Canada has, indeed, a noble parentage, the remembrance of which its inhabitants may well cherish with respect, affection, and pride.

Egerton Ryerson: "The Loyalists of America and their Times." (Adapted)



OFT, IN THE STILLY NIGHT

Oft, in the stilly night, Ere slumber's chain has bound me, Fond Memory brings the light Of other days around me; The smiles, the tears, Of boyhood's years, The words of love then spoken; The eyes that shone, Now dimmed and gone, The cheerful hearts now broken! Thus, in the stilly night, Ere slumber's chain has bound me, Sad Memory brings the light Of other days around me.

When I remember all The friends, so linked together, I've seen around me fall, Like leaves in wintry weather; I feel like one, Who treads alone Some banquet-hall deserted, Whose lights are fled, Whose garlands dead, And all but he departed! Thus, in the stilly night, Ere slumber's chain has bound me, Sad Memory brings the light Of other days around me.

Moore



THE HARP THAT ONCE THROUGH TARA'S HALLS

The harp that once through Tara's halls The soul of music shed, Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls As if that soul were fled. So sleeps the pride of former days, So glory's thrill is o'er, And hearts that once beat high for praise, Now feel that pulse no more.

No more to chiefs and ladies bright The harp of Tara swells; The chord alone, that breaks at night, Its tale of ruin tells. Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes, The only throb she gives, Is when some heart indignant breaks, To show that still she lives.

Moore



HUDSON STRAIT

Hudson Strait opens from the Atlantic between Resolution Island on the north and the Button Islands on the south. From point to point, this end of the strait is forty-five miles wide. At the other end, the west side, between Digges' Island and Nottingham Island, is a distance of thirty-five miles. From east to west, the straits are four hundred and fifty miles long—wider at the east where the south side is known as Ungava Bay, contracting at the west, to the Upper Narrows. The south side of the strait is Labrador; the north, Baffin's Land. Both sides are lofty, rocky, cavernous shores lashed by a tide that rises in places as high as thirty-five feet and runs in calm weather ten miles an hour. Pink granite islands dot the north shore in groups that afford harbourage, but all shores present an adamant front, edges sharp as a knife or else rounded hard to have withstood and cut the tremendous ice jam of a floating world suddenly contracted to forty miles, which Davis Strait pours down at the east end and Fox Channel at the west.

Seven hundred feet is considered a good-sized hill; one thousand feet, a mountain. Both the north and the south sides of the straits rise two thousand feet in places. Through these rock walls ice has poured and torn and ripped a way since the ice age preceding history, cutting a great channel to the Atlantic. Here, the iron walls suddenly break to secluded silent valleys, moss-padded, snow-edged, lonely as the day Earth first saw light. Down these valleys pour the clear streams of the eternal snows, burnished as silver against the green, setting the silence echoing with the tinkle of cataracts over some rock wall, or filling the air with the voice of many waters at noontide thaw. One old navigator—Coates—describes the beat of the angry tide at the rock base and the silver voice of the mountain brooks, like the treble and bass of some great cathedral organ sounding its diapason to the glory of God in this peopleless wilderness.

Perhaps the kyacks of some solitary Eskimo, lashed abreast twos and threes to prevent capsizing, may shoot out from some of these bog-covered valleys like sea-birds; but it is only when the Eskimos happen to be hunting here, or the ships of the whalers and fur traders are passing up and down—that there is any sign of human habitation on the straits.

Walrus wallow on the pink granite islands in huge herds. Polar bears flounder from icepan to icepan. The arctic hare, white as snow but for the great bulging black eye, bounds over the boulders. Snow buntings, whistling swans, snow geese, ducks in myriads—flacker and clacker and hold solemn conclave on the adjoining rocks, as though this were their realm from the beginning and for all time.

Of a tremendous depth are the waters of the straits. Not for nothing has the ice world been grinding through this narrow channel for billions of years. No fear of shoals to the mariner. Fear is of another sort. When the ice is running in a whirlpool and the incoming tide meets the ice jam and the waters mount thirty-five feet high and a wind roars between the high shores like a bellows—then it is that the straits roll and pitch and funnel their waters into black troughs where the ships go down. "Undertow," the old Hudson's Bay captains called the suck of the tide against the ice wall; and that black hole, where the lumpy billows seemed to part like a passage between wall of ice and wall of water, was what the mariners feared. The other great danger was just a plain crush, getting nipped between two icepans rearing and plunging like fighting stallions, with the ice blocks going off like pistol shots or smashed glass. No child's play is such navigating either for the old sailing vessels of the fur traders or the modern ice-breakers propelled by steam! Yet, the old sailing vessels and the whaling fleets have navigated these straits for two hundred years.

Agnes C. Laut: "The Conquest of the Great Northwest."



Good name in man and woman, Is the immediate jewel of their souls: Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing; 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands; But he that filches from me my good name Robs me of that which not enriches him, And makes me poor indeed.

Shakespeare



SCOTS WHA HAE

Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled, Scots, wham Bruce has aften led; Welcome to your gory bed, Or to victorie. Now's the day, and now's the hour; See the front o' battle lour: See approach proud Edward's power— Chains and slaverie!

Wha will be a traitor knave? Wha can fill a coward's grave? Wha sae base as be a slave? Let him turn and flee! Wha for Scotland's King and law Freedom's sword will strongly draw, Free-man stand, or free-man fa', Let him follow me!

By Oppression's woes and pains! By your sons in servile chains, We will drain our dearest veins, But they shall be free! Lay the proud usurpers low! Tyrants fall in every foe! Liberty's in every blow! Let us do, or die!

Burns



ST. AMBROSE CREW WIN THEIR FIRST RACE

(The chief characters in this sketch are Miller, the tyrannical little cockswain of the crew; old Jervis, the captain; Tom Brown, number two, who is rowing his first race; Hardy, a friend of Tom's and one of the best oarsmen in the college—also Jack, the college dog. Though there are several crews in the race the real struggle is between the boats from St. Ambrose and Exeter Colleges. If St. Ambrose can drive the nose of its boat against the Exeter boat—"bump it"—it wins.)

Hark!—the first gun. The report sent Tom's heart into his mouth again. Several of the boats pushed off at once into the stream; and the crowds of men on the bank began to be agitated, as it were, by the shadow of the coming excitement. The St. Ambrose fingered their oars, put a last dash of grease on their rowlocks, and settled their feet against the stretchers.

"Shall we push her off?" asked Bow.

"No; I can give you another minute," said Miller, who was sitting, watch in hand, in the stern; "only be smart when I give the word."

The captain turned on his seat, and looked up the boat. His face was quiet, but full of confidence, which seemed to pass from him into the crew. Tom felt calmer and stronger, as he met his eye. "Now mind, boys, don't quicken," he said, cheerily; "four short strokes to get way on her, and then, steady. Here, pass up the lemon."

And he took a sliced lemon out of his pocket, put a small piece in his own mouth, and then handed it to Blake, who followed his example, and passed it on. Each man took a piece; and just as Bow had secured the end, Miller called out,—

"Now, jackets off, and get her head out steadily."

The jackets were thrown on shore, and gathered up by the boatman in attendance. The crew poised their oars, Number Two pushing out her head, and the captain doing the same for the stern. Miller took the starting-rope in his hand.

"How the wind catches her stern," he said; "here, pay out the rope one of you. No, not you—some fellow with a strong hand. Yes, you'll do," he went on, as Hardy stepped down the bank and took hold of the rope; "let me have it foot by foot as I want it. Not too quick; make the most of it—that'll do. Two and Three, just dip your oars in to give her way."

The rope paid out steadily, and the boat settled to her place. But now the wind rose again, and the stern drifted in towards the bank.

"You must back her a bit, Miller, and keep her a little further out or our oars on stroke side will catch the bank."

"So I see; curse the wind. Back her, one stroke all. Back her, I say!" shouted Miller.

It is no easy matter to get a crew to back her an inch just now, particularly as there are in her two men who have never rowed a race before, except in the torpids, and one who has never rowed a race in his life.

However, back she comes; the starting-rope slackens in Miller's left hand, and the stroke, unshipping his oar, pushes the stern gently out again.

There goes the second gun! one short minute more, and we are off. Short minute, indeed! you wouldn't say so if you were in the boat, with your heart in your mouth and trembling all over like a man with the palsy. Those sixty seconds before the starting-gun in your first race—why, they are a little lifetime.

"By Jove, we are drifting in again," said Miller, in horror. The captain looked grim but said nothing; it was too late now for him to be unshipping again. "Here, catch hold of the long boat-hook and fend her off."

Hardy, to whom this was addressed, seized the boat-hook, and, standing with one foot in the water, pressed the end of the boat-hook against the gunwale, at the full stretch of his arm, and so, by main force, kept the stern out. There was just room for stroke oars to dip, and that was all. The starting-rope was as taut as a harp-string; will Miller's left hand hold out?

It is an awful moment. But the coxswain, though almost dragged backwards off his seat, is equal to the occasion. He holds his watch in his right hand with the tiller rope. "Eight seconds more only. Look out for the flash. Remember, all eyes in the boat."

There it comes, at last—the flash of the starting-gun. Long before the sound of the report can roll up the river, the whole pent-up life and energy which has been held in leash, as it were, for the last six minutes, is loose, and breaks away with a bound and a dash which he who has felt it will remember for his life, but the like of which, will he ever feel again? The starting-ropes drop from the coxswains' hands, the oars flash into the water and gleam on the feather, the spray flies from them, and the boats leap forward.

The crowds on the bank scatter and rush along, each keeping as near as may be to its own boat. Some of the men on the towing-path, some on the very edge of, often in, the water; some slightly in advance, as if they could help to drag their boat forward; some behind, where they can see the pulling better; but all at full speed, in wild excitement, and shouting at the top of their voices to those on whom the honour of the college is laid.

"Well pulled, all!" "Pick her up there, Five!" "You're gaining every stroke!" "Time in the bows!" "Bravo, St. Ambrose!"

On they rushed by the side of the boats, jostling one another, stumbling, struggling, and panting along.

For a quarter of a mile along the bank the glorious, maddening hurly-burly extends, and rolls up the side of the stream.

For the first ten strokes Tom was in too great fear of making a mistake to feel or hear or see. His whole soul was glued to the back of the man before him, his one thought to keep time and get his strength into the stroke. But, as the crew settled down into the well-known long sweep, what we may call consciousness returned; and, while every muscle in his body was straining, and his chest heaved, and his heart leaped, every nerve seemed to be gathering new life, and his senses to wake into unwonted acuteness. He caught the scent of wild thyme in the air, and found room in his brain to wonder how it could have got there, as he had never seen the plant near the river, or smelt it before. Though his eye never wandered from the back of Diogenes, he seemed to see all things at once. The boat behind, which seemed to be gaining;—it was all he could do to prevent himself from quickening on the stroke as he fancied that;—the eager face of Miller, with his compressed lips, and eyes fixed so earnestly ahead that Tom could almost feel the glance passing over his right shoulder; the flying banks and the shouting crowd; see them with his bodily eyes he could not, but he knew, nevertheless, that Grey had been upset and nearly rolled down the bank into the water in the first hundred yards, that Jack was bounding and scrambling and barking along by the very edge of the stream; above all, he was just as well aware as if he had been looking at it, of a stalwart form in cap and gown, bounding along, brandishing the long boat-hook, and always keeping just opposite the boat; and amid all the Babel of voices, and the dash and pulse of the stroke, and the labouring of his own breathing, he heard Hardy's voice coming to him again and again, and clear as if there had been no other sound in the air, "Steady, Two! steady! well pulled! steady, steady." The voice seemed to give him strength and keep him to his work. And what work it was! he had had many a hard pull in the last six weeks, but never aught like this.

But it can't last forever; men's muscles are not steel, or their lungs bulls' hide, and hearts can't go on pumping a hundred miles an hour long, without bursting. The St. Ambrose boat is well away from the boat behind, there is a great gap between the accompanying crowds; and now, as they near the Gut, she hangs for a moment or two in hand, though the roar from the bank grows louder and louder, and Tom is already aware that the St. Ambrose crowd is melting into the one ahead of them.

"We must be close to Exeter!" The thought flashes into him, and, it would seem, into the rest of the crew at the same moment; for, all at once, the strain seems taken off their arms again; there is no more drag; she springs to the stroke as she did at the start; and Miller's face, which had darkened for a few seconds, lightens up again.

Miller's face and attitude are a study. Coiled up into the smallest possible space, his chin almost resting on his knees, his hands close to his sides, firmly but lightly feeling the rudder, as a good horseman handles the mouth of a free-going hunter; if a coxswain could make a bump by his own exertions, surely he will do it. No sudden jerks of the St. Ambrose rudder will you see, watch as you will from the bank; the boat never hangs through fault of his, but easily and gracefully rounds every point. "You're gaining! you're gaining!" he now and then mutters to the captain, who responds with a wink, keeping his breath for other matters. Isn't he grand, the captain, as he comes forward like lightning, stroke after stroke, his back flat, his teeth set, his whole frame working from the hips with the regularity of a machine? As the space still narrows, the eyes of the fiery little coxswain flash with excitement, but he is far too good a judge to hurry the final effort before the victory is safe in his grasp.

The two crowds are mingled now, and no mistake; and the shouts come all in a heap over the water. "Now, St. Ambrose, six strokes more." "Now, Exeter, you're gaining; pick her up." "Mind the Gut, Exeter." "Bravo, St. Ambrose!" The water rushes by, still eddying from the strokes of the boat ahead. Tom fancies now he can hear their oars and the workings of their rudder, and the voice of their coxswain. In another moment both boats are in the Gut, and a perfect storm of shouts reaches them from the crowd, as it rushes madly off to the left to the footbridge, amidst which "Oh, well steered, well steered, St. Ambrose!" is the prevailing cry. Then Miller, motionless as a statue till now, lifts his right hand and whirls the tassel round his head. "Give it her now, boys; six strokes and we're into them." Old Jervis lays down that great broad back and lashes his oar through the water with the might of a giant, the crew catch him up in another stroke, the tight new boat answers to the spurt, and Tom feels a little shock behind him, and then a grating sound, as Miller shouts, "Unship oars, Bow and Three!" and the nose of the St. Ambrose boat glides quietly up the side of the Exeter till it touches their stroke oar.

"Take care where you're coming to." It is the coxswain of the bumped boat who speaks.

Tom finds himself within a foot or two of him when he looks round; and, being utterly unable to contain his joy, and yet unwilling to exhibit it before the eyes of a gallant rival, turns away towards the shore, and begins telegraphing to Hardy.

"Now, then, what are you at there in the bows? Cast her off, quick. Come, look alive! Push across at once out of the way of the other boats."

"I congratulate you, Jervis," says the Exeter stroke, as the St. Ambrose boat shoots past him. "Do it again next race and I shan't care."

Thomas Hughes: "Tom Brown at Oxford."



HUNTING SONG

Waken, lords and ladies gay, On the mountain dawns the day; All the jolly chase is here With hawk and horse and hunting-spear; Hounds are in their couples yelling, Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling, Merrily, merrily mingle they, 'Waken, lords and ladies gay.'

Waken, lords and ladies gay, The mist has left the mountain gray, Springlets in the dawn are steaming, Diamonds on the brake are gleaming, And foresters have busy been To track the buck in thicket green; Now we come to chant our lay, 'Waken, lords and ladies gay.'

Waken, lords and ladies gay, To the greenwood haste away; We can show you where he lies, Fleet of foot and tall of size; We can show the marks he made When 'gainst the oak his antlers frayed; You shall see him brought to bay: 'Waken, lords and ladies gay.'

Louder, louder chant the lay, Waken, lords and ladies gay! Tell them youth and mirth and glee Run a course as well as we; Time, stern huntsman! who can baulk, Staunch as hound and fleet as hawk; Think of this, and rise with day, Gentle lords and ladies gay!

Scott



It is not what he has, nor even what he does, which directly expresses the worth of a man, but what he is.

Amiel



BORDER BALLAD

March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale, Why, my lads, dinna ye march forward in order! March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale, All the Blue Bonnets are bound for the Border. Many a banner spread Flutters above your head, Many a crest that is famous in story; Mount and make ready then, Sons of the mountain glen, Fight for the Queen and our old Scottish glory!

Come from the hills where your hirsels[1] are grazing, Come from the glen of the buck and the roe; Come to the crag where the beacon is blazing, Come with the buckler, the lance, and the bow; Trumpets are sounding, War-steeds are bounding, Stand to your arms, and march in good order; England shall many a day Tell of the bloody fray When the Blue Bonnets came over the Border.

Scott

FOOTNOTES: [1] Cattle



THE GREAT NORTHERN DIVER

The weird, long call, or the shrill, demoniacal laugh coming out of the night tells of the sleepless activity of the loon. The whip-poor-will in the adjacent shrubbery seems companionable, and there is a friendly spirit in the short, shrill tremolo of the night-hawk from the invisible sky. Even the plaint of the screech-owl has a tone of human sympathy. But the dreary cadence of the loon is the voice of the inhospitable night, repelling every thought of human association. It does not entreat, it does not warn; yet there is a fascination in its expressionless strength. Over the black water, under the lowering sky, or through the bright still moonlight, the same unfeeling tone fills the ear of night. And sometimes, when the lingering moon sheds a broad trail of light along the still waters of the lake, the graceful swimmer will glide across and disappear in the darkness, breaking the bright reflection into a multitude of chasing, quivering, trailing threads of silver. Throughout the day, where the cedars come down to meet their shadows in the dark water, he swims ceaselessly about, sitting low, with black, glossy neck gracefully curved and displaying its delicate white markings. Sometimes he stretches himself wearily, flapping his wings, and displaying his white breast and the handsome, showy markings of his sides. Though wary and aloof, and without a trace of animation in his loud, penetrating cries, he shows his kinship by the scrupulous care with which he preens his handsome feathers—even lying on his back in the water to comb out and smooth his glossy, white breast.

A hurried cry from overhead may unexpectedly reveal the presence of a pair of loons in another element, and it is always fascinating to watch their steady, strained, energetic flight above the tops of the pines, generally to curve down to some more attractive expanse in the cedar-girt lake. For the water is the loon's natural element. There is an amusing deliberateness in his graceful, silent dive. He does not make the hurried dip of his smaller cousin, the grebe, but more calmly curves both neck and body, disappearing under the surface in a graceful arch. Settling down and swimming with only head and neck exposed is an evidence of suspicion, and is generally followed by a long dive, with a belated reappearance in some remote part of the lake.

When the mother loon takes her two offspring out for a swim, it is a big event in the domestic circle. The outing is announced by prolonged and unusual repetitions of the laughing call. For half an hour the echoes of the lake are kept alive with sounds portentous of new departures in the loon world. Then a peculiar object is seen to emerge from the marshy bay and cross under the shadowy cedars toward the open water. A field-glass shows it to be the mother loon and her two offspring, the three huddled so closely together that they are almost indistinguishable. The mother is unceasing in her care and attention. She strokes the backs of the young birds with her bill, playing and fussing around and close to them, as if they could not exist without her constant attention. Now and then she leans over and lifts a broad, black, webbed foot out of the water, holding it up distended, as if to endorse the modern theory that the parent loon teaches her young to swim. They cling to each other and cling to her, as if afraid of being lost in the great expanse of water to which they have been so recently introduced.

A short distance away the father swims about in lordly indifference, diving occasionally and regaling himself on the unsuspecting fish. A boat comes out from the shore, rowed by an industrious guide, with an angler, picturesquely protected by mosquito net, sitting in the stern. The mother loon pushes and urges her indolent pair in the direction of safety. How slow they must seem as she hurries and encourages them! The trio moves at a snail's pace compared with her ordinary speed, but the young ones show no inclination to dive out of harm's way. Their clinging, crowding tendency serves but to incommode and obstruct her. And where is the male protector? Alas for the romance of chivalry! When the boat comes near, he deliberately dives, and, after the usual protracted wait, reappears in another part of the lake, away from the danger that alarms and threatens the defenceless trio. But the mother remains and urges the encumbering young things to speed. They do make some headway, though slowly, toward the marshy bay from which they recently emerged with so much loud, wild laughter. The indifference of the fisherman and the guide does not reassure them, and they never cease their entangled struggle till lost to sight in the winding lagoon.

S. T. Wood



TO THE CUCKOO

O blithe New-comer! I have heard, I hear thee and rejoice. O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird, Or but a wandering Voice?

While I am lying on the grass Thy twofold shout I hear; From hill to hill it seems to pass, At once far off, and near.

Though babbling only to the Vale, Of sunshine and of flowers, Thou bringest unto me a tale Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring! Even yet thou art to me No bird, but an invisible thing, A voice, a mystery;

The same whom in my school-boy days I listened to; that Cry Which made me look a thousand ways In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove Through woods and on the green; And thou wert still a hope, a love; Still longed for, never seen.

And I can listen to thee yet; Can lie upon the plain And listen, till I do beget That golden time again.

O blessed Bird! the earth we pace Again appears to be An unsubstantial faery place, That is fit home for Thee!

Wordsworth



ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET

The poetry of earth is never dead: When all the birds are faint with the hot sun, And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead; That is the Grasshopper's—he takes the lead In summer luxury—he has never done With his delights; for when tired out with fun

He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed. The poetry of earth is ceasing never: On a lone winter evening, when the frost Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever, And seems to one in drowsiness half-lost, The Grasshopper's among some grassy hills.

Keats



THE GREAT NORTHWEST

And now let us turn our glance to this great Northwest, whither my wandering steps are about to lead me. Fully nine hundred miles as bird would fly, and one thousand two hundred as horse can travel, west of Red River, an immense range of mountains eternally capped with snow rises in rugged masses from a vast stream-scarred plain. They who first beheld these grand guardians of the central prairies named them the Montagnes des Rochers (Rocky Mountains),—a fitting title for such vast accumulations of rugged magnificence. From the glaciers and ice-valleys of this great range of mountains, innumerable streams descend into the plains. For a time they wander, as if heedless of direction, through groves and glades and green-spreading declivities; then, assuming greater fixity of purpose, they gather up many a wandering rill and start eastward upon a long journey. At length the many detached streams resolve themselves into two great water systems. Through hundreds of miles these two rivers pursue their parallel courses, now approaching, now opening out from each other. Suddenly the southern river bends towards the north, and, at a point some six hundred miles from the mountains, pours its volume of water into the northern channel. Then the united river rolls, in vast, majestic curves, steadily towards the north-east, turns once more towards the south, opens out into a great reed-covered marsh, sweeps on into a large cedar-lined lake, and finally, rolling over a rocky ledge, casts its waters into the northern end of the great Lake Winnipeg, fully one thousand three hundred miles from the glacier cradle where it took its birth. This river, which has along it every diversity of hill and vale, meadow-land and forest, treeless plain and fertile hillside, is called by the wild tribes who dwell along its glorious shores, the Saskatchewan or "rapid-flowing river." But this Saskatchewan is not the only river which drains the great central region between Red River and the Rocky Mountains. The Assiniboine or "stony river" drains the rolling prairie-lands five hundred miles west from Red River; and many a smaller stream, and rushing, bubbling brook, carries into its devious channel the waters of that vast country which lies between the American boundary line and the pine woods of the Lower Saskatchewan.

So much for the rivers; and now for the land through which they flow. How shall we picture it? how shall we tell the story of that great, boundless, solitary waste of verdure? The old, old maps, which the navigators of the sixteenth century formed from the discoveries of Cabot and Cartier, of Verrazanno and Hudson, played strange pranks with the geography of the New World. The coast-line, with the estuaries of large rivers, was tolerably accurate; but the centre of America was represented as a vast inland sea, whose shores stretched far into the Polar North—a sea through which lay the much-coveted passage to the long-sought treasures of the old realms of Cathay. Well, the geographers of that period erred only in the description of ocean which they placed in the centre of the continent; for an ocean there is—an ocean through which men seek the treasures of Cathay even in our own times. But the ocean is one of grass, and the shores are the crests of mountain ranges and the dark pine forests of sub-Arctic regions. The great ocean itself does not present such infinite variety as does this prairie-ocean of which we speak:—in winter, a dazzling surface of purest snow; in early summer, a vast expanse of grass and pale pink roses; in autumn, too often a wild sea of raging fire! No ocean of water in the world can vie with its gorgeous sunsets; no solitude can equal the loneliness of a night-shadowed prairie: one feels the stillness, and hears the silence: the wail of the prowling wolf makes the voice of solitude audible; the stars look down through infinite silence upon a silence almost as intense. This ocean has no past;—time has been nought to it, and men have come and gone, leaving behind them no track, no vestige of their presence. Some French writer, speaking of these prairies, has said that the sense of this utter negation of life, this complete absence of history, has struck him with a loneliness, oppressive and sometimes terrible in its intensity. Perhaps so, but, for my part, the prairies had nothing terrible in their aspect, nothing oppressive in their loneliness. One saw here the world, as it had taken shape and form from the hands of the Creator. Nor did the scene look less beautiful because nature alone tilled the earth, and the unaided sun brought forth the flowers.

October had reached its latest week; the wild geese and swans had taken their long flight to the south, and their wailing cry no more descended through the darkness; ice had settled upon the quiet pools and was settling upon the quick-running streams; the horizon glowed at night with the red light of moving prairie fires. It was the close of the Indian Summer, and Winter was coming quickly down, from his far northern home.

Major W. F. Butler: "The Great Lone Land."



RULE, BRITANNIA

When Britain first, at Heaven's command, Arose from out the azure main, This was the charter of the land, And guardian angels sung this strain: Rule, Britannia, rule the waves! Britons never will be slaves!

The nations, not so blest as thee, Must in their turns to tyrants fall, While thou shalt flourish great and free— The dread and envy of them all.

Still more majestic shalt thou rise, More dreadful from each foreign stroke; As the loud blast that tears the skies Serves but to root thy native oak.

Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame; All their attempts to bend thee down Will but arouse thy generous flame, But work their woe and thy renown.

To thee belongs the rural reign; Thy cities shall with commerce shine; All thine shall be the subject main, And every shore it circles thine.

The Muses, still with Freedom found, Shall to thy happy coast repair; Blest Isle, with matchless beauty crowned, And manly hearts to guard the fair:— Rule, Britannia, rule the waves! Britons never will be slaves!

James Thomson



THE COMMANDMENT AND THE REWARD

My son, forget not my law; But let thine heart keep my commandments: For length of days, and years of life, And peace, shall they add to thee. Let not mercy and truth forsake thee: Bind them about thy neck; Write them upon the table of thine heart: So shalt thou find favour, And good repute in the sight of God and man.

Trust in the LORD with all thine heart, And lean not upon thine own understanding: In all thy ways acknowledge him, And he shall direct thy paths. Be not wise in thine own eyes; Fear the LORD, and depart from evil: Honour the LORD with thy substance, And with the first-fruits of all thine increase: So shall thy barns be filled with plenty, And thy vats shall overflow with new wine.

Proverbs, III.



THE SPACIOUS FIRMAMENT

The spacious firmament on high, With all the blue ethereal sky, And spangled heavens, a shining frame, Their great Original proclaim. Th' unwearied Sun from day to day Does his Creator's power display; And publishes to every land The work of an Almighty hand.

Soon as the evening shades prevail, The Moon takes up the wondrous tale; And nightly to the listening Earth Repeats the story of her birth: Whilst all the stars that round her burn, And all the planets in their turn, Confirm the tidings as they roll, And spread the truth from pole to pole.

What though in solemn silence all Move round the dark terrestrial ball; What though no real voice nor sound Amid their radiant orbs be found? In Reason's ear they all rejoice, And utter forth a glorious voice; Forever singing as they shine, "The Hand that made us is divine."

Addison



JUNE

—What is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days; Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune, And over it softly her warm ear lays: Whether we look, or whether we listen, We hear life murmur, or see it glisten; Every clod feels a stir of might, An instinct within it that reaches and towers, And groping blindly above it for light, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers; The flush of life may well be seen Thrilling back over hills and valleys; The cowslip startles in meadows green, The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace; The little bird sits at his door in the sun, Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, And lets his illumined being o'errun With the deluge of summer it receives; His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings, And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings; He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,— In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best? Now is the high-tide of the year, And whatever of life hath ebbed away Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer, Into every bare inlet and creek and bay; Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it, We are happy now because God wills it; No matter how barren the past may have been, 'Tis enough for us now that the leaves are green; We sit in the warm shade and feel right well How the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell; We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help knowing That skies are clear and grass is growing; The breeze comes whispering in our ear, That dandelions are blossoming near, That maize has sprouted, that streams are flowing, That the river is bluer than the sky, That the robin is plastering his house hard by; And if the breeze kept the good news back, For other couriers we should not lack; We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing.— And hark! how clear bold chanticleer, Warmed with the new wine of the year, Tells all in his lusty crowing!

Lowell



THE FIFTH VOYAGE OF SINBAD THE SAILOR

All the troubles and calamities I had undergone could not cure me of my inclination to make new voyages. I therefore bought goods, departed with them for the best seaport, and there, that I might not be obliged to depend upon a captain, but have a ship at my own command, I remained till one was built on purpose at my own charge. When the ship was ready, I went on board with my goods: but not having enough to load her, I agreed to take with me several merchants of different nations, with their merchandise.

We sailed with the first fair wind, and after a long navigation the first place we touched at was a desert island, where we found an egg of a roc, equal in size to that I saw on a former voyage, fifty paces round, and shining as a great white dome when seen even from afar. There was a young roc in it, just ready to be hatched, and its bill had begun to appear.

The merchants whom I had taken on board, and who landed with me, broke the egg with hatchets, and having made a hole in it, pulled out the young roc piecemeal and roasted it. I had earnestly entreated them not to meddle with the egg, but they would not listen to me.

Scarcely had they finished their repast, when there appeared in the air, at a considerable distance from us, two great clouds. The captain whom I had hired to navigate my ship, knowing by experience what they meant, said they were the male and female roc that belonged to the young one, and pressed us to re-embark with all speed, to prevent the misfortune which he saw would otherwise befall us. We hastened on board and set sail with all possible expedition. In the meantime, the two rocs approached with a frightful noise, which they redoubled when they saw the egg broken and their young one gone. They flew back in the direction they had come, and disappeared for some time, while we made all the sail we could to endeavour to prevent that which unhappily befell us.

They soon returned, and we observed that each of them carried between its talons, stones, or rather rocks, of a monstrous size. When they came directly over my ship they hovered, and one of them let fall a stone, but by the dexterity of the steersman it missed us, and, falling into the sea, divided the water so that we could almost see the bottom. The other roc, to our misfortune, threw his massy burden so exactly into the middle of the ship as to split it into a thousand pieces. The mariners and passengers were all crushed to death, or sunk. I myself was of the number of the latter, but, as I came up again, I fortunately caught hold of a piece of the wreck, and swimming, sometimes with one hand and sometimes with the other, but always holding fast my board, the wind and tide favouring me, I came to an island whose shore was very steep. I overcame that difficulty, however, and got ashore.

I sat down upon the grass to recover myself from my fatigue, after which I went into the island to explore it. It seemed to be a delicious garden. I found trees everywhere, some of them bearing green, and others ripe fruits; and there were streams of fresh, pure water running in pleasant meanders. I ate of the fruits, which I found excellent; and drank of the water, which was very light and good.

When I was a little advanced into the island I saw an old man, who appeared very weak and infirm. He was sitting on the bank of a stream, and at first I took him to be one who had been shipwrecked like myself. I went towards him and saluted him, but he only slightly bowed his head. I asked him why he sat so still; but instead of answering me, he made a sign for me to take him upon my back and carry him over the brook, signifying that it was to gather fruit.

I believed him really to stand in need of my assistance, took him upon my back, and having carried him over, bade him get down, and for that end stooped, that he might get off with ease; but instead of doing so (which I laugh at every time I think of it), the old man who appeared to me quite decrepit, threw his legs nimbly about my neck. He sat astride upon my shoulders, and held my throat so tight that I thought he would have strangled me, the apprehension of which made me swoon and fall down.

Notwithstanding my fainting, the ill-natured old fellow kept fast about my neck. When I had recovered my breath, he thrust one of his feet against my stomach, and struck me so rudely on the side with the other, that he forced me to rise up against my will. Having arisen, he made me carry him under the trees, and forced me now and then to stop, to gather and eat fruit such as we found. He never left me all day, and when I lay down to rest at night, he laid himself down with me, holding always fast about my neck. Every morning he pushed me to make me awake, and afterwards obliged me to get up and walk, and pressed me with his feet. You may judge then, what trouble I was in to be loaded with such a burden of which I could not get rid.

One day I found in my way several dry calabashes that had fallen from a tree. I took a large one, and after cleaning it, pressed into it some juice of grapes, which abounded in the island. Having filled the calabash, I put it by in a convenient place; and going thither again some days after, I tasted it and found the wine so good that it soon made me forget my sorrow, gave me new vigour, and so exhilarated my spirits, that I began to sing and dance as I walked along.

The old man, perceiving the effect which this liquor had upon me, and that I carried him with more ease than before, made me a sign to give him some of it. I handed him the calabash, and the liquor pleasing his palate, he drank it all off. There being a considerable quantity of it, and the fumes getting into his head, he began to sing and dance upon my shoulders, and to loosen his legs from about me by degrees. Finding that he did not press me as before, I threw him upon the ground, where he lay without motion; then I took up a great stone and crushed his head.

I was extremely glad to be thus freed for ever from this troublesome fellow. I now walked towards the beach, where I met the crew of a ship that had cast anchor, to take water. They were surprised to see me, but more so at the particulars of my adventures. "You fell," said they, "into the hands of the old man of the sea, and are the first who ever escaped strangling by his malicious tricks. He never quitted those he had once made himself master of till he had destroyed them, and he has made this island notorious by the number of men he has slain."

After having informed me of these things, they carried me with them to the ship; the captain received me with great kindness when they told him what had befallen me. He put out again to sea, and after some days' sail, we arrived at the harbour of a great city, the houses of which were built with hewn stone.

One of the merchants who had taken me into his friendship invited me to go along with him and carried me to a place appointed for the accommodation of foreign merchants. He gave me a large bag, and having recommended me to some people of the town, who used to gather cocoa-nuts, desired them to take me with them. "Go," said he, "follow them, and act as you see them do; but do not part from them, otherwise you may endanger your life." Having thus spoken, he gave me provisions for the journey, and I went with them.

We came to a thick forest of cocoa trees, very lofty, with trunks so smooth that it was not possible to climb to the branches that bore the fruit. When we entered the forest, we saw a great number of apes of several sizes, who fled as soon as they perceived us and climbed up to the tops of the trees with surprising swiftness.

The merchants gathered stones and threw them at the apes in the trees. I did the same, and the apes, out of revenge, threw cocoa-nuts at us so fast, and with such gestures, as sufficiently testified their anger and resentment. We gathered up the cocoa-nuts, and from time to time threw stones to provoke the apes; so that by this stratagem we filled our bags with cocoa-nuts, which it had been impossible otherwise to have done. I thus gradually collected as many cocoa-nuts as produced me a considerable sum.

We sailed towards the islands, where pepper grows in great plenty. From thence we went to the isle of Comari, where the best species of wood of aloes grows. I exchanged my cocoa in those islands for pepper and wood of aloes, and went with other merchants a-pearl-fishing. I hired divers, who brought me up some that were very large and pure. I embarked in a vessel that happily arrived at Bussorah; from thence I returned to Bagdat, where I made vast sums of my pepper, wood of aloes, and pearls. I gave the tenth of my gains in alms, as I had done upon my return from my other voyages, and endeavoured to dissipate my fatigues by amusements of different kinds.

"The Arabian Nights Entertainments."



All are needed by each one; Nothing is fair or good alone. I thought the sparrow's note from heaven, Singing at dawn on the alder bough; I brought him home, in his nest, at even; He sings the song, but it cheers not now, For I did not bring home the river and sky;— He sang to my ear,—they sang to my eye.

Emerson



OCEAN

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean—roll! Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain; Man marks the earth with ruin,—his control Stops with the shore; upon the watery plain The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain A shadow of man's ravage, save his own, When for a moment, like a drop of rain, He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan— Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and unknown.

His steps are not upon thy paths,—thy fields, Are not a spoil for him,—thou dost arise And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields For earth's destruction, thou dost all despise, Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies, And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray, And howling to his gods, where haply lies His petty hope in some near port or bay, And dashest him again to earth; there let him lay.

The armaments which thunderstrike the walls Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake, And monarchs tremble in their capitals; The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make Their clay creator the vain title take Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war: These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake, They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar.

Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee— Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? Thy waters washed them power while they were free, And many a tyrant since; their shores obey The stranger, slave, or savage; their decay Has dried up realms to deserts: not so, thou; Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play. Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow; Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now.

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests; in all time, Calm or convulsed—in breeze or gale or storm, Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime, Dark-heaving, boundless, endless and sublime— The image of eternity—the throne Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone.

And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles onward: from a boy I wantoned with thy breakers; they to me Were a delight; and, if the freshening sea Made them a terror—'twas a pleasing fear; For I was as it were a child of thee And trusted to thy billows far and near, And laid my hand upon thy mane—as I do here.

Byron: "Childe Harold's Pilgrimage."



Britain's myriad voices call "Sons be welded each and all, Into one imperial whole, One with Britain, heart and soul! One life, one flag, one fleet, one Throne!" Britons, hold your own!

Tennyson



PONTIAC'S ATTEMPT TO CAPTURE FORT DETROIT

In the year 1763, a celebrated chief of the Ottawas, called Pontiac, succeeded in forming a confederacy of the Ottawas, Hurons, Chippewas, and some other tribes, with the avowed object of expelling the British from the lake regions of the country. With the craftiness peculiar to the Indian race, an ingenious stratagem was devised, by means of which it was hoped that the allies would easily gain possession of the forts.

For this purpose a grand Lacrosse match was organized at each post, and the officers of the garrison invited to become participators in the game.

Pontiac and his attendant chiefs had, while the warriors and braves were engaged in the game of Lacrosse on the common, sought an audience of the governor of the fort. He received them in the mess-room, apparently not suspecting any artifice on their part.

"The pale warrior, the friend of the Ottawa chief, is not here," said the governor, as he glanced his eye along the semi-circle of Indians. "How is this? Is his voice still sick, that he cannot come? or has the great chief of the Ottawas forgotten to tell him?"

"The voice of the pale warrior is still sick, and he cannot speak," replied the Indian. "The Ottawa chief is very sorry; for the tongue of his friend, the pale-face, is full of wisdom."

Scarcely had the last words escaped his lips when a wild, shrill cry from without the fort rang on the ears of the assembled council, and caused a momentary commotion among the officers. It arose from a single voice, and that voice could not be mistaken by any who had heard it once before. A second or two, during which the officers and chiefs kept their eyes intently fixed on one another, passed anxiously away; and then nearer to the gate, apparently on the very drawbridge itself, was pealed forth the wild and deafening yell of a legion of fiendish voices. At that sound, the Ottawa and the other chiefs sprang to their feet, and their own fierce cry responded to that yet vibrating on the ears of all. Already were their gleaming tomahawks brandished wildly over their heads, and Pontiac had even bounded a pace forward to reach the governor with the deadly weapon, when, at the sudden stamping of the foot of the latter upon the floor, the scarlet cloth in the rear was thrown aside, and twenty soldiers, their eyes glancing along the barrels of their levelled muskets, met the startled gaze of the astonished Indians.

An instant was enough to satisfy the keen chief of the true state of the case. The calm, composed mien of the officers, not one of whom had even attempted to quit his seat amid the din by which his ears were so alarmingly assailed,—the triumphant, yet dignified, and even severe expression of the governor's countenance; and, above all, the unexpected presence of the prepared soldiery,—all these at once assured him of the discovery of his treachery, and the danger that awaited him. The necessity for an immediate attempt to join his warriors without was now obvious to the Ottawa; and scarcely had he conceived the idea before he sought to execute it. In a single spring he gained the door of the mess-room, and, followed eagerly and tumultuously by the other chiefs, to whose departure no opposition was offered, in the next moment stood on the steps of the piazza that ran along the front of the building whence he had issued. The surprise of the Indians on reaching this point was now too powerful to be dissembled; and incapable either of advancing or receding, they remained gazing on the scene before them with an air of mingled stupefaction, rage, and alarm. Scarcely ten minutes had elapsed since they had proudly strode through the naked area of the fort, and yet even in that short space of time its appearance had been entirely changed. Not a part was there now of the surrounding buildings that was not replete with human life and hostile preparation. Through every window of the officers' low rooms was to be seen the dark and frowning muzzle of a field-piece bearing upon the gateway, and behind these were artillerymen holding their lighted matches, supported again by files of bayonets that glittered in their rear. In the block-houses the same formidable array of field-pieces and muskets was visible; while from the four angles of the square as many heavy guns, that had been artfully masked at the entrance of the chiefs, seemed ready to sweep away everything that should come before them. The guard-room near the gate presented the same hostile front. The doors of this, as well as of the other buildings, had been firmly secured within; and from every window affording cover to the troops gleamed a line of bayonets, rising above the threatening field-pieces, pointed, at a distance of little more than twelve feet, directly upon the gateway. In addition to his musket, each man of the guard held a hand grenade, provided with a short fuse that could be ignited in a moment from the matches of the gunners, with immediate effect. The soldiers in the block-houses were similarly provided.

Almost magical as was the change thus suddenly effected in the appearance of the garrison, it was not the most interesting feature in the exciting scene. Choking up the gateway, in which they were completely wedged, and crowding the drawbridge, a dense mass of "husky" Indians were to be seen casting their fierce glances around, yet paralyzed in their movements by the unlooked-for display of resisting force, threatening instant annihilation to those who should attempt either to advance or recede. Never, perhaps, were astonishment and disappointment more forcibly depicted on the human countenance, than they were now exhibited by these men, who had already in imagination secured to themselves an easy conquest. They were the warriors who had so recently been engaged in the manly yet innocent exercise of the ball; but, instead of the harmless hurdle, each now carried a short gun in one hand and a gleaming tomahawk in the other.

After the first general yelling heard in the council-room, not a sound was uttered. Their burst of rage and triumph had evidently been checked by the unexpected manner of their reception; and they now stood on the spot on which the further advance of each had been arrested, so silent and motionless, that, but for the rolling of their dark eyes, as they keenly measured the insurmountable barriers that were opposed to their progress, they might almost have been taken for a wild group of statuary. Conspicuous at the head of these was he who wore the blanket; a tall warrior on whom rested the startled eye of every officer and soldier who was so situated as to behold him. His face was painted black as death; and as he stood under the arch of the gateway, with his white turbaned head towering far above those of his companions, this formidable and mysterious enemy might have been likened to the spirit of darkness presiding over his terrible legions.

In order to account for the extraordinary appearance of the Indians, armed in every way for death, at a moment when neither gun nor tomahawk was apparently within miles of their reach, it was necessary to revert to the first entrance of the chiefs into the fort. The fall of Pontiac had been the effect of design; and the yell pealed forth by him, on recovering his feet, as if in taunting reply to the laugh of his comrades, was in reality a signal intended for the guidance of the Indians without. These now following up their game with increasing spirit, at once changed the direction of their line, bringing the ball nearer to the fort. In their eagerness to effect this object, they had overlooked the gradual secession of the unarmed troops, spectators of their sport from the ramparts, until scarcely more than twenty stragglers were left. As they neared the gate, the squaws broke up their several groups, and, forming a line on either hand of the road leading to the drawbridge, appeared to separate solely with a view not to impede the players. For an instant a dense group collected around the ball, which had been drawn to within a hundred yards of the gate, and fifty hurdles were crossed in their endeavour to secure it, when the warrior, who formed the solitary exception to the multitude, in his blanket covering, and who had been lingering in the extreme rear of the party, came rapidly up to the spot where the well-affected struggle was maintained. At his approach the hurdles of the other players were withdrawn, when, at a single blow from his powerful arm, the ball was seen flying in an oblique direction and was for a moment lost altogether to the view. When it again met the eye, it was descending into the very centre of the fort.

With the fleetness of thought now commenced a race which had ostensibly for its object the recovery of the lost ball, and in which he who had driven it with resistless force outstripped them all. Their course lay between the two lines of squaws; and scarcely had the head of the bounding Indians reached the opposite extremity of those lines, when the women suddenly threw back their blankets, and disclosed each a short gun and tomahawk. To throw away their hurdles and seize upon these, was the work of an instant. Already, in imagination, was the fort their own; and, such, was the peculiar exaltation of the black and turbaned warrior when he felt the planks of the drawbridge bending beneath his feet, all the ferocious joy of his soul was pealed forth in the terrible cry which, rapidly succeeded by that of the other Indians, had resounded so fearfully through the council-room.

What their disappointment was, when, on gaining the interior, they found the garrison prepared for their reception, has already been shown.

Major Richardson



MY NATIVE LAND

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, As home his footsteps he hath turned, From wandering on a foreign strand! If such there breathe, go, mark him well; For him no minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish can claim: Despite those titles, power, and pelf, The wretch, concentred all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown, And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung.

Scott: "The Lay of the Last Minstrel."



MORNING ON THE LIEVRE

Far above us where a jay Screams his matins to the day, Capped with gold and amethyst, Like a vapour from the forge Of a giant somewhere hid, Out of hearing of the clang Of his hammer, skirts of mist Slowly up the woody gorge Lift and hang.

Softly as a cloud we go, Sky above and sky below, Down the river; and the dip Of the paddles scarcely breaks, With the little silvery drip Of the water as it shakes From the blades, the crystal deep Of the silence of the morn, Of the forest yet asleep; And the river reaches borne In a mirror, purple gray, Sheer away To the misty line of light, Where the forest and the stream In the shadow meet and plight, Like a dream.

From amid a stretch of reeds, Where the lazy river sucks All the water as it bleeds From a little curling creek, And the muskrats peer and sneak In around the sunken wrecks Of a tree that swept the skies Long ago, On a sudden seven ducks With a splashy rustle rise, Stretching out their seven necks, One before, and two behind, And the others all arow, And as steady as the wind With a swivelling whistle go, Through the purple shadow led, Till we only hear their whir In behind a rocky spur, Just ahead.

Archibald Lampman



I call, therefore, a complete and generous education, that which fits a man to perform justly, skilfully, and magnanimously, all the offices, both private and public, of peace and war.

Milton: "On Education."



EVENING

From upland slopes I see the cows file by, Lowing, great-chested, down the homeward trail, By dusking fields and meadows shining pale With moon-tipped dandelions. Flickering high, A peevish night-hawk in the western sky Beats up into the lucent solitudes, Or drops with griding wing. The stilly woods Grow dark and deep and gloom mysteriously. Cool night winds creep, and whisper in mine ear, The homely cricket gossips at my feet, From far-off pools and wastes of reeds I hear, Clear and soft-piped, the chanting frogs break sweet In full Pandean chorus. One by one Shine out the stars, and the great night comes on.

Archibald Lampman



For manners are not idle, but the fruit Of loyal nature and of noble mind.

Tennyson



AN ELIZABETHAN SEAMAN

Some two miles above the port of Dartmouth, once among the most important harbours in England, on a projecting angle of land which runs out into the river at the head of one of its most beautiful reaches, there has stood for some centuries the Manor House of Greenaway. The water runs deep all the way to it from the sea, and the largest vessels may ride with safety within a stone's throw of the windows. In the latter half of the sixteenth century there must have met, in the hall of this mansion, a party as remarkable as could have been found anywhere in England. Humfrey and Adrian Gilbert, with their half-brother, Walter Raleigh, here, when little boys, played at sailors in the reaches of Long Stream, in the summer evenings doubtless rowing down with the tide to the port, and wondering at the quaint figure-heads and carved prows of the ships which thronged it; or climbing on board, and listening, with hearts beating, to the mariners' tales of the new earth beyond the sunset. And here in later life, matured men, whose boyish dreams had become heroic action, they used again to meet in the intervals of quiet, and the rock is shown underneath the house where Raleigh smoked the first tobacco. Another remarkable man could not fail to have made a fourth at these meetings. A sailor-boy of Sandwich, the adjoining parish, John Davis, showed early a genius which could not have escaped the eye of such neighbours, and in the atmosphere of Greenaway he learned to be as noble as the Gilberts, and as tender and delicate as Raleigh.

In 1585 John Davis left Dartmouth on his first voyage into the Polar Seas; and twice subsequently he went again, venturing in small, ill-equipped vessels of thirty or forty tons into the most dangerous seas. These voyages were as remarkable for their success as for the daring with which they were accomplished, and Davis' epitaph is written on the map of the world, where his name still remains to commemorate his discoveries. Brave as he was, he is distinguished by a peculiar and exquisite sweetness of nature, which, from many little facts of his life, seems to have affected every one with whom he came in contact in a remarkable degree. We find men, for the love of Master Davis, leaving their firesides to sail with him, without other hope or motion; we find silver bullets cast to shoot him in a mutiny; the hard, rude natures of the mutineers being awed by something in his carriage which was not like that of a common man. He has written the account of one of his northern voyages himself; and there is an imaginative beauty in it, and a rich delicacy of expression, which is called out in him by the first sight of strange lands and things and people.

We have only space to tell something of the conclusion of his voyage north. In latitude sixty-three degrees, he fell in with a barrier of ice, which he coasted for thirteen days without finding an opening. The very sight of an iceberg was new to all his crew; and the ropes and shrouds, though it was midsummer, becoming compassed with ice,—

"The people began to fall sick and faint-hearted—whereupon, very orderly, and with good discretion, they entreated me to regard the safety of mine own life, as well as the preservation of theirs; and that I should not, through over-boldness, leave their widows and fatherless children to give me bitter curses.

"Whereupon, seeking counsel of God, it pleased His Divine Majesty to move my heart to prosecute that which I hope shall be to His glory and to the contentation of every Christian mind."

He had two vessels—one of some burden, the other a pinnace of thirty tons. The result of the counsel which he had sought was, that he made over his own large vessel to such as wished to return, and himself, "thinking it better to die with honour than to return with infamy," went on with such volunteers as would follow him, in a poor leaky cutter, up the sea now in commemoration of that adventure called Davis' Strait. He ascended four degrees north of the furthest known point, among storms and icebergs, when the long days and twilight nights alone saved him from being destroyed, and, coasting back along the American shore, he discovered Hudson Strait, supposed then to be the long desired entrance into the Pacific. This exploit drew the attention of Walsingham, and by him Davis was presented to Burleigh, "who was also pleased to show him great encouragement." If either these statesmen or Elizabeth had been twenty years younger, his name would have filled a larger space in history than a small corner of the map of the world; but, if he was employed at all in the last years of the century, no vates sacer has been found to celebrate his work, and no clew is left to guide us. He disappears; a cloud falls over him. He is known to have commanded trading vessels in the Eastern seas, and to have returned five times from India. But the details are all lost, and accident has only parted the clouds for a moment to show us the mournful setting with which he, too, went down upon the sea.

In taking out Sir Edward Michellthorne to India, in 1604, he fell in with a crew of Japanese, whose ship had been burnt, drifting at sea, without provisions, in a leaky junk. He supposed them to be pirates, but he did not choose to leave them to so wretched a death, and took them on board; and in a few hours, watching their opportunity, they murdered him.

As the fool dieth, so dieth the wise, and there is no difference; it was the chance of the sea, and the ill reward of a humane action—a melancholy end for such a man—like the end of a warrior, not dying Epaminondas-like on the field of victory, but cut off in some poor brawl or ambuscade. But so it was with all these men. They were cut off in the flower of their days, and few of them laid their bones in the sepulchres of their fathers. They knew the service which they had chosen, and they did not ask the wages for which they had not laboured. Life with them was no summer holiday, but a holy sacrifice offered up to duty, and what their Master sent was welcome. Beautiful is old age—beautiful is the slow-dropping mellow autumn of a rich, glorious summer. In the old man, Nature has fulfilled her work; she loads him with her blessings; she fills him with the fruits of a well-spent life; and, surrounded by his children and his children's children, she rocks him softly away to a grave, to which he is followed with blessings. God forbid we should not call it beautiful. It is beautiful, but not the most beautiful. There is another life, hard, rough, and thorny, trodden with bleeding feet and aching brow; the life of which the cross is the symbol; a battle which no peace follows, this side the grave; which the grave gapes to finish, before the victory is won; and—strange that it should be so—this is the highest life of man. Look back along the great names of history; there is none whose life has been other than this. They to whom it has been given to do the really highest work in this earth—whoever they are, Jew or Gentile, Pagan or Christian, warriors, legislators, philosophers, priests, poets, kings, slaves—one and all, their fate has been the same—the same bitter cup has been given them to drink. And so it was with the servants of England in the sixteenth century. Their life was a long battle, either with the elements or with men; and it was enough for them to fulfil their work, and to pass away in the hour when God had nothing more to bid them do.

Froude: "Short Studies on Great Subjects."



THE SEA-KING'S BURIAL

"My strength is failing fast," Said the sea-king to his men; "I shall never sail the seas As a conqueror again. But while yet a drop remains Of the life-blood in my veins, Raise, O raise me from the bed; Put the crown upon my head; Put my good sword in my hand, And so lead me to the strand, Where my ship at anchor rides Steadily; If I cannot end my life In the crimsoned battle-strife, Let me die as I have lived, On the sea."

They have raised King Balder up, Put his crown upon his head; They have sheathed his limbs in mail, And the purple o'er him spread; And amid the greeting rude Of a gathering multitude, Borne him slowly to the shore— All the energy of yore From his dim eyes flashing forth— Old sea-lion of the north— As he looked upon his ship Riding free, And on his forehead pale Felt the cold, refreshing gale, And heard the welcome sound Of the sea.

They have borne him to the ship With a slow and solemn tread; They have placed him on the deck With his crown upon his head, Where he sat as on a throne; And have left him there alone, With his anchor ready weighed And his snowy sails displayed To the favouring wind, once more Blowing freshly from the shore; And have bidden him farewell Tenderly, Saying, "King of mighty men, We shall meet thee yet again, In Valhalla, with the monarchs Of the sea."

Underneath him in the hold They have placed the lighted brand; And the fire was burning slow As the vessel from the land, Like a stag-hound from the slips, Darted forth from out the ships. There was music in her sail As it swelled before the gale, And a dashing at her prow As it cleft the waves below, And the good ship sped along, Scudding free; As on many a battle morn In her time she had been borne, To struggle and to conquer On the sea.

And the king, with sudden strength, Started up and paced the deck, With his good sword for his staff And his robe around his neck: Once alone, he raised his hand To the people on the land; And with shout and joyous cry Once again they made reply, Till the loud, exulting cheer Sounded faintly on his ear; For the gale was o'er him blowing Fresh and free; And ere yet an hour had passed, He was driven before the blast, And a storm was on his path On the sea.

"So blow, ye tempests, blow, And my spirit shall not quail: I have fought with many a foe, I have weathered many a gale; And in this hour of death, Ere I yield my fleeting breath— Ere the fire now burning slow Shall come rushing from below, And this worn and wasted frame Be devoted to the flame— I will raise my voice in triumph, Singing free;— To the great All-Father's home I am driving through the foam, I am sailing to Valhalla, O'er the sea.

"So blow, ye stormy winds— And, ye flames, ascend on high;— In the easy, idle bed Let the slave and coward die! But give me the driving keel, Clang of shields and flashing steel; Happy, happy, thus I'd yield, On the deck or in the field, My last breath, shouting: 'On To victory.' But since this has been denied, They shall say that I have died Without flinching, like a monarch Of the sea."

And Balder spoke no more, And no sound escaped his lip;— Neither recked he of the roar, The destruction of his ship, Nor the fleet sparks mounting high, Nor the glare upon the sky; Scarcely heard the billows dash, Nor the burning timber crash: Scarcely felt the scorching heat That was gathering at his feet, Nor the fierce flames mounting o'er him Greedily. But the life was in him yet, And the courage to forget All his pain, in his triumph On the sea.

Once alone a cry arose, Half of anguish, half of pride, As he sprang upon his feet With the flames on every side. "I am coming!" said the king, "Where the swords and bucklers ring— Where the warrior lives again With the souls of mighty men— I am coming, great All-Father, Unto Thee! Unto Odin, unto Thor, And the strong, true hearts of yore— I am coming to Valhalla, O'er the sea."

Charles Mackay



Reading enables us to see with the keenest eyes, to hear with the finest ears, and listen to the sweetest voices of all time.

Lowell



MY CASTLES IN SPAIN

I am the owner of great estates. Many of them lie in the west, but the greater part in Spain.

You may see my western possessions any evening at sunset when their spires and battlements flash against the horizon. But my finest castles are in Spain. It is a country famously romantic, and my castles are all of perfect proportions and appropriately set in the most picturesque situations.

I have never been in Spain myself, but I have naturally conversed much with travellers to that country; although, I must allow, without deriving from them much substantial information about my property there.

The wisest of them told me that there were more holders of real estate in Spain than in any other region he had ever heard of, and they are all great proprietors.

Every one of them possesses a multitude of the stateliest castles. It is remarkable that none of the proprietors have ever been to Spain to take possession and report to the rest of us the state of our property there, and it is not easy for me to say how I know so much about my castles in Spain.

The sun always shines upon them. They stand lofty and fair in a luminous, golden atmosphere, a little hazy and dreamy, perhaps, like the Indian summer, but in which no gales blow and there are no tempests.

All the sublime mountains and beautiful valleys and soft landscapes that I have not yet seen are to be found in the grounds.

I have often wondered how I should reach my castles. I have inquired very particularly, but nobody seemed to know the way. It occurred to me that Bourne, the millionaire, must have ascertained the safest and most expeditious route to Spain; so I stole a few minutes one afternoon and went into his office.

He was sitting at his desk, writing rapidly, and surrounded by files of papers and patterns, specimens, boxes,—everything that covers the tables of a great merchant.

"A moment, please, Mr. Bourne." He looked up hastily, and wished me good-morning, which courtesy I attributed to Spanish sympathy.

"What is it, sir?" he asked blandly, but with wrinkled brow.

"Mr. Bourne, have you any castles in Spain?" said I, without preface. He looked at me for a few moments, without speaking and without seeming to see me. His brow gradually smoothed, and his eyes apparently looking into the street were really, I have no doubt, feasting upon the Spanish landscape.

"Too many, too many," said he, at length, musingly, shaking his head and without addressing me.

He feared, I thought, that he had too much impracticable property elsewhere to own so much in Spain: so I asked:—

"Will you tell me what you consider the shortest and safest route thither, Mr. Bourne? for, of course, a man who drives such an immense trade with all parts of the world will know all that I have come to inquire."

"My dear sir," answered he, wearily, "I have been trying all my life to discover it; but none of my ships have ever been there—none of my captains have any report to make.

"They bring me, as they brought my father, gold-dust from Guinea, ivory, pearls, and precious stones from every part of the earth; but not a fruit, not a solitary flower, from one of my castles in Spain.

"I have sent clerks, agents, and travellers of all kinds, philosophers, pleasure hunters, and invalids, in all sorts of ships, to all sorts of places, but none of them ever saw or heard of my castles, except a young poet, and he died in a madhouse."

"Mr. Bourne, will you take five thousand at ninety-seven?" hastily demanded a man whom, as he entered, I recognized as a broker. "We'll make a splendid thing of it."

Bourne nodded assent, and the broker disappeared.

"Happy man!" muttered the merchant, as the broker went out; "he has no castles in Spain."

"I am sorry to have troubled you, Mr. Bourne," said I, retiring.

"I'm glad you came," returned he; "but, I assure you, had I known the route you hoped to ascertain from me I should have sailed years and years ago. People sail for the Northwest Passage, which is nothing when you have found it. Why don't the English Admiralty fit out expeditions to discover all our castles in Spain?"

Yet I dream my dreams and attend to my castles in Spain. I have so much property there that I could not in conscience neglect it.

All the years of my youth and hopes of my manhood are stored away, like precious stones, in the vaults; and I know that I shall find everything elegant, beautiful, and convenient when I come into possession.

As the years go by, I am not conscious that my interest diminishes.

Shall I tell a secret? Shall I confess that sometimes when I have been sitting reading to my Prue "Cymbeline," perhaps, or a "Canterbury Tale," I have seemed to see clearly before me the broad highway to my castles in Spain, and, as she looked up from her work and smiled in sympathy, I have even fancied that I was already there?

George William Curtis: "Prue and I." (Adapted)



ALADDIN

When I was a beggarly boy And lived in a cellar damp, I had not a friend or a toy, But I had Aladdin's lamp; When I could not sleep for cold, I had fire enough in my brain, And builded with roofs of gold My beautiful castles in Spain!

Since then I have toiled day and night, I have money and power good store, But I'd give all my lamps of silver bright For the one that is mine no more; Take, Fortune, whatever you choose, You gave, and may snatch again; I have nothing 'twould pain me to lose, For I own no more castles in Spain!

Lowell



DRAKE'S VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD

Francis Drake was born near Tavistock in the year 1545. He served his time as an apprentice in a Channel coaster, and his master, who had been struck with his character, left the vessel to him in his will when he died. He was then twenty-one. His kinsman, John Hawkins, was fitting out his third expedition to the Spanish Main, and young Drake, with a party of his Kentish friends, went to Plymouth and joined him. In 1572 "he made himself whole with the Spaniards" by seizing a convoy of bullion at Panama, and on that occasion, having seen the South Pacific from the mountains, "he fell on his knees and prayed God that he might one day navigate those waters," which no English keel as yet had furrowed.

The time and the opportunity had come. He was now in the prime of his strength, thirty-two years old, of middle height, with crisp brown hair, a broad high forehead; gray, steady eyes, unusually long; small ears tight to the head; the mouth and chin slightly concealed by the moustache and beard, but hard, inflexible, and fierce. His dress, as he appears in his portrait, is a loose, dark, seaman's shirt, belted at the waist. About his neck is a plaited cord with a ring attached to it, in which, as if the attitude was familiar, one of his fingers is slung, displaying a small, delicate, but long and sinewy hand. When at sea he wore a scarlet cap with a gold band, and was exacting in the respect with which he required to be treated by his crew.

Such was Francis Drake when he stood on the deck of the Pelican in Plymouth harbour, in November, 1577. The squadron, with which he was preparing to sail into a chartless ocean and invade the dominions of the King of Spain, consisted of his own ship, of a hundred and twenty tons, the size of the smallest class of our modern Channel schooners, two barques of fifty and thirty tons each, a second ship as it was called, the Elizabeth, of eighty tons, not larger than a common revenue cutter, and a pinnace, hardly more than a boat, intended to be burnt if it could not bear the seas. These vessels, with a hundred and sixty-four men, composed the force. The object of the expedition was kept as far as possible secret. On the fifteenth of November the expedition sailed from Plymouth Sound. The vessels struck across the Atlantic and made the coast of South America on the fifth of April in latitude thirty-three degrees South.

The perils of the voyage were now about to commence. No Englishman had as yet passed Magellan's Strait. Cape Horn was unknown. Tierra del Fuego was supposed to be part of a solid continent which stretched unbroken to the Antarctic pole. A single narrow channel was the only access to the Pacific then believed to exist. There were no charts, no records of past experiences. It was known that Magellan had gone through, but that was all. It was the wildest and coldest season of the year, and the vessels in which the attempt was to be made were mere cockle-shells. They were taken on shore, overhauled and scoured, the rigging looked to, and the sails new bent.

On the seventeenth of August, answering to the February of the northern hemisphere, all was once more in order. Drake sailed from Port St. Julian, and on the twentieth entered the Strait and felt his way between the walls of mountain "in extreme cold with frost and cold continually." To relieve the crews, who were tried by continual boat work and heaving the lead in front of the ships, they were allowed occasional halts at the islands, where they amused and provisioned themselves with killing infinite seals and penguins. Everything which they saw, birds, beasts, trees, climate, country, were strange, wild, and wonderful. After three weeks' toil and anxiety, they had accomplished the passage and found themselves in the open Pacific. But they found also that it was no peaceful ocean into which they had entered, but the stormiest they had ever encountered. Their vessels were now reduced to three; the pinnace had been left behind at Port St. Julian, and there remained only the Pelican, the Elizabeth, and the thirty-ton cutter. Instantly that they emerged out of the Strait, they were caught in a gale which swept them six hundred miles to the south-west. For six weeks they were battered to and fro, in bitter cold and winds which seemed as if they blew in these latitudes for ever. The cutter went down in the fearful seas, carrying her crew with her. The Elizabeth and the Pelican were separated. The bravest sailor might well have been daunted at such a commencement, and Winter, recovering the opening again and, believing Drake to be lost, called a council in his cabin and proposed to return to England. They had agreed to meet, if they were parted, on the coast in the latitude of Valparaiso. The men, with better heart than their commander, desired to keep the appointment. But those terrible weeks had sickened Winter. He overruled the opinions of the rest, re-entered the Strait, and reached England in the following June.

Drake, meanwhile, had found shelter among the islands of Tierra del Fuego. At length spring brought fair winds and smooth seas, and running up the coast and looking about for her consort, the Pelican or Golden Hind—for she had both names—fell in with an Indian fisherman, who informed Drake that in the harbour of Valparaiso, already a small Spanish settlement, there lay a great galleon which had come from Peru. Galleons were the fruit that he was in search of. He sailed in, and the Spanish seamen, who had never yet seen a stranger in those waters, ran up their flags, beat their drums, and prepared a banquet for their supposed countrymen. The Pelican shot up alongside. The English sailors leaped on board, and one "Thomas Moore," a lad from Plymouth, began the play with knocking down the first man that he met, saluting him in Spanish as he fell, and crying out "Down, dog." The Spaniards, overwhelmed with surprise, began to cross and bless themselves. One sprang overboard and swam ashore; the rest were bound and stowed away under the hatches while the ship was rifled. The beginning was not a bad one. Wedges of gold were found weighing four hundred pounds, besides miscellaneous plunder. The settlement, which was visited next, was less productive, for the inhabitants had fled, taking their valuables with them.

At Arica, the port of Potosi, fifty-seven blocks of precious metal were added to the store; and from thence they made haste to Lima, where the largest booty was looked for. They found that they had just missed it. Twelve ships lay at anchor in the port without arms, without crews, and with their sails on shore. In all of these they discovered but a few chests of reals and some bales of silk and linen. A thirteenth, called by the seamen the Cacafuego, but christened in her baptism "Our Lady of the Conception," had sailed for the Isthmus a few days before, taking with her all the bullion which the mines had yielded for the season. She had been literally ballasted with silver, and carried also several precious boxes of gold and jewels.

Not a moment was lost. The cables of the ships at Lima were cut, and they were left to drive on shore to prevent pursuit; and then away sped the Pelican due north, with every stitch of her canvas spread. A gold chain was promised to the first man who caught sight of the Cacafuego. A sail was seen the second day of the chase: it was not the vessel which they were in pursuit of, but the prize was worth the having. They took eighty pounds' weight of gold in wedges, the purest which they yet had seen.

For eight hundred miles the Pelican flew on. At length, one degree to the north of the line, off Quito, and close to the shore, a look-out on the mast-head cried out that he saw the chase and claimed the promised chain; she was recognized by the peculiarities in her sails, of which they had received exact information at Lima. There lay the Cacafuego; if they could take her their work would be done, and they might go home in triumph. She was several miles ahead of them; if she guessed their character, she would run in under the land, and they might lose her. It was afternoon: several hours remained of daylight, and Drake did not wish to come up with her till dark.

The Pelican sailed two feet to the Cacafuego's one, and dreading that her speed might rouse suspicion, he filled his empty wine casks with water and trailed them astern. The chase meanwhile unsuspecting, and glad of company on a lonely voyage, slackened sail and waited for her slow pursuer. The sun sank low, and at last set into the ocean, and then, when both ships had become invisible from the land, the casks were hoisted in, the Pelican was restored to her speed, and shooting up within a cable's length of the Cacafuego, hailed to her to run into the wind. The Spanish commander, not understanding the meaning of such an order, paid no attention to it. The next moment the corsair opened her ports, fired a broadside, and brought his main-mast about his ears. His decks were cleared by a shower of arrows, with one of which he was himself wounded. In a few minutes more he was a prisoner, and his ship and all that it contained was in the hands of the English. The wreck was cut away, the ship cleared, and her head turned to the sea; by daybreak even the line of the Andes had become invisible, and at leisure, in the open ocean, the work of rifling began. The full value of the plunder taken in this ship was never actually confessed. It remained a secret between Drake and the Queen. In a schedule afterwards published, he acknowledged to have found in the Cacafuego alone twenty-six tons of silver bullion, thirteen chests of coined silver, and almost a hundredweight of gold. But this was only so much as the Spaniards could prove to have been on board.

Drake imagined, like most other English seamen, that there was a passage to the north corresponding to Magellan's Strait, of which Frobisher conceived that he had found the eastern entrance. He went on therefore at his leisure towards the coast of Mexico, intending to follow the shore till he found it. Another ship coming from China crossed him on his way loaded with silks and porcelain. He took the best of the freight with a golden falcon and a superb emerald. Then needing fresh water he touched at the Spanish settlement of Guatulco.

The work of plunder was nearly over. Again sailing north, the Pelican fell in with a Spanish nobleman who was going out as Governor to the Philippines. He was detained a few hours and relieved of his finery, and then, says one of the party: "Our general, thinking himself both in respect of his private injuries received from the Spaniards, as also their contempt and indignities offered to our country and prince in general, sufficiently satisfied and revenged, and supposing her Majesty would rest contented with this service, began to consider the best way for his country."

The first necessity was a complete repair of the Pelican's hull. Before the days of copper sheathing, the ships' bottoms grew foul with weed; the great barnacles formed in clusters and stopped their speed, and the sea-worms bored holes into the planking. Twenty thousand miles of unknown water lay between Drake and Plymouth Sound, and he was not a man to run idle risks. Running on till he had left the furthest Spanish station far to the south, he put into the Bay of Canoa in Lower California. There he laid his ship on shore, set up forge and workshop, and refitted her with a month's labour from stem to stern.