Page 217 - The model orator, or, Young folks' speaker : containing the choicest recitations and readings from the best authors for schools, public entertainments, social gatherings, Sunday schools, etc. : including recitals in prose and verse ...

The food was brought, the wine was brought out of a see ret place,
But each one paused aghast, and looked into his neighbor's face ■

Her haughty step and settled brow, and chill inaifTerent m ien,
Suited so strangely with the gloom and grimness of the scene.

She glided here, she glided there, before our wondering eyes,
Nor anger showed, nor .shame, nor fear, nor sorrow, nor surprise;
At every step, from soul to soul a nameless horror ran,
And made us pale and silent as that si fen t murdered man.

She sat, and calmly soothed her child into a slumber sweet:;
Calmly the bright blood on the floor crawled red around our feet.
On placid fruits and bread lay soil the shadows of the wine,
And we like marble statues glared—-a chill, unmoving line.

■;\U white, all cold; and moments thus flew by without a breath,
A company of living things where ali was sthl—but death;
My hair rose up from roots of ice as there unnerved I stood
And watched the only thing that stirred— the rippling of the blood.
The woman's voice was heard at length, it broke the solemn spell,
And human fear, displacing awe, upon our spirits fel[—
" Tlo f slayers of the sinewless! Ilo 1 tramplers of the weak !
What [ shrink yc from the ghastly meats and life-bought wine ye .seek ?

"Feed, and begone! I wish to weep— I bring you out n:y store—■
Devour it.—waste it all— and then—pass and be seen no more.
Poison I Is that your craven fear? ” She snatched the goblet up,
And raised it to her queen-like head, as if to drain the cup.
But our fierce leader grasped her wrist— No, woman ! 110 !J’ he said,
" A mother's heart of love is deep— give it your child instead.”
She only smiled a bitter smile— " Frenchmen, I do not shrink—
As pledge of my fidelity, behold the infant drink ! ”

lie fixed on hers his broad black eye, scanning her inmost soul;
But her chill fingers trembled not as she returned the bowl.