on this errand. So our deputy spelling-master mounted the top of the wood-pile, just in front of Jonas, to put out words to his temporary pupil, who still kept on putting out chips.

'Do you know where the lesson begins, Jonas?' 'No, I do n't, but I s'pose I shall find out now.' 'Well, here 't is.' (They both belonged to the same class.) Spell A-bom-i-nation.' Jonas spells : A-b-o-m bom a-bom (in the mean time up goes the axe high in air) i a-bomi (down it goes again chuck into the wood) n-a na a-bomi-na (up it goes again) t-i-o-n tion, a-bom-i-na-tion, chuck goes the axe again; and, at the same time, out flies a furious chip, and hits Memorus on the nose. At this moment, the master appeared just at the corner of the school-house, with one foot still on the threshold.

'Jonas, why don't you come in? did n't I send Memorus out to spell you?' 'Yes, sir, and he has been spelling me. How could I come in, if he spelt me here?' At this the master's eye caught Memorus perched upon the top stick, with his book open upon his lap, rubbing his nose, and just in the act of putting out the next word of the column. Ac-commo-da-tion, pronounced Memorus, in a broken but louder voice than before; for he caught a glimpse of the master, and he wished to let him know that he was doing his duty.

This was too much for the master's gravity. He perceived the mistake, and without saying more, wheeled back into the school-room, almost bursting with the most tumultuous laugh he ever tried to suppress. The scholars wondered at his looks, and grinned in sympathy, But in a few minutes Jonas came in, followed by Memorus with his spelling-book, who exclaimed, 'I have heard him spell clean through the whole lesson, and he did n't spell hardly none of 'em right.' The master could hold in no longer; and the scholars perceived the blunder; and there was one simultaneous roar from pedagogue and pupils; the scholars laughing twice as loud and uproariously, in consequence of being permitted to laugh in school-time, and to do it with the accompaniment of the

master.

See RULE FOR THE READING OF HUMOROUS DESCRIP TION, following EXERCISE CXIV

EXERCISE CXXVIII.

THE BACKWOODSMAN.- Ephraim Peabody.

The silent wilderness for me!

Where never sound is heard,
Save the rustling of the squirrel's foot,
And the flitting wing of bird,
Or its jow and interrupted note,

And the deer's quick, crackling tread,
And the swaying of the forest boughs,
As the wind moves overhead.

Alone, (how glorious to be free!)
My good dog at my side,
My rifle hanging in my arm,
I range the forests wide.
And now the regal buffalo

Across the plains I chase;
Now track the mountain stream, to find
The beaver's lurking place.

I stand upon the mountain's top,
And (solitude profound!)

Not even a woodman's smoke curls up,
Within the horizon's bound.

Below, as o'er its ocean breadth
The air's light currents run,
The wilderness of moving leaves
Is glancing in the sun.

I look around to where the sky,
Meets the far forest line;

And this imperial domain,

This kingdom, all is mine.

This bending heaven, these floating clouds,

Waters that ever roll,

And wilderness of glory, bring

Their offerings to my soul.

My palace, built by God's own hand,
The world's fresh prime hath seen;
Wide stretch its living halls away,
Pillared and roofed with green.
My music is the wind that now
Pours loud its swelling bars,
Now lulls in dying cadences;
My festal lamps are stars.

Though when, in this my lonely home,
My star-watched couch I press,

I hear no fond 'good night,' — think no
I am companionless.

Oh no! I see my father's house,

The hill, the tree, the stream;

And the looks and voices of my home
Come gently to my dream.

LIFE IN THE COUNTRY.-Henry Colmar.

To live in the country, and enjoy all its pleasures, we should love the country. To love the country, is to take an interest in all that belongs to the country,its occupations, its sports, its culture, and its improvements, its fields and its forests, its trees and rocks, its valleys and hills, its lakes and rivers; to gather the flocks around us, and feed them from our own hands; to make the birds our friends, and call them all by their names; to wear a chaplet of roses as if it

were a princely diadem; to rove over the verdant fields with a higher pleasure than we should tread the carpeted halls of regal courts.

To love the country, is to inhale the fresh air of the morning as if it were the sweet breath of infancy, to brush the dew from the glittering fields, as if our path were strewed with diamonds; to hold converse with the trees of the forest, r their youth and in their decay, as if they could tell us the history of their own times, and as if the gnarled bark of the aged among them were all written over with the record of by-gone days, of those who planted them, and those who early gathered their fruits.

To love the country, is to find hope and joy bursting like a flood upon our hearts, as the darting rays of light gently break upon the eastern horizon; to see the descending sun robing himself in burnished clouds, as if these were the gathering glories of the divine throne; to find, in the clear evening of winter, our chamber studded with countless gems of living light, to feel that 'we are never less alone than when alone;' to make even the stillness and solitude of the country eloquent, and, above all, in the beauty of every object which presents itself to our senses, and in the unbought provision which sustains, and comforts, and fills with joy, the countless multitudes of living existences which people the land, the water, the air, everywhere, to repletion, to see the radiant tokens of an infinite and inexhaustible Beneficence, as they roll by us and around us in one ceaseless flood; and in a lear and bright day of summer, to stand out in the midst of this resplendent creation, circled by an horizon which conLinually retreats from our advances, holding its distance undiminished, and with the broad and deep blue arches of heaven over us, whose depths no human imagination can fathom; to perceive this glorious temple all instinct with the presence of the Divinity, and to feel, amidst all this, the brain growing dizzy with wonder, and the heart swelling with an adoration and a holy joy, absolutely incapable of utterance; this it is to love the country, and to make it, not the home, of the person only, but of the soul.

EXERCISE CXXX.

THE WARRIORS OF THE REVOLUTION. - Mrs. E. T. Daniels

A noble race they were, the tried
And true of olden time;

Our glorious sires who bled and died
For this our own free clime!
Oh! hallowed be each sacred name,
That fearless to the conflict came,
And freely on the battle plain
Poured out his blood like drops of rain.

Few are the sculptured gifts of art,
A nation's love to tell;

And many a brave and gallant heart
Hath mouldered where it fell:
The spiry maize luxuriant waves
Its long green leaves o'er heroes' graves;
And thoughtless swains the harvest reap
Where our stern fathers' ashes sleep!

But after years the tale shall tell,
In words of light revealed,
Who bravely fought, who nobly fell;
And many a well-fought field,
Outspread beneath this western sun,
Shall live with ancient Marathon;
And Bunker Hill and Trenton's name
Be linked with old Platea's fame!

But the surviving few, who stand
A remnant weak and old;
Sole relics of that glorious band

Whose hearts were hearts of gold;
Oh! honored be each silvery hair,
Each furrow trenched by toil and care;
And sacred each old bending form
That braved oppression's battle-storm!