Did you ride to town yesterday? No, I went into the country.

Did you ride to town yesterday? No, I went the day before.

Have you seen James or John lately? I have seen James, but not John.

Did you say there were four eggs in the nest, or three? There were only three eggs, not four.

Were the eggs white or blue? The eggs were white, not blue.

Had the boy a hat on his head, or a cap? He had a cap on, not a hat.

PUNCTUATION.

PUNCTUATION should be thoroughly studied by the pupil, in order that he may become perfectly familiar with the marks and pauses found in the reading lessons of this volume.

MARKS AND PAUSES.

These marks are used to point off written or printed matter into sentences and parts of sentences, and thus to assist the reader in obtaining the meaning of the writer. They seldom indicate the length of the pause to be made; this must be determined by the sense.

A Hyphen (-) is used between syllables in a word divided at the end of a line; as, "be-cause," ", ques-tion," page 10, and between the parts of a compound word; as, Rocking-chair, good-by.

The Comma (,), Semicolon (;), and Colon (:) mark grammatical divisions in a sentence; as,

God is good; for he gives us all things.

Be wise to-day, my child: 't is madness to defer.

A Period (.) is placed at the end of a sentence; as,

God is love. Life is short.

Or is used after an abbreviation; as,

Dr. Murphy. Jan. 10, 1879.

An Interrogation Point (?) denotes a question; as,

Has he come? Who are you?

An Exclamation Point (!) denotes strong feeling; as, O Absalom! my son! my son!

The Dash (-) is used where there is a sudden break or pause in a sentence; as,

as,

The truth has power--such is God's will-to make us better.

Quotation Marks ("") denote the words of another;

God said, "Let there be light."

An Apostrophe (') denotes that a letter or letters are left out; as,

O'er, for over; 't is, for it is.

And is also used to show ownership; as,

The man's hat. Helen's book.

(13)

But his cows never drank any water,

And his sheep never needed a crook.

2. For the pasture was gay as a garden,
And it glowed with a flowery red;
But the meadows had never a grass blade,

And the brooklet-it slept in its bed:

3. And it lay without sparkle or murmur,
Nor reflected the blue of the skies;
But the music was made by the shepherd,
And the sparkle was all in his eyes.

4. Oh, he sang like a bird in the summer!
And, if sometimes you fancied a bleat,
That, too, was the voice of the shepherd,
And not of the lambs at his feet.

5. And the glossy brown cows were so gentle That they moved at the touch of his hand O'er the wonderful, rosy-red meadow,

And they stood at the word of command.

6. So he led all his sheep to the pasture,

And his cows, by the side of the brook; Though it rained, yet the rain never pattered O'er the beautiful way that they took.

7. And it was n't in Fairyland either,

But a house in the midst of the town, Where Roy, as he looked from the window, Saw the silvery drops trickle down.

8. For his pasture was only a table,
With its cover so flowery fair,

And his brooklet was just a green ribbon,
That his sister had lost from her hair.

9. And his cows were but glossy horse-chestnuts, That had grown on his grandfather's tree; And his sheep only snowy-white pebbles,

He had brought from the shore of the sea.

10. And at length when the shepherd was weary, And had taken his milk and his bread, And his mother had kissed him and tucked him,

And had bid him "good night" in his bed;

11. Then there entered his big brother Walter,
While the shepherd was soundly asleep,

And he cut up the cows into baskets,
And to jackstones turned all of the sheep.
Emily S. Oakey.

LESSON II.

eoun'try

gröveş los'ing sug'ar

freez'eş

JOHNNY'S FIRST SNOWSTORM.

1. Johnny Reed was a little boy who never had seen a snowstorm till he was six years old. Before this, he had lived in a warm country, where the sun shines shines down on beautiful