sat for a long time sullen and sulky, the picture of disappointed ambition. So might a wounded and baffled lion lie down in his lair and brood over his defeat.

Beach said that he could easily have captured them both, but he thought he would see the fight out. When, however, they both staid under half a minute or more, he concluded he should never see his eagle again. Whether the latter in his rage was bent on capturing his prize, and would retain his hold, though at the hazard of his life, or whether in his terrible swoop he had stuck his crooked talons so deep in the back of the salmon that he could not extricate himself, the hunter said he could not tell. Life in the Woods.

The scene of the incident in the lesson is in Northern New York, in America, on the bank of a small stream, called the Raquette. Beach was a hunter.

EXERCISES.

1. Explain these phrases-(a) He hovered a moment; (b) Plunging from his high watch-tower; (c) He emerged into view; (d) He had miscalculated his strength; (e) It was all over with the bird; (f) He made a desperate effort to rise; (g) He lashed the lake into spray.

2. Distinguish between these phrases-The boy was struck by a stone; The man was much struck by the view. He had a singular attachment to the bird; This word is in the singular; He had a singular appearance. The rest fled; He lay down to rest. He drove his talons deep in his victim's back; Cradled on the bosom of the deep; They besought him not to send them into the deep.

3. Give the derivation of miscalculate; illustrate the origin of the word from any scene in Robinson Crusoe.

4. With what English verbs are these words respectively connected-hunter, passage, swoop, sight, weight, lair?

LESSON LVI.

Sir Philip Sidney.

ap-pal'-ling, awful, terrible.
be-nign', kind, gracious.
car'-riage, bearing, appear-

ance.

corse'-let, body armour.
di'-a-dem, crown.
dint'-ed, battered with blows.
ex-haust'-ed, worn out, faint.
fal'-con, a bird of the hawk
species.

lan'-guid, weary, faint.
le'-gend, story.
ri'-valled, equalled.
san'-guine, bloody.

scathe'-less, unhurt, unwounded.

shroud, winding-sheet, grave-
clothes.

vet'-e-ran, an old soldier.
wist'-ful, anxious, keen.

THE hoarser din of war had died away,

The cannon's thunder and the clarion's swell, And on the sanguine field of battle-fray,

Silence more sad and more appalling fell ;-Stillness unbroken but by murmurs low, Which told of faintness, weariness, and woe.

Here lay a chief, whose war-cry through the field Had rivalled late the trumpet's clamour loud, His cold brow pillowed on his dinted shield,

His bloody corselet, now, alas! his shroud;

And there, beside him, soiled with dust and foam, The faithful steed that bore him from his home.

Here lay a stripling, ne'er to rise again

From his first field of battle, and his last: And there, a veteran of the warrior-train, Who scatheless many a fearful fray had passed;

But now was stretched upon his gory bed,

The mute companion of the silent dead.

And now a living group arrests the eye;—
Two squires at arms supporting on the plain
A knight of manly form and lineage high,

Living, but faint with weariness and pain;-
And round them, eager to afford relief,
Gather the faithful followers of their chief.

He, through the thickest of the fight had led
The fearless on to victory and to fame;

Like one whose heart no danger e'er could dread,
Whose ardent spirits no fatigue could tame;—
But now exhausted on the field of death,
Each languid sigh appears his parting breath;

His cheek, his brow are pale; his eye is dim,
So lately like a falcon's in it's gaze;
And shapeless forms before his vision swim,
Such as the sleeper in a dream surveys;-
Oh for a cup of water! 'twould be worth
The richest vintage of the teeming earth.

'Tis brought,—a gift more welcome than a gem;
For never yet, in beauty's braided hair,
Or haughty monarch's costly diadem,

Shone pearl or ruby with it to compare ;Cool, bright, and sparkling, in that faint distress Worth kingly smile, or woman's dear caress.

He lifts it to his lips :-he stops! Ah! why Not quaff the draught, when life may come with drinking?

He sees beside him one whose wistful eye
Is on that cup, whose very soul is sinking:
Poor, helpless, nameless! none to him attend,
For when had humble wretchedness a friend?

Oh! then and there;-for, melting at the view,
The noble Sydney, in his hour of need,
From his parched lips the welcome cup withdrew,

And gave it him whose sufferings thus could Exclaiming, with benevolence benign- [plead: "Here, drink, my friend! thy want surpasses mine."

And never knightly deed of arms was done

By him, the frank, the chivalrous, the bold, Which more enduring fame hath nobly won, Than in this simple legend is enrolled ;Fame which the heart shall suffer not to die, Glory befitting genuine chivalry!

BERNARD BARTON.

Sir Philip Sydney was born at Penhurst, Kent, in 1554. He fought with great gallantry at the battle of Zutphen, where he received a mortal wound. The battle was

fought in 1586. The incident recorded in the poem took place when he was being carried off the field. He was a poet of no mean order, and his early death was a cause of general regret.

Sanguine field.-The battle was fought close to the walls of Zutphen, a fortified town on the right bank of the Yssel, in Guelderland, Holland, where Sir Philip Sydney met, unexpectedly, a force of 3000 men, who were marching to the relief of Zutphen, then held by the Spaniards, and besieged by the English in favour of the Flemings.

EXERCISES.

1. Write out in your own words the story of the poem.

2. Give the derivation of falcon, and thence show why this species of birds was so named. What is meant by falconry, the king's falconer, a falcon's eye?

3. What is the force of the termination ling in the word stripling? Mention other words having the same termination. 4. What is the derivation of chivalry? What is meant by the word?

perceiving.

un'-du-lat-ing, waring back

wards and forwards.

way-lay', entrap, to take off one's guard.

con-tem'-pla-ting, beholding, sur-vey', examine.

de-tect', find out, discover. il-lum'-i-nated, lighted up. lu'-mi-nous, clear, bright.

ON the 4th of August, 1844, I received an invitation from the inhabitants of Mahouna, the lion's paradise, which I immediately accepted. On my arrival, about sunset, I found the village surrounded by immense piles of light wood, arranged for the reception of the lion, that paid them nightly calls. I forbade them being kindled, and immediately selected the place I intended to occupy, in order to waylay him that very night, in case he should come as usual to prey on the herds. Having, by careful searching, found the route by