Cobwebs from an Empty Skull

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by Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)

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Title: Cobwebs From an Empty Skull

Author: Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)

Release Date: June 30, 2004 [EBook #12793]

Language: English


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COBWEBS

FROM

AN EMPTY SKULL.

BY

DOD GRILE.

ILLUSTRATED WITH ENGRAVINGS BY DALZIEL BROTHERS.

LONDON AND NEW YORK:

GEORGE ROUTLEDGE AND SONS

1874

To my friend,

SHERBURNE B. EATON.

PREFACE.

The matter of which this volume is composed appeared originally in the columns of "FUN," when the wisdom of the Fables and the truth of the Tales tended to wholesomely diminish the levity of that jocund sheet. Their publication in a new form would seem to be a fitting occasion to say something as to their merit.

Homer's "Iliad," it will be remembered, was but imperfectly appreciated by Homer's contemporaries. Milton's "Paradise Lost" was so lightly regarded when first written, that the author received but twenty-five pounds for it. Ben Jonson was for some time blind to the beauties of Shakespeare, and Shakespeare himself had but small esteem for his own work.

Appearing each week in "FUN," these Fables and Tales very soon attracted the notice of the Editor, who was frank enough to say, afterward, that when he accepted the manuscript he did not quite perceive the quality of it. The printers, too, into whose hands it came, have since admitted that for some days they felt very little interest in it, and could not even make out what it was all about. When to these evidences I add the confession that at first I did not myself observe anything extraordinary in my work, I think I need say no more: the discerning public will note the parallel, and my modesty be spared the necessity of making an ass of itself.

D.G.

CONTENTS

Fables of Zambri, the Parsee. 1

Brief Seasons of Intellectual Dissipation. 90

Divers Tales.

1. The Grateful Bear. 101

2. The Setting Sachem. 106

3. Feodora. 107

4. The Legend of Immortal Truth. 111

5. Converting a Prodigal. 115

6. Four Jacks and a Knave. 119

7. Dr. Deadwood, I Presume. 124

8. Nut-Cracking 126

9. The Magician's Little Joke 130

10. Seafaring. 135

11. Tony Rollo's Conclusion.