flat on the ground. All followed his example in silence. 6. We remained thus for about ten minutes, during which a still heat, like that of a red-hot iron slowly passing over us, was alone to be felt. Then the tent walls began again to flap in the returning gusts, and announced that the worst of the Simoon had gone by. We got up half dead with exhaustion, and unmuffled our faces. My comrades appeared more like corpses than living men; and So, I suppose, did I. However, I could not forbear, in spite of warning, to step out and look at the camels: they were still lying flat as if they had been shot. The air was yet darkish, but before long it brightened up to its usual dazzling clearness. During the whole time that the Simoon lasted, the atmosphere was entirely free from sand or dust, so that I hardly know how to account for its singular obscurity. 1. Solstice, scorched, oppressiveness, mutually, relapsed, asylum, concentrated, reassure, atmosphere, obscurity, interrogations, providentially. 2. Where do simoons occur? Where is Arabia? Who was Selim? What beasts of burden are used on deserts? What renders them peculiarly adapted to this use? Why did the Arabs muffle their faces? What is meant by seemed to draw up like a curtain"? " concentrated poison blast"? "the four crown pleas"? LXXXIX. COUNTRY LIFE IN EARLY ENGLAND. 1. The rural knight or squire inhabited a huge building, half house, half castle, crowded with servants in homespun blue coats, many of whom were only serviceable in filling up the blank spaces of the mansion, but as these men had been born in his worship's service, it was held as a matter of course that they should live and die in it. The family rose at daybreak, and first of all assembled at prayers, which were read by the chaplain. 2. Then came breakfast, after which the master of the household and his sons got into the saddle and went off to hunt the deer, followed by some score of mounted attendants; while the lady and her daughters superintended the dairy or the buttery, prescribed the day's task for the spinningwheels, dealt out bread and meat to the poor, and concocted all manner of simples for the sick and infirm of the village. 3. If leisure still remained, the making of confections and preserves was a never-failing resource, independently of spinning or sewing, or perhaps embroidering some battle or hunting piece which had been commenced by the housewives of a preceding generation. At noon dinner was served up in the great hall, the walls of which were plentifully adorned with stag's horns, casques, antique brands, and calivers; and the noisy bell that sent the note of warning over the country gave also a universal invitation and welcome to the hospitable board. After dinner, sack or home-brewed October ale occupied the hours until bedtime, at sunset. 4. Such was the ordinary history of a day. When the weather prevented out-door recreation, the family library, some six or eight large tomes, was in requisition, and if the members of the family could read they might while away the hours in perusing these volumes for the twentieth time. 5. In this fashion they derived their knowledge of religion in general from the Bible and the "Practice of Piety," their Protestantism from Fox's "Acts and Monuments," their chivalrous lore from Froissart's "Chronicles" or, perchance, the "Merrie Gests of Robin Hood," their historical erudition from Hall or Holinshed, and their morality and sentiment from the "Seven Wise Masters "Seven Champions of Christendom." or the 6. Such was the life of an old country gentleman when James succeeded to the crown of England. But these habits, the last relics of the simplicity of the olden time, did not long outlive that event. Tidings of the gay doings at court, and the wonderful good fortune of the royal favorites, reached the ears of the aristocratic rustics, and from that moment rural occupations and village maypoles lost their charm; the young were impatient to repair to the metropolis, and the old were obliged to yield to the prevailing fashion. 7. With all the fierce impetuosity of novices, clod-compelling esquires and well-dowried country widows rushed into the pleasures and excesses of town life; and this with a rapidity hitherto unknown in England, and at which moralists became giddy, ancient manors tumbled to decay, fortunes that had accumulated for generations vanished, the hereditary estates of centuries became the property of men of yesterday, and the time-honored names of the most ancient families disappeared from the scroll of English heraldry, and soon ceased to be remembered. 1. Serviceable, chaplain, concocted, embroidery, antique, casques, calivers, recreation, tomes, requisition, chivalrous, lore, perchance, erudition, impetuosity, novices, dowried, hereditary, heraldry, scroll. 2. Why was it necessary to have the squire's home "half castle"? Why were books so scarce? Whom did James I. succeed? Why do so many from the country wish to go to the city? XC. TO AUTUMN. 1. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun; Conspiring with him how to load and bless With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run To bend with apples the moss'd cottage trees, To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells |
