You must not, you cannot cross Old Court House Street without looking carefully to see that you stand no chance of being run over. This is beautiful.... It means business, it means money-making, it means crowded and hurrying life... -from "City of the Dreadful Night" Though he achieved lasting fame with his children's tale The Jungle Book, Rudyard Kipling left us with a vast array of writing that has fallen into sad-and unwarranted-obscurity. This collection of short stories reminds us of the bitter slyness of his wit and his sometimes furious and keen powers of observation. First published in 1890, this volume includes: . "The Courting of Dinah Shadd," which recalls the tragedies of Thomas Hardy . the war story "A Conference of the Powers" . the slyly humorous "Among the Railway Folk" and "In an Opium Factory" . "City of the Dreadful Night," a traveler's account of Calcutta An excellent reintroduction to one of the finest writers in the English language, this will delight fans of 19th-century popular literature. British author and poet RUDYARD KIPLING (1865-1936) was born in colonial India, a locale that inspired his best-known works, The Jungle Book (1894), Kim (1901), and Gunga Din (1892). He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1907.