Слике страница
PDF
ePub

5. "Stop a moment, Captain, and you shall see.

[ocr errors]

6. The half-human voices now sounded nearer, and we could perceive that the animals were approaching the spot where we lay. Presently they appeared upon the opposite bank, headed by an old gray chieftain, and officered like so many soldiers.

7. One an aid-de-camp, or chief pioneer, perhaps,ran out upon a projecting rock, and, after looking across the stream, as if calculating the distance, scampered back, and appeared to communicate with the leader. This produced a movement in the troops. Commands were issued, and fatigue parties were detailed, and marched to the front. Meanwhile several engineers, no doubt,ran along the bank, examining the trees on both sides.

[ocr errors]

8. At length they all collected around a tall cottonwood, that grew over the narrowest part of the stream, and twenty or thirty of them scampered up its trunk. On reaching a high point, the foremost a strong fellow ran out upon a limb, and, taking several turns of his tail around it, slipped off, and hung head downwards.

9. The next on the limb, also a stout one, climbed down the body of the first, and whipping his tail tightly around the neck and forearm of the latter, dropped off in his turn, and hung head down. The third repeated the maneuver upon the second, and the fourth upon the third, and so on, until the last one upon the string rested his fore paws upon the ground.

10. The living chain now commenced swinging backward and forward, like the pendulum of a clock. The motion was slight at first, but gradually increased, the lowermost monkey striking his hands violently on the earth as he passed the tangent of the oscillating curve. Several others upon the limbs above aided the move

ment.

11. This continued until the monkey at the end of

the chain was thrown among the branches of a tree on the opposite bank. Here, after two or three vibrations, he clutched a limb and held fast. This movement was executed adroitly, just at the culminating point of the oscillation, in order to save the intermediate links from the violence of a too sudden jerk.

12. The chain was now fast at both ends, forming a complete suspension bridge, over which the whole troop, to the number of four or five hundred, passed with the rapidity of thought. It was one of the most comical sights I ever beheld, to witness the quizzical expressions of the countenances along that living chain.

13. The troop was now on the other side, but how were the animals forming the bridge to get themselves over? This was the question which suggested itself. Manifestly by number one letting go his tail. But then the other side was much lower, and number one, with half a dozen of his neighbors, would be dashed against the opposite bank or soused into the water.

14. Here, then, was a problem, and we waited with some curiosity for its solution. It was soon solved. A monkey was now seen attaching his tail to the lowest on the bridge, another girded him in a similar manner, and another, and so on, until a dozen more were added to the string. These last were all powerful fellows; and, running up to a high limb, they lifted the bridge into a position almost horizontal.

15. Then a scream from the last monkey of the new formation warned the tail end that all was ready; and the next moment the whole chain was swung over, and landed safely on the opposite bank. The lowermost links now dropped off like a melting candle, while the higher ones leaped to the branches and came down by the trunk. The whole troop then scampered off into the chaparral and disappeared.

LIEUT. MAYNE REID.

LXVII. ENTHUSIASM NECESSARY TO

SUCCESS.

1. There was never, probably, a time in the world's history when high success, in any profession, demanded harder or more incessant labor than now. Men can no

longer go at one leap into eminent position. The world, as Emerson says, is no longer clay, but rather iron in the hands of its workers, and men have got to hammer out a place for themselves by steady and rugged blows.

2. Above all, a deep and burning enthusiasm is wanted in every one who would achieve great ends. No great thing is or can be done without it. It is a quality that is seen wherever there are earnest and determined workers in the silence of the study, and amid the roar of cannon; in the painting of a picture, and in the carving of a statue.

3. Ability, learning, accomplishment, opportunity, are all well; but they do not, of themselves, insure success. Thousands have all these, and live and die without benefiting themselves or others. Men, on the other hand, of mediocre talents, often scale the dizzy steeps of excellence and fame because they have firm faith and high resolve.

[ocr errors]

4. It is this solid faith in one's mission-the rooted belief that it is the one thing to which he has been called this enthusiasm, attracting an Agassiz to the Alps or the Amazon, impelling a Pliny to explore the volcano in which he is to lose his life, and nerving a Vernet, when tossing in a fierce tempest, to sketch the waste of waters, and even the wave that is leaping up to devour him that marks the heroic spirit; and wherever it is found success, sooner or later, is almost inevitable.

WILLIAM MATHEWS.

LXVIII. SPRING.

1. The Spring,- she is a blessed thing!
She is mother of the flowers!

She is the mate of birds and bees,
The partner of their revelries,

Our star of hope through wintry hours.

2. The merry children, when they see
Her coming, by the budding thorn,
They leap upon the cottage floor,
They shout beside the cottage door
And run to meet her, night and morn.

3. They are soonest with her in the woods, Peeping the withered leaves among,

To find the earliest fragrant thing

That dares from the cold earth to spring,
Or catch the earliest wild bird's song.

4. The little brooks run on in light,

As if they had a chase of mirth;
The skies are blue, the air is warm;
Our very hearts have caught the charm.
That sheds a beauty o'er the earth.

5. The aged man is in the field,

The maiden 'mong her garden flowers;
The sons of sorrow and distress

Are wandering in forgetfulness

Of wants that fret and care that lowers.

6. She comes with more than present good, With joys to store for future years; From which, in striving crowds apart, The bowed in spirit, bruised in heart, May glean up hope with grateful tears.

7. Up! let us to the fields away,
And breathe the fresh and balmy air;
The bird is building in the tree,

The flower has opened to the bee,

And health and love and peace are there.

MARY HOWITT.

LXIX.-GOD ONLY CAN SATISFY OUR AFFECTIONS.

1. The motives which are most commonly urged for cherishing supreme affection towards God are drawn from our frailty and weakness, and from our need of more than human succor in the trials of life and in the pains of death. But religion has a still higher claim. It answers to the deepest want of human nature.

2. We refer to our want of some being or beings to whom we may give our hearts; whom we may love more than ourselves; for whom we may live and be ready to die; and whose character responds to that idea of perfection which, however dim and undefined, is an essential element of every human soul.

3. We can not be happy beyond our love. At the same time, love may prove our chief woe, if bestowed unwisely, disproportionately, and on unworthy objects; if confined to beings of imperfect virtue, with whose feelings we can not always innocently sympathize; whose interests we can not always righteously promote; who narrow us to themselves, instead of breathing universal charity; who are frail, mutable, exposed to suffering, pain and death!

4. To secure a growing happiness and a spotless virtue, we need for the heart a being worthy of its whole treasure

« ПретходнаНастави »