McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader

Examples — Sitting 31

Turn, turn, my wheel! 'Tis nature's plan The child should grow into the man, The man grow wrinkled, old, and gray; In youth the heart exults and sings, The pulses leap, the feet have wings; In age the cricket chirps, and brings The harvest home of day.

Turn, turn, my wheel! The human race, Of every tongue, of every place, Caucasian, Coptic, or Malay, All that inhabit this great earth, Whatever be their rank or worth, Are kindred and allied by birth, And made of the same clay.

Turn, turn, my wheel! What is begun At daybreak must at dark be done, To-morrow will be another day; To-morrow the hot furnace flame Will search the heart and try the frame, And stamp with honor or with shame These vessels made of clay.

Stop, stop, my wheel! Too soon, too soon The noon will be the afternoon, Too soon to-day be yesterday; Behind us in our path we cast The broken potsherds of the past, And all are ground to dust at last, And trodden into clay. --Longfellow.

NOTE.--Coptic was formerly the language of Egypt. and is preserved in the inscriptions of the ancient monuments found there; it has now given place entirely to Arabic.

LXXX. A HOT DAY IN NEW YORK. (292)

William Dean Howells, 1837--, was born in Belmont County. Ohio. In boyhood he learned the printer's trade, at which he worked for several years. He published a volume of poems in 1860, in connection with John J. Piatt. From 1861 to 1865 he was United States Consul at Venice. On his return he resided for a time in New York City, and was one of the editors of the "Nation." In 1871 he was appointed editor in chief of the "Atlantic Monthly." He held the position ten years, and then retired in order to devote himself to his own writings. Since then, he has been connected with other literary magazines. Mr. Howells has written several books: novels and sketches: his writings are marked by an artistic finish, and a keen but subtile humor. The following selection is an extract from "Their Wedding Journey." ###

When they alighted, they took their way up through one of the streets of the great wholesale businesses, to Broadway. On this street was a throng of trucks and wagons, lading and unlading; bales and boxes rose and sank by pulleys overhead; the footway was a labyrinth of packages of every shape and size; there was no flagging of the pitiless energy that moved all forward, no sign of how heavy a weight lay on it, save in the reeking faces of its helpless instruments.

It was four o'clock, the deadliest hour of the deadly summer day. The spiritless air seemed to have a quality of blackness in it, as if filled with the gloom of low-hovering wings. One half the street lay in shadow, and one half in sun; but the sunshine itself was dim, as if a heat greater than its own had smitten it with languor. Little gusts of sick, warm wind blew across the great avenue at the corners of the intersecting streets. In the upward distance, at which the journeyers looked, the loftier roofs and steeples lifted themselves dim out of the livid atmosphere, and far up and down the length of the street swept a stream of tormented life.

All sorts of wheeled things thronged it, conspicuous among which rolled and jarred the gaudily painted stages, with quivering horses driven each by a man who sat in the shade of a branching, white umbrella, and suffered with a moody truculence of aspect, and as if he harbored the bitterness of death in his heart for the crowding passengers within, when one of them pulled the strap about his legs, and summoned him to halt.

Most of the foot passengers kept to the shady side, and to the unaccustomed eyes of the strangers they were not less in number than at any other time, though there were fewer women among them. Indomitably resolute of soul, they held their course with the swift pace of custom, and only here and there they showed the effect of the heat.

One man, collarless, with waistcoat unbuttoned, and hat set far back from his forehead, waved a fan before his death-white, flabby face, and set down one foot after the other with the heaviness of a somnambulist. Another, as they passed him, was saying huskily to the friend at his side, "I can't stand this much longer. My hands tingle as if they had gone to sleep; my heart--" But still the multitude hurried on, passing, repassing, encountering, evading, vanishing into shop doors, and emerging from them, dispersing down the side streets, and swarming out of them.

It was a scene that possessed the beholder with singular fascination, and in its effect of universal lunacy, it might well have seemed the last phase of a world presently to be destroyed. They who were in it, but not of it, as they fancied--though there was no reason for this--looked on it amazed, and at last their own errands being accomplished, and themselves so far cured of the madness of purpose, they cried with one voice that it was a hideous sight, and strove to take refuge from it in the nearest place where the soda fountain sparkled.

It was a vain desire. At the front door of the apothecary's hung a thermometer, and as they entered they heard the next comer cry out with a maniacal pride in the affliction laid upon mankind, "Ninety-seven degrees!" Behind them, at the door, there poured in a ceaseless stream of people, each pausing at the shrine of heat, before he tossed off the hissing draught that two pale, close-clipped boys served them from either side of the fountain. Then, in the order of their coming, they issued through another door upon the side street, each, as he disappeared, turning his face half round, and casting a casual glance upon a little group near another counter.

The group was of a very patient, half-frightened, half-puzzled looking gentleman who sat perfectly still on a stool, and of a lady who stood beside him, rubbing all over his head a handkerchief full of pounded ice, and easing one hand with the other when the first became tired. Basil drank his soda, and paused to look upon this group, which he felt would commend itself to realistic sculpture as eminently characteristic of the local life, and, as "The Sunstroke," would sell enormously in the hot season.

"Better take a little more of that," the apothecary said, looking up from his prescription, and, as the organized sympathy of the seemingly indifferent crowd, smiling very kindly at his patient, who thereupon tasted something in the glass he held.

"Do you still feel like fainting?" asked the humane authority. "Slightly, now and then," answered the other, "but I'm hanging on hard to the bottom curve of that icicled S on your soda fountain, and I feel that I'm all right as long as I can see that. The people get rather hazy occasionally, and have no features to speak of. But I do n't know that I look very impressive myself," he added in the jesting mood which seems the natural condition of Americans in the face of an embarrassments.

"Oh, you'll do!" the apothecary answered, with a laugh; but he said, in an answer to an anxious question from the lady, "He mustn't be moved for an hour yet," and gayly pestled away at a prescription, while she resumed her office of grinding the pounded ice round and round upon her husband's skull. Isabel offered her the commiseration of friendly words, and of looks kinder yet, and then, seeing that they could do nothing, she and Basil fell into the endless procession, and passed out of the side door.

"What a shocking thing," she whispered. "Did you see how all the people looked, one after another, so indifferently at that couple, and evidently forgot them the next instant? It was dreadful. I should n't like to have you sun-struck in New York."

"That's very considerate of you; but place for place, if any accident must happen to me among strangers, I think I should prefer to have it in New York. The biggest place is always the kindest as well as the cruelest place. Amongst the thousands of spectators the good Samaritan as well as the Levite would be sure to be. As for a sunstroke, it requires peculiar gifts. But if you compel me to a choice in the matter, then I say give me the busiest part of Broadway for a sunstroke. There is such experience of calamity there that you could hardly fall the first victim to any misfortune."

LXXXI. DISCONTENT.--AN ALLEGORY. (295)

Joseph Addison, 1672-1719, the brilliant essayist and poet, has long occupied an exalted place in English literature. He was the son of an English clergyman, was born in Wiltshire, and educated at Oxford; he died at "Holland House" (the property of his wile, to whom he had been married but about two years), and was buried in Westminster Abbey. Several years of his life were spent in the political affairs of his time, he held several public offices, and was, for ten years, a member of Parliament. His fame as an author rests chiefly upon his "Hymns," his tragedy of "Cato," and his "Essays" contributed principally to the "Tatler" and the "Spectator." The excellent style of his essays, their genial wit and sprightly humor, made them conspicuous in an age when coarseness, bitterness, and exaggeration deformed the writings of the most eminent: and these characteristics have given them an unquestioned place among the classics of our language.

Mr. Addison was shy and diffident, but genial and lovable; his moral character was above reproach, excepting that he is said to have been too fond of wine. ###

It is a celebrated thought of Socrates, that if all the misfortunes of mankind were cast into a public stock, in order to be equally distributed among the whole species, those who now think themselves the most unhappy, would prefer the share they are already possessed of before that which would fall to them by such a division. Horace has carried this thought a great deal farther, and supposes that the hardships or misfortunes we lie under, are more easy to us than those of any other person would be, in case we could change conditions with him.

As I was ruminating on these two remarks, and seated in my elbowchair, I insensibly fell asleep; when, on a sudden, methought there was a proclamation made by Jupiter, that every mortal should bring in his griefs and calamities, and throw them together in a heap. There was a large plain appointed for this purpose. I took my stand in the center of it, and saw, with a great deal of pleasure, the whole human species marching one after another, and throwing down their several loads, which immediately grew up into a prodigious mountain, that seemed to rise above the clouds.

There was a certain lady of a thin, airy shape, who was very active in this solemnity. She carried a magnifying glass in one of her hands, and was clothed in a loose, flowing robe, embroidered with several figures of fiends and specters, that discovered themselves in a thousand chimerical shapes as her garment hovered in the wind. There was something wild and distracted in her looks. Her name was Fancy. She led up every mortal to the appointed place, after having officiously assisted him in making up his pack, and laying it upon his shoulders. My heart melted within me to see my fellow-creatures groaning under their respective burdens, and to consider that prodigious bulk of human calamities which lay before me.

There were, however, several persons who gave me great diversion upon this occasion. I observed one bringing in a fardel, very carefully concealed under an old embroidered cloak, which, upon his throwing it into the heap, I discovered to be poverty. Another, after a great deal of puffing, threw down his luggage, which, upon examining, I found to be his wife.

There were multitudes of lovers saddled with very whimsical burdens, composed of darts and flames; but, what was very odd, though they sighed as if their hearts would break under these bundles of calamities, they could not persuade themselves to cast them into the heap, when they came up to it; but, after a few faint efforts, shook their heads, and marched away as heavy loaden as they came.

I saw multitudes of old women throw down their wrinkles, and several young ones who stripped themselves of a tawny skin. There were very great heaps of red noses, large lips, and rusty teeth. The truth of it is, I was surprised to see the greatest part of the mountain made up of bodily deformities. Observing one advancing toward the heap with a larger cargo than ordinary upon his back, I found, upon his near approach, that it was only a natural hump, which he disposed of with great joy of heart among this collection of human miseries.

There were, likewise, distempers of all sorts, though I could not but observe that there were many more imaginary than real. One little packet I could not but take notice of, which was a complication of all the diseases incident to human nature, and was in the hand of a great many fine people. This was called the spleen. But what most of all surprised me was, that there was not a single vice or folly thrown into the whole heap: at which I was very much astonished, having concluded within myself that everyone would take this opportunity of getting rid of his passions, prejudices, and frailties.

I took notice in particular of a very profligate fellow, who, I did not question, came loaden with his crimes, but upon searching into his bundle, I found that instead of throwing his guilt from him, he had only laid down his memory. He was followed by another worthless rogue, who flung away his modesty instead of his ignorance.

When the whole race of mankind had thus cast their burdens, the phantom which had been so busy on this occasion, seeing me an idle spectator of what passed, approached toward me. I grew uneasy at her presence, when, of a sudden, she held her magnifying glass full before my eyes. I no sooner saw my face in it, but was startled at the shortness of it, which now appeared to me in its utmost aggravation. The immoderate breadth of the features made me very much out of humor with my own countenance, upon which I threw it from me like a mask. It happened very luckily that one who stood by me had just before thrown down his visage, which, it seems, was too long for him. It was, indeed, extended to a most shameful length; I believe the very chin was, modestly speaking, as long as my whole face. We had both of us an opportunity of mending ourselves; and all the contributions being now brought in, every man was at liberty to exchange his misfortunes for those of another person.

As we stood round the heap, and surveyed the several materials of which it was composed, there was scarcely a mortal in this vast multitude who did not discover what he thought pleasures and blessings of life, and wondered how the owners of them ever came to look upon them as burthens and grievances. As we were regarding very attentively this confusion of miseries, this chaos of calamity, Jupiter issued out a second proclamation, that everyone was now at liberty to exchange his affliction, and to return to his habitation with any such other bundle as should be delivered to him. Upon this, Fancy began again to bestir herself, and, parceling out the whole heap with incredible activity, recommended to everyone his particular packet. The hurry and confusion at this time was not to be expressed. Some observations, which I made upon the occasion, I shall communicate to the public.