III. DESCRIPTION OF A STORM.

FROM D'ISRAELI.

D'ISRAELI is an English writer, who first distinguished himself as an author, but has, for several years, devoted himself to politics. He has been a member of the English ministry and of Parliament.

1. * * * THEY looked round on every side, and hope gave way before the scene of desolation. Immense branches were shivered from the largest trees; small ones were entirely stripped of their leaves; the long grass was bowed to the earth; the waters were whirled in eddies out of the little rivulets; birds, leaving their nests to seek shelter in the crevices of the rocks, unable to stem the driving air, flapped their wings and fell upon the earth; the frightened animals of the plain, almost suffocated by the impetuosity of the wind, sought safety, and found destruction; some of the largest trees were torn up by the roots; the sluices of the mountains were filled, and innumerable torrents rushed down

the before empty gullies. The heavens now open, and the lightning and thunder contend with the horrors of the wind.

2. In a moment, all was again hushed. Dead silence succeeded the bellow of the thunder, the roar of the wind; the rush of the waters, the moaning of the beasts, the screaming of the birds. Nothing was heard save the plash of the agitated lake, as it beat up against the black rocks which girt it in.

3. Again, greater darkness enveloped the trembling earth. Anon, the heavens were rent with lightning, which nothing could have quenched but the descending deluge. Cataracts poured down from the lowering firmament. For an instant, the horses dashed madly forward; beast and rider blinded and stifled by the gushing rain, and gasping for breath. Shelter was nowhere. The quivering beasts reared, and snorted, and sank upon their knees, dismounting their riders.

4. He had scarcely spoken, when there burst forth a terrific noise, they knew not what; a rush, they could not understand; a vibration which shook them on their horses. Every terror sank before the roar of the cataract. It seemed that the

mighty mountain, unable to support its weight of waters, shook to the foundation. A lake had burst upon its summit, and the cataract became a falling ocean. The source of the great deep appeared to be discharging itself over the range of mountains; the great gray peak tottered on its foundation!It shook!—it fell! and buried in its ruins, the castle, the village, and the bridge!

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IV. HYMN TO THE NIGHT-WIND.

UNBRIDLED SPIRIT, throned upon the lap
Of ebon Midnight, whither dost thou stray?
Whence didst thou come, and where is thy abode?
From slumber I awaken at the sound

Of thy most melancholy voice; sublime,

Thou ridest on the rolling clouds, which take
The form of sphinx, or hippogriff, or car,
Like those of Roman conquerors of yore
In Nemean pastimes used, by fiery steeds
Drawn headlong on; or choosest, all unseen,
To ride the vault, and drive the murky storms
Before thee, or bow down, with giant wing,
The wondering forests as thou sweepest by!

2. Daughter of Darkness! when remote the noise
Of tumult, and of discord, and mankind;

3.

When but the watch-dog's voice is heard, or wolves
That bay the silent night, or from the tower,
Ruined and rent, the note of boding owl,
Or lapwing's shrill and solitary cry;

When sleep weighs down the eyelids of the world,
And life is as it were not; down the sky,

Forth from thy cave, wide-roaming, thou dost come
To hold nocturnal orgies.

Behold!

Stemming with eager prow the Atlantic tide,
Holds on the intrepid mariner; abroad

The wings of night brood shadowy; heave the waves
Around him, mutinous, their curling heads,
Portentous of a storm; all hands are plied,
A zealous task, and sounds the busy deck
With notes of preparation; many an eye
Is upward cast toward the clouded heaven;

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5.

6.

And many a thought, with troubled tenderness
Dwells on the calm tranquillity of home;

And many a heart its supplicating prayer

Breathes forth; meanwhile, the boldest sailor's cheek
Blanches; stout courage fails; young childhood's shriek.
Awfully piercing, bursts and woman's fears
Are speechless.

With a low, insidious moan,

Rush past the gales that harbinger thy way,
And hail thy advent; gloom the murky clouds
Darker around; and heave the maddening waves
Higher their crested summits. With a glare,
Unveiling but the clouds and foaming sea,
Flashes the lightning; then, with doubling peal,
Reverberating to the gates of heaven,

Rolls the deep thunder, with tremendous crash,
Sublime as if the firmament were rent

Amid the severing clouds that pour their storms,
Commingling sea and sky.

Disturbed, arise

The monsters of the deep, and wheel around
Their mountainous bulk unwieldy, while aloft,
Poised on the feathery summit of the wave,
Hangs the frail bark, its howlings of despair,
Lost on the mocking storm. Then frantic, thou
Dost rise, tremendous Power, thy wings unfurled,
Unfurled, but not to succor nor to save:
Then is thine hour of triumph; with a yell

Thou rushest on; and with a maniac tone

Sing'st in the rifted shroud; the straining mast
Yields, and the cordage cracks.

Thou churn'st the deep

To madness, tearing up the yellow sands
From their profound recesses, and dost strew
The clouds around thee, and within thy hand
Tak'st up the billowy tide, and dashest down
The vessel to destruction!- -She is not !
But when the morning lifts her dewy eye,
And to a quiet calm, the elements,
Subsiding from their fury, have dispersed,
There art thou, like a satiate conqueror,
Recumbent on the murmuring deep, thy smiles
All unrepentant of the savage wreck.

V. THE CATARACT OF LODORE.

FROM SOUTHEY.

ROBERT SOUTHEY, a distinguished English poet, was born in Bristol, in 1774. He wrote upon a great variety of subjects, and was, in 1813, appointed Poet Laureate, a post which he retained till his decease, in March, 1843.

[This lesson is inserted on account of its very peculiar adaptation for practice on the difficult sound ing.]

How does the water

Come down at Lodore?

From its sources which well

In the tarn on the fell;
From its fountains

In the mountains,

Its rills and its gills;

Through moss and through brake,

It runs and it creeps

For awhile, till it sleeps

In its own little lake.
And thence at departing
Awakening and starting,
It runs through the reeds,
And away it proceeds,
Through meadow and glade,
In sun and in shade,

And through the wood-shelter,
Among crags in its flurry,
Helter-skelter,

Hurry-skurry.

Here it comes sparkling,
And there it lies darkling;
Now smoking and frothing
Its tumult and wrath in,
Till, in this rapid race

On which it is bent,

It reaches the place

Of its steep descent.

The cataract strong
Then plunges along,
Striking and raging

As if a war waging

Its caverns and rocks among;

Rising and leaping,

Sinking and creeping,
Swelling and sweeping,
Showering and springing,
Flying and flinging,
Writhing and ringing,

Eddying and whisking,
Spouting and frisking,
Turning and twisting,
Around and around
With endless rebound ·
Smiting and fighting,
A sight to delight in;

Confounding, astounding,

Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound.

Collecting, projecting,.

Receding and speeding,

And shocking and rocking,

And darting and parting,

And threading and spreading,

And whizzing and hissing,
And dripping and skipping,
And hitting and splitting,
And shining and twining,
And rattling and battling,
And shaking and quaking,
And pouring and roaring,
And waving and raving,
And tossing and crossing,
And guggling and struggling,
And heaving and cleaving,
And moaning and groaning,
And glittering and frittering,
And gathering and feathering,
And whitening and brightening,
And quivering and shivering,
And hurrying and skurrying,
And thundering and floundering:

Dividing and gliding and sliding,

And falling and brawling and sprawling,