conversational tone. The second, capitalized, should be read slowly, very distinctly, and a prolonged pause follow before proceeding: "But it is no more than a skirmish which is going on;" which

should be spoken in a free, easy tone, to be followed in the same tone by:

"In the course of which, however," followed by, uttered rapidly: An occasion suddenly arises;" and in an emphatic tone, and considerable force:

"for A DESPERATE SERVICE."

Continuing in an interesting, talkative tone, proceed to:

"MUST BE RECAPTURED AT ANY PRICE," to be read as the previous phrase.

The same holds true of capitalized phrases following.

The description of the signals, italicized, should be given rapidly, with some slight pause between each signal.

Thus we realize other rules suggested for EXPRESSIVE READING, Viz.: "Lay special stress on those points that are to attract the attention of an audience."

"The reading should be accelerated or retarded, the volume of voice increased or diminished, to express the progress of thought or sentiment, or to conform to the requirements of imitative harmony."

62

Paraphrase "The Fountain,” after the following:

The fountain gushes from morn till eve in the clear sunshine. Its waters, when shone upon by the moon's borrowed light, seem whiter than snow, and while the winds blow, the expanded waters look like outspread branches. All through the hours our fountain is happy and gay; its spray has a pretty glare, and being ever in motion, the fountain never seems weary or fatigued. All weather suits it, and its very motion affords it rest. Nothing can keep down the fountain, and though its waters are ever changing, the spring remains the same. the fountain, must do our duty, unchangingly, and like the spring too, We, like we must ever move upward, onward, and do good to all men.

spray

blithesome

aweary

element

THE MIDNIGHT SUN.

WHEN I went on deck, on the morning after our

departure, we were in the narrow strait between the islands of Mageroe-the northern extremity of which forms the North Cape-and the mainland. On either side, the shores of bare, bleak rock, spotted with patches of moss and stunted grass, rose precipitously from the water, the snow filling up their ravines from the summit to the sea. Not a tree, nor a shrub, nor a sign of human habitation was visible; there was no fisher's sail on the lonely waters, and only the cries of some sea-gulls, wheeling about the cliffs, broke the silence.

The sea and fiords are alive with fish, which are not only a means of existence, but of profit to the Laplanders, while the wonderful Gulf Stream, which crosses five thousand miles of the Atlantic to die upon this Ultima Thule in a last struggle with the Polar Sea, casts up the spoils of tropical forests to feed their fires. Think of Arctic fishers burning upon their hearths the palms of Hayti, the mahogany of Honduras, and the precious woods of the Amazon and the Orinoco.

On issuing from the strait, we turned southward into the great fiord which stretches nearly a hundred miles into the heart of Lapland. Its shores are high and mountainous hills, half covered with snow, and barren of vegetation except patches of grass and moss. If once wooded, the trees have long since disappeared, and now nothing can be more bleak and desolate. Running along under the eastern shore, we exchanged the dreadful monotony through which we had been sailing, for more rugged and picturesque scenery.

Before us rose a wall of dark cliff, from five to six hundred feet in height, gaping here and there with sharp

clefts or gashes, as if it had cracked in cooling, after the primeval fires. As we approached the end of the promontory which divides the fiords, the rocks became more abrupt and violently shattered. Huge masses, fallen from the summit, lined the base of the precipice, which was hollowed into cavernous arches, the home of myriads of sea-gulls.

Far to the North the sun lay in a bed of saffron light, over the clear horizon of the Arctic Ocean. A few bars of dazzling orange cloud floated above him; and, still higher in the sky, where the saffron melted through delicate rose color into blue, hung light wreaths of vapor, touched with pearly, opaline flushes of pink and golden gray. The sea was a web of pale slate color, shot through and through with threads of orange and saffron, from the dancing of a myriad of shifting and twinkling ripples.

The air was filled and permeated with the soft, mysterious glow, and even the very azure of the southern sky seemed to shine through a net of golden gauze. The headlands of this deeply indented coast lay around us, in different degrees of distance, but all with foreheads touched with supernatural glory. Far to the North-east was the most northern point of the mainland of Europe, gleaming rosy and faint in the full beams. of the sun, and, just as our watches denoted midnight, the North Cape appeared to the westward a long line of purple bluff, presenting a vertical cone of nine hundred feet in height to the Polar Sea.

--

Midway between these two magnificent headlands stood the MIDNIGHT SUN, shining on us with subdued fires, and with the gorgeous coloring of an hour, for which we have no name, since it is neither sunset nor sunrise, but the blended loveliness of both --but

shining, at the same moment, in the heat and splendor of noonday, on the Pacific Isles. This was the Midnight Sun as I had dreamed it as I had hoped to see it.

We ran out under the northern headland, which again charmed us with a glory peculiarly its own. Here the

colors were a part of the substance of the rock, and the sun but heightened and harmonized their tones. The huge projecting masses of pale yellow had a mellow gleam, like golden chalk; behind them were cliffs, violet in shadow; broad strata of soft red, tipped on the edges with vermilion; thinner layers, which shot up vertically to the height of four or five hundred feet, and striped the splendid sea-wall with lines of bronze, orange, brown, and dark red, while great rents and breaks interrupted these marvellous frescos with their dashes of uncertain gloom.

I have seen many wonderful aspects of nature, in many lands, but rock painting such as this I never beheld. A part of its effects may have been owing to atmospheric conditions, which must be rare, even in the North; but, without such embellishments, I think the sight of this coast will nobly repay any one for continuing his voyage beyond Hammerfest. We lingered on deck, as point after point revealed some change in the dazzling diorama, uncertain which was finest, and whether something still grander might not be in store. But the North-east wind blew keenly across the Arctic Ocean, and we were both satisfied and fatigued enough to go to bed. It was the most northern point of our voyage, about 71° 20', which is further north than I ever was before, or wish to be again.

Questions:-Point out the Straits of Magellan. Tell me anything you know about the Gulf Stream. What is meant by the "Ultima