marriage

The Hollow Column (Told by the Tax Collector)

April 16, 2019 By Edmund Mitchell in Old Stories Tags: marriage, love, Edmund Mitchell

“Every man’s fate is fore-ordained,” said the tax-collector, reflectively stroking his beard. “Although we may not understand it at the moment each particular event that happens is simply a means prepared for some destined end that may be many years remote in time. Vishnu the Preserver saved the life of the little maid of Jhalnagor so that her father’s life might later on be saved. But none can read the future, so that we are all blindly doing the things of to-day without knowing their real bearing on the things of a far-away to-morrow. And one man can make or [Read More]

The Other Woman

April 12, 2019 By Sherwood Anderson in Old Stories Tags: marriage, love, Sherwood Anderson

“I am in love with my wife,” he said—a superfluous remark, as I had not questioned his attachment to the woman he had married. We walked for ten minutes and then he said it again. I turned to look at him. He began to talk and told me the tale I am now about to set down. The thing he had on his mind happened during what must have been the most eventful week of his life. He was to be married on Friday afternoon. On Friday of the week before he got a telegram announcing his appointment to a [Read More]

Apple Blossoms

April 10, 2019 By Florence Hull Winterburn in Old Stories Tags: marriage, Florence Hull Winterburn, apple blossoms

In the clean, large kitchen of a Virginia farm-house sat an old woman alone, knitting. She had been pretty once; fifty years ago that wrinkled yellow skin had been called “creamy,” and the scant gray hair drawn back under the plain cap had been a shower of brown curls. And she had coquetted with Judge Holt and turned away from him at the last to marry plain Nathan Bennett, living with him in rare contentment for two-score years, and then coming to spend the remnant of her days with her daughter Ann. Now Ann, too, was gone, and only the [Read More]

Old Man Bobo’s Mandy

April 4, 2019 By Horace Annesley Vachell in Old Stories Tags: California, marriage, love, Horace Annesley Vachell

Old man Bobo was the sole survivor of a once famous trio. Two out of the three, Doc Dickson and Pap Spooner, had passed to the shades, and the legend ran that when their disembodied spirits reached the banks of Styx, the ruling passion of their lives asserted itself for the last time. They demurred loudly, impatiently, at the exorbitant fee, ten cents, demanded by Charon. “We weigh light,” said Pap Spooner, “awful light! Call it, mister, fifteen cents for the two!” “Ten cents apiece,” replied the ferryman, “or three for a quarter.” Thereupon the worthy couple seated themselves in [Read More]

Hearts and Creeds

March 28, 2019 By Maxim Gorky in Old Stories Tags: Maxim Gorky, marriage, love

It is spring-time, the sun shines brightly, and everyone is gay. Even the window-panes of the old stone houses seem to wear a cheerful smile. Along the street of the little town streams a crowd in bright holiday attire. The whole population of the town is there: workers, soldiers, tradespeople, priests, officials, fishermen; all are intoxicated with the spirit of spring-time, talking, laughing, singing in joyous confusion, as if they were a single body overflowing with the zest of life. The hats and parasols of the women make a medley of bright colours; red and blue balloons, like wonderful flowers, [Read More]

The Strike Breaker

March 14, 2019 By George A. Birmingham in Old Stories Tags: marriage, railroad, George A. Birmingham, strike

The train was an hour-and-a-quarter late at Finnabeg. Sir James McClaren, alone in a first-class smoking compartment, was not surprised. He had never travelled in Ireland before, but he held a belief that time is very little accounted of west of the Shannon. He looked out of the window at the rain-swept platform. It seemed to him that every passenger except himself was leaving the train at Finnabeg. This did not surprise him much. There was only one more station, Dunadea, the terminus of the branch line on which Sir James was travelling. It lay fifteen miles further on, across [Read More]

A Sisterly Scheme

March 13, 2019 By H. C. Bunner in Old Stories Tags: marriage, H. C. Bunner, canoe

Away up in the very heart of Maine there is a mighty lake among the mountains. It is reached after a journey of many hours from the place where you “go in.” That is the phrase of the country, and when you have once “gone in,” you know why it is not correct to say that you have gone through the woods, or, simply, to your destination. You find that you have plunged into a new world—a world that has nothing in common with the world that you live in; a world of wild, solemn, desolate grandeur, a world of [Read More]

Madame Célestin’s Divorce

March 7, 2019 By Kate Chopin in Old Stories Tags: marriage, Kate Chopin

Madame Célestin always wore a neat and snugly fitting calico wrapper when she went out in the morning to sweep her small gallery. Lawyer Paxton thought she looked very pretty in the gray one that was made with a graceful Watteau fold at the back: and with which she invariably wore a bow of pink ribbon at the throat. She was always sweeping her gallery when lawyer Paxton passed by in the morning on his way to his office in St. Denis Street. A woman contemplating divorce piques the interest of a local judge. Kate Chopin’s story appears in her [Read More]

A Piece of Red Calico

February 28, 2019 By Frank Richard Stockton in Old Stories Tags: commerce, marriage, Frank Richard Stockton

I was going into town one morning from my suburban residence, when my wife handed me a little piece of red calico, and asked me if I would have time, during the day, to buy her two yards and a half of calico like that. I assured her that it would be no trouble at all; and putting the sample in my pocket, I took the train for the city. In the preface to the collection of Frank R. Stockton’s stories that contains this one (A Chosen Few: Short Stories, hosted at Project Gutenberg), the editors remark that Stockton’s story [Read More]

Easy Money

February 25, 2019 By W. W. Jacobs in Old Stories Tags: young love, sailors, W.W. Jacobs, marriage, scams

A lad of about twenty stepped ashore from the schooner Jane, and joining a girl, who had been avoiding for some ten minutes the ardent gaze of the night-watchman, set off arm-in-arm. The watchman rolled his eyes and shook his head slowly. English writer W.W Jacobs is best known for his story The Monkey’s Paw. This tale of sailors and their money turns on their prejudices — and ours. You can find it, and others like it, in Jacobs’ collection Night Watches, at Project Gutenberg. Nearly all his money on ‘is back, he said, and what little bit ‘e’s got [Read More]

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