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the prime of their strength. Some carried a sword and a lasso, others a trident and a net; some were in light armor, others in the full, heavy equipment of a soldier; some on horseback, some in chariots, some on foot. They marched in, and made their obeisance to the emperor, and with one voice their greeting sounded through the building: "Hail, Cæsar! We who are about to die salute thee!"N They were the gladiators-the swordsmen trained to fight to the death to amuse the populace.

Fights of all sorts took place-the light-armed soldier and the netsman- the lasso and the javelin -the two heavy-armed warriors,-all combinations of single combat, and sometimes a general mêlée of the athletes.

When a gladiator wounded his adversary, he shouted to the spectators, "He has it!" and looked up to know whether he should kill or spare. When the people held up their thumbs, the conquered was left to recover, if he could; if they turned them down, he was to die; and if he showed any reluctance to present his throat for the death blow, there was a scornful shout, "Receive the steel!"

Many of us must have seen casts of that most touching statue of the Wounded Gladiator, that called forth from Byron these noble lines of indignant pity:

I see before me the gladiator lie:

He leans upon his hand; his manly brow

Consents to death, but conquers agony;

And his drooped head sinks gradually low;

And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow

From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one,

Like the first of a thunder shower; and now

The arena swims around him - he is gone,

Ere ceased the inhuman shout which hailed the wretch who won.

He heard it, but he heeded not; his eyes

Were with his heart, and that was far away:
He recked not of the life he lost, nor prize;

But where his rude hut by the Danube lay-
There were his young barbarians N all at play,
There was their Dacian N mother-he their sire,
Butchered to make a Roman holiday-

All this rushed with his blood.-Shall he expire,
And unavenged?-Arise, ye Goths, N and glut your ire!
CHARLOTTE M. YONGE

Biography.-Charlotte M. Yonge is a popular English authoress. Her first production, "Abbey Church," was published in 1844. This was followed by "Kings of England" and " Landmarks of History." Her works number about thirty.

Notes. The "Conquerors of Jerusalem," Vespasian and Titus, lived in the first century A. D.

Orphe us, a musician of fabulous times, was said to move rocks and trees by the music of his lyre.

"We who are about to die, salute thee" is the translation of the Latin words mor i tu'ri, te sal u tā'mus.

Byron (1788-1824) was one of the most famous of English poets. Barbarians was a term applied by Greeks and Romans to foreigners, because their language sounded to them like

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bar, bar."

Da' cian, belonging to an ancient tribe beyond the Danube.
Goths, a barbarous nation that formerly inhabited Europe.

85.-A ROMAN LEGEND.

eor'o net, an inferior crown.

dělved, dug.

en chased', adorned.

vi'ands, provisions.

mē di æ'val, of the middle ages.

măn'i föld, many.

lăm’bent, gleaming.
ter res' tri al, earthly.

pělf, riches; money.

se ques'tered, secluded; quiet.

In mediæval Rome, I know not where,

There stood an image with its arm in air,

And on its lifted finger, shining clear,

A golden ring with the device, "Strike here!” Greatly the people wondered, though none guessed The meaning that these words but half expressed,

Until a learned clerk, who at noonday

With downcast eyes was passing on his way,

Paused, and observed the spot, and marked it well,
Whereon the shadow of the finger fell;

And, coming back at midnight, delved, and found
A secret stair-way leading under ground.
Down this he passed into a spacious hall,
Lit by a flaming jewel on the wall;
And opposite, in threatening attitude
With bow and shaft a brazen statue stood.

Upon its forehead, like a coronet,

Were these mysterious words of menace set:

"That which I am, I am; my fatal aim

None can escape, not even yon luminous flame!"

Midway the hall was a fair table placed,

With cloth of gold and golden cups enchased

With rubies, and the plates and knives were gold, And gold the bread and viands manifold.

Around it, silent, motionless, and sad,

Were seated gallant knights in armor clad,

And ladies beautiful with plume and zone,

But they were stone, their hearts within were stone;
And the vast hall was filled in every part
With silent crowds, stony in face and heart.

Long at the scene, bewildered and amazed,
The trembling clerk in speechless wonder gazed;
Then from the table, by his greed made bold,
He seized a goblet and a knife of gold,

And sudden from their seats the guests upsprang,
The vaulted ceiling with loud clamors rang,

The archer sped his arrow, at their call,

Shattering the lambent jewel on the wall,

And all was dark around and overhead;

Stark on the floor the luckless clerk lay dead!

The writer of this legend then records

Its ghostly application in these words:
The image is the Adversary old,

Whose beckoning finger points to realms of gold;
Our lusts and passions are the downward stair
That leads the soul from a diviner air;
The archer, Death; the flaming jewel, Life;
Terrestrial goods, the goblet and the knife;
The knights and ladies, all whose flesh and bone
By avarice have been hardened into stone;
The clerk, the scholar, whom the love of pelf
Tempts from his books and from his nobler self.

The scholar and the world! The endless strife,
The discord in the harmonies of life!
The love of learning, the sequestered nooks,
And all the sweet serenity of books;

The market-place, the eager love of gain,
Whose aim is vanity, and whose end is pain!

LONGFELLOW.

Biography.-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807-1882) may justly be called the most popular of America's poets.

He graduated from Bowdoin (Bōd'n) College in 1825, and began the practice of law; but the tempting offer of a professorship in Bowdoin induced him to begin a literary life. His first prose work, "Outre Mer" (Beyond the Sea), appeared in 1835, and during the same year he was called to a professorship in Harvard College.

Longfellow visited Europe a number of times in order to perfect his acquaintance with the languages and the literature of the different nations. As a man and as a poet, he seems to have been in perfect harmony with all classes of society, and his writings have reached an enormous sale in both England and America.

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The worship of the Sun constituted the peculiar care of the Incas, and was the object of their lavish expenditure. The most ancient of the many temples dedicated to this divinity was in the Island of Titicaca, whence the royal founders of the Peruvian line were said to have proceeded. From this circumstance this sanctuary was held in peculiar veneration.

Every thing which belonged to it, even the broad fields of maize, which surrounded the temple, and formed part of its domain, partook of a portion of its sanctity. The yearly produce was distributed among the different public store-houses, in small quantities to each, as something that would sanctify the remainder of their contents. Happy was the man who could secure even an ear of the blessed harvest for his own granary!

But the most renowned of the Peruvian temples, the pride of the capital, and the wonder of the empire, was at Cuzco, where, under the munificence of successive sovereigns, it had become so enriched, that it received the name of Coricancha, or "The Place of Gold." It consisted of a principal building and several chapels and inferior edifices, covering a large extent of ground in the heart of the city,

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