LOVE IN LIFE

HENRY TIMROD

HENRY TIMROD (1829-1867), an American poet, was born in Charleston, South Carolina. At Charleston's best school he was the deskmate of Paul Hamilton Hayne. The two boys, both full of poetic talent, became dear friends, and showed each other their earliest poems. Timrod's course at the University of Georgia 5 being interrupted by sickness and lack of money, he returned to Charleston and undertook to prepare himself for a college professorship. He had, however, to be content with positions as tutor in private families.

During his years of teaching he still studied and wrote. His 10 poems were welcomed by the Southern Literary Messenger, then the leading magazine of the South, and later he contributed both prose and poetry to Russell's Magazine.

At the opening of the Civil War, Timrod's fragile health broke down in an attempt first to serve in the ranks, and second to act 15 as war correspondent. He then found a position as an editor in Columbia. But a year later Columbia was burned, his office wrecked, and he himself financially ruined. At the close of the war he had to sell even his household furniture for bread. In a humorous letter to Hayne he says, "We have, we have let me 20 see, — yes, we have eaten two silver pitchers, one or two dozen silver forks, several sofas, innumerable chairs, and a huge bedstead." However, the "state's most eminent men, in their common need, tenderly cared for him and his."

In 1867, after a delightful month at Copse Hill with Hayne, 25 whom he loved as a brother, the poet went home to die of consumption.

Most men know love but as a part of life;

They hide it in some corner of the breast,

Even from themselves; and only when they rest In the brief pauses of that daily strife, Wherewith the world might else be not so rife, They draw it forth (as one draws forth a toy 5 To soothe some ardent, kiss-exacting boy) And hold it up to sister, child, or wife.

Ah me! Why may not love and life be one? Why walk we thus alone, when by our side, Love, like a visible God, might be our guide? 10 How would the marts grow noble! and the street, Worn like a dungeon-floor by weary feet, Seem then a golden court-way of the sun!

TOM AND MAGGIE'S HAPPY DAY

GEORGE ELIOT

GEORGE ELIOT (1819-1880) was the pen name of Mary Ann Evans, one of the greatest of English women novelists. Her father was first a carpenter and then a steward of landed estates. After her mother's death and the marriage of her elder sisters, the future novelist became both housekeeper and companion to her father. 5 She drove with him during the day and read Scott to him at night. “Her education, long pursued with unwavering industry, was unusually good, including Greek, Latin, French, German, Hebrew, and music. After her father's death she went abroad with some literary friends, tarried at Geneva to perfect herself in foreign 10 tongues, visited London on her return, met the editor of the Westminster Review, and began her memorable career as his assistant.”

Her first great novel was Adam Bede. When it appeared Thackeray said that "a star of the first magnitude had just arisen." Tom and Maggie Tulliver are the central figures in her 15 next book, Mill on the Floss. In it she succeeded in interesting two continents in the simple lives of two children.

Much of George Eliot's best work deals with country life. She is as emphatically the great painter of English rural life as Dickens is of the wretched life of the city slums, as Thackeray 20 is of men and women of fashion, as Scott is of knightly customs.

George Eliot is genius and culture.JUSTIN MCCARTHY.

George Eliot in all her novels instills her own faith in plain living and high thinking by showing that it is well in life to care greatly for something worthy of cur care; choose worthy work, 25 and believe in it with all our souls. - - JOHN MORLEY.

The next morning Maggie was trotting with her own fishing rod in one hand and a handle of the basket in the other, stepping always, by a peculiar

gift, in the muddiest places, and looking darkly radiant because Tom was good to her. She had told Tom, however, that she should like him to put the worms on the hook for her, although she 5 accepted his word when he assured her that worms

could n't feel (it was Tom's private opinion that it did n't much matter if they did).

He knew all about worms, and fish, and those things; and what birds were mischievous, and how 10 padlocks opened, and which way the handles of the gates were to be lifted. Maggie thought this sort of knowledge was very wonderful, much more difficult than remembering what was in the books; and she was rather in awe of Tom's superiority, for 15 he was the only person who called her knowledge

"stuff," and did not feel surprised at her cleverness. Tom, indeed, was of opinion that Maggie was a silly little thing; all girls were silly; they could n't throw a stone so as to hit anything, could n't do anything with a pocket knife, and were frightened 5 at frogs. Still, he was very fond of his sister, and meant always to take care of her, make her his housekeeper, and punish her when she did wrong.

They were on their way to the Round Pool, -the wonderful pool which the floods had made a 10 long while ago. No one knew how deep it was; and it was mysterious, too, that it should be almost a perfect round, framed in with willows and tall reeds, so that the water was only to be seen when you got close to the brink. The sight of the old 15 favorite spot always heightened Tom's good humor, and he spoke to Maggie in the most amicable whispers, as he opened the precious basket and prepared their tackle. He threw her line for her, and put the rod into her hand. Maggie thought it prob- 20 able that the small fish would come to her hook, and the large ones to Tom's. But she had forgotten all about the fish, and was looking dreamily at the glassy water, when Tom said, in a loud whisper, "Look! look, Maggie!" and came run- 25 ning to prevent her from snatching her line away.