Why not reform? That's easily said;

But I've gone through such wretched treatment, Sometimes forgetting the taste of bread,

And scarce remembering what meat meant, That my poor stomach 's past reform;

And there are times when, mad with thinking, I'd sell out Heaven for something warm

To prop a horrible inward sinking.

Is there a way to forget to think?

At your age, Sir, home, fortune, friends, A dear girl's love,-but I took to drink;

The same old story; you know how it ends. If you could have seen these classic features,— You need n't laugh, Sir; they were not then Such a burning libel on God's creatures;

I was one of your handsome men!

If you had seen her, so fair and young,
Whose head was happy on this breast!

If you could have heard the songs I sung
When the wine went round, you would n't have
guessed

That ever I, Sir, should be straying

From door to door with fiddle and dog,

Ragged, and penniless, and playing

To you to-night for a glass of grog!

She's married since,-a parson's wife;

'Twas better for her that we should part;— Better the soberest, prosiest life

Than a blasted home and a broken heart. I've seen her? Once: I was weak and spent On the dusty road; a carriage stopped:

But little she dreamed, as on she went,

Who kissed the coin that her fingers dropped!

You've set me talking, Sir; I'm sorry;

It makes me wild to think of the change! What do you care for a beggar's story?

Is it amusing? you find it strange? I had a mother so proud of mẹ!

"T was well she died before-Do you know If the happy spirits in Heaven can see The ruin and wretchedness here below?

Another glass, and strong, to deaden

This pain; then Roger and I will start. I wonder has he such a lumpish, leaden,

Aching thing, in place of a heart?

He is sad, sometimes, and would weep, if he could, No doubt remembering things that were,

A virtuous kennel, with plenty of food,

And himself a sober, respectable cur.

I'm better now; that glass was warming.—
You rascal! limber your lazy feet!

We must be fiddling and performing

For supper and bed, or starve in the street.Not a very gay life to lead, you think?

But soon we shall go where lodgings are free, And the sleepers need neither victuals nor drink;— The sooner the better for Roger and me.

J. T. TROWBRIDGE.

Write these words in full:- Roger's, we've, there's, aren't, won't, he's, can't, that's, I've, here's, he'll, is n't, we 'll, I'm, night's, that's, stomach's, need n't, would n't, and she's.

Explain :—“a bit of rosin," "nice buckwheats," water-andchalk,' "through thick and thin," "God's creatures," "ragged and penniless," "broken heart," "five yelps," "where lodgings are free."

LESSON XXII.

wōe, grief; misery.

soothes, softens; assuages.

văn'ished, disappeared grad- răpt'ūreş, extreme joys or pleasually.

ures.

GOD THE TRUE SOURCE OF CONSOLATION.

O, Thou who driest the mourner's tear,
How dark this world would be,

If, when deceived and wounded here,
We could not fly to Thee!

The friends who in our sunshine live,
When winter comes, are flown,
And he who has but tears to give
Must weep those tears alone.

But Thou wilt heal the broken heart,
Which, like the plants that throw
Their fragrance from the wounded part,
Breathes sweetness out of woe,

When joy no longer soothes or cheers,
And e'en the hope that threw
A moment's sparkle o'er our tears,
Is dimmed and vanished, too,

O, who could bear life's stormy doom,

Did not Thy wing of love,

Come brightly wafting through the gloom
Our peace-branch from above!

Then sorrow touched by Thee grows bright,
With more than rapture's ray,

As darkness shows us worlds of light

We never saw by day.

THOMAS MOORE.

Thomas Moore, one of the most celebrated Irish poets, was born in Dublin in 1779, and died in 1852. The works for which he is chiefly remembered, are his "Irish Melodies," and his "Lallah Rookh." The latter is a dazzling picture of Eastern life.

LESSON XXIII.

pěsti lençe, contagious disease;

plague.

fō'li age, leaves of trees.

fes'tive, gay; mirthful.

ex pā' ti at ed, commented at large.

gnaw'ing, biting off; corroding. | glis'ten ing, sparkling with a pā’tri äreh, the head of a fam

ily.

mild light.
e lǎpsed', passed away.

DESOLATING EFFECTS OF INTEMPERANCE.

The depopulating pestilence that walketh at noonday, the carnage of cruel and devastating war, can scarcely exhibit their victims in a more terrible array, than exterminating drunkenness.

I have seen a promising family spring from a parent trunk, and stretch abroad its populous limbs, like a flowering tree covered with green and healthy foliage.

I have seen the unnatural decay beginning upon the yet tender leaf, and gnawing like a worm in an unopened bud, while they dropped off, one by one, and the scathed and ruined shaft stood desolate and alone, until the winds and rains of many a sorrow laid that, too, in the dust.

On one of those holy days when the patriarch, rich in virtue as in years, gathered about him the great and the little ones of the flock-his sons with their sons, and his daughters with their daughters-I, too, sat at the festive board. I, too, pledged them in the social wine-cup, and rejoiced with them round the hospitable hearth, and expatiated with delight on the eventful future; while the good old man, warmed in the genial glow of youthful enthusiasm, wiped the tear of joy from his glistening eye. He was happy.

I met with them again when the rolling year

brought the festive season round. But they were not all there. The kind old man sighed as his suffused eye dwelt upon the then unoccupied seat. But joy yet came to his relief, and he was happy.

A parent's love knows no diminution, — time, distance, poverty, shame, but gives intensity and strength to that passion, before which all others dissolve and melt away.

Another year elapsed. The board was spread; but the guests came not. The old man cried,—“Where are my children?" And echo answered,-"Where ?" His heart broke; for they were not. Could not Heaven have spared his gray hairs this affliction ? Alas! the demon of Drunkenness had been there! They had fallen victims to his spell. And one short month sufficed to cast the veil of oblivion over the old man's sorrow and the young men's shame. They are all dead!

WASHINGTON IRVING.

Spell and pronounce:—devastating,

exterminating, scathed,

suffused, unoccupied, diminution, intensity, sufficed, dissolve, and oblivion.

Synonyms. - diminution - decrease; decay; abatement; deduction; decrement. devastate-to waste; ravage; desolate; destroy; demolish; plunder; pillage.

Washington Irving (1783-1859) is sometimes called the Goldsmith of America; for, like Goldsmith, there are few departments of literature that his pen has not adorned, and to which he has not contributed a wealth of humor, pathos, wisdom, and fine judgment. His language charms by its beautiful simplicity; his style is forcible, and his powers of description are unsurpassed. "The Sketch Book," "Annals of Diederich Knickerbocker,” "Bracebridge Hall," "Tales of a Traveler,” “Life of Columbus,” and "Life of Washington," are some of his contributions to our standard literature. He died at his beautiful home, "Sunnyside," on the banks of his loved Hudson, in 1859.

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