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Now 'tis louder, but the powder
Will be all exploded soon;

For the only way to do,

When the music's nearly through,

Is to muster all your muscle for a bang,
Striking twenty notes together with a clang:
Hit the treble with a twang,

Give the bass an awful whang,
And close the whole performance

With a slam-bang - whang!

126.-The Countryman and the Lawyer.

1

A lawyer in the Common Pleas,1
Who was esteemed a mighty wit,
Upon the strength of a chance hit
Amid a thousand flippancies,
And his occasional bad jokes

In bullying, bantering, browbeating,
Ridiculing, and maltreating

Women or other timid folks,-
In a late cause resolved to hoax

A clownish Yorkshire farmer,

one

Who, by his uncouth look and gait,
Appeared expressly meant by Fate
To be quizzed and played upon.

So, having tipped the wink to those
In the back rows,

1 Common Pleas (i.e., Common | ordinary suits between parties are Pleadings) is the court in which tried.

Who kept their laughter bottled down
Until our wag should draw the cork,
He smiled jocosely on the clown,

And went to work.

"Well, Farmer Numskull, how go calves at York?" "Why not, sir, as they do wi' you,

But on four legs instead of two." "Officer!" cried the legal elf,1 Piqued at the laugh against himself,

"Do, pray, keep silence down below there. Now look at me, clown, and attend: Have I not seen you somewhere, friend?" "Ye-es- very like: I often go there."

"Our rustic's waggish quite laconic,"
The lawyer cried, with grin sardonic:
"I wish I'd known this prodigy,
This genius of the clods, when I,

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On circuit, was at York residing.
Now, Farmer, do for once speak true:
Mind, you're on oath; so tell me, you
Who doubtless think yourself so clever,
Are there as many fools as ever

In the West Riding? "5

"Why, no, sir, no: we've got our share, But not so many as when you were there."

1 elf, here meaning trickster. 2 like = likely.

sardonic, mocking and bitter. 4 circuit, the appointed route or

tour from court to court made by a judge or lawyer.

5 West Riding, one of the three judicial districts of Yorkshire.

127. ― Rienzi to the Romans.

The following is an extract from the drama of “Rienzi," by Miss Mary Russell Mitford, the English authoress. Cola di Rienzi, known as "the last of the Roman tribunes," was born in Rome about 1312. In 1347 he stirred up the people to revolt against the Roman nobles, and he himself assumed regal power under the ancient Roman title of "tribune." His career, however, was brief, and he was assassinated in 1354.

Friends!

I come not here to talk. Ye know too well
The story of our thralldom. We are slaves!
The bright sun rises to his course, and lights
A race of slaves! He sets, and his last beam
Falls on a slave; not such as, swept along
By the full tide of power, the conqueror leads
To crimson glory and undying fame,-
But base, ignoble slaves! slaves to a horde
Of petty tyrants, feudal despots; 1 lords,
Rich in some dozen paltry villages;

Strong in some hundred spearmen; only great

In that strange spell, -a name! Each hour, dark fraud,

Or open rapine, or protected murder,

Cries out against them. But this very day,

An honest man, my neighbor, there he stands,

Was struck, struck like a dog, by one who wore

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The badge of Orsini! because, forsooth,

He tossed not high his ready cap in air,

1 petty... despots. Rome was | whose houses were fortified castles, in the early part of the fourteenth and whose dependants kept the city century a prey to factions of nobles, in a constant turmoil.

Nor lifted up his voice in servile shouts,

At sight of that great ruffian! Be we men,

And suffer such dishonor?

The stain away in blood?

men, and wash not

Such shames are common.

I have known deeper wrongs. I, that speak to ye,

I had a brother once, a gracious boy,

Full of all gentleness, of calmest hope,

Of sweet and quiet joy: there was the look
Of heaven upon his face, which limners give
To the beloved disciple. How I loved
That gracious boy! Younger by fifteen years,
Brother at once and son ! He left my side,
A summer bloom on his fair cheeks, a smile
Parting his innocent lips. In one short hour
The pretty, harmless boy was slain! I saw
The corse, the mangled corse, and then I cried
For vengeance! Rouse, ye Romans! Rouse, ye slaves!
Have ye brave sons? Look in the next fierce brawl
To see them die! Have ye fair daughters? Look
To see them live, torn from your arms, distained,
Dishonored; and, if ye dare call for justice,
Be answered by the lash! Yet this is Rome,
That sat on her seven hills, and from her throne
Of beauty ruled the world! Yet we are Romans.
Why, in that elder day to be a Roman
Was greater than a king! And once again, —
Hear me, ye walls that echoed to the tread
Of either Brutus ! - once again I swear

The Eternal City shall be free!

MITFORD.

128.- Home.

There is a land, of every land the pride,
Beloved of Heaven o'er all the world beside,
Where brighter suns dispense serener light,
And milder moons imparadise the night,—
A land of beauty, virtue, valor, truth,
Time-tutored age, and love-exalted youth.
The wandering mariner, whose eye explores
The wealthiest isles, the most enchanting shores,
Views not a realm so bountiful and fair,
Nor breathes the spirit of a purer air.
In every clime the magnet of his soul,
Touched by remembrance, trembles to that pole;
For in this land of Heaven's peculiar grace,
The heritage of nature's noblest race,
There is a spot of earth supremely blest,
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest,
Where man, creation's tyrant, casts aside
His sword and scepter, pageantry and pride,
While in his softened looks benignly blend
The sire, the son, the husband, brother, friend.
Here woman reigns the mother, daughter, wife,
Strews with fresh flowers the narrow way of life;
In the clear heaven of her delighted eye,
An angel guard of Loves and Graces lie;
Around her knees domestic duties meet,
And fireside pleasures gambol at her feet.

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