thrall,
The loving laurel turned my tide,
The ferns and the fondling grass said, "Stay,"
The dewberry dipped for to work delay,
And the little reeds sighed, "Abide, abide,"
Here in the hills of Habersham,
Here in the valleys of Hall.

High o'er the hills of Habersham,
Veiling the valleys of Hall,
The hickory told me manifold
Fair tales of shade; the poplar tall
Wrought me her shadowy self to hold;
The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,
Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign,
Said, "Pass not so cold, these manifold
Deep shades of the hills of Habersham,
These glades in the valleys of Hall."

And oft in the hills of Habersham,
And oft in the valleys of Hall,
The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook stone
Did bar me of passage with friendly brawl;
And many a luminous jewel lone
(Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist,
Ruby, garnet, or amethyst)
Made lures with the lights of streaming stone
In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,
In the beds of the valleys of Hall.

FOOTNOTE:

[Footnote 13: By Sidney Lanier, an American musician and poet
(1842-1881). From the _Poems of Sidney Lanier_, published by Charles
Scribner's Sons.]

EXPRESSION: Compare this poem with the one which precedes it.
Compare them both with Tennyson's "Song of the Brook" ("Fifth
Reader," p. 249). Which is the most musical? Which is the best
simply as a description?

Make a list of the unusual words in this last poem, and refer to
the dictionary for their meaning. In what state is the
Chattahoochee River? "Habersham" and "Hall" are the names of two
counties in the same state.

If you have access to a library, find Southey's poem, "The Cataract
of Lodore," and read it aloud.

WAR AND PEACE

I. WAR AS THE MOTHER OF VALOR AND CIVILIZATION[14]

We still hear war extolled at times as the mother of valor and the prime
agency in the world's advancement. By it, we are told, civilization has
spread and nations have been created, slavery has been abolished and the
American Union preserved. It is even held that without war human
progress would have been impossible.

The answer: Men were at first savages who preyed upon each other like
wild beasts, and so they developed a physical courage which they shared
with the brutes. Moral courage was unknown to them. War