Oh! say, can you see by the dawn’s early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming?—
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the clouds of the fight
O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming!
And the rocket’s red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;
Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?
“The Star-Spangled Banner,”—Francis Scott Key.
Francis Scott Key, a noted American poet, was born in Frederick County, Md., August 9, 1780, and died at Baltimore, January 11, 1843. He is best known as the author of “The Star Spangled Banner.”
We may say of angling as Dr. Boteler said of strawberries: “Doubtless God could have made a better berry, but doubtless God never did”; and so, if I might be judge, God never did make a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling.
“The Complete Angler,” Part I, Chap. II,—Izaak Walton.
Izaak Walton, a celebrated English author, was born in Stafford, England, August 9, 1593, and died at Winchester, December 15, 1683. His most famous work was: “The Complete Angler: or, the Contemplative Man’s Recreation.” He also wrote the biographies of a number of famous men, known as “Walton’s Lives.”
Happy the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call to-day his own;
He who, secure within, can say,
To-morrow do thy worst, for I have liv’d to-day.
“Imitation of Horace,” Book iii, Ode 29, Line 65,—John Dryden.
John Dryden, the renowned English poet, was born at Aldwinkle, Northamptonshire, August 9, 1631, and died in London, May 1, 1700. His most famous works were: “The Hind and the Panther,” “Alexander’s Feast,” and “Absalom and Achitophel,” also a number of noted plays including: “Marriage à la Mode,” “The Conquest of Grenada,” “The Spanish Friar,” “Don Sebastian,” “All for Love,” etc.
His temper was of that warm susceptible kind which is caught with the heroic and the tender, and, which is more fitted to delight in the world of sentiment than to succeed in the bustle of ordinary life. This is a disposition of mind well suited to the poetical character, and, accordingly, all his earliest companions agree that Mr. Home was from his childhood delighted with the lofty and heroic ideas which embody themselves in the description or narrative of poetry.... Mr. Home’s favorite amusement was angling.