myebooksbuy
My Books

The whole shelf

All free summaries — page 679

34,239 public-domain books, summarised. Page 679 of 714.

Cover of Tea and the effects of tea drinking

Tea and the effects of tea drinking

W. Scott (William Scott) Tebb

This examination explores the historical rise and physiological consequences of tea consumption in Britain, offering a clinical perspective on a beverage once considered a medicinal necessity.

Drugs/Alcohol/Pharmacology6 min read
Cover of Tea, Its Mystery and History

Tea, Its Mystery and History

Samuel Phillips Day

The humble tea leaf serves as a bridge between ancient Eastern tradition and the modern rituals of the Western parlor, promising both physical vitality and social harmony in every cup.

Cooking & Drinking7 min read
Cover of Terrain Exercises

Terrain Exercises

William H. (William Henry) Waldron

Success in the field demands more than memorizing regulations; it requires the ability to apply tactical principles to the physical reality of the ground beneath one's feet.

History - Warfare6 min read
Cover of The Adventures and Vagaries of Twm Shôn Catti: Descriptive of Life in Wales: Interspersed with Poems

The Adventures and Vagaries of Twm Shôn Catti: Descriptive of Life in Wales: Interspersed with Poems

T. J. Llewelyn (Thomas Jeffery Llewelyn) Prichard

The legend of a Welsh trickster comes to life in these pages, blending rural folklore with the sharp wit of a man who outsmarts the powerful to champion the downtrodden.

Adventure7 min read
Cover of The Aggravation of Elmer

The Aggravation of Elmer

Robert Arthur

The world would beat a path to Elmer’s door—but he had to go carry the door along with him! This story explores the perils of underestimating a child whose intellect outpaces the gravity of his surroundings.

Humour5 min read
Cover of The Arctic regions and the northern whale-fishery

The Arctic regions and the northern whale-fishery

William Scoresby

Exploring the frozen frontiers of the North, this account navigates the intersection of perilous whale-fishing, rigorous scientific observation, and the vast, unforgiving beauty of the Arctic wilderness.

History - Modern (1750+)6 min read
Cover of The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee, November 30, 1864: A statement of the erroneous claims made by General Schofield, and an exposition of the blunder which opened the battle

The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee, November 30, 1864: A statement of the erroneous claims made by General Schofield, and an exposition of the blunder which opened the battle

John K. Shellenberger

The Battle of Franklin was a catastrophic failure of command disguised as a tactical masterpiece, and this account strips away the long-standing myths surrounding its leadership.

Biographies7 min read
Cover of The Battleship Boys' First Step Upward

The Battleship Boys' First Step Upward

Frank Gee Patchin

The life of a sailor on a modern battleship is fraught with peril, but young men of character find that bravery and discipline can transform even the lowliest recruit into a decorated leader.

Adventure5 min read
Cover of The Betrothal: A Sequel to the Blue Bird

The Betrothal: A Sequel to the Blue Bird

Maurice Maeterlinck

This fairy play follows a young man’s quest to find his true love, exploring the idea that our most significant life choices are guided by the unseen voices of our ancestors and our future descendants. It is a work of gentle symbolism, grounding grand metaphysical questions in the simple, rustic setting of a…

Plays/Films/Dramas6 min read
Cover of The Bible in its Making: The most Wonderful Book in the World

The Bible in its Making: The most Wonderful Book in the World

Mildred Duff

The Bible, often viewed as a static relic, is presented here as a living, organic record that grew and evolved like a tree from an acorn. This historical account traces the origins of the Scriptures from their earliest beginnings to their final compilation, offering a window into the ancient world through the lens…

History - Religious6 min read
Cover of The Boat Club

The Boat Club

Oliver Optic

A group of young friends navigates the complexities of honor, rivalry, and the pursuit of excellence while building a custom-made rowing club on a quiet lake.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Boys of Bellwood School

The Boys of Bellwood School

Frank V. Webster

A young boy, unjustly accused of a crime, finds his path to maturity through loyalty, resilience, and the bonds of boarding school life.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Camp Fire Girls on the Open Road

The Camp Fire Girls on the Open Road

Hildegard G. Frey

HOOK A determined young teacher finds her true calling by organizing her difficult rural students into a Camp Fire Girls group during the height of the Great War.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Challenge of the Country: A Study of Country Life Opportunity

The Challenge of the Country: A Study of Country Life Opportunity

George Walter Fiske

This urgent call to action invites college-educated youth to revitalize American rural life by rejecting the city’s allure in favor of dedicated service as leaders in farming communities.

History - American6 min read
Cover of The Come Back

The Come Back

Carolyn Wells

A man presumed dead in the Labrador wilderness returns home, only to discover his mourning family has built their lives around a fraudulent medium and a comforting, occult delusion. He must now navigate a murder mystery and his own identity crisis to save his father’s reputation.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Conquest of Plassans (La Conquête de Plassans)

The Conquest of Plassans (La Conquête de Plassans)

Émile Zola

A subtle invasion of domestic life by a predatory priest unravels a provincial family, illustrating how quiet, calculated influence can be more destructive than any open revolution.

French Literature7 min read
Cover of The Cost of Kindness

The Cost of Kindness

Jerome K. (Jerome Klapka) Jerome

A well-meaning act of superficial polite hypocrisy backfires completely, trapping a quiet village with the very rector they were desperate to see depart.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Crime of the French Café and Other Stories

The Crime of the French Café and Other Stories

Nicholas (House name) Carter

The mystery of a waiter fleeing a quiet restaurant sets a master detective on a trail through the dark streets and shadowed gardens of old New York. Nothing is as it appears when death, diamonds, and double-crosses converge.

American Literature5 min read
Cover of The Death Ship: A Strange Story, Vol. 3 (of 3)

The Death Ship: A Strange Story, Vol. 3 (of 3)

William Clark Russell

This atmospheric maritime novel depicts a terrifying encounter with the legendary Flying Dutchman, exploring the psychological toll of immortality and the desperate struggle for human survival against a supernatural, ageless curse.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Elect Lady

The Elect Lady

George MacDonald

A quiet, transformative journey unfolds in the Scottish countryside, where the rigid expectations of class and the hollow rituals of tradition are challenged by the radical simplicity of a life lived in direct obedience to divine instruction.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Fleets Behind the Fleet: The Work of the Merchant Seamen and Fishermen in the War

The Fleets Behind the Fleet: The Work of the Merchant Seamen and Fishermen in the War

W. MacNeile (William MacNeile) Dixon

The merchant sailor is the unsung architect of victory, a figure whose courage in the face of invisible peril quietly sustains the very existence of a nation under siege.

History - British7 min read
Cover of The Fur Bringers: A Story of the Canadian Northwest

The Fur Bringers: A Story of the Canadian Northwest

Hulbert Footner

In the rugged expanses of the Canadian Northwest, a young fur trader battles a corrupt monopoly and his own complex feelings for the daughter of his most formidable rival.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The German Pioneers: A Tale of the Mohawk

The German Pioneers: A Tale of the Mohawk

Friedrich Spielhagen

A harrowing journey from the pestilence of a trans-Atlantic voyage to the bloody, frontier reality of the Mohawk Valley tests the souls of German immigrants striving for a new life.

German Literature6 min read
Cover of The Ghetto: A Drama in Four Acts

The Ghetto: A Drama in Four Acts

Herman Heijermans

This drama follows the collision between an aging miser’s rigid religious devotion and his son’s yearning for a life defined by art, honesty, and a love that transcends the barriers of the Ghetto.

Plays/Films/Dramas6 min read
Cover of The Girl and Her Fortune

The Girl and Her Fortune

L. T. Meade

The sisters Brenda and Florence Heathcote finish school, only to learn their inheritance is gone. They must navigate a precarious, sudden poverty to discover who truly loves them for themselves and who is merely chasing a fortune.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine

The Go Ahead Boys and Simon's Mine

Ross Kay

A group of self-reliant young explorers ventures into the rugged, dangerous wilderness of the American Southwest to track down the legendary, long-lost mining claim of a mysterious prospector.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Golfer's Rubaiyat

The Golfer's Rubaiyat

Henry Walcott Boynton

The golf course serves as a poignant mirror for the human condition, where the swing of a club echoes the fleeting rhythm of our own existence. Through a series of meditative verses, this work finds profound spiritual resonance in the simple, often frustrating, pursuit of a white ball across a field of green.

Humour6 min read
Cover of The Great Secret

The Great Secret

E. Phillips (Edward Phillips) Oppenheim

A quiet night at a London hotel spirals into a desperate international conspiracy when a stranger collapses in a traveler’s room, pulling an unsuspecting sportsman into a high-stakes game of shadows and statecraft.

Crime, Thrillers and Mystery6 min read
Cover of The happy tree

The happy tree

Rosalind Murray

A young woman watches yellow leaves drop onto a suburban street, tracing the quiet path that brought her from an idyllic childhood to a muted, sensible adulthood.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Honour of the Flag

The Honour of the Flag

William Clark Russell

A collection of maritime tales where the boundary between the natural and the supernatural dissolves into the salt spray of the nineteenth-century high seas.

Humour5 min read
Cover of The Letters of Her Mother to Elizabeth

The Letters of Her Mother to Elizabeth

W. R. H. (William Rutherford Hayes) Trowbridge

This sharp, cynical correspondence offers a rare glimpse into the maneuvering of the British upper class at the turn of the century. It serves as a witty, unsparing companion piece to the social world of its predecessor.

British Literature5 min read
Cover of The Life and Public Service of General Zachary Taylor: An Address

The Life and Public Service of General Zachary Taylor: An Address

Abraham Lincoln

A statesman pauses to reflect on the nature of mortality and duty following the sudden passing of a national leader. This memorial address offers a rare window into a formative moment of mid-nineteenth-century American political life.

Biographies6 min read
Cover of The Life of a Ship

The Life of a Ship

R. M. (Robert Michael) Ballantyne

The Fair Nancy rises from a shipyard skeleton to a majestic, white-sailed vessel, only to face a brutal transformation when a hurricane leaves her a shattered wreck upon a hostile, frozen shore.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The malady of the century

The malady of the century

Max Simon Nordau

A restless intellectual struggles to reconcile his lofty, detached idealism with the messy, impulsive demands of a world he finds profoundly hollow. This searching narrative captures the disquiet of a man caught between his own principles and the weight of human expectation.

German Literature7 min read
Cover of The Meadow-Brook Girls Across Country

The Meadow-Brook Girls Across Country

Janet Aldridge

A group of resourceful young women embarks on a cross-country hiking challenge, testing their endurance and wits against nature, a rival club of boys, and a series of perilous adventures in the great outdoors.

Adventure6 min read
Cover of The Merry Wives of Windsor

The Merry Wives of Windsor

William Shakespeare

When a boastful, penniless knight attempts to woo two married women simultaneously, he finds himself ensnared in a web of elaborate, hilarious traps. In this world, the hunters quickly become the hunted.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Message and the Man:: Some Essentials of Effective Preaching

The Message and the Man:: Some Essentials of Effective Preaching

J. Dodd (James Dodd) Jackson

The work of the pulpit is a divine calling that demands both a profound spiritual surrender and a keen, practical understanding of the human condition. It is a plea for preachers to move beyond mere institutional tradition and rediscover the living power of the Gospel.

Religion/Spirituality6 min read
Cover of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 14, No. 393, October 10, 1829

The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 14, No. 393, October 10, 1829

Various

This collection offers a vibrant glimpse into the intellectual curiosities, local traditions, and literary passions of early nineteenth-century British life. It serves as a time capsule of an era’s common interests.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 535, February 25, 1832

The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 19, No. 535, February 25, 1832

Various

This collection offers a vibrant window into the intellectual life of 1832, blending natural history, historical reflection, and personal narrative into an engaging survey of the era's curiosities.

Essays, Letters & Speeches6 min read
Cover of The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 573, October 27, 1832

The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. Volume 20, No. 573, October 27, 1832

Various

This collection offers a vibrant, eclectic window into the Victorian mind, blending historical curiosities, poignant verse, and worldly observations into a single, immersive snapshot of life in 1832.

Art6 min read
Cover of The Naiad: A ghost story

The Naiad: A ghost story

George Sand

The truth, often stranger than fiction, is that a phantom may reside in the heart as surely as in a haunted room. This story explores whether the specters we chase are ghosts of the past or mirrors of our own desires.

French Literature6 min read
Cover of The Padre Island Story

The Padre Island Story

Loraine Daly

This guide explores the untamed history and modern transformation of a slender Texas barrier island, where golden treasure and colonial ghosts meet the rise of a flourishing, sun-drenched resort coast.

History - American5 min read
Cover of The rasp

The rasp

Philip MacDonald

A gentleman detective intervenes when a local police investigation goes astray, using his keen intuition and social detachment to untangle a web of deception surrounding a brutal murder.

British Literature6 min read
Cover of The Repair of Casa Grande Ruin, Arizona, in 1891: Fifteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1893-94, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1897, pages 315-348

The Repair of Casa Grande Ruin, Arizona, in 1891: Fifteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1893-94, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1897, pages 315-348

Cosmos Mindeleff

A federal engineer documents the urgent, 1891 effort to stabilize a crumbling prehistoric desert landmark, providing a rare technical window into the early days of American historic preservation.

Archaeology & Anthropology6 min read
Cover of The Russian Ballet

The Russian Ballet

A. E. (Alfred Edwin) Johnson

The Russian Ballet is a discerning, firsthand survey of the golden age of the Ballets Russes, capturing the aesthetic revolution that transformed dance in the early twentieth century. It serves as an essential, elegant record of an era when art, music, and movement converged to create a new theatrical language.

Art6 min read
Cover of The sailor hero

The sailor hero

F. C. (Francis Claudius) Armstrong

A spirited foundling rises through the ranks of the Royal Navy during the French Revolutionary Wars, navigating high-seas combat and the dangerous political intrigues of a displaced noble family.

Adventure7 min read
Cover of The Salmon Fishery of Penobscot Bay and River in 1895-96

The Salmon Fishery of Penobscot Bay and River in 1895-96

Hugh M. (Hugh McCormick) Smith

HOOK This report captures the waning days of 19th-century Atlantic salmon fishing, documenting how traditional river weirs and emerging state-sponsored hatcheries defined the life of the Penobscot.

Environmental Issues6 min read
Cover of The Scornful Lady

The Scornful Lady

John Fletcher

A volatile romantic comedy of manners, this play tracks the high-stakes games of pride, courtship, and reckless excess played by two brothers and their stubborn, sharp-witted counterparts.

British Literature6 min read
Advertisement