EXERCISE VI.

SPEECH OF COBB.-Anonymous Translator.

[The reading of the following piece requires great slowness, with long pauses: the enunciation, throughout, should be exact and distinct. The passages which express emotion, are all in a suppressed tone, indicating deep, but subdued and manly feeling.]

Cobb, the head chief of the Choctaws, east of the Mississippi, made the following reply to the speech of the agent of the United States, to the assembled tribe, in 1843:—

BROTHER:-We have heard you talk as from the lips of our father, the Great white Chief at Washington; and my people have called upon me to speak to you. The red man has no books; and when he wishes to make known his views, like his father before him, he speaks from his mouth. He is afraid of writing. When he speaks, he knows what he says: the Great Spirit hears him. Writing is the invention of the pale-faces it gives birth to error and to feuds. The Great Spirit talks, ·we hear him in the thunder, in the rushing winds, and the mighty waters; but he never writes.

Brother: When you were young, we were strong; we fought by your side; but our arms are now broken. You have grown large. My people have become small.

Brother: My voice is weak; you can scarcely hear me; it is not the shout of a warrior, but the wail of an infant. I have lost it in mourning over the misfortunes of my people. These are their graves; and in these aged pines you hear the ghosts of the departed. Their ashes are here; and we have been left to protect them. Our warriors are nearly all gone to the far country west; but here are our dead. Shall we go too, and give their bones to the wolves?

Brother: Two sleeps have passed since we heard you talk. We have thought upon it. You ask us to leave our country, and tell us it is our father's wish. We would not desire to displease our father. We respect him, and you his child. But the Choctaw always thinks. We want time to answer. Brother: Our hearts are full. Twelve winters ago, our chiefs sold our country. Every warrior that you see here

was opposed to the treaty. If the dead could have bee counted, it could never have been made; but, alas! though they stood around, they could not be seen or heard. Their tears came in the rain-drops, and their voices in the wailing wind; but the pale-faces knew it not; and our land was aken away.

Brother: We do not now complain. The Choctaw suffers, but he never weeps. You have the strong arm; and we cannot resist. But the pale-face worships the Great Spirit. So does the red man. The Great Spirit loves truth. When you took our country, you promised us land. There is your promise, in the book. Twelve times have the trees dropped their leaves; and yet we have received no land. Our houses have been taken from us. The white man's plough turns up the bones of our fathers.

Brother: Is this truth? But we believe, now our Great Father knows our condition, he will listen to us. We are as mourning orphans in our country; but our father will take us by the hand. When he fulfils his promise, we will answer his talk. He means well. We know it. But we cannot Grief has made children of us.

think now.

Brother: You stand in the moccasins of a great chief; you speak the words of a mighty nation; and your talk was long. My people are small; their shadow reaches to your knee; they are scattered and gone: when I shout, I hear my voice in the depths of the woods; but no answering shout comes back. My words, therefore, are few. I have nothing more to say, but ask you to tell what I have said to the tall chief of the pale-faces.

GENERAL RULE FOR THE READING OF. SPECIMENS OF INDIAN ELOQUENCE.

Speeches and addresses, such as the preceding, need much attention from young readers, to the due SLOWNESS of utterance, the great LENGTH of PAUSES, and the perfectly DISTINCT ARTICULATION indispensable to right effect.

EXERCISE VII.

AN INDIAN'S REPROOF.- Anon.

-

[The following piece requires attention to lively and easy utterance, distinct enunciation, natural and vivid changes of tone, particularly in the dialogue part.]

A Shoshone* warrior possessed a beautiful mare: no horse in the prairie could outspeed her; and, in the buffalo or bear hunt, she would enjoy the sport as much as her master, and run alongside the huge beast, with great courage and spirit. Many propositions were made to the warrior to sell or exchange the animal, but he would not listen to them. The dumb brute was his friend, his sole companion; they had both shared the dangers of battle and the privations of prairie travelling; - why should he part with her?

The fame of that mare extended so far, that, in a trip he made to San Francisco, several Mexicans offered him large sums of money for her: nothing, however, could shake him in his resolution. In those countries, though horses will often be purchased at the low price of one dollar, it often happens that a steed, well known as a good hunter or rapid pacer, will bring sums equal to those paid in England for a fine race-horse.

resolved to

One of the Mexicans, —a wild young man, obtain the mare, by whatever means. One evening, when the Indian was returning from a neighboring plantation, the Mexican lay down in some bushes at a short distance from the road, and moaned as if in the greatest pain. The good and kind-hearted Indian having reached the spot, heard his cries of distress, dismounted from his mare, and offered any assistance. It was nearly dark; and although he knew the sufferer to be a pale-face, yet he could not distinguish his features. The Mexican begged for a drop of water; and the Indian dashed into a neighboring thicket, to procure it for him. As soon as the Indian was sufficiently distant, the Mexican vaulted upon the mare, and apostrophized the Indian :

You fool of a red-skin, - not cunning enough for a

* Pronounced, 'Shoshonay.

Mexican, -you refused my gold: now I have the mare for nothing; and I will make the trappers laugh, when I tell them how easily I have outwitted a Shoshone.'

6

The Indian looked at the Mexican a few moments in silence; for his heart was big, and the shameful treachery wounded him to the very core. At last he spoke. Pale-face,' said he, for the sake of others, I may not kill thee. Keep the mare, since thou art dishonest enough to steal the only property of a poor man: keep her; but never say a word how thou camest by her; lest, hereafter, a Shosho ne, having learned distrust, should not hearken to the voice of grief and woe. Away, away with her! let me never see her again; or, in an evil hour, the desire of vengeance may make a bad man of me.'

The Mexican was wild, inconsiderate, and not over-scrupulous; but not without feeling. He dismounted from the horse, and putting the bridle into the hand of the Shoshone, he said: 'Brother, I have done wrong;- pardon me! from an Indian I learn virtue; and, for the future, when I would commit any deed of injustice, I will think of thee.'

EXERCISE VIII.

THE PALACE AND THE COT.-Mrs. Crawford.

[In all pieces such as the following, in which the main point is the expression of sentiment,· a clear, distinct enunciation, with the tone of vivid feeling, is indispensable to right effect. Rapid utterance, and dead monotony, with metrical chant, are the faults into which young readers commonly fall in such passages.]

In yon pile of renown, dear to ages of glory,

Whose walls are enriched with the trophies of old ;
Where the windows are blazoned with legend and story,
And cornice and roof are all fretted with gold,
There is one magic circle, where care may not enter,
Where state for a season may throw off its load;
The hearth, the bright hearth, is the shrine and the centre
Of union and bliss, in that gorgeous abode.

In yon cottage of peace, where the smoke is ascending,
The setting sun lingers, and throws his last look:

There the thrush and the black-bird their wild notes are blending;

1here murmurs the breeze; and there ripples the brook. The rose, in the glory which Nature has lent her,

Vies there with the brightest, and blossoms as sweet; And the hearth, the dear hearth, is the shrine and the centre Of union and bliss, in that lowly retreat.

Oh! the palace shines brighter, 'midst splendor and pleasure,
When these purest of joys are its highest renown;

And the cottage is blest, when it boasts for its treasure,
These richest of gems as the glory and crown.

Yes,

there's one magic circle,' where care may not enter, Or if for a season, how soon 't is forgot!

The hearth, the bright hearth, is the shrine and the centre Of endearment and peace, both in palace and cot.

[This piece

EXERCISE IX.

THE FAITHFUL DOG.-Anon.

like all other interesting and affecting narratives-needs attention to lively and natural tones of feeling. The reader should give up the heart entirely to the story, and read not with the tone of a lesson or a task, but with the genuine emotion which every true-hearted girl or boy must feel, in reading such a tale, — which, morcover, is not one of fiction but of fact.]

Alabama was originally a part of Mississippi Territory. Its contiguity to Georgia and the Carolinas, induced numberless families from those States to remove there. The route pursued by them led through the Cherokee nation; and, like the Israelites of old, the emigrants experienced difficulties in reaching the land of promise.

In some seasons of the year, the rivers and creeks are so swollen by the frequent rains, as to render them troublesome. It was during one of those periods, that a family, consisting