footsteps of his pursuers, roused him to new exertions. He again fled before them. A fragment of a wall, that had withstood the ravages made by war in the adjoining fences of wood, fortunately crossed his path. He hardly had time to throw his exhausted limbs over this barrier before twenty of his enemies reached its opposite side. Their horses refused to take the leap in the dark, and amid the confusion of the rearing chargers, and the execrations of their riders, Birch was enabled to gain a sight of the base of the hill, on whose summit was a place of perfect security. The heart of the peddler now beat high with hope when the voice of Captain Lawton again rang in his ears, shouting to his men to make room. The order was obeyed, and the fearless trooper rode at the wall at the top of his horse's speed, plunged the rowels in his charger, and flew over the obstacle in safety. The triumphant hurrahs of the men, and the thundering tread of the horse, too plainly assured the peddler of the emergency of his danger. He was nearly exhausted, and his fate no longer seemed doubtful. "Stop or die!" was uttered above his head, and in fearful proximity to his ears. Harvey stole a glance over his shoulder, and saw within a bound of him the man he most dreaded. By the light of the stars he beheld the uplifted arm and the threatening saber. Fear, exhaustion, and despair seized his heart, and the intended victim fell at the feet of the dragoon. The horse of Lawton struck the prostrate peddler, and both steed and rider came violently to the earth. As quick as thought Birch was on his feet again, with the sword of the discomfited dragoon in his hand. Vengeance seems too natural to human passions. There are few who have not felt the seductive pleasure of making our injuries recoil on their authors; and yet there are some who know how much sweeter it is to return good for evil. All the wrong of the peddler shone on his brain with a dazzling brightness. For a moment the demon within him prevailed, and Birch brandished the powerful weapon in the air; in the next it fell harmless on the reviving but helpless trooper. The peddler vanished up the side of the friendly rock. GOLD THOMAS HOOD ! GOLD! Gold ! Gold ! Gold! Bright and yellow, hard and cold, Molten, graven, hammered and rolled; Hoarded, bartered, bought and sold, Gold! Gold! Gold! Gold ! How widely its agencies vary, — To save, to ruin, to curse, to bless, As even its minted coins express, Now stamped with the image of good Queen Bess, BOOKS BOOKS AND READING OOKS are the best things, well used; abused, among the worst. EMERSON. The books which help you most are those which make you think the most. The hardest way of learning is by easy reading; but a great book, that comes from a great thinker, — it is as a ship of thought, deep freighted with truth and with beauty. THEODORE PARKER. Books are the legacies that a great genius leaves to mankind, which are delivered down from generation to generation, as presents to the posterity of those who are yet unborn. ADDISON. One cannot celebrate books sufficiently. After saying his best, still something better remains to be spoken in their praise. ALCOTT. Nothing can supply the place of books. - CHANNING. The end of learning is to read great books. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. BACON. It is chiefly through books that we enjoy intercourse with superior minds, and these invaluable means of communication are in the reach of all. In the best books, great men talk to us, and give us their most precious thoughts, and pour their souls into ours. CHANNING. A home without books is like a room without windows. - Beecher. God be thanked for books. They are the voices of the distant and the dead, and make us heirs of the spiritual life of past ages. Books are the true levelers. They give to all, who will faithfully use them, the society, the spiritual presence of the best and greatest of our race. No matter how poor I am, no matter though the prosperous of my own time will not enter my obscure dwelling. If the sacred writers will enter and take up their abode under my roof, if Milton will cross my threshold to sing to me of paradise, and Shakespeare to open to me the worlds of imagination and the workings of the human heart, and Franklin to enrich me with his practical wisdom, I shall not pine for the want of intellectual companionship, and I may become a cultivated man though excluded from what is called the best society in the place where I live. CHANNING. Books are the windows through which the soul looks out. BEECHER. The continuous reading of a classic is in itself a liberal education. As good almost kill a man as a good book; who kills a man kills a reasonable creature, God's image; but he who destroys a good book kills reason itself, kills the image of God as it were in the eye. MILTON. No book can be so good as to be profitable when negligently read. SENECA. A multitude of books distracts the mind. SENECA. Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body. - ADDISON. Half the gossip of society would perish if the books that are truly worth reading were but read. DAWSON. Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, In a corner of my house I have books, - the miracle of all my possessions, more wonderful than the wishing cap of the Arabian tales; for they transport me instantly, not only to all places, but to all times. By my books I can conjure up before me to a momentary existence many of the great and good men of past ages, and for my individual satisfaction they seem to act again the most renowned of their achievements; the orators declaim for me, the historians recite, the poets sing. ARNOTT. Consider what you have in the smallest chosen library. A company of the wisest and wittiest men that could be picked out of all civil countries, in a thousand years, have set in best order the results of their learning and wisdom. EMERSON. - What is a great love of books? It is something like a personal introduction to the great and good men of all past times. JOHN BRIGHT. Let us thank God for books. When I consider what some books have done for the world, and what they are doing; how they keep up our hope, awaken new courage and faith, soothe pain, give an ideal life to those whose homes are hard and cold, bind together distant ages and foreign lands, create new worlds of beauty, bring down truths from heaven, — I give eternal blessings for the gift, and pray that we may use it aright, and abuse it not. -JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE. |