Harper's Young People, April 27, 1880 Part 4

Britain was first peopled, so far as we know, by men of the Celtic (or Keltic) race, of which the native Irish are types. The names of the rivers, mountains, and other natural features of the land are mostly Celtic, just as in this country they are mostly Indian. About fifty years before the Christian era the Romans conquered Britain, and held it for about 500 years. They brought in the Latin language; but few traces of it now remain except in the names of certain towns and cities. The ma.s.s of the people kept their old Celtic tongue. Between the years 450 and 550 A.D. Britain was invaded and conquered by German tribes, chiefly Angles and Saxons. It now became _Angleland_, or _England_; and the language became what is called _Anglo-Saxon_, except in the mountains of Wales and of Scotland, where Celtic is found to this day. In the ninth and tenth centuries the Danes invaded England, and ruled it for a time, but they caused no great change in the language. In the year 1066 the Norman Conquest took place, and William the Conqueror became King of England. Large numbers of the Norman French came with him, and French became the language of the court and of the n.o.bility. By degrees our English language grew out of the blending of the Anglo-Saxon of the common people and the Norman French of their new rulers, the former furnis.h.i.+ng most of the _grammar_, the latter supplying many of the _words_. Now the French was of Latin origin, and the English thus got an important Latin or "Cla.s.sical" element, which has since been increased by the adding of many Greek and Latin words, especially scientific and technical terms.

The two great events in the history of the English language, as of the English people, are the Saxon and the Norman conquests. To the former it owes its grammatical frame-work, or skeleton; to the latter much of its vocabulary, or the flesh that fills out the living body.

It must not be inferred that our grammar is just like the Anglo-Saxon because this is the _basis_ of it. The Anglo-Saxon had many more _inflections_ (case-endings of nouns and p.r.o.nouns, etc.) than the French, and in the forming of English most of these were dropped, prepositions and auxiliaries coming to be used instead. It was not until about A.D. 1550 that the language had become in the main what it now is.

Some words have since been lost, and many have been added, but its grammar has changed very little. Our version of the Bible, published in 1611, shows what English then was (and had been for fifty years or more), and has done much to keep it from further change.

As a rule the most common words--those that chiefly make up the language of childhood and of every-day life--are Saxon; and very many of them are words of one syllable. In the inscription above, every monosyllable is Saxon, with _Boston_, _grateful_, and _coming_; the rest are French or Latin. In the case of pairs of words having the same meaning, one is likely to be Saxon, the other Cla.s.sical. Thus _happiness_ is Saxon, _felicity_ is French; _begin_ is Saxon, _commence_ is French; _freedom_ is Saxon, _liberty_ is French, etc. The Saxon is often to be preferred, though not always; but, as has been implied above, if a short and simple word conveys our meaning, we should never put it aside for a longer and less familiar one. In such cases the chances are that the former is Saxon, and the latter Cla.s.sical. Thus above, _citizens_, _sacrificed_, _preserved_, _integrity_, and _erected_ are all Cla.s.sical.

THE STORY OF GEORGE WAs.h.i.+NGTON.

BY EDWARD C. CARY.

CHAPTER III.

Was.h.i.+ngton spent about nine months with the army around Boston. Several times he was ready to attack the British, and to try and drive them from the city; but his officers were afraid the army was not strong enough.

So Was.h.i.+ngton had to wait and watch--he had a good deal of waiting and watching to do all through the war, for that matter. At last, in March, 1776, the Americans around Boston having gradually pushed closer and closer, the British found that they must either leave or fight. Their General did not feel strong enough to fight, so he put his men on s.h.i.+ps and sailed away to Halifax. Of course the Americans were greatly rejoiced. Was.h.i.+ngton got much praise, and deserved it, for he had shown great good judgment and skill in his management of the army.

Was.h.i.+ngton knew that the British would soon come back, and thought they would come to New York. So he took nearly all his army, and marched them westward to that city.

Early in July the British came, as Was.h.i.+ngton had expected, and made their camp on the beautiful hillsides of Staten Island. They brought with them what they called propositions for peace. These were simply offers to pardon the Americans for resisting the British tax laws, if they would now obey them. But this would only have left things exactly as they were in the beginning; it came too late. The Americans had already made up their minds that they would not obey the British laws which taxed them, nor any laws of Great Britain, but that in the future they would make their own laws in such manner as seemed to them most just. This purpose was written out in a long paper called the Declaration of Independence, and was signed on the Fourth of July, 1776, by the members of Congress. General Was.h.i.+ngton caused the Declaration of Independence to be read to his soldiers. "Now," he said to them, "the peace and safety of our country depend, under G.o.d, solely on the success of our arms," and he appealed to "every officer and soldier to act with fidelity and courage."

The year 1776 was a very gloomy one. All efforts to hold New York failed. A hard battle was fought around Brooklyn (August 27), and the Americans were badly beaten. Was.h.i.+ngton had to give up New York, and content himself with trying to keep the British from going to Philadelphia. Late in the fall he got across the Delaware River, with the British close on his heels. Soon the river filled with ice, as the cold weather came on, and the two armies lay one on one side and the other on the other. The American troops had dwindled away until there were only about three thousand of them.

Was.h.i.+ngton resolved that something must be done to raise the spirits of the country, or the people would lose all hope of resisting the British with success. At Trenton, on the opposite side from his own army, lay a force of Hessians, who were German soldiers, hired by Great Britain to come to America to fight, and Was.h.i.+ngton formed the plan of capturing them.

On Christmas-eve, 1776, he crossed the Delaware with 2400 men. The night was bitterly cold; a pelting hail-storm was falling; ice in great blocks was running down the stream, and hindered the boats, so that the army did not get across until four o'clock in the morning. Then the soldiers formed in ranks in the darkness, and being divided into two parties, started for Trenton, nine miles below. Was.h.i.+ngton led one of the parties, and General Sullivan the other. As they plodded along through the hail and snow, some of the men, exhausted, fell by the road-side, and of these two froze to death before they could be rescued.

As the men under Was.h.i.+ngton reached Trenton, and began to capture the Hessian soldiers set as sentinels to watch the road, they heard firing on the other side of the town, and knew that Sullivan's men had come up.

Then both parties rushed swiftly toward the centre of the town, and with very little bloodshed a thousand prisoners were taken. This was a great success of itself, and had the effect which Was.h.i.+ngton had hoped for: it gave the whole country new courage.

Was.h.i.+ngton then started back toward New York, and so rapid was his march that the British commander became frightened lest the Americans should retake the city, and he too went quickly back, and gave up all thought of reaching Philadelphia that year.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

A DISOBEDIENT SOLDIER.

BY DAVID KER.

"Now, lads, there's the battery; remember the Emperor himself is watching you, and carry it in true French style. The moment you get into it, make yourselves fast against attack; and mind that any man who comes out again to pick up the wounded, even though I myself should be among them, shall be tried for disobedience as soon as the battle's over."

So spoke Colonel Lasalle to his French grenadiers just before the final charge that decided the battle of Wagram. Then he waved his sword, and shouted, "_En avant!_"

Forward swept the grenadiers like a torrent, with the shout which the Austrians opposed to them already knew to their cost. Through blinding smoke and pelting shot they rushed headlong on, with mouths parched, faces burning, and teeth set like a vise. Ever and anon a red flash rent the murky cloud around them, and the cannon-shot came tearing through their ranks, mowing them down like gra.s.s. But not a man flinched, for the same thought was in every mind, that they were fighting under the eye of their "Little Corporal," as they affectionately called the terrible Napoleon.

Suddenly the smoke parted, and right in front of them appeared the dark muzzles of cannon, and the white uniforms of Austrian soldiers. One last shout, which rose high above all the roar of the battle, the bayonets went glittering over the breastwork like the spray of a breaking wave, and the battery was won.

"Where's the Colonel?" cried a voice, suddenly.

There was no answer. The handful of men that remained of the doomed band looked meaningly at each other, but no one spoke. Strict disciplinarian as he was, seldom pa.s.sing a day without punis.h.i.+ng some one, the old Colonel had nevertheless won his men's hearts completely by his reckless courage in battle; and every man in the regiment would gladly have risked his life to save that of "the old growler," as they called him.

But if he were not with them, where was he? Outside the battery the whole ground was scourged into flying jets of dust by a storm of bullets from the fight that was still raging on the left. In such a cross-fire it seemed as if nothing living could escape, and if he had fallen _there_, there was but little hope for him.

"_I_ see him!" cried a tall grenadier. "He's lying out yonder, and alive, too, for I saw him wave his hand just now. I'll have him here in five minutes, boys, or be left there beside him."

"But you mustn't disobey orders, Dubois," said a young Captain (now the oldest surviving officer, so terrible had been the havoc), hoping by this means to stop the reckless man from rus.h.i.+ng upon certain death.

"Remember what the Colonel told you--that even if he _were_ left among the wounded, no one must go out to pick them up."

"I can't help that," answered the soldier, laying down his musket and tightening the straps of his cross-belts. "Captain, report Private Dubois for insubordination and breach of discipline. I'm going out to bring in the Colonel."

And he stepped forth unflinchingly into the deadly s.p.a.ce beyond.

They saw him approach the spot where the Colonel lay; they saw him bend over the fallen man, s.h.i.+elding him from the shot with his own body. Then he was seen to stagger suddenly, as if from a blow; but the next moment he had the Colonel in his arms, and was struggling back over the shot-torn ground, through the dying and the dead. Twice he stopped short, as if unable to go farther; but on he came again, and had just laid his officer gently down inside the battery, when, with his comrades' shout of welcome still ringing in his ears, he fell fainting to the earth, covered with blood.

By the next morning Colonel Lasalle had recovered sufficiently to amaze the whole regiment by putting under arrest the man who had saved his life; but the moment it was done, the Colonel mounted his horse, and rode off to head-quarters at full gallop. In about an hour he was seen coming back again, side by side with a short, square-built man in a gray coat and c.o.c.ked hat, at sight of whom the soldiers burst into deafening cheers, for he was no other than the Emperor Napoleon.

"Let me see this fellow," said Napoleon, sternly; and two grenadiers led forward Pierre Dubois, so weak from his wounds that he could hardly stand.

"So, fellow, thou hast dared to disobey orders, ha?" cried the Emperor, in his harshest tones.

"I have, sire. And if it were to be done again, I'd do it."

"And what if we were to shoot thee for insubordination?"

"My life is your Majesty's, now as always," answered the grenadier, boldly. "And if I must choose between dying myself and leaving my Colonel to die, the old regiment can better spare a common fellow like me than a brave officer like him."

A sudden spasm shook the old Colonel's iron face as he listened, and even Napoleon's stern gray eyes softened as few men had ever seen them soften yet.

"Thou'rt wrong _there_," said he, "for I would not give a 'common fellow' of thy sort for twenty Colonels, were every one of them as good as my old Lasalle here. Take this, _Sergeant_ Dubois"--and he fastened his own cross of the Legion of Honor to Pierre's breast. "I warrant me thou'lt be a Colonel thyself one of these days."

And sure enough, five years later, Pierre Dubois was not only a Colonel, but a General.

[Ill.u.s.tration: READY TO MOVE--MAY-DAY IN THE CITY.]