EXERCISE XXXIX.

DIRECTION. – Vary the following expressions by using circumlocution:

14. The

grass is

1. Despair not. 2. Fishes swim. 3. Forsake evil. 4. The sun rises. 5. Know thyself. 6. Bread is dear. 7. Life is fleeting. 8. Death is certain. 9. Time is precious. 10. Pity excites love. 11. The sky is clear. 12. Man lives by toil. 13. Avarice is a curse.

green. 15. Jenny Lind is dead. 16. Men delve for gold. 17. Knowledge is power. 18. Contentment is peace. 19. Her manners are gentle. 20. The moon shines bright. 21. She has disappointed me. 22. Washington was a patriot. 23. The sun gives light and heat. 24. Our school-mates seldom forget us. 25. Victoria

sways

the English scepter. 26. Palaces and cottages alike must fall.

EXERCISE XL.

DIRECTION. - Recast each of the following sentences, expressing the sense in as many different ways as possible:

1. She resolved to become entirely free.
2. Fortune was still as unkind as ever.
3. The king was thoroughly alarmed at this invasion.
4. These successes did not long continue.
5. We should love our enemies.
6. Many a man sacrifices his life to the acquisition of wealth.
7. The world is still deceived with ornament.

8. Mercy is twice blessed; it blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.

9. The sumach is staining the hedges with red. IO. One

may

hide his sorrow beneath a smiling face. 11. Rome, the capital of Italy, is the world's art-center. 12. The heart is not satisfied. 13. Trust thyself. 14. He who is honest is noble, whatever his fortunes or birth.

15. The way-worn traveler longs for rest.
16. The fields are gay with buttercups and clover.
17. Few persons have the courage of their convictions.

18. Neither man nor angel can discern hypocrisy, the only evil that walks invisible, except to God alone.

19. Our unwise purposes are wisely crossed. 20. As thy day is, so shall thy strength be. 21. Form your taste on the classics, and your principles on the book of all truth.

22. Let the first fruits of your intellect be laid before the altar of Him who breathed into your nostrils the breath of life; and with that breath your immortal spirit.

23. God's angel, Sleep, with manifold

Soft touches, smoothing brows of care,
Dwells not beyond the gates of gold,

Because no night is there.
24. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,

Wherein he puts alms for oblivion.
25. Out of the earthly years we live,

How small a profit springs !

EXERCISES IN COMPOSITION.

REPRODUCTION X.

AN INCIDENT OF THE FIRE AT HAMBURG.

The tower of old Saint Nicholas soared upward to the skies,
Like some huge piece of Nature's make, the growth of centuries;
You could not deem its crowding spires a work of human art,
They seemed to struggle lightward from a sturdy living heart.
Not Nature's self more freely speaks in crystal or in oak,
Than, through the pious builder's hand, in that gray pile she spoke;
And as from acorn springs the oak, so, freely and alone,
Sprang from his heart this hymn to God, sung in obedient stone.

It seemed a wondrous freak of chance, so perfect, yet so rough,
A whim of Nature crystallized slowly in granite tough;
The thick spires yearned towards the sky in quaint, harmonious lines,
And in broad sunlight basked and slept, like a grove of blasted pines.

Never did rock or stream or tree lay claim with better right
To all the adorning sympathies of shadow and of light;
And, in that forest petrified, as forester there dwells
Stout Herman, the old sacristan, sole lord of all its bells.
Surge leaping after surge, the fire roared onward red as blood,
Till half of Hamburg lay engulfed beneath the eddying flood;
For miles away the fiery spray poured down its deadly rain,
And back and forth the billows sucked, and paused, and burst again.

From square to square with tiger leaps panted the lustful fire;
The air to leeward shuddered with the gasps of its desire;
And church and palace, which even now stood whelmed but to the

knee,
Lift their black roofs like breakers lone amid the whirling sea.
Up in his tower old Herman sat and watched with quiet look;
His soul had trusted God too long to be at last forsook;
He could not fear, for surely God a pathway would unfold
Through this red sea for faithful hearts, as once he did of old.
But scarcely can he cross himself, or on his good saint call,
Before the sacrilegious flood o'erleaped the church-yard wall;
And, ere a pater half was said, mid smoke and crackling glare,
His island tower scarce juts its head above the wide despair.

Upon the peril's desperate peak his heart stood up sublime; His first thought was for God above, his next was for his chime; “Sing now and make your voices heard in hymns of praise,” cried he, “As did the Israelites of old, safe walking through the sea ! “Through this red sea our God hath made the pathway safe to shore; Our promised land stands full in sight; shout now as ne'er before!” And as the tower came crushing down, the bells, in clear accord, Pealed forth the grand old German hymn,—“All good souls, praise the Lord !”

J. R. LOWELL.

REPRODUCTION X1.

PRAYING FOR RAIN.

How difficult, alas! to please mankind!

One or the other every moment mutters:
This wants an eastern, that a western, wind :

A third, petition for a southern, utters.
Some pray for rain, and some for frost and snow:
How can Heaven suit all palates ?—I don't know.

Good Lamb, the curate, much approved,
Indeed, by all his flock beloved,

Was one dry summer begged to pray for rain.
The parson most devoutly prayed-
The powers of prayer were soon displayed;

Immediately a torrent drenched the plain.
It chanced that the church-warden, Robin Jay,
Had of his meadow not yet saved the hay:

Thus was his hay to health quite past restoring.
It happened, too, that Robin was from home;
But when he heard the story, in a foam

He sought the parson, like a lion roaring. “Zounds! Parson Lamb, why, what have you been doing ? A pretty storm, indeed, ye have been brewing!

What! pray for rain before I saved my hay?
Oh! you're a cruel and ungrateful man!
I that forever help you all I can;

Ask you to dine with me and Mistress Jay,
Whenever we have something on the spit,
Or in the pot a nice and dainty bit;
“Send you a goose, a pair of chicken,
Whose bones you are so fond of picking;

And often, too, a cag of brandy!
You that were welcome to a treat,
To smoke and chat, and drink and eat;

Making my house so very handy!”

*

*

*

*

*

“Dear Mister Jay!” quoth Lamb, “alas! alas!
I never thought upon your field of grass.”
“Lord! parson, you're a fool, one might suppose-
Was not the field just underneath your nose?
This is a very pretty losing job!"-
“Sir," quoth the curate, "know that Harry Cobb,
Your brother warden, joined to have the prayer.”

"Cobb! Cobb! why, this for Cobb was only sport:

What doth Cobb own that any rain can hurt?”
Roared furious Jay as broad as he could stare.
“Besides—why could you not for drizzle pray?
Why force it down in buckets on the hay?
Would I have played with your hay such a freak?
No! I'd have stopped the weather for a week."
“Dear Mister Jay, I do protest,
I acted solely for the best;

I do affirm it, Mr. Jay, indeed.
Your anger for this once restrain,
I'll never bring a drop again
Till you and all the parish are agreed.”

PETER PINDAR.