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100.- The Height of the Ridiculous.

I wrote some lines once on a time
In wondrous merry mood,

And thought, as usual, men would say
They were exceeding good.

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"These to the printer," I exclaimed;
And, in my humorous way,
I added (as a trifling jest),

"There'll be the devil' to pay."

He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within:
At the first line he read, his face

Was all upon the grin.

1 devil. To understand this pun, | errands and does chores, is called pupils should know that the boy "the printer's devil," - not a very in the printing office, who runs of complimentary name.

He read the next; the grin grew broad,
And shot from ear to ear:

He read the third; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.

The fourth, he broke into a roar;
The fifth, his waistband split;
The sixth, he burst five buttons off,
And tumbled in a fit.

Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,
I watched that wretched man;
And since, I never dare to write

As funny as I can.

HOLMES.

101.-The Old Continentals.

This very original poem, by Guy H. McMaster of New York (18291887), was called by its author Carmen Bellicosum ("Song of War"). It may be taken, not as referring to any particular battle of the Revolutionary War, but as a general description of the Continental soldiers of that period.

In their ragged regimentals
Stood the old Continentals,

Yielding not.

When the Grenadiers were lunging,'

And like hail fell the plunging

Cannon shot:

1 lunging, thrusting with bayonets.

When the files

Of the Isles,1

From the smoky night encampment, bore the banner of

the rampant

8

Unicorn,2

And grummer, grummer, grummer rolled the roll of the drummer,

Through the morn!

But with eyes to the front all,
And with guns horizontal,
Stood our sires;

And the balls whistled deadly,

And in streams flashing redly

Blazed the fires;

As the roar

On the shore

Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green-sodded

acres

Of the plain;

And louder, louder, louder cracked the black gunpowder, Cracking amain!*

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Cannoneers;

And the "villainous saltpeter "2
Rang a fierce, discordant meter
Round their ears;

As the swift

Storm-drift,

With hot sweeping anger came the Horse-guards' clangor On our flanks.

Then higher, higher, higher burned the old-fashioned fire Through the ranks!

Then the old-fashioned Colonel
Galloped through the white, infernal
Powder cloud;

His broad sword was swinging,

And his brazen throat was ringing

Trumpet loud.

Then the blue

Bullets flew,

And the trooper jackets redden at the touch of the leaden Rifle breath.

And rounder, rounder, rounder roared the iron sixpounder,

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102. — Bingen on the Rhine.

A soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers : There was lack of woman's nursing, there was dearth of woman's tears;

But a comrade stood beside him, while his lifeblood ebbed away,

And bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he might

say.

The dying soldier faltered, as he took that comrade's

hand;

And he said,

"I never more shall see my own, my native land.

Take a message and a token to some distant friends of

mine,

For I was born at Bingen,1—at Bingen on the Rhine.

"Tell my brothers and companions, when they meet and crowd around

To hear my mournful story, in the pleasant vineyard

ground,

That we fought the battle bravely; and when the day was done,

Full many a corpse lay ghastly pale beneath the setting

sun.

And midst the dead and dying were some grown old in

wars,

1 Bingen (pron. bingʼen).

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