Many ages ago in North America there was no spring or summer or autumn, but only winter all the time; there were no forests or fields or flowers, but only ice and snow, which stretched from the Arctic Ocean to Maryland. Sometimes the climate would grow a little warmer, and then the great glaciers would shrink toward the north, and then again it would grow cold, while the ice crept southward; but finally it became warmer and warmer until all the southern part of the country was quite free from the ice and snow, which could then only be seen, as it is now, in the Polar regions.??Ages and ages after this, grass and trees began to ap-pear, and at last great forests covered the land, and over the fields and through the woods gigantic animals roved—strange and terrible-looking beasts, larger than any animal now living, and very fierce and strong. Among these were the mammoth and mastodon, which were so strong and ferocious that it would take hundreds of men to hunt and kill them. These great animals would go trampling through the forests, breaking down the trees and crushing the grass and flowers under their feet, or rush over the fields in pursuit of their prey, making such dreadful, threatening noises that all the other animals would flee before them, just as now the more timid animals flee from the lion or rhinoceros. ??Sometimes they would rush or be driven by men into swamps and marshes, where their great weight would sink them down so deep into the mud that they could not lift themselves out again, and then, they would die of starvation or be killed by the arrows of the men who were hunting them.??Besides these mammoths and mastodons there were other animals living in North America at that time, very different from those that are found here now. ?

"The Shunned House" is a horror fiction novelette by American author H. P. Lovecraft, written on October 16–19, 1924. It was first published in the October 1937 issue of Weird Tales. The Shunned House of the title is based on an actual house in Providence, Rhode Island, built around 1763 and still standing at 135 Benefit Street. Lovecraft was familiar with the house because his aunt Lillian Clark lived there in 1919-20 as a companion to Mrs. H. C. Babbit. However, it was another house in Elizabeth, New Jersey that actually compelled Lovecraft to write the story.

So long a time had passed that Dorothy C. had grown to be what father John called "a baker's dozen of years old"; and upon another spring morning, as fair as that when she first came to them, the girl was out upon the marble steps, scrubbing away most vigorously. The task was known locally as "doing her front," and if one wishes to be considerable respectable, in Baltimore, one's "front" must be done every day. On Saturdays the entire marble facing of the basement must also be polished; but "pernickity" Mrs. Chester was known to her neighbors as such a forehanded housekeeper that she had her Saturday's work done on Friday, if this were possible.??Now this was Friday and chanced to be a school holiday; so Dorothy had been set to the week-end task, which she hated; and therefore she put all the more energy into it, the sooner to have done with it, meanwhile singing at the top of her voice. Then, when the postman came round the corner of the block, she paused in her singing to stare at him for one brief instant. The next she had pitched her voice a few notes higher still, and it was her song that greeted her father's ears and set him smiling in his old familiar fashion. ??Unfortunately, he had not been smiling when she first perceived him and there had been a little catch in her tones as she resumed her song. Each was trying to deceive the other and each pretending that nothing of the sort was happening.??"Heigho, my child! At it again, giving the steps a more tombstone effect? Well, since it's the fashion—go ahead!"??"I wish the man, or men, who first thought of putting scrubby-steps before people's houses had them all to clean himself! Hateful old thing!"

KING CHARLES THE SECOND was the son and successor of King Charles the First. These two are the only kings of the name of Charles that have appea-red, thus far, in the line of English sovereigns. Nor is it very probable that there will soon be another. The reigns of both these monarchs were stained and tarnished with many vices and crimes, and darkened by national disasters of every kind, and the name is thus connected with so many painful associations in the minds of men, that it seems to have been dropped, by common consent, in all branches of the royal family.??The reign of Charles the First, as will be seen by the history of his life in this series, was characterized by a long and obstinate contest between the king and the people, which brought on, at last, a civil war, in which the king was defeated and taken prisoner, and in the end beheaded on a block, before one of his own pala-ces. During the last stages of this terrible contest, and before Charles was himself taken prisoner, he was, as it were, a fugitive and an outlaw in his own dominions. His wife and family were scattered in various foreign lands, his cities and castles were in the hands of his enemies, and his oldest son, the prince Charles, was the object of special hostility. The prince incurred, therefore, a great many dangers, and suffered many heavy calamities in his early years. He lived to see these calamities pass away, and, after they were gone, he enjoyed, so far as his own personal safety and welfare were concerned, a tranquil and prosperous life. The storm, however, of trial and suffering which enveloped the evening of his father's days, darkened the morning of his own. ??The life of Charles the First was a river rising gently, from quiet springs, in a scene of verdure and sunshine, and flowing gradually into rugged and gloomy regions, where at last it falls into a terrific abyss, enveloped in darkness and storms. That of Charles the Second, on the other hand, rising in the wild and rugged mountains where the parent stream was engulfed, commences its course by leaping frightfully from precipice to precipice, with turbid and foaming waters, but emerges at last into a smooth and smiling land, and flows through it prosperously to the sea.

HANNIBAL was a Carthaginian general. He acquired his great distinction as a warrior by his desperate contests with the Romans. Rome and Carthage grew up together on opposite sides of the Mediterranean Sea. For about a hundred years they waged against each other most dreadful wars. There were three of these wars. Rome was successful in the end, and Carthage was entirely destroyed.?There was no real cause for any disagreement between these two nations. Their hostility to each other was mere rivalry and spontaneous hate. They spoke a different language; they had a different origin; and they lived on opposite sides of the same sea. So they hated and devoured each other.?Those who have read the history of Alexander the Great, in this series, will recollect the difficulty he experienced in besieging and subduing Tyre, a great maritime city, situated about two miles from the shore, on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Cart-hage was originally founded by a colony from this city of Tyre, and it soon became a great commercial and maritime power like its mother. The Carthaginians built ships, and with them explored all parts of the Mediterranean Sea.

"The Moon-Bog" is a short story by American horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft, written in or before March 1921. The story was first published in the June 1926 issue of the pulp magazine Weird Tales. In the story, the unnamed narrator describes the final fate of his good friend, Denys Barry, an Irish-American who reclaims an ancestral estate in Kilderry, a fictional village in Ireland. Barry ignores pleas from the superstitious local peasantry not to drain the nearby bog, with unfortunate supernatural consequences.

"The Man Without a Country" first appeared in the Atlantic Monthlyfor December, 1863. It was the author's wish that it be published anonymously, in the hope that it might be ascribed to some officer of the Navy; but unfortunately, the man who compiled the year's index for the magazine, which was mailed with the December number, recognized Dr. Hale's handwriting, and gave him credit for it in the index. The story was written during the darkest period of the Civil War, and this war is perhaps the gloomiest period in the history of our great republic in the history of our great Republic; it was written at a time when one-half of the people in the United States were burning with patriotism, and were ready to lay down their lives to preserve the Union, while the other half were striving to disrupt what to them was merely a confederation of States, in no wise binding, and were damning the United States, even as did Philip Nolan; at at time when the President was bending low under the weight of sorrow for the loss of thousands of noble men who were falling in battle, and was enduring in pitiful silence the villification that was heaped upon him by the "copper-head" opposition; at a time when patriotism was preached in the pulpit, sung by our poets, and exhaled with every breath. The story launched in such an atmosphere, met with immediate favor. It was reprinted everywhere without regard for copyright, and was translated into several foreign languages. It was accepted by many as a narrative of actual facts, and provoked many discussions as to whether Philip Nolan was a real person; some even went so far as to identify him.

Prin volumul Istorie ?i sacralitate, Const. Miu ne poart? prin lumea cuv?ntului spus ori scris, de la ?nceputuri ?i p?n? ?n prezent. Autorul, ?n acest volum, atrage aten?ia, al?turi de al?i autori dedica?i adev?rului, pe care domnia sa ?i citeaz?, c? lingvi?tii no?tri din motive de ne?n?eles au l?sat a se ?n?elege c? limba rom?n? ar fi una de ?mprumut. Nu putem ?ti ce anume i-a determinat pe ace?tia s? conchid? ?n privin?a unor cuvinte din dic?ionarul limbii rom?ne c? ar avea r?d?cini turcice, slave ori din limba latin?. Se pare c? au uitat c? aceast? limb? este vorbit? pe ?ntreg arealul ??rii, spre deosebire de limba italian?, ce are mai multe dialecte ?i idiomuri care difer? de la o provincie la alta.

Aceste povestiri au fost scrise ?n perioada 2010?2014 ?i publicate, ?n parte, ?n periodice. Le?am numit parabole, av?nd o anumit? inten?ionalitate, ?i am aplicat ?n realizarea lor aceea?i structur? (cvadripartit?) ?i acela?i registru can?titativ (aproximativ o mie de cuvinte).Pe cele din C?l?uzitorul de suflete (cea dint?i sec?iune) le consider europene, ac?iunea lor petrec?ndu?se ?n loca?ii diferite de pe b?tr?nul continent ?i majoritatea ideilor pe care se bazeaz? n?sc?ndu?se ?n timpul unor peregrin?ri (iubirile, c?r?ile, muzica ?i c?l?toriile sunt, dup? umila?mi p?rere, cele mai frumoase lucruri care ni se pot ?nt?mpla ?ntr?o via??). Cu excep?ia primei ?i a ultimei lucr?ri care schi?eaz? un posibil cadru, ordinea povestirilor este alfabetic?. De?i g?ndite ca fantastice, ele au ?i o dimensiune experien?ial?, ?n acela?i timp put?nd fi citite ?i ca poeme ?n proz?: ale ora??elor prin care am trecut, ale oamenilor pe care i?am cunos?cut ?i, desigur, ale sufletului meu, undeva, ?n str?fundurile mele consider?ndu?m?, ca mul?i semeni de?ai mei, oarecum poet… (Ladislau Daradici)

Al sentir un roce en el cuello, Fernando de Ojeda soltó la pluma y levantó la cabeza. Una palmera enana movía detrás de él con balanceo repentino sus anchas manos de múltiples y puntiagudos dedos. Para evitarse este contacto avanzó el sillón de junco, pero no pudo seguir escribiendo. Algo nuevo había ocurrido en torno de él mientras con el pecho en el filo de la mesa y los ojos sobre los papeles huía lejos, muy lejos, acompa?ado en esta fuga ideal por el leve crujido de la pluma. Vio con el mismo aspecto exterior cosas y personas al salir de su abstracción; pero una vida interna, ruidosa y móvil parecía haber nacido en las cosas hasta entonces inanimadas, mientras la vida ordinaria callaba y se encogía en las personas, como poseída de súbita timidez.??Sus ojos, fatigados por la escritura, huían de las ampollas eléctri-cas del techo, inflamadas en plena tarde, para reposarse en los rectángulos de las ventanas que encuadraban el azul grisáceo de un día de invierno. La blancura de la madera laqueada temblaba con cierto reflejo húmedo que parecía venir del exterior. Dos salones agrandados por la escasez de su altura eran el campo visual de Ojeda. En el primero, donde estaba él, mezclábase a la blancura uniforme de la decoración el verde charolado de las palmeras de inver-náculo, el verde pictórico de los enrejados de madera tendidos de pilastra a pilastra y el verde amarillento y velludo de unas parras artificiales, cuyas hojas parecían retazos de terciopelo. Sillones de floreada cretona en torno de las mesas de bambú formaban islas, a las que se acogían grupos de personas para embadurnar con manteca y mermeladas el pan tostado, husmear el perfume del té o seguir el burbujeo de las aguas minerales te?idas de jarabes y licores. ? AUTOR: Vicente Blasco Ibanez nacio el 29 de enero de 1867 en Valencia (Espana). Era hijo de Ramona Ibanez y del comerciante Gaspar Blanco. Estudio Derecho en la Universidad de Valencia. Participo en la politica uniendose al Partido Republicano". En 1894 fundo el periodico El pueblo. En el ano 1896, fue detenido y condenado a varios meses de prision. En 1889 contrajo matrimonio con Maria Blasco del Cacho, hija del magistrado Rafael Blasco y Moreno. Cuando subio al poder Canovas del Castillo, el escritor se exilio brevemente en la ciudad de Paris. Fue un autor vinculado en muchos aspectos al naturalismo frances. Por otra parte, la explicita intencion politicosocial de algunas de las novelas de Blasco Ibanez, aunada al escaso bagaje intelectual del autor, lo mantuvo alejado de los representantes de la Generacion del 98. Murio el 28 de enero de 1928 en Menton (Francia)a los 60 anos. Entre sus titulos destacan: "Arroz y Tartana" (1894), "La Barraca" (1898), "Entre Naranjos (1900), "Canas y Barro" (1902), "La Horda" (1905), "Sangre y Arena" (1908) o "Los Cuatro Jinetes Del Apocalipsis" (1916).

An undertaker finds himself trapped in the vault where coffins are stored during winter for burial in the spring, and is mysteriously injured when he escapes.

"Hypnos" is a short story by H.P. Lovecraft, penned in March 1922 and first published in the May 1923 issue of National Amateur. The narrator, a sculptor, recounts meeting a mysterious man in a railway station. The moment the man opened his "immense, sunken and widely luminous eyes", the narrator knew that the stranger would become his friend-–"the only friend of one who had never possessed a friend before". In the eyes of the stranger he saw the knowledge of the mysteries he always sought to learn

Sailors kill a 50-foot creature at sea after a lengthy battle. The creature bears strange anatomical irregularities such as a single large eye and rudimentary forelegs and six-toed feet in place of pectoral fins. After inspection by marine biologists, it is revealed to be just a juvenile. The captain who captured the creature tours the coast and profits from the corpse of the deceased creature. As the captain attempts to finish his business at Martin's Beach, a group of swimmers are attacked. The captain and others attempt to rescue the victims but it is too late. The rescuers and the captain are hypnotized and pulled into the water by the creature's apparently vengeful mother, to the horror of an onlooking crowd.

STORIES:?OLE LUCKOIE, (SHUT-EYE.)?MONDAY.?TUESDAY.?WEDNESDAY.?THURSDAY.?FRIDAY.?SATURDAY.?SUNDAY.?THE DAISY.?THE NAUGHTY BOY.?TOMMELISE.?THE ROSE-ELF.?THE GARDEN OF PARADISE.?A NIGHT IN THE KITCHEN.?LITTLE IDA'S FLOWERS.?THE CONSTANT TIN SOLDIER.?THE STORKS.??There is nobody in all this world who knows so many tales as Ole Luckoie! He can tell tales! In an evening, when a child sits so nicely at the table, or on its little stool, Ole Luckoie comes. He comes so quietly into the house, for he walks without shoes; he opens the door without making any noise, and then he flirts sweet milk into the children's eyes; but so gently, so very gently, that they cannot keep their eyes open, and, therefore, they never see him; he steals softly behind them and blows gently on their necks, and thus their heads become heavy. ??Oh yes! But then it does them no harm; for Ole Luckoie means nothing but kindness to the children, he only wants to amuse them; and the best thing that can be done is for somebody to carry them to bed, where they may lie still and listen to the tales that he will tell them.

In H.P. Lovecraft’s, "The Dunwich Horror", we are told the story of Wilbur Whateley, the son of a deformed albino mother and an unknown father (alluded to in passing by the mad Old Whateley as "Yog-Sothoth"), and the strange events surrounding his birth and precocious development. Wilbur matures at an abnormal rate, reaching manhood within a decade. All the while, his sorcerer grandfather indoctrinates him into certain dark rituals and the study of witchcraft.

Yazar, bandan geen gizemli olaylar okuyucusuyla paylamaktadr.Yazar yal bir kadn tesadüfen kaldrmda baygn vaziyette bulur hastaneye kaldrr fakat daha sonra hastane odasnda brakr ve mutsuz ekilde Bodrum’a geri dner. ünkü yaynevlerinden bekledii ilgiyi grmez.Doktor hemire ve hastalar kadn ok sever ve sahip karlar.Yal kadna daha sonra devlet sahip kar ve onu bir huzur evine yatrr. Yal kadn orada da ok sevilir. Fakat huzur evi müdürü kadndan üphelenir. Yazar ise bir türlü istedii eseri yazamamaktadr. stelik ok sevdii ruh eine kavuamamaktadr. Bütün skntlarn zecek gü yal kadndr fakat yazar bunu bilmez. Fakat yazarn kader dngüsü deimek üzeredir ve yal kadn onu kendisine doru arr.Yazar balarda bununla mücadele etmeye alr fakat daha sonra pes eder. stanbul’a doru yolculuk yapmaya karar verir. Yolculuk esnasnda rüyasnda gerilim ve gizemli olaylar grür bilmedii ey aslnda bu olaylarn gerekte yaanddr. Yal kadn düündüü kii deildir.Yazarn gizemli bir ekilde tant yal kadnn srlar vardr. Yazar gerek grevi iin armaktadr.Aslnda yazar kayp halkadan birisidir.

"The Descendant" is a story fragment by American horror fiction writer H. P. Lovecraft, believed to have been written in 1927.[1] It was first published in the journal Leaves in 1938, after Lovecraft's death.

The story is the testament of a tortured, morphine-addicted man who relates an incident that occurred during his service as an officer during World War I. In the unnamed narrator's account, his cargo ship is captured by an Imperial German sea-raider in "one of the most open and least frequented parts of the broad Pacific"

"The Crawling Chaos" is a short story by American writers H. P. Lovecraft and Winifred V. Jackson (first published April 1921 in the United Cooperative. As in their other collaboration, "The Green Meadow", the tale was credited to "Elizabeth Berkeley" (Jackson) and "Lewis Theobald, Jun" (Lovecraft). The story begins with the narrator describing the effects of opium and the fantastical vistas it can inspire. The narrator then tells of his sole experience with opium in which he was accidentally administered an overdose by a doctor during the "year of the plague".

IN ancient times, when the city of Rome was at the height of its power and splendor, it was the custom, as it is in fact now with the inhabitants of wealthy capitals, for the principal families to possess, in addition to their city residences, rural villas for summer retreats, which they built in picturesque situations, at a little distance from the city, sometimes in the interior of the country, and sometimes upon the seashore. There were many attractive places of resort of this nature in the neighborhood of Rome. Among them was Antium.??The beauty and the salubrity of Antium made it a very attractive place of summer resort for the people of Rome; and in process of time, when the city attained to an advanced stage of opulence and luxury, the Roman noblemen built villas there, choosing situations, in some instances, upon the natural terraces and esplanades of the promontory, which looked off over the sea, and in others cool and secluded retreats in the valleys, on the land. It was in one of these villas that NERO was born.??NERO's father belonged to a family which had enjoyed for several generations a considerable degree of distinction among the Roman nobility, though known by a somewhat whimsical name. The family name was Brazenbeard, or, to speak more exactly, it was Aheno-barbus, which is the Latin equivalent for that word. ?

"The Colour Out of Space" is a first-person narrative written from the perspective of an unnamed surveyor from Boston. In order to prepare for the construction of a new reservoir in Massachusetts, he surveys a rural area that is to be flooded near Lovecraft's fictional town of Arkham. He comes across a mysterious patch of land, an abandoned five-acre farmstead, which is completely devoid of all life.