Short Fiction by H. G. Wells (ebook smartphone .txt) π
Description
H. G. Wells is probably best known for his imaginative longer works, such as his novels The War of the Worlds and The Invisible Man; but he was also a prolific short story writer. This Standard Ebooks edition of his short fiction includes fifty-four of Wellsβ stories, written between 1894 and 1909 and compiled from the collections The Stolen Bacillus and Other Incidents (1895), The Plattner Story and Others (1897), Tales of Time and Space (1899), Twelve Stories and a Dream (1903) and The Country of the Blind and Other Stories (1911). They are presented here in approximate order of first publication.
The stories vary wildly in genre and theme, ranging from tales of domestic romance, to ghost stories and tropical adventures, to far-future science fiction. Interestingly, many of the stories deal with the exciting but also frightening prospect of heavier-than-air flight and aerial warfare, and it is worth noting that these stories were written some years before the Wright brothers first took to the air.
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- Author: H. G. Wells
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Through the middle of the building ran a great aisle, a vista, that the Prince came to care for more and more. From the inner entrance of the building he looked along the length of an immense pillared gallery and across the central area from which the rose-hued columns had long since vanished, over the top of the pavilion under which lay the sarcophagus, through a marvellously designed opening, to the snowy wildernesses of the great mountain, the Lord of all Mountains, two hundred miles away. The pillars and arches and buttresses and galleries soared and floated on either side, perfect yet unobtrusive, like great archangels waiting in the shadows about the presence of God. When men saw that austere beauty for the first time they were exalted, and then they shivered and their hearts bowed down.
Very often would the Prince come to stand there and look at that vista, deeply moved and not yet fully satisfied. The Pearl of Love had still something for him to do, he felt, before his task was done. Always he would order some little alteration to be made or some recent alterations to be put back again. And one day he said that the sarcophagus would be clearer and simpler without the pavilion; and after regarding it very steadfastly for a long time, he had the pavilion dismantled and removed.
The next day he came and said nothing, and the next day and the next. Then for two days he stayed away altogether. Then he returned, bringing with him an architect and two master craftsmen and a small retinue.
All looked, standing together silently in a little group, amidst the serene vastness of their achievement. No trace of toil remained in its perfection. It was as if the God of natureβs beauty had taken over their offspring to himself.
Only one thing there was to mar the absolute harmony. There was a certain disproportion about the sarcophagus. It had never been enlargedβ βand indeed how could it have been enlarged?β βsince the early days. It challenged the eye; it nicked the streaming lines. In that sarcophagus was the casket of lead and silver, and in the casket of lead and silver was the Queen, the dear immortal cause of all this beauty. But now that sarcophagus seemed no more than a little dark oblong that lay incongruously in the great vista of the Pearl of Love. It was as if someone had dropped a small valise upon the crystal sea of heaven.
Long the Prince mused, but no one knew the thoughts that passed through his mind.
At last he spoke. He pointed.
βTake that thing away,β he said.
EndnotesNo European is known to have seen a live Aepyornis, with the doubtful exception of MacAndrew, who visited Madagascar in 1745. ββ H. G. W. β©
βRemarks on a Recent Revision of Microlepidoptera.β Quart. Journ. Entomological Soc., 1863 β©
βRejoinder to certain Remarks,β etc. Quart. Journ. Entomological Soc. 1864. β©
βFurther Remarks,β etc. Quart. Journ. Entomological Soc. β©
ColophonShort Fiction
was compiled from short stories published between 1894 and 1909 by
H. G. Wells.
This ebook was produced for
Standard Ebooks
by
Kenneth Williams and David Grigg,
and is based on transcriptions produced between 2008 and 2013 by
Charles Bidwell, Stephen Blundell, Aaron Cannon, Chris Curnow, eagkw, Stephanie Johnson, Paul Murray, Lindy Walsh, David Widger, Kenneth Williams, and The Online Distributed Proofreading Team
for
Project Gutenberg
and on digital scans available at the
Internet Archive.
The cover page is adapted from
In the Laboratory,
a painting completed in about 1856 by
Henry Alexander.
The cover and title pages feature the
League Spartan and Sorts Mill Goudy
typefaces created in 2014 and 2009 by
The League of Moveable Type.
The first edition of this ebook was released on
February 15, 2019, 9:08 p.m.
You can check for updates to this ebook, view its revision history, or download it for different ereading systems at
standardebooks.org/ebooks/h-g-wells/short-fiction.
The volunteer-driven Standard Ebooks project relies on readers like you to submit typos, corrections, and other improvements. Anyone can contribute at standardebooks.org.
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