been doing?

4. Where are they going?

5. What feeling is expressed

in the second stanza? 6. Describe the picture that this story brings to your mind. 7. What details do you remember of the picture of the sea home in stanza 4? 8. What gives color to the picture? 9. What called Margaret away from the sea home? 10. How did the merman and the children try to bring her back? you get of Margaret in church (stanza 6). of seal'd (stanza 6). 13. What things give

11.

Describe the picture which

12. Explain the meaning Margaret pleasure in the

town? 14. Why is she not entirely happy? 15. In the eighth stanza what is the feeling expressed? 16. What difference is there in the feel17. What words show the continuing love of the merman and the children for Margaret? 18. Select a passage which seems to you the most beautiful picture in the poem.

ing of the ninth stanza?

For Study with the Glossary: spent (used up), spindle, amber, heath. Matthew Arnold was the son of Dr. Thomas Arnold, the great teacher you have read about in Tom Brown at Rugby. Matthew Arnold was a poet of rare quality and one of the chief essayists and critics of his time. You will enjoy his long poem, Sohrab and Rustum.

Topics for Oral Composition and Debate

1. The Life of Byron.

2. The Lives of Byron and Shelley Compared.

3. Some Poems of the Sea.

4. Some Poems of the Great War.

5. Is "Horatius" or "The Prisoner of Chillon " the better poem? 6. Is verse or prose the easier to remember?

ELEGY, WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea, The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r,

The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such as, wand'ring near her secret bow'r, Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,

The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,

No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

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For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,

Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!

How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,

And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike th' inevitable hour.

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,

Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire,

Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,
Or wak'd to ecstasy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page
Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll
Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene

The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear; Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

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;

Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little Tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,

Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

Th' applause of list'ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,

And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib'd alone

Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd;
Forbade to wade, thro' slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind;

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The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride

With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray;
Along the cool sequester'd vale of life

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd Muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply;

And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who, to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,

This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires ;
Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.