3. "Come, lads, come! it is time to be doing now, and to cease talking, for yonder curling flame is truly coming on like a trotting moose. Put hands upon this short and withered grass where we stand, and lay bare the earth."-"Would you think to deprive the fire of its victims in this childish manner?" exclaimed Middleton. A faint but solemn smile passed over the features of the old man as he answered: "Your grandfather would have said that, when the enemy was nigh, a soldier could do no better than to obey."

4. The captain felt the reproof, and instantly began to imitate the industry of Paul, who was tearing the decayed herbage from the ground in a sort of desperate compliance with the trapper's direction. Even Ellen lent her hands to the labor; nor was it long before Inez was seen similarly employed, though none among them knew why or wherefore.

5. When life is thought to be the reward of labor, men are wont to be industrious. A very few moments sufficed to lay bare a spot of some twenty feet in diameter. Into one edge of this little area the trapper brought the females, directing Middleton and Paul to cover their light and inflammable dresses with the blankets of the party.

6. So soon as this precaution was observed, the old man approached the opposite margin of the grass, which still environed them in a tall and dangerous circle, and, selecting a handful of the driest of the herbage, he placed it over the pan of his rifle. The light combustible kindled at the flash. Then he placed the little flame into a bed of the standing grass, and, withdrawing from the spot to the center of the ring, patiently awaited the result.

7. The subtle element seized with avidity upon its new fuel, and in a moment forked flames were gliding among the grass, as the tongues of ruminating animals are seen rolling among their food, apparently in quest of its sweetest portions. "Now," said the old man, holding up a finger, and laughing in his peculiarly silent manner, "you shall see fire fight fire! Ah me! many a time I have burned a smooth path from wanton laziness to pick my way across a tangled plain."

8. "But is this not fatal?" cried the amazed Middleton; "are you not bringing the enemy nigher to us, instead of avoiding it?"-"Do you scorch so easily? Your grandfather had a tougher skin. But we shall live to see; we shall all live to see." The experience of the trapper was in the right.

9. As the fire gained strength and heat, it began to spread on three sides, dying of itself on the fourth for want of aliment. As it increased, and the sullen roaring announced its power, it cleared everything before it, leaving the black and smoking soil far more naked than if the scythe had swept the place.

10. The situation of the fugitives would have still been hazardous had not the area enlarged as the flamet encircled them. But by advancing to the spot where the trapper had kindled the grass, they avoided the heat, and in a very few moments the flames began to recede in every quarter, leaving them enveloped in a cloud of smoke, but perfectly safe from the torrent of fire that was still furiously rolling onward.

11. The spectators regarded the simple expedient of the trapper with that species of wonder with which the

courtiers of Ferdinand are said to have viewed the manner in which Columbus made his egg to stand on its end; though with feelings that were filled with gratitude instead of envy.

12. "Most wonderful!" said Middleton, when he saw the complete success of the means by which they had been rescued from a danger that he had conceived to be unavoidable. "The thought was a gift from Heaven, and the hand that executed it should be immortal."

13. "Old trapper," cried Paul, thrusting his fingers through his shaggy locks, "I have lined many a loaded bee into its hole, and know something of the nature of the woods; but this is robbing a hornet of his sting without touching the insect!"

14. "It will do-it will do!" returned the old man, who after the first moment of his success seemed to think no more of the exploit. "Let the flames do their work for a short half-hour, and then we will mount. That time is needed to cool the meadow, for these unshod beasts are as tender on the hoof as a barefooted girl."

15. The veteran, on whose experience they all so implicitly relied for protection, employed himself in reconnoitering objects in the distance, through the openings which the air occasionally made in the immense bodies of smoke, that by this time lay in enormous piles on every part of the plain. James Fenimore Cooper.

FOR PREPARATION.-I. This extract is taken from Cooper's novel, "The Prairie." Have you read "The Prairie "?" The Spy"?-"Lionel Lincoln"? In what region is the scene laid? How do you know? (by the prairie.) The Tetons were a tribe of Indians.

II. Sŏl'-emn (-em), nigh, o-bey', de-eãyed', suf-ficed' (-fizd), scythe, con-çēived', sub'-tle (sŭt'l), hẽrb'-age (ērb’ej).

III. Un-avoid-able (a syllable placed before a word, to change its meaning, is called a prefix-pre meaning before; hence prefix: = fixed before. So un is a prefix, meaning not; hence, unavoidable means not avoidable. A syllable, or syllables, placed after a word for the same purpose is called a suffix. Thus able is a suffix, meaning "possible to be": avoidable means possible to be avoided), unshod (prefix un), circumvent (circum: = around; circumvent = come round, hence to gain advantage over), recede (re= back; recede = go back), diameter (dia = through; meter = measure).

IV. Aliment, area, expedient, rescued, withered, inflammable, environed, combustible, 'pan of his rifle," avidity, ruminating, "wanton laziness," reconnoitering.

V. "Lined a loaded bee." (When loaded with honey, the wild bee pursues a straight line for its hive, which is generally in a hollow tree. The bee-hunter watches its course, and finds the hive.)

XLIX. THE MOUNTAIN AND THE SQUIRREL.

1. The Mountain and the Squirrel

Had a quarrel,

And the former called the latter "Little Prig."

2. Bun replied:

"You are doubtless very big;

But all sorts of things and weather

Must be taken in together,

To make up a year,

And a sphere;

3. And I think it no disgrace

To occupy my place.

If I'm not so large as you,
You're not so small as I,
And not half so spry.

4. I'll not deny you make

A very pretty squirrel-track.

Talents differ; all is well and wisely put:
If I can not carry forests on my back,
Neither can you crack a nut."

Ralph Waldo Emerson.

FOR PREPARATION.-I. What fables have you had before in this Reader? Do you remember any difference between the fable and other stories ?

II. Squir'-rel (note the English pronunciation; see Lesson XXXIX.), mount'-ain (-in), quar'-rel, doubt'-less (dout'-), weath'-er, Ŏe'-eu-py, dif'-fer, nēi'-ther.

III. Explain the omissions in I'm, you're, I'll. Give the other forms of the pronouns I (my, mine, me, we, our, ours, us), you, it, my.

IV. Prig (conceited fellow), sphere, occupy, spry, "squirrel-track."

V. Who is called "Bun" in this fable? "All sorts of things and weather must be taken in together, to make up a year (of time), and a sphere" (of space, i. e., the world). If largeness has its advantages, so has smallness too. Does the squirrel express contempt by saying, “I'll not deny you make a very pretty squirrel-track "?

L-THE LILLIPUTIAN WAR AT SEA.

1. The empire of Blefuscu is an island situated to the northeast of Lilliput, from which it is parted only by a channel eight hundred yards wide.

2. I had not yet seen it, and, upon this notice of an intended invasion, I avoided appearing on that side of the coast, for fear of being discovered by some of the enemy's ships, who had received no intelligence of me; all intercourse between the two empires having been