without it for the plates for his batteries. The practical chemist employs it in the preparation of hydrogen, and the medical man finds it valuable in diseases of the eyes. In combination with sulphuric acid it forms the white vitriol of commerce, a very strong poison.

EXERCISE.-49. MEANING OF WORDS.

1. Give the meaning of the following:-elements, simple, crucible, optician, ambitious, malleable, locomotive, smelting, emetics, pervade ductile.

2. Distinguish between :-ores, oars; miner, minor; tons, tuns; carat, carrot, caret; quartz, quarts; plate, plait; seen, scene.

3. Illustrate the different meanings of :-lead, band, pipe, goods, grain, press, compass.

ELIZA.

ERASMUS DARWIN.*

spec-ta-tress [L. specto, to behold], a female beholder or looker on. pur-sued [F. poursuivre, from L. per, through; sequor, to follow), folfowed after. in-trep-id [L. in, negative; trepidus, fearful], brave, courageous. vi-tal [L. vita, life], belonging to or containing life.

Now stood Eliza on the wood-crowned height,
O'er Minden's plains spectatress of the fight;
Sought with bold eye amid the bloody strife
Her dearer self, the partner of her life;
From hill to hill the rushing host pursued,
And viewed his banner, or believed she viewed.
Pleased with the distant roar, with quicker tread,
Fast by his hand one lisping boy she led;
And one fair girl, amid the loud alarm

Slept on her kerchief, cradled on her arm:
While round her brows bright beams of honour dart,
And love's warm eddies circle round her heart.

* Dr. ERASMUS DARWIN was born at Elston, near Newark, Nottinghamshire, in 1731, and died at Derby, April 18, 1802. His poetry is perfect in rhythm and cadence, but excepting a few short and scattered passages, it is utterly deficient in that pathos and feeling which alone can render poetry popular. The best of his works are his "Botanic Garden," and a philosophical disquisition, entitled "Phytologia, or the Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening."

(1) The battle of Minden, in Prussia, was fought August 1, 1759, between the English, Hessians, and Hanoverians on one side, and the French on the other.

-Near and more near the intrepid beauty pressed,
Saw through the driving smoke his dancing crest,
Heard the exulting shout-" They run!—they run!"
'He's safe!" she cried, "he's safe! the battle's won!"
-A ball now hisses through the airy tides,

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(Some Fury wings it, and some Demon guides,)
Parts the fine locks her graceful head that deck,
Wounds her fair ear, and sinks into her neck;
The red stream issuing from her azure veins,
Dyes her white veil, her ivory bosom stains.

Ah me!" she cried, and sinking on the ground,
Kissed her dear babes, regardless of the wound:
Oh, cease not yet to beat, thou vital urn,

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Wait, gushing life, oh! wait my love's return!”-
Hoarse barks the wolf, the vulture screams from far,
The angel, Pity, shuns the walks of war ;-
"Oh spare, ye war-hounds, spare their tender
age !
"On me, on me," she cried, "exhaust your rage!"
Then, with weak arms, her weeping babes caressed,
And sighing, hid them in her blood-stained vest.

From tent to tent the impatient warrior flies,
Fear in his heart, and frenzy in his eyes:

Eliza's name along the camp he calls,

Eliza echoes through the canvas walls;

Quick through the murmuring gloom his footsteps

tread,

O'er groaning heaps, the dying and the dead,

Vault o'er the plain,-and in the tangled wood,

Lo! dead Eliza-weltering in her blood!

Soon hears his listening son the welcome sounds,
With open arms and sparkling eyes he bounds,
Speak low," he cries, and gives his little hand,
Mamma's asleep upon the dew-cold sand;

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Alas! we both with cold and hunger quake

Why do you weep? Mamma will soon awake."

She'll wake no more!" the hopeless mourner cried, Upturned his eyes, and clasped his hands, and sighed; Stretched on the ground, awhile entranced he lay, And pressed warm kisses on the lifeless clay;

And then upsprung with wild convulsive start,
And all the father kindled in his heart;

"Oh heaven!" he cried, "my first rash vow forgive?
These bind to earth, for these I pray to live!"
Round his chill babes he wrapped his crimson vest,
And clasped them, sobbing, to his aching breast.

EXERCISE.-50. COMPOSITION.

1. Give other phrases for the following: vital, urn, walks of war, aching breast, ivory bosom.

2. Select from this lesson all the examples of apostrophe.

3. What is the difference between the conventional and the rhetorical arrangement of words? Arrange in conventional order the following:

The red stream issuing from her azure veins

Dyes her white veil, her ivory bosom stains.

4. Express the facts of this poem in a short narrative.

THE LARK: AN AUSTRALIAN STORY.
CHARLES READE.

fra-grance [L. fragro, to smell], pleasantness of odour or perfume. o-val [L. ovum. an egg], egg-shaped, oblong. in-no-cent [L. in, not; noceo, to hurt], harmless, pure, upright, lawful. in-ter-rupt-ed [L. inter, between; ruptus, from rumpo, to break], stopped, hindered.

It was the month of January in Australia; a blazing hot day was beginning to glow through the freshness of morning; the sky was one cope of pure blue, and the southern air crept slowly up, its wings clogged with fragrance, and just tuned the trembling leaves-no more.

"Is not this pleasant, Tom; isn't it sweet?"

"I believe you, George, and what a shame to run down such a country as this. There they come home and tell you the flowers have no smell, but they keep dark about the trees and bushes being hay-stacks of flowers. Snuff the air as we go, it is a thousand English gardens in one. Look at all those tea scrubs, each with a thousand blossoms on it as sweet as honey, and the golden wattles on the other side,

* CHARLES READE is one of the most popular of our present writers of fiction. His style is original, lively, and epigrammatic. The above is abridged from one of his best novels, "It is Never too Late to Mend; a Matter of Fact Romance," the scene of which is partly laid in Australia, and which depicts life in the bush and at the gold-diggings.

and all smelling like seven o'clock, after which who need complain about flowers?"

"Ay, lad! it is very refreshing-and it is Sunday, and we have got away from the wicked for an hour or two; but in England there would be a little white church out yonder, and a spire like an angel's fore-finger pointing from the grass to heaven, and the lads in their clean smock-frocks like snow, and the wenches in their new shawls, and the old women in their scarlet cloaks, all going one road, and a tinkle-tinkle from the belfry, that would turn all these other sounds and colours and sweet smells holy as well as fair, on the Sabbath morn. Ah! England. Ah!"

"There's no need to sigh: this is a lovely land. But where are we going, George?"

"Oh not much farther, only about twelve miles from the camp."

" Where to?"

"To a farmer I know. I am going to show you a lark, Tom," said George, and his eyes beamed benevolence upon his comrade.

Tom Robinson stopped dead short. George," said he, "no don't let us. I would rather stay at home and read my book. You can go into temptation and come out pure: I can't. I am one of those that if I go into a puddle up to my shoe, I must splash up to my middle."

"What has that to do with it?

"You are proposing to me to go in for a lark on the Sabbath-day."

"Why, Tom, am I the man to tempt you to do evil?" asked George, hurt.

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Why, no! but for all that, you proposed a lark."

"Ay, but an innocent one, one more likely to lift your heart on high than to give you ill thoughts."

“Well, this is a riddle;' " and Robinson was intensely puzzled.

The friends strode briskly on, and a little after eleven o'clock they came upon a small squatter's house and premises. "Here we are," cried George, and his eyes glittered with innocent delight.

The house was thatched and whitewashed, and English

was written on it and on every foot of ground round it. A furze-bush had been planted by the door. Vertical oak palings were the fence, with a five-barred gate in the middle of them. From the little plantation all the magnificent trees and shrubs of Australia had been excluded with amazing resolution and consistency, and oak and ash reigned safe from over-towering rivals. They passed to the back of the house and there George's countenance fell a little, for on the oval grass plot and gravel walk he found from thirty to forty rough fellows, most of them diggers.

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Ah, well," said he, on reflection, we could not expect to have it all to ourselves, and, indeed, it would be a sin to wish it, you know. Now, Tom, come this way; here it is, here it is there." Tom looked up, and in a gigantic cage was a light brown bird.

He was utterly confounded.

twelve miles to see?"

"What! is it this we came

Ay! and twice twelve wouldn't have been much to me." "Well, but what is the lark you talked of?"

"This is it."

"This? This is a bird."

"Well, and isn't a lark a bird."

"Oh ay! I see! ha! ha! ha! ha!"

Robinson's merriment was interrupted by a harsh remonstrance from several of the diggers, who were all from the other end of the camp.

"Hold your cackle," cried one, "he is going to sing;" and the whole party had their eyes turned with expectation towards the bird.

Like most singers, he kept them waiting a bit. But at last, just at noon, when the mistress of the house had warranted him to sing, the little feathered exile began as it were to tune his pipes. The savage men gathered round the cage that moment and amidst a dead stillness the bird uttered some very uncertain chirps, but after a while he seemed to revive his memories, and call his ancient cadences back to him, one by one, and string them sotto voce.

And then the same sun that had warmed his little heart at home came glowing down on him here, and he gave music back for it more and more, till at last, amidst breathless

M