and advancing very softly to my face, one of them, an officer in the guards, put the sharp end of his half-pike a good way into my left nostril, which tickled my nose like a straw, and made me sneeze violently; whereupon they 5 stole off unperceived, and it was three weeks before I knew the cause of my 'awaking so suddenly. We made a long march the remaining part of that day, and rested that night with five hundred guards on each side of me, half with torches, and half with bows and arrows, ready to To shoot me if I should offer to stir. The next morning at sunrise we continued our march, and arrived within two hundred yards of the city gates about noon. The emperor and all his court came out to meet us, but his great officers would by no means suffer His Majesty to endanger 15 his person by mounting on my body.

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At the place where the carriage stopped, there stood an ancient temple, esteemed to be the largest in the whole kingdom, which having been polluted some years before by an unnatural murder, was, according to the zeal of those people, looked on as profane, and therefore had been applied to common use, and all the ornaments and furniture carried away. In this edifice it was determined I should lodge. The great gate fronting to the north was about four feet high, and almost two feet wide, through which I could easily 25 creep. On each side of the gate was a small window, not above six inches from the ground; into that on the left side the king's smiths conveyed fourscore and eleven chains, like those that hang to a lady's watch in Europe, and almost as large, which were locked to my left leg with six and 30 thirty padlocks. Over against this temple, on the other side of the great highway, at twenty foot distance, there was a turret at least five foot high. Here the emperor ascended

with at least twenty lords of his court, to have an opportunity of viewing me, as I was told, for I could not see them. It was reckoned that above an hundred thousand inhabitants came out of the town upon the same errand; and in spite of my guards, I believe there could not be fewer 5 than ten thousand, at several times, who mounted upon my body by the help of ladders. But a proclamation was soon issued to forbid it upon pain of death. When the workmen found that it was impossible for me to break loose, they cut all the strings that bound me; whereupon I rose up o with as melancholy a disposition as ever I had in my life. But the noise and astonishment of the people at seeing me rise and walk are not to be expressed. The chains that held my left leg were about two yards long, and gave me not only the liberty of walking backwards and forwards in 15 a semicircle, but being fixed within four inches of the gate, allowed me to creep in, and lie at full length in the temple. -Gulliver's Travels.

1. Relate briefly what happened to Gulliver after he landed on Lilliput. What devices does Swift use to make this story appear real? 2. Do the little people act exactly like people of our own kind? 3. Swift was a master satirist; that is, he was constantly ridiculing people, things, or customs. Do you find any trace of satire in this selection?

4. Pronounce, define, and use in sentences:

5. Jonathan Swift (1667-1745) was born and educated in Dublin, Ireland. Most of his manhood was spent in that country, where he figured prominently in political and religious affairs. In 1713 he was made dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin.

BY HENRYK SIENKIEWICZ

Nero was the emperor of Rome, A. D. 54-68. He was a wicked tyrant among whose crimes are the death of his first wife, the death of his own mother, and the murder of a second wife. Two thirds of the city of Rome was burned, and the emperor has been accused of having had the fire set so he could enjoy the sight. Be that as it may, Nero laid the blame on the Christians whom he persecuted. They were thrown into prison, fed to wild beasts in the arena, and burned on poles. Among the captives were the maid Lygia, and her faithful guard, Ursus. Vinicius, Lygia's lover, belonged to the Roman nobility. He had once tried to seize Lygia, but Ursus had foiled his plan by killing the attendant, Croton.

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HE prefect of the city waved a red handkerchief, the hinges opposite Cæsar's podium creaked, and out of the dark gully came Ursus into the brightly lighted arena.

The giant blinked, dazed evidently by the glitter of the 5 arena; then he pushed into the center, gazing around as if to see what he had to meet. It was known to all the Augustans and to most of the spectators that he was the man who had stifled Croton; hence at sight of him a murmur passed along every bench. In Rome there was to no lack of gladiators larger by far than the common measure of man, but Roman eyes had never seen the like of Ursus. Cassius, standing in Cæsar's podium, seemed puny compared with that Lygian.

Senators, vestals, Cæsar, the Augustans, and the people 15 gazed with the delight of experts at his mighty limbs as large as tree trunks, at his breast as large as two shields

joined together, and his arms of a Hercules. The murmur rose every instant. For those multitudes there could be no higher pleasure than to look at those muscles in play in the exertion of a struggle. The murmur rose to shouts, and eager questions were put: Where did the people live 5 who could produce such a giant?

He stood there, in the middle of the amphitheater, naked, more like a stone colossus than a man, with a collected expression, and at the same time the sad look of a barbarian; and while surveying the empty arena, he gazed wonderingly with his blue childlike eyes, now at the spectators, now at Cæsar, now at the grating of the cunicula, whence, as he thought, his executioners would come.

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At that moment when he stepped into the arena his simple heart was beating for the last time with the hope 15 that perhaps a cross was waiting for him; but when he saw neither the cross nor the hole in which it might be put, he thought that he was unworthy of such favor that he would find death in another way, and surely from wild beasts. He was unarmed, and had determined to die as 20 became a confessor of the "Lamb," peacefully and patiently. Meanwhile he wished to pray once more to the Savior; so he knelt on the arena, joined his hands, and raised his eyes toward the stars which were glittering in the lofty opening of the amphitheater.

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That act displeased the crowds. They had had enough of those Christians who died like sheep. They understood that if the giant would not defend himself the spectacle would be a failure. Here and there hisses were heard. Some began to cry for scourgers, whose office it was to 30 lash combatants unwilling to fight. But soon all had grown silent, for no one knew what was waiting for the

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giant, nor whether he would not be ready to struggle when he met death eye to eye.

In fact, they had not long to wait. Suddenly the shrill sound of brazen trumpets was heard, and at that signal a 5 grating opposite Cæsar's podium was opened, and into the arena rushed, amid shouts of beast keepers, an enormous German aurochs, bearing on his head the naked body of a

woman.

"Lygia! Lygia!" cried Vinicius.

Then he seized his hair near the temples, squirmed like a man who feels a sharp dart in his body, and began to repeat in hoarse accents:

"I believe! I believe! O Christ, a miracle!"

And he did not even feel that Petronius covered his 15 head that moment with the toga. It seemed to him that death or pain had closed his eyes. He did not look, he did not see. The feeling of some awful emptiness possessed him. In his head there remained not a thought; his lips merely repeated, as if in madness,

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"I believe! I believe! I believe!"

This time the amphitheater was silent. The Augustans rose in their places, as one man, for in the arena something uncommon had happened. That Lygian, obedient and ready to die, when he saw his queen on the horns of the 25 wild beast sprang up as if touched by living fire, and bending forward he ran at the raging animal.

From all breasts a sudden cry of amazement was heard, after which came deep silence.

The Lygian fell on the raging bull in a twinkle, and seized 30 him by the horns.

"Look!" cried Petronius, snatching the toga from the head of Vinicius.