10. "Thou know'st that twice a day I have brought thee in this can

Fresh water from the brook, as clear as ever ran; And twice in the day, when the ground is wet with dew,

I bring thee draughts of milk-warm milk it is, and new.

11. Thy limbs will shortly be twice as stout as they

are now;

Then I'll yoke thee to my cart, like a pony in the

plough:

My playmate thou shalt be; and when the wind is

cold,

Our hearth shall be thy bed, our house shall be thy

fold."

12. "Alas, the mountain tops, that look so green and

fair!

I've heard of fearful winds and darkness that come

there;

The little brooks, that seem all pastime' and all play,
When they are angry, roar like lions for their prey.

13. "Here thou need'st not dread the raven in the

sky;

Night and day thou art safe; our cottage is hard by.
Why bleat so after me? Why pull so at thy chain?
Sleep, and at break of day I will come to thee
again."

14. As homeward through the lane I went with lazy

feet,

This song to myself did I oftentimes repeat;

And it seemed, as I retraced the ballad' line by line, That but half of it was hers, and one half of it was mine.

15. Again, and once again, did I repeat the song: "Nay," said I, "more than half to the damsel 1o must belong;

For she looked with such a look, and she spoke with such a tone,

That I almost received her heart into my own."

1 HEDGE.

A fence made of thorns, prickly bushes, or shrubs.

? TETHERED. Tied by a rope or chain so as to feed within certain limits. UNOBSERVED. Not noticed, unseen. 4 PEER. An equal.

5 COVERT. A covered place, a shelter.
6 FOLD. A pen for sheep.

7 PASTIME. Sport, amusement.
8 RETRACED. Went over again.
9 BALLAD. A light song or poem.
10 DAMSEL. A maiden, a girl.

LXVI. -THE TIGERS.

J. ABBOTT.

[Timboo is a native of one of the South Sea Islands, and lives with Mr. and Mrs. Cheveril, on the Hudson River. Mark and Fanny are their children. Timboo is an honest, worthy lad, whose influence over the children 's good. Mark had been hiding from his mother, to escape the trouble of going an errand for her; and Timboo reproves him, as will be read.]

1. Timboo. I DID not say that you were worse than a tiger in general, but only that I once knew some tigers that were in some respects better than you.

2. Mark. In what respect?

3. Tim. Why, they were grateful, and you are ungrateful.

4. Mark. Nonsense, Timboo! I'm not ungrateful But tell us about those tigers.

5. Fanny. Yes, Timboo, do.

6. Tim. Well, once upon a time, in the course of my voyages, I stopped at the port of Havre, in France. If you had not been in the habit, like other foolish boys, of wasting your time in school in whispering and playing, instead of attending to your studies, you would know where Havre is.

7. Mark. I do know where it is. It is on the northern coast of France- on the shore of the English Channel.

8. Tim. Right. You have studied your geography better than I thought you had. It was up the English Channel that I sailed when I went to Havre.

9. Mark. Well, tell us about the tigers. Do they have these tigers in Havre?

10. Tim. They had some for a show when I was there, and I went to see them. They had them in a tent, at a sort of fair,' outside of the town. One evening, I was strolling about, and I came to this fair, and I thought I would go into the tent and see the tigers. 11. Mark. How much did you have to pay?

12. Tim. Two sous.

13. Mark. How much is a sou?

14. Tim. About a cent.

15. Mark. Then it was a very cheap show.

16. Tim. Yes; the shows at those fairs are always pretty cheap. Besides, I took one of the cheapest seats. When I went in and had taken my seat, I saw before me a number of cages, and a tiger in every cage. 17. Mark. How did they look ?

18. Tim. They looked very ferocious. They were

roaring and growling dreadfully, and they walked back and forth, and jumped up and down, as if they were in a state of great fury.

19. Fan. I should have been afraid of them.

20. Tim. No, there were strong iron bars in front of the cages; so we were not afraid. Well, in a few minutes, a young girl came in. She was dressed all in white, and was, I should think, about fifteen years of age. She was a very delicate and pretty-looking girl. She came in upon the stage, and took her stand in front of the cages. There she stood and courtesied to the audience.

21. Mark. Did the tigers stop growling?

22. Tim. No; they looked fiercer and more ferocious than ever. Pretty soon, some rough-looking men came in from a side-door, bringing some baskets with great pieces of meat in them.

23. Fan. Meat?

24. Tim. Yes, meat to feed the tigers with. One of the men had a wooden pitchfork. He gave the pitchfork to the girl. She took it and held it with the points up. Then another man took a piece of the meat, and put it upon the points of the pitchfork; and the girl, turning round, held it to the bars of one of the tigers' cages. The tiger immediately seized it with his paws, and pulled it through the grating.

25. Mark. And what did he do then?

26. Tim. He crouched down upon the floor, and, holding the meat in his paws, he began to gnaw it, as a dog would a bone. The girl then held her pitchfork again, and the man put a second piece of meat upon it, and the girl then fed the second tiger, and so on, along the whole row. The tigers seemed to be well

contented as soon as they got their meal; and they remained some time, eating it very quietly. We all looked on.

27. Mark. And was that all that you saw?

28. Tim. No. As soon as the girl had fed the tigers, she went out, and a man came in. The man said if we would wait a few minutes, until the tigers had eaten their meat, the young lady would go into their cages and play with them.

29. Fan. And did she?

30. Tim. Yes, she went in by a back door into one of the cages, and then passed from one cage to another along the whole row, by means of doors between.

31. Fan. And didn't they bite her?

32. Tim. No. They jumped about and played with her, and tumbled over and over each other before her, just as if they had been so many kittens.

33. Mark. I should have thought they would have torn her to pieces.

34. Tim. Yes, I suppose you would have torn her to pieces if you had been one of the tigers! But they had some gratitude. They remembered that she gave them their meat, and they were thankful to her for it. They would do whatever she directed' them. She would make them jump through a hoop that she held in her hand, or lie down and put their heads in her lap, and do various other things. Whatever she wished them to do, that they all seemed very willing to do.

35. Mark. I shouldn't think tigers would mind a girl.

36. Tim. They were grateful because she fed them. If you had been one of them, you would have torn her to pieces, I suppose, even if she had fed you every day for ten years.