ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY IN BELZONI'S EXHIBITION. 21

Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat,

Or doff'd thine own to let Queen Dido pass,
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great Temple's dedication.

I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed,
Has any Roman soldier maul'd and knuckled,
For thou wert déad, and búried, and embálm'd,
Ere Romulus and Remus had been súckled:
Antiquity appears to have begún
Long after thy primeval race was rùn.

Thou couldst devélope, if that wither'd tongue
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have séen,
How the world look'd when it was fresh and young,
And the great deluge still had left it grèen;
Or was it then so old, that history's pages
Contain'd no record of its early ages?

Still silent, incommunicative élf!

Art sworn to secrecy? then keep thy vows; But pr'ythee tell us something of thysélf; Reveal the secrets of thy prison-hoùse ; Since in the world of spirits thou has slúmber'd, What hast thou sèen? what strange adventures nùmber'd?

Since first thy form was in this box exténded,

We have, above ground, seen some strange mutà

tions;

The Roman empire has begun and ended,

New worlds have risèn-we have lost old nátions,

22 ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY IN BELZONI'S EXHIBITION.

And countless kings have into dust been húmbled,
Whilst not a fragment of thy flesh has crùmbled.

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thine héad,
When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses,
March'd armies o'er thy tomb with thundering tread,
O'erthrew Osiris, O'rus, A'pis, I'sis,

And shook the Pyramids with fear and wonder,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asùnder?

If the tomb's secrets may not be conféss'd,
The nature of thy private life unfòld:

A heart has throbb'd beneath that leathern brèast,
And tears adown that dusky cheek have ròll'd:
Have children climb'd those knees, and kiss'd that

fáce?

What was thy nàme and stàtion, age and ràce?
Statue of flèsh-immortal of the dead!
Imperishable type of evanescence!

Posthumous màn, who quitt'st thy narrow béd,
And standest undecay'd within our présence,
Thou wilt hear nothing till the judgment mòrning,
When the great trump shall thrill thee with its warn-
ìng.

Why should this worthless ligament endure,
If its undying guest be lost for èver?
Oh, let us keep the soul embalm'd and pure,

In living virtue, that, when both must séver,
Although corruption may our frame consúme,
The immortal spirit in the skies may bloom.
Horace Smith.

ON INFLECTION.

28

MUCH of the force, variety, and harmony of reading depends on those risings and fallings of the voice, of which we are treating.

But as they are not marked in books, and as consequently you must exercise your own knowledge and judgment in making them, a few rules are here given for your guidance, which, with a little careful practice, will enable you to apply the various inflections with correctness and good taste.

1. Every simple affirmative sentence requires the falling inflection at its close.

A soft answer turneth away wràth.

Trials are the lot of màn.

Sincerity and truth form the basis of every virtue. The acquisition of knowledge is one of the most honourable occupations of yoùth.

Disappointments are often blessings in disguise.
Happy is the man that findeth wisdom.

Change and alteration form the very essence of the world.

A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.

2. Negative sentences require the rising inflection at the end, but the falling inflection on the negative word. Thou shalt not steál.

Entreat me not to leave thee.

Remove not the old lánd-marks.

The quality of mercy is nòt stráined.
Rejoice not when thy enemy fálleth.
Boast not thyself of to-morrow.

24

WHEN THE VOICE RISES OR FALLS.

3. Wherever words or phrases are used as antithetic, that is, opposed to each other, or in contradistinction, they must have opposite inflections.

Paúl, the Apòstle; or, Paùl, the Apóstle.
What is doné, cannot be ùndone.

Religion raises men above themselves; írreligion sinks them below the brutes.

For this corruptible must put on incorruption; this mórtal must put on immortality.

Religion is the best ármour in the world, but the worst cloak.

Death to the wicked is all lóss; to the righteous all gàin.

The difference between a madman and a fool is, that the former reasons justly from false data; and the latter wrongly from jùst data.

All nature is but árt, unknown to thee;

All chance, diréction, which thou canst not see ;
All discord, hármony, not understood;

All partial èvil, universal goód.

4. Interrogative sentences take the rising inflection.

Did you gó?

Are you going home?

Have you learned your lesson?

King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets?

Have ye not known? have ye not heard? hath it not been told you from the beginning? have ye not understood from the foundations of the earth?

WHEN THE VOICE RISES OR FALLS.

Who can count the dust of Jacob?

25

Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of his hand, and meted out heaven with a spàn? Where have ye laid him?

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress', or persecution, or fámine, or nakedness, or péril, or sword?

The exception to this rule is, that when a question is asked by a pronoun or adverb, it requires the falling inflection, as in the sentence above:-"Who shall separate us from the love of Christ ?"

5. A parenthesis has the same inflection as that which immediately precedes it in the sentence.

"And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, and sáid, (the number of the names together were about an hundred and twénty,) Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled."

66 The word which God sent unto the children of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ: (he is Lord of all)."

"Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of Gòd, (which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,) concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lòrd.”

Lét us (since life can little more supply
Than just to look about us and to díe)
Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man;
A mighty maze, but not without a plan.