The father shared and heightened. But at length
The rigorous law had grasped him, and condemned
To fetters and to darkness.

The captive's lot

He felt, in all its bitterness; - the walls

Of his deep dungeon answered many a sigh

And heart-heaved groan. His tale was known, and touched
His jailer with compassion;

-

and the boy,

Thenceforth a frequent visitor, beguiled

His father's lingering hours, and brought a balm
With his loved presence, that in every wound
Dropt healing. But in this terrific hour

He was a poisoned arrow in the breast
Where he had been a cure.

3.

With earliest morn,

Of that first day of darkness and amaze,

He came.

The iron door was closed, for them
Never to open more! The day, the night,
Dragged slowly by; nor did they know the fate.
Impending o'er the city. Well they heard
The pent-up thunders in the earth beneath,
And felt its giddy rocking: and the air
Grew hot at length, and thick; but in his straw
The boy was sleeping: and the father hoped
The earthquake might pass by; nor would he wake
From his sound rest the unfearing child, nor tell
The dangers of their state. On his low couch
The fettered soldier sunk; and with deep awe
Listened the fearful sounds: with upturned eye
To the great gods he breathed a prayer; then strove
To calm himself, and lose in sleep a while

His useless terrors.

a Darkness produced by volcanic smoke, which preceded the eruption of Mount Vesu. vius, when Herculaneum was destroyed, A. D. 79.

4.

But he could not sleep.

His body burned with feverish heat; his chains

Clanked loud, although he moved not; deep in earth Groaned unimaginable thunders; sounds,

Fearful and ominous, arose and died,

Like the sad moanings of November's wind,
In the blank midnight. Deepest horror chilled.
His blood that burned before; cold, clammy sweats
Came o'er him; then, anon, a fiery thrill

1.

2.

Shot through his veins. Now on his couch he shrunk
And shivered, as in fear; now upright leaped,
As though he heard the battle-trumpet sound,
And longed to cope with death.

He slept at last,

-

A troubled, dreamy sleep. Well, had he slept

Never to waken more!

But terrible his agony.

His hours are few,

PART II.

Soon the storm

Burst forth; the lightnings glanced; the air
Shook with the thunders. They awoke; they sprung
Amazed upon their feet. The dungeon glowed

A moment as in sunshine,—and was dark.
Again a flood of white flame fills the cell;
Dying away upon the dazzled eye

In darkening, quivering tints, as stunning sound

Dies throbbing, ringing in the ear.

Silence,

And blackest darkness. With intensest awe

The soldier's frame was filled; and many a thought
Of strange foreboding hurried through his mind,

As underneath he felt the fevered earth
Jarring and lifting, and the massive walls
Heard harshly grate and strain.

Loudly the father called upon his child.

No voice replied. Trembling and anxiously

He searched their couch of straw; with headlong haste

Trod round his stinted limits, and, low bent,

Groped darkling on the earth; no child was there. Again, he called: again, at farthest stretch

Of his accursed fetters, till the blood

Seemed bursting from his ears, and from his
eyes
Fire flashed; he strained with arm extended far,
And fingers widely spread, greedy to touch
Though but his idol's garment. Useless toil
Yet still renewed: still round and round he goes,
And strains, and snatches; and, with dreadful cries,`
Calls on his boy. Mad frenzy fires him now.
He plants against the wall his feet; his chain
Grasps tugs, with giant strength, to force away
The deep-driven staple: yells and shrieks with rage.

3. And, like a desert lion in the snare
Raging to break his toils; to and fro bounds.
But see! the ground is opening: a blue light
Mounts, gently waving; noiseless: thin and cold
It seems, and like a rainbow tint, not flame;
But by its luster,' on the earth outstretched,
Behold the lifeless child! his dress is singed,
And o'er his face serene a darkened line
Points out the lightning's track.

4.

5.

The father saw;

And all his fury fled: a dead calm fell
That instant on him: speechless, fixed he stood,
And with a look that never wandered, gazed
Intensely on the corse. Those laughing eyes
Were not yet closed; and round those ruby lips
The wonted smile returned.

Silent and pale

The father stands: no tear is in his eye:
The thunders bellow; but he hears them not;
The ground lifts like a sea; he knows it not:
The strong walls grind and gape: the vaulted roof

Takes shapes like bubble tossing in the wind.
See! he looks up and smiles; for death to him
Is happiness. Yet could one last embrace

Be given, 't were still a sweeter thing to die.

6. It will be given. Look! how the rolling ground,
At every swell, nearer and still more near

Moves toward the father's outstretched arm his boy.
Once he has touched his garment; how his eye
Lightens with love, and hope, and anxious fears!
Ha! see; he has him now! he clasps him round;
Kisses his face; puts back the curling locks
That shaded his fine brow; looks in his eyes;
Grasps in his own those little dimpled hands;
Then folds him to his breast, as he was wont
To lie when sleeping; and resigned awaits
Undreaded death.

And pangless.

And death came soon, and swift,

The huge pile sunk down at once
Into the opening earth. Walls, arches, roof,
And deep foundation-stones, all mingling, fell!

LESSON XCIX.

INFLUENCE OF SUPERIOR MINDS.

SPRAGUE.

1. Ir belongs to cultivated men to construct, and put in motion, and direct, the complex machinery of civil society. Who originated these free institutions, the arteries through which the life-blood of our country's prosperity circulates? Who built and rocked the cradle of American liberty, and guarded the infant angel, until she walked forth in the vigor of a glorious maturity?

2. Whom do we welcome to the helm of state, when the storm of faction beats, or dark clouds hang about the heavens ?

Who speak, trumpet-tongued, to a nation's ear, in behalf of a nation's rights? Who hold the scales of equity, measuring out a portion both to the just and the unjust? Are they men who have been nursed in the lap of ignorance, or are they not rather your great and cultivated minds; your Franklins* and Madisons, and Adamses; and your Kents, and Speners, and Storys?!

3. And then, again, who framed that social system, if system it could be called, which exploded in the horrors of the French revolution; sporting with time-hallowed associations, and unsealing all the fountains of blood? Think you that ignorance was the presiding genius in that war of elements?

4. O, no; the master-spirits had many of them been known as standard-bearers in the empire of letters; they partook at once of the strength of the angel, and the depravity of the fiend. And, as it is in these opposite cases that I have mentioned, so it is always and everywhere; men with cultivated minds will ultimately have the power, whether they use it in the spirit of a lofty patriotism, or pervert it to do homage to faction, and tear society in pieces.

LESSON C.

DUTY OF LITERARY MEN TO THEIR COUNTRY.

GRIMKE.

1. We cannot honor our country with too deep a reverence; we cannot love her with an affection too pure and fervent; we cannot serve her with an energy of purpose or a faithfulness of zeal too steadfast and ardent. And what is our country? It is not the East, with her hills and her valleys, with her countless sails, and the rocky ramparts of her shores.

a Benjamin Franklin, the philosopher. b James Madison; fourth President of the United States. c Samuel, John, and John Quincy Adams. d Chancellor Kent, of New York. e Ambrose Spencer, of New York. fJustice Story, of Cambridge. g French Revolution; a revolution in the French government in 1793, in which Louis XVI. was guillotined, and many of his subjects destroyed.