صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

II. Sī’-lençe, tōll, eõurt'-ier, mēa'-ğre (mē’gur), sŏft'-ly, bēğ'-gar'ş roof, păl'-açe, gate, dy'-ing.

III. In the above piece make a list of the words and phrases that tell the manner of the actions, and opposite each write the action-words (e. g., softly-tread; in reverent silence—bow).

IV. Reverent, paltry, wail, stupendous.

V. "Passing bell" (was rung while the person was dying, to obtain prayers for the departing soul; the bell tolled while the funeral procession moves is also called the passing bell). "One greater than thou" (Death personified). "This moment," etc. (6) (lying there on that couch so lowly, and in such agony just now, but even now beyond the stars). What is meant by the " sun eternal"?

XL. MRS. CAUDLE URGING THE NEED OF SPRING CLOTHING.

1. If there's anything in the world I hate and you know it it is asking you for money. I am sure, for myself, I'd rather go without a thing a thousand times— and I do, the more shame for you to let me !

2. "What do I want now?" As if you didn't know? I'm sure, if I'd any money of my own, I'd never ask you for a farthing-never! It's painful to me, gracious knows!

3. What do you say? "If it's painful, why so often do it?" I suppose you call that a joke-one of your club-jokes. As I say, I only wish I'd any money of my own. If there is anything that humbles a poor woman, it is coming to a man's pocket for every farthing. It's dreadful!

4. Now, Caudle, you hear me, for it. isn't often I speak. Pray, do you know what month it is? And did you see how the children looked at church to-day ?—like nobody else's children!

5. "What was the matter with them?" Oh, Caudle! how can you ask? Weren't they all in their thick merinoes and beaver bonnets?

6. What do you say? "What of it?" What! You'll tell me that you didn't see how the Briggs girls in their new chips turned their noses up at 'em? And you didn't see how the Browns looked at the Smiths, and then at our poor girls, as much as to say, "Poor creatures! what figures for the first of May!"

7. "You didn't see it?" The more shame for you! I'm sure those Briggs girls—the little minxes!—put me into such a pucker, I could have pulled their ears for 'em over the pew.

[ocr errors]

8. What do you say? "I ought to be ashamed to own it?" Now, Caudle, it's no use talking; those children shall not cross over the threshold next Sunday, if they haven't things for the summer. Now mind-they sha'n't; and there's an end of it!

9. "I'm always wanting money for clothes?" How can you say that? I'm sure there are no children in the world that cost their father so little; but that's it-the less a poor woman does upon, the less she may.

10. Now, Caudle, dear! What a man you are! I know you will give me the money, because, after all, I think you love your children, and like to see 'em welldressed. It's only natural that a father should.

11. "How much money do I want?" Let me see, love. There's Caroline, and Jane, and Susan, and Mary Anne, and

12. What do you say? "I needn't count 'em! You know how many there are!" That's just the way you take me up!

13. Well, how much money will it take? Let me see- -I'll tell you in a minute. You always love to see the dear things look like new pins. I know that, Caudle; and though I say it-bless their little hearts!—they do credit to you, Caudle.

14. "How much?" Now don't be in a hurry! Well, I think, with good pinching—and you know, Caudle, there's never a wife who can pinch closer than I can—I think, with pinching, I can do with twenty pounds.

15. What did you say? "Twenty fiddle-sticks?" 16. What! "You won't give half the money!" Very well, Mr. Caudle; I don't care. Let the children go in rags; let them stop from church, and grow up like heathens and cannibals; and then you'll save your money, and, I suppose, be satisfied.

17. What do you say? "Ten pounds enough?" Yes, just like you men; you think things cost nothing for women; but you don't care how much you lay out upon yourselves.

18. "They only want frocks and bonnets?" How do you know what they want? How should a man know anything at all about it? And you won't give more than ten pounds? Very well. Then you may go shopping with it yourself, and see what you'll make of it! I'll have none of your ten pounds, I can tell you-no, sir!

19. No; you've no cause to say that. I don't want to dress the children up like countesses! You often throw that in my teeth, you do; but you know it's false, Caudle; you know it! I only wish to give 'em proper notions of themselves; and what, indeed, can the poor things think, when they see the Briggses, the Browns, and the Smiths -and their father don't make the money you do, Caudle

-when they see them as fine as tulips? Why, they must think themselves nobody. However, the twenty pounds I will have, if I've any, or not a farthing.

20. No, sir-no! I don't want to dress up the children like peacocks and parrots! I only want to make 'em respectable.

21. What do you say? "You'll give me fifteen pounds?" No, Caudle-no! Not a penny will I take under twenty. If I did, it would seem as if I wanted to waste your money; and I'm sure, when I come to think of it, twenty pounds will hardly do!

Douglas William Jerrold.

FOR PREPARATION.-I. From "Mrs. Caudle's Curtain Lectures" (first published in Punch, the greatest of humorous periodicals. These lectures were published in a book form in 1846). This piece is well adapted for a drill in the proper use of emphasis and inflection; each pupil, however, should read only a very short passage.

II. Me-rï'-noeş (-rē'-), bēa'-ver, fig'-üreş, minx'-eş, min'-ute (-it) (and mi-nute), păr'-rots.

III. Briggses, Browns, Smiths. (Names of persons do not usually take the form denoting many; it is used here to denote the members of the family.) IV. Farthing, threshold, cannibals, pound, club-jokes, shopping, count

esses.

V. In this dialogue only one person is reported, and we have to infer what the other person says from the nature of the retort and from the words quoted; as, for example, "What do I want now?" is quoted or repeated from the response of the husband, who had said, "What do you want now?" What is the effect of keeping back one of the persons in the dialogue, and letting him appear only as reflected in the retorts of the other? (Does it not assist greatly in painting the character of the petulant scold, whose speech is torrent-like, and does not give an opportunity for the other to make reply except in the briefest rejoinders? There is another use of this style in some of the poems of Tennyson, and most frequently in those of Robert Browning, and in those of our own Bret Harte. A certain subtlety is added by it, which in some cases makes the poems very difficult to understand. Such poems are problems, in which you have given the effect of the one

answer on the other, from which to calculate what that answer was; in case the suppressed answer was a long one, the difficulty of the problem is great). In the above piece, number the rejoinders of Mrs. Caudle, and write out in full the remarks you suppose Mr. Caudle to throw in. Point out the colloquial expressions (vulgarisms): "Gracious knows," "chips," "little minxes," "such a pucker," 99 66 'over 'em," etc. Note redundances (where more words are used than are necessary for the sense, as in "descend down "); e. g., 66 cross over the threshold"; these are common with uneducated people, who do not realize two or more meanings in a word, but add separate words to express all of the meanings but one; cross means to go over, but Mrs. Caudle takes it in the sense of go. Explain omissions (called "ellipses ") in "the less a poor woman does upon, the less she may."

66

XLI.-UNDER THE GREENWOOD TREE.

1. Under the greenwood tree

Who loves to lie with me,

And tune his

merry note

Unto the sweet bird's throat

Come hither, come hither, come hither!
Here shall he sce

No enemy

But winter and rough weather.

2. Who doth ambition shun

And loves to live i' the sun,

Seeking the food he eats

And pleased with what he gets-
Come hither, come hither, come hither!

Here shall he see

No enemy

But winter and rough weather.

William Shakespeare.

FOR PREPARATION.-I. In the forest of Arden (which Byron identifies with the forest of Soignies, near Waterloo), collect a number of people driven from the tyrannical French Court by various causes. This little

« السابقةمتابعة »