School Reading by Grades: Sixth Year Part 17

Its highest beauty is in what it symbolizes. It is because it represents all, that all gaze at it with delight and reverence.

It is a piece of bunting lifted in the air; but it speaks sublimely, and every part has a voice. Its stripes of alternate red and white proclaim the original union of thirteen states to maintain the Declaration of Independence. Its stars of white on a field of blue proclaim that union of states const.i.tuting our national constellation, which receives a new star with every new state. The two together signify union past and present.

The very colors have a language which was officially recognized by our fathers. White is for purity, red for valor, blue for justice; and altogether, bunting, stripes, stars, and colors, blazing in the sky, make the flag of our country to be cherished by all our hearts, to be upheld by all our hands.

II.

I have said enough and more than enough to manifest the spirit in which this flag is now committed to your charge. It is the national ensign, pure and simple, dearer to all hearts at this moment as we lift it to the gale, and see no other sign of hope upon the storm cloud which rolls and rattles above it, save that which is its own radiant hues--dearer, a thousand fold dearer to us all than ever it was before, while gilded by the sunshine of prosperity and playing with the zephyrs of peace. It will speak for itself far more eloquently than I can speak for it.

Behold it! Listen to it! Every star has a tongue; every stripe is articulate. There is no speech nor language where their voices are not heard. There is magic in the web of it. It has an answer for every question of duty. It has a solution for every doubt and every perplexity. It has a word of good cheer for every hour of gloom or of despondency.

Behold it! Listen to it! It speaks of earlier and of later struggles.

It speaks of victories and sometimes of reverses, on the sea and on the land. It speaks of patriots and heroes among the living and among the dead; and of him, the first and greatest of them all, around whose consecrated ashes this unnatural and abhorrent strife has been so long raging. But, before all and above all other a.s.sociations and memories,--whether of glorious men, or glorious deeds, or glorious places,--its voice is ever of Union and Liberty, of the Const.i.tution and of the Laws.

--_Robert C. Winthrop._

THE HIGH TIDE ON THE COAST OF LINCOLNSHIRE--1571.

The old mayor climbed the belfry tower, The ringers ran by two, by three:-- "Pull, if ye never pulled before, Good ringers, pull your best," quoth he.

"Play up, play up, O Boston bells!

Ply all your changes, all your swells; Play up 'The Brides of Enderby'!"

[Ill.u.s.tration: Jean Ingelow.]

Men say it was a stolen tide; The Lord that sent it, he knows all; But in mine ears doth still abide The message that the bells let fall: And there was naught of strange, beside The flights of mews and peewits pied By millions crouched on the old sea wall.

I sat and spun within the door, My thread brake off, I raised mine eyes; The level sun, like ruddy ore, Lay sinking in the barren skies, And dark against day's golden death She moved where Lindis wandereth, My son's fair wife, Elizabeth.

"Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!" calling, Ere the early dews were falling, Far away I heard her song.

"Cusha! Cusha!" all along, Where the reedy Lindis floweth, Floweth, floweth; From the meads where melick groweth Faintly came her milking song,

"Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!" calling, "For the dews will soon be falling; Leave your meadow gra.s.ses mellow, Mellow, mellow; Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow; Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot; Quit the stalks of parsley hollow, Hollow, hollow; Come up, Jetty, rise and follow, From the clovers lift your head; Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot, Come up, Jetty, rise and follow, Jetty, to the milking shed."

If it be long, ay, long ago, When I begin to think how long, Again I hear the Lindis flow, Swift as an arrow, sharp and strong; And all the air, it seemeth me, Is full of floating bells (saith she), That ring the tune of Enderby.

All fresh the level pasture lay, And not a shadow might be seen, Save where full five good miles away The steeple towered from out the green.

And lo! the great bell far and wide Was heard in all the country side That Sat.u.r.day at eventide.

The swanherds where their sedges are Moved on in sunset's golden breath, The shepherd lads I heard afar, And my son's wife, Elizabeth; Till floating o'er the gra.s.sy sea Came down that kindly message free, The "Brides of Mavis Enderby."

Then some looked up into the sky, And all along where Lindis flows To where the goodly vessels lie, And where the lordly steeple shows.

They said, "And why should this thing be?

What danger lowers by land or sea?

They ring the tune of Enderby!

"For evil news from Mablethorpe, Of pirate galleys warping down; For ships ash.o.r.e beyond the scorpe, They have not spared to wake the town: But while the west is red to see, And storms be none, and pirates flee, Why ring 'The Brides of Enderby'?"

I looked without, and lo! my son Came riding down with might and main; He raised a shout as he drew on, Till all the welkin rang again, "Elizabeth! Elizabeth!"

(A sweeter woman ne'er drew breath Than my son's wife, Elizabeth.)

"The old sea wall," he cried, "is down, The rising tide comes on apace, And boats adrift in yonder town Go sailing up the market place."

He shook as one that looks on death: "G.o.d save you, mother!" straight he saith, "Where is my wife, Elizabeth?"

"Good son, where Lindis winds away, With her two bairns I marked her long; And ere yon bells began to play, Afar I heard her milking song."

He looked across the gra.s.sy lea, To right, to left, "Ho, Enderby!"

They rang "The Brides of Enderby!"

With that he cried and beat his breast; For, lo! along the river's bed A mighty eygre reared his crest, And up the Lindis raging sped.

It swept with thunderous noises loud; Shaped like a curling snow-white cloud, Or like a demon in a shroud.

And rearing Lindis backward pressed Shook all her trembling banks amain; Then madly at the eygre's breast Flung up her weltering walls again.

Then banks came down with ruin and rout-- Then beaten foam flew round about-- Then all the mighty floods were out.

So far, so fast the eygre drave, The heart had hardly time to beat Before a shallow seething wave Sobbed in the gra.s.ses at our feet; The feet had hardly time to flee Before it brake against the knee, And all the world was in the sea.

Upon the roof we sat that night, The noise of bells went sweeping by; I marked the lofty beacon light Stream from the church tower, red and high-- A lurid mark and dread to see; And awesome bells they were to me, That in the dark rang "Enderby."

They rang the sailor lads to guide From roof to roof who fearless rowed; And I--my son was at my side, And yet the ruddy beacon glowed; And yet he moaned beneath his breath, "Oh, come in life, or come in death!

Oh lost! my love Elizabeth."

And didst thou visit him no more?

Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter dear; The waters laid thee at his door, Ere yet the early dawn was clear.

Thy pretty bairns in fast embrace, The lifted sun shone on thy face, Down drifted to thy dwelling place.

That flow strewed wrecks about the gra.s.s, That ebb swept out the flocks to sea; A fatal ebb and flow, alas!

To many more than mine and me: But each will mourn his own (she saith), And sweeter woman ne'er drew breath Than my son's wife, Elizabeth.

I shall never hear her more By the reedy Lindis sh.o.r.e, "Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!" calling, Ere the early dews be falling; I shall never hear her song, "Cusha! Cusha!" all along Where the sunny Lindis floweth, Goeth, floweth; From the meads where melick groweth, Where the water winding down, Onward floweth to the town.

I shall never see her more Where the reeds and rushes quiver, Shiver, quiver; Stand beside the sobbing river, Sobbing, throbbing, in its falling To the sandy, lonesome sh.o.r.e; I shall never hear her calling, "Leave your meadow gra.s.ses mellow, Mellow, mellow; Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow; Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot; Quit your pipes of parsley hollow, Hollow, hollow; Come up, Lightfoot, rise and follow; Lightfoot, Whitefoot, From your clovers lift the head; Come up, Jetty, follow, follow, Jetty, to the milking shed."

--_Jean Ingelow._

THE STORY OF THOMAS BECKET.

I. HIS LIFE.

Henry II. began his reign over England in the year 1154, and he was the mightiest king that had yet sat upon the throne. He had vast possessions. All England and nearly half of France were his, and he was well able to rule over them and keep them in order.

He was a short, stout, reddish-haired man, with a face well-tanned by exposure to the wind and the sun. His legs were bowed by constant riding. Ever busy at something, he rarely sat down, except at meals; and there was plenty of work for him to do.