Fourth Reader

So saying, he again bent his bow, but on the present occasion looked with attention to his weapon, and changed the string which he thought was no longer truly round, having been a little frayed by the two former shots. He then took his aim with some deliberation, and the multitude awaited the event in breathless silence. The archer vindicated their opinion of his skill; his arrow split the willow rod against which it was aimed. A jubilee of acclamations followed; and even Prince John, in admiration of Locksley’s skill, lost for an instant his dislike to his person. “These twenty nobles,” he said, “which, with the bugle thou hast fairly won, are thine own; we shall make them fifty, if thou wilt take livery and service with us as a yeoman of our bodyguard, and be near to our person. For never did so strong a hand bend a bow, or so true an eye direct a shaft.”

“Pardon me, noble Prince,” said Locksley; “but I have vowed that if ever I take service, it shall be with your royal brother, King Richard. These twenty nobles I leave to Hubert, who has this day drawn as brave a bow as his grandsire did at Hastings. Had he not refused the trial, he would have hit the wand as well as I.”

Hubert shook his head as he received with reluctance the bounty of the stranger; and Locksley, anxious to escape further observation, mixed with the crowd and was seen no more. – Sir Walter Scott.

THE PLAINS OF ABRAHAM

I stood upon the plain
That had trembled, when the slain
Hurled their proud, defiant curses at the battle-heated foe,
When the steed dashed right and left,
Through the bloody gaps he cleft,
When the bridle-rein was broken, and the rider was laid low.

What busy feet had trod
Upon the very sod
When I marshalled the battalions of my fancy to my aid!
Heard the quick, incessant fire,
And I saw the combat dire,
And the cannons’ echoes startling the reverberating glade.

I heard the chorus dire,
That jarred along the lyre
On which the hymn of battle rung, like surgings of the wave,
When the storm, at blackest night,
Wakes the ocean in affright,
As it shouts its mighty Pibroch o’er some shipwrecked vessel’s grave.

I saw the broad claymore
Flash from its scabbard, o’er
The ranks that quailed and shuddered at the close and fierce attack;
When victory gave the word,
Auld Scotia drew the sword,
And with arms that never faltered drove the brave defenders back.

I saw two great chiefs die,
Their last breaths like the sigh
Of the zephyr-sprite that wantons on the rosy lips of morn;
No enemy-poisoned darts,
No rancor in their hearts,
To unfit them for their triumph over death’s impending scorn.

And as I thought and gazed,
My soul, exultant, praised
The power to whom each mighty act and victory are due;
Like a heaven-gifted child,
For the saint-like peace that smiled
And for the air of quietude that steeped the distant view.

Oh, rare, divinest life
Of peace compared with strife!
Yours is the truest splendor, and the most enduring fame;
All the glory ever reaped
Where the fiends of battle leaped,
In harsh discord to the music of your undertoned acclaim.

    – Charles Sangster.
Still runs the water when the brook is deep.

THE GRAVES OF A HOUSEHOLD

They grew in beauty side by side,
They fill’d one home with glee;
Their graves are sever’d far and wide
By mount and stream and sea.

The same fond mother bent at night
O’er each fair sleeping brow;
She had each folded flower in sight:
Where are those dreamers now?

One ’midst the forests of the West
By a dark stream is laid;
The Indian knows his place of rest,
Far in the cedar-shade.

The sea, the blue lone sea, hath one;
He lies where pearls lie deep;
He was the loved of all, yet none
O’er his low bed may weep!

One sleeps where southern vines are drest
Above the noble slain;
He wrapt his colors round his breast
On a blood-red field of Spain.

And one – o’er her the myrtle showers
Its leaves, by soft winds fann’d;
She faded ’midst Italian flowers;
The last of that bright band.

And parted thus they rest who play’d
Beneath the same green tree;
Whose voices mingled as they pray’d
Around one parent knee!

They that with smiles lit up the hall
And cheer’d with mirth the hearth;
Alas, for love! if thou wert all,