“ The unknown rider reins his steed back on his haunches right in the path of a broad-shouldered militiaman. "Now! cowards! advance another step and I'll strike you to the heart!" shouts the unknown, extending a pistol in either hand. "What! are you Americans, men, and fly before British soldiers? Back again, and face them once more, or I myself will ride you down." This appeal was not without its effect. The militiaman turns; his comrades, as if by one impulse, follow his example. In one line, but thirty men in all, they confront thirty sharp bayonets. The British advance. ”

“ Home! how often we hear persons speak of the home of their childhood. Their minds seem to delight in dwelling upon the recollections of joyous days spent beneath the parental roof, when their young and happy hearts were as light and free as the birds who made the woods resound with the melody of their cheerful voices. What a blessing it is, when weary with care, and burdened with sorrow, to have a home to which we can go, and there, in the midst of friends we love, forget our troubles and dwell in peace and quietness. ”

“ There was something in the appearance of this horse and his rider that struck them with surprise. Look! he draws his sword, the sharp blade quivers through the air—he points to the distant battle, and, lo! he is gone; gone through those clouds, while his shout echoes over the plains. Wherever the fight is the thickest, there, through intervals of cannon smoke, you may see riding madly forward that strange soldier, mounted on his steed black as death. Look at him, as with face red with British blood he waves his sword and shouts to his legions. ”

“ Find out if you are always honest; if you always tell the square, perfect truth in business deals; if your life is as good and upright at eleven o'clock at night as it is at noon; if you are as sound a temperance man on a fishing expedition as you are at a Sabbath-school picnic; if you are as good a boy when you go to Chicago as you are at home; if, in short, you really are the manner of young man your father hopes you are, your mother says you are, and your sweetheart believes you are. ”

“ Coming from childhood's sunny lips, it has a peculiar charm; for it speaks of one to whom they look and trust for protection.
A mother is the truest friend we have; when trials heavy and sudden fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends, who rejoiced with us in our sunshine, desert us when troubles thicken around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts. ”

“ The servants immediately start to obey the king's command, but there was a rule in Oriental society that no woman might appear in public without having her face veiled. Yet here was a mandate that no one dare dispute, demanding that Vashti come in unveiled before the multitude. However, there was in Vashti's soul a principle more regal than Ahasuerus, more brilliant than the gold of Shushan, of more wealth than the revenue of Persia, which commanded her to disobey the order of the King; and so all the righteousness and holiness and modesty of her nature rises up into one sublime refusal. ”

“ Heaven! that land of quiet rest—toward which those, who, worn down and tired with the toils of earth, direct their frail barks over the troubled waters of life, and after a long and dangerous passage, find it—safe in the haven of eternal bliss. Heaven is the home that awaits us beyond the grave. There the friendships formed on earth, and which cruel death has severed, are never more to be broken: and parted friends shall meet again, never more to be separated. ”

“ Richmond dropped the first letter and picked another. "The same stuff," he commented. "I hope you do not believe a word he says. Ah! now in number three he calls you 'an angel!' He's romantic, upon my soul! And what is this? 'Those who forbid me to see you can find no fault with me but my poverty. I am honest—I am earnest in my efforts. I am by birth a gentleman, and I love you from the depths of my soul. Do not let them sell you for gold, Lucilla.' Great heavens, what impertinence to your parents!"
"I don't remember Fred saying anything of that kind," said poor little Lucilla. ”

“ You shall call it the elixir of life. You shall believe it to be nutritious to the body and gladdening to the soul. The love of it shall grow with the use of it. It shall soothe the solitary hour and cheer the festive board. It shall charm away your griefs, and be the cause of your rejoicings. It shall be the inducement to communion and the bond of friendship. It shall be prized alike by the high and the low. It shall be the joy of princes as well as of the meanest of mortals. It shall be the stimulant to laborious toil, and the reward for labor done. ”

“ Six horses to a piece, three riders to each gun. Over dry ditches where a farmer could not drive a [Pg 31] wagon; through clumps of bushes, over logs a foot thick, every horse on the gallop, every rider lashing his team and yelling,—the sight behind us makes us forget the foe in front. The guns jump two feet high as the heavy wheels strike rock or log, but not a horse slackens his pace, not a cannoneer loses his seat. Six guns, six caissons, sixty horses, eighty men, race for the brow of the hill as if he who reached it first was to be knighted. ”

“ Whose honor have I wantonly assailed? Whose rights, though of the weakest and poorest, have I violated? I dwell, where I would ever dwell, in the hearts of my people. It is written in your faces, that I reign not more over you than within you. The foundation of my throne is not more power than love.
Suppose, now, my ambition should add another province to our realm. Would that be an evil? The kingdoms already bound to us by the joint acts of ourselves and the late royal Odenatus, we found discordant and at war. They are now united and at peace. ”

“ Broke and fled.
No one staid—but the dead!
With curses, shrieks and cries,
Horses and wagons and men
Tumbled back through the shuddering glen,
And above us the fading skies.
There's one hope, still,—
Those batteries parked on the hill!
"Battery, wheel!" (mid the roar)
"Pass pieces; fix prolonge to fire
Retiring. Trot!" In the panic dire
A bugle rings "Trot"—and no more.
The horses plunged,
The cannon lurched and lunged,
To join the hopeless rout.
But suddenly rode a form
Calmly in front of the human storm,
With a stern, commanding shout:
"Align those guns!" ”

“ And thus the soul flies from zone to zone and from world to world, sipping the sweets of wisdom, as the bee sucks honey from the flowers; reading lessons from the leaflet on the tree, studying the language of the soft whispering zephyr, and of the hurricane which springs from nothing into devastating power; and it is ever restless in its researches, for it seeks its own happiness and improvement in its new discoveries, and in a better knowledge of God's creation. Speak to the human soul of liberty, and swell it with gratitude, and, beaming with smiles, it will follow whereever you lead. ”

“ I tell you, Mirandy! the man who conceived that brilliant notion is a heaven-born genius—a boon to mankind; and his name should go ringing down the corridors of time with those of such brilliant intellect as Watt, Morse, Edison, and other successful scientific investigators. You see, the least jar of the door will dislodge the pan, and the noise occasioned thereby will not only awaken the occupants of the room, but will also scare the burglar half to death, and perhaps the pan will strike him on the head and fracture his skull. ”

“ Every day's experience, every hour of reflection, teaches me that it is the duty of patriotism, the duty of humanity, the duty of Christianity, to live Christian lives, and to exert temperance influence among the people.
There was a time, when I was younger than I am now, when I hoped to live long enough to see the cause which my heart loves and my judgment approves stronger than it is to-day. ”

“ A score of the whistling soldiers were caught by the rebel host.
With hands fast tied behind us, we were dragged to a prison pen,
Where, hollow-eyed and starving, lay a thousand loyal men.
No roof but the vault of Heaven, no bed save the beaten sod,
Shut in from the world around us, by a wall where the sentries trod.
For a time our Annie Laurie brought cheer to that prison pen;
A hope to the hearts of the living; a smile to the dying men. ”

“ Is so much ambition praiseworthy, and more criminal? Is it fixed in nature that the limits of this empire should be Egypt on the one hand, the Hellespont and the Euxine on the other? Were not Suez and Armenia more natural limits? Or hath empire no natural limit, but is broad as the genius that can devise, and the power that can win? Rome has the West. Let Palmyra possess the East. Not that nature prescribes this and no more. The gods prospering, I mean that the Mediterranean shall not hem me in upon the west, or Persia on the east. ”

“ It shall disgrace the judge upon the bench, the minister in the sacred desk, and the senator in his exalted seat. It shall make your food tasteless, your mouth to burn as with a fever, and your stomach to tremble as with disease. It shall cause the besotted mother to overlay her newborn, unconscious that it dies beneath the pressure of her weight; the natural cravings of the infant shall make it strive to awaken her who has passed, unheeded, to her last long sleep. The son shall hide his face that he may not behold his father's depravity ”

“ The meal was passed in silence; then, having adjourned to the parlor, Mr. Richmond seated himself in a great arm-chair, and demanded, in a voice of thunder: "Those absurd letters, if you please."
"Six letters—six shameful pieces of deception, Lucilla," said the indignant parent. "I am shocked that a child of mine should practice such duplicity. Hem! let me see. Number one, I believe. June, and this is December. Half a year you have deceived us then, Lucilla. Let me see—ah! 'From the first moment I adored you,' bah! Nonsense. People don't fall in love in that absurd manner. ”

“ The last vestige of that feast is gone; the last garland has faded; the last arch has fallen; the last tankard has been destroyed, and Shushan is a ruin; but as long as the world stands there will be multitudes of men and women, familiar with the Bible, who will come into this picture-gallery of God and admire the divine portrait of Vashti, the Queen; Vashti, the veiled; Vashti, the sacrifice; Vashti, the silent. ”

“ You would think a tornado was howling through the forest, followed by billows of fire, and yet men live through it—aye! press forward to capture the battery! We can hear their shouts as they form for the rush.
Now the shells are changed for grape and canister, and the guns are served so fast that all reports blend into one mighty roar. The shriek of a shell is the wickedest sound in war, but nothing makes the flesh crawl like the demoniac singing, purring, whistling grape-shot and the serpent-like hiss of canister. Men's legs and arms are not shot through, but torn off. ”

“ Leaving the weeping of women, and booming of signal guns;
Leaving the mother who loved them, and the girls that the sailors love,
Going to death for duty, and trusting to God above!
Do you murmur a prayer, my brothers, when cozy and safe in bed,
For men like these, who are ready to die for a wreck off Mumbles Head?
It didn't go well with the lifeboat! 'twas a terrible storm that blew! ”

“ Life can never be too short, which brings nothing but disgrace and oppression. Death never comes too soon, if necessary in defence of the liberties of your country.
I call upon you, old men, for your counsels, and your prayers, and your benedictions. May not your gray hairs go down in sorrow to the grave, with the recollection that you have lived in vain. May not your last sun sink in the west upon a nation of slaves. ”

“ Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance by lying supinely on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies shall have bound us hand and foot? Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper use of those means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. ”

“ Into the great vestibule of heaven, God called up a man from dreams, saying, "Come thou hither, and see the glory of my house." And, to the servants that stood around His throne, He said, "Take him, and undress him from his robes of flesh; cleanse his vision, and put a new breath into his nostrils; only touch not with any change his human heart,—the heart that weeps and trembles."
It was done; and, with a mighty angel for his guide, the man stood ready for his infinite voyage ”

“ It lights up the ocean's bed, melting its mysteries into solution, detecting its coral richness, and causing its buried pearls, which have rested for long centuries beneath the black waves, to glow with their long-hoarded beauty. It holds converse with the glittering planets of the skies and compels them to tell it of their mountain ranges, their landscapes, and their utility. It toys with the mad lightnings which break from the darkness, and guides death and destruction through the earth, until it allures the impetuous element into docility and subserviency. ”

“ Every gun is using short-fuse shell. The ground shakes and trembles—the roar shuts out all sounds from a battle-line three miles long, and the shells go shrieking into the swamp to cut trees short off—to mow great gaps in the bushes—to hunt out and shatter and mangle men until their corpses cannot be recognized as human. ”

“ He was such a burst of sunshine into our lives that his going away has been like covering our every-day existence with a pall. Sometimes, when we sit alone of an evening, I writing and she sewing, a child on the street will call out as our boy used to, and we will both start up with beating hearts and a wild hope, only to find the darkness more of a burden than ever. ”

“ That fortress yonder, on Bemiss' Heights, must be won, or the American cause is lost! That cliff is too steep—that death is too certain. The officers cannot persuade the men to advance. The Americans have lost the field. Even Morgan, that iron man among iron men, leans on his rifle and despairs of the field. But look yonder! In this moment when all is dismay and horror, here crashing on, comes the black horse and his rider. That rider bends upon his steed, his frenzied face covered with sweat and dust and blood ”