And round the heart, and o'er the aching head, Blest be the gracious Power who taught mankind 5 Beasts may convey and tuneful birds may sing 6 1 Survey the dome. The poet is 3 Chronic. A complaint is said to be the patient at all, or only for a short time. (Gr. chronos, time.) 4 Mild opiates, for lulling the pain. (Lat. opium.) 5 To stamp, &c, that is, by writing and printing words which convey the ideas of the mind. 6 To plead, &c. Such is the influence of good books upon people yet unborn, ROME, ROME IN ITS INFANCY. OME, still an important city, was at one time the mistress of the world. It was founded by Romulus in the year 753 b.c. The infant city was built on one of the seven hills which afterwards formed the site of the full-grown city. Romulus was the first of seven kings that ruled over the old Romans. He is said to have experienced great difficulty in finding young women, as wives, for the young men in his new city. Now in a neighbouring city lived a people called the Sabines. These the young king invited to a festival. The men came, with their wives and daughters. At a given signal during the feast in rushed a band of young Romans, and seized all the maidens and carried them off to be their wives. The Sabines in consequence made war against the Romans. Romulus committed the citadel to the care of his faithful follower Tarpeius. But Tarpeius had a daughter, the fair Tarpeia, who promised to admit the Sabines secretly into the citadel, if they would give her what they wore upon their left arms, by which she meant their golden armlets. They readily agreed; but when they had entered the gate which she opened for them, each man threw upon her the heavy shield which he wore upon his left arm. Thus the Sabines, while profiting by the treachery, expressed their abhorrence of the traitress. The citadel was won, but Rome still held out; and when at length the two armies were about to fight a pitched battle, the Sabine women, who had found good husbands in the Romans they had been compelled to marry, threw themselves between the two armies, and succeeded in making a peace which led to the union of the two nations under one government. Rome was next enlarged by a successful war with the Albans, who lived in the neighbouring town of Alba. When the two armies were drawn up in battle array, it was agreed that the quarrel should be decided by a combat of champions chosen from each army. Now it chanced that there were three brothers in each army, equal in age, and apparently so in strength and valour. Accordingly, these were chosen to be the champions. The three brothers on the Roman side were called Horatii, and their Alban opponents, Curiatii. The champions advanced to a chosen spot midway between the armies, and the combat began. Long and bravely the two bands of brothers fought. At length all the Curiatii were seriously wounded, whilst of the Horatii, two lay dead upon the field, but the third was yet unharmed. This one, with great presence of mind, pretended to flee before his three opponents. They pursued him, each as he was able, and so became separated from each other. Suddenly the Roman turned and fell upon the foremost, and slew him, and then in succession the second and the third. Thus it was that the Albans became subjects of the Roman king, and as such they were ever afterwards bound to fight as their allies. Now it happened that the Romans were soon afterwards at war with the people of Veii. The Albans came, as if to the aid of their allies, but stood aloof upon a neighbouring hill while the battle was raging, to see which side was likely to win. When they saw the day going in favour of the Romans, their general led them down to complete the victory. Tullus, the Roman king, took no notice of his conduct, but summoned all the Albans to a great feast on the following day. They came without arms, as to a peaceful festival, when suddenly a Roman army closed round them, so that they could neither fight nor flee. Then Tullus rebuked the Albans for their insincerity, but said that he would only punish Metius their commander. Metius was taken and bound by the arms and legs to two four-horsed chariots. Then the chariots, being drawn in different directions, tore the unhappy wretch asunder. THE DISCOVERY OF THE MAMMOTH. HE Mammoth is an extinct animal similar to a gigantic elephant. Though it belonged to an age anterior1 to the creation of man, more than one entire body in its natural condition has been found enveloped in a mass of ice. In 1800, a Russian naturalist, travelling in Northern Siberia, discovered one of these monstrous creatures in the ice of the river Alasæia. The H rolling waters had disengaged the mass of ice which had imprisoned the prodigious pachyderm for thousands of years. The body, in a complete state of preservation, and covered with its flesh as well as its entire hide, to which long hairs adhered in certain places, found itself, again, nearly erect on its four feet. About forty years after this a fossil3 mammoth was discovered in India. During the progress of the Jumna canal works, it was necessary to blast some sandstone rocks. After one of these blasts, when a great mass of sandstone had fallen down, the engineer officer in charge of the works observed in a piece of stone two round marks, differing in colour from the sandstone, and something like a pair of bull's eyes. Looking up the face of the rock, he saw the same marks, and, judging them to be caused by something different to the stone itself, he ordered the piece to be preserved, and as successive blasts were made, he numbered and preserved the sections that exhibited peculiar marks. These numbered sections were barged to Calcutta, shipped home round the Cape, and duly deposited in the British Museum, where with the greatest care the fossil remains were dissected out of their stony envelope, and these, on being properly arranged and connected, presented to view the tusks and skull of a mighty mammoth. Every bit of the original ivory and bony substance had passed away, particle by particle, and had been replaced by particles of stone. But under the microscope all the structure of the metamorphosed substances could be traced; and as there is nothing in the world of the same texture as ivory but ivory, these fossil remains were beyond all doubt bequeathed to us by some gigantic species of elephant now extinct. "This Indian mammoth," says Professor Owen, "had probably died a natural death. As its end approached, feeling the fever which precedes dissolution,' it made for the nearest river, to drink, and then, being weak, stumbled in and was drowned. Its great carcass would then be carried down to the sea and sunk in the sand at its mouth, its flesh would rot away from the bones, |