Book Description

Excerpt from The Lady of the Crossing Although the scene of this book is the West of America and, on cursorily flipping the pages, one's eye does not encounter the words Florence, Venice, Simla, Quartier Latin, Shepheard's Hotel, or Cafe de la Paix, it is not a novel of revolver-shots. A story can be written of Western America in which revolvers are in abeyance. There is much to be said for Gilbert's "Hearts just as pure and fair May beat in Belgrave Square As in the lowly air Of Seven Dials!" It is a whimsical plea for the open mind. Formulae for books may make the writing of a certain kind of book easier, may make reviewing of a certain kind easier, and the life of the harassed assistant librarian easier; but they won't do for me and, I trust, for you. One should go everywhere with an open mind, meet everybody with an open mind. The point is that one never knows. One day we may even read of a novel that "no thinking man can ignore this work," or that "here we have a reading of Life," and on taking the volume up find that, after all, despite such phrases, it is not a special Lancet article gone astray. Foregone conclusions regarding Books, Men and Women are surely sometimes wrong. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works."