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a noose was slipped over her head, and her struggles were in vain.

It was some time, however, before she gave over rearing and plunging and lashing out with her feet on every side. The two rangers then led her along the valley by two strong lassoes, which enabled them to keep at a sufficient distance on each side to be out of the reach of her hoofs; and whenever she struck out in one direction, she was jerked in the other. In this way her spirit was gradually subdued.

As to Tonish, who had marred the whole scheme by his precipitancy,' he had been more successful than he deserved, having managed to catch a beautiful creamcoloured colt about seven months old, that had not had strength to keep up with its companions.

The mercurial little Frenchman was beside himself with exultation. It was amusing to see him with his prize. The colt would rear and kick, and struggle to get free, when Tonish would take it about the neck, wrestle with it, jump on its back, and cut as many antics as a monkey with a kitten.

Nothing surprised me more, however, than to witness how soon these poor animals, thus taken from the unbounded freedom of the prairie, yielded to the dominion of man. In the course of two or three days the mare and colt went with the led horses, and became quite docile.

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NIGHT AFTER VICTORY.

[The most famous siege in the world's history was that of Troy, a city at the entrance of the Hellespont (Dardanelles). Its ruins are now buried, but they have recently been discovered. It was besieged for ten years by the Greeks, and finally taken and destroyed (B.C. 1184). Priam was the last king of Troy, and his son Hector the most renowned leader of the Trojans. On the Greek side the most famous warriors were Achilles, Ajax, and Diomede (Tydides).]

Now deep in ocean sunk the lamp of light,
And drew behind the cloudy veil of night;

1

The conquering Trojans 1 mourn his beams decayed;
The Greeks rejoicing bless the friendly shade.
The victors keep the field: and Hector calls
A martial council 2 near the navy walls:

3

These to Scamander's bank apart he led,

Where thinly scattered lay the heaps of dead.
The assembled chiefs, descending on the ground,
Attend his order, and their prince surround.
A massy spear he bore of mighty strength,
Of full ten cubits was the lance's length;
The point was brass, refulgent to behold,
Fixed to the wood with circling rings of gold:
The noble Hector on his lance reclined,

And bending forward, thus revealed his mind:
"Ye valiant Trojans, with attention hear!
Ye Dardan bands, and generous aids,5 give ear!
This day, we hoped, would wrap in conquering flame
Greece with her ships, and crown our toils with fame.
But darkness now, to save the cowards, falls,
And guards them trembling in their wooden walls.
Obey the night, and use her peaceful hours,
Our steeds to forage, and refresh our powers.
Straight from the town be sheep and oxen sought,
And strengthening bread and generous wine be brought.
Wide o'er the field, high blazing to the sky,
Let numerous fires the absent sun supply,
The flaming piles with plenteous fuel raise,
Till the bright morn her purple beam displays;

Lest, in the silence and the shades of night,
Greece on her sable ships attempt her flight.
Not unmolested let the wretches gain

Their lofty decks, or safely cleave the main : 6
Some hostile wound let every dart bestow,

Some lasting token of the Phrygian 7 foe:

Wounds, that long hence may ask their spouses' care,
And warn their children from a Trojan war.
Now, through the circuit of our Ilion 8 wall,
Let sacred heralds sound the solemn call;
To bid the sires with hoary honours crowned,
And beardless youths, our battlements surround.
Firm be the guard, while distant lie our powers,
And let the matrons hang with lights the towers:
Lest, under covert of the midnight shade,
The insidious foe the naked town invade.
Suffice, to-night, these orders to obey;

A nobler charge shall rouse the dawning day.
The gods, I trust, shall give to Hector's hand,
From these detested foes to free the land,

Who ploughed, with fates averse, the watery way;
For Trojan vultures a predestined prey."

11

Our common safety must be now the care:
But soon as morning paints the fields of air,
Sheathed in bright arms let every troop engage,
And the fired fleet behold the battle rage.
Then, then shall Hector 10 and Tydides 11 prove,
Whose fates are heaviest in the scale of Jove.
To-morrow's light (O haste the glorious morn!)
Shall see his bloody spoils in triumph borne,
With this keen javelin shall his breast be gored,
And prostrate heroes bleed around their lord.
Certain as this, oh! might my days endure,
From age inglorious, and black death secure ;
So might my life and glory know no bound,
Like Pallas 13 worshipped, like the sun renowned!
As the next dawn, the last they shall enjoy,
Shall crush the Greeks, and end the woes of Troy."

12

The leader spoke. From all his host around
Shouts of applause along the shores resound.
Each from the yoke the smoking steeds untied,
And fixed their headstalls to his chariot-side.
Fat sheep and oxen from the town are led,
With generous wine, and all-sustaining bread.
Full hecatombs 14 lay burning on the shore;
The winds to heaven the curling vapours bore;
Ungrateful offering 15 to the immortal powers!
Whose wrath hung heavy o'er the Trojan towers;
Nor Priam 16 nor his sons obtained their grace;
Proud Troy they hated, and her guilty race.
The troops exulting sat in order round,
And beaming fires illumined all the ground.
As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night!
O'er heaven's clear azure spreads her sacred light,
When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene;
Around her throne the vivid planets roll,
And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole;
O'er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
And tip with silver every mountain's head.
Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies:
The conscious swains,17 rejoicing in the sight,
Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.
So many flames before proud Ilion blaze,

And lighten glimmering Xanthus 18 with their rays:
The long reflections of the distant fires
Gleam on the walls, and tremble on the spires.
A thousand piles the dusky horrors gild,

And shoot a shady lustre o'er the field.

Full fifty guards each flaming pile attend,

Whose umbered 19 arms, by fits, thick flashes send,
Loud neigh the coursers o'er their heaps of corn,
And ardent warriors wait the rising morn.

1 Trojans, people of Troy (Troja).
2 A martial council, a council of

war.

3 Scamander, a river near Troy.
4 Dardan, another name for Trojan.
5 Generous aids, allics.

The main, the ocean.

7 Phrygian, another name for Trojan. Ilion, same as Troy.

9 A predestined prey, marked out as victims beforehand.

10 Hector, leading warrior on the Trojan side.

11 Tydides, same as Diomede, one of the Greek leaders.

12 Secure, safe. (Lat. se, apart from; cura, care.)

13 Pallas, same as Minerva, the goddess of wisdom, war, &c.

14 Hecatombs, sacrifices of a hundred
oxen. (Gr. hecaton, a hundred.)
15 Ungrateful offering, unpleasing
sacrifice. (Lat. gratus, pleasing.)
16 Priam, the king of Troy.
17 The conscious swains, the rus-
tics now awake.

18 Xanthus, a river near Troy.
19 Umbered, thrown into shadow and
glimmering in the darkness. (Lat.
umbra, a shade.)

A WORD TO THE WISE.

[The following is addressed by the celebrated Bishop Berkeley (born 1684, died 1753) to the Irish clergy. The condition of the Irish peasantry has very much improved since Berkeley's time; but his words, if unneeded now, will at any rate serve as an historic picture.]

HE house of an Irish peasant is the cave of poverty:

within, you see a pot and a little straw; without, a heap of children tumbling on the dunghill. Their fields and gardens are a lively counterpart of Solomon's description in the Proverbs: "I went," saith that wise king, "by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding, and lo! it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was broken down." In every road the ragged ensigns of poverty are displayed; you often meet caravans of poor, whole families in a drove, without clothes to cover, or bread to feed them, both which might be easily procured by moderate labour. They are encouraged in this vagabond life by the miserable hospitality they meet within every cottage, whose inhabitants expect the same kind reception in their turn, when they become beggars themselves beggary being the last refuge of these improvident 2 creatures.

If I seem to go out of my province, or to prescribe

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