――――:o:―――― CANTO VI. Breathes there the man, with soul so dead, Who never to himself has said, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne’er within him burn’d, As home his footsteps he hath turn’d, 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; 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, unhonour’d, and unsung. O Caledonia! stern and wild, Meet nurse for a poetic child! Land of brown heath and shaggy wood, Land of the mountain and the flood, Land of my sires! what mortal hand Can e’er untie the filial band That knits me to thy rugged strand! * * * * * WALTER SCOTT. ―――― A DECLAMATION. By Miss Mudge, _the Blue Stocking_. Breathes there the man with soul so dead, Who never several times has read The works of Spencer and of Mill! Whose heart hath ne’er within him burned, As o’er the pages he has turned Of Hamilton upon the Will! If such there breathe, go rate him well, For him no student’s raptures swell. High though his titles, what of them? I want a man whose diadem Is the Binomial Theorem! What matters it how proud his look, He knows not Euclid’s second book! His wealth is boundless――that may be; But how about his Rule of Three? Despite his titles, pride and pelf, And all the books upon his shelf, The wretch not knowing Algebra, Shall greeted be with shouts of “Bah!” Whilst many an one, his soul to vex, Shall ask him what’s the power of _x_ And give him, heeding not his groans, Equations with the three unknowns. Until at last, his torture’s o’er, He seeks a School Board’s open door; And there, by jeers to action stung, Begins on learning’s lowest rung, O Conic Sections! oft reviled, How sweet thou art to this young child! And book eleven of Euclid too, How sweet it is thy props, to do! And then to draw from them deductions! There’s but one thing still better――Fluxions! Geometry! what mortal hand Can e’er untie the knotted band That knits me to thy propositions, Thy postulates and definitions! Strong too’s the cord which fastens me To Statics and Geology! Still stronger those which me affiance To thee, my own, my Natural Science! But strongest are the heavenly ones That join me to Mars’ late-found suns! [_She collapses._