be enriched by it; if he nurse bitter and envenomed thoughts, his own spirit will absorb the poison, and he will crawl among men as a burnished adder, whose life is mischief, whose errand is death.

He who hunts for flowers will find flowers; and he who loves weeds may find weeds.

30

Let it be remembered that no man, who is not himself morally diseased, will have a relish for disease in others. Reject, then, the morbid ambition of the Cynic, or cease to call yourself a man. 35 GLOSSARY. Mousing; morose; innuendoes; asceticism; envenomed; morbid. STUDY. What is a cynic? Why is he compared to the owl? What is his attitude toward human actions? toward the qualities we call "good"? What is his effect upon a listener? Give illustrations of his "criticisms and innuendoes." What comparison shows their effect? What is the result of the cynical habit of mind upon its possessor? What of the appreciative habit of mind? Do you agree fully with all that is said in the final paragraph? Do you think the comparison to an adder is a fitting one?

THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign,
Sails the unshadowed main,-

The venturous bark that flings

On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings,

And coral reefs lie bare,

Where the cold sea maids rise to sun their streaming hair.

Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl·

Wrecked is the ship of pearl!

And every chambered cell,

Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell,
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell,

Before thee lies revealed,

Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed!

5

10

Year after year beheld the silent toil

That spread his lustrous coil;

Still, as the spiral grew,

He left the past year's dwelling for the new,

Stole with soft step its shining archway through,

Built up its idle door,

Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the old no more.

Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee,

Child of the wandering sea,

Cast from her lap, forlorn!

From thy dead lips a clearer note is born

Than ever Triton blew from wreathèd horn!

While on mine ear it rings,

Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings:

Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
As the swift seasons roll!

Leave thy low-vaulted past!

Let each new temple, nobler than the last,

Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,

Till thou at length art free,

Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea!

GLOSSARY. Siren; sea maids; irised; crypt; Triton. STUDY. The nautilus was formerly supposed to move over the water by means of a kind of membrane which served as a sail. What does this make clear about the imagery of the opening stanza? What is the state of the shell as the poet looks at it and writes (stanza 2)? Sketch the life history of the nautilus as the poet builds it up in stanza 3. What likeness or analogy does the poem set forth between the growth of the nautilus and the development of the human soul? What appeal to the soul is based upon a recognition of this analogy? How does it serve as an inspiration to us? Explain in detail the meaning of the imagery in the last four lines.

MEDITATIONS

EDWARD HOWARD GRIGGS

I. NEEDLESS FAILURE

In the stir and hurry of life how careless we are of little courtesies! We rudely brush aside love that yearns to bless us. Unthinkingly we wound hearts whose joy or sorrow hangs upon our slightest act or word. Pride or carelessness checks the spontaneous expression of our love. We crush and cast aside the 5 flower of life's mystery, and then bemoan the monotony of existence. Oh, to be awake every moment to the wonder and majesty of it all!

GLOSSARY. Spontaneous; monotony.

STUDY. To what lack in us does this paragraph call attention? What is the result upon our lives? How may we avoid the failure set forth here?

II. DUTY

Men frequently abandon their property when they no longer have use for it, and imagine they are very benevolent. So when 10 a man finds his life a wreck he is apt to say he will live for others. Yet one can give to others only what one's life is worth to one's self.

To abandon a mean situation is not the path to a better one. Only when we are faithful to the little duty are we worthy to 15 meet a larger one. It is often necessary to leave a situation that offers small chance for the realization of our lives, but it makes all the difference in the world whether we sneak meanly out from under the little duty or climb bravely through and over the top. GLOSSARY. Benevolent.

STUDY. What is the ideal of duty presented? What mean ways of dodging this call are mentioned? What test of a strong character is suggested?

III. HUMANITY

Out upon the night-wind it is born, faint, tremulous, rising 20 into a deep swell of sound, shaking the fabric of the earth and

reaching aloft to heaven-the sigh of suffering humanity. It shakes the throne of the despot, and weakens the foundations upon which Pride and Selfishness have built their seemingly 25 eternal palaces. It rings in the ears of the dreamer and makes tremulous the heart of every lover of his fellow-men. More powerful than the wind that lashes the sea, more lasting than the ceaseless hum of toil, pitiable, insistent, menacing, it shall not go unheard and unanswered. The ear of God listens, the forces of 30 the universe wait to leap into being to answer its need. Those who cause it shall be swept into ruin, and those who listen and seek to help shall attain a power no tyrant ever dreamed.

From "A Book of Meditations."

GLOSSARY. Insistent; menacing. STUDY. State the thought that dominates this paragraph. What illustrations of the effect of the "sigh of suffering humanity" are given? What feeling does it awaken in regard to the greatest duty of human beings? And what warning is there for those who do not heed?

GLOSSARY. Metaphor; fettered.

STUDY. What did the sea-wind mean yesterday? What does it mean to-day?

Do both meanings seem justified? Is the change in the sea-wind, or in the mind of the poet, or may it be in both? Is it at any rate possible that some new meaning, some rumor of mystery, may be found in the sea-wind to-morrow? (The natural tendency of our minds is to find illustrations of our own thoughts and feelings in the world round about us.)

RIP VAN WINKLE

A POSTHUMOUS WRITING OF DIEDRICH KNICKERBOCKER

WASHINGTON IRVING

By Woden, God of Saxons,

From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodnesday.
Truth is a thing that ever I will keep
Unto thylke day in which I creep into
My sepulchre-

CARTWRIGHT.

I. THE HENPECKED HUSBAND

Whoever has made a voyage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill mountains. They are a dismembered branch of the great Appalachian family, and are seen away to the west of the river, swelling up to a noble height, and lording it over the surrounding country. Every change of season, every change of 5 weather, indeed, every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains, and they are regarded by all the good wives, far and near, as perfect barometers. When the weather is fair and settled, they are clothed in blue and purple, and print their bold outlines on the clear 10 evening sky; but sometimes, when the rest of the landscape is cloudless, they will gather a hood of gray vapors about their summits, which, in the last rays of the setting sun, will glow and light up like a crown of glory.

At the foot of these fairy mountains, the voyager may have 15 descried the light smoke curling up from a village, whose shingle roofs gleam among the trees, just where the blue tints of the