Fourth Reader. Various

Чтение книги онлайн.

      “Ay,” said the oak tree, feebly, “my end has come; see, I am shattered and helpless.”

      “But I am unhurt,” remonstrated the ivy; “and I shall bind up your wounds and nurse you back to health and vigor.”

      And so it was that, although the oak tree was ever afterwards a riven and broken thing, the ivy concealed the scars upon his shattered form and covered his wounds all over with her soft foliage.

      “I had hoped,” she said, “to grow up to thy height, to live with thee among the clouds, and to hear the solemn voices thou didst hear.”

      But the old oak tree said, “Nay, nay, I love thee better as thou art, for with thy beauty and thy love thou comfortest mine age.”

      Then would the ivy tell quaint stories to the oak tree, – stories she had learned from the crickets, the bees, the butterflies, and the mice when she was a humble little vine and played at the foot of the majestic oak tree towering in the greenwood. And these simple tales pleased the old and riven oak tree; they were not as heroic as the tales the wind, the clouds, and the stars told, but they were far sweeter, for they were tales of contentment, of humility, of love. So the old age of the oak tree was grander than his youth.

      And all who went through the greenwood paused to behold and admire the beauty of the oak tree then; for about his scarred and broken trunk the gentle vine had so entwined her graceful tendrils and spread her fair foliage, that one saw not the havoc of the years nor the ruin of the tempest, but only the glory of the oak tree’s age, which was the ivy’s love and ministering. – Eugene Field.

      HARVEST SONG

      HARVEST TIME

      HARE-AND-HOUNDS AT RUGBY

      The only incident worth recording here, however, was the first run at hare-and-hounds. On the last Tuesday but one of the half-year, Tom was passing through the hall after dinner, when he was hailed with shouts from Tadpole and several other boys. They were seated at one of the long tables; the chorus of their shouts was, “Come and help us tear up scent.”

      Tom approached the table in obedience to the summons, always ready to help, and found the party engaged in tearing up old newspapers, copy-books, and magazines into small pieces, with which they were filling four large canvas bags.

      “It’s the turn of our house to find scent for Big-side hare-and-hounds,” exclaimed Tadpole. “Tear away; there’s no time to lose.”

      “I think it’s a great shame,” said another small boy, “to have such a hard run for the last day.”

      “Which run is it?” said Tadpole.

      “Oh, the Barby run, I hear,” answered the other. “Nine miles at least, and hard ground; no chance of getting in at the finish unless you’re a first-rate runner.”

      “Well, I’m going to have a try,” said Tadpole.

      “I should like to try, too,” said Tom.

      “Well, then, leave your waistcoat behind, and listen at the door, after roll-call, and you’ll hear where the meet is.”

      After roll-call, sure enough, there were two boys at the door, calling out, “Big-side hare-and-hounds meet at White Hall.” And Tom, having girded himself with leather strap, and left all superfluous clothing behind, set off for White Hall, an old gable-ended house some quarter of a mile from the town, with East, whom he had persuaded to join. At the meet they found some forty or fifty boys; and Tom felt sure, from having seen many of them run at football, that he and East were more likely to get in than they.

      After a few minutes’ waiting, two well-known runners, chosen for the hares, buckled on the four bags filled with scent, compared their watches with those of young Brooke and Thorne, and started off at a long, swinging trot across the fields in the direction of Barby. Then the hounds clustered round Thorne, who explained shortly: “They’re to have six minutes’ law. We run into the Cock, and every one who comes in within a quarter of an hour of the hares will be counted, if he has been round Barby church.”

      Then comes a pause of a minute or so, and then the watches are pocketed, and the pack is led through the gateway into the field which the hares had first crossed. Here they break into a trot, scattering over the field to find the first traces of the scent which the hares throw out as they go along.

      The old hounds make straight for the likely points, and in a minute a cry of “Forward” comes from one of them, and the whole pack, quickening their pace, make for the spot. The boy who hit the scent first, and the two or three nearest to him, are over the first fence, and making play along the hedgerow in the long-grass СКАЧАТЬ