the head of the river Quilimancy, which, passing through such a tract of land from Narea to near Melinda, mull have opened a very considerable communication with the inland country.

territory, called Zindero, or Gingiro, is a very small one. The father and Fecur Egzie rested the sixth day from their setting out from Narea. The river Zebeè, by the description of Fernandes, seems to incline from its source in a greater angle than any river on the north of that partition. He says it carries more water with it than the Nile, and is infinitely more rapid, so that it would be absolutely impassable in the season of rains, were it not for large rocks which abound in its channel.

passage was truly tremendous; trees were laid from the shore to the next immediate rock; from that rock to the next another tree was laid; then another that reached


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valentinus


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 to the shore. These trees were so elastic as to bend with the weight of a single person. At a great distance below ran the foaming current of the river, so deep an abyss that it turned the heads of those who were passing on the moveable elastic support or bridge above. upon this seeming inconvenience the existence of that country depended. The Galla that surrounded it would have over-run it in a month, but for this river, always rapid and always full, whose ordinary communication by a bridge could be destroyed in a moment; and which, though it had one ford, yet this was useless, unless passengers had assistance from both sides of the river, and consequently could never be of service to an enemy.

terrible appearance of this tottering bridge for a time stopped the ambassador and missionary. They looked upon the passing upon these trembling beams as certainly incurring inevitable destruction. But the reflection of dangers that pressed them behind overcame these fears, and they preferred the resolution to run the rifle of being drowned in the river Zebee, rather than, by staying on the other side all night, to stand the chance of being murdered by the Galla. But, after all the men only could pass the bridge, they were obliged to leave the mules on the other side till the next morning, with instructions to their people, that, upon the first appearance of the Galla, they should leave them, and make their best way over the bridge, throwing down one of the trees after them. The next morning, two peasants, subjects of Gingiro, shewed them the ford, where their beasts passed over with great difficulty and danger, but without loss.


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valetta


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valhalla


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valjean, Jean


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valladolid (Spain)


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Valladolid (Mexico)


text: The New Student's Reference Work/Vallejo, Cal.


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Rh which he shewed to the king of Abyssinia, though he was neither his subject nor vassal. He inquired much after the king's health, and stood a little by the ambassador and Fernandes, speaking by an interpreter. Afterwards he again returned to his balcony, sat down there, read his letter, and then corresponded with the ambassador by messages sent from above to them below.

is impossible to conceive from this, or any thing that Fernandes says, whether the language of Gingiro is peculiar to that country or not. The king of Gingiro read Socinios's letter, which was either in the Tigrè or Arabic language. Fernandes understood the Arabic, and Fecur Egzie the Tigrè and Amharic. It is not possible, then, to know what was the language of the king of Gingiro, who read and understood Socinios's letter, but spoke to Fecur Egzie by an interpreter.

last the king of Gingiro told them, that all contained in the king of Abyssinia's letter was, that he should use them well, give them good guard and protection while they were in his country, and further them on their journey; which he said he would execute with the greatest pleasure and punctuality.

next day, as is usual, the ambassador and missionary carried the king's present, chints, calicoe, and other manufactures of India, things that the king esteemed most. In return to Fernandes he sent a young girl, whom the father returned, it not being customary, as he said, for a Christian priest to have girls in his company. In exchange for the girl, the good-natured king of Gingiro sent him a slave of


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 was necessary now to acquaint the king of Gingiro of their arrival in his kingdom, and to beg to be honoured with an audience. But he happened at that time to be employed in the more important business of conjuration and witchcraft, without which this sovereign does nothing.

kingdom of Gingiro may be fixed upon as the first on this side of Africa where we meet with the strange practice of divining from the apparition of spirits, and from a direct communication with the devil: A superstition this which likewise reaches down all along the western side of this continent on the Atlantic Ocean, in the countries of Congo, Angola, and Benin. In spite of the firmest foundation in true philosophy, a traveller, who decides from the information and investigation of facts, will find it very difficult to treat these appearances as absolute fiction, or as owing to a superiority of cunning of one man in over-reaching another. For my own part, I confess I am equally at a loss to assign reasons for disbelieving the fiction on which their pretensions to some preternatural information are founded, as to account for them by the operation of ordinary causes. The king of Gingiro found eight days necessary before he could admit the ambassador and Fernandes into his presence. On the ninth, they received a permission to go to court, and they arrived there the same day.

they came into the presence of the king he was seated in a large gallery, open before, like what we call a balcony, which had steps from below on the outside, by which he ascended and descended at pleasure. When the letter which the ambassador carried was intimated to him, he came down from the gallery to receive it, a piece of


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350 without water, and exposed greatly to the incursions of the Galla. After two days journey, they arrived in the morning of the third, at the foot of Senaffé, where there was water. It is the frontier (as the name imports) of the province of Enderta, now united to the government of Tigré. It is part of that ridge of mountains which separates the seasons, occasioning summer on the one side, while rain and cold prevail on the other.

the night before they came to the mountain, while dubious of their way, a star of more than ordinary magnitude, and of surprising brightness, appeared over the patriarch, giving so strong a light that it illuminated the heavens down to the horizon. It was not, in its place or manner of appearing, like a common star, but stood stationary, in the way leading to Senaffé, for above six minutes, and disappeared. This star, the patriarch and his followers modestly say, was probably the same that conducted the Magi to the cradle of Christ, and was now sent to shew them the way into Abyssinia.

they were at the foot of this mountain, the Muleteers, all Mahometans, thought the occasion a proper one to plunder them, by obliging them to pay an additional hire for their beasts, which they pretended were not able to ascend so steep a mountain. The camels certainly could not pass; but mules and asses have a more practicable road, for the sake of carrying the salt. They insisted to leave the company till they should bring them fresh mules. The caravan consisted of the patriarch and six ecclesiastics, priests, and friars, and thirteen laymen, three of whom were


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 with her lover solemnly and publicly. For which purpose she applied to the patriarch to dispense with the affinity between her and Za Christos, arising from his having been married before to her sister.

is not to be supposed that the patriarch would have resisted, if nothing had stood in the way except the affinity: but weighty impediments presented themselves befides; for either the first marriage was valid, or it was not. If it was valid, then Wengelawit could not marry Za Christos or any one else, because her husband was alive; nor could she marry her second, nor Tecla Georgis, her third. If the first marriage was not valid, then the second was, which husband was still alive; and, in this case, a licence to marry was giving her liberty of having three husbands at one time. The patriarch, for these reasons, refused his authority to this manifold adultery and incest; nor could he, notwithstanding the intercession of the whole court, ever be brought to comply. His firmness (however commendable) greatly increased the hatred to his person, and aversion to the church of Rome.

day when the king was fitting in his apartment, a monk entered the room, crying with a loud voice, "Hear the ambassador of God and of the Virgin Mary!" The king, upon first sight of the man, expecting some improper liberty might be taken, ordered his attendants to turn him out at the door, and, being removed from his presence, to bring word what he had to say, which was to this effect: "It is three days since I rose from the dead. One day when I was standing in paradise, God called me, and sent me with this message to you: — O emperor! says God, it is now many years


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444 perihelion, or had already passed it, and was receding to its aphelion; but by its increasing tail, already at a great length, we may conjecture it was only then going down to its conjunction, and was then near approaching to the sun.

this we should conclude that this comet must have been seen, however rapidly it did move, some time before the 6th of November, or two days before the feast of St Michael. But this depends on the circumstances of the climate; for though the tropical rains cease the first of September, the cloudy weather continues all the month of October; at the end of these fall the latter rains in gentle showers, which allay the fevers in Dembea, and make the country wholesome for the march of the army, and these rains fall mostly in the night. From this it is probable that the comet, having at first little light and no tail, as yet at a distance from the sun, was not very apparent to the naked eye, till by its increased motion and heat it had acquired both tail and brightness, as it approached its perihelion.

we find by our European accounts, that, in the year 1689, there did appear a comet, the orbit of which was calculated by M. Pingre. And this comet arrived at its perihelion on the 1st day of December 1689, so was going down much inflamed, and with a violent motion to the sun, the 6th of November, when it was observed at Gondar, being but 25 days then from its perihelion.

these circumstances are more than sufficient to constitute the identity of the comet, a phenomenon too rare to


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 Lidda, which, after a short but violent course, falls into the Mareb.

Shangalla of Betcoom did nothing worthy of their reputation or numbers. They had already procured intelligence of the fate of great part of their nation, and had dispersed themselves in unknown and desolate places. The king, however, made a considerable number of slaves of the younger sort, and killed as many of the rest as fell into his hands.

Betcoom, the army proceeded still eastward; passed through the mountains of the Habab, into the low level country which runs parallel to the Red Sea, at the base of these mountains, where he spent several days hunting the elephant, some of which he flew with his own hand, and turned then to the left to Amba Tchou and Taka.

Taka are a nation of Shepherds living near the extremity of the rains. They are not Arabs, but live in villages, and were part formerly of the Bagla, or Habab; they speak the language of Tigré, and are now reputed part of the kingdom of Sennaar.

the king was at Taka, he received the disagreeable news, that, after he had left the Shangalla on the Mareb, Mustapha Gibberti, a Mahometan soldier in the service of Kasmati Fafa Christos of Dedgin, had, with a small number of men, ventured down, thinking that he should


text:
User talk:Digipoke

Welcome
Welcome

Hello, and welcome to Wikisource! Thank you for. I hope you like the place and decide to stay. Here are a few good links for newcomers:
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I hope you enjoy contributing to Wikisource, the library that is free for everyone to use! In discussions, please "sign" your comments using four tildes ( ~ ); this will automatically produce your IP address (or username if you're logged in) and the date. If you need help, ask me on my talk page, or ask your question here (click  [ edit] ) and place  before your question.

Again, welcome! Beeswaxcandle (talk) 06:44, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

The Rough Riders
Hi Digipoke, thanks for your contribution to my ongoing project with the Rough Riders. I always appreciate the help! As you continue to experiment, help out, and make edits, I encourage you to both review various editing policies and to check out how other people have formatted and coded their pages by pressing the editing button on pages that already exist and have been proofread or validated. I see that you already have a certain grasp of how to use HTML effectively to format pages, which is great! Here on Wikisource, however, we strive to use Wiki markup as much as we can because it provides a standard that everyone is familiar with and because it helps protect Wikisource from outside tampering. That being said, once you become a little more familiar with wiki markup, I think you'll find that it's a lot easier to use than HTML and CSS. I've just made some edits to page 157 that I encourage you to take a look at. As a new contributor, I encourage you to make a few changes to your preferences that will make your editing easier and that I changed shortly after becoming a contributor. Under the "editing" tab of your preferences, go to the bottom and uncheck the box that says "Enable enhanced editing toolbar" because the new enhanced toolbar can cause some problems when editing. Namely, it makes it so that the header and footer fields are automatically obscured, and this new toolbar doesn't have the button that allows you to toggle visibility of these fields, which are very necessary, especially when using the RunningHeader template (usually to list page numbers and any type on headers and footers of a page) and for listing references (done in the footer). If you want the header and footer pages to be displayed automatically, you can go to the "Gadgets" heading and check the box that says "Show header and footer fields when editing in the Page namespace." Also, don't forget to sign your name to posts with four tildes (~)! Happy editing, and if you have any questions, I'll do my best to try and answer them! Polyglottalstop (talk) 18:07, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

 * You're continuing to make good edits and get better each time. I've already made some changes to and validated pages 160 and 161, so I encourage you to look at what changes I made using the "compare versions" tool under the "view history" tab. I've also made substantial edits to and validated all of your page edits to "All quiet along the Potomac and other poems," so I encourage you to look at those as well. Thanks! Polyglottalstop (talk) 20:20, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the tips Poly, I was trying to find that header/footer button for quite a while. I looked over the changes you made to some of the pages and was wondering what's the {smallref}/ tags in the footer and how/why do you consolidate the text. Thanks. Digipoke (talk) 20:37, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

 * Sure thing! The smallrefs template simply displays the footnotes in a smaller font size, which I think looks truer to the appearance of an actual footnote in a book. Without smallrefs template, references/ is the tag that usually displays any references or footnotes created by the ref and /ref tags in the body of the text. If you look at the different revisions of the text before and after I added smallrefs, you can see the difference. Alternatively, you can pick a page with a footnote, delete smallrefs from the footer, and preview to see the difference. Sorry for not explaining what I meant by "consolidating the text." Instead of leaving the text the way the OCR produces it,—because it very often leaves small amounts of text on a line or weird things like that—I always use the backspace/delete key to make sure that the text is in coherent blocks. Mostly, it just makes editing easier, but it can also help prevent weird spaces in the final product and it helps me catch things like typos produced by the OCR (like himgry for hungry) and hanging half-words (like when you see something like ammun- ition instead of ammunition). It's kind of hard to explain, but if you compare revisions on the several Rough Riders pages that I've validated, you can see what I mean by consolidating.Polyglottalstop (talk) 20:51, 16 June 2011 (UTC)

Referring to main namespace rather than Page: namespace
Gday. Welcome to your PotM. A little local knowledge that I thought worth passing on. When we are doing internal references to works, we don't wish to direct them to the Page: namespace pages, we wish to refer them to the work in the main namespace. If you have a look at these changes, you will see how I have undertaken that with the PotM. The neatest thing is that with our left marginal page numbering, each is actually a page anchor, so you can use #pp page number referencing. Thanks. — billinghurst  sDrewth  01:48, 18 June 2011 (UTC)

Blackletter
Hi. I took the liberty to modify Page:Marriagewithdece00mayow.djvu/9 to format title with blackletter. In case you want to use it also later in the work. Since I am writing, another suggestion: in case you still do not have them, I suggest that you get User:Hesperian cleanup scripts. Your proofreading speed will boost. Contact him or look for them in Scriptorium. Bye --Mpaa (talk) 21:43, 25 June 2011 (UTC)

Not proofread/proofread
Hi. I saw that you created many pages in Index:U.S. Department of the Interior Annual Report 1880.djvu. If you are done with proofreading a page, please mark the page as proofread. So the next person to proofread the page will be able to mark it as Validated. --Mpaa (talk) 20:12, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
 * I'm not actually reading anything, just editing the pages to make it easier for others to read. I've left out some tables and I'm not sure if there are mistakes in the OCR text. Didn't want to mark it as proofread in case people assume it's been checked/read through and just check valiated. Should I list it as Proofread even if I'm just editing the layout and not reading the text? Digipoke (talk) 20:20, 26 June 2011 (UTC)
 * It is Ok as you are proceding then. I had a quick look and saw formatting, wiki codes, etc. and then assumed you also proofread. --Mpaa (talk) 20:32, 26 June 2011 (UTC)

Style of work
Digipoke, I was thinking that you should contact Beeswaxcandle on what he was thinking for how to style Narrative of an Official...Guatemala book (which he and I are working on together). On page 113 (djvu) you put in the symbol at the bottom of the page, and my views on this are complicated:

1) I used to believe that we should have each page on here match as closely as we can the original (and still do a bit now). In that way, the symbols would be good to put on the page.

but

2) I now believe that, with the invention of an ePub maker, we (the wiki community) should start trying to make the book look good (albeit staying close to the original)
 * I put those in the footer because I thought those didn't show up when the pages were transcluded. Does it show up in an ePub? If so, it's probably a good idea to leave it out. Digipoke (talk) 18:25, 27 June 2011 (UTC)

When I transclude the chapter I'll let you know if it does show up. - Tannertsf (talk) 03:21, 28 June 2011 (UTC)

Presidendial calendars — new WS:NARA project?
Hey Digipoke, I want to thank you for all the work you've done so far for WS:NARA! Wikisource's efforts so far have been awesome. I recently talked with a staff member here in the Office of Presidential Libraries, and one project he was interested in doing was the daily calendars of the presidents. Right now, these are scattered across the websites of each of the presidential libraries, in different formats and only sometimes with a text transcription or text layer on the PDF. I think these would be excellent additions to Wikisource. One of the most approachable of these is the Nixon calendar (links to the PDFs here). I have uploaded the first year of these at Category:Richard Nixon's presidential daily calendar, and all the others can use that exact same format, just changing the title to represent the month. Does this sound like a project you would be interested in working on? I put up a summary of the other calendars at WikiProject NARA/Presidential calendars. Dominic (talk) 22:29, 7 July 2011 (UTC)
 * It sounds like an interesting project. I'll help out wherever I can. Are you looking for the same type of setup as NARA, with indices and djvus? Digipoke (talk) 01:08, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I can make the index pages with the pdfs. Should i put them in the same type of table as the Works to Prepare page and put them on the Presidential calendars page? Digipoke (talk) 01:31, 10 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Yeah, whatever you think works best. I just wanted to ask someone personally because it's a big project, so it might take some individual attention. I was planning on adding the calendars to the WS:NARA progress table once I finished uploading an entire administration. Dominic (talk) 09:10, 11 July 2011 (UTC)

I've added the first month to the Works to Prepare page. Were you talking about something like that? If the same format is going to be used, it's going to be quite long so maybe it should get it's own page. If this is fine I can add the rest of the index pages when I make them. Also, the OCR text for all the pages only shows up on the first page. Any idea how to move them to their respective pages (manually takes to long). Bot?? Digipoke (talk) 14:47, 11 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Also are PDF indices fine or are DJVUs preferred?
 * Some of these are questions that you probably need a more experienced Wikisourceror to answer. As for formatting the project page, it's really up to you. It's likely that we want only a single index page for the entire Nixon presidential calendar, though. I'm not sure how that works with multiple files involved. Dominic (talk) 13:40, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

I've been told from the start that DJVUs are preferred. Something about PDFs not totally working well with the site and transclusion. - Tannertsf (talk) 14:20, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Alright, will check around and try and upload some DJVUs.Digipoke (talk) 16:12, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Doing great!
I hope that you are enjoying your time here. You have picked up the skills quickly and doing a fine job. If you have works that you wish to be considered for the Proofread of the Month, then please consider adding them to the discussions at the project's talk page. — billinghurst  sDrewth  10:12, 13 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks! Will do. Digipoke (talk) 16:14, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Index:Presidential Daily Diary, compiled 01-1969.pdf
I've declined your speedy delete request for now, until I know what is going on. What index has this been replaced by? Do the subpages linked to by the index need to be moved somewhere, or should they also be deleted? Hesperian 00:20, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
 * It's been replaced by Richard Nixon's presidential daily calendar - 1969. The first 39 pages are the same as Presidential Daily Diary, compiled 01-1969, so you can just delete everything. Digipoke (talk) 09:59, 21 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Done. Hesperian 11:08, 22 July 2011 (UTC)

polytonic orthography
Hi. Cheers for the supplying the missing greek at the Æsop pages. I don't know the first thing about ancient Greek, if the scan is good I can sometimes transcribe what I see on the page with my character palette. On this page I see what appears to be different diacritics at the iotas, what you transcribed as Αίσωπείων. I appreciate this may make no difference to the meaning, but I hope to put what was given in the text. Assuming there is actually are different diacritics here, am I being too obsessive in wanting to preserve complex polytonic orthography? CYGNIS INSIGNIS 23:28, 22 July 2011 (UTC)
 * I've changed the second ί to ὶ. I think all the letters are right except for the omega(ω). I looked through all the greek letters and the only circumflex omega WS has was ῶ. I didn't see the one in the book and wasn't sure what else to put down. You can check for yourself. At the bottom of the page where it says select, choose greek (it has more letters than the enhanced toolbar). Digipoke (talk) 23:50, 22 July 2011 (UTC)
 * Ta, I've never known what to do with that one myself. I use the palette on my platform, it sometimes offers more clues than the one at the site. As I say, I have no idea about these things and leave it to those who read Greek. Regards, CYGNIS INSIGNIS 00:18, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Page:Narrative of an Official Visit to Guatemala.djvu/533
Please be careful ... I'm currently putting these pages under construction .. thanks for helping .. but I have a little system going with this. I will copy the header stuff though.- Tannertsf (talk) 22:33, 23 July 2011 (UTC)

Executive orders
Hi... hope this finds you & your's well,

I see you've started creating/proofreading some of the supplemental GPO publications of EOs not printed in the "original" CFR or FR indexes. If you plan to stick with proofreading any of those, please try to use the and  templates whenever possible to maintain signature/footer conformity as close as possible to the GPO Manual of Style guide(s) (as well as our jumble of style guides re: the Page: namespace).

Any questions on EOs or other Executive instruments - feel free to drop me a line. -- George Orwell III (talk) 03:50, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

 * Will start putting in the and  templates when proofreading. Would it be better to proofread the "original" indexes and not these? Are these on wikisource? Also should I move some of these proofread pages ro the mainspace if they're not there? Digipoke (talk) 18:47, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

 * Those EO-range .DjVus are actually the ones ommitted from the compiled publications so in fact they are even "more rare" as far as EOs go. The unresolved issue for the EO project (basically Carl Lindberg and I) was how best to proofread and present these additional EOs in realtion to the compiled ones, and later, the ones standardized by/with the creation of the Federal Register. See the Table of Scanned Indexes for all the EOs that currently have scans but aren't neccessarily worked on enough yet to be ready for any major transclusion to the mainspace. In general, anything earlier than Truman is pretty much in a state of unresolved & incomplete flux - including the basic lists for each President - to be honest about it.
 * I ask to be mindful of just one thing - most Indexes have been realigned so that the published CFR # page matches the .djvu/# page (makes for easier roll-out for templates and Wikipedia linkage when pages line-up 1:1), but if an Index does not match, please do not create any pages in it. I guess you can transclude/replace them to the mainspace as they get PR'd but the problem then becomes how to label/page# them since there never was a real page number in any real compilation for those to the best of our research so far ever.
 * There are serveral other considerations, in my opinion, that need to be resolved before potential contributors can really take a whack at all those Indexes, but progess has been slow and I am first contstrained limited free time in addition to first insuring my admin. role is not just a button to be collected but one that is properly fulfilled. -- George Orwell III (talk)

If there are still things to sort out for transclusion, maybe I'll just stick to proofreading a few more orders. I probably won't be doing to may more if there is a lot to sort out, seems like i'll just be getting in the way. Will these indexes be replacing the EO's w/o scans when all the problems have been solved? Digipoke (talk) 10:39, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

 * Well the issues are more about mainspace presention &/or stylistic in nature than substantive so there is absolutely no harm in PRing and transcluding those either way. If any changes are to be made in the future, they will not be the kind that makes PRing "moot". Plus, we now have tools that make moving hundreds of pages, if need be, an automated process whereas at one time there was no such option.
 * The hope is to replace at least all the EOs from ~1929 to today and we know scans exist for that range (we don't have the 1990's converted & uploaded just yet on top of the ones where pages aren't aligned to match yet), but anything prior to that literally involves 'original research' since no definitive collection was ever made public nevermind formally published. All we have is a listing of all the possible numbered EO issued (starts with Lincoln) and that hasn't been cross-checked for accuracy since 1941 either. -- George Orwell III (talk) 13:28, 3 December 2011 (UTC)

I thought that I was going crazy, then I saw Santa's helper. :-) — billinghurst  sDrewth  00:37, 25 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Hmm. Are you stalking me? Nice work.  I have added to new texts though don't be shy about adding them yourself. — billinghurst  sDrewth  14:01, 27 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Haha! Nope, not stalking, just like to do the shorter works, but you just seem to get to them first. :) - Digipoke (talk) 17:24, 27 December 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, I can explain that most easily in that I go and hunt them up and bring them in. — billinghurst  sDrewth  22:08, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Mystery solved! Is there special page that catalogues works (indexes) by length? - Digipoke (talk) 23:22, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

A note of thanks
Many thanks for your help in the PSM project.— Ineuw talk 01:53, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks!
Just wanted to thank you for helping out with the Pentagon Papers project. Page:Pentagon-Papers-Index.djvu/4 in particular looks really great. – GorillaWarfare (talk) 01:18, 9 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure no problem. Happy to help. - Digipoke (talk) 16:14, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Nice follow-up and tidying
I see that you have been following up on some of the works that others have been adding, and tidying to style, and in a really nice way. Great to see! You may also consider patrolling the works (Mark as patrolled) if you are doing the following through RecentChanges. If you are there is a good (ajax) gadget that works nicely and comfortably. — billinghurst  sDrewth  11:49, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
 * As a follow-up, have you, or would you consider being a fellow administrator? I would be happy to nominate you if think that is a step that you would like to take. — billinghurst  sDrewth  11:59, 12 July 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks! I'll enable the gadget. I'll think about being an admin, but at a later stage as I won't be on as much for a while (real life stuff). -- Digipoke (talk) 23:51, 16 July 2012 (UTC)
 * (-: … Lifus interruptus :-/  — billinghurst  sDrewth  13:01, 17 July 2012 (UTC)

Is use of multicol a bad thing to do?
Hello Digipoke.

 * I noticed you have carefully removed any use of multicol from several of my recent edits (e.g. Page:The Oak (Index).)
 * Would you please be so kind as to elaborate why?
 * Am I doing something wrong; or is there a outright some problem with this template (i.e. should I avoid using it at all?)
 * Perhaps specifying the font colour (i.e. black) like I did was regarded as bad practice?
 * The only public discussion I have been able to find suggests using tables for formatting is frowned upon, but I am a little at a loss as to how else to represent things which consist of multiple columns otherwise. I would appreciate your views. MODCHK (talk) 08:23, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a transclusion issue. The columns dont line up properly. In the first page in the left column it went from A to C and on the right from D to G. The next page left column started at H. So when it's transcluded the left coulmn read A, B, C then straight to H. Like this:

 * It's messy and harder to read/follow. So for things with columns it's simpler to just remove the columns. There might be a template concerning this. I'll see if I can find it. - Digipoke (talk) 11:55, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * You could play around with DGRG column used in Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography. It shows as columns in the pagesapce but straight text in the mainspace. I haven't used it, though, so i'm not sure how well it works. - Digipoke (talk) 12:04, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

 * Thank you. It is hard to get the idea out of my head the end product is not paginated, so I now see your point! And in any case the main driver to use multicol was the inter-column line, which makes no sense at all in the transcluded output. Which sort of puts paid to the utility of DGRG column as an alternative as well. However thank you very much for doing the research.
 * If I have got it right, then there should be no problem using multicol for single-on-page tables? This is about the limit of what I think might be acceptable. What do you think? MODCHK (talk) 13:06, 2 August 2012 (UTC)
 * The way you made the table on that page was exactly right. You might be able to get a similar result using multicol. For simple single page tables multicol will work and is easier but for more complicated works, make a table. Tables can span more than one page, I'm not sure about multicol. Also look at table style for shortcuts to use in a table. - Digipoke (talk)

Is the signature required?
Hey there, Digipoke. I've noticed that on Page:How to Write Music.djvu/5, you've marked the page as problematic because the signature needs to be added. Is the signature required for the book to be complete (i.e. did the book originally belong to some famous person, &c.) or can it be validated otherwise? Thanks,— Clockery Fairfeld (talk) 12:56, 16 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Fixed now, thanks. — Clockery Fairfeld (talk) 13:27, 16 September 2013 (UTC)

title: User talk:Digipoke


text: The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Mystic Theology


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/179

chief feeling, after hearing the story, was one of intense indignation.

"Pretty cheap, I call it," he growled, "to stop a girl and frighten her. The miserable cowards! Just let me get a crack at them once!"

"Bob Henderson, you stay right on this farm," cried Betty, her alarm returning. "They weren't trying to frighten me—at least, that wasn't their main purpose. They wanted to find out about you. They'll kidnap you, or do something dreadful to you. I wish with all my heart that Uncle Dick would come."

"Well, look here, Betty," argued Bob, impressed in spite of himself by her reasoning, "I'm pretty husky and I might have something to say if they tried to do away with me. Besides, what would be their object?"

Betty admitted that she did not know, unless, she added dismally, they planned to set the house on fire some night and burn up the whole family.

Bob laughed, and refused to consider this seriously. But for the next few days Betty dogged Rh


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/180

170 his footsteps like the faithful friend she was, and though the boy found this trying at times he could not find it in his heart to protest.

Miss Hope and Miss Charity were very happy these days. For a while they forgot that the interest was due the next month, that no amount of patient figuring could show them how the year's taxes were to be met, and that the butter and egg money was their sole source of income. Instead, they gave themselves up to the enjoyment of having young folk in the quiet house and to the contemplation of Bob as their nephew. Faith had died, but she had left them a legacy—her son, who would be a prop to them in their old age.

Miss Hope and Miss Charity were talking things over one morning when Betty and Bob were out whitewashing the neglected hen house. Though the sisters protested, they insisted on doing some of the most pressing of the heavy tasks long neglected.

"I really do not see," said Miss Hope, "how we are to feed and clothe the child until he is old enough to earn his living. Of course Faith's son must have a good education. Betty tells me he is very anxious to go to school this winter. He Is determined to get a job, but of course he is much too young to be self-supporting. If only we hadn't traded that stock!"


text: Talk:The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Mystic Theology


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/181

Rh "Maybe what he says about the farm being worth a large sum of money Is true," said Miss Charity timidly. "Wouldn't it be wonderful If there should be oil here, Sister?"

Miss Hope was a lady, and ladles do not snort, but she came perilously near to it.

"Humph!" she retorted, crushing her twin with a look. "I'm surprised at you, Charity! A woman of your age should have more strength of character than to believe in every fairy tale. Of course Bob and Betty think there is oil on the farm—they believe In rainbows and all the other pretty fancies that you and I have outgrown. Besides, I never did take much stock in this oil talk. I don't think the Lord would put a fortune into any one's hands so easily. It's a lazy man's idea of earning a living."

Miss Charity subsided without another reference to oil. Truth to tell, she did not believe in her heart of hearts that there was oil sand on the old farm, and she and her sister had been out of touch with the outside world so long that to a great extent they were ignorant of the proportions of the oil boom that had struck Flame City.

Bob had the stables in good order soon after his arrival, and a day or so before Mr. Gordon was expected he took it into his head to tinker up the cow stanchions. The two rather scrubby


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/182

172 cows were turned out Into the near-by pasture, and Bob set valiantly to work.

Betty was helping the aunts in the kitchen that afternoon, and the three were surprised when Bob thrust a worried face in at the door and announced that the black and white cow had disappeared.

"I'm sure I pegged her down tightly," he explained. "That pasture fence is no good at all, and I never trusted to it. I pegged Blossom down with a good long rope, and Daisy, too; and Daisy is gone while Blossom is still eating her head off."

"I'll come and help you hunt," offered Betty. "The last pan of cookies is in the oven, isn't it, Aunt Hope? Walt till I wash my hands. Bob."

Betty now called Bob's aunts as he did, at their own request, and anyway, said Miss Hope, if Betty's uncle could be Bob's, too, why shouldn't she have two aunts as well as he?

"Where do you think she went?" questioned Betty, hurrying off with Bob. "Is the fence broken in any place?"

"One place it looks as though she might have stepped over," said Bob doubtfully. "The whole thing is so old and tottering that a good heavy cow could blow it down by breathing on it! There, see that corner? Daisy might have ambled through there."


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/183

Rh "Then you go that way, and I'll work around the other end of the farm," suggested Betty. "In that way, we'll cover every inch. A cow is such a silly creature that you're sure to find her where you'd least expect to. The first one to come back will put one bar down so we'll know and go on up to the house."

Betty went off in one direction and Bob in another, and for a moment she heard his merry whistling. Then all was silent.

Betty, for a little while, enjoyed her search. She had had no time to explore the Saunders farm, and though much of it was of a deadly sameness, the three hills, whose shadows rested always on the fields, were beautiful to see, and the air was wonderfully bracing. Shy jack rabbits dodged back and forth between the bushes as Betty walked, and once, when she investigated a thicket that looked as though it might shelter the truant Daisy, the girl disturbed a guinea hen that flew out with a wild flapping of wings.

"I don't see where that cow can have gone," murmured Betty uneasily. "Bob is never careless, and I'm sure he must have pegged her down carefully. Losing one of the cows is serious, for the aunts count every pint of milk; they have to, poor dears. I wish to goodness they would admit that there might be oil on the farm. I'm sure it irritates Bob to be told so flatly that he is dreaming


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/184

174 day-dreams every time he happens to say a word about an oil well."

Betty searched painstakingly, even going out into the road and hunting a short stretch, lest the cow should have strayed out on the highway. The fields through which she tramped were woefully neglected, and more than once she barely saved herself from a turned ankle, for the land was uneven and dead leaves and weeds filled many a hole. Evidently there had been no systematic cultivation of the farm for a number of years.

The sun was low when Betty finally came out in the pasture lot. She glanced toward the bars, saw one down, and sighed with relief. Bob, then, had found the cow, or at least he was at home. She knew that the chances were he had brought Daisy with him, for Bob had the tenacity of a bulldog and would not easily abandon his hunt.

"Did Bob find her?" demanded Betty, bursting into the kitchen where Miss Hope and Miss Charity were setting the table for supper.

The aunts looked up, smiled at the flushed, eager face, and Miss Charity answered placidly.

"Bob hasn't come back, dearie," she said. "You know how boys are—he'll probably look under every stone for that miserable Daisy. She's a good cow, but to think she would run off!"

"Oh, he's back, I know he is," insisted Betty confidently. "I'll run out to the barn. I guess


text:
Page:Barlaam and Josaphat. English lives of Buddha.djvu/23

 Rh inclusion in the saintly calendar, as in the "Golden Legend" of Jacobus de Voragine, to the popularity of the parables which, as we shall see, were connected with their name. But in any case, the ultimate source of each entry is to be found in the life of the two Saints, attributed to St. John of Damascus. In fact, the Roman martyrology in the form given to it by the great Baronius, and just quoted, expressly states that fact.

It must not be supposed that the inclusion of these names in the lists of the Saints is of equal validity with the formal process known as "Canonisation." It is usually stated in summing up the inquiries on which we are about to enter that "Buddha has been canonised as a Saint of the Catholic Church," and much searching of heart has been caused to earnest Catholics by this statement. But M. Cosquin has conclusively shown in a special article devoted to the subject (Revue des Questions Historiques, October, 1880) that there is all the difference in the world between the two processes. Inclusion in the calendar only implies a verdict similar to that of a magistrate's court or a Grand Jury; a prima facie


text:
The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Mystic Theology/Preface

MYSTIC THEOLOGY is like that ladder set up on the earth whose top reached to Heaven on which the angels of God were ascending and descending, and above which stood Almighty God. The Angel ascending is the “negative” which distinguishes Almighty God from all created things. God is not matter—soul, mind, spirit, any being, nor even being itself, but above and beyond all these. The Angel descending is the “Affirmative.” God is good, wise, powerful, the Being, until we come to Symbolic Theology, which denotes Him under material forms and conditions: Theology prefers the negative because Almighty God is more appropriately presented by distinction than by comparison.


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/185

Rh he is going to do the chores before he comes in."

She thought it odd that Bob had not told his aunts of his return, but she was so sure that he was in the barn that she shouted his name as she entered the door. Clover whinnied, but no voice answered her. Blossom was in her stanchion, Bob had placed her there before setting out to hunt, and everything was just as he had left it, even to his hammer lying on the barn floor.

Betty went into the pig house, the chicken house and yard, and every outbuilding. No Bob was in sight.

"But he put the bar down—that was our signal," she said to herself, over and over.

"Don't fret, dearie. Sit down and eat your supper," counseled Miss Hope placidly, when she had to report that she could not find him. "He may be real late. I'll keep a plate hot for him."

The supper dishes were washed and dried, the table cleared, and a generous portion of biscuits and honey set aside for Bob. Miss Hope put on an old coat and went out with Betty to feed the stock, for it was growing dark and she did not want the boy to have it all to do when he came in tired.

"I'll do the milking," said Betty hurriedly. "I'm not much of a milker, but I guess I can manage. Bob hates to milk when it is dark."

In the girl's heart a definite fear was growing.


text:
Page:Barlaam and Josaphat. English lives of Buddha.djvu/24

xviii case for sainthood has been made out. Before canonisation can be obtained, the searching cross-examination of the Avvocato del Diavolo must be triumphantly sustained. Modern scholarship has acted the part of the Devil's Advocate with the result that the next edition of the Roman Martyrology will not, in all probability, contain the names of Barlaam and Josaphat.

But that these mysterious personages have been regarded by clergy and laity as veritable Saints of the Church, there can be no doubt. Sir Henry Yule visited a church at Palermo dedicated "Divo Josaphat." In 1571 the Doge Luigi Mocenigo presented to King Sebastian of Portugal a bone and part of the spine of St. Josaphat. When Spain seized Portugal in 1580 these sacred treasures were removed by Antonio, the Pretender to the Portuguese crown, and ultimately found their way to Antwerp. On August 7, 1672, a grand procession defiled through the streets of Antwerp, carrying to the cloister of St. Salvator the holy remains of St. Josaphat. There, for ought


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/186

176 Something had happened to Bob! Milking, the thought of the sharpers came to her. Oddly enough they had not been in her mind for several days. The bar! Had they anything to do with the one bar being down?

Neither she nor Bob had ever said a word to his aunts on the subject of the two men in gray, arguing that there was no use in making the old ladies nervous. Now that the full responsibility had devolved upon Betty, she was firmly resolved to say no word concerning the men who had stopped her in the road and asked her questions about Bob.

She finished milking Blossom, and fastened the barn door behind her. Glancing toward the house, she saw Miss Hope come flying toward her, wringing her hands.

"Oh, Betty!" she wailed, "something has happened to Bob! I heard a cow low, and I went out front, and there Daisy stood on the lawn. I'm afraid Bob is lying somewhere with a broken leg!"


text: Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil/Chapter 21


text:
Page:Barlaam and Josaphat. English lives of Buddha.djvu/25

 Rh I know to the contrary, they remain to the present day.

But while Catholic Christendom had no doubt as to the reality of these Saints, Catholic scholarship was by no means positive as to the authorship of the Legend of the Saints. The Greek MSS. attributed it to "John, Monk of the Convent of St. Saba," or St. Sinai. It is only in the latest MSS. that this Monk John is directly identified with John of Damascus, a somewhat distinguished theologian of the eighth century. He was the only ecclesiastical writer of the name of John to whom the book could be attributed, and scholarship, like Nature herself, abhors a vacuum. And so the book of Barlaam and Joasaph has been included among the works of John of Damascus ever since his editors have collected them together. Yet they have not been without their doubts, and they always felt themselves obliged to defend the inclusion of the book. One of his editors indeed, Lequien, went so far as to exclude it altogether from the authentic works. The whole question has been carefully threshed out by M. Zotenberg in his Notice sur le Livre de Barlaam


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Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/187

heart thumped, but she managed to control her voice. She was now convinced that the sharpers had something to do with Bob's disappearance.

Miss Hope was so beside herself with grief and fear that Betty thought, with the practical wisdom that was far beyond her years, that it would be better for her to occupy herself with searching than to remain in the house and let her imagination run riot.

Miss Charity came tremblingly out with a lantern, and after the milk was strained—for the habits of every day living hold even in times of trouble and distress—they set out, an old lady on either side of Betty, who had taken the lantern.

It was a weird performance, that tramp over the uneven fields with a flickering lantern throwing dim shadows before them and the bushes and trees assuming strange and terrifying shapes, fantastic beyond the power of clear daylight to make them. More than once Miss Charity started Rh


text:
Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/188

178 back in fright, and Miss Hope, who was stronger, shook so with nervousness that she found it difficult to walk. Betty, too, was much overwrought, and it is probable that if either a jack rabbit or a white owl had crossed the path of the three there would have been instant flight. However, they saw nothing more alarming than their own shadows and a few harmless little insects that the glow of the lantern attracted.

"Suppose the poor, dear boy is lying somewhere with a broken leg!" Miss Hope kept repeating. "How would we get a doctor for him? Could we get him back to the house?"

"Think how selfish we were to sit down and eat supper—we ought to have known something was wrong with him," grieved Miss Charity. "I'd rather have lost both cows than have anything happen to Bob."

Betty could not share their fear that Bob was injured. The memory of that one bar down, haunted her, though she could give no explanation. Then the cow had come back. Betty had positive proof that the animal had not wandered to the half of the farm she had explored, and Bob's section had been nearer the house. Why had Daisy stayed away till almost dark, when milking time was at half past five? And the cow had been milked! Betty forebore to call the aunts' attention to this, and they were too


text:
Page:Barlaam and Josaphat. English lives of Buddha.djvu/26

 xx (Paris, 1886). He may fairly be said to have disposed of the claims of John of Damascus. He points out that the style of the book is superior in purity, correctness, and richness to that of the recognised works of John of Damascus. The defenders of the authorship had pointed to similarities of doctrine in ecclesiastical matters in the Barlaam and in the recognised writings of John of Damascus. M. Zotenberg in his case traces the similarity to a common source. Apart, however, from these negative arguments, M. Zotenberg has, by a careful scrutiny of the theology of Barlaam, arrived at an ingenious crucial difference between the views expressed in the book and those known to be held by John of Damascus. Each decade of the earlier centuries of Christianity can be distinguished by its fashionable heresy. The years 620-38 were dominated in Christian theology by the discussion of the exact relations of the human and divine Will in Christ. I do not profess to understand the minutiae of the discussion, and my readers will probably be grateful to me if I profess the heresy of Lord Dundreary with regard to it. But it seems that the Christian world


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Page:Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil.djvu/189

Rh in their own conjectures to have noticed the fact.

"Well, he isn't on the farm." Miss Hope made this reluctant admission after they had visited every nook and cranny. "What can have become of him?"

Miss Charity was almost in a state of collapse, and her sister and Betty both saw that she must be taken home. It was hard work, going back without Bob, and once in the kitchen. Miss Charity was hysterical, clinging to her sister and sobbing that first Faith had died and now her boy was missing.

"But we'll find him, dear," urged Miss Hope. "He can't be lost. A strong boy of fourteen can't be lost; can he, Betty?"

"Of course we'll find him," asserted Betty stoutly. "I'm going to ride to the Watterbys in the morning and telephone to Uncle Dick. He will know what to do. You won't mind staying alone for a couple of hours, will you?"

"Not in the daytime," quavered Miss Charity. "But my, I'm glad you're here to-night, Betty. Sister and I never used to be afraid, but you and Bob have spoiled us. We don't like to stay alone."

Betty slept very little that night. Aside from missing Bob's protection—and how much she had relied on him to take care of them she did not


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 Rh of the East was divided between Dyotheletism, which recognised two Wills in Christ, and Monotheletism, which fuses the two into one. The decisive moment in the controversy came in 633, when Cyrus of Alexandria promulgated his Nine Articles, by which Monotheletism became incumbent on the orthodox. Now the book of Barlaam is distinctly Dyotheletic in tendency, and by this subtle means we are therefore led by M. Zotenberg to the conclusion that its date must be anterior at least to the year 633. On the other hand, a terminus a quo is given for the book by the fact that the Convent of St. Saba was refounded by that Saint in the year 491.

M. Zotenberg went a step further in determining the age of the book by a careful examination of the historical background involved in it. The Religions of the world are stated to be three: Idolatry, Judaism, Christianity. Hence M. Zotenberg infers that the book was written previous to the marvellous spread of Islam in the seventh century. And in the particular form of Idolatry professed by Abenner, King of the Indians and father of Joasaph, clear reference is to be found in the tenets of


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180 realize until she missed him—there were the demands made on her by the old ladies, who both suffered from bad dreams. During much of the night Betty's active mind insisted on going over and over the most trivial points of the day. Always she came back to the two mysteries that she could not discuss with the aunts: Who had put the single bar down, and who had milked the cow?

Breakfast was a sorry pretense the next morning, and Betty was glad to hurry out to the barn and feed and water the stock and milk the two cows. It was hard and heavy work and she was not skilled at it, and so took twice as long a time as Bob usually did. Then, when she had saddled Clover and changed to her riding habit, she sighted the mail car down the road and waited to see if the carrier had brought her any later news of her uncle. The Watterbys promptly sent her any letters that came addressed to her there.

There was no news, but the delay was fifteen minutes or so, and when Betty finally started for the Watterbys it was after nine o'clock. She had no definite plan beyond telephoning to her uncle and imploring him to come and help them hunt for Bob.

"Where could he be?" mourned poor Miss Hope, with maddening persistency. "We looked all over the farm, and yet where could he be?


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Rh If he went to any of the neighbors to inquire, and was taken sick, he'd send us word. I don't see where he can be!"

Betty hurried Clover along, half-dreading another encounter with the men who had stopped her. She passed the place where she had been stopped, and a bit further on met Doctor Morrison on his way to a case, his car raising an enormous cloud of dust in the roadway. He pulled out to allow her room, recognized her, and waved a friendly hand as he raced by. By this token Betty knew he was in haste, for he always stopped to talk to her and ask after the Saunders sisters.

The Watterby place, when she reached it, seemed deserted. The hospitable front door was closed, and the shining array of milk pans on the back porch was the only evidence that some one had been at work that morning. No Grandma Watterby came smiling down to the gate, no busy Mrs. Will Watterby came to the window with her sleeves rolled high.

"Well, for pity's sake!" gasped Betty, completely astounded. "I never knew them to go off anywhere all at once. Never! Mrs. Watterby is always so busy. I wonder if anything has happened."

"Hello! Hello!" A shout from the roadway


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Rh indicate jocosely, to hint at playfully .... Allusion is the by-play of language." — Words and Their Uses, ch. 5, p. 90. (S. H. & Co.'70)

Allude is from the Latin alludo, treat lightly, from ad, at, and ludo, play, and should be used only with the sense of "to refer incidentally, indirectly, or by suggestion." When you toast a hero by name, you certainly do not allude to him, although in so doing you make a pretty allusion to the heroic act with which his name is identified. In toasting Dewey, you do not allude to him but to his deeds off Manila.

allusion: Distinguish between this word and illusion. The former is derived from the Latin ad, at, + ludo, play (treat lightly), and means an incidental suggestion or passing reference, a species of innuendo; the latter is derived from in, on, + ludo, play (play tricks on), and means an unreal image presented to the senses.

almost: "An adjective in early English, the use of which has recently been revived, but it has not received the sanction of general usage." —.

An "almost Christian" is, however, a most expressive term, and would oftentimes more nearly express the truth than the absolute and unqualified "Christian." Compare.

almost, about: These words are now commonly used as interchangeable synonyms. Formerly, such


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182 made her turn. "You looking for Mr. Watterby?"

"I'm looking for any one of them," explained Betty, smiling at the tow-haired boy who stood grinning at her. "Are they all away?"

"Yep. They're out riding in an automobile," announced the boy importantly. "Grandma Watterby's great-nephew, up to Tippewa, died and left her two thousand dollars. And she says she always wanted a car, and now she's going to have one. A different agent has been here trying to sell her one every week. They took me last time."

In spite of her anxiety, Betty laughed at the picture she had of the hard-working family leaving their cares and toil to go riding about the country in a demonstrator's car. She hoped that Grandma would find a car to her liking, one whose springs would be kind to her rheumatic bones, and that there would be enough left of the little legacy to buy the valiant old lady some of the small luxuries she liked.

"Ki's home," volunteered the boy. "He's working 'way out in the cornfield. Want to see him? I'll call him for you."

"No thanks," said Betty, uncertain what to do next. "I don't suppose there's a telephone at your house, is there?" she asked, smiling.

The urchin shook his head quickly.

"No, we ain't got one," he replied. "Was


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Rh you wanting to use Mis' Watterby's? It's out of order. Been no good for two days. My ma had to go to Flame City yesterday to telephone my dad."

"I'll have to go to Flame City, too, I think," decided Betty. "I hope you'll take the next automobile ride," she added, mounting Clover.

"Gee, Grandma Watterby says if they buy a car I can have all the rides I want," grinned the towhead engagingly. "You bet I hope they buy!"

All her worry about Bob shut down on Betty again as she urged the horse toward the town. Suppose Uncle Dick were not within reach of the telephone! Suppose he were off on a long inspection trip!

Flame City had not improved, and though Betty could count her visits to it on the fingers of one hand, she thought it looked more unattractive than ever. The streets were dusty and not over clean, and were blocked with trucks and mule teams on their way to the fields with supplies. Here and there a slatternly woman idled at the door of a shop, but for the most part men stood about in groups or waited for trade in the dirty, dark little shops.

"I wonder where the best place to telephone is," said Betty to herself, shrinking from pushing her way through any of the crowds that


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184 seemed to surround every doorway. "I'll ask them in the post-office."

The post-office was a yellow-painted building that leaned for support against a blue cigar store. Like the majority of shacks in the town, it boasted of only one story, and a long counter, whittled with the initials of those who had waited for their mail, was its chief adornment.

Betty hitched Clover outside and entered the door to find the postmaster rapidly thumbing over a bunch of letters while a tall man in a pepper-and-salt suit waited, his back to the room.

"Can you tell me where to find a public telephone?" asked Betty, and at the sound of her voice, the man turned.

"Betty!" he ejaculated. "My dear child, how glad I am to see you!"

Mr. Gordon took the package of mail the postmaster handed him and thrust it into his coat pocket.

"The old car is outside," he assured his niece. "Let's go out and begin to get acquainted again."

Betty, beyond a radiant smile and a furtive hug, had said nothing, and when Mr. Gordon saw her in the sunlight he scrutinized her sharply.

"Everything all right, Betty?" he demanded, keeping his voice low so that the loungers should not overhear. "I'd rather you didn't come over to town like this. And where is Bob?"


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Rh "Oh, Uncle Dick!" The words came with a rush. "That's why I'm here. Bob has disappeared! We can't find him anywhere, and I'm afraid those awful men have carried him off."

Mr. Gordon stared at her in astonishment. In a few words she managed to outline for him her fears and what had taken place the day before. Mr. Gordon had made up his mind as she talked.

"We'll leave Clover at the hotel stable. It won't kill her for a few hours," he observed. "You and I can make better time in the car, rickety as it is. Hop in, Betty, for we're going to find Bob. Not a doubt of it. It's all over but the shouting."


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" you think thase sharpers carried off Bob?" urged Betty, bracing herself as the car dipped into a rut and out again.

"Every indication of it," agreed her uncle, swerving sharply to avoid a delivery car.

"But where could they have taken him?" speculated Betty, clinging to the rim of the side door. "How will you know where to look?"

"I think he is right on the farm," answered Mr. Gordon. "In fact, I shall be very much surprised if we have to go off the place to discover him. I'm heading for the farm on that supposition."

"But, Uncle Dick," Betty raised her voice, for the much-abused car could not run silently, "I can't see why they would carry Bob off, anyway. Of course I know they don't like him, and I do believe they recognized him as the boy who sat behind them on the train, though Bob laughs and says he isn't so handsome that people remember his face; but I don't understand what good it would do them to kidnap him. The aunts are too Rh


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already amid use was condemned. One may say of a task that it is "almost completed" or that it is "about completed" meaning that it is nearly accomplished or approaches closely to a completed state.

already: Although this word consists of two elements "all" and "ready," it is not correctly spelled with two "l's" but already.

also, likewise: According to some writers also merely denotes addition, and likewise denotes connection with some person or thing that has previously been referred to. Likewise, which means "in like manner," of necessity refers to states and conditions which are susceptible of manner, and should not be used indiscriminately for also, which properly connects facts and qualities. There is, for example, a considerable difference between the expressions "He spoke also" and "He spoke likewise." In the second case, the matter of speech may be considered to have been to the same effect as the speech first alluded to. Lexicographers do not recognize this difference.

In practise, the choice between these words is largely to secure euphony and avoid repetition. Also and likewise affirm that what is added is like that to which it is added. —, p.59.

alternative: "This word means a choice — one choice — between two things. Yet popular usage has


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Rh poor to pay any money for him, that's certain."

"Well, now, Betty, I'm rather surprised at you," Mr. Gordon teased her. "For a bright girl, you seem to have been slow on this point. What do these sharpers want of the aunts, anyway?"

"The farm," answered Betty promptly. "They know there is oil there and they want to buy it for almost nothing and make their fortunes."

"At the expense of two innocent old ladies," added Mr. Gordon.

"But, Uncle Dick, Bob doesn't own the farm. Only his mother's share. And the aunts would be his guardians, he says, so his consent isn't necessary for a sale. You see, I do know a lot about business." And Betty glanced triumphantly at her uncle.

He smiled good-humoredly, and let the car out another notch.

"Has it ever occurred to you, my dear," he said casually, "that, if Bob were out of the way, the aunts might be persuaded to sell their farm for an absurdly small sum? A convincing talker might make any argument seem plausible, and neither Miss Hope nor Miss Charity are business women. They are utterly unversed in business methods or terms, and are the type of women who obediently sign any paper without reading it, I intend to see that you grow up with a


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188 of legal terms and forms that will at least protect you when you're placed in the position the Saunders women are."

"Miss Hope said once her father attended to everything for them," mused Betty, "and I suppose when he died they just had to guess. Oh!" a sudden light seemed to break over her. "Oh, Uncle Dick! do you suppose those men may be there now trying to get them to sell the farm?"

"Of course I don't know that they were on the place when you left," said her uncle. "But allowing them half an hour to reach there, I am reasonably certain that they are sitting in the parlor this minute, talking to the aunts. I only hope they haven't an agreement with them, or, if they have, that the pen and ink is where Miss Hope can't put her hands on it."

"Do you think there really is oil there?" asked Betty hurriedly, for another turn would bring them in sight of the farm. "Can you tell for sure, Uncle Dick?"

Mr. Gordon regarded her whimsically.

"Oil wells are seldom 'sure,'" he replied cautiously. "But if I had my doubts, they'd be clinched by what you tell me of these men. No Easterner with a delicate daughter was ever so anxious to buy a run-down place—not with a whole county to chose from. Also, as far as I can tell, judging from the location, which is all


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Rh I've had to go by, I should say we were safe in saying there is oil sand there. In fact, I've already taken it up with the company, Betty, and they're inclined to think this whole section may be a find."

Betty hardly waited for the automobile to stop before she was out and up the front steps of the farm house, Mr. Gordon close behind her.

"I hear voices in the parlor," whispered Betty, "Oh, hurry!"

"All cash, you see," a voice that Betty recognized as Blosser's was saying persuasively. "Nothing to wait for, absolutely no delay."

Mr. Gordon put a restraining hand on Betty's arm, and motioned to her to keep still.

"But my sister and I should like to talk it over, for a day or so," quavered Miss Hope. "We're upset because our nephew is missing, as we have explained, and I don't think we should decide hastily."

"I don't like to hurry you," struck in another voice, Fluss's, Betty was sure, "but I tell you frankly, Madam, a cash offer doesn't require consideration. All you have to do, you and your sister, is to sign this paper, and we'll count the money right into your hand. Could anything be fairer?"

"It's a big offer, too," said Blosser. "A run-down place like this isn't attractive, and you're


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190 likely to go years before you get another bid. Our client wants to get his daughter out into this air, and he has money to spend fixing up. I tell you what we'll do—we'll pay this year's taxes—include them in the sale price. Why, ladies, you'll have a thousand dollars in cash!"

Betty could picture Miss Hope's eyes at the thought of a thousand dollars.

"Well, Sister, perhaps we had better take it," suggested Miss Charity timidly. "We can do sewing or something like that, and that money will put Bob through school."

"Come on, here's where we put a spoke in the wheel," whispered Mr. Gordon, beckoning Betty to follow him and striding down the hall.

"Why, Betty!" Miss Hope rose hastily and kissed her. "Sister and I had begun to worry about you."

"This is my uncle, Mr. Gordon, Miss Hope," said Betty. "I found him in Flame City. Has Bob come back?"

Miss Hope, much flustered by the presence of another stranger, said that Bob had not returned, and presented Mr. Gordon to her sister.

"These gentlemen, Mr. Snead and Mr. Elmer,"—she consulted the cards in her hand—"have called to see us about selling our farm."

Mr. Gordon nodded curtly to the pair whose


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Rh faces were as black as a thunder-cloud at the interruption.

"I'm sure Mr. Gordon will excuse us if we go on with the business," said Blosser smoothly. "You have a dining-room, perhaps, or some other room where we could finish this matter quietly?"

Miss Hope glanced about her helplessly. Betty noticed that there was pen and ink and a package of bills of large denomination on the table. Evidently they had reached the farm just in time.

"Why, it happens that I'm interested in a way in your farm, if it is for sale," announced Mr. Gordon leisurely.

He selected a comfortable chair, and leaned back in it with the air of a man who is not to be hurried. A look of relief came into Miss Hope's face, and her nervous tension perceptibly relaxed.

"This farm is sold," declared Blosser truculently. "My partner and I have bought it for a client of ours."

"Any signatures passed?" said Mr. Gordon lazily.

"Miss Hope will sign right here," said Blosser, hastily unfolding a sheet of foolscap. "She was about to do so when you came in."

Miss Hope automatically took up the pen.

"Have you read that agreement?" demanded Mr. Gordon sharply. "Do you know what you


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192 are signing? I'd like to know the purchase price. I'm representing Bob's interest."

"Oh, Bob!" Miss Hope and Miss Charity both turned from the paper toward the speaker. "We think the money will put Bob through school—a whole thousand dollars, Mr. Gordon, and the taxes paid. We can't run the farm any longer. We can't afford to hire help."

"No farm is sold without a little more trouble than this," announced Mr. Gordon pleasantly. "You don't mind if I ask you a few questions?"

"We're in a hurry," broke in Fluss. "Sign this, ladies, and my partner and I will pay you the cash and get on to the next town. You can answer this gentleman's questions after we're gone."

"I suppose there is a mortgage?" asked Mr. Gordon, Ignoring Fluss altogether.

"Five hundred dollars," answered Miss Hope. "We had to give a mortgage to get along after Father died."

"So they've offered you fifteen hundred dollars for an oil farm," said Mr. Gordon contemptuously. "Well, don't take it."

"Bob said there was oil herel" cried Miss Charity.

"That's a lie!" snarled Blosser furiously. "You're out of the oil section by a good many miles. Are you going to turn down a cash offer for this forsaken dump, simply because a stranger


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Rh so corrupted it, that it is now commonly applied to the things themselves, and not to the choice between them, as 'You may take either alternative,' 'I was forced to choose between two alternatives.' And, indeed, some people go so far as to say 'several alternatives were presented him.' "—, Good English, Misused Words, p. 45.

always, all ways: Discriminate carefully between these terms. Always means "during all time"; all ways means "in every way."

amateur, novice: These terms are not synonymous. The distinction between them is that an amateur may be the equal in skill of a professional, but a novice is a beginner, and as such does not equal the professional in skill.

ambidextrous: Do not spell this word "ambidexterous" It is derived from the Latin dextra, the right hand, and ous. Although the form ambidexterous was common in England in the nineteenth century, it is not now in use.

ambition should not be used to signify mild energy as it imports persistent and inordinate or steadfast desire. "The heat leaves me without ambition for work" illustrates an altogether wrong use of the word.

amid, among: Discriminate carefully between these words. Amid denotes position when one object is surrounded by others from which it differs in nature or characteristics; among denotes an intermingling


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Rh happens along and tells you there may be oil on it? Bah!"

"Keep your temper," counseled Fluss in a low tone. "Well, rather than see two ladies lose a sale," he said with forced cheerfulness, "We will make you an offer of three thousand dollars. Money talks louder than fair words."

"I'll give you five thousand, cash," Mr. Gordon spoke quietly, but Betty bounced about on the sofa in delight.

Fluss leaped to his feet and brought his fist smashing down on the table.

"Six thousand!" he cried fiercely. "We're buying this farm. We'll give you six thousand dollars, ladies."

"Seven thousand," said Mr. Gordon conversationally. He did not shift his position, but his keen eyes followed every movement of the rascally pair. He said afterward that he was afraid of gun play.

"Oh—oh, my goodness!" stammered Miss Hope. "I can't seem to think."

"You don't have to, Madam," Fluss assured her, his immaculate gray tie under one ear and his clothing rumpled from the heat and excitement. "Sell us your farm. We'll give you ten thousand dollars. That's the last word. Ten thousand for this mud hole. Here's a pen—sign this!"


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194 "Drop that pen!" thundered Mr. Gordon, and Miss Hope let it fall as though it had burned her fingers. "I'll give you fifteen thousand dollars," he said more gently.

Fluss looked at Blosser who nodded.

"Seventeen thousand," he shrieked, as though the sisters were deaf. "Seventeen I tell you, seventeen thousand!"

"Twenty," said Mr. Gordon cheerfully.

Miss Charity suddenly found her voice.

"I think we'd better sell to Mr. Gordon," she announced quietly.


text: Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil/Chapter 22


text: Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil/Chapter 23


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, who had been wringing her hands, bewildered and hopelessly at sea, hailed this concrete suggestion with visible relief.

"All right, Sister, I think so, too," she agreed, glad for once not to have to make the decision. "You're sure you are not cheating yourself, Mr. Gordon, by paying us twenty thousand dollars?"

Mr. Gordon, who had strolled over to the door leading into the hall, assured her that he was well-satisfied with his bargain.

"Well, we'll be going," muttered Blosser. "All this comes from trying to do business with women. You had as good as passed us your word that you'd sell to us, and see what's happened. However, women don't know nothing about ethics. Come on, Fluss."

He was too disappointed and angry to notice the slip of his tongue, but Fluss flushed a brick red.

"Just one minute," said Mr. Richard Gordon, blocking the doorway. "You don't leave this place until you promise to produce that boy." Rh


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196 Blosser feigned ignorance, but the attempt deceived no one.

"What boy?" he blustered. "You seem bent on stirring up trouble, Stranger."

"You know very well what boy," retorted Mr. Gordon evenly. "You'll stir up something more than mere trouble if he isn't brought here within a few minutes, or information given where we may find him. Where is Bob Henderson?"

"Here, sir!" a blithe voice announced, and the door leading into a communicating room was jerked open.

Bob, his clothing a bit the worse for wear, but apparently sound and whole, stood there, brandishing a stout club.

"Oh, Bob!" Betty's cry quite drowned the exclamation of the aunts, but Bob had no eye for any one but Blosser and Fluss, who were making a wild attempt to get past Mr. Gordon.

"Have they bought the farm?" demanded the boy excitedly. "Did they get my aunts to sign anything for them?"

"I'm your new landlord. Bob," announced Mr. Gordon, patting himself on the chest. "Don't think you can put me off when the rent comes due."

"So that's all right," said Bob, with manifest relief. "As for those two scamps, who nearly choked me, well, let me get at them once."

Whirling his club he charged upon the pair who


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Rh squealed in terror and tore past Mr. Gordon, down the hall and out into the yard, Bob in pursuit. Miss Hope and Miss Charity ran to the windows, and Betty and her uncle watched from the porch (Betty was going to follow Bob as a matter of course, but Mr. Gordon held her back) as the boy continued the chase. Fluss and Blosser presented a ludicrous sight as they ran heavily, their coats flapping in the wind and their hats jammed low over their eyes. Bob did not try to catch up with them, but contented himself with shouting loudly and swishing his heavy club through the air, while he kept just close enough to their heels to warn them that it was not safe to slacken speed. In a few minutes the watchers saw him coming back, walking, a broad grin on his face.

"Good little Marathon, wasn't it?" he called from the road. "Did you hear me yelling like an Indian? I chased them as far as the boundary line, and when I saw them they were still running. Gee, Mr. Gordon, I mean Uncle Dick, you got back from the oil fields just in time."

He came up on the steps and shook hands with Mr. Gordon, and submitted to a hug from each aunt.

"Have you really bought the farm?" he asked curiously. "Or was that just a blind?"

Miss Hope and Miss Charity looked anxiously


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198 at Mr. Gordon. They had planned exactly what to do with that twenty thousand dollars.

"We haven't signed an agreement," admitted the successful bidder, "but the farm is sold, all right. I'll give this check to Miss Hope now—" he hastily filled out a blank slip from his book—"as an evidence of good faith. Then I want to hear Bob's tale, and then I must do a bit of telephoning. And to-morrow morning, good people, I promise you the surprise of your lives."

Miss Hope glanced at the check he gave her, gasped, and opened her mouth to speak.

"Sh!" warned Mr. Gordon. "Dear lady, I've set my heart on staging a little climax; don't spoil it. To-morrow morning at eleven o'clock we'll have all the explanations. Now, Bob, what happened to you? I hear you nearly frightened your aunts into hysterics, to say nothing of Betty, whom I found tearing around Flame City hunting for a telephone."

Bob was in a fever of curiosity to know about the farm, whether Mr. Gordon thought there was a good prospect of oil or not, but Uncle Dick was not the kind of man to have his decisions debated. Bob wisely concluded to wait with what patience he could until the proper time. He turned to Betty.

"You know when we separated to hunt for Daisy?" he said. "Well, I went through the first


text:
The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Mystic Theology/Caput I

What is the Divine Gloom?

Section I
TRIAD supernal, both super-God and super-good, Guardian of the Theosophy of Christian men, direct us aright to the super-unknown and super-brilliant and highest summit of the mystic Oracles, where the simple and absolute and changeless mysteries of theology lie hidden within the super-luminous gloom of the silence, revealing hidden things, which in its deepest darkness shines above the most super-brilliant, and in the altogether impalpable and invisible, fills to overflowing the eyeless minds with glories of surpassing beauty. This then be my prayer; but thou, O dear Timothy, by thy persistent commerce with the mystic visions, leave behind both sensible perceptions and intellectual efforts, and all objects of sense and intelligence, and all things not being and being, and be raised aloft unknowingly to the union, as far as attainable, with Him Who is above every essence and knowledge. For by the resistless and absolute ecstasy in all purity, from thyself and all, thou wilt be carried on high, to the superessential ray of the Divine darkness, when thou hast cast away all, and become free from all.

Section II
But see that none of the uninitiated listen to these things—those I mean who are entangled in things being, and fancy there is nothing superessentially above things being, but imagine that they know, by their own knowledge, Him, Who has placed darkness as His hiding-place. But, if the Divine initiations are above such, what would any one say respecting those still more uninitiated, such as both portray the Cause exalted above all, from the lowest of things created, and say that It in no wise excels the no-gods fashioned by themselves and of manifold shapes, it being our duty both to attribute and affirm all the attributes of things existing to It, as Cause of all, and more properly to deny them all to It, as being above all, and not to consider the negations to be in opposition to the affirmations, but far rather that It, which is above every abstraction and definition, is above the privations.

Section III
Thus, then, the divine Bartholomew says that Theology is much and least, and the Gospel broad and great, and on the other hand concise. He seems to me to have comprehended this supernaturally, that the good Cause of all is both of much utterance, and at the same time of briefest utterance and without utterance; as having neither utterance nor conception, because It is superessentially exalted above all, and manifested without veil and in truth, to those alone who pass through both all things consecrated and pure, and ascend above every ascent of all holy summits, and leave behind all divine lights and sounds, and heavenly words, and enter into the gloom, where really is, as the Oracles say, He Who is beyond all. For even the divine Moses is himself strictly bidden to be first purified, and then to be separated from those who are not so, and after entire cleansing hears the many-voiced trumpets, and sees many lights, shedding pure and streaming rays; then he is separated from the multitude, and with the chosen priests goes first to the summit of the divine ascents, although even then he does not meet with Almighty God Himself, but views not Him (for He is viewless) but the place where He is. Now this I think signifies that the most Divine and Highest of the things seen and contemplated are a sort of suggestive expression, of the things subject to Him Who is above all, through which His wholly inconceivable Presence is shown, reaching to the highest spiritual summits of His most holy places; and then he (Moses) is freed from them who are both seen and seeing, and enters into the gloom of the Agnosia; a gloom veritably mystic, within which he closes all perceptions of knowledge and enters into the altogether impalpable and unseen, being wholly of Him Who is beyond all, and of none, neither himself nor other; and by inactivity of all knowledge, united in his better part to. the altogether Unknown, and by knowing nothing, knowing above mind.


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Rh field all right, but when I was passing those two old apple trees that have grown together, Fluss and Blosser jumped out and one of 'em threw a coat over my head so I couldn't shout. They downed me, and then Fluss stuffed his handkerchief in my mouth while Blosser tied my hands and feet. Daisy was behind the tree. I figured out they had come and got her, and I was mighty glad we had agreed to separate. I don't doubt they would have bound and gagged you, too, Betty, if you had been with me. They wouldn't stop at anything.

"They carried me to the barn loft—" Betty jumped a little. "Yes, I was up there when you were milking. Awfully hot up there in the hay it was, too. They were hiding near us when we planned to drop the bar as a signal, and I heard them laughing over that trick half the night. They slept up there with me—I was nearly dead for a drink of water—and once during the night Fluss did go down to the pump and bring me a drink, standing over me with that big club in case I should cry out when they took out the gag.

"This morning they watched and saw you ride off on Clover. They were in a panic for fear you would come back with some one before they could persuade the aunts to sell. I wish you could have seen them brushing each other off and shining their shoes on a horse blanket. They wanted


text:
The Works of Dionysius the Areopagite/Mystic Theology/Caput II

How we ought both to be united and render praise to the Cause of all and above all.

Section I
WE pray to enter within the super-bright gloom, and through not seeing and not knowing, to see and to know that the not to see nor to know is itself the above sight and knowledge. For this is veritably to see and to know and to celebrate super-essentially the Superessential, through the abstraction of all existing things, just as those who make a lifelike statue, by extracting all the encumbrances which have been placed upon the clear view of the concealed, and by bringing to light, by the mere cutting away,the genuine beauty concealed in it. And, it is necessary, as I think, to celebrate the abstractions in an opposite way to the definitions. For, we used to place these latter by beginning from the foremost and descending through the middle to the lowest, but, in this case, by making the ascents from the lowest to the highest, we abstract everything, in order that, without veil, we may know that Agnosia, which is enshrouded under all the known, in all things that be, and may see that superessential gloom, which is hidden by all the light in existing things.

Refences

 * 1) i.e. the abstraction.