Various
Fourth Reader
THE GRAVES OF A HOUSEHOLD
They grew in beauty side by side,
They fill’d one home with glee;
Their graves are sever’d far and wide
By mount and stream and sea.
The same fond mother bent at night
O’er each fair sleeping brow;
She had each folded flower in sight:
Where are those dreamers now?
One ’midst the forests of the West
By a dark stream is laid;
The Indian knows his place of rest,
Far in the cedar-shade.
The sea, the blue lone sea, hath one;
He lies where pearls lie deep;
He was the loved of all, yet none
O’er his low bed may weep!
One sleeps where southern vines are drest
Above the noble slain;
He wrapt his colors round his breast
On a blood-red field of Spain.
And one – o’er her the myrtle showers
Its leaves, by soft winds fann’d;
She faded ’midst Italian flowers;
The last of that bright band.
And parted thus they rest who play’d
Beneath the same green tree;
Whose voices mingled as they pray’d
Around one parent knee!
They that with smiles lit up the hall
And cheer’d with mirth the hearth;
Alas, for love! if thou wert all,
And naught beyond, O Earth!
– Felicia Dorothea Hemans.
THE MIRACULOUS PITCHER
One evening, in times long ago, old Philemon and his wife Baucis sat at their cottage door, enjoying the calm and beautiful sunset. They talked together about their garden, and their cow, and their bees, and their grape vine on which the grapes were beginning to turn purple.
The shouts of children, and the fierce barking of dogs in the village near at hand, grew louder and louder, until, at last, it was hardly possible for Baucis and Philemon to hear each other speak.
“Ah, wife,” cried Philemon, “I fear some poor traveller is seeking food and lodging in the village yonder, and our neighbors have set their dogs at him, as their custom is.”
“Welladay!” answered Baucis, “I do wish our neighbors felt a little more kindness for their fellow-creatures.”
“I never heard the dogs so loud!” observed the good old man.
“Nor the children so rude!” answered his good old wife.
They sat shaking their heads, while the noise came nearer and nearer, until, at the foot of the little hill on which their cottage stood, they saw two travellers approaching, on foot. Close behind them came the fierce dogs, snarling at their very heels. A little farther off ran a crowd of children, who sent up shrill cries, and flung stones at the two strangers with all their might. The travellers were very humbly clad, and this, I am afraid, was the reason why the villagers had allowed their children and dogs to treat them so rudely.
“Come, wife,” said Philemon to Baucis, “let us go and meet these people.”
“Go you and meet them,” answered Baucis, “while I make haste within doors, and see whether we can get them anything for supper.”
Accordingly, she hastened into the cottage. Philemon went forward and extended his hand, saying in the heartiest tone, “Welcome, strangers! welcome!”
“Thank you,” replied the younger of the two, in a lively kind of a way. “This is quite another greeting than we have met with yonder in the village.”
Philemon was glad to see him in such good spirits; nor, indeed, would you have fancied, by the traveller’s look and manner, that he was weary with a long day’s journey. He was dressed in rather an odd way, with a sort of cap on his head, the brim of which stuck out over both ears. Though it was a summer evening, the traveller wore a cloak, which he kept wrapped closely about him. Philemon perceived, too, that he had on a singular pair of shoes. He was so wonderfully light and active that it appeared as if his feet sometimes rose from the ground of their own accord.
“I used to be light-footed in my youth,” said Philemon to the traveller. “But I always find my feet grow heavier towards nightfall.”
“There is nothing like a good staff to help one along,” answered the stranger; “and I happen to have an excellent one, as you see.”
This staff, in fact, was the oddest-looking staff that Philemon had ever beheld; it was made of olive wood, and had something like a little pair of wings near the top. Two snakes carved in the wood were twining themselves about the staff, and old Philemon almost thought them alive, and that he could see them wriggling and twisting. Before he could ask any questions, however, the elder stranger drew his attention from the wonderful staff by speaking to him.
“Was there not,” asked the stranger, in a deep tone of voice, “a lake, in very ancient times, covering the spot where now stands yonder village?”
“Not in my time, friend,” answered Philemon; “and yet I am an old man, as you see. There were always the fields and meadows, just as they are now, and the trees, and the stream murmuring through the midst of the valley.”
The stranger shook his head. “Since the inhabitants of yonder village have forgotten the affections and sympathies of their nature, it were better that the lake should be rippling over their dwellings again!” He looked so stern that Philemon was almost frightened; the more so, that when he shook his head, there was a roll as of thunder in the air.
While Baucis was getting the supper, the travellers both began to talk with Philemon.
“Pray, my friend,” asked the old man of the younger stranger, “what may I call your name?”
“Why, I am very nimble, as you see,” answered the traveller. “So, if you call me Quicksilver, the name will fit me well.”
“Quicksilver? Quicksilver?” repeated Philemon. “It is a very odd name! And your companion there! Has he as strange a one?”
“You must ask the thunder to tell it you,” replied Quicksilver. “No other voice is loud enough.”
Baucis had now got supper ready and, coming to the door, began to make apologies for the poor fare which she was forced to set before her guests.
“All will be very well; do not trouble yourself, my good dame,” replied the elder stranger, kindly. “An honest, hearty welcome to a guest turns the coarsest food to nectar and ambrosia.”
The supper was exceedingly small, and the travellers drank all the milk in their bowls at one draught.
“A little more milk, kind Mother Baucis, if you please,” said Quicksilver. “The day has been hot, and I am very much athirst.”
“Now, my dear people,” said Baucis, in great confusion, “I am sorry and ashamed; but the truth is, there is hardly a drop more milk in the pitcher.”
“It appears to me,” cried Quicksilver, taking the pitcher by the handle, “that matters are not quite so bad as you represent them. Here is certainly more milk in the pitcher.” And to the vast astonishment of Baucis, he proceeded to fill not only his own bowl, but his companion’s likewise. The good woman could scarcely believe her eyes.
“But I am old,” thought Baucis to herself, “and apt to be forgetful. I suppose I must have made a mistake. At all events, the pitcher is empty now.”
“What excellent milk!” observed Quicksilver, after quaffing the entire contents of the second bowl. “Excuse me, my kind hostess, but I must really ask you for a little more.”
Baucis turned the pitcher upside down to show that there was not a drop left. What was her surprise, therefore, when such a stream of milk fell bubbling into the bowl that it was filled to the brim, and overflowed upon the table.
“And now a slice of your brown loaf, Mother Baucis,” said Quicksilver, “and a little honey!”
Baucis cut him a slice accordingly; and though the loaf, when she and her husband ate of it, had been rather dry and crusty, it was now as light and moist as if but a few hours out of the oven. But, oh, the honey! Its color was that of the purest gold, and it had the odor of a thousand flowers. Never was such honey tasted, seen, or smelled.
Baucis could not but think that there was something out of the common in all that had been going on. So, after helping the guests, she sat down by Philemon, and told him what she had seen.
“Did you ever hear the like?” she whispered.
“No, I never did,” answered Philemon, with a smile. “And I rather think, my dear wife, that there happened to be a little more in the pitcher than you thought – that is all.”
“Another cup of this delicious milk,” said Quicksilver, “and I shall then have supped better than a prince.”
This time old Philemon took up the pitcher himself; for he was curious to discover whether there was any reality in what Baucis had whispered to him. On taking up the pitcher, therefore, he slyly peeped into it, and was fully satisfied that it contained not so much as a single drop. All at once, however, he beheld a little white fountain which gushed up from the bottom of the pitcher, and speedily filled it to the brim. It was lucky that Philemon, in his surprise, did not drop the miraculous pitcher from his hand. He quickly set it down and cried out, “Who are ye, wonder-working strangers?”
“Your guests, Philemon, and your friends!” replied the elder traveller, in his mild, deep voice. “We are your guests and friends, and may your pitcher never be empty for kind Baucis and yourself, nor for the needy wayfarers!”
The supper being now over, the strangers requested to be shown to their place of repose. When left alone the good old couple spent some time in conversation about the events of the evening, and then lay down to sleep.
The old man and his wife were stirring betimes the next morning, and the strangers likewise arose with the sun, and made their preparations to depart. They asked Philemon and Baucis to walk forth with them a short distance and show them the road.
“Ah me!” exclaimed Philemon, when they had walked a little way from their door. “If our neighbors knew what a blessed thing it is to show hospitality to strangers, they would tie up their dogs, and never allow their children to fling another stone.”
“It is a sin and a shame for them to behave so!” cried good old Baucis.
“My dear friends,” cried Quicksilver, with the liveliest look of mischief in his eyes, “where is this village that you talk about? On which side of us does it lie?”
Philemon and his wife turned towards the valley, where at sunset, only the day before, they had seen the meadows, the houses, the gardens, the street, the children playing in it. But what was their astonishment! There was no longer any appearance of a village! Even the fertile valley in the hollow of which it lay had ceased to have existence. In its stead they beheld the broad blue surface of a lake which filled the great basin of the valley from brim to brim.
“Alas!” cried these kind-hearted old people, “what has become of our poor neighbors?”
“They exist no longer as men and women,” said the elder traveller, in his grand and deep voice, while a roll of thunder seemed to echo it in the distance. “There was neither use nor beauty in such a life as theirs; therefore the lake that was of old has spread itself forth again to reflect the sky.
“As for you, good Philemon,” continued the elder traveller, – “and you, kind Baucis, – you, with your scanty means, have done well, my dear old friends. Request whatever favor you have most at heart, and it is granted.” Philemon and Baucis looked at one another, and then one uttered the desire of both their hearts.
“Let us live together while we live, and leave the world at the same instant when we die!”
“Be it so!” replied the stranger, with majestic kindness. “Now look towards your cottage.”
They did so. What was their surprise on beholding a tall edifice of white marble on the spot where their humble residence had stood.
“There is your home,” said the stranger, smiling on them both. “Show your kindness in yonder palace as freely as in the poor hovel to which you welcomed us last evening.”
The astonished old people fell on their knees to thank him; but, behold! neither he nor Quicksilver was there.
So Philemon and Baucis took up their residence in the marble palace, and spent their time in making everybody happy and comfortable who happened to pass that way. They lived in their palace a very great while, and grew older and older, and very old indeed. At length, however, there came a summer morning when Philemon and Baucis failed to make their appearance, as on other mornings. The guests searched everywhere, but all to no purpose. At last they espied in front of the door, two venerable trees, which no one had ever seen there before. One was an oak and the other a linden tree.
While the guests were marvelling how these trees could have come to be so tall in a single night, a breeze sprang up and set their boughs astir. Then there was a deep murmur in the air, as if the two trees were speaking.
“I am Philemon!” murmured the oak.
“I am Baucis!” murmured the linden tree.
And oh, what a hospitable shade did they fling around them! Whenever a wayfarer paused beneath it, he heard a whisper of the leaves above his head, and wondered how the sound could so much resemble words like these, —
“Welcome, welcome, dear traveller, welcome!”
– Nathaniel Hawthorne.
THE UNNAMED LAKE
It sleeps among the thousand hills
Where no man ever trod,
And only Nature’s music fills
The silences of God.
Great mountains tower above its shore,
Green rushes fringe its brim,
And o’er its breast forevermore
The wanton breezes skim.
Dark clouds that intercept the sun
Go there in spring to weep,
And there, when autumn days are done,
White mists lie down to sleep.
Sunrise and sunset crown with gold
The peaks of ageless stone,
Where winds have thundered from of old
And storms have set their throne.
No echoes of the world afar
Disturb it night or day,
But sun and shadow, moon and star,
Pass and repass for aye.
’Twas in the gray of early dawn,
When first the lake we spied,
And fragments of a cloud were drawn
Half down the mountain side.
Along the shore a heron flew,
And from a speck on high,
That hovered in the deepening blue,
We heard the fish-hawk’s cry.
Among the cloud-capt solitudes,
No sound the silence broke,
Save when, in whispers down the woods,
The guardian mountains spoke.
Through tangled brush and dewy brake,
Returning whence we came,
We passed in silence, and the lake
We left without a name.
– Frederick George Scott.
THE HUNTER OF THE PRAIRIES
Ay, this is freedom! these pure skies
Were never stained with village smoke:
The fragrant wind, that through them flies,
Is breathed from wastes by plough unbroke.
Here, with my rifle and my steed,
And her who left the world for me,
I plant me, where the red deer feed
In the green desert – and am free.
For here the fair savannas know
No barriers in the bloomy grass;
Wherever breeze of heaven may blow,
Or beam of heaven may glance, I pass.
In pastures, measureless as air,
The bison is my noble game;
The bounding elk, whose antlers tear
The branches, falls before my aim.
Mine are the river-fowl that scream
From the long strip of waving sedge;
The bear that marks my weapon’s gleam.
Hides vainly in the forest’s edge;
In vain the she-wolf stands at bay;
The brinded catamount, that lies
High in the boughs to watch his prey,
Even in the act of springing, dies.
With what free growth the elm and plane
Fling their huge arms across my way,
Gray, old, and cumbered with a train
Of vines, as huge, and old, and gray!
Free stray the lucid streams, and find
No taint in these fresh lawns and shades;
Free spring the flowers that scent the wind
Where never scythe has swept the glades.
Alone the Fire, when frost-winds sere
The heavy herbage of the ground,
Gathers his annual harvest here,
With roaring like the battle’s sound,
And hurrying flames that sweep the plain,
And smoke-streams gushing up the sky:
I meet the flames with flames again,
And at my door they cower and die.
Here, from dim woods, the aged past
Speaks solemnly; and I behold
The boundless future in the vast
And lonely river, seawards rolled.
Who feeds its founts with rain and dew?
Who moves, I ask, its gliding mass,
And trains the bordering vines, whose blue
Bright clusters tempt me as I pass?
Broad are these streams – my steed obeys,
Plunges, and bears me through the tide.
Wide are these woods – I thread the maze
Of giant stems, nor ask a guide.
I hunt till day’s last glimmer dies
O’er woody vale and grassy height;
And kind the voice and glad the eyes
That welcome my return at night.
– William Cullen Bryant.
MOSES GOES TO THE FAIR
As we were now to hold up our heads a little higher in the world, my wife suggested that it would be proper to sell the colt, which was grown old, at a neighboring fair, and buy us a horse that would carry single or double upon an occasion, and make a pretty appearance at church or upon a visit. This at first I opposed stoutly; but it was as stoutly defended. However, as I weakened, my antagonist gained strength, till at last we agreed to part with him.
As the fair happened on the following day, I had intentions of going myself; but my wife persuaded me that I had got a cold, and nothing could prevail upon her to permit me from home. “No, my dear,” said she, “our son Moses is a discreet boy, and can buy and sell to very good advantage. You know all our great bargains are of his purchasing. He always stands out and higgles, and actually tires them till he gets a bargain.”
As I had some opinion of my son’s prudence, I was willing enough to intrust him with this commission; and the next morning I perceived his sisters very busy in fitting out Moses for the fair, – trimming his hair, brushing his buckles, and cocking his hat with pins. The business of the toilet being over, we had at last the satisfaction of seeing him mounted upon the colt, with a deal box before him to bring home groceries in.
He had on a coat made of that cloth they call thunder and lightning, which, though grown too short, was much too good to be thrown away. His waistcoat was of gosling-green, and his sisters had tied his hair with a broad black ribbon. We all followed him several paces from the door, bawling after him, “Good luck! good luck!” till we could see him no longer.
When it was almost nightfall, I began to wonder what could keep our son so long at the fair. “Never mind our son,” cried my wife; “depend upon it, he knows what he is about. I’ll warrant we’ll never see him sell his hen on a rainy day. I have seen him buy such bargains as would amaze one. I’ll tell you a good story about that, that will make you split your sides with laughing – But, as I live, yonder comes Moses without a horse, and the box at his back.”
As she spoke, Moses came slowly on foot, and sweating under the deal box, which he had strapped round his shoulders like a pedler.
“Welcome, welcome, Moses! Well, my boy, what have you brought us from the fair?”
“I have brought you myself,” said Moses, with a sly look, and resting the box on the dresser.
“Ay, Moses,” cried my wife, “that we know; but where is the horse?”
“I have sold him,” replied Moses, “for three pounds five shillings and twopence.”
“Well done, my good boy,” returned she; “I knew you would touch them off. Between ourselves, three pounds five shillings and twopence is no bad day’s work. Come, let us have it then.”
“I have brought back no money,” cried Moses, again; “I have laid it all out in a bargain, – and here it is,” pulling out a bundle from his breast; “here they are, – a gross of green spectacles, with silver rims and shagreen cases.”
“A gross of green spectacles!” repeated my wife, in a faint voice. “And you have parted with the colt, and brought us back nothing but a gross of green paltry spectacles!”
“Dear mother,” cried the boy, “why won’t you listen to reason? I had them a dead bargain, or I should not have bought them. The silver rims alone will sell for double the money.”
“A fig for the silver rims!” cried my wife, in a passion; “I dare swear they won’t sell for above half the money at the rate of broken silver, five shillings an ounce.”
“You need be under no uneasiness,” said I, “about selling the rims, for they are not worth sixpence; for I perceive they are only copper varnished over.”
“What!” cried my wife; “not silver! the rims not silver!”
“No,” cried I; “no more silver than your saucepan.”
“And so,” returned she, “we have parted with the colt, and have got only a gross of green spectacles, with copper rims and shagreen cases? A murrain take such trumpery! The blockhead has been imposed upon, and should have known his company better.”
“There, my dear,” cried I, “you are wrong; he should not have known them at all.”
“To bring me such stuff!” returned she; “if I had them, I would throw them into the fire.”
“There again you are wrong, my dear,” said I; “for though they are copper, we shall keep them by us, as copper spectacles, you know, are better than nothing.”
By this time the unfortunate Moses was undeceived. He now saw that he had been imposed upon by a prowling sharper, who, observing his figure, had marked him for an easy prey. I therefore asked the circumstances of his deception. He sold the horse, it seems, and walked the fair in search of another. A reverend-looking man brought him to a tent, under pretence of having one to sell.
“Here,” continued Moses, “we met another man, very well dressed, who desired to borrow twenty pounds upon these, saying that he wanted money, and would dispose of them for a third of the value. The first gentleman whispered me to buy them, and cautioned me not to let so good an offer pass. I sent to Mr. Flamborough, and they talked him up as finely as they did me; and so at last we were persuaded to buy the two gross between us.”
Our family had now made several vain attempts to be fine. “You see, my children,” said I, “how little is to be got by attempts to impose upon the world. Those that are poor and will associate with none but the rich are hated by those they avoid, and despised by those they follow.” – Oliver Goldsmith.