"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."

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He shook as one that looks on death:

"God save you, mother!" straight he saith, "Where is my wife, Elizabeth?"

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WITH HER TWO BAIRNS I MARKED HER LONG.

"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 grassy lea,
To right, to left, "Ho, Enderby!"
They rang "The Brides of Enderby!"

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100

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,
105 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.

110 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 115 Before a shallow seething wave

Sobbed in the grasses at our feet;
The feet had hardly time to flee
Before it brake against the knee,
And all the world was in the sea.

120 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 bignA lurid mark and dread to see;

125 And awsome bells they were to me,

130

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;

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UPON THE ROOF WE SAT THAT NIGHT.

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 grass,
That ebb swept out the flocks to sea;

A fatal ebb and flow, alas!

To many more than mine and me:

140

145 But each will mourn his own (she saith), And sweeter woman ne'er drew breath Than my son's wife, Elizabeth.

150

155

I shall never hear her more

By the reedy Lindis shore,

"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.

160

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 shore;
165 I shall never hear her calling,

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Leave your meadow grasses mellow,
Mellow, mellow;

Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow;

Come up, Whitefoot, come up, Lightfoot:

170 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."

Belfry. A part of a steeple or Mablethorpe.

175

JEAN INGELOW.

On the Coast of

tower where bells are hung; Lincolnshire; is now a bathing

originally a watch-tower. Boston, or St. Botolph's Town, in South-east Lincolnshire, is so called because the Saint founded a convent here in 654 A.D. Changes.

Variations in ringing

the bells. Swells. A kind of peal in bellringing. Enderby Mavis. A place in East Lincolnshire. Mew. A gull.

Peewit. A bird often found on moors, called also the lapwing. Melick. A plant that grows in

marshy places. Swanherds. Those who tend flocks of swans.

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resort.

Warping. Towed or moving along
with a line attached to a buoy.
Scorpe. A spit of sand.
Welkin. The sky, the vault of
heaven.

Bairns. Children.
Lea. Meadow.

Eygre (pronounced ā-ger). A Lin-
colnshire name for a "bore," a
great wave that rushes up some
rivers when the tide comes up.
There is one on the Trent, and as
it comes the boatmen utter the

warning cry, Ware eygre!" for it is sometimes very dangerous. Weltering. Rolling, wallowing. Awsome. Dreadful, awful.

LESSON 46.

AN AWKWARD TWENTY MINUTES.

PART I.

Sir Samuel Baker (1821-1893) lived a life crowded with adventure. He spent eight years of colonisation and sport in Ceylon; he took part in the Crimean War; he organised the first railway in Turkey; and he added much to the world's knowledge of Central Africa. Baker wrote Eight Years in Ceylon," 'The Rifle and Hound in Ceylon," Albert N'yanza, Great Basin of the Nile,' ""Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia," and "Ismailia"; but, though he was a great traveller, he was not a great writer. The interest of his books lies in the incidents described, not in the descriptions themselves.

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THE haunts of the buffalo are in the hottest parts of Ceylon. In the neighbourhood of lakes, swamps, and extensive plains, the buffalo exists in large herds;