The Duplicity of Hanrgraves
By O. Henry (1862-1910) When Major Pendleton Talbot, of Mobile, sir, and his daughter, Miss Lydia Talbot, came to Washington to reside, they selected for a boarding place …
Colonel Starbottle for the Plaintiff
By Bret Harte (1839-1902) It had been a day of triumph for Colonel Starbottle. First, for his personality, as it would have been difficult to separate the Colonel’s …
The Buller Podington Compact
BY FRANK RICHARD STOCKTON (1834-1902) “I tell you, William,” said Thomas Buller to his friend Mr. Podington, “I am truly sorry about it, but I cannot arrange for …
The Nice People
By Henry Cuyler Bunner (1855-1896) “They certainly are nice people,” I assented to my wife’s observation, using the colloquial phrase with a consciousness that it was anything but …
The Hotel Experience of Mr. Pink Fluker
BY RICHARD MALCOLM JOHNSTON (1822-1898) I Mr. Peterson Fluker, generally called Pink, for his fondness for as stylish dressing as he could afford, was one of that sort …
Elder Brown's Backslide
By Harry Stillwell Edwards (1855- ) Elder Brown told his wife good-by at the farmhouse door as mechanically as though his proposed trip to Macon, ten miles away, …
The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County
By Mark Twain (1835-1910) In compliance with the request of a friend of mine, who wrote me from the East, I called on good-natured, garrulous old Simon Wheeler, …
A Visit to the Asylum for Aged and Decayed Punsters
By Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894) Having just returned from a visit to this admirable Institution in company with a friend who is one of the Directors, we propose …
My Double; and How He Undid Me
By Edward Everett Hale (1822-1909) It is not often that I trouble the readers of The Atlantic Monthly. I should not trouble them now, but for the importunities of …
Titbottom's spectacles
BY GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS (1824-1892) In my mind’s eye, Horatio. Prue and I do not entertain much; our means forbid it. In truth, other people entertain for us. …
The Watkinson Evening
By Eliza Leslie (1787-1858) Mrs. Morland, a polished and accomplished woman, was the widow of a distinguished senator from one of the western states, of which, also, her …