The New York Speaker: A Selection of Pieces Designed for Academic Exercises in Elocution

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Mason Brothers, 1860 - Recitations - 502 pages

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Page 270 - TO him who in the love of nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty, and she glides Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness, ere he is aware.
Page 390 - What sought they thus afar? Bright jewels of the mine? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? — They sought a faith's pure shrine. Ay, call it holy ground, — The soil where first they trod! They have left unstained what there they found — Freedom to worship God ! Felicia Hemans.
Page 250 - In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire, In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire, Leaping higher, higher, higher, With a desperate desire, And a resolute endeavor Now — now to sit or never, By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Page 290 - Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody, So sweet we know not we are listening to it, Thou the meanwhile wast blending with my thought, Yea, with my life, and life's own secret joy ; Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused, Into the mighty vision passing — there, As in her natural form, swelled vast to heaven.
Page 273 - I heard you" — here I opened wide the door; Darkness there and nothing more. Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore?
Page 275 - Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted — On this home by Horror haunted — tell me truly, I implore: Is there — is there balm in Gilead? — tell me — tell me, I implore!
Page 250 - Yet the ear distinctly tells, In the jangling, And the wrangling, How the danger sinks and swells, By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells Of the bells Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells In the clamor and the clangor of the bells! IV Hear the tolling of the bells Iron bells! What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!
Page 304 - Work — work — work, Till the brain begins to swim; Work — work — work, Till the eyes are heavy and dim! Seam, and gusset, and band, Band, and gusset, and seam, Till over the buttons I fall asleep, And sew them on in a dream! "Oh, Men, with Sisters dear! Oh, Men, with Mothers and Wives! It is not linen you're wearing out, But human creatures
Page 221 - The isles of Greece ! the isles of Greece ! "Where burning Sappho loved and sung, — Where grew the arts of war and peace, Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung ! Eternal summer gilds them yet, But all, except their sun, is set. The Scian and the Teian muse, The hero's harp, the lover's lute, Have found the fame your shores refuse ; Their place of birth alone is mute To sounds which echo further west Than your sires'
Page 89 - The angels, not half so happy in Heaven, Went envying her and me Yes! that was the reason (as all men know. In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night. Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

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