e warrior,
who formed the solitary exception to the multitude, in his blanket
covering, and who had been lingering in the extreme rear of the party,
came rapidly up to the spot where the well-affected struggle was
maintained. At his approach the hurdles of the other players were
withdrawn, when, at a single blow from his powerful arm, the ball was
seen flying in an oblique direction and was for a moment lost altogether
to the view. When it again met the eye, it was descending into the very
centre of the fort.

With the fleetness of thought now commenced a race which had ostensibly
for its object the recovery of the lost ball, and in which he who had
driven it with resistless force outstripped them all. Their course lay
between the two lines of squaws; and scarcely had the head of the
bounding Indians reached the opposite extremity of those lines, when the
women suddenly threw back their blankets, and disclosed each a short gun
and tomahawk. To throw away their hurdles and seize upon these, was the
work of an instant. Already, in imagination, was the fort their own;
and, such, was the peculiar exaltation of the black and turbaned warrior
when he felt the planks of the drawbridge bending beneath his feet, all
the ferocious joy of his soul was pealed forth in the terrible cry
which, rapidly succeeded by that of the other Indians, had resounded so
fearfully through the council-room.

What their disappointment was, when, on gaining the interior, they found
the garrison prepared for their reception, has already been shown.

Major Richardson

MY NATIVE LAND

Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned,
From wandering on a foreign strand!
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim:
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust, from whence he sprung,
Unwept, unhonoured, and unsung.

Scott: "The Lay of the Last Minstrel."

MORNING ON THE LIEVRE

Far above us where a jay
Screams his matins to the day,
Capped with gold and amethyst,
Like a vapour from