To lay beside this severed curl, Of chrysolite or pearl? 4. Ah, no! not so! We may follow on his track, And yet I dare aver He is a brave discoverer Of climes his elders do not know. He has more learning than appears On the scroll of twice three thousand years, Or from farthest Indies brought; - He knows, perchance, how spirits fare, – What is their guise and speech In those lands beyond our reach, And his eyes behold Things that shall never, never be to mortal hearers told. LANGUAGE STUDY. I. What expression (1) means, who is only three years old? What is the allusion in "who seek the frozen Pole" (1)? What lines in stanza 1 mean, he has died? What is meant by "one who bore a flower" (2)? Give synonyms of: voyager; surges; bark; command; return; severed. Write the analysis of: voyager; discoverer; unknown; noiseless. Write the analysis of: portal (porta); severed (parare); mortal (mors). II. In stanza 1 select a complex sentence. Select an exclamative sentence in stanza 3. Analyze : "We may follow on his track, but he comes not back." prose order: "And yet a voyager is he greater than Arrange in the Drake or Frobisher." III. The fact expressed in this poem is that a child has died: what beautiful strain of imagery does the poet use to convey this? Point out what you consider fine uses of this image. Select skillfully chosen describing words (epithets), as “severed curl" (stanza 3). Note the arrangement of words in "sweet smile innocent." 10. Six Chinese Proverbs. great, of high station. | small, in humble life. 1. If a man has not done any thing wrong, a knock may come at dead of night, and he will not be startled. 2. Think of your own faults the first part of the night (when you are awake), and of the faults of others the latter part of the night (when you are asleep). 3. Even if you should be uncivil to a great man, be sure that you are respectful to a small man. 4. To go a long journey to offer incense in a distant temple, is not so good as showing kindness near home. 5. Use men as you use wood: if one inch is rotten, you do not throw away the whole piece. 6. Do not unto others what you would not have them do to you. 11.- Knickerbocker Life in New York. am-phĭb'i-oŭs, capable of living | et'i-quette, laws of politeness. in both water and air. burgh'er, a well-to-do citizen. com-mu'ni-ty, possession in com mon. gris'ly, frightful, terrible. pri-mē'val, belonging to early times. Delft, or dělf, white earthenware rhomboids, oblique-angled parof Delft, Holland. allelograms. PREPARATORY NOTES. The following is an extract from Irving's "History of New York, by Diedrich Knickerbocker." Knickerbocker was a purely imaginary author, but the popularity of the book caused the name to be given to the old Dutch families of New York. Washington Irving (born in the city of New York in 1783, and died 1859) is the most classic of American authors. He is distinguished for his graceful style, rich humor, and simple pathos. —(2) St. Nicholas, the Santa Claus of the Dutch. — (4) sanc'tum sanc-tor'um (sănk'tum sănk-tōr'um, Latin, "holy of holies"), hence the most private apartment. 1. In those good old days of simplicity and sunshir, a passion for cleanliness was the leading principle in domestic economy, and the universal test of an able housewife. 2. The front door was never opened, except for marriages, funerals, New Year's Day, the festival of St. Nicholas, or some such great occasion. It was ornamented with a gorgeous brass knocker, which was curiously wrought,— sometimes in the device of a dog, and sometimes in that of a lion's head,- and daily burnished with such religious zeal, that it was often worn out by the very precautions taken for its preservation. 3. The whole house was constantly in a state of inundation, under the discipline of mops and brooms and scrubbing brushes; and the good housewives of those days were a kind of amphibious animal, delighting exceedingly to be dabbling in water, insomuch that an historian of the day gravely tells us that many of his townswomen grew to have webbed fingers, "like unto a duck.” 4. The grand parlor was the sanctum sanctorum, where the passion for cleaning was indulged without control. No one was permitted to enter this sacred apartment, except the mistress and her confidential maid, who visited it once a week for the purpose of giving it a thorough cleaning. On these occasions they always took the precaution of leaving their shoes at the door, and entering devoutly in their stocking-feet. 5. After scrubbing the floor, sprinkling it with fine white sand,— which was curiously stroked with a broom into angles and curves and rhomboids, - after washing the windows, rubbing and polishing the furniture, and putting a new branch of evergreens in the fireplace the windows were again closed to keep out the flies, and the room was kept carefully locked, until the revolution of time brought round the weekly cleaning day. 6. As to the family, they always entered in at the gate, and generally lived in the kitchen. To have seen a numerous household assembled round the fire, one would have imagined that he was transported to those happy days of primeval simplicity which float before our imaginations like golden visions. 7. The fireplaces were of a truly patriarchal magnitude, where the whole family, old and young, master and servant, black and white, -nay, even the very cat and dog, enjoyed a community of privilege, and had each a right to a corner. 8. Here the old burgher would sit in perfect silence, puffing his pipe, looking in the fire, with half-shut eyes, and thinking of nothing, for hours together; the good wife, on the opposite side, would employ herself diligently in spinning yarn or knitting stockings. The young folks would crowd around the hearth, listening with breathless attention to some old crone of a negro, who was the oracle of the family, and who, perched like a raven in a corner of the chimney, would croak forth, for a long winter afternoon, a string of incredible stories about New England witches, grisly ghosts, horses without heads, hairbreadth escapes, and bloody encounters among Indians. 9. In these happy days, fashionable parties were generally confined to the higher classes, or noblesse; that is to say, such as kept their own cows, and drove their own wagons. The company usually assembled at three o'clock, and went away about six, unless it was in winter-time, when the fashionable hours were a little earlier, that the ladies might reach home before dark. |