XXVII. SCENE FROM THE "LITTLE MER CHANTS." PIEDRO and FRANCISCO. 1. Piedro. This is your morning's work, I presume; and you'll make another journey to Naples to-day, on the same errand, I warrant, before your father thinks you have done enough. 2. Francisco. Not before my father thinks I have done enough, but before I think so myself. 3. P. I do enough to satisfy myself and my father, too, without slaving myself after your fashion. Look here! (showing money.) All this was had for asking. It is no bad thing, you'll allow, to know how to ask for money properly. 4. F. I should be ashamed to beg, or to borrow either. 5. P. Neither did I get what you see by begging, or borrowing either, but by using my wits-not as you did yesterday, when, like a novice, you showed the bruised side of your melon, and so spoiled your market by your wisdom! 6. F. Wisdom I think it, still. 7. P. And your father? 8. F. And my father. 9. P. Mine is of a different way of thinking. He always tells me that the buyer has need of a hundred eyes, and if one can blind the whole hundred, so much the better. You must know I got off the fish to-day that my father could not sell yesterday in the market. Got it off for fresh, just out of the river— got twice as much as the market price for it; and from whom, think you? Why, from the very booby that would have bought the bruised melon for a good one, if you would have let him. You'll allow that I am no fool, Francisco, and that I am in a fair way to grow rich, if I go on as I have begun. 10. F. Stay,-you forgot that the "booby" you took in to-day will not be so easily taken in to-morrow. He will buy no more fish from you, because he will be afraid of your cheating him; but he will be ready enough to buy fruit of me, because he will know I shall not cheat him. So you will have lost a customer, and I gained one. 11. P. With all my heart. One customer does not make a market; if he buys no more, what care I? There are people enough to buy fish in Naples. 12. F. And do you mean to serve them all in the same manner? 13. P. If they will be only so good as to give me leave. "Venture a small fish to catch a large one!” 14. F. You have never considered, then, that all these people will, one after another, find you out in time. 15. P. Aye, in time; but it will be some time first: there are a great many of them,- enough to last me all summer, if I lose a customer a day. 16. F. And next summer, what will you do? 17. P. Next summer is not come yet; there is time enough to think what I shall do before next summer comes. Why, now, suppose the blockheads, after they had been taken in and found it out, all joined against me, and would buy none of our fish,-what then? Are there no trades, then, but that of a fisherman? In Naples, are there not a hundred ways of making money for a smart lad like me as my father says? What do you think of turning merchant, and selling sugar-plums and cakes to the children in the market? Would they be hard to deal with, think you? 18. F. I think not. But I think the children would find it out in time if they were cheated, and would like it as little as the men. 19. P. I don't doubt that; then, in time, I could, you know, change my trade, sell chips and sticks in the wood market; hand about lemonade to the fine folks, or twenty other things; there are trades enough for a man. 20. F. Yes, for the honest dealer, but for no other; for in all of them you'll find, as my father says, that a good character is the best fortune to set up with. Change your trade ever so often, you'll be found out for what you are at last. 21. P. And what am I, pray? The whole truth of the matter is, that you envy my good luck and can't bear to hear this money jingle in my hand. "It's better to be lucky than wise," as my father says. Good morning to you; when I am found out for what I am, or when the worst comes to the worst, I can drive a stupid donkey, with his panniers filled with rubbish, as well as you do now, honest Francisco. 22. F. Not quite so well; unless you were honest you would not fill his panniers quite so readily. MARIA EDGEWORTH. XXVIII.- CLEAR THE WAY. 1. Men of thought, be up and stirring, Sow the seed Night and day! - withdraw the curtain Clear the way! Men of action, aid and cheer them As ye may ! There's a fount about to stream, There's a light about to beam, There's a midnight blackness changing Men of thought, and men of action, 2. Once the welcome light has broken, What the unmingled glories Of the day? What the evil that shall perish Aid the dawning, tongue and pen; And our earnest must not slacken Men of thought, and men of action, 3. Lo! a cloud's about to vanish From the day; Lo! a right's about to conquer — And a brazen wrong to crumble Into clay. With that right shall many more For their prey; Men of thought, and men of action, XXIX.-ICELAND. 1. There are no large trees in Iceland, a few low bushes and stunted pines alone adorning the ground. Corn will not ripen in its short summer, nor on its sterile soil. It is a land of vast snow-plains and huge icebergs. In the latter ships often get frozen up for the long winter of these regions. 2. The people live chiefly on butter, milk, fish, and porridge made of Iceland moss, with a little fresh meat occasionally, but the latter and rye bread are considered holiday fare. Yet they are very happy and contented; and they will tell you that "Iceland is the best country that the sun shines on." 3. One day a traveler was rambling among the rocks admiring the wild scenery before him, when he heard some children singing. On looking, he saw a party of little folks with baskets on their arms. They were gathering the moss which grew among the rocks and hardened lava. The following lines were the burden of their song: 4. "Over slippery rocks we climb, Both alike with joy we tread 5. No lonely birds need guard their nest Be still the rabbit's panting breast, For search like ours ye need not fear; The mossy rock can well supply |