had long believed the prey of fishes in the ocean, here preserved, though lifeless! I assist at thy funeral, splendid in its external circumstances, still more splendid from the noble persons who attend thee to thy place of rest. And to these," added he, with a faltering voice, so soon as I can speak, I will express my thanks.”

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21. Tears hindered him from saying more. By the pressure of a spring, the abbé sunk the body into the cavity of the marble. Four youths, dressed as the boys had been, came out from behind the tapestry, and, lifting the heavy, beautifully ornamented lid upon the coffin, thus began their song:

22. The Youths "Well is the treasure now laid up, the fair image of the Past! Here sleeps it in the marble, undecaying. In your hearts, too, it lives, it works. Travel, travel back into life! Take along with you this holy earnestness; for earnestness alone makes life eternity."

23. The invisible chorus joined in with the last words; but no one heard the strengthening sentiment; all were too much busied with themselves, and the emotions which these wonderful disclosures had excited. The abbé and Natalia conducted the marchese out; Theresa and Lothario walked by Wilhelm. It was not till the music had altogether died away that their sorrows, thoughts, meditations, curiosity, again fell on them with all their force, and made them long to be transported back into that exalting scene.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (Carlyle's translation).

FOR PREPARATION.-I. From "Wilhelm Meister," Book VIII., Chapter viii. In XXXI., Mignon's Song of Italy has been given. She dies young, after being taken into a noble family in Germany. During the stately funeral ceremonies here described, an Italian marquis, then on

a visit

to this family, recognizes in the corpse his niece, who had been stolen from her home when an infant, and was supposed to have been drowned in the sea.

II. Ab'-bé (-bā), trăv'-el, ear'-nest-ness (ēr'-), ehō'-rus, mār-ehẹ’-şe, bug'-ied (biz'id), won'-der-ful, strength'-en-ing (strength'n-), dis-elō'-sure (-klō'zhur), Nă-tä'-lià, sçēne, rèç-Ĭ-ta-tïve'.

III. Write the pronouns that express only male persons;-females;-neither males nor females; that express only the person speaking;-the person spoken to ;-spoken of; all that express possession.

IV. Eternity, invisible, sentiment, emotions, excited, meditations, exalting, transporting, friezes, socles, azure, tapestry, candelabras, sarcophagus, recitative, exequies, abbé, magnificently, ornamented, illuminated, ceiling, visible, reluctantly, repose, bier, imaginative, appointment, silent, victims, rigorous, arbitrary, duration, contradictions, committed, final, uncertain, conjecture, shrouded, gratitude, vivid, consumed, utmost, posture, compose, humility, consecrated, ardor, intensely, faltering.

V. "Still dwelling" (the tomb). Note the form of this recitative, modeled on the rhythmic parallelism of Hebrew poetry (see CIII., CXX.) (e. g., repetition of "still dwelling" and "bring” in question and response; correspondence in "tired playmate-let her rest, till songs.. awaken"; repetition of welcome; antithesis of "no boy-age only," etc.). Make a list of the repetitions, synonyms, correspondences, and contrasts, used in these funeral services. "Yet look at the strong wings." (In a charade played by the children a few days before her death, she had personated an angel, and worn wings; in the angel's dress she was laid out for burial.) Note the grief-expressed by the boys as representing the particular, the individual human ties of friendship and love-and the consolation-expressed by the invisible chorus, as representing the universal, the moral and religious principles that support man in sorrow. "The man who prepared this silent abode" (i. e., the "Hall of the Past," as it was named by the old nobleman who had founded it. He was the uncle of Natalia and Lothario, who inherited the castle from him).

CXLVI. THE CLOSING SCENE.

1. Within his sober realm of leafless trees
The russet Year inhaled the dreamy air,
Like some tanned reaper in his hour of ease,

When all the fields are lying brown and bare.

2. The gray Barns, looking from their hazy hills
O'er the dim waters widening in the vales,
Sent down the air a greeting to the Mills,
On the dull thunder of alternate flails.

3. All sights were mellowed and all sounds subdued;
The hills seemed farther, and the streams sang low
As in a dream, the distant woodman hewed
His winter log with many a muffled blow.

4. The embattled forests, erewhile armed in gold,
Their banners bright with every martial hue,
Now stood, like some sad beaten host of old,
Withdrawn afar in Time's remotest blue.

5. On slumbrous wings the vulture tried his flight; The dove scarce heard his sighing mate's com plaint;

And like a star slow drowning in the light,

The village church vane seemed to pale and faint.

6. The sentinel cock upon the hillside crew

Crew twice, and all was stiller than beforeSilent till some replying warder blew

His alien horn, and then was heard no more.

7. Where erst the jay, within the elm's tall crest,
Made garrulous trouble round her unfledged young
And where the oriole hung her swaying nest,
By every light wind like a censer swung-

8. Where sang the noisy masons of the eaves,
The busy swallows, circling ever near,
Foreboding, as the rustic mind believes,
An early harvest and a plenteous year—

9. Where every bird which charmed the vernal feast Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at morn, To warn the reaper of the rosy east

All now was songless, empty, and forlorn.

10. Alone from out the stubble piped the quail, And croaked the crow through all the dreary gloom;

Alone the pheasant, drumming in the vale,

Made echo to the distant cottage loom.

11. There was no bud, no bloom upon the bowers;
The spiders wove their thin shrouds night by night;
The thistle down, the only ghost of flowers,
Sailed slowly by, passed noiseless out of sight.

12. Amid all this, in this most cheerless air,

And where the woodbine shed upon the porch
Its crimson leaves, as if the Year stood there
Firing the floor with his inverted torch-

13. Amid all this, the center of the scene,

The white-haired matron, with monotonous tread,
Plied the swift wheel, and with her joyless mien
Sat like a Fate, and watched the flying thread.

14. She had known sorrow-he had walked with her, Oft supped, and broke with her the ashen crust; And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir

Of his black mantle trailing in the dust.

15. While yet her cheek was bright with summer bloom,
Her country summoned, and she gave her all;
And twice War bowed to her his sable plume—
Regave the sword to rust upon the wall.

16. Regave the sword-but not the hand that drew
And struck for liberty its dying blow,
Nor him who, to his sire and country true,
Fell 'mid the ranks of the invading foe.

17. Long, but not loud, the droning wheel went on,
Like the low murmur of a hive at noon;
Long, but not loud, the memory of the gone
Breathed through her lips a sad and tremulous tune.

18. At last the thread was snapped: her head was bowed;
Life dropped the distaff through his hands serene;
And loving neighbors smoothed her careful shroud,
While death and winter closed the autumn scene.
Thomas Buchanan Read.

FOR PREPARATION.-I. As the poet and painter, author of this piece, was a native of Pennsylvania, the fact suggests to us the probability that this unequaled poetic painting of the scenery and atmospheric effects of Indian summer, together with the impressions made by it upon a sensitive nature, is descriptive of a Pennsylvania landscape in November.

II. Realm, ha'-zy, ǎl-ter'-nate, fields, plen'-te-ous, phĕaş'-ant (fez'-), ĕeh'-o, ma'-tron, se-rēne'.

III. Give the forms of the verb be that agree with the person speaking;— person spoken to;-spoken of; that express present time;-past time with have ;-past time without have. Use all the forms that you can with I;— with we;—with thou ;—-with you;—with he;—with they.

IV. Sober, russet, year, inhaled, tanned, "alternate flails," subdued, mellowed, hewed, embattled, erewhile, "martial hue," remotest blue," vulture, sentinel, warder, alien, erst, crest, garrulous, unfledged, censer, foreboding, rustic, charmed, "vernal feast," stubble, loom, "inverted torch," monotonous, mien, sable, sire, invading, tremulous, distaff.

V. "Russet Year," gray Barns," and "Mills "-note personification. "A greeting to the Mills" (in the barns the grain was being threshed, to send to the mills for flour). "Alternate flails" (two men with flails stand at opposite ends of the threshing floor and strike the grain in alternate blows). Note the pictures in this piece, every one easily painted, and every one hav