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CHIVALRY.
The trouble with us Americans is, we are too absorbed in the grand money-hunt, leaving no leisure for culture and domestic enjoyment. Germany thinks we had better adopt "Time is money," as our national motto. England says we eat faster than any other nation. We have worshiped "the golden calf" long enough; we have endured chronic dyspepsia long enough.
No nation so young was ever so rich. Now is the time to polish and refine our accumulated ore; to diminish, if not wholly extinguish, this growing and dangerous curse of illiteracy, to establish a free library in every county by the side of our jails and poor-houses, to educate our public representatives to be men whose influence shall be felt in our universities as well as in our country caucuses; men who are interested in the suppression of illiteracy and the advancement of education, as well as in "the returns" of some petty township. Then, and only then, will America have reached her proper place. But we must work. The young must have this instilled into them.
Teach the children to hate ignorance and vice, to love honor and wisdom. Then will America be free, freer a thousand fold than when Lee's army fled before Richmond
Wendell Phillips' eloquent words in behalf of the suppression of slavery, can appropriately be used by us in behalf of the suppression of illiteracy: "Education will triumph. I hear it. Do you remember in that disastrous siege in India, where the Scotch girl raised her head from the pallet of the hospital and said to the sickening hearts of the English, 'I hear the bagpipes, the Campbells are coming;' and they said, Jessie, it is delirium.' 'No, I know it; I heard it far off.' And in an hour the pibroch burst upon their glad ears, and the banner of England floated in triumph over their heads. So I hear in the dim distance the first notes of the jubilee rising from the hearts of the millions. Soon, very soon, you shall hear it at the gates of the citadel, and the Stars and Stripes shall guarantee liberty forever from the Lakes to the Gulf." C.
CHIVALRY.
Up from the ashes of the middle ages there rises a spirit to which, if we cannot accord the worship it received in olden times, we are bound to render just honor and respect—the spirit of chivalry.
No one can contemplate the gloomy period when modern nations were evolving themselves,when civilization seemed to have passed behind the densest cloud and the world had almost returned to its primitive chaos,without deprecating the cold cruelties,the untold horrors,which,for a time,everywhere characterized the blunted
sensibilities of man's finer nature. But as "among the roses grow some wicked weeds;" or rather, as among the wicked weeds grow some roses, so in this deplorable period of the middle ages, the eye lights upon one bright spot.
Far be it from me to defend chivalry in all its practices, except upon the ground of its reaching a higher level than any of its contemporary institutions. Yet it had one feature which commends it to our admiration as being in advance of any-