Page images
PDF
EPUB

"Long ago he sailed away, out of sight and hearing,

Straight across the bay he went, into sunset steering.

Every day we look for him, and hope for his returning,

Every night my mother keeps the candle for him burning.

Summer goes, and winter

spring returns, but never

comes, and

Father's step comes to the gate. O, is he gone forever?

The great, grand ship that bore him off, think you some tempest wrecked her?" Tears shone in little Rose's eyes, upturned to her protector.

Eagerly the bonny boy went on: “O, sir, look yonder!

In the offing see the sails that east and westward wander;

Every hour they come and go, the misty

distance thronging,

While we watch and see them fade, with

sorrow and with longing."

"Little Robert, little Rose!" The stranger's eyes were glistening,

At his bronzed and bearded face, upgazed the children, listening;

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

Robert brave, and little Rose, as bright as any blossom.

"Father, father!

Is it you?" The still

air rings with rapture;

All the vanished joy of years the waiting ones recapture!

Finds he welcome wild and sweet, the low

thatched cottage reaching,

But the ship that into sunset steered, upon the rocks lies bleaching.

Directions for Reading.- Read the conversational parts of this poem like conversation in prose.

Point out the emphatic words in the first line of the last stanza.

Language Lesson.- Into sunset steering, means sailing westward. The misty distance thronging, means gathering together in the distance.

The still air rings with rapture, means that the air becomes full of joyful shouts,

All the vanished joy of years the waiting ones recapture, means that the children regain the happiness lost during their father's absence.

LESSON IX.

im poş'ing, grand looking; of | stär'tled, suddenly alarmed; sur

[blocks in formation]

e nôr moŭs, very large; huge. | in erēas'ing, growing larger.

THE LION.

There is, in the appearance of the lion, something both noble and imposing. Na

ture has given him wonderful strength and beauty.

His body, when full grown, is only about seven feet long and less than four feet high; but his large and shapely head, with its powerful jaws, his glaring eye, and long, flowing mane, give him an air of majesty that shows him worthy of the name "King of Beasts."

Yet we are told that a lion will not willingly attack man, unless first attacked himself or driven by hunger to forget his habits.

On meeting man suddenly, he will turn, retreat slowly for a short distance, and then run away.

The lion belongs to the cat family, and his teeth and claws are similar in form and action to those of the house cat.

His food is the flesh of animals; and so great is his appetite, that it must require several thousand other animals to supply one lion with food during his lifetime.

His strength is so enormous that he can crush the skull of an ox with a single blow of his powerful paw, and then grasp it in his jaws and bound away.

Unless driven by hunger to bolder measures, he will hide in the bushes, or in the tall reeds along the banks of rivers, and spring suddenly upon the unlucky animal that chances to come near him.

Many lions have been captured, and their habits and appearance carefully studied. Although there is a difference in colorsome being of a yellowish brown, others of a deep red, and a few silvery gray-the general form and appearance of all lions is the same.

The mane is of a dark brown, or of a dusky color, and the tail nearly three feet long, with a bunch of hair at the tip.

The lioness, or female lion, is smaller in every way than the male, and has no mane.

It is in the nighttime that the lion goes out from his den to seek for food, and his color is so dark and his movements so silent, that his presence is not known even at the distance of a few yards.

These dangerous beasts are no longer found in Europe, although they lived there in numbers many hundred years ago. It is only in the deserts and rocky hills of Asia and Africa that they are met with.

« PreviousContinue »