The boy travellers in the Far East : adventures of two youths ... - Library

?,">, T?IE BOY TRAVELLERS.
" You see the popular qnotatiou is wrong," he added ; " it is the covrse
of empire that is mentioned in the poem, and not the 6/«?'."
"I suppose," said Fred, "that the Bisliop referred to the discovery of
America hj Columhus vhen he sailed to the West, and to the settlement
of America which began on the Eastern coast and then went on to the
West."
" You are exactly right," was the reply.
Frank added that he thought " star of empire " more poetical than
" course of empire."
"But course is more near to the truth," said Fred, "than star. Don't
you see that Bishop Berkeley wrote before railways were invented, and
before people could travel as they do nowadays ? Emigrants, when they
went out West, went with wagons, or on horseback, or on foot. They
travelled by day and rested at night. Now—don't you see ?—they made
their course in the daytime, when they couldn't see the stars at all ; and
when the stars were out, they were asleep, unless the wolves or the Indians
kept them awake. Tliey were too tired to waste any time over a twink-
ling star of empire, but they knew all about the course."
Tliere was a laugh all around at Fred's ingenious defence of the au-
thor of the verse in cpiestion, and then the attention of the party was
turned to the scenery along the route. Although living near the line of
VALLEY OF THE NEVEESINK.