Every sailorman grumbles about the sea, said the night-watchman, thoughtfully. It's human nature to grumble, and I s'pose they keep on grumbling and sticking to it because there ain't much else they can do. There's not many shore-going berths that a sailorman is fit for, and those that they are-such as a night-watchman's, for instance-wants such a good character that there's few as are to equal it. Sometimes they get things to do ashore. I knew one man that took up butchering, and 'e did very well at it till the police took him up.

***Traditional Character Edition***

Mr. and Mrs. Zhang live with their grown son Guisheng who works at a factory. One day an old friend of Mr. Zhang comes to visit the family after having spent years traveling in the mysterious hills of China's Yunnan Province. He tells the Zhang family of a monkey's paw that has magical powers to grant three wishes to the holder. Against his better judgment, he reluctantly gives the monkey paw to the Zhang family, along with a warning that the wishes come with a great price for trying to change ones fate...

Deep Waters, the Entire Collection by W. W. Jacobs Included in this collection are "Paying Off," "Made to Measure," "Sam's Ghost," "Bedridden," "The Convert," "Husbandry," "Family Cares," "The Winter Offensive," "The Substitute," "Striking Hard," and "Dirty Work." William Wymark Jacobs was an English author of short stories and novels. Quite popular in his lifetime primarily for his amusing maritime tales of life along the London docks (many of them humorous as well as sardonic in tone). Today he is best known for a few short works of horror fiction. One being "The Monkey's Paw"(published...

Since Mr. Jacobs has already published fifteen volumes of stories of seafaring men, it is scarcely necessary to review at length his last book. This is, therefore, not a criticism, but an appreciation, for those who have once loved Mr. Jacobs's humour can never cease to love it, and must needs hold out to others the pleasure that is theirs. His is the humour, not of the unexpected, but of the obvious, at the opposite pole to Mr. Chesterton's fantasies, the humour of the man who sits down on his hat, the humour, if we may be allowed the expression, of the man who cannot see a joke. Here, in...