2.

The dinner was served up in the great hall, where the squire always held his Christmas banquet. A blazing crackling fire of logs had been heaped on to warm the spacious apartment, and the flame went sparkling and wreathing up the wide-mouthed chimney. The great picture of the crusader and his white horse had been profusely decorated with greens for the occasion; and holly and ivy had likewise been wreathed round the helmet and weapons on the opposite wall, which I understood were the arms of the same warrior. A sideboard was set out just under this chivalric trophy, on which was a display of plate that might have vied (at least in variety) with Belshazzar's parade of the vessels of the temple: "flagons, cans, cups, beakers, goblets, basins, and ewers;" the gorgeous utensils of good companionship that had gradually accumulated through many generations of jovial housekeepers. Before these stood the two Yule candles, beaming like two stars of the first magnitude; other lights were distributed in branches, and the whole array glittered like a firmament of silver.-Irving: The Christmas Dinner.

3.

It had a garret, very nearly such a one as it seems to me one of us has described in one of his books; but let us look at this one as I can reproduce it from memory. It has a flooring of laths with ridges of mortar squeezed up between them, which if you tread on you will go to the Lord have mercy on you! where will you go to? the same being crossed by narrow bridges of boards, on which you may put your feet, but with fear and trembling. Above you and around you are beams and joists, on some of which you may see, when the light is let in, the marks of the conchoidal clippings of the broad-axe, showing the rude way in which the timber was shaped as it came, full of sap, from the neighboring forest. It is a realm of darkness and thick dust, and shroud-like cobwebs and dead things they wrap in their gray folds. For a garret is like a sea-shore, where wrecks are thrown up and slowly go to pieces. There is the cradle which the old man you just remember was rocked in; there is the ruin of the bedstead he died on; that ugly slanting contrivance used to be put under his pillow in the days when his

breath came hard; there is his old chair with both arms gone, symbol of the desolate time when he had nothing earthly left to lean on; there is the large wooden reel which the blear-eyed old deacon sent the minister's lady, who thanked him graciously, and twirled it smilingly, and in fitting season bowed it out decently to the limbo of troublesome conveniences. And there are old leather portmanteaus, like stranded porpoises, their mouths gaping in gaunt hunger for the food with which they used to be gorged to bulging repletion; and old brass andirons, waiting until time shall revenge them on their paltry substitutes, and they shall have their own again, and bring with them the fore-stick and the back-log of ancient days; and the empty churn, with its idle dasher, which the Nancys and Phoebes, who have left their comfortable places to the Bridgets and Norahs, used to handle to good purpose; and the brown, shaky old spinning-wheel, which was running, it may be, in the days when they were hanging the Salem witches.-Holmes: The GambrelRoofed House.

Class discussion.

1. Find for each of the above compositions a subject which will define the idea the author meant to convey. 2. What details determined your choice of subject in each case? 3. In the last composition, what expressions give the piece a human quality? 4. Find other words for the following, taken from the first composition: intensely, fume, diffused. 5. In the second extract: spacious, profusely, vied, jovial, gorgeous. 6. In each composition find an illustration used to make the picture more vivid.

Subjects for written composition.

From the following subjects choose one which has come under your close observation:- 1. A spacious play-room. 2. Your grandmother's old-fashioned garret. 3. Your own cluttered attic. 4. A cluttered corner of the barn or cellar. 5. A fine playground. 6. A comfortable

veranda. 7. A cosy corner. 8. Your "den," or workshop. 9. An untidy back-yard. 10. A well-kept orchard. Subjects for oral composition.

1. Read the poem aloud. 2. Why did the "Royal George" go down? 3. Tell the story of some other vessel that has sunk, and floated again.

LOSS OF THE ROYAL GEORGE.

Toll for the Brave!

The brave that are no more!

All sunk beneath the wave

Fast by their native shore!

Eight hundred of the brave
Whose courage well was tried,
Had made the vessel heel

And laid her on her side.

A land-breeze shook the shrouds

And she was overset;

Down went the Royal George,

With all her crew complete.

Toll for the brave!

Brave Kempenfelt is gone;
His last sea-fight is fought,
His work of glory done.

It was not in the battle;
No tempest gave the shock;
She sprang no fatal leak,
She ran upon no rock.

His sword was in its sheath,
His fingers held the pen,
When Kempenfelt went down
With twice four hundred men.

-Weigh the vessel up

Once dreaded by our foes!
And mingle with our cup

The tears that England owes.

Her timbers yet are sound,

And she may float again

Full charged with England's thunder,

And plough the distant main:

But Kempenfelt is gone,
His victories are o'er;

And he and his eight hundred

Shall plough the wave no more.

-W. Cowper.

LESSON VII

I. Clearness in the Expression of Ideas by means of Capitals.

1. It might be objected that capitals have nothing to do with clearness, because arbitrary rules govern their use. While this objection is true in a certain measure, we should remember that the primary use of capitals is to distinguish certain classes of words, and thus to make ideas clearer to the reader.

2. We have already found how necessary to clearness it is to have our sentences begin with capitals. In addition to this regular use are other usages, rules for which we have been learning throughout our school course. Rules for these usages will be found in Appendix B, p. 256 and they should be consulted in all cases of doubt. It is as important to use a capital in the proper place as it is to spell correctly, or to punctuate properly.

Exercise 1. Give the rule for the use of the capitals in bold face type in the following:

1.

In the December "Atlantic Monthly" there is an article on "Expansion through Reciprocity," one on the question of whether Italy will renew the Triple Alliance, an essay on the literature of the Civil War, and a Christmas poem by Julia C. R. Dorr.

2.

By Woden, god of Saxons,

From whence comes Wensday, that is Wodensday,
Truth is a thing that ever I will keep.