Short passages for reading, drawn from history, legend, poetry and fiction.
By Giovanni Battista Tiepolo (1696-1770), from the National Gallery of Art via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
Standing on the dockside with Laertes, who is eager to board ship for Paris, Polonius takes a moment to share some fatherly wisdom.
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By William Anderson (1757-1837), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
After word came that Harry Demane had been lured aboard a slave-ship, Granville Sharp had only a few hours in which to make sure he did not sail.
© Peter K. Burian, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
The great French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte protested that in calling England ‘a nation of shopkeepers’ he had paid us a compliment.
From the Illustrated London News (December 4, 1847), via Wikimedia Commons. Licence: Public domain.
After a visit to England in 1847, Aleksey Khomyakov published his impressions of our country and our people in a Moscow magazine.
© Magrippa, Wikimedia Commons.Licence: CC BY-SA 3.0.
Alexander, who had just taken the bath intended for his vanquished enemy Darius of Persia and was now eating Darius’s supper, was interrupted by a commotion in the camp.
© mattbuck, Wikimedia Commons. Licence: CC BY-SA 2.0.
As he sat in his guest room at Durham Abbey, Ranulf de Capella could think of nothing but finding someone to rid him of his painful toothache.