NECESSITY OF CONSIDERING BOTH SIDES OF A

QUESTION.

VICTORY; Vik't r-y. OLD; sound ld. INSCRIBED; sound bd. Two; too; oo, not . ARMED; sound rmd. FORESTS; Sound sts. SOVEREIGN; suv'er-in; three syllables. EVILS; e'vlz; i is silent. YONDER; Ŏ, not й.

In the days of knight errantry and paganism, one of our old British princes set up a statue to the goddess of Victory, in a point where four roads met. In her right hand she held a spear, and her left hand rested upon a shield; the outside of this shield was of gold, and the inside of silver. On the former was inscribed, in the old British language, "To the goddess ever favorable;" and on the other," For four victories, obtained successively over the Picts and other inhabitants of the northern islands."

It happened, one day, that two knights, completely armed, one in black armor, the other in white, arrived, from opposite parts of the country, at this statue, just about the same time; and as neither of them had seen it before, they stopped to read the inscription and observe the excellence of its workmanship.

After contemplating it for some time, "This golden shield. says the black knight. "Golden shield!” cried the white knight, who was as strictly observing the opposite side; "why, if I have my eyes, it is silver." "I know nothing of your eyes," replied the black knight," but if ever I saw a golden shield in my life, this is one." "Yes," returned the white knight, smiling, "it is very probable, indeed, that they should expose a shield of gold in so public a place as this! For my part, I wonder even a silver one is not too strong a temptation for the devotion of some people who pass this way; and it appears, by the date, that this has been here above three years."

The black knight could not bear the smile with which this was delivered, and grew so warm in the dispute, that it soon ended in a challenge; they both, therefore, turned their horses, and rode back so far as to have sufficient space for their career; then fixing their spears in their rests, they flew at each other with the greatest fury and impetuosity. Their shock was so rude, and the blow on each side so effectual, that they both fell to the ground, much wounded and bruised, and lay there for some time, as in a trance.

A good Druid, who was travelling that way, found them in this condition. The Druids were the physicians of those times, as well as the priests. He had a sovereign balsam about him, which he had composed himself, for he was very skilful in all the plants that grew in the fields or in the forests; he stanched their blood, applied his balsam to their wounds, and brought them, as it were, from death to life again. As soon as they were sufficiently recovered, he began to inquire into the occasion of their quarrel. "Why, this man," cried the black knight, "will have it that yonder. shield is silver." "And he will have it," replied the white knight," that it is gold." And then they told him all the particulars of the affair.

"Ah!" said the Druid, with a sigh, "you are both of you, my brethren, in the right, and both of you in the wrong. Had either of you given himself time to look at the opposite side of the shield, as well as that which first presented itself to view, all this passion and bloodshed might have been avoided. However, there is a very good lesson to be learned from the evils that have befallen you on this occasion. Permit me, therefore, to entreat you never to enter into any dispute, for the future, till you have fairly considered both sides of the question."

KNIGHT ERRANTRY; the practice of wandering in quest of adventures. PAGANISM; heathenism. CHALLENGE; a summons to fight a duel. IMPETUOSITY; violence, fury. BALSAM; an unctuous, aromatic, healing substance.

r d 197.

THE LILY OF THE VALE.

WITH HER; Sound the h in her; do not blend the two words into one, as, wither. AFFECTS; not ks, but kts. AND; be careful to sound d. RENDS; sound ndz.

To the curious eye

A little monitor presents her page

Of choice instruction, with her snowy bells —
The lily of the vale. She nor affects

The public walk, nor gaze of midday sun;
She to no state or dignity aspires;

But, silent and alone, puts on her suit,

And sheds her lasting perfume, but for which
We had not known there was a thing so sweet

Hid in the gloomy shade. So, when the blast

Her sister tribes confounds, and to the earth

Stoops their high heads, that vainly were exposed,
She feels it not, but flourishes anew,

Still sheltered and secure. And so the storm,
That makes the high elm couch, and rends the oak,
The humble lily spares. A thousand blows,
That shake the lofty monarch on his throne,
We lesser folks feel not. Keen are the pains
Advancement often brings. To be secure,
Be humble; to be happy, be content.

MONITOR; One who warns or admonishes. BELL; the cup or calix of the flower in the form of a bell. ADVANCEMENT; preferment, promotion. COUCH; lie down, stoop or bend down.

THE INSECT OF A DAY.

SUPPORT; sound the r. FELLOWS; long o; ōz, not uz. SUBJECT; short e;ject, not jict. SWARM; sound rm. TERRIBLE; short i, not short u. FIRMEST; short è in est, not short i. AGAINST; ai like short e. HUNDRED; drěd, not drud, nor děd.

ARISTOTLE says, that upon the River Hypanis there exist little animals who live only one day. Those who die at eight o'clock in the morning, die in their youth; those who die at five o'clock in the evening, die in a state of decrepitude.

Suppose one of the most robust of these Hypanians as old, according to these nations, as time itself; he would have begun to exist at the break of day, and, through the strength of his constitution, would have been enabled to support an active life during the infinite number of seconds contained in ten or twelve hours. During so long a succession of instants, by his own experience and by his reflections on all he had seen, he must have acquired great wisdom; he looks upon his fellows who have died at noon, as creatures happily delivered from the great number of infirmities to which old age is subject. He may have to relate to his grandsons an astonishing tradition of facts anterior to all the memories of the nation.

The young swarm, composed of beings who have lived but an hour, approach the venerable patriarch with respect, and listen with admiration to his instructive discourse. Every thing he relates to them appears a prodigy to this generation whose life has been so short. A day appears to them the entire duration of time, and the dawn of day would be called, in their chronology, the great era of their creation. Suppose, now, that the venerable insect, this Nestor of the Hypanis, a short time before his death, about the hour of sunset, assembles all his descendants, his friends and acy 340.

e 49, 312.

quaintances, to give them, with his dying breath, his last advice. They gather, from all parts, under the vast shelter of a mushroom, and the dying sage addresses them in the following manner:—

"Friends and compatriots, I feel that the longest life must have an end. The term of mine has arrived, and I do not regret my fate, since my great age has become a burden to me, and there is nothing new under the sun for me. The revolutions and calamities that have desolated my country, the great number of particular accidents to which we are all subject, the infirmities that afflict our species, and the misfortunes which have happened in my own family, all that I have seen in the course of a long life, have only too well taught me this great truth, that happiness, placed in things which do not depend upon ourselves, can never be certain and lasting.

"An entire generation has perished by a violent wind; a multitude of our imprudent youth has been swept into the water by a brisk and unexpected breeze. What terrible floods a sudden rain has caused! Our firmest shelters even are not proof against a hail storm. A dark cloud causes the most courageous hearts to tremble.

“I lived in the early ages, and conversed with insects of larger growth, of stronger constitutions, and I may say of greater wisdom than any of the present generation. I conjure you to give credit to my last words, when I assure you that the sun which now appears beyond the water, and which seems not far from the earth, I have seen in times past fixed in the middle of the heavens, its rays darting The earth was much lighter in past ages, the air was much warmer, and our ancestors were more sober and more virtuous.

directly upon us.

66

Although my senses are enfeebled, my memory is not: I can assure you that this glorious luminary moves. I have seen it rising over the summit of that mountain, and I began