ECHO AND THE FERRY

Ay, Oliver! I was but seven, and he was eleven;

He looked at me pouting and rosy. I blushed where I stood.
They had told us to play in the orchard (and I only seven!
A small guest at the farm); but he said, “Oh! a girl was no
good!"

So he whistled and went, he went over the stile to the wood.
It was sad, it was sorrowful! Only a girl — only seven!
At home in the dark London smoke I had not found it out.
The pear-trees looked on in their white, and bluebirds flashed
about,

And they, too, were angry as Oliver. Were they eleven?

I thought so. Yes, every one else was eleven - eleven!

So Oliver went, but the cowslips were tall at my feet,

And all the white orchard with fast-falling blossom was littered;
And under and over the branches those little birds twittered,
While hanging head downward they scolded because I was seven.
A pity a very great pity. One should be eleven.

But soon I was happy, the smell of the world was so sweet,
And I saw a round hole in an apple-tree rosy and old.

Then I knew, for I peeped, and I felt it was right they should scold.

Eggs small and eggs many. For gladness I broke into laughter; And then some one else—oh; how softly!-came after, came after

With laughter with laughter came after.

-

And no one was near us to utter that sweet, mocking call,
That soon very tired sank low with a mystical fall.

But this was the country

perhaps it was close under heaven; Oh! nothing so likely; the voice might have come from it even. I knew about heaven. But this was the country, of this Light, blossom, and piping, and flashing of wings not at all. Not at all. No. But one little bird was an easy forgiver:

She peeped, she drew near as I moved from her domicile small, Then flashed down her hole like a dart-like a dart from the

quiver,

And I waded atween the long grasses, and felt it was bliss.

So this was the country; clear dazzle of azure and shiver And whisper of leaves, and a humming all over the tall White branches, a humming of bees. And I came to the wallA little, low wall- and looked over, and there was the river, The lane that led on to the village, and then the sweet river, Clear shining and slow, she had far, far to go from her snow; But each rush gleamed a sword in the sunlight to guard her long flow,

And she murmured, methought, with a speech very soft- very low.

"The ways will be long, but the days will be long," quoth the river,

"To me a long liver, long, long!" quoth the river the river.

I dreamed of the country that night, of the orchard, the sky, The voice that had mocked coming after and over and under. But at last in a day or two, namely Eleven and I

-

Were very fast friends, and to him I confided the wonder.
He said that was Echo. "Was Echo a wise kind of bee
That had learned how to laugh? Could it laugh in one's ear and

then fly,

And laugh again yonder?

low

"No; Echo "-he whispered it

Was a woman, they said, but a woman whom no one could see And no one could find; and he did not believe it, not he;

But he could not get near for the river that held us asunder.
Yet I that had money—a shilling, a whole silver shilling-
We might cross if I thought I would spend it."
"Oh! yes, I

was willing"

And we ran hand in hand; we ran down to the ferry, the ferry, And we heard how she mocked at the folk with a voice clear and

merry

When they called for the ferry; but, oh! she was very was very Swift-footed. She spoke and was gone; and when Oliver cried, "Hie over! hie over! you man of the ferry the ferry!"

By the still water's side she was heard far and wide-she replied, And she mocked in her voice sweet and merry, "You man of the

"Hie over!" he shouted. The ferryman came at his calling; Across the clear reed-bordered river he ferried us fast.

Such a chase! Hand in hand, foot to foot, we ran on; it surpassed
All measure her doubling so close, then so far away falling,
Then gone, and no more. Oh! to see her but once unaware,
And the mouth that had mocked; but we might not (yet sure she
was there),

Nor behold her wild eyes, and her mystical countenance fair.
We sought in the wood, and we found the wood-wren in her stead;
In the field, and we found but the cuckoo that talked overhead;
By the brook, and we found the reed-sparrow deep-nested, in
brown;

Not Echo, fair Echo! for Echo, sweet Echo! was flown.

So we came to the place where the dead people wait till God call.
The church was among them, gray moss over roof, over wall.
Very silent, so low. And we stood on a green, grassy mound
And looked in at the window, for Echo, perhaps, in her round
Might have come in to hide there. But, no; every oak-carven seat
Was empty. We saw the great Bible—old, old, very old,
And the parson's great Prayer-book beside it; we heard the slow
beat

Of the pendulum swing in the tower; we saw the clear gold
Of a sunbeam float down to the aisle, and then waver and play
On the low chancel step and the railing; and Oliver said,
"Look, Katie! look, Katie! when Lettice came here to be wed
She stood where that sunbeam drops down, and all white was her

gown;

And she stepped upon flowers they strewed for her."

Then quoth small Seven:

"Shall I wear a white gown and have flowers to walk upon ever?” All doubtful: "It takes a long time to grow up," quoth Eleven; "You're so little, you know, and the church is so old, it can never Last on till you're tall." And in whispers - because it was old And holy, and fraught with strange meaning, half felt, but not told,

Full of old parsons' prayers, who were dead, of old days, of old folk,

Neither heard nor beheld, but about us in whispers we spoke. Then we went from it softly, and ran hand in hand to the strand,

While bleating of flocks and birds' piping made sweeter the land.
And Echo came back e'en as Oliver drew to the ferry.

Ay, here it was here that we woke her, the Echo of old;
All life of that day seems an echo, and many times told.
Shall I cross by the ferry to-morrow, and come in my white
To that little low church? and will Oliver meet me anon?
Will it all seem an echo from childhood passed over

--

passed on? -Jean Ingelow.

THE VICTOR OF MARENGO

Napoleon was sitting in his tent; before him lay a map of Italy. He took four pins and stuck them up; measured, moved the pins, and measured again. "Now," said he, "that is right; I will capture him there!"

"Who, sir?" said an officer.

Milas, the old fox of Austria. He will retire from Genoa, pass Turin, and fall back on Alexandria. I shall cross the Po, meet him on the plains of Laconia, and conquer him there," and the finger of the child of destiny pointed to Marengo.

Two months later the memorable campaign of 1800 began. The 20th of May saw Napoleon on the heights of St. Bernard. The 22d, Larmes, with the army of Genoa, held Padua. So far, all had been well with Napoleon. He had compelled the Austrians to take the position he desired; reduced the army from one hundred and twenty thousand to forty thousand men; dispatched Murat to the right, and June 14th moved forward to consummate his masterly plan.

But God threatened to overthrow his scheme! A little rain had fallen in the Alps, and the Po could not be crossed in time. The battle was begun. Milas, pushed to the wall, resolved to cut his way out; and Napoleon reached the field to see Larmes beaten, Champeaux dead, Desaix still charging old Milas, with his Austrian phalanx at Marengo, till the consular guard gave way, and the well-planned victory was a terrible defeat. Just as the day was lost, Desaix, the boy General, sweeping across the field at the head of his cavalry, halted on the eminence where stood Napoleon. There was in the corps a drummer-boy, a gamin whom Desaix had picked up in the streets of Paris. He had followed the vic

torious eagle of France in the campaigns of Egypt and Germany. As the columns halted, Napoleon shouted to him: "Beat a retreat!"

The boy stopped, grasped his drumsticks, and said: “Sir, I do not know how to beat a retreat; Desaix never taught me that; but I can beat a charge,- oh! I can beat a charge that will make the dead fall into line. I beat that charge at the Pyramids; I beat that charge at Mount Tabor; I beat it again at the bridge of Lodi. May I beat it here?"

Napoleon turned to Desaix, and said: "We are beaten; what shall we do?"

"Do? Beat them! It is only three o'clock, and there is time enough to win a victory yet. Up! the charge! beat the old charge of Mount Tabor and Lodi!"

A moment later the corps, following the sword-gleam of Desaix, and keeping step with the furious roll of the gamin's drum, swept down on the host of Austrians. They drove the first line back on the second — both on the third, and there they died. Desaix fell at the first volley, but the line never faltered, and as the smoke cleared away, the gamin was seen in front of his line marching right on, and still beating the furious charge. Over the dead and wounded, over breastworks and fallen foe, over cannon belching forth their fire of death, he led the way to victory, and the fifteen days in Italy were ended. To-day men point to Marengo in wonder. They admire the power and foresight that so skillfully handled the battle, but they forget that a general only thirty years of age made a victory of a defeat. They forget that a gamin of Paris put to shame the child of destiny."

-Anonymous.

MAMMY'S LI'L' BOY

Who all time dodgin' en de cott'n en de corn?
Mammy's li'l' boy, mammy's li'l' boy!

Who all time stealin' ole massa's dinner-horn?
Mammy's li'l' baby boy.