LESSON XVI. THE EPHEMERA: AN EMBLEM OF HUMAN LIFE. 1. You may remember, my dear friend, that when we lately spent that happy day in the delightful garden and sweet society of the Moulin Joly, I stopped a little in one of our walks, and staid some time behind the company. We had been shown numberless skeletons of a kind of little fly, called an ephemera, whose successive generations, we were told, were bred and expired within the day. 2. I happened to see a living company of them on a leaf, who appeared to be engaged in conversation. You know I understand all the inferior animal tongues. My too great application to the study of them is the best excuse I can give for the little progress I have made in your charming language. 3. I listened, through curiosity, to the discourse of these little creatures; but as they, in their national vivacity, spoke three or four together, I could make but little of their conversation. I found, however, by some broken expressions that I heard now and then, they were disputing warmly on the merit of two foreign musicians, one a gnat, the other a mosquito; in which dispute they spent their time, as regardless of the shortness of life as if they had been sure of living a month. 4. Happy people! thought I. You are certainly under a wise, just, and mild government, since you have no public grievances to complain of, nor any subject of contention but the perfections and imperfections of foreign music. I turned my head from them to an old gray-headed one, who was single on another leaf, and talking to himself. Being amused with his soliloquy, I put it down in writing, in the hope that it will likewise amuse her* to whom I am so much indebted for the * Madame Brilliant, to whom the letter was written. most pleasing of all amusements, her delicious company and heavenly harmony. 5. "It was," said he, "the opinion of learned philosophers of our race, who lived and flourished long before my time, that this vast world, the Moulin Joly, could not itself exist more than eighteen hours; and I think there was some foundation for that opinion; since, by the apparent motion of the great luminary that gives life to all nature, and which, in my time, has evidently declined considerably toward the ocean at the end of our earth, it must then finish its course, be extinguished in the waters that surround us, and leave the world in cold and darkness, necessarily producing universal death and destruction. 6. "I have lived seven of these hours, a great age, being no less than four hundred and twenty minutes of time. How very few of us continue so long! I have seen generations born, flourish, and expire. My present friends are the children and grandchildren of the friends of my youth, who are now, alas! no more. And I must soon follow them; for, by the course of nature, though still in health, I can not expect to live above seven or eight minutes longer. 7. "What now avails all my toil and labor in amassing honey-dew on this leaf, which I can not live to enjoy? What the political struggles I have been engaged in for the good of my compatriot inhabitants of this bush, or my philosophical studies for the benefit of our race in general! For, in politics, (what can laws do without morals?) our present race of ephemera will, in the course of minutes, become corrupt, like those of other and older bushes, and consequently as wretched. 8. "And in philosophy, how small our progress! Alas! art is long, and life is short! My friends would comfort me with the idea of a name, they say, I shall leave behind me; and they tell me I have lived long enough to nature and to glory. But what will fame be to an ephemera who no longer exists? And what will become of all history in the eighteenth hour, when the world itself, even the whole Moulin Joly, shall come to an end, and be buried in universal ruin?" WORD ANALYSIS AND DEFINITIONS. Dr. Franklin. E phem'e ra (eph, for; ē'me-rā, a day), a kind of fly that lives only one day. Plural, ephemerœ. Ex pire' (ex, out; pire or spire, to breathe), to breathe out; to die. Lu mi'na ry (lumin, light; ary, that which), a body that emits light; the sun. Progress (pro, forward; gress, to go), a going forward; advancement. LESSON XVII. LITTLE NELL AND THE SEXTON. The old Sexton soon got better, and was about again. He was not able to work; but one day there was a grave to be made, and he came to overlook the man who was digging it. He was in a talkative mood; and little Nell, at first standing by his side, and afterwards sitting on the grass at his feet, with her thoughtful face raised toward him, began to converse with him. Little Nell. You were telling me about your gardening. Do you ever plant things here? Sexton. In the churchyard? Not I. Little Nell. I have seen some flowers and little shrubs about; there are some over there, you see. I thought they were of your rearing; though, indeed, they grow but poorly. Sexton. They grow as Heaven wills; and it kindly ordains. that they never shall flourish here. Little Nell. I don't understand you. Sexton. Why, this it is; they mark the graves of those who had very tender, loving friends. Little Nell (earnestly). I was sure they did! I am very glad to know they do! Sexton. Ay, but stay. Look at them. See how they hang their heads, and droop, and wither. Do you guess the reason'? Little Nell. No. What is the reason? : Sexton. Because the memory of those who lie below passes away so soon. At first those loving friends tend the flowers morning, noon, and night; but they soon begin to come less frequently, from once a week to once a month; then at long and uncertain intervals; then not at all. Such tokens seldom flourish long. I have known the briefest summer flowers outlive them. Little Nell. How sad that is! I grieve to hear it. Sexton (shaking his head). Ah! so say the gentlefolks who come down here to look about them; but I say otherwise. "It's a pretty custom you have in this part of the country," they say to me sometimes, "to plant the graves; but it's melancholy to see these things all withering or dead." I crave their pardon, and tell them that, as I take it, 't is a good sign for the happiness of the living. And so it is. It's nature. Little Nell (very seriously). Perhaps the mourners learn to look to the blue sky by day and to the stars by night, and to think that the dead are there and not in the graves. It may be. Sexton (doubtfully). Perhaps so. Little Nell (in a low tone, to herself). Whether it be as I believe it is or not, I'll make this place my garden. It will be no harm, at least, to work here day by day; and pleasant thoughts will come of it, I'm sure. Charles Dickens. (Adapted.) QUESTIONS. Where should the rising inflection be used in this piece? The falling inflection? Why? (See Introduction, page ix). Where is the movement slow? Where medium? (See page xv). Point out any examples of absolute emphasis. Of antithetic emphasis. 1. Although cotton was not generally known among the nations of the earth until a much later period than the other substances used for clothing, such as flax, wool, etc., it is now raised in such abundance as to afford the cheapest material for this purpose. From its resemblance to sheep's wool, it was called by the ancients the "wool of trees"; and the term cotton-wool is still often employed. The Germans call it treewool. 2. The many varieties of the cotton-plant have been divided into herb-cotton, shrub-cotton, and tree-cotton, according to the mode of growth. Of these, the most useful is the herb-cotton, E |