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solid gold of talents remains, like the works of nature, to increase our admiration as our knowledge increases.

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1. Whence are the popular fictions of the English derived?

2. What is the character of the "Arabian Nights?"

3. Describe what a work of fiction, or a novel, is or ought to be?

LESSON LXX. MARCH THE ELEVENTH.

Recollection of Youthful Days.

Down by yon hazel copse, at evening blazed
The gipsy's faggot there we stood and gazed;
Gazed on her sun-burnt face with silent awe,
Her tatter'd mantle, and her hood of straw,
Her moving lips, her caldron brimming o'er;
The drowsy brood that on her back she bore;
Imps, in the barn with mousing owlet bred,
From rifled roost at nightly revel fed;

Whose dark eyes flash'd through locks of blackest shade,
When in the breeze the distant watch-dog bay'd:

And heroes fled the sybil's mutter'd call,

Whose elfin prowess scaled the orchard wall:

As o'er my palm the silver piece she drew,

And traced the line of life with searching view:

How throbb'd my flutt'ring pulse with hopes and fears,
To learn the colour of my future years!

Ah, then, what honest triumphs flush'd my breast,
This truth once known-To bless is to be blest.
We led the bending beggar on his way;
(Bare were his feet, his tresses silver-gray ;)
Soothed the keen pangs his aged spirit felt,
And on his tale with mute attention dwelt.
As in his scrip we dropp'd our little store,
And wept to think that little was no more,

He breathed in prayer: "Long may such goodness live,"

'Twas all he gave, 'twas all he had to give.

But hark! through those old firs, with sullen swell,

The church-clock strikes! ye tender scenes, farewell!
It calls me hence, beneath their shade to trace
The few fond lines that time may soon efface.

On yon gray stone, that fronts the chancel door,
Worn smooth by busy feet now seen no more,

EFFECTS OF TEMPERANCE IN PROLONGING LIFE. 99

Each eve we shot the marble through the ring,
When the heart danced, and life was in its spring,
Alas! unconscious of the kindred earth,

That faintly echoed to the voice of mirth.

The glow-worm loves her emerald light to shed,
Where now the sexton rests his hoary head:
Oft, as he turn'd the greensward with his spade,
Or lectured every youth that round him play'd;
And, calmly pointing where his father lay,
Roused us to rival each, the hero of his day.

1. What name is given to that species of fortune-telling practised by gypsies?

2. Give a definition of the beggar's scrip.

3. What great peculiarity distinguishes the glow-worm?

LESSON LXXI.

MARCH THE TWELFTH.

Effects of Temperance in prolonging Life.

LOUIS CORNARO, a Venetian noble, who died at Padua in the year 1596, had brought his body into such a state of decay in his thirty-sixth year, by intemperance and excess, that his physicians assured him that he must very soon die, unless he altered his way of living. Cornaro had resolution sufficient to set about this important change. He confined himself to a certain quantity of food, exactly weighed out to him, daily, kept himself from all excess of wine, from all violent passions, and indeed was temperate in all things. With this regimen he lived healthy, alert, and without feeling any of the infirmities of age, till he arrived at his hundredth year, in which, without any previous sickness or pain, he fell into a kind of swoon, and presently expired.

In his seventieth year, being on a journey, he was overturned in his carriage, and was so dragged by the frightened horses, that he dislocated an arm and a leg, and received several wounds in the head: he recovered in a short time from all the effects of this accident, without the assistance of a physician.

He retained all his senses in full perfection, till his death; his spirits were brisk, and his voice continued so good, that at times, when in the select society of his friends, he used to sing the songs he had learnt in his youth. In the last years of his life he took no more daily

than twelve ounces of chosen food, and fourteen ounces of drink. By the same system of moderation, his wife also reached to extreme old age, and survived him several years. In his ninety-fifth year, he published a small treatise, wherein he points out the means by which he had attained to so great an age. The following extract will serve to show with how much vigour he could write at such an advanced age.

"Is the visit of a friend so agreeable to us, when we are sick-of a friend who takes part in our sufferings, who consoles and cheers our drooping spirits? how much more. must the visit of a physician rejoice us, whose encouragements lead us to hope for the speedy return of health.

"But for preserving this health in an uninterrupted vigour, nothing more is necessary than temperance and regular living. This is the natural and infallible means of keeping even persons of the tenderest frame in constant health, and of continuing their lives to a hundred and more, the means of preserving them from an immature and painful death, and at last causes man to die in calmness and serenity, when his powers are exhausted."

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1. Who was Louis Cornaro, and in what year did he die?

2. To what age did he arrive?

3. What did Cornaro publish in his 95th year?

4. To what was his longevity to be attributed ?

LESSON LXXII.

MARCH THE THIRTEENTH.
Belisarius.

On the thirteenth of March, 565, died Belisarius, general of the emperor Justinian's army; who overthrew the Persians in the East, the Vandals in Africa, and the Goths in Italy. But after all his great exploits, he was falsely accused of a conspiracy against the emperor. The real conspirators had been detected and seized, with daggers hidden under their garments. One of them died by his own hand, and the other was dragged from the sanctuary. Pressed by remorse, or tempted by the hopes of safety, he accused two officers of the household of Belisarius; and torture forced them to declare that they had acted according to the secret instructions of their patron. Posterity will not hastily believe that a hero who in the vigour of life had disdained the fairest offers of ambition and revenge, should stoop to the murder of

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his prince, whom he could not long expect to survive. His followers were impatient to fly; but flight must have been supported by rebellion, and he had lived enough for nature and for glory.

Belisarius appeared before the council with less fear than indignation; after forty years' service, the emperor had prejudged his guilt; and injustice was sanctified by the presence and authority of the patriarch. The life of Belisarius was spared: but his fortunes were sequestered; and from December to July he was guarded as a prisoner in his own palace. At length his innocence was acknowledged; his freedom and honours were restored; and death, which might be hastened by resentment and grief, removed him from the world about eight months after his deliverance. That he was deprived of his eyes, and reduced by envy to beg his bread, is a fiction of later times; which has obtained credit, or rather favour, as a strange example of the vicissitudes of fortune.

1. What brave general died on this day, in the year 565? 2. What was he falsely accused of, and what followed?

3. Is the account of Belisarius having been deprived of his sight, and reduced to beggary, true?

LESSON LXXIII.

MARCH THE FOURTEENTH.

Admiral Byng.

On this day, in 1757, John Byng, an unfortunate English admiral, who had given many proofs of courage, was, on a very dubious sentence for neglect of duty, shot at Portsmouth. Many persons, indeed, consider him as being sacrificed to the political fervour of the times. The French had threatened to invade England; and several bodies of their troops were sent down to the coasts that lay opposite to the British shores. These were instructed in the manner of embarking and relanding from flat-bottomed boats, which were made in great numbers for that expedition. The number of men amounted to 50,000; but all discovered the utmost reluctance to the undertaking. The ministry were greatly alarmed; and they applied to the Dutch for 6000 men, which they were by treaty obliged to furnish in case of an invasion. This supply was refused; the Dutch alleging, that their treaty was to send the troops in case of an actual, and not a threatened invasion. The king, therefore, finding he could not have the Dutch forces till their assistance would

be too late, entirely relinquished the demand for them, and the Dutch, with great amity, returned him thanks for withdrawing his request. Upon this 10,000 Hessians and Hanoverians were brought over. But the appearance of so large a body of foreign mercenaries occasioned great discontent. The people only demanded a vigorous exertion of their own internal strength, and then feared no force that could be led to invade them. The British invasion, however, never took place; but a French army landed in Minorca, and invested the citadel of St. Philip's, which was reckoned the strongest in Europe; but the garrison was weak, and no way fitted to stand a vigorous siege. To raise this siege, Admiral Byng was despatched with a squadron of ten men-of-war, with orders to relieve Minorca, or at any rate to throw a body of troops into the garrison. This last he considered too hazardous an undertaking, and therefore he did not attempt it.

Soon after a French fleet appeared nearly equal in force to his own; but the admiral resolved to act only upon the defensive. The French advanced; a slight engagement ensued with part of the English fleet; after which the French slowly sailed away, and another opportunity never occurred of coming to a closer engagement. After this, it was resolved in a council of war to return to Gibraltar to refit, and that the relief of Minorca was impracticable.

For this conduct, Byng was brought home under arrest, tried, and sentenced to be shot. He suffered with the greatest resolution, after delivering a paper filled with protestations of his innocence as to any treacherous intention.

1. When and where was Admiral Byng shot?

2. What had the French threatened?

3. What did the number of men amount to who were to be employed in the expedition ?

4. For what did the British apply to the Dutch?

5. For what purpose was the admiral despatched, and what followed?

LESSON LXXIV.

MARCH THE FIFTEENTH.
Julius Cæsar.

On this day, B. C. 44, Julius Cæsar was assassinated in the senate-house at Rome. Envy, jealousy, resentment, and a surviving love of liberty, conjointly, produced a conspiracy against the life of Cæsar; and among the lead

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