Sivut kuvina
PDF
ePub

stead pasture, and put them in with mine; and in the fall you shall take them back, and if any one is missing you may take your pick out of my whole flock.'

8. "Pulcifer looked confounded; he did not know how to take me. At last he stammered out, 'Now, 'Squire, are you in earnest?'-'Certainly I am,' I answered; it is better for me to feed your sheep in my pasture on grass, than to feed them here on grain; and I see the fence can't keep them out.'

9. "After a moment's silence, 'The sheep shall not trouble you any more,' exclaimed Pulcifer. 'I will fetter them all. But I'll let you know that when any man talks of shooting, I can shoot, too; and when a man is kind and neighborly, I can be kind and neighborly, too.' The sheep never again trespassed on my lot.

10. "Now, my friends, remember this: When nations threaten to fight, other nations will be ready, too. Love will beget love; a wish to be at peace will keep you in peace. You can overcome evil with good. There is no other way."

[blocks in formation]

Do not say pint for point; objeck for object; wile for while. Pronounce the o in nothing like short u, as in nut.

O! WHO shall lightly say that Fame

Is nothing but an empty name,
While in that sound there is a charm

The nerves to brace, the heart to warm,

As, thinking of the mighty dead,

The young from slothful couch shall start,
And vow, with lifted hands outspread,
Like them to act a noble part!

O! who shall lightly say that Fame
Is nothing but an empty name,
When, but for those,

our mighty dead, —
All ages past, a blank would be,
Sunk in oblivion's murky bed,

[ocr errors]

A desert bare, a shipless sea ?
They are the distant objects seen,
The lofty marks of what hath been.

[ocr errors]

O! who shall lightly say that Fame '
Is nothing but an empty name,
When memory of the mighty dead,
To earth-worn pilgrim's wistful eye,
The brightest rays of cheering shed,
That point to immortality?

JOANNA BAILLIE. (1765-1860.)

[blocks in formation]

CAR'RIAGE, n., a vehicle with two or Cov'E-NANT (kŭv'e-nant), n., a mutual

[blocks in formation]

In Ro-land', the accent is on the last syllable. Give the y sound to u in at'ti-tude. The c in the last syllable of sac'ri-fice has the sound of z. Do not say libutty for lib'er-ty; presunce for près'ence; acrost for a-cross.

1. DURING the reign of terror in France, Madame Roland was brought before the Convention on an absurd charge of treasonable correspondence with England. By her presence of mind, her acuteness, and her wit, she baffled and mortified her accusers.

2. But on the 31st of May, 1793, she was again

arrested, and sent to prison. As an officer was conducting her, he asked if she wished to have the windows of the carriage closed. "No," replied she; oppressed innocence should not assume the attitude of crime and shame. I do not fear the looks of honest men, and I brave those of my enemies."

66

3. The cowards and ruffians who then had control of public affairs in France were afraid of the talents and the influence of this woman. They determined on her death. They gave her a trial; but it was a mere mockery of justice, a solemn farce. In her address before the Revolutionary Tribunal, on the 8th of November, 1793, she spoke as follows:

4. "Not to its own times merely does the generous mind feel that it belongs. It comprehends in its regard the whole human race, and extends its care even to posterity. It was my lot to be the friend of men proscribed and sacrificed by those who hated them for their superiority. And I must perish in my turn! I have a double claim to death at your hands.

5. "When Innocence walks to the scaffold at the command of error and of guilt, every step she takes is an advance to glory. Might I be the last victim of that furious spirit of party, by which you are impelled, with what joy would I quit this unfortunate earth, which swallows up the friends of virtue, and drinks the blood of the just!

6. "Truth! Friendship! Country!- sacred objects, sentiments dear to my heart, - accept my last sacrifice! My life was devoted to you, and you will render my death easy and glorious. Righteous Heaven! enlighten this wretched people, for whom I invoked liberty.

[ocr errors]

7. "Liberty? Ah! that is for noble minds not for weak beings who enter into a covenant with guilt, and try to varnish cowardice and selfishness with the

name of prudence; - not for corrupt wretches who rise from the bed of vice, or from the mire of indigence, to feast their eyes on the noble blood that streams from the scaffold.

8. "O, no! Liberty is the portion of a people who delight in humanity, who revere justice, despise flattery, and venerate truth. While you are not such a people, O! my fellow-citizens, in vain will you talk of liberty. Instead of liberty, you will have licentiousness; and to that you will all in your turns fall victims. You will ask for bread, and will get-dead bodies! And at length you will bow down your necks to the yoke, and find your vile refuge in the rule of a despot.

9. "I make no concealment of my sympathies, my opinions. I know that a Roman mother once was sent to the scaffold for lamenting the death of her son. I know that, in times of delusion and party rage, he who dares avow himself the friend of the proscribed, exposes himself to their fate.

10. "But I do not fear death. I never feared any thing but guilt; and I will not purchase life at the price of a lie. Woe to the times! Woe to the people, among whom to do homage to disregarded truth is to incur their hate! Happy he who, under such circumstances, is bold enough to defy that hate-as I do!"

11. All the eloquence, all the courage, all the feminine beauty of Madame Roland, could not save her from the guillotine. She heard herself sentenced to death, with the air of one who saw in her condemnation merely her title to immortality. She rose, and, slightly bowing to her craven judges, said, with an ironical smile, "I thank you for considering me worthy to share the fate of the good and great men you have murdered."

12. As she passed along the corridor, where the

other prisoners had assembled to greet her return, she looked at them smilingly, and, drawing her right hand across her throat, made a sign expressive of cutting off a head. This was her only farewell; it was tragic as her destiny, joyous as her deliverance; and well was it understood by those who saw it.

13. To the last moment did this remarkable woman preserve her presence of mind, her intrepidity, and even her gayety. A colossal statue of Liberty, composed of clay, like the liberty of the time, stood near the scaffold. Bowing before this statue, as though to do homage to a power for whom she was about to die, she exclaimed, “O Liberty! Liberty! how many crimes are committed in thy name!" She then resigned herself to the hands of the executioner, and in a few seconds her head fell into the basket placed to receive it.

[blocks in formation]

IM-PU'NI-TY, N., exemption from pun- MER'CE-NA-RY, a., hired; venal.

ishment.

IN'STI-GATE, v. t., to urge.

DEM'A-GŎGUE, n., a leader of the mob.
EX-AG'GE-RATE, v., to overstate.

RE-IN-AUGU-RATE, v. t., to enter upon again.

AR-IS-TOC'RA-CY, n., literally, a gov¬ ernment by the best; the gentry.

Pronounce Caius, Kā'yus; Gracchus, Grăk'kus. The abbreviation B. C. stands for Before Christ. Do not say toomult for tu'mult. Give the y sound to long u.

Caius Gracchus, born B. C. 163, was the son of that Cornelia who once said, pointing to her two boys, "These are my jewels!" Tiberius, his elder brother, an advocate of popular rights, was slain by the aristocratic party.

1. It is now ten years, O Romans! since my brother, Tiberius Gracchus, was elected your trib'une. In what

« EdellinenJatka »