excellent subject for the operations of swindlers and banterers. Bullies jostled him into the kennel. Hackney-coachmen splashed him from head to foot. Thieves explored with perfect security the huge pockets of his horseman's coat, while he stood entranced by the splendor of the lord mayor's show. Money droppers, sore from the cart's tail, introduced themselves to him, and appeared to him the most honest, friendly gentlemen that he had ever seen. If he asked his way to St. James's, his informants sent him to Mile End. If he went into a shop, he was instantly discerned to be a fit purchaser of everything that nobody else would buy, of second-hand embroidery, copper rings, and watches that would not go. If he rambled into any fashionable coffeehouse, he became a mark for the insolent derision of fops and the grave waggery of templars. Enraged and mortified, he soon returned to his mansion, and there, in the homage of his tenants and the conversation of his boon companions, found consolation for the vexations and humiliations which he had undergone. There he once more felt himself a great man; and he saw nothing above him except when at the assizes he took his seat on the bench near the judge, or when at the muster of the militia he saluted the lord lieutenant. The chief cause which made the fusion of the different elements of society so imperfect was the extreme difficulty which our ancestors found in passing from place to place. Of all inventions, the alphabet and the printing press alone excepted, those inventions which abridge distance have done most for the civilization of our species. Every improvement of the means of locomotion benefits mankind morally and intellectually as well as materially, and not only facilitates the interchange of the various productions of nature and art, but tends to remove national and provincial antipathies, and to bind together all the branches of the great human family. In the seventeenth century, the inhabitants of London were, for almost every practical purpose, farther from Reading than they now are from Edinburgh, and farther from Edinburgh than they now are from Vienna. Did the treatment of a man from the country by city rogues differ very greatly from that of to-day? How was the lord recognized as from the country? What inventions of our day "abridge distance"? The second and third sentences of the last paragraph are very thoughtful. See if you can understand them. SUGGESTIONS FOR ORAL AND WRITTEN ENGLISH Using the same method as in Wouter Van Twiller, describe a city gentleman in the country, or a country gentleman in the city. Or, using the method of Patrick Henry's speech, write down your points in the following: Resolved: That the City Boy is as "Green" in the Country, as the Country Boy is in the City. How We Knew He Was Country-bred. How We Knew She Was Citybred. What the Interurban Has Done for What the Interurban Has Done City People. for the Farmer. A Day in The City. The Way Grandfather Traveled. Describe an automobile for some one A Busy City Corner. who has never seen one. What the Street Railway Does for our Town. SUGGESTIONS FOR ADDITIONAL READINGS Lays of Ancient Rome. Thomas Babington Macaulay. Stories of Inventors. Russell Doubleday. My Garden Acquaintance. James Russell Lowell. A Reputed Changeling. Charlotte M. Yonge. For the teacher to read to the class: Selections from Peveril of the Peak, Sir Walter Scott; Warren Hastings and Life of Samuel Johnson, Thomas Babington Macaulay. HOW MANY WAYS1 CALE YOUNG RICE Cale Young Rice (1872 ) was born in Dixon, Kentucky. He is not only an exquisite lyric poet, but also a rarely gifted writer of poetic dramas. See also: Townsend's Kentucky in American Letters, Vol. II, pp. 284-289. Cale Young Rice, Poet and Dramatist, Book News Monthly, October, 1909. How many ways the Infinite has To-night, in earth and sky: A falling star, a rustling leaf, A whippoorwill on the wooded hill, How many ways the Infinite has: How many ways the Infinite has: A home-light in the West, And joy deep-glowing in your eyes, Wherein is all my rest. 1 From At the World's Heart (1914). Used by special arrangement with the author. STUDY HINTS From the poems you have read in this book, one thought must have come to you: that everything in the world, from a leaf to a star, is wonderful and brings joy to us if we will only open our eyes to it. Notice how reverently Cale Young Rice has expressed this thought, and that each stanza begins and ends with the two most wonderful things in the world. What are they? Mention some of the many ways in which the poet says the Infinite expresses Himself. Specify some additional beautiful ways that occur to you. H. & B. READINGS - 20 |