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And I have thought of other lands, whose storms
Are summer flaws to those of mine, and just

Have wished me there;

the thought that mine was free
Has checked that wish, and I have raised my head,
And cried in thraldom to that furious wind,
Blow on! This is the land of liberty!

18. WILLIAM TELL AMONG THE MOUNTAINS.-J. S. Knowles.

YE crags and peaks, I'm with you once again!
I hold to you the hands you first beheld,

To show they still are free.

Methinks I hear

A spirit in your echoes answer me,

And bid your tenant welcome to his home
Again! O sacred forms, how proud you look!
How high you lift your heads into the sky!
How huge you are! how mighty, and how free!
Ye are the things that tower, that shine, whose smile
Makes glad, whose frown is terrible, whose forms,
Robed or unrobed, do all the impress wear

Of awe divine. Ye guards of liberty,

I'm with you once again!

With all my voice! - I hold

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I call to you

my

hands to you,

To show they still are free. I rush to you
As though I could embrace you!

Scaling yonder peak,

I saw an eagle wheeling near its brow
O'er the abyss: his broad-expanded wings
Lay calm and motionless upon the air,
As if he floated there without their aid,
By the sole act of his unlorded will,
That buoyed him proudly up. Instinctively
I bent my bow; yet kept he rounding still
His airy circle, as in the delight

Of measuring the ample range beneath

And round about; absorbed, he heeded not

The death that threatened him. I could not shoot!

'T was liberty! I turned my bow aside,

And let him soar away!

19. THE FRACTIOUS MAN.-Original Translation from Brueys.

Monsieur Grichard. Blockhead! Would you keep me knocking two hours at the door?

Lolive. I was at work, Sir, in the garden. At the first sound of the knocker, I ran to answer it with such haste, as to fall down on

the way.

M. Gri. A great pity it was you did n't break your neck, booby' Why did n't you leave the door open ?

Lol. Why, Sir, you scolded me, yesterday, because I did so. When it is open, you storm about it. When it is shut, you storm about it just the same. I should like to know what to do.

M. Gri. What to do, sirrah? What to do, did you say?

Lol. O, come now, master, how would you have it? Do you wish me to leave the door open ?

M. Gri. No.

Lol. Do you wish me to keep it shut?
M. Gri. No!

Lol. But, Sir, it must be either open or

M. Gri. What, rascal, what! Do you presume to argue the point?

Lol. But does n't it hold to reason
M. Gri. Silence!

Lol. I say, Sir, that a door must be either open or shut. Now, how will you have it?

M. Gri. I have told you, a thousand times, you scoundrel, — I have told you, I wished it- wished it- but confound your impudence, Sir! Is it for you to ask questions? Let me only lay hands on you, I'll show you how I wish it! Have you swept the staircase?

Lol. Yes, Sir, from top to bottom.

M. Gri. And the yard?

Lol. If you find a bit of dirt there big as a filbert, I'll forfeit my

wages.

M. Gri.

You have n't watered the mule ?

Lol. Ask the neighbors, who saw me pass, if I have n't.

M. Gri. Have you given him his oats?

Lol. Yes, Sir. Ask William if I have n't. He saw me do it. M. Gri. But you have n't taken those bottles of Peruvian bark where I ordered you?

Lol. Pardon me, Sir; I took them, and brought back the empty bottles.

M. Gri. And my letters? Did you take them to the Post Office? Hah?

Lol. Did n't I, though? I took good care to do that!

M. Gri. You villain, you! A hundred times I have forbidden you to scrape your infernal violin. Now, I heard you, this morn

ing

Lol. This morning? Don't you remember you smashed it all to pieces, for me, yesterday?

M. Gri. Humph! I'll lay a wager that those two cords of wood

Lol. The wood is all sawed, split, and housed, Sir; and since putting it in, I have helped William get a load of hay into the barn, I have watered all the trees in the garden, dug over three of the beds and was digging another when you knocked.

M. Gri. O, I must get rid of this fellow! Was there ever such a provoking scamp? He will kill me with vexation. Away with you, Sir! Out of my sight!

20. BALTHAZAR AND THE QUACK.-John Tobin. Born, 1770; died, 1804.

Balthazar. And now, thou sketch and outline of a man! Thou thing, that hast no shadow in the sun!

Thou eel in a consumption, eldest born

Of Death on Famine! thou anatomy

Of a starved pilchard!

Quack. I do confess my leanness. I am spare,
And therefore spare me! Man, you know, must live!
Balt. Yes; he must die, too.

Quack. For my patients' sake!

Balt. I'll send you to the major part of them.

The window, Sir, is open; come, prepare.

I

Quack. Pray, consider, Sir,

may hurt some one in the street.

Balt. Why, then,

I'll rattle thee to pieces in a dice-box.

Or grind thee in a coffee-mill to powder:

For thou must sup with Pluto;

- so, make ready!

Whilst I, with this good small-sword for a lancet,
Let thy starved spirit out, for blood thou hast none,
And nail thee to the wall, where thou shalt look

Like a dried beetle with a pin stuck through him.
Quack. Consider my poor wife!

Balt. Thy wife!

Quack. My wife, Sir.

Balt. Hast thou dared to think of matrimony, too?

No conscience, and take a wife!

Quack. I have a wife, and three angelic babes,

Who, by those looks, are well-nigh fatherless!

Balt. Well, well, your wife and children shall plead for you.

Come, come, the pills! where are the pills? produce them.
Quack. Here is the box.

Balt. Were it Pandora's, and each single pill

Had ten diseases in it, you should take them.

Quack. What, all?

Balt. Ay, all; and quickly, too; - come, Sir, begin!

That's well; - another.

Quack. One's a dose !

Balt. Proceed, Sir.

Quack. What will become of me?

I do beseech you let me have some drink,

Some cooling liquid, Sir, to wash them down'

Balt. O, yes-produce the vial!
Quack. Mercy on me!

Balt. Come, Sir, your new invented patent draught:
You've tried it on a dog; so there's no danger.

Quack. If you have any mercy, think of me!
Balt. Nay, no demur!

Quack. May I entreat to make my will first?
Balt. No; you have naught but physic to bequeath;
And that no one will take, though you should leave it.

Quack. Just to step home, and see my wife and children?
Balt. No, Sir.

Quack. Let me go home and set my shop to rights,
And, like immortal Cæsar, die with decency!

Balt. Away, and thank thy lucky star I have not
Brayed thee in thine own mortar, or exposed thee
For a large specimen of the lizard genus.

Quack. Would I were one! for they can feed on air.
Balt. Home, Sir, and be more honest!
Quack. If I am not,

I'll be more wise, at least! [Exit.]

[Exit.]

21. BRUTUS AND TITUS.— Nathaniel Lee.

There are some noble touches in the following dialogue, from Lee's tragedy of "Lucius Junius Brutus," although from the pen of a poet who mingled the extravagance of a madman with the inspirations of genius. Lee was born in Hertfordshire, England, in 1651, and died in 1692. He was for some time confined in a mad-house, being for nearly four years a raving

maniac.

Brutus. Well, Titus, speak; how is it with thee now?

I would attend a while this mighty motion,
Wait till the tempest were quite overblown,
That I might take thee in the calm of nature,
With all thy gentler virtues brooding on thee:
So hushed a stillness, as if all the gods

Looked down and listened to what we were saying:
Speak, then, and tell me, O my best beloved,
My son, my Titus! is all well again?

Titus. So well, that saying how must make it nothing:

So well, that I could wish to die this moment,

For so my heart, with powerful throbs, persuades me:

That were indeed to make you reparation;

That were, my Lord, to thank you home to die!

And that, for Titus, too, would be most happy.

Brutus. How's that, my son? would death for thee be happy?
Titus. Most certain, Sir; for in my grave I 'scape

All those affronts which I, in life, must look for;
All those reproaches which the eyes, the fingers,
And tongues of Rome, will daily cast upon me;
From whom, to a soul so sensible as mine,

Each single scorn would be far worse than dying.
Besides, I 'scape the stings of my own conscience,
Which will forever rack me with remembrance,
Haunt me by day, and torture me by night,
Casting my blotted honor in the way,
Where'er my melancholy thoughts shall guide me.
Brutus. But, is not death a very dreadful thing?
Titus. Not to a mind resolved. No, Sir; to me
It seems as natural as to be born.

Groans and convulsions, and discolored faces,
Friends weeping round us, crapes, and obsequies,
Make it a dreadful thing; the pomp of death
Is far more terrible than death itself.

Yes, Sir; I call the powers of Heaven to witness,
Titus dares die, if so you have decreed;
Nay, he shall die with joy to honor Brutus.

Brutus. Thou perfect glory of the Junian race!
Let me endear thee once more to my bosom,
Groan an eternal farewell to thy soul;
Instead of tears, weep blood, if possible;
Blood, the heart-blood of Brutus, on his child!
For thou must die, my Titus; die, my son!
I swear, the gods have doomed thee to the grave.
The violated genius of thy country

Bares his sad head, and passes sentence on thee.
This morning sun, that lights thy sorrows on
To the tribunal of this horrid vengeance,

Shall never see thee more!

Titus.

Why art thou moved thus?

Alas! my Lord,

Why am I worth thy sorrow? Why should the godlike Brutus shake to doom me? Why all these trappings for a traitor's hearse?

The gods will have it so.

Brutus.
They will, my Titus;
Nor Heaven nor earth can have it otherwise.
Nay, Titus, mark! the deeper that I search,
My harassed soul returns the more confirmed.
Methinks I see the very hand of Jove
Moving the dreadful wheels of this affair, -
Like a machine, they whirl thee to thy fate.
It seems as if the gods had preördained it,
To fix the reeling spirits of the People,
And settle the loose liberty of Rome.

'Tis fixed; O, therefore, let not fancy dupe thee!

So fixed thy death, that 't is not in the power

Of gods or men to save thee from the axe.

Titus. The axe! O, Heaven! must I, then, fall so basely?

What! Shall I perish by the common hangman?

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