Various

“ It is part of the ordinary duty of a London fireman to be a hero, and he never fails when it is expected of him.
It is natural to think of the brigade as a miniature Navy. It smells of the sea in every way. The captain is a naval man. Its crew of 1,009 are seamen, and the work of the brigade is of a nature readily performed by sailors, who are used to danger, and skilled in the art of hanging on to the skyline by their teeth.
Even the apparatus is peculiarly adapted for the use of the horny-handed sons of the sea. ”

“ He fell as if shot, face downward into the shallow water, and lay there dead. Miss Lindsay turned, threw her arms around me, and with a sob buried her face on my shoulder. But though I had avenged her momentarily, my triumph was short, for a fellow named Survur Khan, whose brother it was that I had killed, with a cry of rage struck Miss Lindsay on the head with a club he carried, smashing her skull and covering me with her blood and brains. ”

“ Warrington was trying to see the whole of his person at once in a six-inch strip of looking-glass.
"Now, I ask you, Vic," he said, plaintively, "is it likely she'd have an object like me?"
"Fishing!" said the subaltern. "You're not an Adonis, but a V.C. covers a multitude of sins."
"Pooh! what does a girl care about that?" said Warrington; and Vicary laughed aloud at him. To himself he said, "The girl that gets you will get the bravest, cleanest, best gentleman that wears the Queen's uniform; and the girl that will refuse you doesn't exist." ”

“ THE LIFTING DRILL
Attention!
Raising the body to the knees.
London is to all intents and purposes an impregnable city—impregnable, that is to say, as regards an outside foe. The possibility of internal destruction by fire, although by no means so great as in the days of the Great Fire of London, still exists, in spite of fire-proof buildings, stone walls, and wide streets. Although the possibility exists, the risk of such a catastrophe will not be worth consideration so long as the Metropolitan Fire Brigade maintains its present high state of efficiency. ”

“ We were grievously disappointed with our search, and had to be content with a bare negative gain—the absolute assurance that the caves contained no trace of previous human occupation. The foot of man never desecrated this sanctuary of the eagle and falcon before. Being virtually inaccessible, it was left to bird and bat and mountain bee. Overhead the beetling crag jutted out forty feet and more, while under foot the rock floor was polished and slippery from untold centuries of wear by the feet of myriads on myriads of birds. ”

“ They waited, and once again Gascoyne sent up the cry.
Then the leaves of the jungle parted, and a panther, black and mangy, but with the fierce light still alive in the topaz eyes, bounded to the side of the recumbent figure, and began to lick its face, snarling at the three men.
Gascoyne lifted his hand, and the great beast crouched beside him. And so the group remained while a man might have counted twenty. Then Gascoyne raised himself, and stretched out his arms, as if to someone at the foot of his couch, "Madge, Madge," he cried hoarsely, "I am coming," and so fell back and moved no more. ”

“ Berend, running lightly after them, jumped in too.
"I asked Mr. Berend to come with us," said Lady Lomond, "because if you do not mind I should like you to drive me home first, and I thought he could then escort you on to the Rue de la Place." The smile which accompanied this remark conveyed that she thought she had done a very clever and acceptable thing in giving these two an opportunity for a tête-à-tête.
"Thanks," responded Lady Anstiss, stiffly, "but I am afraid that will be taking Mr. Berend quite out of his way; and I am accustomed to drive alone often." ”

“ Great honour is due to the heroic conduct and intrepidity displayed by a soldier—Private Cox, of the Royal Irish Fusiliers—who was in the runaway train. When he realised that no human power could avert the appalling disaster, he stepped out on to the foot-board, and, with death staring him in the face, withdrew the frightened children from the compartments as rapidly as he could, and dropped them on to the bank, where they were afterwards discovered almost unhurt. ”

“ As Miss Jennie Chamberlain her loveliness was the talk of two continents, and her beauty has an exquisite setting in her present London house, for her father-in-law was one of the foremost art collectors in Europe.
Mrs. Arthur Paget takes a very leading place among the American women who have made England their home, for to exceptional loveliness she joins great vivacity and charm of manner. This latter quality is probably owing to the fact that her mother, Mrs. Paran Stevens, was always surrounded in New York by a circle of intellectual and interesting people. ”

“ It was only in London, and in a flat, that the true woman—she disclaimed the term new woman—could possibly realise herself. Most of her life she had spent in the country, a fact which I might have guessed. One of the main fallacies which the true woman was going to expose, and which had been intruded on her that night, was the notion that no girl could associate with a man without some foolish idea of love-making. This fallacy she denounced vigorously, and, as I thought, with a purpose. ”

“ To the average man it is a self-evident fact that unless you put energy or force of some sort into a machine it won't work. Thus, a locomotive will not move unless you apply steam or electricity, nor a bicycle unless the muscular energy of your own body propels it. But, simple as this fact may seem, there have been, from early times, as we have indicated, men whose whole object in life has been to construct a machine that, once started, shall run for ever by its own momentum. ”

“ Lady Randolph has preserved an extraordinary look of youth, and, though the eldest of the three, she looks younger than either of her sisters, Mrs. Jack Leslie, and Mrs. Morton Frewen.
Among the American women who have been called upon to take an active interest in British political life, Mrs. Joseph Chamberlain certainly deserves the foremost place. She is devoted to her husband, and has made herself thoroughly conversant with all that affects or that may affect his political ambitions. ”

“ On the sheet of paper which the waiter had given her, the girl had written these words, which the searcher read in a muttered undertone—
"I am going to pick this man's pocket as the best way of getting him into a police-station without violence. He is Colonel Mathurin, alias Rossiter, alias Connell, and he is wanted in Detroit, New York, Melbourne, Colombo, and London. Get four men to pin him unawares, for he is armed and desperate. I am a member of the New York detective force—Nora Van Snoop." ”

“ I said something appropriate.
"Nonsense!" said Nellie, with a blush. "Please ask them to call my carriage; I want to go home. And you might come to-morrow and talk things over with me—and—and—book a passage to Lisbon by the next mail—you'll want it."
"Well, I'm—astonished," said I; but I wasn't.
"My dear fellow," said Farquhar to me, when I visited him again in his Cintra hut, "I don't want to be rude to you, but I'd much rather you let me alone. I've broken with the old life, you see, and you must allow that you are out of place in the new one. ”

“ Dum-dum-dum went the throbbing piano above. The former occupants of that flat has possessed a baby which I used to anathematise, but even its merry crowings or midnight howls were better than this.
The lady—an elderly lady of the spinster persuasion—had passed me several times on the stairs, and I heartily wished that Providence had blessed her with a husband and several children to occupy her spare time. If I ever wanted to go into Parliament, I should have only one item in my programme, and that would be to make a licence as necessary for music in a private as in a public house. ”

“ After whispered consultation the inspector appeared, holding the note in his hand.
"Now then, be spry," said Miss Van Snoop. "Oh, you needn't worry! I've got my credentials right here," and she dived into another pocket.
"But do you know—can you be sure," said the inspector, "that this is the man who shot the Detroit bank manager?"
"Great heavens! Didn't I see him shoot Will Stevens with my own eyes! And didn't I take service with the police to hunt him out?"
The girl stamped her foot, and the inspector left. For two, three, four minutes, she stood listening intently. ”

“ Although this principle in all its scientific exactitude is less than a century old, yet its truth is now so well settled, that nothing short of an actual working perpetual motor could demonstrate its falsity. The search for the Philosopher's Stone, the production of an Elixir of Life, have, like the hope of an El Dorado, been consigned to the limbo of forgotten things. ”

“ Perhaps the most remarkable rock in the world is to be found in the centre of the Island of Ceylon, and its story is full of romance It was fortified 1,400 years ago to shelter a cowardly parricide, and when he died it became a Buddhist monastery. But for centuries no human foot rested on its summit; it was the abode of silence; its walls were buried beneath the dust of ages, birds built their nests on it and the beasts of the field haunted the jungle which grew about its base. ”

“ It is therefore easy to understand how it is that these well-disciplined, hard-nerved men are pressed into the service of the brigade.
Many who have read of the marvellous rapidity with which the engines are turned out to a fire, or those who have been fortunate enough to see these splendid fellows at their work, may be interested in learning how a London fireman is made. ”

“ Berend perceived the situation or not it was impossible to tell.
He handed some tea to Lady Lomond, made one of his subtly inane remarks, and took his leave, saying, as he bowed over Lady Anstiss's hand, which he pressed more closely than the farewell warranted—
"I should like to feel quite certain about that scarabæus. Perhaps you will let me examine it again at leisure another day; it is exceedingly interesting to me." ”

“ A moving white blur appeared somewhere in the thick darkness, then another, and another; and a suggestion of low-toned guttural conversation reached Warrington's straining ears. He shifted his revolver to his left hand and gently drew his sword. Then from over there where he knew the camp lay came six revolver shots in quick succession.
[Pg 238]
"That's Welby!" he said to himself.
Vicary's hand had been grasping the heel of his foot tightly. Now he felt the grip relax; and in a moment more the wounded subaltern slipped a little with a slight tinkle of steel on rock, and groaned. ”

“ Miss Davis, though the daughter of a very wealthy man, was not, in the ordinary sense of the word, an heiress; and since her marriage she and her husband, who is Lord Dufferin's second son, have lived quite quietly either in a pretty flat in Paris, or more lately in Cadogan Square, where their house is one of the prettiest in London, each room representing a different period, the curious and valuable furniture having been a present from Lady Terence's father.
Lady Naylor-Leyland is the most beautiful American in society. ”

“ After another year of wandering, the word spread of a great reward offered by the English Government for the Nana, dead or alive, also of pardon for all not actually guilty of murder. Then a conspiracy among the hundred or so followers left was set on foot to earn the reward, but, still determined to feed my unsatisfied vengeance, I betrayed it to the Rajah, and, heading those who were still faithful to him, I fell on the conspirators the night before their projected outbreak, and slaughtered them to a man ”

“ It is a curious fact that the young Duchess of Marlborough, née Miss Vanderbilt, is the godchild and namesake of Consuelo, Duchess of Manchester, owing to the circumstance that the latter and Mrs. Vanderbilt were intimate friends. The Duke of Marlborough first met Miss Vanderbilt when she was visiting her godmother, but the engagement and marriage took place, as all the world knows, in New York.
The Duchess of Marlborough, like most of her fellow countrywomen, has shown remarkable powers of adaptability. ”

“ One of the most interesting experiments in trick photography is that devoted to the evolving of composite portraits. The production of a successful composite practically means the creation of a new face. The method is similar to that employed in the making of ghost pictures. It is necessary to obtain, say, four portraits—the more used the greater the difficulty. These are all photographed one over the other on the same plate. The difficulty consists in regulating the exposures, that photographed first requiring a longer exposure than the next, and so on through the series. ”

“ A photograph is absolutely inadmissible as evidence of anything, unless it is proved conclusively that it was in nowise faked after being taken.
The faking can be carried on almost to any extent. In fact, nothing is impossible to the clever knight of the camera.
If a photographer wished to show that you were in a particular street at a certain time, he could do it with the greatest ease, notwithstanding that you were a thousand miles away at the moment in question.
A RAILWAY IN HOLBORN, LONDON! ”

“ Then I passed to where the Nana and Begum lay. He demanded what this meant.
"'Get up,' I said, 'and you shall know.'
"Shaking with fear, the Begum stood upright. I led them to the opening. When they saw Survur Khan they turned ashen grey.
"'See,' I cried in English, 'you three, I am an English officer. All this time I have followed you, helped you, fed you, shielded you in danger, that I might avenge on you the murder of the woman I loved, and of my countrywomen, with my own hand. Look,' I cried, tearing off Survur Khan's head covering, 'ask him where he got that scar. ”