once, and followed and supported by the smaller vessels; and such was the effect of her heavy carronades that the British ships all soon struck. The combat had lasted about three hours, with a loss on either side of one hundred and fifty in killed and wounded, Barclay himself among the latter.

Definitions.—I. În de făt ́i ga ble, unwearied. Căr ron ade', a kind of short cannon designed to throw a large ball with a small rate of motion. Twelve, a cannon throwing a ball weighing twelve pounds. 7. Weâr, to turn in another course.

NOTE. The battle of Lake Erie was fought Sept. 10th, 1813. It was the first time that a whole British fleet was surrendered. See Eclectic History of U. S., p. 219.

68. SOLITUDE.

GEORGE GORDON NOEL, LORD BYRON (1788-1824), was born in London. His father was a worthless profligate, who, after wasting his wife's fortune, deserted her. Byron's first volume, Hours of Idleness, was severely criticised, and the poet retorted with English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, one of the most caustic books of the age. He afterwards wrote several long poems, of which Childe Harold is the best. The Giaour, The Bride of Abydos, The Corsair, The Siege of Corinth, and Don Juan are of less power, but any one would serve to make the reputation of a poet. He died in Greece while aiding that nation in their struggle with the Turks. His greatest strength as a writer was in the field of description, particularly of striking and majestic scenery.

1. To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,

Where things that own not man's dominion dwell,
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen,
With the wild flock that never needs the fold:
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean-

This is not solitude; 't is but to hold

Converse with Nature's charms, and view her stores

unrolled.

2. But 'midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men, To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess,

To roam along, the world's wide denizen,

With none who bless us, none whom we can bless,
Minions of splendor shrinking from distress!
None that with kindred consciousness endued,
If we were not, would seem to smile the less
Of all that flattered, followed, sought, or sued;
This is to be alone; this is solitude.

69. A CARNIVAL OF LIGHT.

She re

HELEN HUNT JACKSON (1830–1885) was born in Massachusetts. ceived a thorough education, but did not commence to write till she was thirty years of age. She published several volumes-verses, travels, short stories, and novels. Her best books are Ramona and A Century of Dishonor, both of which deal with the wrongs of the Indians, in whose welfare Mrs. Hunt took a strong interest in her later life. Her writings are sparkling and vivacious, sometimes extravagant, but always suggestive. The following selection is adapted from Bits of Travel at Home.

1. FROM the top of the square granite rock off which the Merced leaps in the Pi-wy-ack Fall runs a narrow staircaseway down to the bottom of the cañon. It is a staircase, and not a ladder; for the steps are not rounds, and there is a railing to cling to. But it feels like a ladder, and most persons can get down easier by going backward. You land at the mouth of a shallow cave, whose whole roof is fringed with the dainty maiden-hair fern. There is only a narrow rocky run between you and the mad river which is foaming

down the cañon. On each side the stone walls rise almost vertically, and are thickly wooded with firs and cedars.

2. There you are, you and the river, together at the bottom of this crevice. It is easy to see what would become of you if the river were suddenly to crowd a little. Every pine, every cedar, every moss is glistening. The bowlders are black, they are so wet. You can look only a little way down the cañon, for the spray rises in clouds which lap, and roll, and spread like steam. Going a few steps into it, and looking back to the Fall, you see that just at the upper edge it is emerald green for a hand's-breadth, perhaps, no more; then it breaks all at once, in an instant, into millions of distinct drops, sparkling, whirling, round as dew-drops, falling in perpetual showers.

3. No need here to travel for the magic rainbow end where the money lies. It follows you, it trips you up, it tangles around your feet. As I first walked back toward the Fall, after going as far out in the spray as I dared, I accidentally slipped on a rolling stone. I looked down quickly to find a firmer footing; and I looked down upon a broad band of the most brilliant rainbow. I exclaimed at the sight; but as I exclaimed, the rainbow slipped to the left, then as I advanced it slowly retreated, as if luring me to the Fall. Suddenly as it came it vanished on the surface of a wet bowlder. A step or two back into the spray, and it danced under my feet; a step or two forward, and it was gone.

4. "These ain't any thing," said Murphy. "The place where you get the rainbows is down there," pointing into what looked like the mouth of a steaming caldron, some rods down the cañon.

5. Through this we must go if we walked down to Lady Franklin's Rock. Remembering the choked breath and dripping hair of the people we had seen the day before, we hesitated; but, remembering also the joy which flashed in their eyes, we longed.

6. Leaping from stone to stone, poising on slippery logs under water, clinging to Murphy's hand as to a life-preserver, blinded, choked, stifled, drenched, down into that cañon, through that steaming spray, we went. It was impossible to keep one's eyes open wide for more than half a second at a time. The spray drove and pelted, making great gusts of wind by its own weight as it fell. It seemed to whirl round and round, and wrap us, as if trying to draw us down into the black depths.

7. It was desperately uncomfortable and dangerous, no doubt. But what of that? We were taken into the heart of a carnival of light. Rainbows rioted every-where, and we were crowding and jostling through as we could. The air was full of them; the ground danced with them; they climbed, and chased, and tumbled mockingly over our heads and shoulders, and across our faces. I nearly lost my footing, laughing at one, made chiefly of blue and purple, which flitted across Murphy's left eyebrow. They wheeled, and broke into bits, and flew; they swung, and revolved, and twined.

8. When I looked at them in the air, I could think of nothing but a gigantic loom on which threads of rainbow were being shuttled and woven with magic swiftness. When I looked down into the confusion of dark bowlders and pools under our feet, I could think of nothing but gigantic mill-hoppers spinning round and grinding up purple, and blue, and yellow, and green, and red. I held out my hand, caught the threads of the loom, stopped them, turned them, snapped them. I leaned down and dipped into the purple, and blue, and yellow, and green, and red, and lifted them in the hollow of my palm. I do not think anybody could have come nearer to the secrets of rainbows if he had sat in the sky and watched the first one made.

9. There was nobody waiting at the Rock to laugh at us as we also came, running, bending over, parting the wet