Ornithologist. birds. Genera. genus; One who studies same order, as hens, pigeons, pheasants, grouse, etc. Desultory. Going on by a series Plural of the Latin Betides. Happens to. Wavering; moving first one way and then the other. Gesticulations. Gestures; motions of the body and limbs. COMPOSITION.—Explain how the structure of birds adapts them for flight. LESSON 19. A SIEGE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. PART I. Charles Reade (1814-1884), novelist and dramatist, came of a good family. After being well flogged by one private tutor and well taught by another, he went to Oxford, where he won honours and a fellowship. At the age of twenty-eight he was called to the bar; but he does not seem to have been ambitious of success in his profession, though he must have succeeded if all the work that he gave other lawyers had been given to him. He held very strong views on various subjects, and was as ready to enforce them in the courts as in his books-many of which were written to expose abuses or to promote reform. "It is Never too Late to Mend," for instance, was directed against the prison system; "Hard Cash," against private lunatic asylums; "Foul Play," against insuring rotten ships; "Put Yourself in His Place," against trades unions, and “A Woman Hater,” against the wrongs of the sex. The presence of a too obvious purpose, no less than the intrusion of the author's strong personality, took something away from the merit of Reade's novels as art. His characteristic faults, however, hardly appear in "The Cloister and the Hearth," which is not only the best of his works but one of the best historical romances ever written. THAT afternoon they came in sight of a strongly fortified town; and a whisper went through the little army that this was a disaffected place. But when they came in sight, the great gate stood open, and the towers that flanked it on each side were manned with a single sentinel apiece. So the advancing force somewhat broke their array and marched carelessly. When they were within a furlong, the drawbridge across the moat rose slowly and creaking till it stood vertical against the fort; and the very moment it settled into this warlike attitude, down rattled the portcullis at the gate, and the towers and curtains bristled with lances and crossbows. A stern hum ran through the front rank and spread to the rear. "Halt!" cried their leader. down the line, and they halted. gate!" The word went "Herald to the A herald spurred out of the ranks, and halting twenty yards from the gate, raised his bugle with his herald's flag hanging down round it, and blew a summons. A tall figure in brazen armour appeared over the gate. A few fiery words passed between him. and the herald, which were not audible, but their import clear, for the herald blew a single keen and threatening note at the walls, and came galloping back with war in his face. The leader moved out of the line to meet him, and their heads had not been together two seconds ere he turned in his saddle and shouted, "Pioneers, to the van!" and in a moment hedges were levelled, and the force took the field and encamped just out of shot from the walls; and away went mounted officers flying south, east, and west, to the friendly towns, for catapults, palisades, mantelets, raw hides, tar-barrels, carpenters, provisions, and all the materials for a siege. The besiegers encamped a furlong from the walls, and made roads; kept their pikemen in camp ready for an assault when practicable; and sent forward their sappers, pioneers, catapultiers, and crossbowmen. These opened a siege by filling the moat, and mining, or breaching the wall, etc. And as much of their work had to be done under close fire of arrows, quarrels, bolts, stones, and little rocks, the above artists "had need of a hundred eyes," and acted in concert with a vigilance, and an amount of individual intelligence, daring, and skill that made a siege very interesting, and even amusing, to lookers-on. The first thing they did was to advance their carpenters behind rolling mantelets, and to erect a stockade high and strong on the very edge of the moat. Some lives were lost at this, but not many; for a strong force of crossbowmen, including Denys, rolled their mantelets up and shot over the workmen's heads at every besieged who showed his nose, and at every loop-hole, arrow-slit, or other aperture, which commanded the particular spot the carpenters happened to be upon. Covered by their condensed fire, these soon raised a high palisade between them and the ordinary missiles from the walls. But the besieged expected this, and ran out at night their hoards or wooden penthouses on the top of the curtains. The curtains were built with square holes near the top to receive the beams that supported these structures, the true defence of medieval forts, from which the besieged delivered their missiles with far more freedom and variety of range than they could shoot through the oblique but immovable loop-holes of the curtain, or even through the sloping crenelets of the higher towers. On this the besiegers brought up mangonels, and set them hurling huge stones at these wood-works and battering them to pieces. At the same time they built a triangular wooden tower as high as the curtain, and kept it ready for use, and just out of shot. This was a terrible sight to the besieged. These wooden towers had taken many a town. They began to mine underneath that part of the moat the tower stood frowning at; and made other preparations to give it a warm reception. The besiegers also mined, but at another part, their object being to get under the square barbican and throw it down. All this time Denys was behind his mantelet with another arbalestrier, protecting the workmen and making some excellent shots. These ended by earning him the esteem of an unseen archer, who every now and then sent a winged compliment quivering into his mantelet. One came and stuck within an inch of the narrow slit through which Denys was squinting at the moment. "Ha ha!" cried he, "you shoot well, my friend. Come forth and receive my congratulations! Shall merit such as thine hide its head? Comrade, it is one of those Englishmen, with his half ell shaft. I'll not die till I've had a shot at London wall." On the side of the besieged was a figure that soon attracted great notice by promenading under fire. It was a tall knight, clad in complete brass, and carrying a light but prodigiously long lance, with which he directed the movements of the besieged. And when any disaster befell the besiegers, this tall knight and his long lance were pretty sure to be concerned in it. My young reader will say, "Why did not Denys shoot him?" Denys did shoot him; every day of his life; other arbalestriers shot him; archers shot him. Everybody shot him. He was there to be shot, apparently. But the abomination was, he did not mind being shot. Nay, worse, he got at last so demoralised as not to seem to know when he was shot. At last the besiegers got spiteful, and would not waste any more good steel on him. They. The forces under Anthony and Baldwyn of Burgundy. They had entered Flanders to quell a rebellion against the Duke of Burgundy. Portcullis. A grating hung over the gateway of a castle or fort to be let down to keep the enemy out. Curtain. The unbroken wall which seems to hang like a curtain between two towers of a castle or fortified place. Import. Meaning. Pioneer. A soldier who clears the way before an army. Catapults. Machines used (before the introduction of cannon) for throwing great stones. Mantelet. A kind of very large shield used to protect besiegers as they were advancing towards the enemy. Sappers. Men employed in digging under the foundations of walls, etc. Quarrel. A diamond-shaped bolt for the crossbow. It is the Welsh word for " pane," from the fact that panes were formerly diamond-shaped. Stockade. A fence made by sticking stakes into the ground. Denys. A Burgundian archer, who had been pressed into the service of the besiegers. He is one of the chief characters in The Cloister and the Hearth. Aperture. Opening. Condensed fire. Fire all directed at one point. Penthouse. A shed sloping from a building. Medieval. Belonging to the middle ages. Crenelets. Openings at the top of towers; embrasures, battlements. Mangonels. Machines for throwing stones to batter walls. Barbican. A defence outside the walls, generally in front of the gate, or at the end of a drawbridge. Arbalestrier. Crossbowman. At London wall. Denys hired himself out as a soldier to any leader, and he hoped to be some time led to the attack of London. LESSON 20. A SIEGE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. PART II. It was a bright day, clear, but not quite frosty. The efforts of the besieging force were concentrated against a space of about two hundred and fifty yards, containing |