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SCARRON'S DESCRIPTION OF HIMSELF.

There flies a child; his aid the father lends,

But writhing falls by random bullets battered; With his last breath the boy to God commends,

Nor knows that both by the same blow were shat-
tered:

So Boreas, when he stirs his mighty wings,
The blooming hop, and its supportance, flings.

Like the fond lover, whose too dazzling flame
Forbids him to discern, ye're mocked by fate.
If fortune give me neither wealth nor fame,
At least I do not grudge them to the great.
A heart at ease, a home where friends resort,
I would not change for tinsel, or for court.

Thou best of carpets, spread thee at my feet!
Meadow, brook, reeds, beside you let me dwell!
Gold is but sand, not worth these murmurs sweet;
These branchy shades all palace-roofs excel.
When of your hills my wandering visions dream
The world's as little to me as they seem.

167

ley, and that I raise and lower it to salute
those who come to see me. I think I ought,
in conscience, to prevent them from telling
I would have had my-
any more lies
self well painted, if any painter had dared
to undertake it. In default of the painting,
I intend to tell you as nearly as I can what
sort of a fellow I am.
If I

I have left thirty years behind me.
get to forty, I shall add many pains to those
I have already suffered for eight or nine
I have had a good figure, though
years.
short. My illness has shortened it by a good
foot. My head is rather large for my height.
I have a pretty full face for my meagre body;
hair enough not to need a wig; I have many
white ones in spite of the proverb; pretty
good sight, though my eyes are rather large:
they are blue; one is more deeply set than
the other, on the side that I bend my head.
I have a nose of tolerably good shape. My
teeth, which used to be squares of pearl, are
of the colour of wood, and will soon be the
colour of slate. I have lost one and a half
on the left side, and two-and-a-half on the
right, and two are a little chipped. My

SCARRON'S DESCRIPTION OF HIM- legs and my thighs formed at first an ob

SELF.

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Reader, you who have never seen me, and who perhaps trouble yourself very little about me-for there is not much to be gained by seeing a person made like me-know that I should not be anxious that you should see me, if I had not learned that some facetious wits make themselves merry at the expense of my misfortunes, and depict me as quite different from what I am. Some say that I am a cripple in a bowl; others, that I have no thighs, and that I am put on the table in a box, where I chatter like a winking magpie; and others that my hat is fastened to a cord that's attached to a pul

tuse angle, and then a right angle, and at last an acute angle. My thighs and my body made another; and my head bending down on my chest, I am pretty much like a Z. My arms are shortened as well as my legs, and my fingers as well as my arms. In fact, I am an epitome of human misery. That's pretty nearly how I look.

Since I am in such a fair way, I will tell you something of my temper. Besides, this introduction is written just to make the book bigger, at the request of the bookseller, who is afraid he will not get back the expenses of printing, but for that it would be of no But it use, just like a good many others. is no new thing to commit folly out of good nature, besides those that one does on one's own account.

I have always been rather passionate, rather fond of good things, and rather idle. I often call my valet a fool, and soon after, sir. I hate nobody; God send they may treat I am very comfortable when me the same.

I

I have any money, and should be still more comfortable if I had my health. enjoy myself very well in company. I am very content when I am alone. I bear my troubles pretty patiently.

But it seems to me that my introduction is long enough, and that it is time for me to make an end.

THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD.

[The following odo, by THEODORE O'HARA, formed a part of the ceremonies at the dedication of the monument to the soldiers of Kentucky who fell in the war with Mexico.]

The muffled drum's sad roll has beat

The soldier's last tattoo;

No more on life's parade shall meet
That brave and fallen few.
On Fame's eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread,

And Glory guards with solemn round
The bivouac of the dead.

No rumor of the foe's advance

Now swells upon the wind,

No troubled thought at midnight haunts

Of loved ones left behind;

No vision of the morrow's strife
The warrior's dream alarms;

No braying horn nor screaming fife
At dawn shall call to arms.

Their shivered swords are red with rust,
Their plumed heads are bowed,
Their haughty banner trailed in dust,
Is now their martial shroud-
And plenteous funeral tears have washed
The red stains from each brow,
And the proud forms by battle gashed
Are free from anguish now.

The neighing troop, the flashing blade,
The bugle's stirring blast,
The charge, the dreadful cannonade,
The din and shout are passed-
Nor War's wild note, nor Glory's peal
Shall thrill with fierce delight,
Those breasts that never more may feel
The rapture of the fight.

Like the fierce northern hurricane
That sweeps his great plateau,
Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,
Came down the serried foe-
Who heard the thunder of the fray
Break o'er the field beneath,
Knew well the watchword of that day
Was Victory or Death.

Full many a moth er's breath has swept
O'er Angostura's plain,

And long the pitying sky has wept
Above its mouldered slain.

The raven's scream or eagle's flight,
Or shepherd's pensive lay,

Alone now wake each solemn height
That frowned o'er that dread fray.

Sons of the dark and bloody ground,
Ye must not slumber there,
Where stranger steps and tongues resound
Along the heedless air;

Your own proud land's heroic soil
Shall be your fitter grave;

She claims from war its richest spoil-
The ashes of her brave.

Thus 'neath their parent turf they rest, Far from the gory field,

Borne to a Spartan mother's breast

On many a bloody shield.

The sunshine of their native sky
Smiles softly on them here,

And kindred eyes and hearts watch by
The hero's sepulchre,

Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!
Dear as the blood ye gave,

No impious footsteps here shall tread
The herbage of your grave;
Nor shall your glory be forgot

While Fame her record keeps,
Or Honour points the hallowed spot
Where Valor proudly sleeps.

Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone
In deathless song shall tell,

When many a vanished year has flown,
The story how ye fell;

Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight,
Nor time's remorseless doom,

Can dim one ray of holy light
That gilds your glorious tomb.

THE BATTLE OF MOUNT VESU VIUS.

A VICTORY TO WHICH ROME OWED HER CON QUEST OF THE WORLD.

[THOMAS ARNOLD, D. D., the eminent educator and historian, was born at Cowes, Isle of Wight, June 13, 1795. He was educated at Oxford, in which University he subsequently became regius professor of history. As head-master of Rugby school, Dr. Arnold wielded a vast and beneficent influence. His chief literary work -left incomplete,-is a History of Rome, from which we offer a quotation. Dean Stanley says: "His [Dr. Arnold's] greatness did not consist in the pre-eminence f any single quality, but in several remarkable powers, thoroughly leavened and pervaded by an ever-increasing moral nobleness." He died June 12, 1842, leaving two sons, one of whom is the distinguished poet, Matthew Arnold.]

When the Latins sent their two prætors as ambassadors to Rome, it is evident that

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