"Who planted this old apple tree?"
The children of that distant day

Thus to some aged man shall say;
And gazing on its mossy stem,

The gray-haired man shall answer them:
"A poet of the land was he,

Born in the rude but good old times;

'Tis said he made some quaint old rimes

On planting the apple tree."

1. Bryant describes the planting, the fruitage, and the later years of the apple tree. What does he say about each? When should apple trees be planted? What kinds do you know?

TREES

BY JOYCE KILMER

I THINK that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is pressed
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree.

(From Trees and Other Poems by Joyce Kilmer. Copyright, 1914, George H. Doran Company, Publishers.)

5

THE BLUE AND THE GRAY

BY FRANCIS MILES FINCH

Our Civil War was fought (1861-1865) between the North and the South. The Northern, or Union, soldiers wore blue uniforms; the Southern soldiers, or Confederates, wore gray uniforms.

BY THE flow of the inland river,

Whence the fleets of iron have fled,
Where the blades of the grave-grass quiver,
Asleep are the ranks of the dead.

Under the sod and the dew,

Waiting the judgment day;
Under the one, the Blue;
Under the other, the Gray.

These, in the robings of glory;
Those, in the gloom of defeat;
All, with the battle blood gory,

In the dusk of eternity meet.
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Under the laurel, the Blue;
Under the willow, the Gray.

From the silence of sorrowful hours

The desolate mourners go,

Lovingly laden with flowers,

Alike for the friend and the foe.

Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Under the roses, the Blue;

Under the lilies, the Gray.

So with an equal splendor
The morning sun rays fall,
With a touch impartially tender
On the blossoms blooming for all.
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Broidered with gold, the Blue;
Mellowed with gold, the Gray.

So when the summer calleth,

On forest and field of grain,
With an equal murmur falleth
The cooling drip of the rain.
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Wet with the rain, the Blue;
Wet with the rain, the Gray.

Sadly, but not with upbraiding,

The generous deed was done;

In the storm of the years that are fading
No braver battle was won.
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Under the blossoms, the Blue;

Under the garlands, the Gray.

ΤΟ

15

20

25

5

No more shall the war cry sever,

Or the winding rivers be red;
They banish our anger forever

When they laurel the graves of our dead.
Under the sod and the dew,
Waiting the judgment day;
Love and tears, for the Blue;

Tears and love, for the Gray.

1. Explain the meaning of the Blue and the Gray.

2. Who were the combatants in the Civil War? Which side was victorious? Who were some of the leaders on each side?

the greatest man on each side, developed by this war.

Name

3. Read the lines in the second stanza that suggest the victor and the vanquished. Read various lines of the poem that put the Blue and the Gray on an equality.

4. What occasion would this poem fit? When are the memories of our fallen heroes especially honored?

THE FALLEN HEROES

MOLDERING side by side

Peaceful the heroes rest.

Each bravely fought and died

For the cause he loved the best.

Cast no reflections now,

Silent lie friend and foe;
Honor the graves of all;

Ask not who lies below.

DEDICATION OF GETTYSBURG CEMETERY

BY ABRAHAM LINCOLN

On July 1-3, 1863, the greatest battle ever fought on American soil took place between the Union and the Confederate forces at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. So many men fell on both sides that the battlefield became a large burying ground. Accordingly, it was decided to make it a National Cemetery. At its dedication, November 19, 1863, President Lincoln made the following address in some ways the greatest speech in the English language.

It is a model of brevity, containing only 267 words. These words are mostly short, Anglo-Saxon terms, insuring simplicity. And finally, the sincerity of the speaker lifts the address to the high plane of true literature.

OURSCORE and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so con- s ceived and so dedicated — can long endure.

We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as the final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we 10 should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow, this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world 15 will little note nor long remember what we say here; but it can never forget what they did here.