Imatges de pàgina
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officers, by the cool, steady, upright, downright, and impartial discharge of my business, and the constancy with which I stand to my post. Summer or winter, nobody seeks me in vain; for all day long I am seen at the busiest corner, just above the market, stretching out my arms to rich and poor alike; and at night I hold a lantern over my head, both to show where I am, and to keep people out of the gutters.

4. At this sultry noontide, I am cupbearer to the parched populace, for whose benefit an iron goblet is chained to my waist. Like a dramseller on the public square, on a muster day, I cry aloud to all and sundry, in my plainest accents, and at the very tiptop of my voice. Here it is, gentlemen'! Here is the good liquor! Walk up', walk up', gentlemen', walk up', walk up'! Here is the superior stuff! Here is the unadulterated ale of father Adam'! better than Cogniac', Hollands', Jamaica', strong beer', or wine of any' price; here it is, by the hogshead or the single glass, and not a cent to pay! Walk up, gentlemen, walk up and help yourselves!

5. It were a pity, if all this outcry should draw no customers. Here they come. A hot day, gentlemen. +Quaff and away again, so as to keep yourselves in a nice, cool sweat. You, my friend, will need another cupfull to wash the dust out of your throat, if it be as thick there as it is on your cowhide shoes. I see that you have trudged half a score of miles to-day, and, like a wise man, have passed by the taverns, and stopped at the running brooks and wellcurbs. Otherwise, betwixt heat without and fire within, you would have been burnt to a cinder, or melted down to nothing at all, in the fashion of a jellyfish.

6. Drink, and make room for that other fellow, who seeks my aid to quench the fiery fever of last night's potations, which he drained from no cup of mine. Welcome, most rubicund sir! You and I have been great strangers hitherto; nor, to confess the truth, will my nose be anxious for a closer intimacy, till the fumes of your breath be a little less potent.

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7. Mercy on you, man! The water absolutely hisses down your red-hot *gullet, and is converted quite into steam in the *minature +Tophet, which you mistake for a stomach. Fill again, and tell me, on the word of an honest toper, did you ever, in cellar, tavern, or any other kind of dramshop, spend the price of your children's food, for a swig half so delicious? Now, for the first time these ten years, you know the flavor of cold water. Good-by; and whenever you are thirsty, recollect that I keep a constant supply, at the old stand.

8. Who next? Oh, my little friend, you are just let loose from school, and come hither to scrub your blooming face, and drown the memory of certain taps of the ferule, and other school-boy

troubles, in a draught from the Town Pump. Take it, pure as the current of your young life; take it, and may your heart and tongue never be scorched with a fiercer thirst than now.

9. There, my dear child, put down the cup, and yield your place to this elderly gentleman, who treads so tenderly over the pavingstones, that I suspect he is afraid of breaking them. What! he limps by, without so much as thanking me, as if my hospitable offers were meant only for people who have no wine-cellars.

10. Well, well, sir, no harm done, I hope! Go, draw the cork, tip the decanter; but when your great toe shall set you a roaring, it will be no affair of mine. If gentlemen love the pleasant titillation of the gout, it is all one to the Town Pump. This thirsty dog, with his red tongue +lolling out, does not scorn my hospitality, but stands on his hind legs, and laps eagerly out of the trough. See, how lightly he *capers away again! Jowler, did your worship ever have the gout?

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11. Your pardon', good people'! I must interrupt my stream of eloquence, and spout forth a stream of water, to replenish the trough for this teamster and his two yoke of oxen, who have come all the way from Staunton, or somewhere along that way. No part of my business gives me more pleasure than the watering of cattle. Look! how rapidly they lower the water-mark on the sides of the trough', till their capacious stomachs are moistened with a gallon or two apiece, and they can afford time to breathe, with sighs of calm enjoyment. Now, they roll their quiet eyes around the brim of their monstrous drinking vessel. An ox is your true toper.

12. I hold myself the grand reformer of the age. From my spout, and such spouts as mine, must flow the stream that shall cleanse our earth of a vast portion of its crime and anguish, which has gushed from the fiery fountains of the still. In this mighty + enterprise, the cow shall be my great confederate. Milk and water!

13. Ahem! Dry work, this speechifying, especially to all unpracticed orators. I never conceived, till now, what toil the temperance lecturers undergo for my sake. Do, some kind Christian, pump a stroke or two, just to wet my whistle. Thank you, sir. But to proceed.

14. The Town Pump and the Cow! Such is the glorious partnership, that shall finally monopolize the whole business of quenching thirst. Blessed consummation! Then, Poverty shall pass away from the land, finding no hovel so wretched, where her squalid form may shelter itself. Then, Disease, for lack of other victims, shall gnaw his own heart and die. Then, Sin, if she do not die, shall lose half her strength.

15. Then, there will be no war of households. The husband and the wife, drinking deep of peaceful joy, a calm bliss of temperate affections, shall pass hand in hand through life, and lie down, not reluctantly, at its protracted close. To them, the past will be no turmoil of mad dreams, nor the future an eternity of such moments as follow the delirium of the drunkard. Their dead faces shall express what their spirits were, and are to be, by a lingering smile of memory and hope.

16. Drink, then, and be refreshed! The water is as pure and cold as when it slaked the thirst of the red hunter, and flowed beneath the aged bough, though now this gem of the wilderness is treasured under these hot stones, where no shadow falls, but from the brick buildings. But, still is this fountain the source of health, peace, and happiness, and I behold with certainty and joy, the approach of the period, when the virtues of cold water, too little valued since our father's days, will be fully appreciated and recognized by all.

HAWTHORNE.

QUESTIONS.- -In what respect, and why may the Town Pump be considered as assisting in the various town offices? Describe the various characters who are supposed to approach the pump for a drink, and the pump's remarks to them. What benefits arise from the use of water as a drink? What change has taken place in this respect?

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Parse "pardon," in the 11th paragraph. Pump" and "cow," in the 14th. Which are the adverbs in the last sentence? Which are the conjunctions? Which are the nouns, and what is the possessive singular of each one of them?

TO TEACHERS.

The EXERCISES ON ARTICULATION which are placed between the Reading Lessons, will be found of great value, and the pupil should study and practice them frequently and thoroughly. In the Second and Third Readers the Exercises are systematic and extensive. In this Reader they are designed for review and general practice, and are therefore of a more miscellaneous character, but include all the elements of articulation.

LESSON XXIV.

REMARK. In reading poetry, that does not rhyme, where the termination of one line is very closely connected in sense and construction with the commencement of the following line, there should be no pause.

In the following, there must be a slight pause at the end of the first line, and the usual ones at the third and fourth, but none at all at the end of the second.

EXAMPLE.

Ye who have anxiously and fondly watched
Beside a fading friend, unconscious that

The cheek's bright vision, lovely to the view,

Like nightshade, with unwholesome beauty bloomed.

ARTICULATE distinctly.-With-hold, not with-old: hast, not ast: hands, not ands: have, not ave: where, not were: whelps, not welps:

2. As-say', v. to attempt, to try.

Com-mune'. v. converse.

10. Con'fi-dence, n. trust, reliance.

24. Vis'-ions, n. revelations from God.

6. Up-hold'-en, p. (obsolete for upheld) 42. Ex'-cel-len-cy, n. valuable quality sustained.

1.

VISION OF A SPIRIT.

THEN Eliphaz the Temanite answered and said,

If we assay to commune with thee, wilt thou be grieved'?
But who can withhold himself from speaking'?
Behold! thou hast +instructed many,

5. And thou hast strengthened the weak hands.
Thy words have upholden him that was falling,
And thou hast strengtened the feeble knees.
But now it is come upon thee, and thou faintest :
It toucheth thee, and thou art troubled.

10. Is not this thy fear, thy confidence,

Thy hope, and the uprightness of thy ways"?

Remember, I pray thee, whoever perished, being innocent?
Or where were the righteous' cut off?

Even as I have seen, they that plow + iniquity,

15. And sow wickedness', reap the same'.

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By the blast of God they perish',

And by the breath of his nostrils are they consumed'.

The roaring of a lion', and the voice of the fierce' lion,
And the teeth of the young' lions are broken.

20. The old lion perisheth for lack of prey,

And the stout lion's whelps are scattered abroad.

Now a thing was secretly brought to me,
And mine ear received a little thereof.
In thoughts from the visions of the night,
25. When deep sleep falleth on men,

discern the form thereof.

Fear came upon me, and trembling,
Which made all my bones to shake.
Then a spirit passed before my face;
The hair of my flesh stood
up:
30. It stood still, but I could not
An image was before mine eyes,
There was silence, and I heard a voice saying,
Shall mortal man be more just than God?
Shall a man be more pure than his Maker?
35. Behold! he put no trust in his servants';
And his angels' he charged with folly:

How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay,
Whose foundation is the dust,

Which are crushed before the moth!

40. They are destroyed from morning to evening:

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They perish forever without any regarding it.
Doth not their excellency which is in them go away?
They die even without wisdom.

BIBLE.

QUESTIONS.-Who was Eliphaz? Did he consider Job, whom he addressed, as an innocent or guilty man? What reason does he give for considering him guilty? Was he correct in his opinion? Does God afflict the good in this world? For what purpose?

Why do the questions in the 2d and 3d lines receive different inflections? Give the rules for the inflections marked in the lesson.

Which are the pronouns in the last four lines, and for what does each of them stand? Which are the adverbs, and what does each of them qualify? Which are the prepositions, and what does each of them govern?

N. B. The Teacher is requested to bear in mind, that the definitions given to the words at the head of each lesson, are those that belong to them in the connection in which they are used in the lesson.

The grammatical exercises are adapted to Pinneo's Analytical Grammar. It is recommended that the pupil be frequently examined on the Analysis of Sentences, as explained in that Grammar, page 113-135.

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