the precious crops. What novelty is worth that sweet monotony where everything is known, and loved because it is known? The wood I walk in on this mild May day, with 5 the young yellow-brown foliage of the oaks between me and the blue sky, the white star flowers, and the blue-eyed speedwell, and the ground ivy at my feet, what grove of tropic palms, what strange ferns or splendid broad-petaled blossoms, could ever 10 thrill such deep and delicate fibers within me as this home scene? These familiar flowers, these well-remembered bird notes, this sky with its fitful brightness, these furrowed and grassy fields, each with a sort of personality given to it by the capri15 cious hedgerows, such things as these are the mother tongue of our imagination, the language that is laden with all the subtle associations the fleeting hours of our childhood left behind them. Our delight in the sunshine on the deep-bladed 20 grass to-day might be no more than the faint per ception of wearied souls, if it were not for the sunshine and the grass in the far-off years, which still live in us and transform our perception into love. mysterious secret and hard to understand. - tench: a freshwater fish. - eagre: a flood tide moving up the river. monotony : capricious: changeable. — subtle: mysterious. sameness. BRUCE'S ADDRESS ROBERT BURNS ROBERT BURNS (1759-1796) was the son of a poor Scottish peasant, in whose simple home books were the only luxury. Of a collection of English songs Burns says, “I pored over them driving my cart or walking to labor, song by song, verse by verse." He In his twenty-sixth year Burns published a volume of poems that went to the hearts of the Scottish people and made him famous. spent two years at Edinburgh, where he received much honor, but his lack of selfcontrol made his life a disappointment to himself and to his friends. The memory of Burns, every man's, every boy's, every girl's head carries snatches of his songs, and they say them by heart, and what is strangest of all, never learned them from a book, but from mouth to mouth. The wind whispers them, the birds 25 whistle them, the corn, barley, and bulrushes hoarsely rustle them, nay the music boxes at Geneva are framed and toothed to play them; the hand organs of the Savoyards in all cities repeat them, and the chimes of bells ring them in spires. They are the property and solace of mankind. - RALPH WALDO EMERSON. 30 5 10 15 Scots, who have with Wallace bled, Now's the day, and now 's the hour; See approach proud Edward's power Who will be a traitor knave? Who so base as be a slave? Let him turn and flee! Who for Scotland's king and law 20 SELF-CONTROL Reader, attend! whether thy soul Know, prudent, cautious self-control Is wisdom's root. From A Bard's Epitaph SCOTLAND Oh Scotia! my dear, my native soil! For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is sent! Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toil Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet content! And oh! may Heaven their simple lives prevent 5 From luxury's contagion, weak and vile! Then, howe'er crowns and coronets be rent, A virtuous populace may rise the while, And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved From The Cotter's Saturday Night isle. Wallace: a patriotic Scottish leader who tried to free his country from English rule. -Bruce: the Scottish king who defeated the English king at Bannockburn and won independence for his land. gory: full of blood.-Edward: Edward II of England, the king who was defeated by Bruce.-fa': Scottish for fall. 10 10 A BRAVE RESCUE AND A ROUGH RIDE RICHARD DODDRIDGE BLACKMORE RICHARD DODDRIDGE BLACKMORE (1825-1900), an English novelist and poet, was born at Longworth, Berkshire, England. He was an honor graduate of Exeter College, University of Oxford. His law practice in London did not prevent his writing 5 many books. His novel, Lorna Doone, from which the following story is taken, did not attract much attention when it first appeared. Subsequently, however, it sprang into sudden fame, and in a comparatively short time ran through thirteen editions. It happened upon a November evening (when I was about fifteen years old and outgrowing my strength very rapidly, my sister Annie being turned thirteen) that the ducks in the court made a terrible quacking, instead of marching off to their pen, one 15 behind another. Thereupon Annie and I ran out to see what might be the sense of it. There were thirteen ducks, and they all quacked very movingly. They pushed their gold-colored bills here and there (yet dirty, as gold is apt to be), and they jumped 20 on the triangles of their feet, and sounded out of their nostrils; and some of the over-excited ones ran along low on the ground, quacking grievously, with their bills snapping and bending, and the roof of their mouths exhibited. |