Puslapio vaizdai
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In the city to which the pine was taken, lay a large and beautiful ship lately launched into the water. On this the pine was erected as a mast, and on the highest point waved the flag.

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But the proud mast could not carry the ship forward.

Then there came a great white cloth; that was the sail. It went up after the mast, wrapped itself around it, spread itself out like a giant wing, and caught the wind on its wide curve.

The sail was woven of linen that grew out in the field on the edge of the wood; and the friends who were so dear to each other clasped each other faithfully. Out over the blue waves and the foaming billows they went, to new, beautiful lands and unknown places. It was life, it was pleasure, to go on united, side by side.

The wind, who travels with messages around the world, flew to the forest, to the thistle, and the burdock, and told them that the pine and the flax, now united, were traveling over the ocean.

"Who would have believed it?" whispered the forest trees.

"Who could have believed it?" said the burdock and its comrades.

But the pine and the flax believed it. They believed in each other.

ALBREKT SEGERSTEDT.

THE SCOTTISH SHEPHERD IN WINTER.

When red hath set the beamless sun,
Through heavy vapors dark and dun;
When the tired plowman, dry and warm,
Hears, half asleep, the rising storm,
Hurling the hail, and sleeted rain
Against the casement's tinkling pane;
The sounds that drive wild deer and fox
To shelter in the brake and rocks,
Are warnings which the shepherd ask
To dismal and to dangerous task.

Oft he looks forth, and hopes, in vain,
The blast may sink in mellowing rain;
Till, dark above, and white below,
Decided drives the flaky snow,
And forth the hardy swain must go.

Long, with dejected look and whine,
To leave the hearth the dogs repine;
Whistling and cheering them to aid,
Around his back he wreathes the plaid :
His flock he gathers and he guides,
To open downs, the mountain sides,
Where fiercest though the tempest blow,
Least deeply lies the drift below.

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The blast, that whistles o'er the fells,
Stiffens his locks to icicles;

Oft he looks back, while streaming far,
His cottage window seems a star,-
Loses its feeble gleam, and then
Turns patient to the blast again,
And, facing to the tempest's sweep,
Drives through the gloom his lagging sheep.

If fails his heart, if his limbs fail,
Benumbing death is in the gale:
His paths, his landmarks, all unknown,
Close to the hut, no more his own,
Close to the aid he sought in vain,
The morn may find the stiffened swain:
The widow sees, at dawning pale,
His orphans raise their feeble wail;
And, close beside him in the snow,
Poor Yarrow, partner of their woe,
Couches upon his master's breast,"
And licks his cheek to break his rest.

WALTER SCOTT.

I slept, and dreamed that life was Beauty;
I woke, and found that life was Duty.
Was my dream, then, a shadowy lie?
Toil on, poor heart, unceasingly;
And thou shalt find thy dream to be
A truth and noonday light to thee.

ELLEN STURGIS HOOPER.

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