Part 5

1. Lonely mood.--2. His heart was beginning to sink.--3. Low despair.--4. Silken clew.--5. Ceiling dome.--6. Bruce could not _divine_.--7. Strong endeavor.--8. Slipping sprawl.--9. Bruce _braced his mind_.--10. Con over this strain.

XXIII.--THE FARMER AND THE FOX.

J. A. FROUDE.

A Farmer, whose poultry-yard had suffered severely from the foxes, succeeded at last in catching one in a trap.

“Ah, you rascal!” said he, as he saw him struggling, “I’ll teach you to steal my fat geese. You shall hang on the tree yonder, and your brothers shall see what comes of thieving.”

The Farmer was twisting a halter to do what he had threatened, when the Fox, whose tongue had helped him in hard pinches before, thought there could be no harm in trying if it might not do him one more good turn.

“You will hang me,” he said, “to frighten my brother foxes. On the word of a fox they won’t care a rabbit-skin for it; they’ll come and look at me, but you may depend upon it, they will dine at your expense before they go home again!”

“Then I shall hang you for yourself, as a rogue and a rascal,” said the Farmer.

“I am only what Nature, or whatever you call the thing, chose to make me,” the Fox answered; “I didn’t make myself.”

“You stole my geese,” said the man.

“Why did Nature make me like geese, then?” said the Fox. “Live and let live; give me my share and I won’t touch yours; but you keep them all to yourself.”

“I don’t understand your fine talk,” answered the Farmer; “but I know that you are a thief, and that you deserve to be hanged.”

His head is too thick to let me catch him so, thought the Fox; I wonder if his heart is any softer. “You are taking away the life of a fellow-creature,” he said; “that’s a responsibility,--it is a curious thing that life, and who knows what comes after it? You say I am a rogue; I say I am not; but at any rate I ought not to be hanged, for if I am not, I don’t deserve it; and if I am, you should give me time to repent.” I have him now, thought the Fox; let him get out if he can.

“Why, what would you have me do with you?” said the man.

“My notion is, that you should let me go, and give me a lamb, or a goose or two, every month, and then I could live without stealing; but perhaps you know better than I, and I am a rogue; my education may have been neglected; you should shut me up, and take care of me, and teach me. Who knows but in the end I may turn into a dog?”

“Very pretty,” said the Farmer; “we have dogs enough, and more, too, than we can take care of, without you. No, no, Master Fox; I have caught you, and you shall swing, whatever is the logic of it. There will be one rogue less in the world, any how.”

“It is mere hate and unchristian vengeance,” said the Fox.

“No, friend,” the Farmer answered, “I don’t hate you, and I don’t want to revenge myself on you; but you and I can’t get on together, and I think I am of more importance than you. If nettles and thistles grow in my cabbage-garden, I don’t try and persuade them to grow into cabbages. I just dig them up. I don’t hate them; but I feel somehow that they mustn’t hinder me with my cabbage, and that I must put them away; and so, my poor friend, I am sorry for you, but I am afraid you must swing.”

XXIV.--A CANADIAN BOAT SONG.

THOMAS MOORE.

[Written on the river Ottawa in the summer of 1804.]

Faintly as tolls the evening chime, Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time; Soon as the woods on the shore look dim, We’ll sing at St. Anne’s our parting hymn. Row, brothers, row, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near, and the daylight’s past.

Why should we yet our sail unfurl? There is not a breath the blue wave to curl; But when the wind blows off the shore, O sweetly we’ll rest our weary oar. Blow, breezes, blow, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near, and the daylight’s past.

Utaw’a’s tide! this trembling moon Shall see us float over thy surges soon. Saint of this green isle! hear our prayers; O grant us cool heavens, and favoring airs. Blow, breezes, blow, the stream runs fast, The Rapids are near, and the daylight’s past.

XXV.--THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS.

LONGFELLOW.

It was the schooner Hesperus, That sailed the wintry sea; And the skipper had taken his little daughter, To bear him company.

Blue were her eyes as the fairy flax, Her cheeks like the dawn of day, And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds, That ope in the month of May.

The skipper he stood beside the helm, His pipe was in his mouth, And he watched how the veering flaw did blow The smoke now west, now south.

Then up and spake an old sailor, Had sailed the Spanish Main, “I pray thee put into yonder port. For I fear a hurricane.

“Last night the moon had a golden ring, And to-night no moon we see!” The skipper he blew a whiff from his pipe, And a scornful laugh laughed he.

Colder and louder blew the wind, A gale from the north-east; The snow fell hissing in the brine, And the billows frothed like yeast.

Down came the storm, and smote amain The vessel in its strength; She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed, Then leaped her cable’s length.

“Come hither! come hither! my little daughter, And do not tremble so; For I can weather the roughest gale, That ever wind did blow.”

He wrapped her warm in his seaman’s coat, Against the stinging blast; He cut a rope from a broken spar, And bound her to the mast.

“O father! I hear the church bells ring, O say, what may it be?” “’Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast!”-- And he steered for the open sea.

“O father! I hear the sound of guns, O say what may it be?” “Some ship in distress, that cannot live In such an angry sea!”

“O father! I see a gleaming light, O say, what may it be?” But the father answered never a word,-- A frozen corpse was he.

Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark, With his face turned to the skies, The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow On his fixed and glassy eyes.

Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed That savèd she might be; And she thought of Him who stilled the wave On the Lake of Galilee.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear, Through the whistling sleet and snow, Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept Towards the reef of Norman’s Woe.

And ever the fitful gusts between A sound came from the land; It was the sound of the trampling surf, On the rocks and the hard sea-sand.

The breakers were right beneath her bows,-- She drifted a dreary wreck, And the whooping billow swept the crew Like icicles from her deck.

She struck where the white and fleecy waves Looked soft as carded wool, But the cruel rocks, they gored her side Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice, With the masts went by the board; Like a vessel of glass she stove and sank-- Ho! Ho! the breakers roared!

At daybreak on the bleak sea-beach, A fisherman stood aghast, To see the form of a maiden fair Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast, The salt tears in her eyes; And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed, On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus, In the midnight and the snow; Oh! save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman’s Woe!

_Word Exercise._

yeast (_yēst_) aghast (_a-gast´_) icicles (_ī´sik-kls_) whistling (_hwis´ling_) gored steered skip´per fright´ed wreck frothed Span´ish haw´thorn a-main´ sheeted schoon´er whoop´ing lăn´tern Găl´i-lēe Hĕs´pe-rŭs hŭr´ri-cāne

_Phrase Exercise._

1. _To bear_ him company.--2. _Fairy_ flax.--3. Veering flaw.--4. Spanish Main.--5. The moon had a _golden ring_.--6. _Scornful_ laugh.--7. I can weather the roughest gale.--8. _Stinging_ blast.--9. Rock-bound coast.--10. In distress.--11. _Gleaming_ light.--12. Stiff and stark.--13. Norman’s Woe.--14. Fitful gusts.--15. By the board.--16. Whooping billow.

* * * * *

_The blue skies smile, and flowers bloom on,_ _And rivers still keep flowing,_ _The dear God still his rain and sun_ _On good and ill bestowing._ _His pine trees whisper, “Trust and wait!”_ _His flowers are prophesying_ _That all we dread of change or fate_ _His love is underlying._

--_J. G. Whittier._

XXVI.--HOLLAND.

MARY MAPES DODGE.

Dutch cities seem, at first sight, to be a bewildering jumble of houses, bridges, churches, and ships, sprouting into masts, steeples, and trees. In some cities boats are hitched, like horses, to their owners’ door-posts, and receive their freight from the upper windows.

Mothers scream to their children not to swing on the garden gate for fear they may be drowned. Water roads are more frequent in Holland than common roads and railroads; water fences, in the form of lazy green ditches, enclose pleasure-ground, farm, and garden.

Sometimes fine green hedges are seen; but wooden fences, such as we have, are rarely met with in Holland. As for stone fences, a Hollander would lift his hands with astonishment at the very idea. There is no stone there, excepting those great, masses of rock that have been brought from other lands, to strengthen and protect the coast. All the small stones or pebbles, if there ever were any, seem to be imprisoned in pavements or quite melted away. Boys, with strong, quick arms, may grow from aprons to full beards, without ever finding one to start the water-rings, or set the rabbits flying.

The water-roads are nothing less than canals crossing the country in every direction. These are of all sizes, from the great North Holland Ship Canal, which is the wonder of the world, to those which a boy can leap. Water-omnibuses constantly ply up and down these roads for the conveyance of passengers; and water-drays are used for carrying fuel and merchandise.

Instead of green country lanes, green canals stretch from field to barn, and from barn to garden; and the farms are merely great lakes pumped dry. Some of the busiest streets are water, while many of the country roads are paved with brick. The city boats, with their rounded sterns, gilded bows, and gayly-painted sides, are unlike any others under the sun; a Dutch waggon, with its funny little crooked pole, is a perfect mystery of mysteries.

One thing is clear, you may think that the inhabitants need never be thirsty. But no, Odd-land is true to itself still. With the sea pushing to get in, and the lakes struggling to get out, and the overflowing canals, rivers, and ditches, in many districts there is no water that is fit to swallow. Our poor Hollanders must go dry, or send far inland for that precious fluid, older than Adam, yet young as the morning dew. Sometimes, indeed, the inhabitants can swallow a shower, when they are provided with any means of catching it; but generally they are like the sailors told of in a famous poem, who saw

“Water, water, everywhere, Nor any drop to drink!”

Great flapping windmills all over the country make it look as if flocks of huge sea-birds were just settling upon it. Everywhere one sees the funniest trees, bobbed into all sorts of odd shapes, with their trunks painted a dazzling white, yellow, or red.

Horses are often yoked three abreast. Men, women and children go clattering about in wooden shoes with loose heels.

Husbands and wives lovingly harness themselves side by side on the bank of the canal and drag their produce to market.

XXVII.--EVENING HYMN.

JOHN KEBLE.

Sun of my soul, Thou Saviour dear, It is not night if Thou be near; Oh! may no earth-born cloud arise To hide Thee from Thy servant’s eyes!

When the soft dews of kindly sleep My wearied eyelids gently steep, Be my last thought, how sweet to rest For ever on my Saviour’s breast!

Abide with me from morn till eve, For without Thee I cannot live! Abide with me when night is nigh, For without Thee I dare not die!

If some poor wandering child of Thine Have spurned, to-day, the voice divine,-- Now, Lord, the gracious work begin; Let him no more lie down in sin!

Watch by the sick, enrich the poor With blessings from Thy boundless store! Be every mourner’s sleep to-night Like infant’s slumbers, pure and light!

Come near and bless us when we wake, Ere through the world our way we take: Till, in the ocean of Thy love, We lose ourselves in Heaven above!

XXVIII.--PSALM XXIII.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down In green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness For his name’s sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley Of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me In the presence of mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; My cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me All the days of my life: And I will dwell in the house of the Lord For ever.

XXIX.--THE HEROIC SERF.

In the dark forests of Russia, where the snow lies on the ground for eight months in the year, wolves roam about in countless troops; and it is a fearful thing for the traveller, especially if night overtakes him, to hear their famished howlings as they approach nearer and nearer to him.

A Russian nobleman, with his wife and a young daughter, was travelling in a sleigh over a bleak plain. About nightfall they reached an inn, and the nobleman called for a relay of horses to go on. The innkeeper begged him not to proceed. “There is danger ahead,” said he: “the wolves are out.” The traveller thought the object of the man was to keep him as a guest for the night, and, saying it was too early in the season for wolves, ordered the horses to be put to. In spite of the repeated warnings of the landlord, the party proceeded on their way.

The driver was a serf who had been born on the nobleman’s estate, and who loved his master as he loved his life. The sleigh sped swiftly over the hard snow, and there seemed no signs of danger. The moon began to shed her light, so that the road seemed like polished silver.

Suddenly the little girl said to her father, “What is that strange, dull sound I heard just now?” Her father replied, “Nothing but the wind sighing through the trees.”

The child shut her eyes, and kept still for a while; but in a few minutes, with a face pale with fear, she turned to her father, and said, “Surely that is not the wind: I hear it again; do you not hear it too? Listen!” The nobleman listened, and far, far away in the distance behind him, but distinct enough in the clear, frosty air, he heard a sound of which he knew the meaning, though those who were with him did not.

Whispering to the serf, he said, “They are after us. Get ready your musket and pistols; I will do the same. We may yet escape. Drive on! drive on!”

The man drove wildly on; but nearer, ever nearer, came the mournful howling which the child had first heard. It was perfectly clear to the nobleman that a pack of wolves had got scent, and was in pursuit of them. Meanwhile he tried to calm the anxious fears of his wife and child.

At last the baying of the wolves was distinctly heard, and he said to his servant, “When they come up with us, single you out the leader, and fire. I will single out the next; and, as soon as one falls, the rest will stop to devour him. _That_ will be some delay, at least.”

By this time they could see the pack fast approaching, with their long, measured tread. A large dog-wolf was the leader. The nobleman and the serf singled out two, and these fell. The pack immediately turned on their fallen comrades, and soon tore them to pieces. The taste of blood only made the others advance with more fury, and they were soon again baying at the sleigh. Again the nobleman and his servant fired. Two other wolves fell, and were instantly devoured. But the next post-house was still far distant.

The nobleman then cried to the post-boy, “Let one of the horses loose, that we may gain a little more time.” This was done, and the horse was left on the road. In a few minutes they heard the loud shrieks of the poor animal as the wolves tore him down. The remaining horses were urged to their utmost speed, but again the pack was in full pursuit. Another horse was cut loose, and he soon shared the fate of his fellow.

At length the servant said to his master, “I have served you since I was a child, and I love you as I love my own life. It is clear to me that we can not all reach the post-house alive. I am quite prepared, and I ask you to let me die for you.”

“No, no!” cried the master, “we will live together or die together. You must not, must not!”

But the servant had made up his mind; he was fully resolved. “I shall leave my wife and children to you; you will be a father to them: you have been a father to me. When the wolves next reach us, I will jump down, and do my best to delay their progress.”

The sleigh glides on as fast as the two remaining horses can drag it. The wolves are close on their track, and almost up with them. But what sound now rings out sharp and loud? It is the discharge of the servant’s pistol. At the same instant he leaps from his seat, and falls a prey to the wolves! But meanwhile the post-house is reached, and the family is safe.

On the spot where the wolves had pulled to pieces the devoted servant, there now stands a large wooden cross, erected by the nobleman. It bears this inscription: “_Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends._”

_Phrase Exercise._

1. Heroic serf.--2. Famished howlings.--3. Bleak plain.--4. _A relay_ of horses.--5. _Ordered_ the horses _to be put to_.--6. Repeated warnings.--7. The moon began _to shed_ her light.--8. _Pack_ of wolves.--9. Had got scent of them.--10. To calm the anxious fears.--11. _Baying_ at the sleigh.--12. Instantly devoured.--13. Fully resolved.--14. To delay their progress.

XXX.--THERE’S A GOOD TIME COMING.

CHARLES MACKAY.

There’s a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: We may not live to see the day, But earth shall glisten in the ray Of the good time coming. Cannon-balls may aid the truth, But thought’s a weapon stronger; We’ll win our battle by its aid;-- Wait a little longer.

There’s a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: The pen shall supersede the sword, And Right, not Might, shall be the lord In the good time coming. Worth, not Birth, shall rule mankind, And be acknowledged stronger; The proper impulse has been given;-- Wait a little longer.

There’s a good time coming, boys, A good time coming:-- War in all men’s eyes shall be A monster of iniquity In the good time coming; Nations shall not quarrel then, To prove which is the stronger; Nor slaughter men for glory’s sake;-- Wait a little longer.

There’s a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: Hateful rivalries of creed Shall not make their martyrs bleed In the good time coming. Religion shall be shorn of pride, And flourish all the stronger; And Charity shall trim her lamp;-- Wait a little longer.

There’s a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: Let us aid it all we can, Every woman, every man, The good time coming. Smallest helps, if rightly given, Make the impulse stronger; ’Twill be strong enough one day;-- Wait a little longer.

XXXI.--JOHN BROWN; OR, A PLAIN MAN’S PHILOSOPHY.

CHARLES MACKAY.

I’ve a guinea I can spend, I’ve a wife and a friend, And a troop of little children at my knee, John Brown; I’ve a cottage of my own, With the ivy overgrown, And a garden with a view of the sea, John Brown; I can sit at my door, By my shady sycamore, Large of heart, though of very small estate, John Brown; So of water drain a glass, In my arbor as you pass, And I’ll tell you what I love, and what I hate, John Brown.

I love the song of birds, And the children’s early words, And a loving woman’s voice, low and sweet, John Brown; And I hate a false pretence, And the want of common sense, And arrogance, and fawning, and deceit, John Brown. I love the meadow flowers, And the briar in the bowers, And I love an open face without guile, John Brown; And I hate a selfish knave, And a proud, contented slave, And a lout who’d rather borrow than he’d toil, John Brown.

I love a simple song, That awakes emotions strong, And the word of hope which raises him who faints, John Brown; And I hate the constant whine Of the foolish who repine, And turn their good to evil by complaints, John Brown; But ever when I hate,-- If I seek my garden gate, And survey the world around me and above, John Brown,-- The hatred flies my mind, And I sigh for human kind, And excuse the faults of those I cannot love, John Brown.

So if you like my ways, And the comfort of my days, I can tell you how I live so unvexed, John Brown; I never scorn my health, Nor sell my soul for wealth, Nor destroy one day the pleasure of the next, John Brown; I’ve parted with my pride, And I take the sunny side, For I’ve found it worse than folly to be sad, John Brown; I keep a conscience clear, I’ve a hundred pounds a year, And I manage to exist and to be glad, John Brown.

_Phrase Exercise._

1. Large of heart.--2. Small estate.--3. _Drain_ a glass.--4. Children’s _early words_.--5. False pretence.--6. Common sense.--7.--Open face without guile.--8. Selfish knave.--9. Contented slave.--10. Simple song.--11. Awakes emotions strong.--12. Constant whine.--13. _Survey_ the world.--14. Excuse the faults.--15. _Scorn_ my health.--16. Sell my soul for wealth.--17. Sunny side.--18. Conscience _clear_.--19. Manage to exist.

XXXII.--THE OTTER.

The otter resembles land animals in shape, hair, and general conformation, and the aquatic tribes in its manner of living and in its webbed toes, which assist it in swimming. It swims even faster than it runs, and can overtake fishes in their own element.

It is found in all parts of the world,--on tropical islands, in America, and on the bleak coasts of Alaska and Siberia. It is one of the great weasel family, as active and cunning in the water, as its land relations are in the field, or in the farm-yard.

The fish-otter--which is found around lakes and rivers in Canada, in the United States, in South America, and in wild parts of Europe--is a famous fisher. Its home is in the water, but it can travel over the land with wonderful swiftness, although its paws are webbed.