...

out or extended by hammering. . . . Mesopotamia: a district of Western Asia named from its position between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris; fr. Gr. mes'õs, middle, and pot'amos, a river.... Narrow: A. S. nearwe; fr. neara, nearer. . . . Orchard: A. S. ortgeard, an inclosure for worts or vegetables; fr. wort, an herb, and geard, a yard. Purple: L. pur'pura, the color formed by blending red and blue.... Rude: L. rud'is, unwrought, rough, wild; h., e-rudite (free from rudeness), e-rudition, rudiment (L. rudimentum, a first attempt). . Sheik: Arabic sheikh, a venerable old man, a chief. . . . Tint: fr. L. tin'go, tinctum, to moisten, to soak in color, to dye; h., at-tainder, at-taint, taint, tincture, tinge, etc. Tomb: Gr. tum'bos, a mound of earth over a dead body. . . Tribe: L. trib'us; h., tribunal, tribune.

...

...

LXXXV.—THE PRAIRIES.

1. BETWEEN the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains there is a vast extent of country, consisting of boundless plains of grass, called prairies. The soil is very fertile and the grass grows high, and when, from any small elevation, the immigrant surveys the scene and sees the grass waving in the wind throughout the whole expanse around him, he may well imagine himself in the midst of an ocean, only that the billows that roll over it are green instead of blue. These plains furnish food for countless thousands of buffaloes, elks, antelopes and other animals that feed on herbage, the whole mass moving continually to and fro over the vast expanse as the seasons change and the state of the pasturage invites them to new fields.

2. Though they present a general level with respect to the whole country, the prairies are yet in themselves not flat, but exhibit a graceful waving surface, swelling and sinking with an easy slope and a full, rounded outline. Hence, in the expressive language of the country, they are spoken of as the rolling prairies, the surface being said to resemble the long heavy swell of the ocean when its waves are subsiding to rest after the agitation of a storm.

3. The attraction of the prairie consists in its extent, its carpet of verdure and flowers, its undulating surface, its groves and the fringe of timber by which it is surrounded. Of all

THEN'W YORK
PUBLIC LIDMANT

ASTOR, LEN X AND TILOUN FOR

1

these, the last is the most expressive feature; it is that which gives character to the landscape, which imparts the shape and marks the boundary of the plain. If the prairie be small, its greatest beauty consists in the vicinity of the surrounding margin of woodland, which resembles the shore of a lake indented with deep vistas, like bays and inlets, and throwing out long points like capes and headlands, while occasionally these points approach so closely on either hand that the traveler passes through a narrow avenue or strait, where the shadows of the woodland fall upon his path, and then emerges again into another prairie.

4. Where the plain is large, the forest outline is seen in the far perspective like the dim shore when beheld at a distance from the ocean. The smaller prairies often resemble parks in which art has supplemented the work of nature. The eye sometimes roams over the green meadow without discovering a tree, a shrub or any object in the immense expanse but the wilderness of grass and flowers; while at another time the prospect is enlivened by groves, which are seen interspersed like islands, or by a tree standing solitary in the blooming desert.

V.

"These are the gardens of the desert; these
The unshorn fields, boundless and beautiful,
For which the speech of England has no name—

The prairies. . . . Lo! they stretch

In airy undulations far away,

As if the Ocean, in his gentle swell,

Stood still, with all his rounded billows fixed

No; they are all unchained again. The clouds
Sweep over with their shadows, and, beneath,
The surface rolls and fluctuates to the eye;
Dark hollows seem to glide along and chase
The sunny ridges.

VI.

"Breezes of the south!

Who toss the golden and the flame-like flowers,
And pass the prairie-hawk, that, poised on high,
Flaps his broad wings yet moves not, ye have played
Among the palms of Mexico and vines

Of Texas, and have crisped the limpid brooks
That from the fountains of Sonora glide

Into the calm Pacific; have ye fanned
A nobler or a lovelier scene than this?

VII.

Man hath no part in all this glorious work;

The Hand that built the firmament hath heaved

And smoothed these verdant swells and sown their slopes
With herbage, planted them with island groves
And hedged them round with forests-fitting floor
For this magnificent temple of the sky--

With flowers whose glory and whose multitude
Rival the constellations.

VIII.

"The great heavens

Seem to stoop down upon the scene in love,

A nearer vault and of a tenderer blue

Than that which bends above the eastern hills.
As o'er the verdant waste I guide my steed,
Among the high, rank grass that sweeps his sides,
The hollow beating of his footsteps seems
A sacrilegious sound."

BRYANT.

...

SELECT ETYMOLOGIES.-Agitate: L. ag'ito, agita'tum, to put in motion; intens. of ag'o, ac'tum; h., co-gitate (L. co-gilo for co-agilo): v. EXACT. Carpet: L. L. car'peta; fr. L. car'po, carp'tum, to pluck, to pluck wool, etc. Constellation: L. constella'tio; fr. con and stel'la, a star; h., stellar, Emerge: L. mer'go, mer'sum, to dip, to plunge; h., emergency (lit., a rising out of a fluid; h., sudden uprisal or occasion), e-mergent, immerse, merge, sub-merge, etc. . . . Fluctuate: L. fluctuo, fluctua'tum; fr.

etc....