Nor you, ye Proud, impute to These the fault,

If Mem’ry o’er their Tomb no Trophies raise,

Where thro’ the long-drawn isle and fretted vault

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn or animated bust

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?

Can Honor’s voice provoke the silent dust,

Or Flatt’ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;

Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway’d,

Or wak’d to ecstasy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page

Rich with the spoils of time did ne’er unroll;

Chill Penury repress’d their noble rage,

And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene,

The dark unfathom’d caves of ocean bear:

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,

And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast

The little Tyrant of his fields withstood;

Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,

Some Cromwell guiltless of his country’s blood.

Th’ applause of list’ning senates to command,

The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o’er a smiling land,

And read their hist’ry in a nation’s eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib’d alone

Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin’d;

Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,

And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,

To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,

Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride

With incense kindled at the Muse’s flame.

Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife,

Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray;

Along the cool sequester’d vale of life

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev’n these bones from insult to protect

Some frail memorial still erected nigh,

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck’d,

Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th’ unletter’d muse,

The place of fame and elegy supply:

And many a holy text around she strews,

That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,

This pleasing anxious being e’er resign’d,

Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,

Nor cast one longing ling’ring look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,

Some pious drops the closing eye requires;

Ev’n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,

Ev’n in our Ashes live their wonted Fires.

For thee, who mindful of th’ unhonor’d Dead

Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;

If chance, by lonely contemplation led,

Some kindred Spirit shall inquire thy fate,

Haply some hoary-headed Swain may say,

‘Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn

‘Brushing with hasty steps the dews away

‘To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

‘There at the foot of yonder nodding beech

‘That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,

‘His listless length at noontide would he stretch,

‘And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

‘Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,

‘Mutt’ring his wayward fancies he would rove,

‘Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,

‘Or craz’d with care, or cross’d in hopeless love.

‘One morn I miss’d him on the custom’d hill,

‘Along the heath and near his fav’rite tree;

‘Another came; nor yet beside the rill,

‘Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

‘The next with dirges due in sad array

‘Slow thro’ the church-way path we saw him borne.

‘Approach and read (for thou can’st read) the lay,

‘Grav’d on the stone beneath yon aged thorn.’

_THE EPITAPH._

_Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth_

_A Youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown._

_Fair Science frown’d not on his humble birth,_

_And Melancholy mark’d him for her own._

_Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,_

_Heav’n did a recompense as largely send:_

_He gave to Mis’ry all he had, a tear,_

_He gain’d from Heav’n (t’was all he wish’d) a friend._

_No farther seek his merits to disclose,_

_Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,_

_(There they alike in trembling hope repose,)_

_The bosom of his Father and his God._

BELSHAZZAR’S FEAST.

BELSHAZZAR the king made a great feast to a thousand of his lords, and

drank wine before the thousand. Belshazzar, while he tasted the wine,

commanded to bring the golden and silver vessels, which his father

Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple which was in Jerusalem; that

the king and his princes and his wives might drink therein.

Then they brought the golden vessels that were taken out of the temple

of the house of God, which was at Jerusalem; and the king, his princes

and his wives, drank in them.

They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold, and of silver, of brass,

of iron, of wood, and of stone.

In the same hour came forth fingers of a man’s hand, and wrote over

against the candlestick upon the plaster of the wall of the king’s

palace: and the king saw the part of the hand that wrote.

Then the king’s countenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him,

so that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees smote one

against another. The king cried aloud to bring in the astrologers, the

Chaldeans, and the soothsayers. And the king spake and said to the wise

men of Babylon: “Whosoever shall read this writing, and show me the

interpretation thereof, shall be clothed with scarlet, and have a chain

of gold about his neck, and shall be the third ruler in the kingdom.”

Then came in all the king’s wise men: but they could not read the

writing, nor make known to the king the interpretation thereof.

Then was King Belshazzar greatly troubled, and his countenance was

changed in him, and his lords were astonished.

Now the queen, by reason of the words of the king and his lords, came

into the banquet house: and the queen spake and said: “O king, live for

ever: let not thy thoughts trouble thee, nor let thy countenance be

changed:

“There is a man in thy kingdom in whom is the spirit of the holy gods;

and in the days of thy father light and understanding and wisdom, like

the wisdom of the gods, was found in him; whom the king Nebuchadnezzar

thy father, the king, I say, thy father, made him master of the

magicians, astrologers, Chaldeans, and soothsayers;

“Forasmuch as an excellent spirit, and knowledge, and understanding,

interpreting of dreams, and showing of hard sentences, and dissolving of

doubts, were found in the same Daniel, whom the king named Belteshazzar:

now let Daniel be called, and he will show the interpretation.”

Then was Daniel brought in before the king. And the king spake and said

unto Daniel: “Art thou that Daniel, which art of the children of the

captivity of Judah, whom the king, my father, brought out of Jewry?

“I have even heard of thee, that the spirit of the gods is in thee, and

that light and understanding and excellent wisdom is found in thee.

“And now the wise men, the astrologers, have been brought in before me,

that they should read this writing, and make known unto me the

interpretation thereof: but they could not show the interpretation of

the thing:

“And I have heard of thee, that thou canst make interpretations, and

dissolve doubts: now if thou canst read the writing, and make known to

me the interpretation thereof, thou shalt be clothed with scarlet, and

have a chain of gold about thy neck, and shalt be the third ruler in the

kingdom.”

Then Daniel answered and said before the king: “Let thy gifts be to

thyself, and give thy rewards to another; yet I will read the writing

unto the king, and make known to him the interpretation.

“O thou king, the most high God gave Nebuchadnezzar thy father a

kingdom, and majesty, and glory, and honor:

“And for the majesty that he gave him, all people, nations, and

languages trembled and feared before him: whom he would he slew, and

whom he would he kept alive; and whom he would he set up, and whom he

would he put down.

“But when his heart was lifted up, and his mind hardened in pride, he

was deposed from his kingly throne, and they took his glory from him:

“And he was driven from the sons of men; and his heart was made like the

beasts, and his dwelling was with the wild asses: they fed him with

grass like oxen, and his body was wet with the dew of heaven; till he

knew that the most high God ruled in the kingdom of men, and that he

appointeth over it whomsoever he will.

“And thou his son, O Belshazzar, hast not humbled thine heart, though

thou knewest all this;

“But hast lifted up thyself against the Lord of heaven; and they have

brought the vessels of his house before thee, and thou and thy lords and

thy wives, have drunk wine in them; and thou hast praised the gods of

silver, and gold, of brass, iron, wood, and stone, which see not, nor

hear, nor know: and the God in whose hand thy breath is, and whose are

all thy ways, hast thou not glorified:

“Then was the part of the hand sent from him; and this writing was

written.

“And this is the writing that was written:--

MENE, MENE, TEKEL, UPHARSIN.

This is the interpretation of the thing:--

MENE;

God hath NUMBERED thy kingdom,

And finished it.

TEKEL;

Thou art WEIGHED in the balances,

And art found wanting.

PERES;

Thy kingdom is DIVIDED,

And given to the Medes and Persians.”

Then commanded Belshazzar, and they clothed Daniel with scarlet and put

a chain of gold about his neck, and made a proclamation concerning him,

that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.

In that night was Belshazzar, the king of the Chaldeans, slain.

And Darius, the Median, took the kingdom, being about threescore and two

years old.

_From “The Bible,” Book of Daniel, Chap. V._

THE BATTLE OF QUEBEC.

FRANCIS PARKMAN.

FRANCIS PARKMAN was born in Boston in 1823. He was graduated from

Harvard College when he was twenty-one. He visited Europe and on

his return went on a tour in the far West, across the prairies and

among the Rocky Mountains. He became well acquainted with the

Indians, sharing their camps and hunting buffaloes with them. His

book, “The California and Oregon Trail,” contains a vivid account

of his explorations. This book was followed by “The History of the

Conspiracy of Pontiac” and a novel called “Vassal Morton.”

[Illustration]

Mr. Parkman devoted a number of years to writing histories of the

attempts of the French and English to settle North America. His

qualities as a writer were of a high order. His style is marked by

uncommon vigor. His pages are alive with thrilling adventure,

brilliant description, and romantic episodes. He has left no room

for a competitor in the same field. Mr. Parkman died in 1893.

THE eventful night of the 12th was clear and calm, with no light but

that of the stars. Within two hours before daybreak thirty boats,

crowded with sixteen hundred soldiers, cast off from the vessels and

floated downward, in perfect order, with the current of the ebb tide. To

the boundless joy of the army, Wolfe’s malady had abated, and he was

able to command in person. His ruined health, the gloomy prospects of

the siege, and the disaster at Montmorenci had oppressed him with the

deepest melancholy, but never impaired for a moment the promptness of

his decisions or the impetuous energy of his action. He sat in the stern

of one of the boats, pale and weak, but borne up to a calm height of

resolution. Every order had been given, every arrangement made, and it

only remained to face the issue. The ebbing tide sufficed to bear the

boats along, and nothing broke the silence of the night but the gurgling

of the river and the low voice of Wolfe, as he repeated to the officers

about him the stanzas of Gray’s “Elegy in a Country Churchyard,” which

had recently appeared and which he had just received from England.

Perhaps, as he uttered those strangely appropriate words,--

“The paths of glory lead but to the grave,”

the shadows of his own approaching fate stole with mournful prophecy

across his mind. “Gentlemen,” he said as he closed his recital, “I would

rather have written those lines than take Quebec to-morrow.”

As they approached the landing-place, the boats edged closer in towards

the northern shore, and the woody precipices rose high on their left,

like a wall of undistinguished blackness.

They reached the landing-place in safety--an indentation in the shore

about a league above the city, and now bearing the name of Wolfe’s Cove.

Here a narrow path led up the face of the heights, and a French guard

was posted at the top to defend the pass. By the force of the current

the foremost boats, including that which carried Wolfe himself, were

borne a little below the spot. The general was one of the first on

shore.

Meanwhile the vessels had dropped downward with the current, and

anchored opposite the landing-place. The remaining troops were

disembarked, and, with the dawn of day, the whole were brought in safety

to the shore.

[Illustration: THE ASCENT TO THE PLAINS OF ABRAHAM.]

The sun rose, and, from the ramparts of Quebec, the astonished people

saw the Plains of Abraham glittering with arms, and the dark-red lines

of the English forming in array of battle. Breathless messengers had

borne the evil tidings to Montcalm, and far and near his wide-extended

camp resounded with the rolling of alarm drums and the din of startled

preparation. He, too, had his struggles and his sorrows. The civil power

had thwarted him; famine, discontent, and disaffection were rife among

his soldiers; and no small portion of the Canadian militia had dispersed

from sheer starvation. In spite of all, he had trusted to hold out till

the winter frosts should drive the invaders from before the town, when,

on that disastrous morning, the news of their successful temerity fell

like a cannon shot upon his ear. Still he assumed a tone of confidence.

“They have got to the weak side of us at last,” he is reported to have

said, “and we must crush them with our numbers.”

At a little before ten the English could see that Montcalm was preparing

to advance, and in a few moments all his troops appeared in rapid

motion. They came on in three divisions, shouting, after the manner of

their nation, and firing heavily as soon as they came within range. In

the British ranks not a trigger was pulled, not a soldier stirred; and

their ominous composure seemed to damp the spirits of the assailants. It

was not till the French were within forty yards that the fatal word was

given, and the British muskets blazed forth at once in one crashing

explosion. Like a ship at full career, arrested with sudden ruin on a

sunken rock, the ranks of Montcalm staggered, shivered, and broke before

that wasting storm of lead. The smoke, rolling along the field, for a

moment shut out the view; but when the white wreaths were scattered on

the wind, a wretched spectacle was disclosed; men and officers tumbled

in heaps, battalions resolved into a mob, order and obedience gone; and

when the British muskets were leveled for a second volley, the masses of

the militia were seen to cower and shrink with uncontrollable panic. For

a few minutes the French regulars stood their ground, returning a sharp

and not ineffectual fire. But now, echoing cheer on cheer, redoubling

volley on volley, trampling the dying and the dead, and driving the

fugitives in crowds, the British troops advanced and swept the field

before them. The ardor of the men burst all restraint. They broke into a

run and with unsparing slaughter chased the flying multitude to the

gates of Quebec. Foremost of all, the light-footed Highlanders dashed

along in furious pursuit, hewing down the Frenchmen with their

broadswords, and slaying many in the very ditch of the fortifications.

Never was victory more quick or more decisive; yet the triumph of the

victors was mingled with sadness as the tidings went from rank to rank

that Wolfe had fallen.

In the heat of the action, as he advanced at the head of the grenadiers

of Louisburg, a bullet shattered his wrist; but he wrapped his

handkerchief about the wound and showed no sign of pain. A moment more

and a ball pierced his side. Still he pressed forward, waving his sword

and cheering his soldiers to the attack, when a third shot lodged deep

within his breast. He paused, reeled, and, staggering to one side, fell

to the earth. Brown, a lieutenant of the grenadiers, Henderson, a

volunteer, an officer of artillery, and a private soldier raised him

together in their arms, and, bearing him to the rear, laid him softly

on the grass. They asked him if he would have a surgeon; but he shook

his head and answered that all was over with him. His eyes closed with

the torpor of approaching death, and those around sustained his fainting

form. Yet they could not withhold their gaze from the wild turmoil

before them and the charging ranks of their companions rushing through

fire and smoke. “See how they run!” one of the officers exclaimed as the

French fled in confusion before the leveled bayonets. “Who run?”

demanded Wolfe, opening his eyes, like a man aroused from sleep. “The

enemy, sir,” was the reply; “they give way everywhere.” “Then,” said the

dying general, “tell Colonel Burton to march Webb’s regiment down to

Charles River, to cut off their retreat from the bridge. Now, God be

praised! I will die in peace,” he murmured; and, turning on his side, he

calmly breathed his last.

_From “Montcalm and Wolfe.”_

THE STARLING.

LAURENCE STERNE.

LAURENCE STERNE, an English novelist, was born in Ireland in 1713.

He was the son of an English officer, and the first ten years of

his life were spent in traveling about with his father’s regiment.

He then entered a school near Halifax, where he studied for eight

or nine years, and completed his education at the University of

Cambridge.

Mr. Sterne became a clergyman of the Church of England, but devoted

a large portion of his time to the writing of fiction. He died in

London in 1768.

AND as for the Bastille, the terror is in the word. Make the most of it

you can, said I to myself, the Bastille is but another word for a tower,

and a tower is but another word for a house you can’t get out of. Mercy

on the gouty! for they are in it twice a year. But with nine _livres_ a

day, and pen and ink and paper and patience, albeit a man can’t get out,

he may do very well within, at least for a month or six weeks, at the

end of which, if he is a harmless fellow, his innocence appears and he

comes out a better and wiser man than he went in.

I had some occasion--I forget what--to step into the courtyard, as I

settled this account, and remember I walked downstairs in no small

triumph with the conceit of my reasoning. “Beshrew the _somber_ pencil!”

said I vauntingly; “for I envy not its power, which paints the evils of

life with so hard and deadly a coloring. The mind sits terrified at the

objects she has magnified herself and blackened. Reduce them to their

proper size and hue, she overlooks them. ’Tis true,” said I, correcting

the proposition, “the Bastille is not an evil to be despised. But strip

it of its towers, fill up the fosse, unbarricade the doors, call it

simply a confinement, and suppose ’tis some tyrant of a distemper, and

not of a man, which holds you in it, the evil vanishes and you bear the

other half without complaint.”

I was interrupted in the heyday of this soliloquy with a voice which I

took to be that of a child, which complained it could not get out. I

looked up and down the passage, and, seeing neither man, woman, nor

child, I went out without further attention.

In my return back through the passage, I heard the same words repeated

twice over; and, looking up, I saw it was a starling, hung in a little

cage. “I can’t get out--I can’t get out,” said the starling.

I stood looking at the bird; and to every person who came through the

passage it ran fluttering to the side towards which they approached it,

with the same lamentation of its captivity. “I can’t get out,” said the

starling. “God help thee!” said I; “but I’ll let thee out, cost what it

will.” So I turned about the cage to get the door. It was twisted and

double twisted so fast with wire there was no getting it open without

pulling the cage to pieces. I took both hands to it.

The bird flew to the place where I was attempting his deliverance, and,

thrusting his head through the trellis, pressed his breast against it,

as if impatient. “I fear, poor creature,” said I, “I cannot set thee at

liberty.” “No,” said the starling; “I can’t get out--I can’t get out.”

I never had my affections more tenderly awakened, nor do I remember an

incident in my life where the dissipated spirits to which my reason had

been a bubble were so suddenly called home. Mechanical as the notes

were, yet so true in tune to nature were they chanted, that in one

moment they overthrew all my systematic reasonings upon the Bastille;

and I heavily walked upstairs, unsaying every word I had said in going

down them.

“Disguise thyself as thou wilt, still, Slavery,” said I, “still thou art

a bitter draught; and though thousands in all ages have been made to

drink of thee, thou art no less bitter on that account. ’Tis thou,

thrice sweet and gracious goddess,”--addressing myself to

Liberty,--“whom all, in public or in private, worship, whose taste is

grateful, and ever will be so, till Nature herself shall change. No

_tint_ of words can spot thy snowy mantle, nor chymic power turn thy

scepter into iron. With thee to smile upon him as he eats his crust, the

swain is happier than his monarch, from whose court thou art exiled.

Gracious Heaven!” cried I, kneeling down upon the last step but one in

my ascent, “grant me but health, thou great Bestower of it, and give me

but this fair goddess as my companion, and shower down thy miters, if it

seem good unto thy divine providence, upon those heads which are aching

for them.”

The bird in his cage pursued me into my room. I sat down close by my

table, and, leaning my head upon my hand, I began to figure to myself

the miseries of confinement. I was in a right frame for it, and so I

gave full scope to my imagination.

I was going to begin with the millions of my fellow-creatures born to no

inheritance but slavery; but finding, however affecting the picture was,

that I could not bring it near me, and that the multitude of sad groups

in it did but distract me, I took a single captive, and, having first

shut him up in his dungeon, I then looked through the twilight of his

grated door to take his picture.

I beheld his body half wasted away with long expectation and

confinement, and felt what kind of sickness of the heart it was which

arises from hope deferred. Upon looking nearer, I saw him pale and

feverish. In thirty years the western breeze had not once fanned his

blood. He had seen no sun, no moon in all that time, nor had the voice

of friend or kinsman breathed through his lattice. His children!--

But here my heart began to bleed, and I was forced to go on with another

part of the portrait.

He was sitting upon the ground, upon a little straw, in the farthest

corner of his dungeon, which was alternately his chair and bed. A little

calendar of small sticks was laid at the head, notched all over with

the dismal days and nights he had passed there. He had one of these

little sticks in his hand, and with a rusty nail he was etching another

day of misery to add to the heap. As I darkened the little light he had,

he lifted up a hopeless eye towards the door, then cast it down, shook

his head, and went on with his work of affliction. I heard his chains

upon his legs as he turned his body to lay his little stick upon the

bundle. He gave a deep sigh. I saw the iron enter into his soul. I burst

into tears. I could not sustain the picture of confinement which my

fancy had drawn.

_From “The Sentimental Journey.”_

THE BELFRY PIGEON.

NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS.

NATHANIEL PARKER Willis was born in Portland, Me., in 1807, and

died near Cornwall-on-the-Hudson, N.Y., in 1867. His father was an

editor and founded “The Youth’s Companion.” His sister was an

authoress who wrote under the name of “Fanny Fern.”

Nathaniel was graduated at Yale College, and wrote poems and

literary essays during his college course. He spent several years

in traveling about Europe, and wrote a series of letters for the

newspapers during this time.

Mr. Willis published a number of poems, books of travel, and

novels. He possessed great natural gifts and there is much beauty

in his prose and verse.

ON the cross-beam, under the Old South bell,

The nest of a pigeon is builded well.

In summer and winter that bird is there,

Out and in with the morning air;

I love to see him track the street,

With his wary eye and active feet;

And I often watch him as he springs,

Circling the steeple with easy wings,

Till across the dial his shadow has passed,

And the belfry edge is gained at last.

’Tis a bird I love, with its brooding note,

And the trembling throb in its mottled throat;

There’s a human look in its swelling breast,

And the gentle curve of its lowly crest;

And I often stop with the fear I feel--

He runs so close to the rapid wheel.

Whatever is rung on that noisy bell--

Chime of the hour, or funeral knell--

The dove in the belfry must hear it well.

When the tongue swings out to the midnight moon,

When the sexton cheerily rings for noon,

When the clock strikes clear at morning light,

When the child is waked with “nine at night,”

When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air,

Filling the spirit with tones of prayer,--

Whatever tale in the bell is heard,

He broods on his folded feet unstirred,

Or, rising half in his rounded nest,

He takes the time to smooth his breast,

Then drops again, with filméd eyes,

And sleeps as the last vibration dies.

Sweet bird, I would that I could be

A hermit in the crowd like thee!

With wings to fly to wood and glen,

Thy lot, like mine, is cast with men;

And daily, with unwilling feet,

I tread, like thee, the crowded street;

But unlike me, when day is o’er,

Thou canst dismiss the world and soar,

Or, at a half-felt wish for rest,

Canst smooth the feathers on thy breast,

And drop, forgetful, to thy nest.

LADY UNA AND THE LION.

EDMUND SPENSER.

EDMUND SPENSER was a famous English, poet who lived in the time of

Queen Elizabeth. He was born in London in 1553 and received his

education at Cambridge, where he was a sizar. There is a mulberry

tree which Spenser is said to have planted still standing in the

garden of the college.

[Illustration]

His early boyhood was passed in London, with frequent visits among

the glens of northern England.

Spenser left Cambridge when he was twenty-four years old, and spent

several years with his relations in the north of England. On his

return to London, he published a series of twelve poems named after

the months, and called “The Shephearde’s Calender.” This gained him

a name as the first poet of the day. The next summer he went to

Ireland as secretary to Lord Grey.

Several years later he was awarded the Castle of Kilcolman for his

services. Here he was visited by Sir Walter Raleigh. Spenser had

written three books of “The Faerie Queene,” his greatest poem, and

Raleigh listened to them as the two poets sat beneath the alder

trees beside the River Mulla, which flowed through the castle

grounds. Raleigh was delighted with the poem, and persuaded Spenser

to accompany him to England, where he was presented to the Queen.

The first three books of “The Faerie Queene” were dedicated to

Queen Elizabeth. It was the first great allegorical poem that

England had produced, and it has never lost its power.

Spenser possessed a wonderful imagination, and had but to close his

eyes and he was in an enchanted land.

“The Faerie Queene” is the story of noble knights fighting against

wrong, and a beautiful lady rescued from danger. Only six books of

the twelve which Spenser planned were published.

The last years of Spenser’s life were filled with sadness. During a

rebellion his castle was burnt, and he and his family fled to

England.

He died in London in 1599, at the age of forty-six, and was buried

in Westminster Abbey.

NOUGHT is there under heaven’s wide hallowness

That moves more dear compassiön of mind,[a]

Than beauty brought t’ unworthy wretchedness

Through envy’s snares, or fortune’s freaks unkind.

I, whether lately through her brightness blind,

Or through allegiance and fast feälty,

Which I do owe unto all womankind,

Feel my heart pierced with so great agony,

When such I see, that all for pity I could die.

And now it is empassionèd so deep,

For fairest Una’s sake, of whom I sing,

That my frail eyes these lines with tears do steep,

To think how she through guileful handëling,[b]

Though true as touch, though daughter of a king,

Though fair as ever living wight was fair,

Though nor in word nor deed ill meriting,

Is from her Knight divorcèd in despair,

And her due loves derived to that vile Witch’s share.[c]

Yet she, most faithful Lady all this while,

Forsaken, woeful, solitary maid,

Far from all people’s press, as in exile,

In wilderness and wasteful deserts stray’d

To seek her Knight; who, subtilly betray’d

Through that late vision which th’ Enchanter wrought,

Had her abandon’d: she, of nought affray’d,

Through woods and wasteness wide him daily sought;

Yet wishèd tidings none of him unto her brought.

One day, nigh weary of the irksome way,

From her unhasty beast she did alight;

And on the grass her dainty limbs did lay

In secret shadow, far from all men’s sight;

From her fair head her fillet she undight,[d]

And laid her stole aside: her angel’s face,

As the great eye of heaven, shinèd bright,

And made a sunshine in the shady place:

Did never mortal eye behold such heavenly grace.

It fortunèd, out of the thickest wood

A ramping lion rushèd suddenly,

Hunting full greedy after savage blood:

Soon as the royal Virgin he did spy,

With gaping mouth at her ran greedily,

To have at once devour’d her tender corse;

But to the prey when as he drew more nigh,

His bloody rage assuagèd with remorse,

And, with the sight amazed, forgat his furious force.

Instead thereof, he kiss’d her weary feet,

And lick’d her lily hands with fawning tongue,

As he her wrongèd innocence did weet.

O, how can beauty master the most strong,

And simple truth subdue avenging wrong!

Whose yielded pride and proud submissiön,

Still dreading death, when she had markèd long,

Her heart ’gan melt in great compassiön;

And drizzling tears did shed for pure affectiön.

“The lion, lord of every beast in field,”

Quoth she, “his princely puissance doth abate,

And mighty proud to humble weak does yield,

Forgetful of the hungry rage which late

Him prick’d, in pity of my sad estate:--

But he, my lion, and my noble lord,

How does he find in cruel heart to hate

Her that him loved, and ever most adored

As the god of my life? why hath he me abhorr’d?”

Redounding tears did choke th’ end of her plaint,

Which softly echo’d from the neighbor wood;

And, sad to see her sorrowful constraint,

The kingly beast upon her gazing stood;

With pity calm’d, down fell his angry mood.

At last, in close heart shutting up her pain,

Arose the Virgin born of heavenly brood,

And to her snowy palfrey got again,

To seek her strayèd Champion if she might attain.

The lion would not leave her desolate,

But with her went along, as a strong guard

Of her chaste person, and a faithful mate

Of her sad troubles and misfortunes hard:

Still, when she slept, he kept both watch and ward;

And, when she waked, he waited diligent,

With humble service to her will prepared:

From her fair eyes he took commandëment,

And ever by her looks conceivèd her intent.

_From “The Faerie Queene.”_

Una is the heroine of the first Book of Spenser’s “Faerie Queene.”

She appears to have been intended, at least in part, as a poetical

impersonation of Truth. At all events, she is one of the sweetest

and loveliest visions that ever issued from a poet’s brain.

[a] l. 2. In Spenser’s time the endings _sion_, _tion_, as also

_cian_, and various others, were often used as two syllables.

[b] l. 13. That is, _handling_, in the sense of _treatment_. Here,

again, we have a relic of ancient usage. So, too, in _commandement_,

in the last stanza of this piece. And in many other like words the old

poets often make two syllables where we now make but one.

[c] l. 18. An old witch named Duessa, painted and dressed up into a

false show of beauty, and dealing in magic arts. She had lied and

cheated the red-cross Knight, the hero of the story, out of his faith

in Una and beguiled him with her mighty spells.

[d] l. 32. _undight_, took off. l. 33. _stole_, a long, loose garment

reaching to the feet. l. 48. _weet_, understand. l. 64. _Redounding_,

flowing.

PURITY OF CHARACTER.

OVER the plum and apricot there may be seen a bloom and beauty more

exquisite than the fruit itself--a soft delicate flush that overspreads

its blushing cheek. Now, if you strike your hand over that, and it is

once gone, it is gone forever; for it never grows but once.

The flower that hangs in the morning impearled with dew, arrayed with

jewels, once shake it so that the beads roll off, and you may sprinkle

water over it as you please, yet it can never be made again what it was

when the dew fell lightly upon it from heaven.

On a frosty morning you may see the panes of glass covered with

landscapes, mountains, lakes, and trees, blended in a beautiful

fantastic picture. Now lay your hand upon the glass, and by the scratch

of your fingers, or by the warmth of the palm, all the delicate tracery

will be immediately obliterated.

So in youth there is a purity of character which when once touched and

defiled can never be restored--a fringe more delicate than frost-work,

and which, when torn and broken, will never be reëmbroidered.

When a young man leaves his father’s house, with the blessing of his

mother’s tears still wet upon his forehead, if he once loses that early

purity of character, it is a loss he can never make whole again.

DELIGHTS OF READING.

SIR JOHN LUBBOCK.

BOOKS are to mankind what memory is to the individual. They contain the

history of our race, the discoveries we have made, the accumulated

knowledge and experience of ages; they picture for us the marvels and

beauties of nature; help us in our difficulties, comfort us in sorrow

and in suffering, change hours of weariness into moments of delight,

store our minds with ideas, fill them with good and happy thoughts, and

lift us out of and above ourselves.

There is an Oriental story of two men: one was a king, who every night

dreamt he was a beggar; the other was a beggar, who every night dreamt

he was a prince and lived in a palace. I am not sure that the king had

very much the best of it. Imagination is sometimes more vivid than

reality. But, however this may be, when we read we may not only (if we

wish it) be kings and live in palaces, but, what is far better, we may

transport ourselves to the mountains or the seashore, and visit the most

beautiful parts of the earth, without fatigue, inconvenience, or

expense.

Many of those who have had, as we say, all that this world can give,

have yet told us they owed much of their purest happiness to books.

Ascham, in “The Schoolmaster,” tells a touching story of his last visit

to Lady Jane Grey. He found her sitting in an oriel window reading

Plato’s beautiful account of the death of Socrates. Her father and

mother were hunting in the park, the hounds were in full cry and their

voices came in through the open window. He expressed his surprise that

she had not joined them. But, said she, “I wist that all their pleasure

in the park is but a shadow to the pleasure I find in Plato.”

Macaulay had wealth and fame, rank and power, and yet he tells us in his

biography that he owed the happiest hours of his life to books. In a

charming letter to a little girl he says: “Thank you for your very

pretty letter. I am always glad to make my little girl happy, and

nothing pleases me so much as to see that she likes books, for when she

is as old as I am she will find that they are better than all the tarts

and cakes, toys and plays, and sights in the world. If any one would

make me the greatest king that ever lived, with palaces and gardens and

fine dinners, and wines and coaches, and beautiful clothes, and hundreds

of servants, on condition that I should not read books, I would not be a

king. I would rather be a poor man in a garret with plenty of books than

a king who did not love reading.”

Books, indeed, endow us with a whole enchanted palace of thoughts. There

is a wider prospect, says Jean Paul Richter, from Parnassus than from

the throne. In one way they give us an even more vivid idea than the

actual reality, just as reflections are often more beautiful than real

nature. All mirrors, says George MacDonald, “are magic mirrors. The

commonest room is a room in a poem when I look in the glass.”

English literature is the birthright and inheritance of the English

race. We have produced and are producing some of the greatest of poets,

of philosophers, of men of science. No race can boast a brighter, purer,

or nobler literature--richer than our commerce, more powerful than our

arms. It is the true pride and glory of our country, and for it we

cannot be too thankful.

Precious and priceless are the blessings which the books scatter around

our daily paths. We walk, in imagination, with the noblest spirits,

through the most sublime and enchanting regions,--regions which, to all

that is lovely in the forms and colors of earth,

“Add the gleam,

The light that never was on sea or land,

The consecration and the poet’s dream.”

Without stirring from our firesides we may roam to the most remote

regions of the earth, or soar into realms where Spenser’s shapes of

unearthly beauty flock to meet us, where Milton’s angels peal in our

ears the choral hymns of Paradise. Science, art, literature,

philosophy,--all that man has thought, all that man has done,--the

experience that has been bought with the sufferings of a hundred

generations,--all are garnered up for us in the world of books.

_From “The Use of Life.”_

BREAK, BREAK, BREAK.

ALFRED TENNYSON.

For a sketch of the life of Tennyson, see Book V, page 102.

BREAK, break, break,

On thy cold gray stones, O Sea!

And I would that my tongue could utter

The thoughts that arise in me.

O well for the fisherman’s boy

That he shouts with his sister at play!

O well for the sailor lad

That he sings in his boat on the bay!

And the stately ships go on

To their haven under the hill:

But O for the touch of a vanished hand,

And the sound of a voice that is still!

Break, break, break,

At the foot of thy crags, O Sea!

But the tender grace of a day that is dead

Will never come back to me.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

[Illustration]

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE was born in the year 1564, at Stratford-on-Avon, in

England. Queen Elizabeth was on the throne then, and it was one of the

most brilliant periods in all English history. The poems and plays that

Shakespeare wrote are the greatest in the English language, and one

cannot appreciate the best there is in literature unless he has studied

them. It is strange that no one thought, in the time that he lived, of

writing his history, so that we might know as much about him and his

boyhood as we do of most other great men.

Stratford is in the heart of England, and the stream of Avon winds

through a beautiful country. There were two famous old castles near by,

which had been peopled by knights in armor, and out of whose great stone

gateways they had ridden to battle.

We are sure that Shakespeare loved to listen to the tales of these old

battles, for in later years he based several of his great historical

plays upon them.

One of these plays is called “Richard III.,” and part of the scenes are

laid in the old Warwick Castle, near his home. He tells how the young

son of the Duke of Clarence was kept a prisoner in one of the great

gloomy towers, by the wicked Duke of Gloucester, who afterward became

King Richard III.; and the play ends with the Battle of Bosworth Field,

where King Richard is slain.

We know that Shakespeare was fond of the woods and the fields, for his

plays are filled with charming descriptions of their beauty. The forest

of Arden was near Stratford, and its streams and woods filled him with

such delight that when he became a man he made them forever famous by

writing a play called “As You Like It,” the most beautiful scenes of

which are laid in this forest.

He liked to imagine that fairies dwelt in the Arden woods, and though he

could not see them in their frolics, he could picture them in his brain.

When he saw the grass and flowers wet with dew, it pleased him to think

that this had been a task set by the Queen of the Fairies in the night

for her tiny subjects. So in his play, “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” he

makes a fairy say:--

“Over hill, over dale,

Thorough brush, thorough brier,

* * * * *

I do wander everywhere,

Swifter than the moony sphere;

And I serve the Fairy Queen.”

Then the fairy tells its companion it must hasten away to its task:--

“I must go seek some dewdrops here

And hang a pearl in every cowslip’s ear.”

Shakespeare must have been in the forest of Arden often in the summer

mornings and seen the dewdrops clinging to the cowslips and glistening

in the sunlight like pearls.

[Illustration: BIRTHPLACE OF SHAKESPEARE.]

The exact day that Shakespeare was born is not certain, but it was about

the 23d of April, and many men who have made a study of the poet’s life

accept that as his birthday. The house in which he was born is still

standing, although it has, of course, undergone many changes in the last

three hundred years.

During the early boyhood of the poet, his father, John Shakespeare, was

a prosperous tradesman. He was a wool dealer and farmer. When

Shakespeare was four years old his father became high-bailiff, or mayor

of the town.

The future dramatist was sent to the village school at about the age of

seven. He could already read, having learned his letters at home from a

very queer primer. It was called the “horn-book,” because it was made of

a single printed leaf, set in a frame of wood like our slates, and

covered with a thin plate of horn.

The boy remained at school only about six years. His father had failed

in many enterprises, and it is probable he needed his son to help him in

his work. Just what Shakespeare learned at school we do not know, but

his writings show some knowledge of Greek and Latin, for these languages

were taught in the schools at that time.

It is certain that Shakespeare’s education went on after he left school.

That is, he learned something from everything he saw about him and from

all that he read. Even the trees in the forest and the streams in the

meadows taught him lessons about nature. And this idea he expresses in

his own beautiful way in the play “As You Like It,” when he makes the

banished Duke in the forest of Arden say:--

“And this our life, exempt from public haunt,

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in everything.”

It is quite probable that John Shakespeare unconsciously decided the

career of his son, for it was while he was mayor of Stratford that plays

were first presented there, and the players must have obtained his

consent in order to give their performances.

We can also learn from his writings what games Shakespeare was fond of,

or, at least, what sports the boys of his time took delight in. In

Shakespeare’s “Comedy of Errors” he refers to the game of football, and

in the historical play of “Julius Cæsar,” there is a fine description of

a swimming match between Cæsar and Cassius. Cassius tells the story to

Brutus of how Cæsar challenged him to leap into the river Tiber, armed

as they were for battle:--

“Cæsar said to me, ‘Darest thou, Cassius, now

Leap in with me into this angry flood,

And swim to yonder point?’ Upon the word,

Accoutered as I was, I plunged in

And bade him follow; so, indeed, he did.

The torrent roar’d and we did buffet it

With lusty sinews, throwing it aside

And stemming it with hearts of controversy.”

Cassius then tells how Cæsar’s strength gave out and he cried for help,

and how Cassius brought him safe to land.

Other sports of Shakespeare’s day were archery, wrestling, hunting, and

falconry, where a bird called a falcon was let loose into the air to

pursue its prey.

When Shakespeare was in his nineteenth year he married Anne Hathaway,

and a few years later he set out to seek his fortune in London.

He had played some small parts on the stage at Stratford, and it is not

surprising that we soon find him among the players in London, filling

such trifling parts as were offered to him, and even, some accounts say,

holding horses at the stage door to help support himself and his family.

His leisure time was spent in study. “Plutarch’s Lives” furnished him

with material for his plays of “Julius Cæsar,” “Antony and Cleopatra,”

and parts, at least, of others.

He was a great student of the Bible, so much so that a learned bishop

who made a study of his plays found that Shakespeare in all his writings

had in five hundred and fifty different places either quoted from the

Scriptures or referred to them.

Shakespeare rose to fame rapidly. He was associated in the building of a

new theater called the Globe, where his plays were acted before

thousands. Then the Blackfriars Theater was built, and these two houses

divided the honor of producing his plays.

He gathered up the history of England, the grandeur of its courts, the

beauty of its woods and fields, and the deeds of its people, and told of

it all in such masterful dramas that his name leads all other English

writers.

The last few years of his life were spent at Stratford-on-Avon, where

he had become a large land-owner. He died in the year 1616, at the age

of fifty-two.

Nearly every great English writer and poet ever since has referred, in

some way or other, to the plays of Shakespeare. The speeches of our

statesmen owe much of their strength and beauty to the influence of his

writings. It has been said that “Shakespeare is like a great primeval

forest, whence timber shall be cut and used as long as winds blow and

leaves are green.”

THE THREE CASKETS.

[ABRIDGED.]

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

_Belmont. A Room in Portia’s House. Three Caskets of

Gold, Silver, and Lead on Table._

Portia, a beautiful and accomplished heiress, is sought in marriage

by a large number of suitors, whose fate is to be determined by the

choice they make of one of three caskets--gold, silver, and base

lead.

The following are the comments of three of the suitors--the Prince

of Morocco, the Prince of Arragon, and Bassanio:--

_Enter Portia, with the Prince of Morocco._

PORTIA.

Now make your choice.

MOROCCO.

The first, of gold, which this inscription bears,--

_Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire;_

The second, silver, which this promise carries,--

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

This third, dull lead, with warning all as blunt,--

_Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath._--

How shall I know if I do choose the right?

PORTIA.

The one of them contains my picture, Prince:

If you choose that, then I am yours withal.

MOROCCO.

Some god direct my judgment! Let me see;

I will survey th’ inscriptions back again.

What says this leaden casket?

_Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath._

Must give,--for what? for lead? hazard for lead?

This casket threatens: men, that hazard all

Do it in hope of fair advantages.

A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross;

I’ll then nor give nor hazard aught for lead.

What says the silver, with her virgin hue?

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

As much as he deserves!--Pause there, Morocco,

And weigh thy value with an even hand:

If thou be’st rated by thy estimation,

Thou dost deserve enough; and yet enough

May not extend so far as to the lady:

And yet to be afeard of my deserving,

Were but a weak disabling of myself.

As much as I deserve! Why, that’s the lady:

I do in birth deserve her, and in fortunes,

In graces, and in qualities of breeding;

But, more than these, in love I do deserve.

What if I stray’d no further, but chose here?

Let’s see once more this saying graved in gold:

_Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire._

Why, that’s the lady; all the world desires her:

....... Deliver me the key;

Here do I choose, and thrive I as I may!

PORTIA.

There, take it, Prince, and if my form lie there,

Then I am yours. [_He unlocks the golden casket._

MOROCCO.

What have we here?

A carrion Death, within whose empty eye

There is a written scroll! I’ll read the writing.

[Reads] _All that glisters is not gold,--_

_Often have you heard that told:_

_Many a man his life hath sold,_

_But my outside to behold:_

_Gilded tombs do worms infold._

_Had you been as wise as bold,_

_Young in limbs, in judgment old,_

_Your answer had not been inscroll’d:_

_Fare you well; your suit is cold._

Cold, indeed; and labor lost;

Then, farewell, heat, and welcome, frost!--

Portia, adieu! I have too grieved a heart

To take a tedious leave: thus losers part.

[_Exit with train._

_Enter Prince of Arragon._

PORTIA.

Behold, there stand the caskets, noble Prince;

If you choose that wherein I am contain’d,

Straight shall our nuptial rites be solemnized:

But if you fail, without more speech, my lord,

You must be gone from hence immediately.

ARRAGON.

I am enjoin’d by oath to observe three things:

First, never to unfold to any one

Which casket ’t was I chose; next, if I fail

Of the right casket, never in my life

To woo a maid in way of marriage; lastly,

If I do fail in fortune of my choice,

Immediately to leave you, and be gone.

PORTIA.

To these injunctions everyone doth swear

That comes to hazard for my worthless self.

ARRAGON.

And so have I address’d me. Fortune now

To my heart’s hope!--Gold, silver, and base lead.

_Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath._

You shall look fairer, ere I give, or hazard.

What says the golden chest? ha! let me see:

_Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire._

What many men desire!--That _many_ may be meant

By the fool multitude, that choose by show,

Not learning more than the fond eye doth teach;

Which pries not to the interior, but, like the martlet,

Builds in the weather on the outward wall,

Even in the force and road of casualty.

I will not choose what many men desire,

Because I will not jump with common spirits,

And rank me with the barbarous multitude.

Why, then to thee, thou silver treasure-house;

Tell me once more what title thou dost bear:

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

And well said too: for who shall go about

To cozen fortune, and be honorable

Without the stamp of merit? Let none presume

To wear an undeserved dignity.

O, that estates, degrees, and offices

Were not derived corruptly! and that clear honor

Were purchased by the merit of the wearer!

How many then should cover, that stand bare!

How many be commanded, that command!

How much low peasantry would then be glean’d

From the true seed of honor! and how much honor

Pick’d from the chaff and ruin of the times,

To be new-varnish’d! Well, but to my choice:

_Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves._

I will assume desert.--Give me a key,

And instantly unlock my fortunes here.

[_He opens the silver casket._

PORTIA.

Too long a pause for that which you find there.

ARRAGON.

What’s here? the portrait of a blinking idiot,

Presenting me a schedule! I will read it.--

How much unlike art thou to Portia!

How much unlike my hopes, and my deservings!

_Who chooseth me shall have as much as he deserves._

Did I deserve no more than a fool’s head?

Is that my prize? are my deserts no better?

PORTIA.

T’ offend, and judge, are distinct offices,

And of opposèd natures.

ARRAGON.

What is here?

_The fire seven times tried this:_

_Seven times tried that judgment is_

_That did never choose amiss._

_Some there be, that shadows kiss;_

_Such have but a shadow’s bliss:_

_There be fools alive, I wis,_

_Silver’d o’er; and so was this._

Still more fool I shall appear

By the time I linger here:

With one fool’s head I came to woo,

But I go away with two.--

Sweet, adieu! I’ll keep my oath,

Patiently to bear my wroth.

[_Exeunt Arragon and Train._

_Enter Bassanio._

BASSANIO.

So may the outward shows be least themselves:

The world is still deceived with ornament.

In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt,

But, being season’d with a gracious voice,

Obscures the show of evil?

* * * * *

There is no vice so simple, but assumes

Some mark of virtue on its outward parts:

How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false

As stayers of sand, wear yet upon their chins

The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars;

Who, inward search’d, have livers white as milk!

And these assume but valor’s excrement,

To render them redoubted. Look on beauty,

And you shall see ’t is purchased by the weight;

Which therein works a miracle in nature,

Making them lightest that wear most of it:

So are those crispèd snaky golden locks,

Which make such wanton gambols with the wind,

Upon supposèd fairness, often known

To be the dowry of a second head,

The skull that bred them in the sepulcher.

Thus ornament is but the guilèd shore

To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf

Veiling an Indian feature; in a word,

The seeming truth which cunning times put on

T’ entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,

Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee:

Nor none of thee, thou stale and common drudge

’Tween man and man: but thou, thou meager lead,

Which rather threatenest, than dost promise aught,

Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence;

And here choose I: Joy be the consequence!

[_Opening the leaden casket._

----What find I here?

Fair Portia’s counterfeit!

----Here’s the scroll,

The continent and summary of my fortune:--

_You that choose not by the view

Chance as fair, and choose as true:

Since this fortune falls to you,

Be content and seek no new.

If you be well pleased with this,

And hold your fortune for your bliss,

Turn you where your lady is,

And claim her with a loving kiss._

PORTIA.

You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,

Such as I am: though, for myself alone,

I would not be ambitious in my wish,

To wish myself much better; yet, for you,

I would be trebled twenty times myself;

A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich;

That, only to stand high on your account,

I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,

Exceed account: but the full sum of me

Is sum of--something; which, to term in gross,

Is an unlesson’d girl, unschool’d, unpracticed:

Happy in this, she is not yet so old

But she may learn; then happier in this,

She is not bred so dull but she can learn;

Happiest of all, in that her gentle spirit

Commits itself to yours to be directed,

As from her lord, her governor, her king.

Myself and what is mine to you and yours

Is now converted: but now I was the lord

Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,

Queen o’er myself; and even now, but now,

This house, these servants, and this same myself,

Are yours, my lord; I give them with this ring;

Which when you part from, lose, or give away,

Let it presage the ruin of your love,

And be my vantage to exclaim on you.

_From “The Merchant of Venice.”_

QUOTATIONS FROM SHAKESPEARE.

ADVERSITY.

SWEET are the uses of adversity;

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,

Wears yet a precious jewel in his head:

And this our life, exempt from public haunt,

Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in everything.

“_As You Like It._”

REPUTATION.

GOOD name in man and woman, dear my lord,

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.

“_Othello._”

FEAR OF DEATH.

COWARDS die many times before their death;

The valiant never taste of death but once.

Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,

It seems to me most strange that men should fear;

Seeing that death, a necessary end,

Will come when it will come.

“_Julius Cæsar._”

SHAKESPEARE’S POETRY.

FRANCIS JEFFREY.

FRANCIS JEFFREY was born in Edinburgh in 1773 and died in 1850. He

attended the schools of his native city and completed his education

in the Universities of Glasgow and Oxford, preparing himself for

the pursuit of law.

He was also a writer of essays and criticisms and attained high

rank as a judge and writer. He was at one time editor of the famous

“Edinburgh Review.”

SHAKESPEARE alone, when the object requires it, is always keen and

worldly and practical; and yet, without changing his hand or stopping

his course, scatters around him, as he goes, all sounds and shapes of

sweetness, and conjures up landscapes of immortal fragrance and

freshness, and peoples them with Spirits of glorious aspect and

attractive grace. He is a thousand times more full of fancy and imagery

and splendor than those who, in pursuit of such enchantments, have

shrunk back from the delineation of character or passion, and declined

the discussion of human duties and cares.

More full of wisdom and ridicule and sagacity than all the moralists and

satirists that ever existed, he is also more wild, airy, and inventive,

and more pathetic and fantastic, than all the poets of all regions and

ages of the world. And he has all those elements so happily mixed up in

him, and bears his high faculties so temperately, that the most severe

reader cannot complain of him for want of strength or of reason, nor

the most sensitive for defect of ornament or ingenuity. Everything in

him is in unmeasured abundance and unequaled perfection; but everything

is so balanced and kept in subordination, as not to jostle or disturb or

take the place of another.

The most exquisite poetical conceptions, images, and descriptions are

given with such brevity, and introduced with such skill, as merely to

adorn, without loading, the sense they accompany. Although his sails are

purple and perfumed, and his prow of beaten gold, they waft him on his

voyage, not less, but more rapidly and directly than if they had been

composed of baser materials. All his excellences, like those of Nature

herself, are thrown out together; and, instead of interfering with,

support and recommend each other. His flowers are not tied up in

garlands, nor his fruits crushed into baskets; but spring living from

the soil, in all the dew and freshness of youth; while the graceful

foliage in which they lurk, and the ample branches, the rough and

vigorous stem, and the wide-spreading roots on which they depend, are

present along with them, and share, in their places, the equal care of

their creator.

HOME.

HENRY W. GRADY.

HENRY W. GRADY was born in Georgia in 1851. While a student at the

University of Georgia, he excelled in debate. On graduation, he

determined to make journalism his life-work. As the editor of the

“Atlanta Constitution,” he rapidly grew into prominence as a

journalist and an orator. Mr. Grady died in 1889.

A FEW days later I visited a country home. A modest, quiet house

sheltered by great trees and set in a circle of field and meadow,

gracious with the promise of harvest; barns and cribs well filled and

the old smoke-house odorous with treasure; the fragrance of pink and

hollyhock mingling with the aroma of garden and orchard and resonant

with the hum of bees and poultry’s busy clucking; inside the house,

thrift, comfort, and that cleanliness that is next to godliness--the

restful beds, the open fireplace, the books and papers, and the old

clock that had held its steadfast pace amid the frolic of weddings, that

had welcomed in steady measure the newborn babes of the family, and kept

company with the watchers of the sick bed, and had ticked the solemn

requiem of the dead; and the well-worn Bible that, thumbed by fingers

long since stilled, and blurred with tears of eyes long since closed,

held the simple annals of the family and the heart and conscience of the

home.

Outside stood the master, strong and wholesome and upright; wearing no

man’s collar; with no mortgage on his roof and no lien on his ripening

harvest; pitching his crops in his own wisdom and selling them in his

own time in his chosen market; master of his lands and master of

himself. Near by stood his aged father, happy in the heart and home of

his son. And as they started to the house, the old man’s hands rested on

the young man’s shoulder, touching it with the knighthood of the fifth

commandment and laying there the unspeakable blessing of an honored and

grateful father.

As they drew near the door, the old mother appeared, the sunset falling

on her face, softening its wrinkles and its tenderness, lighting up her

patient eyes, and the rich music of her heart trembling on her lips, as

in simple phrase she welcomed her husband and son to their home. Beyond

was the good wife, true of touch and tender, happy amid her household

cares, clean of heart and conscience, the helpmate and the buckler of

her husband. And the children, strong and sturdy, trooping down the lane

with the lowing herd, or, weary of simple sport, seeking, as truant

birds do, the quiet of the old home nest.

And I saw the night descend on that home, falling gently as from the

wings of the unseen dove. And the stars swarmed in the bending skies;

the trees thrilled with the cricket’s cry; the restless bird called from

the neighboring wood; and the father, a simple man of God, gathering

the family about him, read from the Bible the old, old story of love and

faith and then went down in prayer, the baby hidden amid the folds of

its mother’s dress, and closed the record of that simple day by calling

down the benediction of God on the family and the home!

And as I gazed, the memory of the great Capitol faded from my brain.

Forgotten its treasure and its splendor. And I said, “Surely here--here

in the homes of the people--is lodged the ark of the covenant of my

country. Here is its majesty and its strength; here the beginning of its

power and the end of its responsibility.” The homes of the people--let

us keep them pure and independent, and all will be well with the

Republic. Here is the lesson our foes may learn--here is work the

humblest and weakest hands may do.

Let us in simple thrift and economy make our homes independent. Let us

in frugal industry make them self-sustaining. In sacrifice and denial

let us keep them free from debt and obligation. Let us make them homes

of refinement in which we shall teach our daughters that modesty and

patience and gentleness are the charms of woman. Let us make them

temples of liberty, and teach our sons that an honest conscience is

every man’s first political law; that his sovereignty rests beneath his

hat, and that no splendor can rob him and no force justify the surrender

of the simplest right of a free and independent citizen. And above all,

let us honor God in our homes--anchor them close in His love. Build His

altars above our hearthstones, uphold them in the set and simple faith

of our fathers, and crown them with the Bible--that book of books in

which all the ways of life are made straight and the mystery of death is

made plain.

Let us keep sacred the Sabbath of God in its purity, and have no city so

great, or village so small, that every Sunday morning shall not stream

forth over towns and meadows the golden benediction of the bells, as

they summon the people to the churches of their fathers, and ring out in

praise of God and the power of His might. Let us keep the states of this

Union in the current of the sweet old-fashioned, that the sweet rushing

waters may lap their sides, and everywhere from their soil grow the

tree, the leaf whereof shall not fade, and the fruit whereof shall not

die.

Let us remember that the home is the source of our national life. Back

of the national Capitol and above it stands the home. Back of the

President and above him stands the citizen. What the home is, this and

nothing else will the Capitol be. What the citizen wills, this and

nothing else will the President be.

A PALACE IN A VALLEY.

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.

DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON was born at Lichfield, England, in 1709, and

died in 1784.

He was educated at Oxford, where he gained honor as a student in

spite of his poverty and defective eyesight.

After leaving college Johnson held a position as an usher, and

later was employed by some booksellers.

He gradually began a literary life, publishing some poems, and then

conducted “The Rambler” and “The Idler,” two periodicals.

He wrote the story of “Rasselas” to pay the expenses of his

mother’s funeral. His greatest work was a Dictionary of the English

Language.

Dr. Johnson’s character was a strange union of strength and

weakness. His manners were uncouth, but his conversation was rich

in wit and wisdom. His genius was recognized during the latter

years of his life.

YE who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy and pursue with

eagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform the

promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will be

supplied by the morrow,--attend to the history of Rasselas, Prince of

Abyssinia.

Rasselas was the fourth son of the mighty emperor in whose dominions the

Father of Waters begins his course; whose bounty pours down the streams

of plenty and scatters over half the world the harvests of Egypt.

According to the custom which has descended from age to age among the

monarchs of the torrid zone, Rasselas was confined in a private palace,

with the other sons and daughters of Abyssinian royalty, till the order

of succession should call him to the throne.

The place which the wisdom or policy of antiquity had destined for the

residence of the Abyssinian princes was a spacious valley in the kingdom

of Amhara, surrounded on every side by mountains, of which the summits

overhang the middle part. The only passage by which it could be entered

was a cavern that passed under a rock. The outlet of the cavern was

concealed by a thick wood, and the mouth which opened into the valley

was closed with gates of iron.

From the mountains on every side rivulets descended that filled all the

valley with verdure and fertility, and formed a lake in the middle

inhabited by fish of every species, and frequented by every fowl whom

Nature has taught to dip the wing in water. This lake discharged its

superfluities by a stream which entered a dark cleft of the mountain on

the northern side, and fell with dreadful noise from precipice to

precipice till it was heard no more.

The sides of the mountains were covered with trees, the banks of the

brooks were diversified with flowers; every blast shook spices from the

rocks, and every month dropped fruits upon the ground. All animals that

bite the grass, or browse the shrub, whether wild or tame, wandered in

this extensive circuit, secured from beasts of prey by the mountains

which confined them. On one part were flocks and herds feeding in the

pastures; on another, all beasts of chase frisking in the lawns. All the

diversities of the world were brought together, the blessings of nature

were collected, and its evils extracted and excluded.

The valley, wide and fruitful, supplied its inhabitants with the

necessaries of life, and all delights and superfluities were added at

the annual visit which the emperor paid his children, when the iron gate

was opened to the sound of music; and during eight days every one that

resided in the valley was required to propose whatever might contribute

to make seclusion pleasant, to fill up the vacancies of attention, and

lessen the tediousness of time. Every desire was immediately granted.

All the artificers of pleasure were called to gladden the festivity; the

musicians exerted the power of harmony, and the dancers showed their

activity before the princes, in hope that they should pass their lives

in this blissful captivity, to which those only were admitted whose

performance was thought able to add novelty to luxury. Such was the

appearance of security and delight which this retirement afforded, that

they to whom it was new always desired that it might be perpetual; and

as those on whom the iron gate had once closed were never suffered to

return, the effect of long experience could not be known. Thus every

year produced new schemes of delight and new competitors for

imprisonment.

The palace stood on an eminence raised about thirty paces above the

surface of the lake. It was divided into many squares or courts, built

with greater or less magnificence, according to the rank of those for

whom they were designed. The roofs were turned into arches of massy

stone, joined by a cement that grew harder by time, and the building

stood from century to century deriding the rains and equinoctial

hurricanes, without need of reparation.

This house, which was so large as to be fully known to none but some

ancient officers who successively inherited the secrets of the place,

was built as if suspicion herself had dictated the plan. To every room

there was an open and secret passage; every square had a communication

with the rest, either from the upper stories by private galleries, or by

subterranean passages from the lower apartments. Many of the columns had

unsuspected cavities, in which a long race of monarchs had deposited

their treasures. They then closed up the opening with marble, which was

never to be removed but in the utmost exigencies of the kingdom; and

recorded their accumulations in a book which was itself concealed in a

tower not entered but by the emperor, attended by the prince who stood

next in succession.

Here the sons and daughters of Abyssinia lived only to know the soft

vicissitudes of pleasure and repose, attended by all that were skilful

to delight, and gratified with whatever the senses can enjoy. They

wandered in gardens of fragrance and slept in the fortresses of

security. Every art was practiced to make them pleased with their own

condition. The sages who instructed them told them of nothing but the

miseries of public life, and described all beyond the mountains as

regions of calamity, where discord was always raging, and where man

preyed upon man.

To heighten their opinion of their own felicity, they were daily

entertained with songs, the subject of which was the happy valley. Their

appetites were excited by frequent enumerations of different enjoyments,

and revelry and merriment was the business of every hour from the dawn

of morning to the close of even.

These methods were generally successful; few of the princes had ever

wished to enlarge their bounds, but passed their lives in full

conviction that they had all within their reach that art or nature could

bestow, and pitied those whom fate had excluded from this seat of

tranquillity.

Thus they rose in the morning and lay down at night, pleased with each

other and with themselves,--all but Rasselas, who, in the twenty-sixth

year of his age, began to withdraw himself from their pastimes and

assemblies, and to delight in solitary walks and silent meditation. He

often sat before tables covered with luxury, and forgot to taste the

dainties that were placed before him; he rose abruptly in the midst of

the song and hastily retired beyond the sound of music. His attendants

observed the change and endeavored to renew his love of pleasure. He

neglected their officiousness, repulsed their invitations, and spent day

after day on the banks of rivulets sheltered with trees, where he

sometimes listened to the birds in the branches, sometimes observed the

fish playing in the stream, and anon cast his eyes upon the pastures and

mountains filled with animals.

This singularity of his humor made him much observed. One of the sages,

in whose conversation he had formerly delighted, followed him secretly,

in hope of discovering the cause of his disquiet. Rasselas, who knew not

that any one was near him, having for some time fixed his eyes upon the

goats that were browsing among the rocks, began to compare their

condition with his own.

“What,” said he, “makes the difference between man and all the rest of

the animal creation? Every beast that strays beside me has the same

bodily necessities with myself; he is hungry and crops the grass, he is

thirsty and drinks the stream; his thirst and hunger are appeased, he is

satisfied and sleeps; he rises again and is hungry; he is again fed and

is at rest. I am hungry and thirsty, like him; but when thirst and

hunger cease, I am not at rest; I am, like him, pained with want; but am

not, like him, satisfied with fullness. The intermediate hours are

tedious and gloomy; I long again to be hungry, that I may again quicken

my attention. The birds peck the berries or the corn, and fly away to

the groves, where they sit in seeming happiness on the branches and

waste their lives in tuning one unvaried series of sounds. I likewise

can call the lutanist and singer, but the sounds that pleased me

yesterday weary me to-day, and will grow more wearisome to-morrow. I can

discover within me no power of perception which is not glutted with its

proper pleasure, yet I do not feel myself delighted. Man surely has some

latent sense for which this place affords no gratification, or he has

some desires distinct from sense, which must be satisfied before he can

be happy.”

After this he lifted up his head, and, seeing the moon rising, walked

toward the palace. As he passed through the fields and saw the animals

around him, “Ye,” said he, “are happy, and need not envy me that walk

thus among you, burdened with myself; nor do I, ye gentle beings, envy

your felicity, for it is not the felicity of man. I have many distresses

from which ye are free; I fear pain when I do not feel it; surely the

equity of Providence has balanced peculiar sufferings with peculiar

enjoyments.”

With observations like these the prince amused himself as he returned,

uttering them with a plaintive voice, yet with a look that discovered

him to feel some complacence in his own perspicacity, and to receive

some solace of the miseries of life from consciousness of the delicacy

with which he bewailed them. He mingled cheerfully in the diversions of

the evening, and all rejoiced to find that his heart was lightened.

_From “Rasselas.”_

TRUE HEROISM.

LET others write of battles fought,

Of bloody, ghastly fields,

Where honor greets the man who wins,

And death the man who yields;

But I will write of him who fights

And vanquishes his sins,

Who struggles on through weary years

Against himself, and wins.

He is a hero stanch and brave

Who fights an unseen foe,

And puts at last beneath his feet

His passions base and low;

Who stands erect in manhood’s might,

Undaunted, undismayed,--

The bravest man who drew a sword

In foray or in raid.

It calls for something more than brawn

Or muscle to o’ercome

An enemy who marcheth not

With banner, plume, or drum,--

A foe forever lurking nigh,

With silent, stealthy tread;

Forever near your board by day,

At night beside your bed.

All honor, then, to that brave heart,

Though poor or rich he be,

Who struggles with his baser part,--

Who conquers and is free!

He may not wear a hero’s crown,

Or fill a hero’s grave;

But truth will place his name among

The bravest of the brave.

THE PEN.

EDWARD BULWER LYTTON.

BENEATH the rule of men entirely great

The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold

The arch enchanter’s wand!--itself a nothing

But taking sorcery from the master’s hand

To paralyze the Cæsars and to strike

The loud earth breathless! Take away the sword--

States can be saved without it.

_From “Richelieu.”_

[Illustration: MOUNT VERNON, THE HOME OF WASHINGTON.]

CHARACTER OF WASHINGTON.

GEORGE BANCROFT.

GEORGE BANCROFT was born at Worcester, Mass., in 1800 and died in

1891.

He was graduated from Harvard College when he was seventeen,

bearing off the second honors of his class.

The following year he sailed for Europe and spent five years

studying under the most learned professors in Germany, France, and

Italy.

On his return to America he became a tutor at Harvard and was

afterwards connected with a classical school at Northampton.

He was deeply interested in the affairs of the nation, but refused

to enter public life, as he had decided to write a history of the

United States.

The first volume of this history appeared in 1834, and the series

occupied his time for many years.

Mr. Bancroft held the position of secretary of the navy for about a

year under President Polk. It was due to his efforts that the Naval

Academy at Annapolis, Md., was established.

He was appointed minister to England in 1846 and remained abroad

for three years.

He returned to this country and resumed his literary work. In 1867

he was appointed minister to Berlin by President Grant.

The “History of the United States” is without a rival. It is

generally accepted as an authority. Mr. Bancroft spared no pains in

his researches among old manuscripts, and his style is full of

interest.

AT eleven years old, left, an orphan, to the care of an excellent but

unlettered mother, Washington grew up without learning. Of arithmetic

and geometry he acquired just knowledge enough to be able to practice

measuring land; but all his instruction at school taught him not so much

as the orthography or rules of grammar of his own tongue. His culture

was altogether his own work, and he was in the strictest sense a

self-made man; yet from his early life he never seemed uneducated. At

sixteen he went into the wilderness as surveyor, and for three years

continued the pursuit, where the forest trained him, in meditative

solitude, to freedom and largeness of mind; and Nature revealed to him

her obedience to serene and silent laws.

In his intervals from toil, he seemed always to be attracted to the best

men, and to be cherished by them. Fairfax, his employer, an Oxford

scholar, already aged, became his fast friend. He read little, but with

close attention. Whatever he took in hand, he applied himself to with

care; and his papers, which have been preserved, show how he almost

imperceptibly gained the power of writing correctly; always expressing

himself with clearness and directness, often with felicity of language

and grace.

Courage was so natural to him that it was hardly spoken of to his

praise; no one ever at any moment of his life discovered in him the

least shrinking from danger; and he had a hardihood of daring which

escaped notice, because it was so enveloped by superior calmness and

wisdom.

He was as cheerful as he was spirited; frank and communicative in the

society of friends; fond of the fox-chase and the dance; often sportive

in his letters; and liked a hearty laugh. This joyousness of disposition

remained to the last, though the vastness of his responsibilities was

soon to take from him the right of displaying the impulsive qualities of

his nature, and the weight which he was to bear up was to overlay and

repress his gayety and openness.

His hand was liberal; giving quietly and without observation, as though

he were ashamed of nothing but being discovered in doing good. He was

kindly and compassionate, and of lively sensibility to the sorrows of

others; so that, if his country had only needed a victim for its relief,

he would have willingly offered himself as a sacrifice. But while he was

prodigal of himself, he was considerate for others; ever parsimonious of

the blood of his countrymen.

His faculties were so well balanced and combined that his constitution,

free from excess, was tempered evenly with all the elements of activity,

and his mind resembled a well-ordered commonwealth; his passions, which

had the intensest vigor, owned allegiance to reason; and with all the

fiery quickness of his spirit his impetuous and massive will was held in

check by consummate judgment. He had in his composition a calm which

gave him, in moments of highest excitement, the power of self-control,

and enabled him to excel in patience, even when he had most cause for

disgust. Washington was offered a command when there was little to bring

out the unorganized resources of the continent but his own influence,

and authority was connected with the people by the most frail, most

attenuated, scarcely discernible threads; yet, vehement as was his

nature, impassioned as was his courage, he so restrained his ardor, that

he never failed continuously to exert the attracting power of that

influence, and never exerted it so sharply as to break its force.

His understanding was lucid, and his judgment accurate; so that his

conduct never betrayed hurry or confusion. No detail was too minute for

his personal inquiry and continued supervision; and at the same time he

comprehended events in their widest aspects and relations. He never

seemed above the object that engaged his attention; and he was always

equal, without an effort, to the solution of the highest questions, even

when there existed no precedents to guide his decision.

In this way he never drew to himself admiration for the possession of

any one quality in excess; never made in council any one suggestion that

was sublime but impracticable; never in action took to himself the

praise or the blame of undertakings astonishing in conception, but

beyond his means of execution. It was the most wonderful accomplishment

of this man that, placed upon the largest theater of events, at the head

of the greatest revolution in human affairs, he never failed to observe

all that was possible, and at the same time to bound his aspirations by

that which was possible.

Profoundly impressed with confidence in God’s providence, and exemplary

in his respect for the forms of public worship, no philosopher of the

eighteenth century was more firm in the support of freedom of religious

opinion; none more tolerant, or more remote from bigotry; but belief in

God and trust in His overruling power formed the essence of his

character. Divine wisdom not only illumines the spirit, it inspires the

will. Washington was a man of action, and not of theory or words; his

creed appears in his life, not in his professions, which burst from him

very rarely, and only at those great moments of crisis in the fortunes

of his country, when Earth and Heaven seemed actually to meet, and his

emotions became too intense for suppression; but his whole being was one

continued act of faith in the eternal, intelligent, moral order of the

Universe. Integrity was so completely the law of his nature, that a

planet would sooner have shot from its sphere, than he have departed

from his uprightness, which was so constant that it often seemed to be

almost impersonal.

They say of Giotto, that he introduced goodness into the art of

painting: Washington carried it with him to the camp and the cabinet,

and established a new criterion of human greatness. The purity of his

will confirmed his fortitude; and, as he never faltered in his faith in

virtue, he stood fast by that which he knew to be just; free from

illusions; never dejected by the apprehension of the difficulties and

perils that went before him; and drawing the promise of success from the

justice of his cause. Hence he was persevering, leaving nothing

unfinished; free from all taint of obstinacy in his firmness; seeking

and gladly receiving advice, but immovable in his devotedness to right.

Of a “retiring modesty and habitual reserve,” his ambition was no more

than the consciousness of his power, and was subordinate to his sense of

duty; he took the foremost place, for he knew, from inborn magnanimity,

that it belonged to him, and he dared not withhold the service required

of him; so that, with all his humility, he was by necessity the first,

though never for himself or for private ends. He loved fame, the

approval of coming generations, the good opinion of his fellow-men of

his own time; and he desired to make his conduct coincide with their

wishes; but not fear of censure, not the prospect of applause, could

tempt him to swerve from rectitude; and the praise which he coveted was

the sympathy of that moral sentiment which exists in every human breast,

and goes forth only to the welcome of virtue.

This also is the praise of Washington, that never in the tide of time

has any man lived who had in so great a degree the almost divine faculty

to command the confidence of his fellow-men and rule the willing.

Whereever he became known, in his family, his neighborhood, his county,

his native state, the continent, the camp, civil life, the United

States, among the common people, in foreign courts, throughout the

civilized world of the human race, and even among the savages, he,

beyond all other men, had the confidence of his kind.

NATIONAL HYMN.

SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH.

SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH was born in Boston in 1808, and died in 1895.

He attended the Boston Latin School, was graduated at Harvard College,

and then studied for the ministry at the Andover Theological Seminary.

While in Harvard he was a classmate of Oliver Wendell Holmes. At a

reunion of his class, held many years after they had left college,

Holmes read a poem which he had written for the occasion, called “The

Boys,” and spoke of Mr. Smith in these words:

“He chanted a song for the brave and the free,

Just read on his medal, ‘My Country, of thee.’”

He referred to the poem beginning “My country, ’tis of thee,” the

national hymn of America, written by Mr. Smith when he was a young

theological student, and first sung at a children’s celebration, held on

one Fourth of July, in the Park Street Church, Boston.

A collection of his hymns and poems has been published under the title

of “Lyric Gems.”

MY country, ’tis of thee,

Sweet land of liberty,

Of thee I sing;

Land where my fathers died,

Land of the pilgrim’s pride,

From every mountain side

Let freedom ring.

My native country, thee--

Land of the noble free--

Thy name I love;

I love thy rocks and rills,

Thy woods and templed hills,

My heart with rapture thrills

Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,

And ring from all the trees

Sweet freedom’s song;

Let mortal tongues awake;

Let all that breathe partake;

Let rocks their silence break--

The sound prolong.

Our fathers’ God, to thee,

Author of liberty,

To thee we sing:

Long may our land be bright

With freedom’s holy light;

Protect us by thy might,

Great God, our King.

THE LARK IN THE GOLD-FIELDS.

CHARLES READE.

CHARLES READE, the youngest of eleven children of John Reade, an English

country squire, was horn in Ipsden in =1814=. His father and mother loved

him dearly, but found it convenient, after the custom of the time, to

intrust his early instruction and care to tutors and masters of boarding

schools. Thus the memory of frequent floggings survived in the boy’s

mind, as marking the thorny road of his first school days.

He entered Magdalen College in =1831= and three years later was appointed

to a fellowship which he held for fifty years, until his death in =1884=.

The income of this enabled him to strive for many years against

disappointments and finally achieve fame as a writer. He toiled long and

hard for recognition and it was not until he was nearly forty years of

age that he became known.

In the meantime he had studied law and had written many plays which he

had vainly tried to have accepted.

His first successful work of note was the brilliant comedy, “Masks and

Faces.” This he turned later into the novel, “Peg Woffington.” His

stories are throughout strong in dramatic situations and, despite his

greater success as a novelist, he always considered himself primarily a

playwright.

Like his friend Charles Dickens, he aimed in his writings to correct

social abuses, and his literary lance was ever couched to aid the

unfortunate.

He wrote “It’s Never too Late to =Mend=” to abolish the evils of the

English prison system. Its success was tremendous, and later, when it

was dramatized and produced at the Princess Theater, there was almost a

riot in the audience.

“Hard Cash” was directed against the abuses in insane asylums; “Foul

Play” dealt with those connected with the merchant shipping service;

“Put Yourself in His Place” took up the hardships of the laboring man.

Thus in his books he assailed the evils of his time.

First and always, however, he was a literary artist. He knew how to

weave together hard, homely facts and romantic incidents so that his

blows for right struck all the harder because of the reader’s absorbing

interest in the plot of his story. “It would require a chemical analysis

to separate the fiction from the reality,” said Justin McCarthy of

Reade’s novels.

“The Cloister and the Hearth” is considered his greatest story.