I stretch lame hands of faith, and grópe,
And gather dust and chaff, and call
To what I feel is Lord of áll,

And faintly trust the larger hope.

TENNYSON's In Memoriam.

4. THE LADDER OF ST. AUGUSTINE.

The low desire, the base design,
That makes another's virtues léss;
The revel of the treacherous wine,
And all occasions of excéss;

The longing for ignoble things,

The strife for triumph more than trúth;
The hardening of the heart that brings
Irreverence for the dreams of youth;

All thoughts of ill; all evil deeds.

That have their root in thoughts of ill;
Whatever hinders or impedes

The action of the noble will,

All these must first be trampled down
Beneath our feet, if we would gain
In the bright fields of fair renówn,
The right of eminent domain.

LONGFELLOW.

Rule VII. Conditional phrases and clauses, when introductory, take the rising inflection, because the sense is carried forward to the principal statements on which they depend.

EXAMPLES.

1. FROM "THE ARMORY."

Were half the power that fills the world with térror; Were half the wealth, bestowed on camps and courts, Given to redeem the human mind from érror,

There were no need of arsenals or fòrts.

LONGFELLOW.

As Cæsar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fórtu nate, I rejoice at it; as he was váliant, I hònor him; but, as he was ambitious, I slèw him. There is tears for his lóve; joy for his fórtune; honor for his válor; and death for his ambition.

3. WATER.

Of all inorganic substances, acting in their own proper núture, and without assistance or combinátion, wáter is the most wonderful. If we think of it as the source of all the changefulness and beauty which we have seen in clouds; then as the instrument by which the earth we have contemplated was modeled into sýmmetry, and its crags chiseled into gráce; then, as in the form of snów, it robes the mountains it has made with that transcendent light which we could not have conceived if we had not seen; then as it exists in the foam of the tórrent in the iris which spáns it, in the morning míst which rises from it, in the deep crystalline pools which mirror its hanging shore, in the broad lake and glancing river; finally, in that which is to all human minds the best emblem of unwéaried, uncónquerable power, the wild, várious, fantástic, támeless unity of the séa; what shall we compare to this mighty, this univèrsal element, for glóry and for beauty? or how shall we follow its eternal changefulness of feeling? It is like trying to paint a soul.

4. FROM WEBSTER'S SPEECHES.

I.

RUSKIN.

If disastrous wár sweep our cómmerce from the ocean, another generation may renèw it; if it exhaust our trèasury, future industry may replenish it; if it desolate and lay waste our fields, still, under a new cultivation, they will grow green again, and ripen to future harvests.

II.

If discord and disunion shall wound it; if party strife

and blind ambition shall hawk at and téar it; if folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary restraint, shall succeed to separate it from that Union, by which alone. its existence is made súre, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was rocked; it will stretch forth its árm with whatever of vigor it may still retain, over the friends who gather round it; and it will fall, if fall it must, amid the proudest mònuments of its glóry and on the very spòt of its òrigin.

Require cach pupil, at the next lesson, to read one additional illustration, selected from some extract in this book.

Rule VIII. In poetic description, whether of prose or verse, the prevailing inflection is the slight rising inflection of the "third."

Does the golden-locked frúit-bearer,

Through his painted woodlands stráy,
Than where hillside oaks and béeches
Overlook the long, blue réaches,
Silver cóves and pebbled béaches,

And green isles of Casco Bày:
Nowhere day, for delay,

With a tenderer look beséeches,

"Let me with my charmed earth stày."

2. WATER.

Gleaming in the déw-drop, singing in the summer ráin, shining in the ice-gem till the trees seem turned to living jewels, spreading a golden véil over the setting sún, or a white gauze around the midnight móon; sporting in the cataract, sleeping in the glacier, dancing in the háil-shower, folding bright snów-curtains softly above the wintry world, and weaving the many-colored íris,

that seraph's zone of the sky, whose warp is the ráin of earth, whose woof is the sunbeam of heaven, all checkered over with celestial flowers by the mystic hand of rarefaction-still always it is beautiful, that blessed cold water! No poison bubbles on its brínk—its foam brings not madness and múrder-no blood stains its liquid gláss-pale widows and starving orphans weep not burning tears in its clear dépths—no drunkard's shrieking ghost from the gráve curses it in words of despair! Speak out, my friends; would you exchange it for the demon's drink-alcohol?

A shout like the roar of the tempest answered "No! No'!"

3. THE VOICE OF SPRING.

The fisher is out on the sunny séa;

And the reindeer bounds o'er the pasture frée;
And the pine has a fringe of softer gréen,

DENTON.

And the moss looks bright, where my foot hath been.
From the streams and founts I have loosed the cháin.
They are sweeping on to the silvery main,
They are flashing down from the mountain brows,
They are flinging spray o'er the forest boughs,
They are bursting fresh from their sparry cáves;
And the earth resounds with the joy of waves.

HEMANS.

Rule IX. Pathos and tender feeling incline the voice to the slight rising inflection.

EXAMPLES.

1. BABIE BELL.

And what did dainty Babie Bèll?
She only crossed her little hands!
She only looked more meek and fair!
We parted back her silken háir;
We laid some buds upon her brów-
Death's bride arrayed in flowers!

ALDRICH.

2. THE RANGER.

When the shadows vail the méadows,
And the sunset's golden ládders

Sink from twilight's walls of gray-
From the window of my dreaming,
I can see his sickle gleaming,
Cheery-voiced can hear him téaming
Down the locust-shaded way;
But away, swift away,

Fades the fond, delusive seéming,

And I kneel again to prày.

WHITTIER.

Rule X. In a series of words or phrases, if the particulars enumerated are unimportant, or if they are to be taken as constituting a whole, each particular, except the last in a closing series, takes the rising inflection.

EXAMPLES.

1. The sún, the plánets, their satellites, the comets, and the méteors, compose the solar system.

2. The solar system consists of the sun, the plánets, their satellites, the cómets, and the mèteors.

3. The minerals of California are gold, silver, cópper, íron, tín, and quicksilver.

4. Wheat, flour, pórk, béef, cótton, tobacco, and petróleum are exported from the United States.

5. The Góth, the Chrístian, Tíme, Wár, Flóod, and Fíre, Have dealt upon the seven-hilled city's pride.

6. CHRISTMAS MARKETS.

Heaped upon the floor, to form a kind of throne, were túrkeys, géese, gáme, bráwn, great joints of meat, súcking-pígs, long wreaths of sausages, mince-píes, plumpúddings, barrels of óysters, red-hot chéstnuts, cherrycheeked apples, juicy óranges, luscious péars, immense twelfth-cákes, and great bowls of pùnch.

DICKENS.