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3snvl38ci4sjc44metxl3bms7edcki | Jim was looking up at the sky when he saw it. He saw a bright light. It got brighter and brighter. But after a few seconds, it started getting less bright. It took him a second to know for sure, but he knew he had seen a shooting star!
This wasn't the first time that Jim had seen something strange in the sky. It was last year, when he was driving home from work at night. He saw another light in the sky that night, but it wasn't anything like this one. The one he saw last year didn't get brighter. The one he saw last year didn't get less bright. The one he saw last year was round, and Jim was sure that it was a space ship.
When Jim saw the shooting star tonight, he was even more sure of what he saw last year. Some people said that the space ship was really a shooting star. But now that he had seen a real shooting star, he knew for sure that this one was different.
Jim wondered what planet the space ship had come from. |
3g2ul9a02de618o1l8v9d6pw5z9764 | "Hi, Jenny!" "Hi, Brian! What class do you have next?" "I have art next," says Brian. "It's my favourite. I draw six pictures every week." "You are a good painter ," says Jenny. "I see some of your pictures. They are beautiful. I like art too, but I am not good at it. I am not going to be a painter when I am older!" "I tell you, Jenny," says Brian. "Art is interesting for everyone. You don't need to be good at it." "You are right, Brian," says Jenny. "And I like our art teacher. He teaches us a lot. I am much better at art this year. "Yes. Mr. Smith is good. He looks like a great painter too, with his long hair and big beard ." "When do you have art lesson, Jenny?" asks Brian. Jenny looks at her timetable. "I have art tomorrow morning," she says. "What class are you going to now?" asks Brian. "I'm going to music class. It's one of my favourites! We are learning a new song this week. I love to sing. What's the time, please?" Brian looks at his watch. "Oh, no! It's 2:13! There are only two minutes!" "Hurry, Brian!" says Jenny. "We don't want to be late for class! See you later." "Okay. I am going to art class. See you after school!" |
3lrliptpeq9vjp7ouf1uxgw473jakp | (CNN) -- Ryan Lochte won the United States' first gold medal at the London Olympics with an outstanding performance in Saturday's 400m individual medley.
Swimming superstar Michael Phelps, who has 14 Olympic gold medals from his three previous Olympics, could only manage fourth place in a disappointing performance.
"I think I am in shock right now. Going into these Games I knew I was capable of getting the win. I'm happy that I was able to do that," said Lochte.
The rivalry between Lochte and Phelps has dominated the build up to this year's swimming competition, but Phelps couldn't live up to the hype as he struggled to find the form that helped him win eight golds in eight days at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
With First Lady Michelle Obama in attendance, Lochte, the current Fina male swimmer of the year, dominated the race from the start.
The six-time Olympic medal winner, including three golds, opened up an early lead and never looked liked being caught in the race that combines four different strokes.
Phelps hasn't missed out on a medal since finishing fifth in the 200m butterfly at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, but he ends day one empty handed after finishing behind surprise medal winners Thiago Pereira and Kosuke Hagino.
"It was just a crappy race. They swam a better race than me, they swam a smarter race than me and that is why they are on the podium," said Phelps, who is scheduled to compete in seven events at the Games. |
3atpcq38j8aq3uw5yu2l6obf6v5yac | CHAPTER XI.
AUNT CATHARINE'S HOME.
The lady sleeps--O may her sleep, As it is lasting, so be deep! Heaven have her in its sacred keep! This bed being changed for one more holy, This room for one more melancholy, Some tomb, that oft hath flung its black And wing-like panels fluttering back, Triumphant o'er the fluttering palls Of her grand family funerals. E. A. POE.
The summer was nearly over, when, one morning at breakfast, Louis surprised his father by a sound, half consternation, half amusement, and handed him a note, containing these words:--
'DEAR F.,--There were three of us last night; there are five this morning. Isabel and the twins are doing well. Heaven knows what is to become of us!
'Yours, J. F.'
'What would you have?' said Lord Ormersfield, calmly. 'The poorer people are, the more children they have!'
He went on with his own letters, while Louis laughed at the enunciation of this inverse ratio; and then took up the note again, to wonder at the tone of anxiety and distress, so unlike James. He went to call on Lady Conway, and was better satisfied to find that James had written in a lively strain to her, as if proud of his little daughters, and resolved not to be pitied. Of this he was in no danger from his sisters-in-law, who looked upon twin-girls as the only blessing needed to complete Isabel's felicity, had devised three dozen names for them, and longed to be invited to Northwold to see them. |
3snvl38ci4sjc44metxl3bms8isck6 | (CNN) -- Politicians make gaffes almost daily. Some they can overcome. Some are fodder for late-night comedians. Some are deadly to their campaigns. Republican congressman Todd Akin's recent gaffe was so toxic, he may not only have killed his campaign, he may be the political equivalent of a zombie who also infects the Romney/Ryan ticket with his deadly virus.
The American public is smarter than most political campaigns give us credit for. We may not be geniuses -- me included -- but we intuitively grasp when a politician has merely slipped up or when he or she has revealed something much more significant.
The first type of political gaffes are just that: mistakes. For example, when then-presidential candidate Barack Obama said he had campaigned in "57 states." Or when Rep. Michele Bachmann suggested that the American Revolution had started in New Hampshire.
These kinds of comments are generally overcome. The only time they're potentially fatal is if they occur with such frequency that they begin to define the politician. Note to Joe Biden: You are really getting close to achieving that feat.
Then there are the gaffes that are not gaffes at all. These reveal the candidate's views on an issue or a character flaw that we had not previously seen.
Rep. Todd Akin's notorious remark Sunday clearly falls into the second category.
Akin assessing candidacy with conservatives in Florida
His statement that a woman being raped could magically shut off her reproductive system and avoid becoming pregnant was so outrageous that even Mitt Romney quickly denounced him. (Surprising, because Romney failed to condemn Rush Limbaugh's despicable comments regarding Sandra Fluke, the law student whom Limbaugh called a "slut" on his radio show after she appeared before Congress to discuss contraception.) Akin's statement also brought national attention to his radical position that a woman who becomes pregnant from rape should be required to carry the baby to term. |
3tok3khvjtiwqeu5l4h3u6bnr6c7oh | The Chinese put up with a lot living in the world's most populous country: standing on over-crowded trains for 40 hours; sleeping outside hospitals to secure a doctor's appointment; waiting more than a year to earn a driver's license.
Add getting a U.S. entry visa to the list. Applicants here have waited as long as 60 days to secure an appointment at one of five U.S. consular locations in China that process visas. There, they're often greeted by long lines, followed by a face-to-face interview that can end badly in a matter of seconds.
Now there are only about 100 U.S. visa officers in China, facing considerable challenges during the summer when tourists and students travel the most. "It's not easy work," Charles Bennett, minister-counselor for Consular Affairs at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing, said to his staff. "You're making, in some cases, life-changing decisions many times a day, and that can cause great tiredness."
To adapt, US consular services expanded their hours, took on about a dozen additional staff and hope to have another 20 officers by spring. More facilities are also being expanded.
Despite the shocking numbers, the embassy remains troubled by charges that it rejects applicants unreasonably and that the process is unfairly burdensome. "I'm fed up," said Wendy Liu, 24. The single woman from Beijing said she was recently refused a visa and told to re-apply when her personal life and finances were more stable. "I'll go anywhere but the U.S. now," she said. "I thought America was supposed to be a country of freedom."
To visit the US, Chinese nationals must prove that they have enough money and family or business ties that make it likely they'll return to China. The Department of Homeland Security said it did not keep records on how many Chinese overstay their visas.
Student visas can be refused on grounds of national security. Beijing native Tan Ge, 25, believes he was not accepted after he stated his interests in infrared technology and nanoelectronics on his application. He now studies in Canada after being forced to abandon a full scholarship to Arizona State University.
By its very nature, the on-the-spot process at the U.S. Embassy can feel unbearable to Chinese applicants, who are asked to take their bank statements, property deeds , marriage licenses and HUKOU, a Chinese household ID.
"It made me feel very uncomfortable," said Xu Yong, 28, a journalist who needed a business visa last month to cover a conference in New York. "They made me feel like someone from a Third World country up to no good."
After giving his fingerprints, Xu waited to be called for his interview, sitting in an area that was as quiet as a library. Each passing minute seemed to be as long as a century.
After an hour, Xu was called with three other people to a window for their interview. Two were rejected before his turn. Then the American officer, speaking fluent Chinese, reached for Xu's paperwork, asked some simple questions and said, "Congratulations."
"I was so nervous. The first thing I did when I got out was to call my mom and tell her I passed," Xu said. "She was the one who warned me it wasn't going to be easy." |
3k772s5np8b77cns4z0jg76308rehc | Bob rode his bike to his house on Monday. He wanted to get home to get some yogurt. On Tuesday, Bob looked over his shoulder and saw Matt. Matt was looking around in the fridge. On Friday, Bob walked on the ice. He fell down. Matt had a saying for such things, but he forgot what it was. Matt played ball with a duck. He did not play ball with a dog, cat, or mouse. On Sunday, Bob wrote a lot down on a piece of paper. Bob wrote a lot about his lip. Bob then walked around. Bob took a look at a pan in the kitchen. Bob then walked around in the vegetable garden. Matt was standing in the garden. Matt asked Bob if he wanted to play. Bob said no. Bob did not want to play with anyone. Matt walked away. Bob went inside. Bob walked into the living room and sat on the couch. |
3l70j4kazgmn5j1e2yf7t31eo3pady | Columbia, South Carolina (CNN) -- It's September of 2014, but Bakari Sellers is already getting calls and visits from the small crop of Democrats considering a 2016 presidential bid.
Few voters outside South Carolina have heard of him. But he's a young star in the state's Democratic party, and as a key political figure in a pivotal early primary state, Sellers could play an outsized role in electing the next President.
When Barack Obama won South Carolina's 2008 presidential primary in blowout fashion, boosting his campaign after a devastating blow in New Hampshire, Sellers, then a 23-year old first-term state legislator, was in the crowd at his victory party, beaming.
Sellers co-chaired Obama's campaign in the early primary state, helping the then-senator go from long-shot to history-maker after vanquishing Hillary Clinton in the heavily African-American state. For Obama, having the Sellers name on his campaign steering committee didn't hurt: Bakari's father, Cleveland Sellers, is a civil rights icon in the state, jailed in the aftermath of the 1968 "Orangeburg Massacre" in which three black students were killed by police.
Today, at the advanced age of 29, Sellers is serving his fourth term in the state house — and he's being courted by the small crop of Democrats considering a 2016 presidential bid, including Vice President Joe Biden and Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley. Hillary Clinton has yet to come calling, but the Ready For Hillary super PAC, eager to co-opt some of Obama's 2008 magic in South Carolina, recently invited Sellers to headline a fundraiser for the group. |
304sm51wa34yqipo52asjd7k7pmsb9 | Belfast, Northern Ireland (CNN) -- Ireland's top Roman Catholic cleric, Cardinal Sean Brady, was under mounting pressure to resign Friday amid renewed allegations about his role in dealing with the sexual abuse of children by priests.
A British television documentary repeated claims made in 2010 that Brady was told of attacks by pedophile priest Father Brendan Smyth in 1975 but did not inform police or the parents of the victims.
The documentary also claimed that Brady, then a priest, had a greater role in the church investigation of the Smyth allegations than he has admitted. New details and documents also were produced.
Responding to the BBC program, Brady repeated his defense that he had done his job by passing details of all allegations to his superiors.
He told CNN that he felt "betrayed" when he discovered that church officials had taken no action against Smyth, who continued to abuse children for years throughout Ireland and in the United States.
Smyth was eventually imprisoned and has since died.
Brady has accepted that during the 1970s, he was "part of an unhelpful culture of deference and silence in society and the church," but he has insisted he does not intend to resign.
The Catholic Church in Ireland said Friday that a previous request from Brady for Pope Benedict XVI to send a bishop to help him with his work would be "reactivated."
Calls continued from abuse victims and lawmakers in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland for Brady to step down.
Abuse survivor Jon McCourt told CNN that further inquiries should be made into Brady's role. |
34s6n1k2zvjldixkllnnt2wna2mhlr | Chinese characters are logograms used in the writing of Chinese and some other Asian languages. In Standard Chinese they are called Hanzi (simplified Chinese: 汉字; traditional Chinese: 漢字). They have been adapted to write a number of other languages including: Japanese, where they are known as kanji, Korean, where they are known as hanja, and Vietnamese in a system known as chữ Nôm. Collectively, they are known as CJKV characters. In English, they are sometimes called Han characters. Chinese characters constitute the oldest continuously used system of writing in the world. By virtue of their widespread current use in East Asia, and historic use throughout the Sinosphere, Chinese characters are among the most widely adopted writing systems in the world.
Chinese characters number in the tens of thousands, though most of them are minor graphic variants encountered only in historical texts. Studies in China have shown that functional literacy in written Chinese requires a knowledge of between three and four thousand characters. In Japan, 2,136 are taught through secondary school (the Jōyō kanji); hundreds more are in everyday use. There are various national standard lists of characters, forms, and pronunciations. Simplified forms of certain characters are used in China, Singapore, and Malaysia; the corresponding traditional characters are used in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and to a limited extent in South Korea. In Japan, common characters are written in post-WWII Japan-specific simplified forms (shinjitai), which are closer to traditional forms than Chinese simplifications, while uncommon characters are written in Japanese traditional forms (kyūjitai), which are virtually identical to Chinese traditional forms. In South Korea, when Chinese characters are used they are of the traditional variant and are almost identical to those used in places like Taiwan and Hong Kong. Teaching of Chinese characters in South Korea starts in the 7th grade and continues until the 12th grade where 1,800 total characters are taught albeit these characters are only used in certain cases (on signs, academic papers, historical writings, etc.) and are slowly declining in use. |
3s06ph7ksr4rbvoe6fmei28bkcb1dz | A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a grammatically simplified means of communication that develops between two or more groups that do not have a language in common: typically, a mixture of simplified languages or a simplified primary language with other languages' elements included. It is most commonly employed in situations such as trade, or where both groups speak languages different from the language of the country in which they reside (but where there is no common language between the groups). Fundamentally, a pidgin is a simplified means of linguistic communication, as it is constructed impromptu, or by convention, between individuals or groups of people. A pidgin is not the native language of any speech community, but is instead learned as a second language. A pidgin may be built from words, sounds, or body language from multiple other languages and cultures. They allow people who have no common language to communicate with each other. Pidgins usually have low prestige with respect to other languages.
Not all simplified or "broken" forms of a language are pidgins. Each pidgin has its own norms of usage which must be learned for proficiency in the pidgin.
A pidgin differs from a creole, which is the first language of a speech community of native speakers, and thus has a fully developed vocabulary and grammar. Most linguists believe that a creole develops through a process of nativization of a pidgin when children of acquired pidgin-speakers learn it and use it as their native language. |
3sb4ce2tjvv13p6vtygjna464qgxac | Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a carbonated soft drink produced by The Coca-Cola Company. Originally intended as a patent medicine, it was invented in the late 19th century by John Pemberton and was bought out by businessman Asa Griggs Candler, whose marketing tactics led Coca-Cola to its dominance of the world soft-drink market throughout the 20th century. The drink's name refers to two of its original ingredients, which were kola nuts (a source of caffeine) and coca leaves. The current formula of Coca-Cola remains a trade secret, although a variety of reported recipes and experimental recreations have been published.
The Coca-Cola Company produces concentrate, which is then sold to licensed Coca-Cola bottlers throughout the world. The bottlers, who hold exclusive territory contracts with the company, produce the finished product in cans and bottles from the concentrate, in combination with filtered water and sweeteners. A typical can contains of sugar (usually in the form of high fructose corn syrup). The bottlers then sell, distribute, and merchandise Coca-Cola to retail stores, restaurants, and vending machines throughout the world. The Coca-Cola Company also sells concentrate for soda fountains of major restaurants and foodservice distributors.
The Coca-Cola Company has on occasion introduced other cola drinks under the Coke name. The most common of these is Diet Coke, along with others including Caffeine-Free Coca-Cola, Diet Coke Caffeine-Free, Coca-Cola Cherry, Coca-Cola Zero, Coca-Cola Vanilla, and special versions with lemon, lime, and coffee. Based on Interbrand's "best global brand" study of 2015, Coca-Cola was the world's third most valuable brand, after Apple and Google. In 2013, Coke products were sold in over 200 countries worldwide, with consumers downing more than 1.8 billion company beverage servings each day. |
3qavnhz3em463vp6ffdvcg9jxc7alu | (CNN) -- Professional ballet dancer Michaela DePrince was just three years old when she saw a ballerina for the first time.
She was standing near the gate of the orphanage she was living in the West African country of Sierra Leone when she found a magazine with a female ballet dancer on the cover.
The image of the beautiful, smiling ballerina mesmerized the young orphan, who had just lost both of her parents.
"I was just so fascinated by this person, by how beautiful she was, how she was wearing such a beautiful costume," she remembers. "So I ripped the cover off and I put it in my underwear."
At the time, DePrince -- or Mabinty Bangura as she was then called -- had no idea what ballet was. But she kept onto the picture, dreaming of one day becoming as happy as the ballerina on the magazine cover.
"It represented freedom, it represented hope, it represented trying to live a little longer," she recalls. "I was so upset in the orphanage, I have no idea how I got through it but seeing that, it completely saved me."
Shortly after, DePrince was adopted by an American couple and began a new life in the United States. Today, at the age of 17, she is one of the ballet world's rising stars -- last month she traveled to South Africa to make her professional debut in Johannesburg.
"I worked very hard and I was en pointe by the time I was seven years old," says DePrince. "I just moved along fast because I was so determined to be like that person on the magazine and she was what drove me to become a better dancer, a better person -- to be just like her was what I wanted to be." |
36zn444ytrytfyb14vl0lv1w5k3oi5 | A database management system (DBMS) is a computer software application that interacts with the user, other applications, and the database itself to capture and analyze data. A general-purpose DBMS is designed to allow the definition, creation, querying, update, and administration of databases. Well-known DBMSs include MySQL, PostgreSQL, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, Sybase, SAP HANA, and IBM DB2. A database is not generally portable across different DBMSs, but different DBMS can interoperate by using standards such as SQL and ODBC or JDBC to allow a single application to work with more than one DBMS. Database management systems are often classified according to the database model that they support; the most popular database systems since the 1980s have all supported the relational model as represented by the SQL language.[disputed – discuss] Sometimes a DBMS is loosely referred to as a 'database'.
Formally, a "database" refers to a set of related data and the way it is organized. Access to these data is usually provided by a "database management system" (DBMS) consisting of an integrated set of computer software that allows users to interact with one or more databases and provides access to all of the data contained in the database (although restrictions may exist that limit access to particular data). The DBMS provides various functions that allow entry, storage and retrieval of large quantities of information and provides ways to manage how that information is organized. |
3lozaj85yddcymbrgjn4hsl8rqyx2q | Chapter VI.--WINTER-QUARTERS 1760-1761.
A melancholy little event, which afterwards proved unexpectedly unfortunate for Friedrich, had happened in England ten days before the Battle of Torgau. Saturday, 25th October, 1760, George II., poor old gentleman, suddenly died. He was in his 77th year; feeble, but not feebler than usual,--unless, perhaps, the unaccountable news from Kloster Kampen may have been too agitating to the dim old mind? On the Monday of this week he had, "from a tent in Hyde Park," presided at a Review of Dragoons; and on Thursday, as his Coldstream Guards were on march for Portsmouth and foreign service, "was in his Portico at Kensington to see them pass;"--full of zeal always in regard to military matters, and to this War in particular. Saturday, by sunrise he was on foot; took his cup of chocolate; inquired about the wind, and the chances of mails arriving; opened his window, said he would have a turn in the Gardens, the morning being so fine. It was now between 7 and 8. The valet then withdrew with the chocolate apparatus; but had hardly shut the door, when he heard a deep sigh, and fall of something,--"billet of wood from the fire?" thought he;--upon which, hurrying back, he found it was the King, who had dropt from his seat, "as if in attempting to ring the bell." King said faintly, "Call Amelia," and instantly died. Poor deaf Amelia (Friedrich's old love, now grown old and deaf) listened wildly for some faint sound from those lips now mute forever. George Second was no more; his grandson George Third was now King. [Old Newspapers (in _Gentleman's Magazine,_ xxx. 486-488).] |
3aqf3rz558ijg1373rtl1y2d44g6fu | Harry is a boy with a learning disability. On his fourth birthday, he was given a pug called Millie. Two weeks after the dog's arrival, he was happier and calmer and said his first words, "dog" and "mummy". Just two months later, thieves stole the dog, and now the heartbroken little boy is back to where he started. He has refused to talk since losing his best friend. His mother was worried and gave him another dog, but he just "pushed it away". Mrs Hainsworth, his mother, says, "My son is very sad. He'll go over to her cage and just beat on the bars. There is no word coming out, but you just know he's screaming 'Where is Millie' inside. Millie was really his best friend. They would play together happily for hours. None of his toys has ever held his attention that long. Now he has just completely turned quiet again. "Harry suffers from a condition which affects his ability to speak and move. But the dog's being with him achieved more in days than months of speech therapy and physiotherapy had. Mrs Hainsworth says, "My son was so happy when he saw Millie. Being with Millie changed him, and within two weeks he had said his first words and was working on saying 'dad'. Just last week, his teachers and I were saying how much Millie had helped him. And now this!" Mrs Hainsworth is considering buying another pug in the hope that her son will accept it. Maureen Hennis of the charity, Pets as Therapy, says she has seen many cases of dogs helping people with speech problems. "People may talk to a dog when they wouldn't like to talk to another human," she says. "A dog doesn't care if words come out wrong." |
3n1fsuefl5083ulxtx5gg0few0sd43 | Fat and shy, Ben Saunders was the last kid in his class picked for any sports team. "Football, tennis, cricket -- anything with a round ball, I was useless," he says now with a laugh. But back then he was the one always made fun of in school gym classes in Devonshire, England. It was a mountain bike he received for his 15thbirthday that changed him. At first he went biking alone in a nearby forest. Then he began to ride the bike along with a runner friend. Gradually, Saunders set up his mind on building up his body, increasing his speed and strength. At the age of 18, he ran his first marathon. The following year he met John Ridgway and started to work as a teacher at Ridgway's school of adventure in Scotland, where he learnt about Ridgway's cold--waterexploits. Greatly interested, Saunders read all he could about North Pole explorers and adventures; he decided that this would be his future. In 2001, after becoming a skillful skier, Saunders started his first long--distance expedition towards the North Pole. It took unbelievable energy. He suffered frostbite, ran into a polar bear and pushed his body to the limit, pulling his sled up and over the rocky mountains. Saunders has become the youngest person to ski alone to the North Pole, and he's skied more of the North Pole by himself than any other British man. His old playmates would not believe the change. |
3e7tuj2egcm900r9as17x8quhd79d1 | Chapter 13: The Final Advance.
A few days after the return of headquarters to Berber, Mahmud was sent down country, and Fatma was permitted to accompany him. She expressed to Gregory, in touching terms, her gratitude for what he had done for her.
"We have been of mutual assistance," said Gregory. "I have the same reason to be grateful to you, as you have to thank me. I saved your life, and you saved mine. You were very kind to me, when I was a captive--I have done as much as I could for you, since you have been with us. So we are quits. I hope you will be happy with Mahmud. We do not treat our prisoners badly, and except that he will be away from the Soudan, he will probably be more comfortable than he has ever been in his life."
Gregory was now employed in the transport department, and journeyed backwards and forwards, with large convoys of camels, to the head of the railway. The line was completed to Berber, but the officers charged with its construction were indefatigable; and, as fast as the materials came up, it was pushed on towards the Atbara. Complete as had been the victory on that river, the Sirdar saw that the force which had been sufficient to defeat the twenty thousand men, under Mahmud, was not sufficiently strong for the more onerous task of coping with three times that number, fighting under the eye of the Khalifa, and certain to consist of his best and bravest troops. He therefore telegraphed home for another British brigade, and additional artillery, with at least one regiment of cavalry--an arm in which the Egyptian Army was weak. |
32m8bpygatm5nlu3gc8sgmsue6rgi5 | (CNN) -- After months of speculation, one of Formula One's worst kept secrets has finally been confirmed.
Fernando Alonso, the double world champion who recently left Ferrari, will rejoin McLaren for the 2015 season, which gets underway in March.
The Spaniard, who won back-to-back world titles with Renault in 2005 and 2006, joins the British team after ending his four-year association with Ferrari.
He will be partnered by Jenson Button, whose services were retained above Kevin Magnussen, who stays on as a test and reserve driver.
Between them, Alonso and Button have won three world titles, 47 grands prix and achieved 147 podium finishes from a combined 500 races.
Now 33, Alonso will be expected to boost McLaren's fortunes after a season which saw it struggle to match the pace set by the all-conquering Mercedes team.
"Over the past year I have received several offers, some of them really tempting given the current performance of some of the teams that showed interest," he said in a statement.
"But, more than a year ago, McLaren-Honda contacted me and asked me to take part, in a very active way, in the return of their partnership -- a partnership that dominated the Formula 1 scene for so long."
Between 1988 and 1992, McLaren and Honda won 44 grands prix out of 80, with Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost winning all but one of the 16 races in one season.
"I still remember, as a kid, the posters in my wardrobe, my toy cars in which I dreamed I would one day emulate Ayrton, and the kart that my father built for my older sister, and that I ended up falling in love with," Alonso added. |
3oe22wjigio191jhdp2it3k7eo1uq0 | CHAPTER XXXII.
MR. GILMORE'S SUCCESS.
Harry Gilmore, the prosperous country gentleman, the county magistrate, the man of acres, the nephew of Mr. Chamberlaine, respected by all who knew him,--with the single exception of the Marquis of Trowbridge,--was now so much reduced that he felt himself to be an inferior being to Mr. Cockey, with whom he breakfasted. He had come to Loring, and now he was there he did not know what to do with himself. He had come there, in truth, not because he really thought he could do any good, but driven out of his home by sheer misery. He was a man altogether upset, and verging on to a species of insanity. He was so uneasy in his mind that he could read nothing. He was half-ashamed of being looked at by those who knew him; and had felt some relief in the society of Mr. Cockey till Mr. Cockey had become jovial with wine, simply because Mr. Cockey was so poor a creature that he felt no fear of him. But as he had come to Loring, it was necessary that he should do something. He could not come to Loring and go back again without saying a word to anybody. Fenwick would ask him questions, and the truth would come out. There came upon him this morning an idea that he would not go back home;--that he would leave Loring and go away without giving any reason to any one. He was his own master. No one would be injured by anything that he might do. He had a right to spend his income as he pleased. Everything was distasteful that reminded him of Bullhampton. But still he knew that this was no more than a madman's idea;--that it would ill become him so to act. He had duties to perform, and he must perform them, let them be ever so distasteful. It was only an idea, made to be rejected; but, nevertheless, he thought of it. |
32xvdsjfpzx14acn2clv6b5alrr2mz | The wedding between Prince Wiliam and Kate Middleton on April 29 has focused the world's camera lenses on the UK.
In Britain, there is a constant debate about the relevance of the royal family to modern British society. However, Windsor (the family name of the British Royal Family) and Middleton have been seen to represent a more modern, forward-looking nation.
Nigel Baker, the British ambassador to Bolivia, believes that the royal wedding is "about modern Britain". "The estimated 2 billion spectators across the world will see that Britain is one of the most culturally and ethnically diverse nations in the world, home to 270 nationalities speaking 300 different languages, founded on tolerance and respect for difference," wrote Baker on his blog.
According to Baker, the wedding could help viewers to see "why Britain is one of the most dynamic and creative countries in the world": The television on which most people watched the event was invented by John Logie Baird, a Briton, and the World Wide Web that broadcast the event to millions more was invented by another Briton, Tim Berners-Lee.
The guests who attended the wedding ceremony gave more than a few clues as to the nature of modern Britain. David and Victoria Beckham represent Britain's obsession with football and celebrity.
Leaders from different religious backgrounds supported Baker's comments on the multicultural nature of modern British society.
Before the wedding, David Elliott, arts director of the British Council China, agreed that the wedding would be a showcase for modern Britain: "I think, and hope, that it (modern British influence) would be values like openness, multiculturalism, creativity, sense of humor and the traditional British sense of fair play," he said.
Furthermore, events such as the Olympics in London in 2012 may also increase people's sense of Britishness.
According to a poll published in Daily Telegraph, more than a third of people in the UK admitted they felt "very British" when watching the Olympics. |
35k3o9huabdntgwm99cjdmuqlxufe4 | Claudius Ptolemy (; , "Klaúdios Ptolemaîos" ; ; ) was a Greco-Roman mathematician, astronomer, geographer, astrologer, and poet of a single epigram in the Greek Anthology. He lived in the city of Alexandria in the Roman province of Egypt, wrote in Koine Greek, and held Roman citizenship. The 14th-century astronomer Theodore Meliteniotes gave his birthplace as the prominent Greek city Ptolemais Hermiou () in the Thebaid (). This attestation is quite late, however, and, according to Gerald Toomer, the translator of his "Almagest" into English, there is no reason to suppose he ever lived anywhere other than Alexandria. He died there around AD 168.
Ptolemy wrote several scientific treatises, three of which were of importance to later Byzantine, Islamic and European science. The first is the astronomical treatise now known as the "Almagest", although it was originally entitled the "Mathematical Treatise" (, "Mathēmatikē Syntaxis") and then known as the "Great Treatise" (, "Hē Megálē Syntaxis"). The second is the "Geography", which is a thorough discussion of the geographic knowledge of the Greco-Roman world. The third is the astrological treatise in which he attempted to adapt horoscopic astrology to the Aristotelian natural philosophy of his day. This is sometimes known as the "Apotelesmatika" () but more commonly known as the "Tetrabiblos" from the Greek () meaning "Four Books" or by the Latin "Quadripartitum". |
3jmsru9hqiucpdic9ohnv8xc9s5evg | NEW YORK (CNN) -- Lillo Brancato Jr., an actor who appeared in "The Sopranos," was acquitted of the 2005 killing an off-duty New York City police officer but found guilty of attempted burglary.
Lillo Brancato Jr. appeared on "The Sopranos" and played alongside Robert De Niro in "A Bronx Tale."
Brancato, 32, was also acquitted of two counts of burglary, but could face three to 15 years in prison on the attempted burglary charge. He has already served three years, according to his attorney, Joseph Tacopina.
Police officer Daniel Enchautegui, 28, was killed trying to break up a burglary attempt at his neighbor's house in the Bronx in December 2005.
During the trial, Brancato said there was not a break-in. Brancato said he knew the owner of the home, and that he and friend Steven Armento, 51, were drinking at a strip club when they decided to go hunt for valium.
Brancato told the jury that the owner, a Vietnam veteran, gave him permission to come to his house and take painkillers or other pills whenever he wanted.
Brancato admitted to breaking a window at the home, but said it was strictly because he was going through intense heroin withdrawal that night and he said he was trying to wake up his friend to get the drugs.
When Brancato and Armento entered the home, the next door neighbor -- Enchautegui -- came outside to investigate.
That's when prosecutors said Armento shot the officer through the heart with his .357 Magnum.
Armento was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in November. The jury in that trial took less than six hours to convict Armento. |
3nl0rfnu0fngh0r7ler3kda4g254k9 | (CNN) -- A Florida woman accused in the death of a lottery millionaire pleaded not guilty at a court hearing Monday in Hillsborough County, CNN affiliate Bay News 9 reported.
Dorice "Dee Dee" Moore is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Abraham Shakespeare, a truck driver turned lottery millionaire. She was arrested in February.
Police said she befriended Shakespeare after he won a $31 million Florida lottery prize in 2006. She was named a person of interest after Shakespeare, 43, went missing.
Deputies found his body outside a home in Plant City in late January after receiving a tip from an associate of Moore's.
Moore might have committed fraud to obtain parts of Shakespeare's fortune, and she bought lime to deal with his body and was trying to find someone to move the corpse before authorities could find it, police said.
Shakespeare was killed on April 6 or April 7, and Moore has admitted trying to convince Shakespeare's family members that he was still alive, Hillsborough County Sheriff David Gee has said.
Her attempts included writing a letter to Shakespeare's mother, claiming to be him, and getting people to call his family members, using his cell phone and claiming they were Shakespeare, Gee said.
Moore proclaimed her innocence before her arrest.
She told reporters said she was planning to help Shakespeare write a book about the challenges of winning millions and that she was helping him manage the money.
|
3vhp9mdgrnk8wic8di6onyunzcocfw | CHAPTER IV
Afternoon tea was brought in by an elderly man-servant in plain livery, and was probably the most unconventional meal which Reist had ever shared. They sat about promiscuously upon chairs and overturned boxes, and there was a good deal of lively conversation. Brand was a newspaper man, who had served as war correspondent with Erlito in the Egyptian campaign, Mr. Van Decht and his daughter were rich Americans, loitering about Europe. Hassen remained silent, and of him Reist learned nothing further. The little which he knew sufficed.
Brand came over and sat by Reist's side. He was a tall, fair man, with keen eyes and weather-beaten skin--by no means unlike Erlito, save that his shoulders were not so broad, and he lacked the military carriage.
"I am interested in your country, Duke," he said. "You are making history there. It seems to me that it may become European history."
"Theos has fallen upon evil times," Reist answered. "All that we pray of Europe is that we may be left alone. If that be granted us we shall right ourselves."
Sara Van Decht looked across at him with frank interest.
"Do you come from Theos, Duke?" she asked.
Reist bowed.
"I have lived there all my life," he said, "and I know it better than any other place.
"It is a very beautiful country," he continued, "and very dear to its people. To strangers, though, and specially you who have been brought up in America, I must confess that we should probably seem outside the pale of civilization." |
3snvl38ci4sjc44metxl3bms8i3ckh | CHAPTER XXV.
CIRCUMSTANTIAL EVIDENCE.
At first Jimmy thought they were the perpetrators of the deed, but almost immediately he recognized one of them as O'Donnell, the erstwhile traffic officer who had been promoted to a detective sergeancy since Jimmy had first met him.
"Compton has been murdered," said Jimmy dully. "He is dead."
"Put up your hands," snapped O'Donnell for the second time, "and be quick about it!"
It was then for the first time that Jimmy realized the meaning that might be put upon his presence alone in the office with his dead employer. O'Donnell's partner searched him, but found no weapon upon him.
"Where's the gat?" he asked.
"Whoever did this probably took it with him," said Jimmy. "Find the watchman."
They made Jimmy sit down in a corner, and while one of them guarded him the other called up central, made his report, and asked for an ambulance and the wagon. Then O'Donnell commenced to examine the room. A moment later he found an automatic behind the door across the room from where Compton's body lay.
"Ever see this before?" asked O'Donnell, holding the pistol up to Jimmy.
"If you're asking me if it's mine, no," said Jimmy. "I have a gun, but it's home. I never carry it. I didn't do this, O'Donnell," he continued. "There was no reason why I should do it, so instead of wasting your time on me while the murderer escapes you'd better get busy on some other theory, too. It won't do any harm, anyway." |
3hya4d452rjvy0k6gphibll1niq2fm | Dear Grace, How are you? Thank you for your last e-mail. You want to know about my school clubs, right ? Well, it's time for us to join the school clubs now. There are many clubs in my school, like the English club, the art club, the music club and the sports club. I have two good friends, Jack and Lisa. We all want to join the school clubs. I want to join the music club, because I can play the guitar. I can't speak English well, but I also want to join the English club. Jack likes sports. He can play soccer and basketball. He is in the school soccer team . He wants to join the sports club. He can play the guitar, too. But he doesn't want to join the music club. Lisa likes drawing. She wants to join the art club. She also speaks English very well. I think she can be in the English club. But she can't be in the music club. She can't play any instruments . Are there any clubs in your school? What club are you in? Please write an e--mail and tell me about your school clubs. Yours, Jane |
3f1567xtnw53p9vefe7rx7xt17l9qq | CHAPTER XII
Once more the men and women of Theos thronged the streets of their time-worn capital. A thousand torches flared in the open space before the palace. Lanterns and flags waved from all the principal houses and public buildings. Only the great Reist mansion was silent and gloomy, and many questioning eyes were turned towards it.
"It was the Duke himself who has brought Ughtred of Tyrnaus here," muttered one. "Yet his house is dark and empty, and no man has seen him."
"There is something strange about it," said another, "and I like not the wolf Domiloff at the shoulder of a Tyrnaus."
"Please God, the son may not be like the father!"
"Let us see him," cried another. "Come--shout!"
So the air shook with the roar of voices, and servants in the blue Tyrnaus livery came out upon the balcony of the brilliantly-lit palace and spread a carpet. But the man whom they longed to see lingered.
Domiloff argued with him in vain. He was unaccountably obstinate.
"It is the Duke of Reist who should stand by my side when first I speak to my people," he declared, coolly. "It is he who brought me from England, not you. He must be my sponsor. If he is not here I will wait."
Domiloff was naturally furious. He had been at considerable pains to insure the absence of Reist from the capital on this occasion, and his inopportune return would amount to a disaster. On the other hand, the populace were fast working themselves up into a state of frenzy. Let this man show himself, and the success of his coup was assured. It was unpardonable hesitation. He trembled with rage. In the King's palace, in his own chamber, he had lost for the moment his hold upon this man. It was the one weak spot in his carefully thought-out scheme. It was the one contingency against which he was comparatively helpless. |
32vnztt0a7424442by00lpwialfr4m | LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Michael Jackson feared his father so much he would faint or vomit sometimes when his father entered the room -- even when the pop singer was an adult, according to a book written by a former Jackson confidant.
Rabbi Shmuley Boteach, Michael Jackson's confidant, sat down with the King of Pop and taped 30 hours of interviews.
"The Michael Jackson Tapes" includes Jackson talking about his fear of growing old, his relationship with children, his friendships with Madonna and Brooke Shields, and his remarkable shyness around people that made his surround himself with mannequins.
Jackson opened up to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach for 30 hours of interviews, which were taped nine years ago and intended for a book Jackson wanted written, Boteach said.
"He was trying to reclaim his life," Boteach said Friday in an NBC "Today Show" interview.
Jackson, who died on June 25 of what the coroner found to be a deadly combination of drugs, "lost the will to live, I think he was just going through the motions of life toward the end," Boteach told NBC.
CNN has not independently confirmed Jackson's quotes in the book, but Boteach was known to be a spiritual adviser to Jackson for several years beginning about 1999.
Ken Sunshine, spokesman for the family, including the singer's father, Joe, issued a statement on the book. "We are not going to dignify this with a comment," he said.
The book was not published during Jackson's lifetime because of the pop star's child molestation trial, which ended with an acquittal in 2005, the author said. The author said Jackson's arrest ended any interest in a book about him. |
3a1cohj8njvqybd1rwejoxahp548hi | Jimmy swam around the pond. He was a duck. He was wet, but he was a duck and didn't care. He ate some bugs. He saw some worms on the bottom, but wasn't interested in them, or in the bread crumbs, or the hot dog the boy had dropped. He kept on swimming and swimming. He was a mess. After he had eaten his food, it was afternoon. The sun was setting, and Jimmy wanted to rest in the sun, and sleep. He found a nice place to sit, and began to rest. Falling asleep quickly, he slept for a few hours. When he woke up it was dark outside. He had missed dinnertime, but there were always those worms at the bottom of the pond. Jimmy ate quickly, and was soon ready to swim more. The pond was small, not a lake, or a river or a stream. He swam around for a little longer, and soon it was ready for bed in the nest, where he slept with his family Billy, Susie, and Doug. The other animals were sleeping as well, the dog and the cat on the porch. The cow was sleeping in the barn. And last the kittens in their box. Jimmy was ready for bed, it had been a long day, and the next day was going to be the same. But Jimmy did not care. He loved being a duck. Jimmy was one happy duck. |
3ql2ofsm96ikkappb6p1v33w18vcny | I don't think I can win the race Tim told his parents over breakfast. His mother asked "Why not?" but his father was silent. Tim knew his father didn't believe he could be a racer: only last year, he had sent Tim to a doctor to ask why his son wasn't a better runner. The doctor told him Tim could be anything he wanted to be, and maybe he didn't like to run.
Tim, who had always preferred a good book to P.E. class, wanted to show his family that he really could be what they wanted him to be, so he spent his allowance on a pair of green running shoes and signed up for his school's Spring Fun Run.
Tim answered, "I'm going to try to win, but Angela is so quick! No one ever beats her at recess."
"Well, we'll be there for you, either way" his mother said.
Tim took an apple and walked to the bus. Since the race was after school today (school was letting out at 3:00 today, instead of 3:15), he knew he would be too nervous to think about anything else until it began. He didn't even bring his new book with him, an action book starring an orphan named Simon that Tim sometimes pretended to be.
3:30 arrived and the race was about to begin. All the other students had brought running shorts, but Tim was going to have to run in his school pants. Suddenly, he saw that his shoes were untied. As he bent down to tie them, one of the older boys kicked the back of his knee, making him fall down right as the race began. By the time he got up and tied his shoes, he saw he would finish in last place, as the other kids were much farther ahead of him.
It was almost 4:00 before Tim saw the end of the run. By the time Tim reached the finish line, the group of parents waiting on their kids was very small, as some kids had been finished for a long time. Tim's father asked, "What took you so long? I'm surprised to see you here at all! Why did you sign up for this when we all knew you wouldn't win?"
Tim thought about why he signed up. It wasn't about winning the race, or making his father proud. It was about finishing, and showing himself that the doctor was right: he could be anything he wanted to be, like his favorite character, Simon. |
3tvss0c0e10rtl0eptbegwgrj2jtw2 | The economy of Himachal Pradesh is currently the third-fastest growing economy in India.[citation needed] Himachal Pradesh has been ranked fourth in the list of the highest per capita incomes of Indian states. This has made it one of the wealthiest places in the entire South Asia. Abundance of perennial rivers enables Himachal to sell hydroelectricity to other states such as Delhi, Punjab, and Rajasthan. The economy of the state is highly dependent on three sources: hydroelectric power, tourism, and agriculture.[citation needed]
After independence, the Chief Commissioner's Province of H.P. came into being on 15 April 1948 as a result of integration of 28 petty princely states (including feudal princes and zaildars) in the promontories of the western Himalaya, known in full as the Simla Hills States and four Punjab southern hill states by issue of the Himachal Pradesh (Administration) Order, 1948 under Sections 3 and 4 of the Extra-Provincial Jurisdiction Act, 1947 (later renamed as the Foreign Jurisdiction Act, 1947 vide A.O. of 1950). The State of Bilaspur was merged in the Himachal Pradesh on 1 April 1954 by the Himachal Pradesh and Bilaspur (New State) Act, 1954. Himachal became a part C state on 26 January 1950 with the implementation of the Constitution of India and the Lt. Governor was appointed. Legislative Assembly was elected in 1952. Himachal Pradesh became a union territory on 1 November 1956. Following area of Punjab State namely Simla, Kangra, Kulu and Lahul and Spiti Districts, Nalagarh tehsil of Ambala District, Lohara, Amb and Una kanungo circles, some area of Santokhgarh kanungo circle and some other specified area of Una tehsil of Hoshiarpur District besides some parts of Dhar Kalan Kanungo circle of Pathankot tehsil of Gurdaspur District; were merged with Himachal Pradesh on 1 November 1966 on enactment of Punjab Reorganisation Act, 1966 by the Parliament. On 18 December 1970, the State of Himachal Pradesh Act was passed by Parliament and the new state came into being on 25 January 1971. Thus Himachal emerged as the 18th state of the Indian Union. |
3lrkmwokb5h13hb6h1bped1j0032zk | CHAPTER IX.
HAROLD SITS IN A GAME.
When Elizabeth Compton broached to her father the subject of a much-needed rest and a trip to the Orient, he laughed at her. "Why, girl," he cried, "I was never better in my life! Where in the world did you get this silly idea?"
"Harold noticed it first," she replied, "and called my attention to it; and now I can see that you really have been failing."
"Failing!" ejaculated Compton, with a scoff. "Failing nothing! You're a pair of young idiots. I'm good for twenty years more of hard work, but, as I told Harold, I would like to quit and travel, and I shall do so just as soon as I am convinced that he can take my place."
"Couldn't he do it now?" asked the girl.
"No, I am afraid not," replied Compton. "It is too much to expect of him, but I believe that in another year he will be able to."
And so Compton put an end to the suggestion that he travel for his health, and that night when Bince called she told him that she had been unable to persuade her father that he needed a rest.
"I am afraid," he said, "that you don't take it seriously enough yourself, and that you failed to impress upon him the real gravity of his condition. It is really necessary that he go--he must go."
The girl looked up quickly at the speaker, whose tones seemed unnecessarily vehement.
"I don't quite understand," she said, "why you should take the matter so to heart. Father is the best judge of his own condition, and, while he may need a rest, I cannot see that he is in any immediate danger." |
33cusnvvnncx50c8oskdbkhimhj88y | CHAPTER XXI
OFF FOR THE MINING DISTRICT
While Jack Wumble was off attending to his private business the three Rover boys took a stroll through Denver.
The city was different from any they had visited, and their walk was full of interest.
Coming to a store in the window of which were exhibited a number of Indian curiosities, the boys halted to examine the objects, when Tom uttered a sudden cry.
"Look, Dick! There is Bradner inside!"
"Yes, and Dan Baxter is with him!" returned the elder brother quickly. "Here's luck, surely!"
"Will you have them locked up?" asked Sam.
"To be sure--if we can."
The boys looked around for a policeman, but none happened to be in sight.
"Run and see if you can find one," said Dick to Sam. "Tom and I can watch the pair."
At once Sam made off. But policemen were not numerous, and it took quite some time to locate one and explain what was wanted.
In the meantime Dan Baxter had caught sight of Tom and told Bradner of his discovery.
Boy and man came out of the store in a great hurry. They were about to run off when Dick caught Bradner by the arm, while his brother halted the former bully of Putnam Hall.
"Let go of me!" hissed Bradner, and as Dick paid no attention he aimed a blow for the youth's head. But Dick "had been there before," and dodged, and the force of his effort nearly took the rascal off his feet. Before he could recover Dick had him down on his back and was sitting on his chest. |
3x3or7wpzz0sk7wrihthgp3o7ok8l1 | Rebel-controlled northern Syria (CNN) -- Mohamed Rashid walked out of the gate of his house with a giant blood stain on his white T-shirt.
"This is the blood of a martyr! Of a hero! Of a lion!" he bellowed. "This is his blood. It is pure!"
Mad with grief, Rashid kissed his bloody T-shirt before being led away by worried relatives.
Just hours before, Rashid learned his son Abdul was killed in battle in the Syrian city of Aleppo.
Housam Abdul Rashid was a 22-year-old defector from the army. He was also the fourth man from his small hilltop village to be killed fighting for the rebels.
The younger Rashid is one of the casualties of the five-day-old rebel offensive on Aleppo, the country's commercial capital. Another rebel, who asked only to be named "Khorshid" because his wife and children were still living in Aleppo, described how his comrade was killed by a helicopter gunship, while climbing onto a rooftop.
Syria: As al-Assad's grip loosens, what could come next?
"Housam's specialty was a sniper," Khorshid said. "He went to the roof, and a helicopter gunship killed him. Another fighter from Aleppo with him was also killed. I was just 4 meters away when it happened."
Khorshid said the rebels mounted their offensive on Aleppo last Friday, two days after a bomb killed four of Syria's top security officials.
Rebel commanders and fighters claimed they made gains, particularly in the neighborhood of Salahuddin. But they were also clearly suffering casualties.
What began 17 months ago as a peaceful protest movement has evolved into a full-fledged armed insurgency. |
3lpw2n6lkt2cgf0jtxefvspgiu6u5j | CHAPTER ELEVEN.
TO THE RESCUE.
Elsie and Cora Ravenshaw were seated at a table in Willow Creek, with their mother and Miss Trim, repairing garments, one night in that same inclement January of which we have been writing.
Mr Ravenshaw was enjoying his pipe by the stove, and Louis Lambert was making himself agreeable. The old man was a little careworn. No news had yet been received of Tony or of Victor. In regard to the latter he felt easy; Victor could take care of himself, and was in good company, but his heart sank when he thought of his beloved Tony. What would he not have given to have had him smashing his pipe or operating on his scalp at that moment.
"It is an awful winter," observed Elsie, as a gust of wind seemed to nearly blow in the windows.
"I pity the hunters in the plains," said Cora. "They say a rumour has come that they are starving."
"I heard of that, but hope it is not true," observed Lambert.
"Oh! they always talk of starving," said old Ravenshaw. "No fear of 'em."
At that moment there was a sound of shuffling in the porch, the door was thrown open, and a gaunt, haggard man, with torn, snow-sprinkled garments, pale face, and bloodshot eyes, stood pictured on the background of the dark porch.
"Baptiste Warder!" exclaimed Lambert, starting up.
"Ay, what's left o' me; and here's the remains o' Winklemann," said Warder, pointing to the cadaverous face of the starving German, who followed him. |
3tu5zicbrd13b4c4am1dxb2ihweq8j | The Linguasphere Observatory (or "Observatoire", based upon its original French and legal title: ) is a transnational linguistic research network.
It was created in Quebec in 1983 and was subsequently established and registered in Normandy as a non-profit association under the honorary presidency of the late Léopold Sédar Senghor, a French-language poet and the first president of Senegal. Its founding director is David Dalby, former director of the International African Institute and emeritus reader in the University of London, and its first research secretary was Philippe Blanchet, a Provençal-language poet currently serving as Professor of Sociolinguistics at the University of Rennes. Since 2010, the deputy director and webmaster of the Observatoire has been Pierrick le Feuvre,with the chairman of its research council being Roland Breton, emeritus professor at the University of Paris VIII. The Observatoire's research hub is currently based in the European Union, in Carmarthenshire, Wales (UK) and in Paris. Its title in Welsh is Wylfa Ieithoedd, literally the "Observatory (of) languages", and its publishing associate (also in Wales) is the Gwasg y Byd Iaith, i.e., "Linguasphere Press" or literally "Press (of) the world (of) language".
The Observatoire has developed an innovative scheme of philological classification, coding all living and recorded languages within a global referential framework or "linguascale". This Linguascale Framework uses a decimal structure (see below) to record both genetic and geographic categories of relationship (termed "phylozones" and "geozones", respectively). |
3hrmw88u16qu8099nphhnncvnoom05 | CHAPTER IV
TARGET PRACTICE
The two boys spent most of the following week rolling logs and they were busy among them one hot afternoon when Mr. Oliver walked out of the bush nearby. As they did not immediately see him, he stopped and stood watching them in the shadow for a few minutes. Frank was feeling more cheerful by this time, though his hands were still very sore and, as a good many of the logs were burned on the outside, he was more or less blackened all over. He was getting used to the work, and Jake, who had arrived with the sloop in the meanwhile, relieved him and his companion of the heaviest part of it. Turning around presently at a sound, Frank saw Mr. Oliver smiling at him.
"If I were as grimy as you I think I'd go in for a swim," he said. "It's hot enough, and there's a nice beach not far away. I dare say Harry will go along with you while Jake and I put up these logs."
Harry lost no time in throwing down his handspike, and they set out together down a narrow trail through the woods, which led them out by and by upon a head above the cove in which the sloop lay moored. Standing on the edge of the crag, Frank looked down upon the clear, green water which lapped smooth as oil upon a belt of milk-white shingle and broke into little wisps of foam beneath the gray rocks at the mouth of the cove. Beyond this the sea flashed silver in the sunlight like a great mirror, except where a faint, fitful breeze traced dark blue streaks across it. Dim smudges of islands and headlands broke the gleaming surface here and there, and high above it all was a cold white gleam of eternal snow. |
31ibvunm9sz4vri84z1tdqickh2vf8 | Jay Carney is stepping down as White House press secretary, President Barack Obama announced on Friday.
Obama said Carney told him of his decision in April, and Carney later said he plans to leave the position in mid-June.
The President announced that deputy press secretary Josh Earnest will step into the role.
Obama considers Carney "one of my closest friends."
"He's got good judgment. He has good temperament and he's got a good heart, and I will miss him a lot," Obama said.
Carney previously spent 21 years in journalism, including a stint as Washington bureau chief for Time magazine, and Obama noted that he went from one of those asking the questions to the person behind the podium in the White House briefing room.
He is Obama's second press secretary during the more than five years of his presidency.
Carney took over in 2011 when Robert Gibbs stepped down, and has been Obama's chief spokesman through budget battles with Congress, the 2012 reelection, the rocky Obamacare rollout, the controversy over the Benghazi terror attack, the Edward Snowden NSA leaks, and now the scandal engulfing the Veterans Affairs Department.
"It's been an amazing experience," Carney told reporters.
"In midlife you don't often make a whole new set of friends, and not just friends, but people you would fight by and for under any circumstances and that's certainly what I have been lucky enough to get over these past five and a half years," he said.
Carney said that he's had discussions about what's next for him but hasn't made any firm decisions. |
3snvl38ci4sjc44metxl3bms784kc5 | CHAPTER XX.
MR WHITTLESTAFF TAKES HIS JOURNEY.
Mr Whittlestaff did at last get into the train and have himself carried up to London. And he ate his sandwiches and drank his sherry with an air of supreme satisfaction,--as though he had carried his point. And so he had. He had made up his mind on a certain matter; and, with the object of doing a certain piece of work, he had escaped from the two dominant women of his household, who had done their best to intercept him. So far his triumph was complete. But as he sat silent in the corner of the carriage, his mind reverted to the purpose of his journey, and he cannot be said to have been triumphant. He knew it all as well as did Mrs Baggett. And he knew too that, except Mrs Baggett and the girl herself, all the world was against him. That ass Montagu Blake every time he opened his mouth as to his own bride let out the idea that John Gordon should have his bride because John Gordon was young and lusty, and because he, Whittlestaff, might be regarded as an old man. The Miss Halls were altogether of the same opinion, and were not slow to express it. All Alresford would know it, and would sympathise with John Gordon. And as it came to be known that he himself had given up the girl whom he loved, he could read the ridicule which would be conveyed by the smiles of his neighbours. |
3copxfw7xbc26tdqjyjrnblz7wrkp2 | .Sarah and Mariam looked at the glass fragments on the floor in panic . They could not believe what had just happened.
Mariam was Sarah's best friend. They had spent the entire day drawing and painting. Sarah's mother had gone to the market to buy some goodies and the two friends were alone at home. Sarah decided to show her friend a very expensive vase that her father had gifted her mother on their wedding anniversary . She took her friend to the drawing room and carefully removed the vase. She knew it was not allowed by her mother but she wanted to show off a bit.
Mariam looked at the vase with wonder. When she was giving back the vase to Sarah, a disaster happened. The vase slipped between their fingers and fell on the floor with a crash.
"Oh no!" cried Sarah in panic. "What shall I do now? Mother will be so angry." Mariam felt equally guilty . "I know! Let us sweep up the pieces and hide them. Mother will not know that I have broken it."
"But she will ask when she sees it missing. What will we say then?" Mariam asked. "I think the best thing would be to own up ."
Sarah took a deep breath. "You are right."
When Sarah's mother came back, Sarah and Mariam poured out their tale. At first, her mother looked angry. Then she saw how unhappy and guilty they both looked. She hugged them both tightly. "I am so glad you were brave enough to own up, Sarah. I am very upset about the vase but I am happy you are both such truthful girls."
"It was Mariam's idea that we should own up, Mother," Sarah added honestly.
The girls laughed. They felt as if a huge load had been taken off their shoulders. |
3qjoxow4xjrtzqo3vwgw8ceziuoemk | Steve Jobs made technology fun.The co-founder of Apple died last Wednesday at the age of fifty-six He had fought for years against cancer.Mourners gathered outside his house in Palo Alto, California, and Apple stores around the world.
Tim Bajarin, president of a high-tech research and consulting company, said "If you actually look at a tech leader, they're really happy if they have one hit in their life.Steve Jobs has the Apple II, the Mac, the iPod, the iPhone, the iPad and Pixar."
Steve Jobs was a college dropout.He was adopted by a machinist and his wife, an accountant.They supported his early interest in electronics.
He and his friend Steve Wozniak started Apple Computer--now just called Apple--in nineteen seventy-six.They stayed at the company until nineteen eighty-five.That year, Steve Wozniak returned to college and Steve Jobs left in a dispute with the chief executive.
Mr.Jobs then formed his own company, called NeXT Computer.He rejoined Apple in nineteen ninety-seven after it bought NeXT.He helped remake Apple from a business that was in bad shape then to one of the most valuable companies in the world today.
Steve Wozniak, speaking on CNN, remembered his longtime friend as a "great visionary and leader'' and a "marketing genius ".
President Obama said in a statement: "By building one of the planet's most successful companies from his garage, _ .By making computers personal and putting the Internet in our pockets, he made the information revolution not only accessible, but intuitive and fun."
David Carroll is a professor at Parsons School of Design in New York City.He says Steve Jobs not only revolutionized technology, he also revolutionized American business.
"The fact that he was able to redesign American commerce top to bottom and across is really stunning .He probably will be considered an industrial giant on the scale of Thomas Edison and Henry Ford, so one of the great[s] of all time." David Carroll said.
Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple's chief executive in August because of his health.He died a day after the company released a new iPhone version that met with limited excitement.Apple's new chief, Tim Cook, will also have to deal with the new Kindle Fire tablet computer from Amazon.com.It costs less than half as much as an iPad but also does less. |
3vw04l3zlt6dz2eo488x7if456nxx4 | United Nations (CNN) -- Palestinian President Mahoud Abbas put forth a historic U.N. membership bid for an independent state of Palestine on Friday; a move Israel says is premature without direct talks that address its longstanding security concerns.
The formal application -- viewed as a largely symbolic gesture because an American veto is all but assured should the request come to a vote in the Security Council -- drew applause in the assembly when the Palestinian leader raised the document at the podium during his speech at the 66th annual session of the General Assembly.
The time has come for a "Palestinian Spring" to join the Arab Spring in reshaping the Middle East, he said. "My people desire to exercise their right to enjoy a normal life like the rest of humanity."
But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, later taking his turn to address the General Assembly, said Palestinians are looking for a "state without peace," ignoring security concerns important to Israel.
He said Palestinians are not armed only with their "hopes and dreams," as Abbas said in his speech. To that he added "10,000 missiles, and Grad rockets supplied by Iran, not to mention the river of lethal weapons flowing into Gaza."
"Palestinians should first make peace with Israel, and then get their state," he declared, adding that peace must arrive through a two-state solution that recognizes Israel as a Jewish state.
If that occurs, Israel "will be the first" to recognize Palestinian statehood, the prime minister said.
Representatives from the United Nations, the United States, Russia and the European Union -- a group commonly referred to as the Quartet for the Middle East -- discussed the request later Friday, and issued a statement saying the bid is now before the U.N. Security Council. |
3ggai1sqevye2s4pz5a1ioewwbkmct | It was hard being the younger of two sisters. I got all the hand-me-downs . I never got to do anything first and my teachers always said, "Oh, you're Jenny's little sister." "No, I am Lauren!" I never liked being the younger. Jenny and I got along with a few fights here and there. Then a few years ago, Jenny and I were in a car accident. She was okay, but I had a large scar on my face. I was very sad. Jenny told me I shouldn't worry about the scar. One day we were riding home from school on the bus. A boy named Jordan made fun of me about my scar. This went on for about a month. Finally I broke down and told Jenny about him. She was angry. When Jordan made fun of me the next time, Jenny stood up, walked to where he was sitting and said something into his ear. I didn't know exactly what she said, but Jordan never said a single word to me again. So, even though getting all of the hand-me-downs might not be the best, I was very happy to have a big sister like Jenny. When anyone asks now, I will tell them, "Yes, I'm Jenny's little sister." ,. |
3h0w84iwbk2kw61v04cdub89na9erf | (CNN) -- Mark Webber vowed to push Sebastian Vettel for the 2013 world title when their champion Red Bull team launched its new Formula One car on Sunday.
The veteran Australian has had to play second fiddle to the all-conquering Vettel in the past three seasons, despite at stages being in contention for his maiden championship.
He has had to contend with recent criticism from Red Bull's motor sport advisor Helmut Marko, who claimed the 36-year-old can't cope with the title pressure.
"I do believe I can have a crack at the championship again this year, as I have done in previous seasons," Webber told reporters at the RB9's launch at the team's English headquarters in Milton Keynes.
"That is my goal and what I think about each day when I get up, and I'm working hard with the team on doing that.
"They know I need 100% support. You cannot win a world title with only 90, you need 100, and we're going into 2013 with this in place, and I'm comfortable with that."
Team boss Christian Horner, who signed a new multi-year contract last week, backed Webber to be a contender despite him finishing sixth overall last season -- 102 points behind his teammate.
"If we weren't happy with Mark then we would never have signed him to be with the team for this year," he said.
"We're very happy with Mark and we give both drivers equal opportunity. It's ultimately down to what they do on the circuit. |
3ts1ar6uqqe2k1hcm1yd7c29y00f77 | CHAPTER XXV
THE BEGINNING OF THE GRAND HUNT
Dave's announcement produced a little sensation, and for the moment his chums stared at him in astonishment.
"Come to think of it, that man does look like the little newsboy," said Roger, slowly. "Do you suppose they can be related?"
"I'd hate to think that Charley Gamp was related to such a fellow," said Phil. "Snogger isn't a nice sort to have anything to do with."
"Mr. Endicott said he didn't use to be so bad," answered Dave. "It is only lately--since he went to work for Mr. Merwell--that he has grown dissolute."
"Maybe he is sorry that he left the Endicott place," said the senator's son. "I'll wager he has no such nice times at the Triple X Ranch as he had at the Star."
"Not if all the cowboys are like those who came to our entertainment," said Phil. "But, Dave, if you think he's related to Charley Gamp, why not speak to him about it?"
"You may get into trouble if you do," interposed Roger, hastily. "Some of these Western characters don't like to have their past raked up."
"But Charley Gamp wants to find his relatives," went on the shipowner's son.
"I'll bring it around--when I get the chance," said Dave. "But I can't do it now," he added. "He's gone." And Dave was right. Hank Snogger had leaped on his horse, and was off, on a trail that led up the river instead of across it.
"What are you boys confabbing about?" cried Belle, coming up, with a box of candy in her hand. |
3jwh6j9i9sd1a5xjx6t6kjxekulbnv | New Orleans (, or ; ) is a major United States port and the largest city and metropolitan area in the state of Louisiana.
The population of the city was 343,829 as of the 2010 U.S. Census. The New Orleans metropolitan area (New Orleans–Metairie–Kenner Metropolitan Statistical Area) had a population of 1,167,764 in 2010 and was the 46th largest in the United States. The New Orleans–Metairie–Bogalusa Combined Statistical Area, a larger trading area, had a 2010 population of 1,452,502. Before Hurricane Katrina, Orleans Parish was the most populous parish in Louisiana. As of 2015, it ranks third in population, trailing neighboring Jefferson Parish, and East Baton Rouge Parish.
It is well known for its distinct French and Spanish Creole architecture, as well as its cross-cultural and multilingual heritage. New Orleans is also famous for its cuisine, music (particularly as the birthplace of jazz), and its annual celebrations and festivals, most notably "Mardi Gras", dating to French colonial times. The city is often referred to as the "most unique" in the United States.
New Orleans is located in southeastern Louisiana, and developed on both sides of the Mississippi River. The heart of the city and French Quarter is on the north side of the river as it curves through this area. The city and Orleans Parish () are . The city and parish are bounded by the parishes of St. Tammany to the north, St. Bernard to the east, Plaquemines to the south, and Jefferson to the south and west. Lake Pontchartrain, part of which is included in the city limits, lies to the north and Lake Borgne lies to the east. |
3bf51chdtva8gm8yws14vi4z676h0i | Joe was moving to a different state. He wanted to make the move without spending much money. He thought about driving in his own vehicle, but didn't do that. So Joe found a shipping company that shipped boxes on trailer trucks. First, Joe packed all his stuff in boxes. Then, he borrowed a small truck from a friend. He brought his belongings to the company's location with the small truck. At the company's building, he packed his stuff into a trailer. After all his belongings were in the trailer, he sealed off the trailer with a wooden wall.
The company filled the rest of the trailer with their own stuff. Then they drove it to the same town where Joe was moving. After Joe flew to his new town, he borrowed another small truck. He drove to the company's location in his new town. There he took his stuff out of the trailer. He carried it to his new house in the small truck. It was more work than using a normal moving company, but Joe saved a lot of money. |
3zdad0o1t1d6il54zy70ifuysdoxtg | Mongolia (Mongolian: in Mongolian Cyrillic; in Mongolian script; in Mongolian Latin script; literally: Mongol State) is a landlocked unitary sovereign state in East Asia. Its area is roughly equivalent with the historical territory of Outer Mongolia, and that term is sometimes used to refer to the Mongolian People's Republic. It is located between China to the south and Russia to the north. While it does not share a border with Kazakhstan, Mongolia is separated from it by only .
At , Mongolia is the 18th largest country in the world by land mass and has a population of around three million people. It is also the world's second-largest landlocked country behind Kazakhstan and the largest landlocked country that does not border a closed sea. The country contains very little arable land, as much of its area is covered by grassy steppe, with mountains to the north and west and the Gobi Desert to the south. Ulaanbaatar, the capital and largest city, is home to about 40%-45% of the country's population.
Horse culture is still integral. The majority of its population are Buddhists. The non-religious population is the second largest group. Islam is the dominant religion among ethnic Kazakhs. The majority of the state's citizens are of Mongol/Mongolian ethnicity, although Kazakhs, Tuvans, and other minorities also live in the country, especially in the west. Mongolia joined the World Trade Organization in 1997 and seeks to expand in its participation for regional economic and trade groups. |
31euonyn2v3y14v132kj0krqdvmov7 | CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
A KNOTTY QUESTION.
"Tom Blunt," said Richard Sharp, "I deny your premises, condemn your reasoning as illogical, and reject your conclusions with scorn!"
The youth who made this remark with very considerable assurance and emphasis was a student. His fellow-student received it with an air of bland good-nature.
"Dick," said he, "your oratory is rotund, and if it were convincing might be impressive; but it fails to some extent in consequence of a certain smack of self-assertion which is unphilosophical. Suppose, now, that we have this matter out in a calm, dispassionate manner, without `tooth,' or egotism, or prejudice, which tend so powerfully to mar human disputation and render it abortive."
"With all my heart, Tom," said the other, drawing close to the fire, placing one foot against the mantelpiece, as being a comfortable, though not elegant posture, resting his elbows on the arms of his chair, and placing his hands in that position--with all the finger tips touching each other--which seems, from the universal practice of civilised society, to assist mental elucidation. "I am quite prepared. Come on!"
"Stay; while my mind is working I like to have my hands employed. I will proceed with my monkey while we talk," said Blunt, taking up a walking-stick, the head of which he had carved into the semblance of a monkey. "Sweet creature!" he added, kissing the object of his affection, and holding it out at arm's-length. "Silent companion of my solitary rambles, and patient auditor of my most secret aspirations, you are becoming quite a work of art. A few more touches of the knife, and something like perfection shall have been attained! Look here, Dick, when I turn it towards the light--so--isn't there a beauty about the contour of that upper lip and nose which--" |
3ve8ayvf8mx6kfmvw6qjlcy49ihf81 | Olympic torch relay planned route Beijing, April 27--The Beijing 2008 Olympic Torch Relay will cover the greatest area and include the largest number of people. The plans were announced on Thursday night. The planned route would last 130 days and travel 137 000 km. First Nobel Prize winner to donate to Hope School Chinanews, Beijing, May 10--Professor Dannel Chee Tsui, in the USA, signed the agreement to donate 350 000yuan to his home town to build a Hope Primary School in China. Bill Gates receives Tsinghua honorary doctorate Beijing,April 20--Bill Gates, chairman of global IT giant Microsoft, received an honorary doctorate when he visited China's famous Tsinghua University on Thursday. Big Shaolin kung fu center to be built in Russia Chinanews, Beijing, April 27--China and Russia have signed a letter of intent ( )on the building of a Shaolin kung fu center in Russia. It will be the first of its kind in Russia,and also the biggest overseas kung fu center when it is completed. |
3qy5dc2mxrk4ict8z9roh4gt7mgfuf | (CNN) -- Senegal's octogenarian incumbent president is seeking a third term Sunday, a bid that has sparked deadly protests and threatened the nation's reputation as one of the most stable democracies in Africa.
The incumbent
Abdoulaye Wade, 85, came to power in 2000 after multiple unsuccessful runs. One of the continent's oldest leaders, the French-trained lawyer also has a degree in economics. He is seeking a third term against a crowded field of 13 others, including two women.
He was initially credited with boosting the nation's infrastructure, but his critics have accused him of autocracy and said he is grooming his son to take over after him.
Others have accused the leader of grandiose investments, including a costly towering monument near the capital of Dakar that sparked criticism in a country where poverty is still rife.
Other contenders include Ousmane Tanor Dieng, Moustapha Niasse and Macky Sall, the latter of whom considered Wade a mentor.
Why are protesters against his run?
Senegalese protesters have taken to the streets nationwide since Wade won a court bid to run for a third term despite a constitutional limit mandating two terms. Wade successfully argued that he is exempt because he took office before the term limit was put in place.
Wade is among a list of elderly leaders clinging to power in sub-Saharan Africa despite demands for them to step down. Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe used his recent 88th birthday to lash out at critics and vowed to run for re-election.
The opposition has said it will protest if Wade wins, but analysts say a lack of cohesion among foes and a system that favors the incumbent make it harder to unseat Wade, who is nicknamed the "hare" for his shrewd politics. |
3jjvg1ybebxxkgrdt6xkq2xssv0b5r | (CNN) -- Jack Klugman, best known as messy sports writer Oscar Madison in TV's "The Odd Couple," died Monday at his California home, his son Adam said. He was 90.
His lawyer, Larry Larson, said he died at his house in Northridge, just north of Los Angeles, with his wife by his side.
Veteran actor William Shatner tweeted: "Condolences go out to the family of Jack Klugman. An extraordinary and talented man. He will be missed."
Klugman, who won two Emmys for his role in the early 1970s sitcom, also starred in "Quincy, M.E." as medical examiner Dr. R. Quincy from 1976 to 1983.
He told Larry King in 2001 that he played Madison on Broadway before the TV show debuted.
"So when (executive producer) Garry Marshall called me, I thought he'd seen me do it on Broadway and that's why he wanted me. He said, 'No, I never saw you.' I said, 'So why did you want me?' He said, 'Well, I saw you in 'Gypsy,' and Ethel Merman was singing to you, and she was spitting all over you.' "
Marshall continued, Klugman said: " 'You know, that's a good actor, he's not showing that she's spitting all over him.' That's why he hired me."
The show, based on a Neil Simon play, was the hilarious story of two recently divorced men who became mismatched roommates. Madison was the gruff, wisecracking slob. Felix Unger, played by the late Tony Randall, was the neurotic neat freak who was a professional photographer. |
36zn444ytrytfyb14vl0lv1w4hboi6 | Mitt Romney hit his party's "magic number" on Tuesday, unofficially clinching the Republican presidential nomination in a race he entered as the front-runner and has had to himself for weeks.
Romney led the pack when he announced his second run for the White House last June, and he has watched his rivals for the nomination slowly trickle out as their own wins looked increasingly unlikely.
The delegates to put him over the 1,144 necessary for the GOP nomination came in Texas, the lone state to vote this week. Romney entered the day 78 delegates away from the magic number, and on Tuesday CNN projected he would win the state's GOP presidential primary, where 152 of the state's 155 delegates were at stake.
On Tuesday, Romney said he was humbled to have secured the requisite delegates to become the GOP nominee.
"I am honored that Americans across the country have given their support to my candidacy and I am humbled to have won enough delegates to become the Republican Party's 2012 presidential nominee," Romney wrote. "Our party has come together with the goal of putting the failures of the last 3½ years behind us. I have no illusions about the difficulties of the task before us. But whatever challenges lie ahead, we will settle for nothing less than getting America back on the path to full employment and prosperity. On November 6, I am confident that we will unite as a country and begin the hard work of fulfilling the American promise and restoring our country to greatness." |
308xblvesi4mp3pbqdant32olrmrbb | CHAPTER XI.--The Night of Adventures.
A cold March wind whistled and yelled round the twisted chimneys of the _Hit or Miss_. The day had been a trial to every sense. First there would come a long-drawn distant moan, a sigh like that of a querulous woman; then the sigh grew nearer and became a shriek, as if the same woman were working herself up into a passion; and finally a gust of rainy hail, mixed with dust and small stones, was dashed, like a parting insult, on the windows of the _Hit or Miss_.
Then the shriek died away again into a wail and a moan, and so _da capo_.
"Well, Eliza, what do you do now that the pantomime season is over?" said Barton to Miss Gullick, who was busily dressing a doll, as she perched on the table in the parlor of the _Hit or Miss_.
Barton occasionally looked into the public-house, partly to see that Maitland's investment was properly managed, partly because the place was near the scene of his labors; not least, perhaps, because he had still an unacknowledged hope that light on the mystery of Margaret would come from the original centre of the troubles.
"I'm in no hurry to take an engagement," answered the resolute Eliza, holding up and examining her doll. It was a fashionable doll, in a close-fitting tweed ulster, which covered a perfect panoply of other female furniture, all in the latest mode. As the child worked, she looked now and then at the illustrations in a journal of the fashions. "There's two or three managers in treaty with me," said Eliza. "There's the _Follies and Frivolities_ down Norwood way, and the _Varieties_ in the 'Ammersmith Road. Thirty shillings a week and my dresses, that's what I ask for, and I'll get it too! Just now I'm taking a vacation, and making an honest penny with these things," and she nodded at a little basket full of the wardrobe of dolls. |
39jec7537u1xsfyydxbs5kx9ognvcz | In epistemology, rationalism is the view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge" or "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification". More formally, rationalism is defined as a methodology or a theory "in which the criterion of the truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive".
In an old controversy, rationalism was opposed to empiricism, where the rationalists believed that reality has an intrinsically logical structure. Because of this, the rationalists argued that certain truths exist and that the intellect can directly grasp these truths. That is to say, rationalists asserted that certain rational principles exist in logic, mathematics, ethics, and metaphysics that are so fundamentally true that denying them causes one to fall into contradiction. The rationalists had such a high confidence in reason that empirical proof and physical evidence were regarded as unnecessary to ascertain certain truths – in other words, "there are significant ways in which our concepts and knowledge are gained independently of sense experience".
Different degrees of emphasis on this method or theory lead to a range of rationalist standpoints, from the moderate position "that reason has precedence over other ways of acquiring knowledge" to the more extreme position that reason is "the unique path to knowledge". Given a pre-modern understanding of reason, rationalism is identical to philosophy, the Socratic life of inquiry, or the zetetic (skeptical) clear interpretation of authority (open to the underlying or essential cause of things as they appear to our sense of certainty). In recent decades, Leo Strauss sought to revive "Classical Political Rationalism" as a discipline that understands the task of reasoning, not as foundational, but as maieutic. |
3lj7ur74rhdhp6cairjjc5r8auan4r | Cotton farmers in some Indian villages are busily buying Coca-Cola and Pepsi, believing that the sugar in the fizzy( ) drinks kills pests.
Farmers say scientists advised them to mix pesticides with a sugary juice to control pests, and they found the mixture cheaper and more effective than pure chemicals-- although soft drink makers and scientists dismissed the remarks. N. Hamunayya, who has become a famous person in his village in the southeastern state of Andhra Pradesh, said his crop survived an attack of pests which had resisted other pesticides. "We found that all the colas had uniform effect on pests. The pests became dead and fell to the ground, "he said. He said the drinks had all the elements they needed : they were cheaper, sticky, fizzy, and attracted ants, which ate the young of the pests. But Thinupathi Reddy, assistant director of the Regional Agri-Research Station, Guntur, says tests had proved such results wrong. "We conducted some field trials on cotton crop at our research station. There was no obvious productivity or destruction of pests, "he says.
Statements from Pepsi and Coca-Cola said there was " no scientific basis" for _ . But their dealers are enjoying increasing sales. Mantan Wall, who sells soft drinks in 17 villages in the region, said sales rose up, thanks to the farmers. " For the 10 days between August and September I had successful business. Instead of just 30 cases( each containing a dozen one-litre bottles) of cola, I started selling almost 200 cases, "he said. " We expected the sales to drop after the news over pesticide residues( ) in the cola drinks. Now I have to keep extra supply for the cotton farmers, "he said.
In February, an Indian environment group made a report saying drinks made by Coca-Cola and Pepsi contained pesticides and called for tougher safety standards. The U. S firms strongly rejected the findings of the New Delhi-based Centre for Science and Environment and said their products were safe. |
3nxnz5rs1axtjrqzjfylxggywhv79s | CHAPTER 52
Nicholas despairs of rescuing Madeline Bray, but plucks up his Spirits again, and determines to attempt it. Domestic Intelligence of the Kenwigses and Lillyvicks
Finding that Newman was determined to arrest his progress at any hazard, and apprehensive that some well-intentioned passenger, attracted by the cry of 'Stop thief,' might lay violent hands upon his person, and place him in a disagreeable predicament from which he might have some difficulty in extricating himself, Nicholas soon slackened his pace, and suffered Newman Noggs to come up with him: which he did, in so breathless a condition, that it seemed impossible he could have held out for a minute longer.
'I will go straight to Bray's,' said Nicholas. 'I will see this man. If there is a feeling of humanity lingering in his breast, a spark of consideration for his own child, motherless and friendless as she is, I will awaken it.'
'You will not,' replied Newman. 'You will not, indeed.'
'Then,' said Nicholas, pressing onward, 'I will act upon my first impulse, and go straight to Ralph Nickleby.'
'By the time you reach his house he will be in bed,' said Newman.
'I'll drag him from it,' cried Nicholas.
'Tut, tut,' said Noggs. 'Be yourself.'
'You are the best of friends to me, Newman,' rejoined Nicholas after a pause, and taking his hand as he spoke. 'I have made head against many trials; but the misery of another, and such misery, is involved in this one, that I declare to you I am rendered desperate, and know not how to act.' |
39lnwe0k4uwos3vy0hx9k1tlneluiy | CHAPTER I--PROGRESS OF THE HOUSE
The winter had been an open one. Things in the trade were slack; and as Soames had reflected before making up his mind, it had been a good time for building. The shell of the house at Robin Hill was thus completed by the end of April.
Now that there was something to be seen for his money, he had been coming down once, twice, even three times a week, and would mouse about among the debris for hours, careful never to soil his clothes, moving silently through the unfinished brickwork of doorways, or circling round the columns in the central court.
And he would stand before them for minutes' together, as though peering into the real quality of their substance.
On April 30 he had an appointment with Bosinney to go over the accounts, and five minutes before the proper time he entered the tent which the architect had pitched for himself close to the old oak tree.
The accounts were already prepared on a folding table, and with a nod Soames sat down to study them. It was some time before he raised his head.
"I can't make them out," he said at last; "they come to nearly seven hundred more than they ought."
After a glance at Bosinney's face he went on quickly:
"If you only make a firm stand against these builder chaps you'll get them down. They stick you with everything if you don't look sharp.... Take ten per cent. off all round. I shan't mind it's coming out a hundred or so over the mark!" |
3igi0vl647kltzms1bysq3xdqgson9 | CHAPTER XIV
GETTING READY FOR THE ENCAMPMENT
For fully ten seconds after the head teacher appeared nobody spoke. Lew Flapp arose slowly to his feet, and bringing out his handkerchief applied it to his bleeding nose.
"What does this mean?" demanded George Strong sternly.
"He--he pitched into me," faltered Flapp.
"That is hardly true," returned Tom hotly.
"Both of you are well aware that it is against the rules of this school to fight," went on the teacher.
"I know that, Mr. Strong," answered Tom. "But Flapp struck me first."
"It isn't so!" cried the big boy. "I wasn't doing anything, when Rover came along and started to quarrel."
"My brother Sam and Harry Moss can prove that Flapp struck me first."
"That is true," said Harry Moss, while Sam nodded.
"What was the quarrel about?"
"I caught him here, beating Harry with this boat chain. I told him to stop and then he pitched into me."
"Is this true, Moss?"
"Ye--yes, sir, but--I--I--didn't want to say anything about it, sir."
"Do you mean to say that Flapp attacked you with that chain?"
Harry Moss was silent.
"Answer me."
"He did. But, Mr. Strong, I don't want to make any complaint. He and some of the others think I'm a--a sneak already," and now Harry could hardly keep back his tears.
"I don't know why he attacked Harry," put in Tom. "But I couldn't stand it, and I took the chain away from him and told him to stop. Then he struck me, and we pitched into each other--and I guess he got the worst of it," added Tom, a bit triumphantly. |
3qapzx2qn4d41w5gd7yx8eyxho8205 | There was once a leprechaun named Tony who spent his days at the end of a rainbow guarding his golden bowl of cereal. Tony was one of the toughest leprechauns in all the land, so no one dared to mess with him or try to take his bowl. That is, until an angel named Jess fell from Heaven. Jess had broken her wing, so she had no choice but stay on Earth, and could not return to the sky. So she chose to make the best of it and went to see all of the beautiful and interesting things on Earth. One day, she came across Tony's rainbow, and was amazed by it. She followed the rainbow to the end, wondering what could be there. Then she saw it: Tony's golden bowl. From the time she saw the bowl, she knew she wanted it. She had heard about how tasty cereal was when she lived in Heaven, but she never tried it for herself. When she went to have some of the cereal, Tony the Leprechaun popped out from behind the rainbow and laughed at her. "Don't you know," he said, "that I'm the toughest leprechaun in all the land? What makes you think you can eat a box of cereal from my golden bowl?" The angel saw that he was right, and she couldn't argue with him. So she left to find something to trade. She came across a seesaw which looked very interesting. She thought that Tony might like it, so she brought the seesaw to his rainbow and said, "I've come bearing a seesaw." When Tony saw the seesaw, he loved it. He didn't argue or laugh at Jess, and traded for his bowl right there. Jess ate from it, and it was delicious. |
3pb5a5bd0v68y1d7xl4vpx2lzf0g77 | CHAPTER XXXVI
Norgate set down the telephone receiver and turned to Anna, who was seated in an easy-chair by his side.
"Selingman is down-stairs," he announced. "I rather expected I should see something of him as I didn't go to the club this afternoon. You won't mind if he comes up?"
"The man is a nuisance," Anna declared, with a little grimace. "I was perfectly happy, Francis, sitting here before the open window and looking out at the lights in that cool, violet gulf of darkness. I believe that in another minute I should have said something to you absolutely ravishing. Then your telephone rings and back one comes to earth again!"
Norgate smiled as he held her hand in his.
"We will get rid of him quickly, dearest," he promised.
There was a knock at the door, and Selingman entered, his face wreathed in smiles. He was wearing a long dinner coat and a flowing black tie. He held out both his hands.
"So this is the great news that has kept you away from us!" he exclaimed. "My congratulations, Norgate. You can never say again that the luck has left you. Baroness, may I take advantage of my slight acquaintance to express my sincere wishes for your happiness?"
They wheeled up a chair for him, and Norgate produced some cigars. The night was close. They were on the seventh story, overlooking the river, and a pleasant breeze stole every now and then into the room.
"You are well placed here," Selingman declared. "Myself, I too like to be high up." |
3m23y66po27sk68t9btk8xlssil6sz | Laura wanted to go to the park and play because she wanted to see her friends. When she got to the park Laura did not see anyone. After looking, she saw her friend George by the basketball hoop. George was playing all by himself. George was happy when he saw Laura. Laura and George played basketball they saw the ice cream man driving in his truck. George asked Laura if she wanted him to buy her an ice cream cone. Laura said she would like him to do that. Laura sat on the bench as George walked to the ice cream truck. Laura looked in the sky and saw a pretty bird flying in a large circle. The bird flew away. George came back with two ice cream cones. One of the ice cream cones had rainbow sprinkles on it. George gave the ice cream cone with sprinkles to Laura. George and Laura sat on the bench and watched a group of boys play football as they ate their ice cream cones. One of the boys broke his leg. When George and Laura were finished with their ice cream, Laura ran home before the street lights came on. |
3aqf3rz558ijg1373rtl1y2d3x7f6f | James was a nice old man who lived by himself. Every day he would walk down the road by his house and say hello to everyone. It was fun saying hello to everyone but he felt lonely sometimes. He wanted a pet to take care of. One day as he was walking down the road a little brown and spotted puppy came up to him and wanted James to pet him. James reached down and petted the puppy and smiled. James hoped to see the puppy again. Many days later James went for a walk again. He thought to himself, "I guess I won't ever see the brown puppy again. I hoped to see him again." A nice young lady said to James, "Would you like a puppy?" James said, "I would like a puppy that was like the one I petted before." The lady smiled. She was holding the little brown and spotted puppy. She told James that she found the little puppy in the woods. She said that the little puppy did not have a family. James said happily, "I would love to give the puppy a home!" So James grabbed the little brown and spotted puppy and took him home. James and the little brown puppy became great friends. James named him Spotty. |
3qy5dc2mxrk4ict8z9roh4gt7jwuf4 | New Delhi (CNN) -- An Indian court has ruled that the organizer of the scandal-plagued 2010 Commonwealth Games in New Delhi is forbidden from attending the opening ceremony of the London Olympics.
The presence at the ceremony of Suresh Kalmadi, who was arrested last year on corruption charges related to the Commonwealth Games, would be "contrary to national interest," the High Court of Delhi said Wednesday.
The legal action seeking to restrict Kalmadi's movements was filed after a different court had authorized him to travel to London. He had sought permission for the trip in order to attend meetings of the International Association of Athletics Federations.
The Delhi high court allowed him to go ahead with his visit. But it said he couldn't leave India until Friday, the day of the opening ceremony, and should honor a pledge not to attend any Olympic events "in any official capacity."
Kalmadi still holds a number of high-profile sports administrative roles, including the presidency of the Indian Olympic Association.
In a statement, he said he was "never planning to attend" the opening ceremony and had never sought permission to do so.
The petitioner who brought the litigation, Rahul Mehra, said Kalmadi's presence at the Olympics would be "extremely embarrassing" for the athletes and India. Mehra described himself as a "patriotic citizen of the country."
The Indian government also is not in favor of Kalmadi attending the Olympics while he still faces corruption charges, according to the text of the high court's judgment.
The 2010 Commonwealth Games, which India had hoped would burnish its image as a rising economic power, was marred by accusations of graft, missed construction deadlines and cost overruns. |
32xvdsjfpzx14acn2clv6b5alx5m29 | CHAPTER XXI.
COLONEL KELMSCOTT'S PUNISHMENT.
While Montague Nevitt was thus congenially engaged in pulling off his treble coup of settling his own share in the Rio Negro deficit, pocketing three thousand pounds, pro tem, for incidental expenses, and getting Guy Waring thoroughly into his power by his knowledge of a forgery, two other events were taking place elsewhere, which were destined to prove of no small importance to the future of the twins and their immediate surroundings. Things generally were converging towards a crisis in their affairs. Colonel Kelmscott's wrong-doing was bearing first-fruit abundantly.
For as soon as Granville Kelmscott received that strangely-worded note from Gwendoline Gildersleeve, he proceeded, as was natural, straight down, in his doubt, to his father's library. There, bursting into the room, with Gwendoline's letter still crushed in his hand in the side pocket of his coat, and a face like thunder, he stood in the attitude of avenging fate before his father's chair, and gazed down upon him angrily.
"What does THIS mean?" he asked, in a low but fuming voice, brandishing the note before his eyes as he spoke. "Is every one in the county to be told it but I? Is everybody else to hear my business before you tell me a word of it? A letter comes to me this morning--no matter from whom--and here's what it says: 'I know you're not the eldest son, and that somebody else is the heir of Tilgate.' Surely, if anybody was to know, _I_ should have known it first. Surely, if I'm to be turned adrift on the world, after being brought up to think myself a man of means so long, I should, at least, be turned adrift with my eyes open." |
39gxdjn2otevgc8lwlvn3y1qyhzv8a | The German equivalent was used with the founding of the North German Confederation whose constitution granted legislative power over the protection of intellectual property (Schutz des geistigen Eigentums) to the confederation. When the administrative secretariats established by the Paris Convention (1883) and the Berne Convention (1886) merged in 1893, they located in Berne, and also adopted the term intellectual property in their new combined title, the United International Bureaux for the Protection of Intellectual Property.
The term can be found used in an October 1845 Massachusetts Circuit Court ruling in the patent case Davoll et al. v. Brown., in which Justice Charles L. Woodbury wrote that "only in this way can we protect intellectual property, the labors of the mind, productions and interests are as much a man's own...as the wheat he cultivates, or the flocks he rears." The statement that "discoveries are...property" goes back earlier. Section 1 of the French law of 1791 stated, "All new discoveries are the property of the author; to assure the inventor the property and temporary enjoyment of his discovery, there shall be delivered to him a patent for five, ten or fifteen years." In Europe, French author A. Nion mentioned propriété intellectuelle in his Droits civils des auteurs, artistes et inventeurs, published in 1846. |
35k3o9huabdntgwm99cjdmuqktofep | I was really scared walking into school today. It was the first day of sixth grade and I was excited to be leaving elementary school, but I ended up going to a different middle school than all my friends since I moved across town last year. My name is Matt, but I'm going to try and not let anyone else know that as I'd rather sit in the back and keep to myself. I didn't want to ride the bus, so my mom said she would drive me there for today. Thankfully I found my classroom, but I walked in and saw nobody I knew, as I thought. I took a seat at an empty table as the teacher, Mrs. Frank took roll call. She seemed nice, and I'm happy we weren't told to sit in alphabetical order or by boys to boys and girls to girls, as I was free to sit by myself for now. Mrs. Frank called out Jimmy, Sally, Linda, Jason, and then finally got to my name in which I raised my hand quickly. As soon as she was done, a few of the kids who arrived late came to sit by me and said their names were Martin and Mark.
Martin said he liked how our names all sounded the same, and Mark seconded that as we started talking before class began. When it was time to eat, we all said we would sit with one another in the lunch room, and also when it came to recess and playing together. It was nice to have some friends after being so nervous earlier, and see that everything does work out in the end. Hopefully soon we can all play together outside of class, but as far as today, it was a great start! |
32ktq2v7rdfc4uxmnl0agydor109m5 | Justice is the legal or philosophical theory by which fairness is administered. The concept of justice differs in every culture. An early theory of justice was set out by the Ancient Greek philosopher Plato in his work "The Republic". Advocates of divine command theory argue that justice issues from God. In the 17th century, theorists like John Locke argued for the theory of natural law. Thinkers in the social contract tradition argued that justice is derived from the mutual agreement of everyone concerned. In the 19th century, utilitarian thinkers including John Stuart Mill argued that justice is what has the best consequences. Theories of distributive justice concern what is distributed, between whom they are to be distributed, and what is the "proper" distribution. Egalitarians argued that justice can only exist within the coordinates of equality. John Rawls used a social contract argument to show that justice, and especially distributive justice, is a form of fairness. Property rights theorists (like Robert Nozick) take a deontological view of distributive justice and argue that property rights-based justice maximizes the overall wealth of an economic system. Theories of retributive justice are concerned with punishment for wrongdoing. Restorative justice (also sometimes called "reparative justice") is an approach to justice that focuses on restoring what is good, and necessarily focuses on the needs of victims and offenders. |
3k9fobbf2hjdnejvoji0ymtjwqonln | Bob Butler lost his legs in 1965 in Vietnam. Later he returned to the USA and began his life in wheelchair . One day he was working in his yard when he heard a woman calling for help. He began moving towards the woman's house, but something on the ground stopped his wheelchair going through the back door. So he got out of his wheelchair and started to crawl . When Butler got through the back door of the house, he found there was a little girl in the pool. She had no arms and couldn't swim. Her mother was calling for help crazily. Butler got into the pool and pulled the little girl out of the water. Her face was blue, and she was not breathing. Butler did CPR on her right away. As Butler continued doing CPR, he talked to the mother. "Don't worry," he said. "It'll be OK. I was her arms to get out of the pool. I am now her lungs. Together we can make it." Soon the little girl coughed and began to cry. The mother asked Butler how he knew it would be OK. "I didn't know," he told her. "But when my legs were blown off in the war, a little girl in Vietnam said to me in broken English, 'It'll be OK. You will live. I'll be your legs. Together we make it.' Her kind words brought hope to me and I wanted to do the same for your little girl." |
3pj71z61r42f85bxuzhcw6pltly198 | The world shares him and London claims him, but Stratford-on-Avon intends to spend 2016 celebrating Shakespeare as their man: the bard of Avon, who was born there in 1564, and died there 400 years ago.
Stratford remained hugely important throughout Shakespeare's life, argues Paul Edmondson, the head of learning and research at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust. "People have seen Shakespeare as a Dick Whittington figure, who turns his back on Stratford and his family, goes to London to earn his fortune and only comes back to die," he said. "But Stratford is where he bought land and property, where he kept his library, where he lived and read and thought. We are going to spend the year re-emphasizing the importance of Shakespeare, the man of Stratford."
The anniversary of the death of the most famous and the most performed playwright in the world will be marked across Britain and the globe. Macbeth is about to open in Singapore, Romeo and Juliet in Brussels. Shakespeare's Globe is completing the first world tour, in which it has taken Hamlet to almost every country. North Korea is still holding out, though.
The Globe director recently jokily claimed Shakespeare as a true Londoner. Stratford, however, will be insisting that the town made and educated Shakespeare. "His old school room in Stratford-on-Avon where Shakespeare learned 'small Latin and less Greek' --as kindly laughed at by his friend Ben Johnson--will open its doors, scarred by centuries of naughty schoolboys, to mark 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death," said Paul Edmondson.
Shakespeare bought the splendid New Place, the second best house in the town, when he had made his fortune on the London stage. "You don't buy a house like New Place and not live there," Paul said. He believes that after Shakespeare bought it, all his thinking time was spent there, and that the late plays, including The Tempest, were at least planned in his library and probably written there. |
3g0wwmr1uvkoebz8goqwf8sd6tvnqq | CHAPTER XXVI
ON THE TRAIL.
It was a long, wet sail up the coast with the wind ahead, and Carroll was content, when, on reaching Comox, Vane announced his intention of stopping there until the mail came in. Immediately after its arrival, Carroll went ashore, and came back empty-handed.
"Nothing," he said. "Personally, I'm pleased. Nairn could have advised us here if there had been any striking developments since we left the last place."
"I wasn't expecting to hear from him," Vane replied.
Carroll read keen disappointment in his face, and was not surprised, although the absence of any message meant that it was safe for them to go on with their project, which should have afforded his companion satisfaction.
They got off shortly afterwards and stood out to the northwards.
Most of that day and the next two they drifted with the tides through narrowing waters, though now and then for a few hours they were wafted on by light and fickle winds. At length they crept into the inlet where they had landed on the previous voyage, and on the morning after their arrival set out on the march. There was on this occasion reason to expect more rigorous weather, and the load each carried was an almost crushing one. Where the trees were thinner, the ground was frozen hard, and even in the densest bush the undergrowth was white and stiff with frost, while, when they could see aloft through some chance opening, a forbidding grey sky hung over them. |
34pgfrqonobxfi49dzxaeqtilddjwy | CHAPTER XXIV. THE BEWITCHMENT OF PAT
We were all in the doleful dumps--at least, all we "young fry" were, and even the grown-ups were sorry and condescended to take an interest in our troubles. Pat, our own, dear, frolicsome Paddy, was sick again--very, very sick.
On Friday he moped and refused his saucer of new milk at milking time. The next morning he stretched himself down on the platform by Uncle Roger's back door, laid his head on his black paws, and refused to take any notice of anything or anybody. In vain we stroked and entreated and brought him tidbits. Only when the Story Girl caressed him did he give one plaintive little mew, as if to ask piteously why she could not do something for him. At that Cecily and Felicity and Sara Ray all began crying, and we boys felt choky. Indeed, I caught Peter behind Aunt Olivia's dairy later in the day, and if ever a boy had been crying I vow that boy was Peter. Nor did he deny it when I taxed him with it, but he would not give in that he was crying about Paddy. Nonsense!
"What were you crying for, then?" I said.
"I'm crying because--because my Aunt Jane is dead," said Peter defiantly.
"But your Aunt Jane died two years ago," I said skeptically.
"Well, ain't that all the more reason for crying?" retorted Peter. "I've had to do without her for two years, and that's worse than if it had just been a few days." |
3dhe4r9ocwb1c0g1r9n0t6ldpcug2y | CHAPTER XI
BROUGHT TO TRIAL
"By jinks! we'll have to be on our good behavior," observed Tom, after he had read his father's letter.
"That's so," responded Sam. "Father means to have us study, or else we must stay here during the spring term."
As anticipated, Alexander Pop reached Cedarville Tuesday afternoon. He came first to Putnam Hall, and was warmly received both by the Rover boys and by the others who knew him as an old hand around the Hall.
"Glad you have come, Aleck!" cried Tom. "I declare it looks as if you belonged here."
"Yes, sah, an' I dun feel like I belong heah, too, Massah Tom," answered the colored man.
"Remember the sport we used to have?" put in Sam.
"'Deed I does, Massah Sam--an' de tricks youse lads used to play on dis yeah coon," and Aleck smiled broadly.
Captain Putnam also came forward to greet Pop. There had been a time when the captain had suspected Pop of stealing, and the colored man had run away in preference to being sent to jail, but now it was known by all that the faithful negro was innocent, and the master, of the Hall was sorry that he had ever accused the man.
"Pop, I miss you a good deal," he said kindly.
"If ever you are out of work again, come to me and I will let you stay here as long as you please."
"T'ank you, Cap'n Putnam, I'll remember dat. But I dun lub de Robers, ain't no use ter talk, an' so long as da wants me to stay by 'em, why dat's whar you will find Aleck Pop, yes, sah!" And he bobbed his head to emphasize his words. |
3duzq9u6smodzwnuaj1skp1ragusv5 | (CNN) -- A Florida death-row inmate convicted of abducting and murdering 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford in 2005 has died, prison officials said Wednesday.
John Couey had been sentenced to death for killing 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford in Florida in 2005.
John Evander Couey, 51, died at 11:15 a.m. ET of natural causes, a Florida Department of Corrections spokeswoman told CNN. He had been taken to a Jacksonville, Florida, hospital from Florida State Prison in Starke, Florida.
Because of privacy laws, no further information could be released by the Department of Corrections.
A source close to the case told CNN that Couey's death was not unexpected and he had been ill for some time.
"I never dreamed it would happen like this," Jessica's father, Mark Lunsford, told CNN. He said he never thought he would live long enough to see Couey put to death because of the lengthy appeals process.
He said he was sad when he heard the news of Couey's death. "To me, death is sad," he said. "But her death, Jessie's death, has been redeemed ... I'm relieved. I'm glad it's over with."
Couey was sentenced to die in August 2007 for abducting and raping Lunsford, then killing her by burying her alive. The girl was snatched from her bed in her family's Homosassa, Florida, home the evening of February 23, 2005, by Couey, a registered sex offender. Her body was found three weeks later, buried at the home of Couey's half-sister, who lived within sight of the Lunsford home.
The girl's body was wrapped in plastic garbage bags, and her hands were bound with speaker wire. She was clutching a stuffed dolphin -- a toy won for her at a state fair by her father, and which Couey allowed her to bring with her when she was abducted. |
3x0h8uuit1oqelnz0t6o6rk5htcsw3 | CHAPTER XI
MIGUEL TAKES CONTROL
A black cloud rolled from _Mossamedes'_ funnel and blew across her bows. The beat of engines quickened and when the stern swung up their furious racing shook the ship. Kit pictured Macallister, sternly calm, at the throttle wheel. Much depended on his skill, for if he were slow when the spinning screw came down and the runaway machinery resumed its load, something must break. Kit, however, did not go to the engine-room. He stood at the door of the pilot-house, inside which Miguel Sænz gripped the slanted gratings with his bare feet. His face was wet by sweat and his brown hand was clenched on the steam-steering wheel.
Although the muscular effort was not great, steering was hard. _Mossamedes_ rode high above water and the gale pressed upon her side; the combers lifted her, and screw and rudder could not get proper hold. Sometimes she came up to windward and rolled until the white seas swept her rail; sometimes she yawed to lee. Kit saw the bows circle and pictured the compass spinning in its bowl.
So far, Miguel steered by compass. Don Erminio had changed his course and headed obliquely for the shoals. It was not the course the gunboat's captain would expect him to steer. Revillon, no doubt, imagined the line along which _Mossamedes_ travelled inclined at a small angle out to sea, in order to clear the hammered sands, and he could steam down from his commanding position and cut her off. The line, however, really slanted the other way. Dark clouds obscured the sky, the light was bad, and the driving spray made accurate observation hard. Kit thought Don Erminio's plan was good, but longed for dark. |
38f71oa9gtwl54ozq702quzztpvmfp | CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.
CONCLUSION.
Once again, and for the last time, we visit the floating light.
It was a calm sunny evening, about the end of autumn, when the Trinity tender, having effected "the relief" of the old Gull, left her in order to perform the same service for her sister light-vessels.
"Good-bye, Welton, good-bye, lads," cried the superintendent, waving his hand as the tender's boat pushed off and left them, for another period of duty, in their floating home.
"Good-bye, sir," replied the mate and men, touching their caps.
"Now, sir," said Dick Moy to the mate, shortly after, when they were all, except the watch, assembled below round the galley stove, "are you goin' to let us 'ave a bit o' that there letter, accordin' to promise?"
"What letter?" inquired Jack Shales, who having only accomplished half of his period of service on board--one month--had not come off with his comrades, and knew little or nothing of what had occurred on shore.
"A letter from the lighthouse from Jim," said the mate, lighting his pipe, "received it this forenoon just as we were gettin' ready to come off."
"All well and hearty, I hope?" asked Jerry MacGowl, seating himself on a bench, and rolling some tobacco between his palms, preparatory to filling his pipe.
"All well," replied the mate, pulling out the letter in question, and regarding the address with much interest; "an' strange news in it."
"Well, then, let's 'ear wot it's all about," said Dick Moy; "there's time to read it afore sunset, an it ain't fair to keep fellers in all the hagonies of hexpectation." |
3tvrfo09gkfiz8xzqp59wokhy0bxlm | (CNN) -- Melissa Huckaby, the former Sunday school teacher accused of kidnapping, raping and killing 8-year-old Sandra Cantu, will face additional charges that she tried to poison two people, including another 7-year-old girl.
Melissa Huckaby is charged with killing Sandra Cantu and attempted poisoning of second child.
A revised complaint against Huckaby, 28, of Tracy, California, was made public just hours before she was due back in court on Friday.
The new charges caused another delay in the murder case, CNN afiliate KRON reported.
The complaint charged that Huckaby "did willfully and unlawfully mingle a harmful substance with food or drink" with the intent to harm the child, identified only as "Jane M. Doe."
Another alleged poisoning victim was identified as Daniel Plowman, but no age or other information was immediately provided.
The latest charges also include one count of child abuse endangerment relating to the unidentified child, who was allegedly in Huckaby's "care and custody." Read the complaint (PDF)
Huckaby did not enter a plea in the Cantu slaying in her first two court appearances last month.
At an earlier hearing, Judge Linda L. Loftis agreed to keep the autopsy and toxicology reports under seal, citing a "great danger of public outrage."
If convicted on the murder, rape and kidnapping charges, Huckaby, could face the death penalty or life in prison without parole, authorities said.
CNN's Alan Duke and Jim Roope contributed to this report
|
3ias3u3i0fg5lj8qbnvmsvug8k2b2h | Rose sat behind Kate in the classroom. They got on well with each other. But one day, Rose didn't see her school IC card at lunch time. She asked her classmates and looked for it everywhere. But she couldn't find it. Later, one girl said that she saw Kate take a card from Rose's desk. Hearing this, Rose got very angry. When she met Kate in the afternoon, Rose shouted, "You have stolen my card!" Hearing this, Kate began to cry, "No, no, I didn't steal it! I only took it by mistake." But Rose didn't think so and she began to say bad words to Kate. Just then a teacher came up and asked what had happened. Kate told the whole story. She said a middle school classmate of hers came to see her in the morning. She was so excited that she took the card on the desk and rushed out. Then they went for lunch happily. "I used the card, but I had thought it was mine. I didn't know it was Rose's until she looked for it. I was too afraid to explain it to her. So I decided to put the card back with some money secretly. I am sorry, Rose." Kate said in a low voice. "It's just a misunderstanding !" said the teacher. Tears came into Rose's eyes. Then she said, "I was very sorry, Kate! I hope we are still good friends." Kate smiled when she heard the words. Hand in hand, they walked toward the classroom building. |
39n5acm9henipxuzf1s2x27jvw39p8 | LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Michael Jackson's sister, LaToya Jackson, told a London newspaper she suspects her brother was "murdered" in a conspiracy by "a shadowy entourage."
Michael Jackson "was surrounded by a bad circle," LaToya Jackson told a British newspaper.
London's Daily Mail newspaper paid for the interview, according to a source close to the Jackson family and another source familiar with the interview arrangements. The amount of money paid was not disclosed.
LaToya Jackson was "very candid" throughout the four-hour interview, which took place in Los Angeles, California, last Thursday, said Caroline Graham, the Daily Mail reporter who conducted the interview.
Jackson cited no evidence of a murder conspiracy, Graham said, but she did tell the paper the family has seen results from the private autopsy it ordered. She would not reveal the findings, Graham said. Watch reporter describe LaToya's demeanor »
"There indeed had been concern among several family members about the circumstances around Michael's death," said Bryan Monroe, the last journalist to interview Michael Jackson. "Some folks have hesitated to go as far as saying it was murder."
The Los Angeles coroner could release his autopsy report on Jackson within a week, according to assistant chief coroner Ed Winter.
Los Angeles police Chief William Bratton told CNN last week that he was waiting for the coroner to determine the exact cause of Jackson's death. "And based on those, we will have an idea of what it is we are dealing (with)," he said.
The Jackson family knows that the probe into his June 25 death might turn into a criminal case, a source close to the family told CNN last Thursday. "The family is aware of a potential criminal prosecution," said the source, who did not want to be identified. |
3z7vu45ipyhuewtayxbb9ure8ok1zl | It had been a difficult move. I'd left my family and friends in Indiana, the beloved state where I'd lived most of my life. My new home in Florida was thousands of miles away from anything I knew. It was hot--all the time. Jobs were hard to come by, but I was up for almost any challenge.
At last, I taught in a special school where students have severe learning and behavioral difficulties.
Another teacher and I had spent weeks teaching the children appropriate behavior for public outings. Unexpectedly, only a few students, including Kyle, had not earned the privilege of going. He was determined to make his disappointment known.
In the corridor between classrooms, he began screaming, cursing, spitting, and swinging at anything within striking distance. Once his outburst died down, he did what he'd done when he was angry at all his other schools, at home, even once at a juvenile detention center. He ran.
People watched in disbelief as Kyle dashed straight into the heavy morning traffic in front of the school.
I heard someone shout, "Call the police!"
But I ran after him.
Kyle was at least a foot taller than me. And he was fast. His older brothers were track stars at the nearby high school. But I could run long distances without tiring. I would at least be able to keep him in my sight and know he was alive.
After several blocks of running directly into oncoming traffic, Kyle slowed his pace.
He took a sharp left. Standing next to a trash bin, Kyle bent over with his hands on his knees. I must have looked ridiculous. But his was not a look of fear. I saw his body relax. He did not attempt to run again. Kyle stood still and watched me approach. I had no idea what I was going to say or do, but I kept walking closer.
He opened his mouth to speak when a police car pulled up, abruptly filling the space between Kyle and me. The school principal and an officer got out. They spoke calmly to Kyle, who willingly climbed into the back of the vehicle. I couldn't hear what was said, but I didn't take my eyes off Kyle's face, even as they drove away.
I couldn't help but feel that I had failed him, that I should have done or said more, that I should have fixed the situation.
I shared my feelings with a speech therapist who was familiar with Kyle's history. "No one ever ran after him before, Rachel," she said. "No one. They just let him go."
Things changed the day he ran and I ran after him, even though I didn't have the right words, even though I wasn't able to save him from the mess he was in. It was the day I didn't throw my hands in the air and decide he was too fast, a waste of time and effort , a lost cause. It was the day my mere presence was enough to make a profound difference. |
3nxnz5rs1axtjrqzjfylxggywa479n | (CNN) -- Woody Allen famously said that 80% of success in life is about just showing up. He's wrong. Success in life -- as in diplomacy -- is about showing up at the right time. So Is John Kerry coming to the Israeli-Hamas crisis too early, too late or just at the right time?
The secretary of state has been eager to get into the middle of this almost since it started. He considered going last weekend from Vienna, Austria, where he had joined five other world powers in negotiations with Iran on the nuclear deal. But he smartly decided -- or was discouraged by the Egyptians who were in the middle of their own cease-fire mediation -- not to go.
Still, the rising number of deaths primarily on the Palestinian side and the real danger of escalation of a ground incursion left him little choice. Regardless of the outcome, after Syria and Iraq, both President Barack Obama and Kerry realized that the United States couldn't sit on the sidelines like a potted plant.
Kerry arrives in Israel
Moreover, Kerry's hot mic comments showing his irritation at Israel's supposed "pinpoint" airstrikes in Gaza revealed a good deal more frustration than simply a desire to collect more frequent flier miles. Kerry is an activist and simply couldn't abide the fact that people were dying and the United States wasn't at least trying to stop it.
But desire and passion won't produce a deal. Kerry proved that in his nine-month effort to negotiate an agreed framework for peace between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. |
3dh6gaktyypr424damiknh2of75zyp | Private schools, also known as independent schools, non-governmental, or nonstate schools, are not administered by local, state or national governments; thus, they retain the right to select their students and are funded in whole or in part by charging their students tuition, rather than relying on mandatory taxation through public (government) funding; at some private schools students may be able to get a scholarship, which makes the cost cheaper, depending on a talent the student may have (e.g. sport scholarship, art scholarship, academic scholarship), financial need, or tax credit scholarships that might be available.
In the United Kingdom and several other Commonwealth countries including Australia and Canada, the use of the term is generally restricted to primary and secondary educational levels; it is almost never used of universities and other tertiary institutions. Private education in North America covers the whole gamut of educational activity, ranging from pre-school to tertiary level institutions. Annual tuition fees at K-12 schools range from nothing at so called 'tuition-free' schools to more than $45,000 at several New England preparatory schools. |
3r9wasfe2zgl4bni5wqwywv8919fzc | Alexandria, Virginia (CNN) -- A former Marine Corps reservist pleaded guilty Thursday to shooting at the Pentagon and other military-related buildings and to trying to desecrate graves at Arlington National Cemetery containing the remains of veterans who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Yonathan Melaku entered a guilty plea to three counts: damaging U.S. property with a firearm, using a firearm in a crime of violence and attempting injury to veterans' memorials on U.S. property.
Melaku, a 23-year-old naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Ethiopia, was arrested June 17 at the cemetery. He had a backpack with four plastic bags each containing 5 pounds of ammonium nitrate, material commonly used in homemade explosives. He also had numerous 9 mm spent shell casings; black paint and a notebook with Arabic statements mentioning al Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, the Taliban and the "Path to Jihad."
In the statement of facts document signed by Melaku, he admitted he "intended to desecrate and injure grave markers by spray-painting the markers with Arabic statements and by leaving the ammonium nitrate he was carrying at the sites of these grave markers."
Melaku did not have all the components needed to make a bomb. In a search of his home, investigators found a typed list that included various components including batteries, wire and a "digital kitchen countdown timer." But he had not obtained all of those items.
Melaku admitted to five shootings with a legally owned handgun at military buildings in Northern Virginia between October 17 and November 2 of 2010. He said he attacked the Pentagon, Marine and Coast Guard recruiting offices and he twice fired at the National Museum of the Marine Corps. |
3o6cyiuled16tyf3py1ols2t1dhuwe | (CNN) -- Lionel Messi celebrated his second successive world player of the year award with a hat-trick as Spanish champions Barcelona crushed division two team Real Betis 5-0 in the first leg of their Copa del Rey quarterfinal on Wednesday night.
The Argentina forward, who headed off clubmates Andres Iniesta and Xavi to win the FIFA Ballon d'Or on Monday, proved the difference after the visitors provided stern early resistance.
The 23-year-old finally broke the deadlock a minute before halftime with a delightful chip, and the tie was effectively over ahead of next week's second leg when he completed his treble with 17 minutes to play.
Betis deserved better for their first-half efforts, highlighted by Ruben Castro crashing a shot against the crossbar soon after Messi's opener.
Why were EPL players snubbed in all-star selection?
But in the end they had goalkeeper Casto to thank that the scoreline was not even greater as he bravely thwarted a succession of Barca attacks.
As it was, Pedro made it 4-0 on 76 with his 13th goal in 14 games after Casto blocked Daniel Alves' initial effort, and Seydou Keita headed the fifth with seven minutes to play as he rose high to meet Iniesta's outrageous scooped cross.
Midfielder Iniesta also had an assist with Messi's first, while the second came in the 62nd minute following a pass from David Villa as the diminutive hero of the Catalan crowd squeezed home from an acute angle after Casto beat out his first attempt.
Messi took his tally to 31 for the season when he won a one-on-one duel with the keeper, but Casto denied him a fourth from a similar situation before he was substituted. |
3e1qt0tdfp9qu6olxew4o9bwqqg8ip | A census-designated place (CDP) is a concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counterparts of incorporated places, such as self-governing cities, towns, and villages, for the purposes of gathering and correlating statistical data. CDPs are populated areas that generally include one officially designated but currently unincorporated small community, for which the CDP is named, plus surrounding inhabited countryside of varying dimensions and, occasionally, other, smaller unincorporated communities as well. CDPs include small rural communities, colonias located along the U.S. border with Mexico, and unincorporated resort and retirement communities and their environs.
The boundaries of a CDP have no legal status. Thus, they may not always correspond with the local understanding of the area or community with the same name. However, criteria established for the 2010 Census require that a CDP name "be one that is recognized and used in daily communication by the residents of the community" (not "a name developed solely for planning or other purposes") and recommend that a CDP's boundaries be mapped based on the geographic extent associated with inhabitants' regular use of the named place.
The Census Bureau states that census-designated places are not considered incorporated places and that it includes only census-designated places in its city population list for Hawaii because that state has no incorporated cities. In addition, census city lists from 2007 include Arlington County, Virginia's CDP in the list with the incorporated places. |
3eo896nrawv5n10fiuszr6mjh9ltjo | Annabelle Smith and her two best friends, Samantha and Kristy, loved going to Sand City School. Mrs. Lemming, their teacher, would read them a story. That Monday afternoon, Mrs. Lemming read them a story called Super Sophie Saves the Day. After school, Annabelle, Samantha and Kristy walked home together. "I decide that from now on I'm going to be a superhero like Sophie," Annabelle told her friends. "You mean heroine," Kristy said. "You're a girl, Annabelle." The next day Kristy and Samantha picked Annabelle up on their way to school. Annabelle had a red towel taped to her blue shirt. "I am Super Annabelle," Annabelle said. "I'll save someone on the way to school." Charlotte, another second-grader, walked past the girls. Her sweater was tied around her waist. She ran a little faster, and her sweater was nearly on the ground. Annabelle wondered what she would do. Giving her a dirty look, Charlotte ran away. Annabelle walked into her father's study when she got home. She had a homework question for him. A note on her father's desk said he was lending some books to Charlotte's father. She noticed a magazine on his desk that said Go Green. "Homework can wait," Annabelle thought. "Maybe Charlotte goes green!" In the woods, Annabelle saw a man cutting down a tree. Trees were good for the environment. She prevented him from cutting down the tree, and then she fell on the hard ground. Annabelle walked farther in the woods, where she found Charlotte picking up litter. Annabelle said, "You are the second-grade's hero, Charlotte." Charlotte stared at Annabelle. "I'm picking up litter to make the earth a better place," she said. "I don't care about being famous." Annabelle felt slightly ashamed of herself. |
3m68nm076h7gjr8gumtfingw7p26ru | CHAPTER XI. THE MARPLOT
Mr. Wilding's appearance produced as many different emotions as there were individuals present. He made the company a sweeping bow on his admission by Albemarle's orders, a bow which was returned by a stare from one and all. Diana eyed him in amazement, Ruth in hope; Richard averted his glance from that of his brother-in-law, whilst Sir Rowland met it with a scowl of enmity--they had not come face to face since the occasion of that encounter in which Sir Rowland's self-love had been so rudely handled. Albemarle's face expressed a sort of satisfaction, which was reflected on the countenances of Phelips and Luttrell; whilst Trenchard never thought of attempting to dissemble his profound dismay. And this dismay was shared, though not in so deep a measure, by Wilding himself. Trenchard's presence gave him pause; for he had been far, indeed, from dreaming that his friend had a hand in this affair. At sight of him all was made clear to Mr. Wilding. At once he saw the role which Trenchard had assumed on this occasion, saw to the bottom of the motives that had inspired him to take the bull by the horns and level against Richard and Blake this accusation before they had leisure to level it against himself.
His quick wits having fathomed Trenchard's motive, Mr. Wilding was deeply touched by this proof of friendship, and for a second, as deeply nonplussed, at loss now how to discharge the task on which he came. |
3vnl7uk1xfjpizejz41ec8uro5mtf9 | Syria's prime minister defected Monday, becoming the latest among high-profile politicians and leaders to leave the embattled regime of Bashar al-Assad.
"I announce today my defection from the killing and terrorist regime and I announce that I have joined the ranks of the freedom and dignity revolution. I announce that I am from today a soldier in this blessed revolution," Riyad Hijab said in a written statement read by a Syrian opposition official on Al Jazeera.
CNN Inside Syria
Analysts described Hijab's departure as a significant symbolic blow for al-Assad's government but noted that the former prime minister had been on the job for only a few months.
Al-Assad appointed Hijab prime minister in June, a month after parliamentary elections that were boycotted by supporters of those seeking to oust al-Assad.
"In short, this isn't going to bring a lot of insight into what Assad is thinking or doing. It is certainly embarrassing and does some damage to regime," said David Hartwell, a senior analyst of Islamic Affairs at Jane's. "But all indications are that Hijab was probably kept in the dark. This wasn't a man who had Assad's ear. Assad appointed him just a few months ago. He was essentially just another Cabinet member without much power at all."
Hijab was tasked with creating a new Cabinet for al-Assad's regime.
Opposition leaders said Hijab had defected, while Syrian state television said al-Assad dismissed Hijab from his post Monday.
Syrian Information Minister Omran al-Zoubi said officials hadn't "heard anything from the former prime minister," according to the state-run Syrian Arab News Agency |
3483fv8beejzf7rvfweehf8ovqt628 | Diane Arbus is known for creating intense black and white photographs of very unusual people. She used a special camera that produced square shaped images. One art expert said Diane Arbus turned photography inside out. Instead of looking at her subjects, she made them look at her.
Diane Arbus was born in 1923 to a wealthy family in New York City. After finishing high school at the age of 18, Diane married Allan Arbus. Mr. Arbus worked in the advertising department of her father's store.
It was Mr. Arbus who gave Diane her first camera. Diane soon decided to take a class with the famous photographer Berenice Abbott. The Arbuses eventually started taking photographs of clothing. These images were used as advertisements for Diane's father's store. After the birth of their daughter, Doon, the Arbuses started a business together. Their purpose was to photograph clothing fashions. Diane Arbus was the stylist. She would prepare the hair and faces of the fashion models who wore the clothing being photographed. Allan Arbus took the pictures.
The couple soon had jobs from important fashion magazines such as "Vogue" and "Harper's Bazaar". Their work was very successful during the 1950s. They became part of a group of artists that were helping to redefine visual culture. They were breaking with past traditions to create a new look for a new decade, the sixties.
But Diane was not satisfied with her secondary role. She wanted a more active part in making photographs. She wanted to explore her own artistic expression and freedom. To do this, she stopped working with her husband. Then she started taking photography classes at the New School in New York City.
Arbus' teacher, Lisette Model, influenced her in many ways. She showed Diane how to use a camera like an expert. She also taught Diane to use her art to face her doubts and fears. Miss Model once said that Diane soon started "not listening to me but suddenly listening to herself." |
3m0nz3jdp1yt2eutzkdnck4vkevz5r | Even kids know that we should wait for the traffic light to turn green before crossing a road, but not everybody follows this basic rule. "Chinese style road crossing" has become a hot expression recently. Chinese people "cross roads without thinking about traffic lights, so long as they are part of a crowd", said a post on Sina Weibo. A CCTV news program showed that in only an hour, more than 600 people ran red lights when crossing a road in Shijiazhuang, Hebei. Many people say that they jaywalk because the red light lasts too long. Such an opinion is supported by a research team at Tongji University. The team did research on people's waiting times at different road crossings from 2008 to 2010. They found that Chinese people would wait for 70 to 90 seconds before they lost their patience. "People are likely to run the red light when the waiting time is longer than they can bear ,"said Ni Ying, a member of the research team. However, a survey on Sina Weibo shows that nearly half of respondents believe that people jaywalk mainly because they disregard rules. "I always obey traffic rules. Time is important but safety should come first,"wrote "Qixiaoe"on Weibo. Many countries give out punishments to jaywalkers. In Singapore, the maximum can be three months in prison. Some Chinese cities have started taking some actions, too. For example, the first three people in a jaywalking group will be fined 50 yuan in Shijiazhuang. But calling on people to respect rules is more important. "To completely solve the problem, everyone should realize the importance of obeying the traffic rules,"Wang Jianping, a professor at Sichuan University, said to Huaxi Metropolis Daily. |
3lrliptpeq9vjp7ouf1uxgw474nakv | Chapter XL
A Book of Revelation
The Irvings came back to Echo Lodge for the summer, and Anne spent a happy three weeks there in July. Miss Lavendar had not changed; Charlotta the Fourth was a very grown-up young lady now, but still adored Anne sincerely.
"When all's said and done, Miss Shirley, ma'am, I haven't seen any one in Boston that's equal to you," she said frankly.
Paul was almost grown up, too. He was sixteen, his chestnut curls had given place to close-cropped brown locks, and he was more interested in football than fairies. But the bond between him and his old teacher still held. Kindred spirits alone do not change with changing years.
It was a wet, bleak, cruel evening in July when Anne came back to Green Gables. One of the fierce summer storms which sometimes sweep over the gulf was ravaging the sea. As Anne came in the first raindrops dashed against the panes.
"Was that Paul who brought you home?" asked Marilla. "Why didn't you make him stay all night. It's going to be a wild evening."
"He'll reach Echo Lodge before the rain gets very heavy, I think. Anyway, he wanted to go back tonight. Well, I've had a splendid visit, but I'm glad to see you dear folks again. 'East, west, hame's best.' Davy, have you been growing again lately?"
"I've growed a whole inch since you left," said Davy proudly. "I'm as tall as Milty Boulter now. Ain't I glad. He'll have to stop crowing about being bigger. Say, Anne, did you know that Gilbert Blythe is dying?" Anne stood quite silent and motionless, looking at Davy. Her face had gone so white that Marilla thought she was going to faint. |
33ppo7fecvf2b1kcem7ka1px1ggdi1 | CHAPTER LII.
SHOWING HOW THINGS WENT ON AT NONINGSBY.
Yes, Lady Staveley had known it before. She had given a fairly correct guess at the state of her daughter's affections, though she had not perhaps acknowledged to herself the intensity of her daughter's feelings. But the fact might not have mattered if it had never been told. Madeline might have overcome this love for Mr. Graham, and all might have been well if she had never mentioned it. But now the mischief was done. She had acknowledged to her mother,--and, which was perhaps worse, she had acknowledged to herself,--that her heart was gone, and Lady Staveley saw no cure for the evil. Had this happened but a few hours earlier she would have spoken with much less of encouragement to Peregrine Orme.
And Felix Graham was not only in the house, but was to remain there for yet a while longer, spending a very considerable portion of his time in the drawing-room. He was to come down on this very day at three o'clock, after an early dinner, and on the next day he was to be promoted to the dining-room. As a son-in-law he was quite ineligible. He had, as Lady Staveley understood, no private fortune, and he belonged to a profession which he would not follow in the only way by which it was possible to earn an income by it. Such being the case, her daughter, whom of all girls she knew to be the most retiring, the least likely to speak of such feelings unless driven to it by great stress,--her daughter had positively declared to her that she was in love with this man! Could anything be more hopeless? Could any position be more trying? |
3rsdurm96amtt7dhez472716r6ieyu | To many Westerners, Manga is synonymous with fantasy -- its glossy lines, popping color palettes and fanciful scenarios are an escapist's delight.
But one of the most celebrated makers of the wildly popular Japanese graphic novels says he draws on reality as much as possible.
Takehiko Inoue was just 23 when his second Manga propelled him to fame in Japan.
"Slam Dunk," published in 31 volumes of magazine "Weekly Shonen Jump" in the early 1990s, followed the fortunes of a loveless delinquent who joins a basketball team to impress a girl, and then discovers a natural ability for the game.
Inoue's interest in Manga was piqued when, at nine years old, he read a popular baseball Manga called "Dokaben." It had "attractive characters," he recalls, "and how they play baseball and how their bodies were drawn -- all these things looked so cool."
A keen basketball player at high school, Inoue says drawing a basketball Manga was a natural way for him to combine his two loves, and he believes "Slam Dunk" readers could see the obvious enjoyment he took from drawing basketball.
"I really drew it in the way I liked, did whatever I wanted," he says.
"Slam Dunk" has now sold almost 120 million copies, been licensed in 17 countries, and adapted into an anime TV series. An English version was released in North America in 2002.
Its popularity endures: According to a 2012 survey by research group goo, it is still the second most popular Japanese Manga, and is responsible for the single most memorable piece of dialogue -- when a coach says, "If you give up, the game is already over!" |
3velcll3gkjo9f2axlh462bwwh31f6 | Steam engines are external combustion engines, where the working fluid is separate from the combustion products. Non-combustion heat sources such as solar power, nuclear power or geothermal energy may be used. The ideal thermodynamic cycle used to analyze this process is called the Rankine cycle. In the cycle, water is heated and transforms into steam within a boiler operating at a high pressure. When expanded through pistons or turbines, mechanical work is done. The reduced-pressure steam is then condensed and pumped back into the boiler.
The first commercially successful true engine, in that it could generate power and transmit it to a machine, was the atmospheric engine, invented by Thomas Newcomen around 1712. It was an improvement over Savery's steam pump, using a piston as proposed by Papin. Newcomen's engine was relatively inefficient, and in most cases was used for pumping water. It worked by creating a partial vacuum by condensing steam under a piston within a cylinder. It was employed for draining mine workings at depths hitherto impossible, and also for providing a reusable water supply for driving waterwheels at factories sited away from a suitable "head". Water that had passed over the wheel was pumped back up into a storage reservoir above the wheel. |
374tnbha8bviqa3mnqz7woqkaf3yqz | Michigan () is a state in the Great Lakes and Midwestern regions of the United States.
The state's name, Michigan, is of French origins (form of the Ojibwe word) "mishigamaa", meaning "large water" or "large lake". Michigan is the tenth most populous of the 50 United States, with the 11th most extensive total area, and the largest state by total area east of the Mississippi River.
Michigan's capital is Lansing, and its largest city is Detroit.
Michigan is the only state to consist of two peninsulas. The Lower Peninsula, to which the name Michigan was originally applied, is often noted to be shaped like a mitten. The Upper Peninsula (often referred to as "the U.P.") is separated from the Lower Peninsula by the Straits of Mackinac, a channel that joins Lake Huron to Lake Michigan. The two peninsulas are connected by the Mackinac Bridge. The state has the longest freshwater coastline of any political subdivision in the world, being bounded by four of the five Great Lakes, plus Lake Saint Clair. As a result, it is one of the leading U.S. states for recreational boating.
Michigan also has 64,980 inland lakes and ponds. A person in the state is never more than from a natural water source or more than from a Great Lakes shoreline. |
3hmigg0u4l6ck63q1wi7ax5kgar8ya | In 1638, John Harvard donated some money and about four hundred books to a new university. This was the beginning of the library at Harvard University. The gift was so important that the university was named for John Harvard. Thomas Bray began the first free lending library in the late 1600s. He set up more than 30 or these libraries in the American colonies. However, the idea for this kind of free library ended when Bray died in 1730. In 1731, Benjamin Franklin and some friends started the first subscription library in the United States. In a subscription library people pay money to become members, but they may _ the books without paying again. In the United States, every child had a free education. This idea soon led to free libraries. One of the first libraries that used tax money to buy books was a library in Peterborough, New Hampshire. This library was set up in 1833. |
3r8yzbnq9hizbq7l0h97jb6n6hs7q7 | CHAPTER XXII
THE REFUGEE'S RETURN
Sabatini's attitude of indolence lasted only until they had turned from the waterway into the main river. Then he sat up and pointed a little way down the stream.
"Can you cross over somewhere there?" he asked.
Arnold nodded and punted across towards the opposite bank.
"Get in among the rushes," Sabatini directed. "Now listen to me."
Arnold came and sat down.
"You don't mean to tire me," he remarked.
Sabatini smiled.
"Do you seriously think that I asked you to bring me on the river for the pleasure of watching your prowess with that pole, my friend?" he asked. "Not at all. I am going to ask you to do me a service."
Arnold was suddenly conscious that Sabatini, for the first time since he had known him, was in earnest. The lines of his marble-white face seemed to have grown tenser and firmer, his manner was the manner of a man who meets a crisis.
"Turn your head and look inland," he said. "You follow the lane there?"
Arnold nodded.
"Quite well," he admitted.
"At the corner," Sabatini continued, "just out of sight behind that tall hedge, is my motor car. I want you to land and make your way there. My chauffeur has his instructions. He will take you to a village some eight miles up the river, a village called Heslop Wood. There is a boat-builder's yard at the end of the main street. You will hire a boat and row up the river. About three hundred yards up, on the left hand side, is an old, dismantled-looking house-boat. I want you to board it and search it thoroughly." |
3ngi5arftt500sr4bod9iwp0ymp1p6 | On 29 November 1947, the United Nations General Assembly recommended the adoption and implementation of the Partition Plan for Mandatory Palestine. This UN plan specified borders for new Arab and Jewish states and also specified an area of Jerusalem and its environs which was to be administered by the UN under an international regime. The end of the British Mandate for Palestine was set for midnight on 14 May 1948. That day, David Ben-Gurion, the executive head of the Zionist Organization and president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared "the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel," which would start to function from the termination of the mandate. The borders of the new state were not specified in the declaration. Neighboring Arab armies invaded the former Palestinian mandate on the next day and fought the Israeli forces. Israel has since fought several wars with neighboring Arab states, in the course of which it has occupied the West Bank, Sinai Peninsula (1956–57, 1967–82), part of Southern Lebanon (1982–2000), Gaza Strip (1967–2005; still considered occupied after 2005 disengagement) and the Golan Heights. It extended its laws to the Golan Heights and East Jerusalem, but not the West Bank. Efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have not resulted in peace. However, peace treaties between Israel and both Egypt and Jordan have successfully been signed. Israel's occupation of Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem is the world's longest military occupation in modern times.[note 2] |
3hl8hngx4516yk551ywxl8tfu0hf9x | The 1912 Summer Olympics (Swedish: "Olympiska sommarspelen 1912"), officially known as the Games of the V Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event held in Stockholm, Sweden, between 5 May and 22 July 1912. Twenty-eight nations and 2,408 competitors, including 48 women, competed in 102 events in 14 sports. With the exception of tennis (starting on 5 May) and football and shooting (both starting on 29 June), the games were held within a month with an official opening on 6 July. It was the last Olympics to issue solid gold medals and, with Japan's debut, the first time an Asian nation participated. Stockholm was the only bid for the games, and was selected in 1909.
The games were the first to have art competitions, women's diving, women's swimming, and the first to feature both the decathlon and the new pentathlon, both won by Jim Thorpe. Electric timing was introduced in athletics, while the host country disallowed boxing. Figure skating was rejected by the organizers because they wanted to promote the Nordic Games. United States won the most gold medals (25), while Sweden won the most medals overall (65).
Following the 1908 Summer Olympics in London, the authorities in Sweden immediately sought to ensure that the next games would be held there. There were two Swedish members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at the time, Viktor Balck and Clarence von Rosen. The pair proposed to the Swedish governing bodies of athletics and gymnastics in order to ensure that they backed any potential bid. Support was given by the national associations on 18 April 1909 for a bid to host the Olympics in Stockholm on the basis that suitable financial arrangements could be made. King Gustaf V was petitioned on 6 May 1909 following the publication of preliminary plans for the Stockholm bid that the expected cost of hosting the Games would be 415,000 kronor (£23,050 or $115,250). The Government accepted the petition on behalf of the King and supported the bid. |
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