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This podcast is for people taking early steps in the English language. I will be reading: popular nursery rhymes, Poems, and short stories. Since beginning ESL students are not regularly exposed to English literature, I hope that you enjoy reading and listening to these beautiful writings and learn something new!
- 79 - # 75 – An American singer-songwriter
# 75 – An American singer-songwriter
Neil Leslie Diamond- is an American singer-songwriter, born in 1941, he is in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and he received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018.
For his 16th birthday, he got as a gift, his first guitar and started to take lessons, and almost immediately began to write songs.
He said that his attraction to songwriting was the "first real interest" he had growing up, while also helped him release his youthful frustrations.
Neil Diamond also used his newly developing skill to write poetry, by writing poems for girls he was attracted to in school, he soon learned it often won their hearts. His male classmates took note and began asking him to write poems for them, which they would sing and use it with equal success.
In January 2018, Neil Diamond announced that he would stop touring because he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. Tour dates on the final leg of the Diamond's "50 Year Anniversary World Tour" in Australia and New Zealand were cancelled.
"Forever in Blue Jeans", co-written and jointly composed with his guitarist, Richard Bennett.
Money talks
But it don't sing and dance
And it don't walk
Long as I can have you
Here with me, I'd much rather be
Forever in blue jeansHoney's sweet
But it ain't nothin' next to baby's treat (are not nothing)
And if you pardon me
I'd like to say ( I would like)
We do okay
Forever in blue jeansMaybe tonight
Maybe tonight by the fire
All alone you and INothing around
But the sound of my heart
And your sighsMoney talks
But it can't sing and dance
And it can't walk
And long as I can have you
Here with me, I'd much rather be
Forever in blue jeans, babeAnd honey's sweet
But it ain't nothin' next to baby's treat
And if you pardon me, I'd like to say
We do okay
Forever in blue jeansMaybe tonight
Maybe tonight by the fire
All alone you and I
Nothing around
But the sound of my heart
And your sighsMoney talks
But it don’t sing and dance
And it don't walk
Long as I can have you
Here with me
I'd much rather be
Forever in blue jeansAnd if you pardon me
I'd like to say ( I would like)
We do okay
Forever in blue jeans babe
long as I can have you
Here with me I'd much rather be
Forever in blue jeans, babeAs long as I can have you
Here with me I'd much rather be
Forever in blue jeans, babeWed, 22 Jun 2022 - 07min - 78 - # 74 - CICERO
Marcus Tullius Cicero was born in 106 BC in a small municipality of Arpinum, 100 kilometers from Rome – He was assassinated in 43 BC, in Rome, at the age of 63. His mother was a housewife, and his father was a well-to-do member of the equestrian order, a wealthy landowner who possessed good connections in Rome.
Cicero was a Roman statesman, lawyer, scholar, and philosopher. His extensive writings include treatises on rhetoric, philosophy, and politics. He is considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.
During his time in Roman history, "cultured" meant being able to speak both Latin and Greek. Cicero was therefore educated in the teachings of the ancient Greek philosophers, poets, and historians, he obtained much of his understanding of the theory and practice of rhetoric from the Greek poet Licinius Archias, and from the Greek rhetorician Apollonius Molon.
Cicero used his knowledge of Greek to translate many of the theoretical concepts of Greek philosophy into Latin, thus translating Greek philosophical works for a larger audience. It was precisely his broad education that tied him to the traditional Roman elite.
Cicero introduced into Latin, the arguments of the chief schools of Hellenistic philosophy, and created a Latin philosophical vocabulary with neologisms such as: evidentia, humanitas, qualitas, quantitas, and essentia, distinguishing himself as a translator and philosopher.
Cicero has been traditionally considered the master of Latin prose.
Quintilian, a well know Roman educator declared, that Cicero was "not the name of a man, but of eloquence itself. The English word Ciceronian (means "eloquent") derive from his name. He is credited with transforming Latin from a modest utilitarian language into a versatile literary medium, capable of expressing abstract and complicated thoughts with clarity.
Though, he was an accomplished orator and successful lawyer, Cicero believed his political career was his most important achievement. Following Gaius Julius Caesar's death, Cicero became an enemy of Mark Antony, who view Cicero as an enemy of the state, consequently, Cicero was executed.
Today Cicero is appreciated primarily for his humanism and philosophical and political writings. His voluminous correspondence, much of it addressed to his friend Atticus, this correspondence has been especially influential, for introducing the art of refined letter writing, to the European culture.
According to John William Mackail, the reformer of the British education system "Cicero's unique and imperishable glory is that he created the language of the civilized world and used that language to create a style, which nineteen centuries have not replaced, and in some respects have hardly altered.
Thu, 16 Jun 2022 - 04min - 77 - # 73 - PARKISONS
PARKISONS DISEASE
Parkinson’s is a progressive, degenerative disease that affects nervous system function, according to the Mayo Clinic. The nerve cells in the brain, called neurons, progressively malfunction, or die off. This, in turn, prevents the brain from producing enough dopamine, a chemical that acts as a messenger for brain signal that control movement, coordination and other key functions.
Parkinson’s is most seen in adults older than 50 and is more frequent in men than women.
Doctors aren’t totally sure why people get Parkinson’s, there is evidence, that genetics may play a role in some cases, other risk factors, may include repeated head trauma and exposure to certain chemicals or heavy metals.
Parkinson’s has four main symptoms: Tremor in hands, arms, legs, jaw, or head.
Muscle stiffness, where muscle remains contracted for a long time.
Slowness of movement.
Impaired balance and coordination, sometimes leading to falls.
People with Parkinson's disease often develop a parkinsonian gait that includes a tendency to lean forward; take small quick steps; and reduce swinging of their arms. They also may have trouble initiating or continuing movement.
Several disorders can cause symptoms similar to those of Parkinson’s disease. People with Parkinson’s-like symptoms that result from other causes, such as multiple system atrophy and dementia, are sometimes said to have parkinsonism.
While these disorders initially may be misdiagnosed as Parkinson’s, certain medical tests, as well as response to drug treatment, may help to better evaluate the cause.
Many other diseases have similar features but require different treatments, so it is important to get an accurate diagnosis as soon as possible.
There is currently no cure for Parkinson’s, although medications that mimic or enhance the effects of dopamine, in conjunction with physical therapy, diet and exercise intervention, may help reduce symptoms, according to the Mayo Clinic.
In advanced cases, doctors may also implant signal-carrying electrical sensors into the brain in hopes of mitigating some symptoms.
Though it can’t be cured, Parkinson’s itself is not fatal, the University of Maryland Medical Center notes. That said, complications from the disease — including decreased motor function and impaired swallowing — can shorten a person’s lifespan.
Thu, 16 Jun 2022 - 04min - 76 - # 72 - HINDUISM
Unlike other religions, Hinduism has no one founder but is instead a fusion of various beliefs.
It is believed that Hinduism started between 2300 B.C. and 1500 B.C., but many Hindus argue that their faith is timeless and has always existed.
Hinduism accepts many different religious ideas, most of the people that follow Hinduism believe that there are many paths to reach their god; even though, they worship a single deity known as Brahman, and have many sects, they still respect other gods and goddesses.
The Hindus code of living emphasizes good conduct and morality. They believe in the continuous cycle of life, death, (reincarnation) and in the universal law of cause and effect (karma), and that all living creatures have a soul, and all these souls, are all part of the supreme soul. The goal is to end the cycle of rebirths to become part of the absolute soul.
Food is an important part of life for Hindus. they consider the cow to be a sacred animal, most of them do not eat beef or pork, many are vegetarians.
The Hindu ancient texts and Vedas are full of amazing stories about different gods, their extraordinary powers, and battles that took place a millennia ago.
It describes gods who fight against evil forces on flying crafts called VIMANAS.
These Vimanas are consistently described as weapons of war. They are flying machines, some Vimanas were made to travel locally from one place to the other, to different countries, some flying machines were used to travel to various planets. The text Describes that, there were four types of Vimanas some were saucer-shaped, others were cylinder-shaped and had the ability to maneuver both under water and in outer space.
These Vimanas were non-combustible, unbreakable, very effective on the offensive and were also invisible to the enemies. They were, able to render enemies, into a suspended animation state, and cause widespread destruction.
The Mahabharata, a Hindu epic, provides even more detail on Vimanas. It says, “The ancient Indian king Salva acquired the flying machine from Maya Danava, who was a resident of a planetary system named Taltala”. The Vimana flew in the sky, rested on the hill, and floated on the water.
There are drawing instructions and detail as to the metal construction of Vimanas, their use of mirrors, and lenses, and the defenses offered by several Vimanas types.
The existence of this text was revealed by G.R. Josyer the founder of the International Academy of Sanskrit Research who said that Pandit Subbaraya Shastry had dictated it to him from 1918 to 1923.
The epic Mahabharata and the Bhagavata Purana is written in Sanskrit, one of the oldest survived languages in the world. It also known to contain scientific information about embryology
Wed, 09 Mar 2022 - 05min - 75 - # 71- Don McLean- American Pie ll
A long, long time ago
I can still remember how that music used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance that I could make those people dance
And maybe they'd be happy for a while
But February made me shiver
With every paper I'd deliver
Bad news on the doorstep
I couldn't take one more step
I can't remember if I cried
When I read about his widowed bride
But something touched me deep inside
The day the music died
So bye-bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
And them good old boys were drinkin' whiskey and rye
Singin' "This'll be the day that I die
This'll be the day that I die"
Did you write the book of love, and do you have faith in God above
If the Bible tells you so?
Have you believe in rock and roll, can music save your mortal soul
And can you teach me how to dance real slow?
Well, I know that you're in love with him
'Cause I saw you dancin' in the gym
You both kicked off your shoes
Man, I dig those rhythm and blues
I was a lonely teenage broncin' buck (a wild horse that is vicious and difficult or impossible to break in)
With a pink carnation and a pickup truck
But I knew I was out of luck
The day the music died
I started singin'
Now for ten years we've been on our own, and moss grows fat on a rollin' stone
But that's not how it used to be
When the jester sang for the king and queen in a coat HE borrowed from James Dean
(The Jesters were an early 1960s rock & roll band and James Dean was a famous actor )
And a voice that came from you and me
Oh, and while the king was looking down
The jester stole his thorny crown
The courtroom was adjourned
No verdict was returned
And while Lenin read a book on Marx
A quartet practiced in the park
And we sang dirges in the dark
The day the music died We were singin'
Helter skelter in a summer swelter, the birds flew off with a fallout shelter
Eight miles high and falling fast
It landed foul on the grass, the players tried for a forward pass
With the jester on the sidelines in a cast
Now the halftime air was sweet perfume
While the sergeants played a marching tune
We all got up to dance
Oh, but we never got the chance
'Cause the players tried to take the field
The marching band refused to yield
Do you recall what was revealed
The day the music died?
We started singin'
Oh, and there we were all in one place, a generation lost in space
With no time left to start again
So come on, Jack be nimble, Jack be quick, Jack Flash sat on a candlestick
'Cause fire is the devil's only friend
Oh, and as I watched him on the stage
My hands were clenched in fists of rage
No angel born in Hell
Could break that Satan's spell
And as the flames climbed high into the night
To light the sacrificial rite
I saw Satan laughing with delight
The day the music died
He was singin'
I met a girl who sang the blues, and I asked her for some happy news
But she just smiled and turned away
I went down to the sacred store where I'd heard the music years before
But the man there said the music wouldn't play
And in the streets, the children screamed
The lovers cried, and the poets dreamed
But not a word was spoken
The church bells all were broken
And the three men I admire most
The Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost
They caught the last train for the coast
The day the music died and
They were singin' bye-bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry
Fri, 21 Jan 2022 - 17min - 74 - # 70- Don McLean- American Pie l
Don McLean was Born October 2, 1945. He is an American singer-songwriter, best known for his 1971 hit song "American Pie"
McLean's original recording was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or artistically significant."
To mark the 50th anniversary of the song, McLean is scheduled to perform a 35-date tour through Europe, starting in Wales and ending in Austria, in 2022.
Don McLean said that he wrote the refrain, of American Pie and 3 months later, he wrote the rest of the song in1 hour.
"The day the music died" refers to the plane crash in 1959 in Iowa during a snowstorm, that killed early rock and roll star Buddy Holly, who was McLean’s childhood music hero.
The song American Pie - reflects the deep cultural changes and profound disillusionment and loss of innocence of his entire generation.
“So bye-bye, Miss American Pie
Drove my Chevy to the levee, but the levee was dry”
(Chevy refers to a car Chevrolet popular at the time - a levee is a quay or a dike an embankment along a river to control floods, in any case, a place where you'd expect to find water.)
In 1971 Don McLean released "Vincent” which is a tribute to Vincent van Gogh. It is often erroneously titled after its opening refrain, "Starry, Starry Night", a reference to Van Gogh's 1889 painting.
McLean said the following about the genesis of the song:
"In the autumn of 1970 I had a job singing in the school system, playing my guitar in classrooms. I was sitting on the veranda one morning, reading a biography of Van Gogh, and suddenly I knew I had to write a song arguing that he wasn't crazy. He had an illness and so did his brother Theo. This makes it different, in my mind, to the garden variety of 'crazy' – because he was rejected by a woman [as was commonly thought]. So, I sat down with a print of Starry Night and wrote the lyrics out on a paper bag."
Fri, 21 Jan 2022 - 04min - 73 - # 69- The story of Ruth part 4 (Old Testament)
When she got back to the town, she came to her mother-in-law, who asked, “How is it you my daughter ?” She told her all that the man had done for her; and she added, “He gave me these six measures of barley, saying to me, “Do not go back to your mother-in-law empty handed.” And Naomi said stay here, daughter, till you learn how the matter turns out. For the men will not rest but will settle the matter today.”
Meanwhile, Boaz had gone to the gate and sat down there. And now the redeemer whom Boaz had mentioned passed by. He called, “Come over and sit down here, so-and-so!” And he came over and sat down. Then Boaz took 10 elders of the town and said,” Be seated here”: and they sat down.
He said to the redeemer, “Naomi , now return from the country of Moab, must sell the piece of land which belonged to our kinsman Elimelech. I thought I should disclose the matter to you and say: Acquire it in the presence of those seated here and in the presence of the elders of my people. If you are willing to redeem it, redeem! But if you will not redeem, tell me, that I may know. For there is no one to redeem but you, and I come after you.” “ I am willing to redeem it,” He replied. Boaz continued, “When you acquired the property from Naomi and from Ruth the Moabite, you must also acquire the wife of the deceased ,so as to perpetuate the name of the deceased upon his state.” The redeemer reply, “Then I cannot redeem it for myself, lest I impair my own estate. You take over my right of redemption for I am unable to exercise it.”
Now this was formally done in Israel in cases of redemption for exchange: to validate any transaction, one man would take off his sandals and hand it to the other. Such as the practice in Israel. So when the redeemer said to Boaz, “Acquire for yourself, he drew off his sandal. And Boaz said to the elders and to the rest of the people, you are you witness today that I am acquiring from Naomi all that belong to Elimelech and all that belong to Chilion and Mahlon and I am also Acquiring Ruth the Moabite, the wife of Mahlon, as my wife, so as to perpetuate the name of the deceased upon his estate, that the name of the deceased may not disappear from among his kinsmen and from the gate of his hometown. you are witness today.”
All the people at the gate and the elders answered, “We are. May the Lord make the woman who is coming into your house like Rachel and Leah, both of whom built up the House of Israel !prosper in Bethlehem and perpetuate your name in Bethlehem! And may your house be like the House of Perez whom Tamar bore to Judah- through the offspring which the Lord will give you by this young woman.”
So Boaz married Ruth; she became his wife, and he cohabitate with her the Lord let her. The Lord let her conceive, and she bore a son .And the women said to Naomi, “Blessed be the Lord, who has not withheld a redeemer from you today ! May his name be perpetuated in Israel! He will renew your life and sustain your old age; for his born of your daughter-in-law, who loves you and is better to you than seven sons.”
Naomi took the child and held it to her bosom. She became its foster mother, and the women neighbors gave him a name, saying, “A son is born to Naomi!” they named him Obed; he was the father of Jesse, father of David.
This is the line of Perez: Perez begot Hezron, Hezron bigot Ram, Ram bigot Amminadab, Amminadab bigot Nahshon, Nahshon bigot Salmon, Salmon begot Boaz, Boaz Begot Obed, Obed begot Jesse, Jesse begot David
Ruth is the great grandmother of the king David of Israel.
Tue, 11 Jan 2022 - 07min - 72 - # 68- The story of Ruth part 3 (Old Testament)
She gleaned in the field until evening. Then she beat out what she had gleaned and carry it back with her to the town. When her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned, and when she also took out and gave her what she had left over after eating her fill, her mother-in-law asked her, “Where did you glean today? where did you work? blessed be he who took such generous notice of you!” So, she told her mother-in-law whom she had worked with, saying, “The name of the man with whom I work today is Boaz.”
Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, “Blessed be the Lord, who has not failed in His kindness to the living or to the dead! “ For, Naomi explain to her daughter-in-law, “ the man is related to us; he is one of our redeeming kinsman.(responsible for the well-being of the family) Ruth the Moabite said, he even told me, “stay close by my workers until all my harvest is finished.” And Naomi answered her daughter-in-law Ruth, “It is best, daughter, that you go out with his girls, and not be annoyed in some other field.” So she stayed close to the maidservants of Boaz, and Gleaned until the barley harvest and the wheat harvest were finished. Then she stayed at home with her mother-in-law.
Naomi her mother-in-law, said to her, “Daughter, I must seek a home for you, where you may be happy. Now there is our kinsman Boaz, whose girls you were close to. He will be winnowing barley (blowing air through grain to remove the husk) on the threshing floor ( it is a flat surface or floor where the farmer separated the grain) tonight. So bathe anoint yourself, dress up, and go down to the threshing floor. But do not disclose yourself to the man until he has finished eating and drinking. When he lies down, note the place where he lies down, and go over and uncover his feet and lie down. He will tell you what you are to do. She replied, “I will do everything you tell me.”
She went down to the threshing floor and did just as her mother-in- law had instructed her. Boaz ate, drank, and in a cheerful mood went to lie down besides the grain pile. Then she went over stealthily and uncovered his feet and laid down. In the middle of the night, the man gave a start and put back - there was a woman line on his feet!
Who are you? he asked. and she replied, “I am your handmaid Ruth” Spread your robe over your handmade, for your redeeming kinsman.”
He exclaimed, “Be blessed of the Lord, daughter! Your latest deed of loyalty is greater than the first, in that you have not turned to younger men, whether poor or rich. And now, daughter, have no fear. I will do in your behalf whatever you ask, for all the elders off my town.
Know what a fine woman you are. but while it is true, I am a redeeming kinsman, there is another redeemer closer than I. Stay for the night then in the morning, if he will act as a redeemer, good! let him redeem. but if he does not want to act as redeemer for you, I will do myself, as the Lord lives! lie down until morning.”
So, she lay at his feet until dawn. She rose before one person could distinguish another from the thought, “Let it not be known that the woman come to the threshing floor.” And he said, “Hold out the shawl you are wearing.” she held it while he measured out six measures of barley and he put it on her back.
Tue, 11 Jan 2022 - 06min - 71 - # 67- The story of Ruth part 2 (Old Testament)
When they arrived in Bethlehem, the whole city buzzed with excitement over them. The women said, “can this be Naomi?” “Do not call me Naomi,” she replied. call me Mara, (Mara means bitter) for GOD made my life very bitter. I went away full, and the Lord has brought me back empty. How can you call me Naomi, when the Lord has dealt harshly with me, when God has brought misfortune upon me!” Thus, Naomi returns from the country of Moab; she returned with her daughter-in-law Ruth the Moabite. they arrived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.
Now Naomi had a kinsman on her husband's side, a man of substance, of the family of Elimelech, His name was Boaz.
Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “I would like to go to the fields and Glean(gather leftover grain after harvest) among the ears of grain, behind someone who may show me kindness.” “Yes, daughter, go,” she replied, and off she went. she came and gleaned in a field, behind the reapers;( are people who harvest a crop) and, as luck would have it, it was the piece of land belong to Boaz, who was of Elimelech’s family.
Presently Boaz arrived from Bethlehem. He greeted the reapers, “The Lord be with you!” And they responded “The Lord bless you!” Boaz said to the servant who was in charge of the reapers, “Whose girl is that?” The servant in charge of the reapers replied, “She is a Moabite girl who came back with Naomi from the country of Moab. She said, “please let me glean and gather among the sheaves ( are a bundle of grain stalks laid lengthwise and tied together after reaping) behind the reapers.” she has been on her feet since she came this morning “she has rested but little in the hut.”
Boaz said to Ruth, “Listen to me, daughter. Don't go to Glean in another field. Don't go elsewhere but stay here close to my girls. keep your eyes on the field they are ripping and follow them. I have ordered the men not to molest you. And when you are thirsty, go to the jars and drink some of the water that the men have drawn.”
She prostrated herself with her face to the ground, and said to him, “why are you so kind as to single me out, when I am a foreigner?”
Boaz said in reply, “I have been told of all that you did for your mother-in-law after the death of your husband, how you left your father and mother and the land of your birth and came to a people you had to know before. May the Lord reward your deeds, may you have a full recompense from the Lord the God of Israel, under whose wings you have sought refuge!”
She answered, “You are most kind, my Lord, to comfort me and to speak gently to your maidservant -though I am not so much as one of your maidservants.”
At mealtime, Boaz said to her, “Come over here and partake of the meal, and dip your morsel (small piece of food) in the vinegar. “So, she sat down beside the reapers. He handed her roasted grain, and she ate her fill and had some leftover.
When she got up again to glean, Boaz gave order to his workers, “You are not only to let her glean among the sheaves, without interference, but you must also pull some stalks out of the heaps end leave then for her to glean, and not scold her.”
Tue, 11 Jan 2022 - 06min - 70 - # 66- The story of Ruth part 1 (Old Testament)
# 66- The story of Ruth part 1 (Old Testament)
Ruth is a story from the Old Testament
In the days when the Chieftains ruled . Chieftains ( were the heads of the tribes of an area in Bethlehem - called Judah – Judah is the 4TH son of the patriarch Jacob and his wife Leah)
There was a famine in the land and a man of Bethlehem in Judah with his wife and two sons went to reside in the country of Moab. (Moab was an ancient city in Jordan near by the dead sea; the Moabites believed in many different Gods) the man's name was Elimelech his wife's name was Naomi and his two sons were named Mahlon and Chilion.
They came to the country of Moab and remain there.
Elimelech Naomi’s husband died, and she was left with her two sons. Her sons married Moabite women, one name Orpah and the other Ruth, and they lived there for about 10 years.
Then Mahlon and Chilion also died; so the woman was left without her two sons and without her husband.
she started out with her daughters-in-law to return from the country of Moab; for in the country of Moab she had heard that the Lord had taken note of his people and given them food. Accompanied by her two daughters-in-law she left the place
where she had been living; and they set out on the road back to the land of Judah.
But Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, “turn back, each of you to her mother ‘s house. May the Lord deal kindly with you as you, have dealt with the dead and me! May the Lord grant that each of you find security in the House of a husband!” And she kissed them farewell. They broke into weeping and said to her, “No we will return with you to your people”
But Naomi replied, “Turn back, my daughters! Why should you go with me? Have I any more sons in my body who might be husbands for you? Turn back, my daughters, for I am too old to be married. Even if I thought there was hope for me, even if I married tonight and I also was bore sons, should you wait for them to grow up? Should you on their account debar yourselves from marriages? Oh no, my daughters! my Lot is far more bitter than yours, for the hand of the Lord has struck out against me.”
They broke into weeping again, and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law farewell. But Ruth clung to her. So Naomi said,” See, your sister- in-law has returned do her people and her gods. Go follow your sister-in-law”. But Ruth replied, “Do not urge me to leave you, to turn back and not follow you. For wherever you go, I will go; wherever you lodge, I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God. Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. Thus, end more may the Lord to do me if anything but death parts me from you”. when Naomi saw how the determined she was to go with her, she ceased to argue with her; and the two went on until they reach Bethlehem.
Tue, 11 Jan 2022 - 05min - 65 - # 65 - Saint Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas was born in 1225 and died in 1274, he was canonized by Pope John XXII in 1323 and became Saint Thomas Aquinas.
Saint Thomas was from Roccasecca near Naples-Italy. He was the seventh and youngest child of a wealth and very influential family.
Against the wishes of his family at the age of nineteen, Thomas decided to join the Dominican Order, which had been founded only about 30 years earlier: the members of the new order were inspired to develop a "mixed" spirituality. The order was both active in preaching, and contemplative in study, prayer, and meditation.
Thomas Aquinas attends the university of Naples and there he was introduced to the teachings of Aristotle, Averroes, and Maimonides.
In 1252 at the College of St. James in Paris, Thomas started a teaching career to which was to involve him in every great intellectual conflict of the time. Beginning as a bachelor, he lectured upon the Scriptures and the basic theological textbook of the day. He enjoys great popularity as a teacher. One of his students later recorded that: Thomas introduced new articles into his lectures, founded a new and clear method of scientific investigation and synthesis, and developed new proofs in his argumentation; although the university required that a master in theology be at least thirty-four years old, Thomas, after a papal dispensation, was given his degree in 1256, when little more than thirty-one years old, and he was appointed to fill one of the two chairs allowed to Dominicans at the university.
In1272 Thomas was recalled to Naples by his superiors to reorganize all the theological courses of his order. There at the university he lectures on the Psalms, and St. Paul, commented on Aristotle’s, and worked on the third part of the Summa.
(Summa Theologica) or Summary of Theology, often referred to simply as the Summa, which is the best-known work of Saint Thomas Aquinas, with more than 3 thousand pages It is a compendium of all the main theological teachings of the Catholic Church.
Today the Summa is used as a guide for theology students, including seminarians and priests. The Summa shows the reasoning for almost all points of Christian theology topics with a cycle that start with: God, Creation, Man, Man's purpose, Christ, the Sacraments, and back to God.
From the Summa first part II - the existence of God. Thomas Aquinas refers to Augustine who said: “since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil.” St. Thomas replies this is part of the infinity goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist and out of it produce good.
Aquinas five statements about the divine qualities:
God is simple, without composition of parts, such as body and soul, or matter and form.
God is perfect, lacking nothing. That is, God is distinguished from other beings on account of God's complete actuality.
God is infinite. That is, God is not finite in the ways that created beings are physically, intellectually, and emotionally limited. This infinity is to be distinguished from infinity of size and infinity of number.
God is immutable, incapable of change on the levels of God's essence and character.
God is one, without diversification within God's self. The unity of God is such that God's essence is the same as God's existence.
Saint Thomas Aquinas, Averroes, and Maimonides are among the greatest religious philosophers of the Middle Ages.
Mon, 06 Dec 2021 - 07min - 64 - #64- Jack London
Jack London
Jack London is known as a writer, journalist and a proud socialist.
He was born - John Griffith Chaney, on January 12, 1876 in San Francisco California, in the United States. He died November 22 1916, in Glen Ellen, California.
He grew up in a working-class area in the city of Oakland, California. While very young, he observed the inequalities in American society and the struggles of the poor.
He was internationally famous for his books -The Call of the Wild (1903), The Sea Wolf (1904) and other literary and journalistic accomplishments. He wrote passionately about the great questions of life and death and the struggle to survive with dignity and integrity.
His stories of high adventure were based on his own experiences at sea, in the Yukon Territory, and in the fields and factories of California. His writings appealed to millions worldwide.
As a schoolboy, London often studied at Heinold's First and Last Chance Saloon, which was a port-side bar in the city of Oakland, California. At 17, he confessed to the bar's owner, John Heinold, his desire to attend university and pursue a career as a writer. Heinold lent London tuition money to attend college.
London desperately wanted to attend the University of California in Berkeley. In 1896, after a summer of intense studying to pass certification exams, he was admitted. Financial circumstances forced him to leave in 1897, and he never graduated.
While at Berkeley, London continued to study and spend time at Heinold's saloon, where he was introduced to the sailors and adventurers who would influence his writings.
Today in the year of 2021, tourists enjoy Jack London Square, which is an entertainment and business destination on the waterfront of Oakland, California,named after Jack London, and owned by the Port of Oakland, it is the home of stores, restaurants, hotels, an Amtrak station, a San Francisco Bay Ferry dock, and the historic Heinold's First and Last Chance Saloon.
Tue, 29 Jun 2021 - 03min - 63 - #63- Paul Frederic Simon, You can call me Al
Paul Frederic Simon was born on October 13, 1941.He is a Singer-songwriter and an iconic figure in American rock music. As a singer-songwriter known for his cerebral composition, it is not a surprise that Simon's mother, Belle, was an English teacher and his father, Louis, was both a teacher and a bandleader.
Paul Simon is also known for his work as part of the duo Simon & Garfunkel, and for his long-running success as a solo artist.
In 1986, he released Graceland, an album inspired by South African township music, which sold 14 million copies worldwide and remains his most popular solo work.
in 2006, Paul Simon was selected as one of the "100 People Who Shaped the World" by Time magazine.
Composition from the album Graceland
You can call me Al
A man walks down the street --
He says, "Why am I soft in the middle, now? - -
Why am I soft in the middle? --
The rest of my life is so hard --
I need a photo-opportunity --
I want a shot at redemption --
Don't want to end up a cartoon --
In a cartoon graveyard --
Bonedigger, Bonedigger Dogs in the moonlight --
Far away in my well-lit door --
Mr. Beerbelly, Beerbelly Get these mutts away from me --
You know, I don't find this stuff amusing anymore --
If you'll be my bodyguard --
I can be your long lost pal --
I can call you Betty --
And Betty, when you call me, you can call me A --l
A man walks down the street --
He says, "Why am I short of attention? --
Got a short little span of attention --
And, whoa, my nights are so long --
Where's my wife and family? --
What if I die here? --
Who'll be my role model --
Now that my role model is gone, gone? --
He ducked back down the alley --
With some roly-poly little bat-faced girl --
All along, along --
There were incidents and accidents --
There were hints and allegations --
If you'll be my bodyguard --
I can be your long lost pal --
I can call you Betty --
And Betty, when you call me, you can call me Al --
A man walks down the street --
It's a street in a strange world --
Maybe it's the third world --
Maybe it's his first time around --
Doesn't speak the language --
He holds no currency --
He is a foreign man --
He is surrounded by the sound, the sound --
Cattle in the marketplace --
Scatterlings and orphanages --
He looks around, around --
He sees angels in the architecture --
Spinning in infinity --
He says, "Amen and Hallelujah!" --
If you'll be my bodyguard --
I can be your long lost pal --
I can call you Betty --
And Betty, when you call me, you can call me Al --
call me Al --
Na na na na, na na na na --
Na na na na, na na na-na na-na --
Na na na na, na-na na-na na na --
Na na na na, na na na na --
If you'll be my bodyguard --
bodyguard Betty --
Thu, 25 Feb 2021 - 09min - 62 - #62- News Year's Celebrations,Robert Burns
Auld Lang Syne by Robert Burns
Most English-speakers on New Year’s Eve sing a song called "Auld Lang Syne" which is an old Scottish song that was first published by the poet Robert Burns in 1796.
Burns transcribed it (and made some refinements to the lyrics) after he heard it sung by an old man in Scotland, Burns’ homeland.
It is often said that "Auld Lang Syne" is one of the most popular songs that nobody knows the lyrics to. "Auld Lang Syne" literally translates as "old long since" and means "times gone by."
The song asks whether old friends and times will be forgotten and promises to remember people of the past with fondness - "For auld lang syne, we'll take a cup of kindness yet."
The lesser-known verses written in Scots language, continue this theme, lamenting how friends who once used to
(run about the hills and pulled up daisies)
(paddled in the stream from morning to dusk)
(have become divided by time, distance, and seas)
(Yet there is always time for old friends to get together, if not in person then in memory and have a “good-will drink”)
But it was Guy Lombardo, and not Robert Burns, who popularized the song and turned it into a New Year's tradition. Lombardo first heard "Auld Lang Syne" in his hometown, Ontario, where it was sung by Scottish immigrants.
The famous dance band, Guy Lombardo and His Royal Canadians, played the song at midnight in 1929 in New York City at a New Year's eve party, the song became a New Year's tradition since .
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And days of auld lang syne
For auld lang syne my dear
For auld lang syne
We will take a cup of kindness yet
For auld lang syne
We two have run about the hills
And pulled the daisies fine
But we ‘ve wandered many a weary foot
Since auld lang syne
Tue, 29 Dec 2020 - 04min - 61 - #61- The Twelve Days of Christmas 2
1- On the first dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
A Partridge in a Pear Tree
2- On the second day of Christmas
my true love sent to me:
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
3- On the third dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
4- On the fourth dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
5- On the fifth day of Christmas
my true love sent to me:
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
6- On the sixth day of Christmas
my true love sent to me:
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
7- On the seventh day of Christmas
my true love sent to me:
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
8- On the eighth dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
8 Maids a Milking
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
9- On the ninth dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
9 Ladies Dancing
8 Maids a Milking
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
10- On the tenth dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
10 Lords a Leaping
9 Ladies Dancing
8 Maids a Milking
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
11- On the eleventh dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
11 Pipers Piping
10 Lords a Leaping
9 Ladies Dancing
8 Maids a Milking
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
12- On the twelfth dayof Christmas
my true love sent to me:
12 Drummers Drumming
11 Pipers Piping
10 Lords a Leaping
9 Ladies Dancing
8 Maids a Milking
7 Swans a Swimming
6 Geese a Laying
5 Golden Rings
4 Calling Birds
3 French Hens
2 Turtle Doves
and a Partridge in a Pear Tree
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_SnsgP2ZpA
Wed, 09 Dec 2020 - 08min - 60 - #60- The Twelve Days of Christmas 1
The Twelve Days of Christmas is a song that was written during the Puritan Movement in England. During the years 1558-1829 Catholics were not allowed to practice their faith. The song has two meanings. The first is the literal meaning of each verse of the song and the second is the subtle translation that was known to those of the Catholic faith.
The Twelve Days of Christmas start on Christmas Day, December 25th. The twelfth day ends at midnight on January 5th of each year. The Holy Day of the Epiphany - which means an illuminating discovery, or a realization) is followed on January 6. All Christmas decorations should be left up until the Epiphany.
1. The first day of Christmas - My True Love, the Partridge in a Pear Tree (Jesus Christ is my true love). In ancient times a partridge was often used as symbol of a divine and sacred king.
2. The second day of Christmas - Two turtle doves are the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. The doves symbolize peace.
3. The third day of Christmas - The three French Hens are Faith, Hope and Love. These are the three gifts of the Holy Spirit.
4. The fourth day of Christmas - The four calling birds are the four Gospels - Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
5. The fifth day of Christmas - The five golden rings describe the first five books of the Old Testament.
6. The sixth day of Christmas - The six geese a laying stood for the first six days of creation.
7. The seventh day of Christmas - The seven swans a swimming represented the sevenfold gifts of the Holy Spirit. These are Prophesy, Serving, Teaching, Exhortation, Contribution, Leadership and Mercy.
8. The eighth day of Christmas - The eight maids a milking are the eight Beatitudes. These are Jesus' teachings of happiness.
9. The ninth day of Christmas - Nine ladies dancing are the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit. These are Charity, Joy, Peace, Patience, Goodness, Mildness, Fidelity, Modesty and Continency.
10. The tenth day of Christmas - The ten lords a leaping are the Ten Commandments.
11. The eleventh day of Christmas - The eleven pipers piping represent the eleven faithful apostles.
12. The twelfth day of Christmas - The twelve drummers drumming represent the twelve points of belief in The Apostles' Creed.
Wed, 09 Dec 2020 - 04min - 59 - #59- Les Misérables, Victor Hugo-part 5
Musical adaptation les Meserables by Vitor Hugo
DO YOU HEAR THE PEOPLE SING
Do you hear the people sing
Sing the song of angry men
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again!
When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes!
Will you join in our crusade?
Who will be strong and stand with me?
Beyond the barricade
Is there a world you long to see?
Then join in the fight
That will give you the right
To be free!
Do you hear the people sing
Sing the song of angry men
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again!
When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes!
Will you give all you can give
So that our banner may advance?
Some will fall and some will live,
Will you stand up and take your chances?
The blood of the martyrs
Will water the meadows of France
Do you hear the people sing
Sing the song of angry men
It is the music of a people
Who will not be slaves again!
When the beating of your heart
Echoes the beating of the drums
There is a life about to start
When tomorrow comes!
Mon, 02 Nov 2020 - 03min - 58 - #58- Les Misérables, Victor Hugo-part 4 Cosette+Marius
COSETTE- becomes a beautiful young woman and she meets Marius they fall in love , however, Eponine, who is one of the daughters of the Thernardiers , also loves Marius, in the end Marius stay with Cosette.
[Cosette thinks]
How strange
This feeling that my life's begun at last.-This change,-Can people really fall in love so fast?-What's the matter with you, Cosette?-Have you been too much on your own?-So many things unclear,-So many things unknown.-in my life-There are so many questions and answers-That somehow seem wrong-In my life-There are times when I catch in the silence-The sigh of a faraway song-And it sings-Of a world that I long to see-Out of reach,-Just a whisper away-Waiting for me
Does he know I'm alive?
Do I know if he's real?
Did he see what I saw
Does he feel what I feel?
In my life I'm no longer alone
Now that love in my life is so near
Find me now, find me here.
[Marius:]
In my life she has burst like the music of angels-he light of the sun-And my life seems to stop-As if something is over-And something has scarcely begun-Eponine, you're the friend who has brought me here-Thanks to you I am one with the gods-And Heaven is near-And I soar through world that is new that is free![Eponine:]
Every word that he says is a dagger in me!-In my life-There's been no one like him anywhere-Anywhere, where he is...-If he asked... I'd be his[Marius & Eponine:]
In my life-There is someone who touches my life[Marius:]
Waiting near - [Eponine:] -Waiting hereMarius:] A heart full of love-A heart full of song-I'm doing everything all wrong-Oh god, for shame-I do not even know your name-Dear Mad'moiselle-Won't you say?-Will you tell?
[Cosette:] -A heart full of love-No fear, no regret -[Marius:] My name is Marius Pontmercy [Cosette:] And mine's Cosette [Marius:] Cosette, I don't know what to say!
[Cosette:] Then make no sound! [Marius:] I am lost [Cosette:] I am found [Marius:] A heart full of light [Cosette:] A night bright as day [Marius:] And you must never go away -Cosette, Cosette! [Cosette:] This is a chain we'll never break [Marius:] Do I dream? [Cosette:] I'm awake [Marius:] A heart full of love
[Eponine:] He was never mine to lose [Marius and Cosette:] A heart full of you
[Eponine:] Why regret what could not be? [Marius:] A single look and then I knew [Eponine:] These are words he'll never say-Not to me-Not to me-Not for me [Cosette:] I knew it too [Marius:] From today [Cosette:] Every day
[Cosette & Marius (Eponine):]
And it isn't a dream (his heart full of love)- Not a dream (he will never) -After all! (feel this way)
Lea Salonga, Judy Kuhn, and Michael Ball sing In My Life/A Heart Full of Love at the 10th anniversary concert of Les Miz at the Royal Albert Hall in London.
Mon, 02 Nov 2020 - 11min - 57 - #57- Les Misérables, Victor Hugo-part 3
THE THÉNARDIERS
THE THÉNARDIERS- represent the lawless subculture of society. they own an Inn and cheat their customers. The novel portrays them as brutal and abusive figures; some adaptation transform them into buffoonish characters, to provide comic relief from the generally more serious tone of the story.
Master of the house- at the Montfermeil inn
[Mr.Thenardier:]
Welcome, Monsieur, sit yourself down And meet the best innkeeper in town-As for the rest, all of them crooks: Rooking their guests and cooking the books-Seldom do you see Honest men like me- A gent of good intent -Who's content to be-Master of the house,doling out the charm -Ready with a handshake and an open palm-Tells a saucy tale, makes a little stir - Customers appreciate a bon-viveur-Glad to do me friends a favor Doesn't cost me to be nice-But nothing gets you nothing -Everything has got a little price!-Master of the house,- keeper of the zoo -Ready to relieve them of a sou or two-Watering the wine,- making up the weight -Picking up their knick-knacks when they can't -see straight -Everybody loves a landlord -Everybody's bosom friend -I do whatever pleases- Jesus! don't I bleed 'em in the end!
[Mr. Thenardier & the Drinkers:]
Master of the house, quick to catch your eye-Never wants a passerby to pass him by-Servant to the poor, butler to the great-Comforter, philosopher, and lifelong mate!-Everybody's boon companion-Everybody's chaperone
[Mr.Thenardier:]
But lock up your valises-Jesus! Won't I skin you to the bone!-Enter Monsieur, lay down your load-Unlace your boots, rest from the road-This weighs a ton, travel's a curse-But here we strive to lighten your purse-Here the goose is cooked-Here the fat is fried-And nothing's overlooked-Till I'm satisfied-Food beyond compare.- Food beyond belief-Mix it in a mincer and pretend it's beef-Kidney of a horse, liver of a cat-Filling up the sausages with this and that-Residents are more than welcome-Bridal suite is occupied-Reasonable charges-Plus some little extra on the side!-Charge 'em for the lice, extra for the mice-Two percent for looking in the mirror twice-Here a little slice, there a little cut-Three percent for sleeping with the window shut-When it comes to fixing prices-There are a lot of tricks he knows-How it all increases, all them bits and pieces Jesus! It'samazing how it grows!
[Mr.Thenardier]:
Master of the house, quick to catch your eye-Never wants a passerby to pass him by-Servant to the poor, butler to the great-Comforter, philosopher, and lifelong mate!-Everybody's boon companion-Gives 'em everything he's got-Dirty bunch of geezers-Jesus! What a sorry little lot!
[Mrs. Thenardier:]
I used to dream that I would meet a prince-But God Almighty, have you seen what's happened since?-Master of the house? Isn't worth me spit!-Comforter, philosopher' and lifelong shit!-Cunning little brain, regular Voltaire-Thinks he's quite a lover but there's not much there-What a cruel trick of nature, landed me with such a louse-God knows ,how I've lasted living with this bastard in the house!
[Mr.Thenardier & the Drinkers:]
Master of the house!- [Mrs. Thenardier:] Master and a half! -[Mr.Thenardier & the Drinkers:]-Comforter, philosopher [Mrs. Thenardier:]- Ah, don't make me laugh!
[]Mr.Thenardier & Drinkers:]
Servant to the poor, butler to the great- [Mrs.. Thenardier:]-Hypocrite and toady and inebriate!- [Mr.Thenardier & Drinkers:] -Everybody bless the landlord!-Everybody bless his spouse! -Everybody raise a glass -[Mrs. Thenardier :] -Raise it up the master's arse -[All]- Everybody raise a glass to the Master of the House!
Master of the house - Alun Armstrong, Jenny Galloway (Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert - Royal Albert Hall in London)
Mon, 02 Nov 2020 - 11min - 56 - #56- Les Misérables, Victor Hugo- part 2 Cosette
Cosette- The daughter of Fantine. After Fantine dies, from approximately the age of three to the age of eight, Cosette is beaten and forced to work for the Thénardiers. Mrs.Thénardier spoils her own daughters and abuses Cosette. The ex-convict Jean Valjean feels sorry for Cosette and help raise her.
Cosette dreams and thoughts and reality:
There is a castle on a cloud
I like to go there in my sleep
Aren't any floors for me to sweep
Not in my castle on a cloud
There is a room that's full of toys
There are a hundred boys and girls
Nobody shouts or talks too loud
Not in my castle on a cloud
There is a lady all in white
Holds me and sings a lullaby
She's nice to see and she's soft to touch
She says, "Cosette, I love you very much"
I know a place where no one's lost
I know a place where no one cries
Crying at all is not allowed
Not in my castle on a cloud
Oh, help, I think I hear them now
And I’m nowhere near finished sweeping…. scrubbing and polishing the floors.
Oh, it’s her…
It’s madame
[Mrs. Thenardier:]
Now look who’s here!
The little madame herself
Pretending once again she’s been so awfully good
Better not let me catch you slacking.
Better not catch my eye
Ten rotten francs you mother sends me
What’s that’ going to buy?
Now take that pail,
My little mademoiselle
And go draw some water from the well
We should never have taken you in
In the first place
How stupid the things we do
Like mother like daughter, the scum of the street
Still there, Cosette?
Your tears will do you no good
I told you, fetch some water from the well in the wood.
COSETTE says:
Please do not send me out alone
Not in the darkness on my own
[Mrs. Thenardier:]
Enough of that …………………………
and don’t forget to be nice
You heard me ask for something and I never ask twice
Castle on a Cloud - Hannah Chick (Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert - Royal Albert Hall in London)
Mon, 02 Nov 2020 - 06min - 55 - #55- Les Misérables, Victor Hugo part 1
Les Misérables, is an epic and historical fiction novel by Victor Hugo, published in French in 1862.
Les Misérables is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. In 5 volume Victor Hugo tells a history of broken dreams and unrequited love, passion, sacrifice, and redemption. it takes place in France in 1815, (more than two decades after the start of the French Revolution).
The Miserable Ones, The Poor Ones, The Victims and The Dispossessed, the novel follows the lives and interactions of several characters, particularly the struggles of an ex-convict Jean Valjean.
It has been popularized through numerous adaptations for film, television, and the stage, including musical on Broadway.
The Broadway production of "Les Misérables" ran for 16 years on Broadway in New York city. The show opened on March 12, 1987 at the Broadway Theatre. in October 1990 was transferred to the Imperial Theatre. The musical runs approximately 3 hours.
In this recording I will show some of the main Characters of Les Misérables though the lens of the Musical show, since the book itself is an exceptionally long for this podcast.
Fantine – A beautiful Parisian young working-class Frenchwoman abandoned with a small child by her lover Félix Tholomyès. Fantine leaves her baby daughter Cosette in the care of the Thénardiers, and finds work at Monsieur Madeleine's factory, Fantine was Illiterate, so she has others write letters to the Thénardiers on her behalf.
A female supervisor discovers that she is an unwed mother and dismisses her. To meet the Thénardiers' repeated demands for money, she sells her hair and two front teeth, and turns to prostitution.
Fantine becomes ill, and died living little Cosette with the Thérnardier innkeepers in the village of Montfermeil
Fantine’s lamentations.
There was a time when men were kind.
When their voices were soft.
And their words inviting.
There was a time when love was blind.
And the world was a song.
And the song was exciting.
There was a time...
Then it all went wrong.
I dreamed a dream in time gone by,
When hope was high
And life worth living.
I dreamed that love would never die.
I dreamed that God would be forgiving.
Then I was young and unafraid,
And dreams were made and used and wasted.
There was no ransom to be paid,
No song unsung, no wine untasted.
But the tigers come at night
With their voices soft as thunder
As they tear your hope apart
As they turn your dreams to shame
He slept a summer by my side
He filled my days with endless wonder
He took my childhood in his stride
But he was gone when autumn came
And still I dream he’ll come to me
That we will live the years together
But there are dreams that cannot be
And there are storms we cannot weather
I had a dream my life would be
So different from this hell I’m living
So different now from what it seemed
Now life has killed the dream - I dream
Ruthie Henshall - I Dreamed A Dream (Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert –
Royal Albert Hall in London)
Mon, 02 Nov 2020 - 10min - 54 - #54- The Little Red Hen, part 3 - American fable
Still confident that they would surely help her some day she sang out, "Who will make the bread?"
Alas for the Little Red Hen! Once more her hopes were dashed! For the Pig said, "Not I," the Cat said, "Not I," the Rat said, "Not I."
So the Little Red Hen said once more, "I will then," and she did.
Feeling that she might have known all the time that she would have to do it all herself, she went and put on a fresh apron and spotless cook's cap. First of all she set the dough, as was proper. When it was time she brought out the moulding board and the baking tins, moulded the bread, divided it into loaves, and put them into the oven to bake. All the while the Cat sat lazily by, giggling and chuckling.
And close at hand the vain Rat powdered his nose and admired himself in a mirror.
In the distance could be heard the long-drawn snores of the dozing Pig.
At last the great moment arrived. A delicious odor was wafted upon the autumn breeze. Everywhere the barnyard citizens sniffed the air with delight.
The Red Hen ambled in her picketty-picketty way toward the source of all this excitement.
Although she appeared to be perfectly calm, in reality she could only with difficulty restrain an impulse to dance and sing, for had she not done all the work on this wonderful bread?
Small wonder that she was the most excited person in the barnyard!
She did not know whether the bread would be fit to eat, but - joy of joys! - when the lovely brown loaves came out of the oven, they were done to perfection!
Then, probably because she had acquired the habit, the Red Hen called: "Who will eat the Bread?"
All the animals in the barnyard were watching hungrily and smacking their lips in anticipation, and the Pig said, "I will," the Cat said, "I will," the Rat said, "I will."
But the Little Red Hen said,
"No, you won't. I will."
And she did.
Tue, 27 Oct 2020 - 03min - 53 - #53- The Little Red Hen, part 2 - American fable
She got the sickle from among the farmer's tools in the barn and proceeded to cut off all of the big plant of Wheat.
On the ground lay the nicely cut Wheat, ready to be gathered and threshed, but the newest and yellowest and downiest of Mrs. Hen's chicks set up a "peep-peep-peeping" in their most vigorous fashion, proclaiming to the world at large, but most particularly to their mother, that she was neglecting them.
Poor Little Red Hen! She felt quite bewildered and hardly knew where to turn.
Her attention was sorely divided between her duty to her children and her duty to the Wheat, for which she felt responsible.
So, again, in a very hopeful tone, she called out, "Who will thresh the Wheat?"
But the Pig, with a grunt, said, "Not I," the Cat, with a meow, said, "Not I," and the Rat, with a squeak, said, "Not I."
So the Little Red Hen, looking, it must be admitted, rather discouraged, said, "Well, I will, then."
And she did.
Of course, she had to feed her babies first, though, and when she had gotten them all to sleep for their afternoon nap, she went out and threshed the Wheat. Then she called out: "Who will carry the Wheat to the mill to be ground?"
Turning their backs with snippy glee, the Pig said, "Not I," and the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat said, "Not I."
So the good Little Red Hen could do nothing but say, "I will then." And she did.
Carrying the sack of Wheat, she trudged off to the distant mill. There she ordered the Wheat ground into beautiful white flour. When the miller brought her the flour she walked slowly back all the way to her own barnyard in her own picketty-picketty fashion.
She even managed, in spite of her load, to catch a nice juicy worm now and then and had one left for the babies when she reached them. Those cunning little fluff-balls were so glad to see their mother. For the first time, they really appreciated her.
After this really strenuous day Mrs. Hen retired to her slumbers earlier than usual - indeed, before the colors came into the sky to herald the setting of the sun, her usual bedtime hour.
She would have liked to sleep late in the morning, but her chicks, joining in the morning chorus of the hen yard, drove away all hopes of such a luxury.
Even as she sleepily half opened one eye, the thought came to her that to-day that Wheat must, somehow, be made into bread.
She was not in the habit of making bread, although, of course, anyone can make it if he or she follows the recipe with care, and she knew perfectly well that she could do it if necessary.
So after her children were fed and made sweet and fresh for the day, she hunted up the Pig, the Cat and the Rat.
Tue, 27 Oct 2020 - 04min - 52 - #52- The Little Red Hen,part 1 - American fable
A Little Red Hen lived in a barnyard. She spent almost all of her time walking about the barnyard in her picketty-picketty fashion, scratching everywhere for worms.
She dearly loved fat, delicious worms and felt they were absolutely necessary to the health of her children. As often as she found a worm she would call "Chuck-chuck-chuck!" to her chickies.
When they were gathered about her, she would distribute choice morsels of her tid-bit. A busy little body was she!
A cat usually napped lazily in the barn door, not even bother herself to scare the rat who ran here and there as he pleased. And as for the pig who lived in the sty – he did not care what happened so long as he could eat and grow fat.
One day the Little Red Hen found a Seed. It was a Wheat Seed, but the Little Red Hen was so accustomed to bugs and worms that she supposed this to be some new and perhaps very delicious kind of meat. She bit it gently and found that it resembled a worm in no way whatsoever as to taste although because it was long and slender, a Little Red Hen might easily be fooled by its appearance.
Carrying it about, she made many inquiries as to what it might be. She found it was a Wheat Seed and that, if planted, it would grow up and when ripe it could be made into flour and then into bread.
When she discovered that, she knew it ought to be planted. She was so busy hunting food for herself and her family that, naturally, she thought she ought not to take time to plant it.
So she thought of the Pig - upon whom time must hang heavily and of the Cat who had nothing to do, and of the great fat Rat with his idle hours, and she called loudly:
"Who will plant the Seed?"
the Pig said, "Not I," and the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat said, "Not I."
"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."
And she did.
Then she went on with her daily duties through the long summer days, scratching for worms and feeding her chicks, while the Pig grew fat, and the Cat grew fat, and the Rat grew fat, and the Wheat grew tall and ready for harvest.
So one day the Little Red Hen chanced to notice how large the Wheat was and that the grain was ripe, so she ran about calling briskly: "Who will cut the Wheat?"
The Pig said, "Not I," the Cat said, "Not I," and the Rat said, "Not I."
"Well, then," said the Little Red Hen, "I will."
And she did.
Tue, 27 Oct 2020 - 04min - 51 - #51- The Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln was an American statesman and lawyer who served as the 16th president of the United States from 1861 to 1865. Lincoln led the nation through the American Civil War, the country's greatest moral, constitutional, and political crisis.
In the United States this speech in thought in elementary school. (Elementary school is after kindergarten; from first (1st) grade through fifth (5th) or sixth (6th) grade depending on the school system.) The children must memorize The Gettysburg Address as a homework.
The Gettysburg Address is a speech that U.S. President Abraham Lincoln delivered during the American Civil War at the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, on the afternoon of November 19, 1863, four and a half months after the Union armies defeated those of the Confederacy at the Battle of Gettysburg. It is one of the best-known speeches in American history.
The Gettysburg Address
byAbraham Lincoln
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln
Thu, 01 Oct 2020 - 04min - 50 - #50- Two Nights at Neempani, Arnaba Saha
I drove all night and did not stop till I reached Neempani. I know the name is strange but the place was too familiar to me. First time I came here was with Sonal. The night was surreal. It was our first date and I drove 55 kms from Betul, just to give us a chance to know each other without any interference. Call it bizarre or just unusual; the date was arranged by our parents. Not completely though. They decided the date and time and I was supposed to take her some place nearby but eventually we ended up here at Neempani.
I had heard that she liked long drives. So we took the highway towards Bhopal with her permission of course. The ice between us broke after we crossed Sonaghati. We talked without any agenda. A moonlit night, endless roads and large and ancient trees arching the roads and a beautiful companion to share your thoughts; the night was truly surreal. As we reached Neempani I realised we were too far from home. I suggested we should go back. It was her idea to dine at Neempani. She said she had heard of this place and food here was good. I must say she was right.
We got married within 5 months from that night. We shifted to Bhopal to commence our nuptial journey. Everything was so perfect: too good to be true. With the passing time, the equation of our relationship changed, so did we. Our initial compromise to make each other happy gradually turned into complains and dissatisfaction. As the charm of our marriage withered out, none of us could restrain the urge to pour our bitterness out. There no particular reason we fought; rather it was simple differences that aggravated. One strange day we decided to be civil to each other and came to the conclusion that it would be better if we part our ways mutually. Yesterday we got divorced.
Tonight as I waited for my order to be served I wondered the enigmatic nature of life. Two nights and the meaning and connotation of my life changed. Both the nights are so different yet so similar. Both the nights changed the course of my life. That night witnessed the budding bonding between us and tonight avouches the end of the bitter and spiteful marriage we were in for past 7 years.
I recommenced my journey. While driving through Ghati I could not clear out the thoughts of my married life. As the meandering roads lead me towards the end of this story. I thought about the key chapters that twisted this tale forever.
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Thu, 17 Sep 2020 - 04min - 49 - #49- The Great Feast, Laura E. Richards
ONCE the Play Angel came into a nursery where four
little children sat on the floor with sad and troubled faces.“What is the matter, dears?” asked the Play Angel.
“We wanted to have a grand feast!” said the child whose nursery it was.
“Yes, that would be delightful!” said the Play Angel.
“But there is only one cookie!” said the child whose nursery it was.
“And it is a very small cookie!” said the child who was a cousin, and therefore felt a right to speak.
“Not big enough for myself!” said the child whose nursery it was.
The other two children said nothing, because they were not relations; but they looked at the cookie with large eyes, and their mouths went up in the middle and down at the sides.
“Well,” said the Play Angel, “suppose we have the feast just the same! I think we can manage it.”
She broke the cookie into four pieces, and gave one piece to the littlest child.
“See!” she said. “This is a roast chicken, a Brown Bantam. It is just as brown and crispy as it can be, and there is cranberry sauce on one side, and on the other a little mountain of mashed potato; it must be a volcano, it smokes so. Do you see?”
“Yes!” said the littlest one; and his mouth went down in the middle and up at the corners.
The Play Angel gave a piece to the next child.
“Here,” she said, “is a little pie! Outside, as you see, it is brown and crusty, with a wreath of pastry leaves round the edge and ‘For You’ in the middle; but inside it is all chicken and ham and jelly and hard-boiled eggs. Did ever you see such a pie?”
“Never I did!” said the child.
“Now here,” said the Angel to the third child, “is a round cake. Look at it! the frosting is half an inch thick, with candied rose-leaves and angelica laid on in true-lovers’ knots; and inside there are chopped-up almonds, and raisins, and great slices of citron. It is the prettiest cake I ever saw, and the best.”
“So it is I did!” said the third child.
Then the Angel gave the last piece to the child whose nursery it was.
“My dear!” she said. “Just look! Here is an ice-cream rabbit. He is snow-white outside, with eyes of red barley sugar; see his ears, and his little snubby tail! but inside, I think you will find him pink. Now, when I clap my hands and count one, two, three, you must eat the feast all up. One—two—three!”
So the children ate the feast all up.
“There!” said the Angel. “Did ever you see such a grand feast?”
“No, never we did!” said all the four children together.
“And there are some crumbs left over,” said the Angel. “Come, and we will give them to the brother birds!”
“But you didn’t have any!” said the child whose nursery it was.
“Oh, yes!” said the Angel. “I had it all!”
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Wed, 16 Sep 2020 - 05min - 48 - #48- Androclus and the Lion, James Baldwin
In Rome there was once a poor slave whose name was Androclus. His master was a cruel man, and so unkind to him that at last Androclus ran away.
He hid himself in a wild wood for many days; but there was no food to be found, and he grew so weak and sick that he thought he should die. So, one day he crept into a cave and lay down, and soon he was fast asleep.
After a while, a great noise woke him up. A lion had come into the cave and was roaring loudly. Androclus was very much afraid, for he felt sure that the beast would kill him. Soon, however, he saw that the lion was not angry, but that he limped as though his foot hurt him.
Then Androclus grew so bold that he took hold of the lion's lame paw to see what was the matter. The lion stood quite still, and rubbed his head against the man's shoulder. He seemed to say,--
"I know that you will help me."
Androclus lifted the paw from the ground, and saw that it was a long, sharp thorn which hurt the lion so much. He took the end of the thorn in his fingers; then he gave a strong, quick pull, and out it came. The lion was full of joy. He jumped about like a dog and licked the hands and feet of his new friend.
Androclus was not at all afraid after this; and when night came, he and the lion lay down and slept side by side.
For a long time, the lion brought food to Androclus every day; and the two became such good friends, that Androclus found his new life a very happy one.
One day some soldiers who were passing through the wood found Androclus in the cave. They knew who he was, and so took him back to Rome.
It was the law at that time that every slave who ran away from his master should be made to fight a hungry lion. So a fierce lion was shut up for a while without food, and a time was set for the fight.
When the day came, thousands of people crowded to see the sport. They went to such places at that time very much as people now days go to see a circus show or a game of baseball.
The door opened, and poor Androclus was brought in. He was almost dead with fear, for the roars of the lion could already be heard. He looked up and saw that there was no pity in the thousands of faces around him.
Then the hungry lion rushed in. With a single bound he reached the poor slave. Androclus gave a great cry, not of fear, but of gladness. It was his old friend, the lion of the cave.
The people, who had expected to see the man killed by the lion, were filled with wonder. They saw Androclus put his arms around the lion's neck; they saw the lion lie down at his feet, and lick them lovingly; they saw the great beast rub his head against the slave's face as though he wanted to be petted. They could not understand what it all meant.
After a while they asked Androclus to tell them about it. So he stood up before them, and, with his arm around the lion's neck, told how he and the beast had lived together in the cave.
"I am a man," he said; "but no man has ever befriended me. This poor lion alone has been kind to me; and we love each other as brothers."
The people were not so bad that they could be cruel to the poor slave now. "Live and be free!" they cried. "Live and be free!"
Others cried, "Let the lion go free too! Give both of them their liberty!"
And so Androclus was set free, and the lion was given to him for his own. And they lived together in Rome for many years.
Tue, 15 Sep 2020 - 06min - 47 - #47- What A Wonderful World, Louis Armstrong
I see trees of green
Red roses too
I see them bloom
For me and you
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world
I see skies of blue
And clouds of white
The bright blessed day
The dark sacred night
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world
The colors of the rainbow
So pretty in the sky
Are also on the faces
Of people going by
I see friends shaking hands
Saying, "How do you do?"
They're really saying
"I love you"
I hear babies cry
I watch them grow
They'll learn much more
Than I'll never know
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world
Yes, I think to myself
What a wonderful world
Oh yeah
Sat, 12 Sep 2020 - 03min - 46 - #46- Who was, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
Anton Pavlovich Chekhov was born on Jan 29, 1860, he was a Russian physician and supreme short story writer and playwright. He was the third of six children. His father was a grocer, painter and religious fanatic with a mercurial temperament who "thrashed" his children and was likely emotionally abusive to his wife. Chekhov, like Dickens, was no stranger to financial hardship, and in 1875 his father took the family and fled to Moscow to escape creditors. Chekhov stayed behind for three more years to finish school. He paid for his tuition by catching and selling goldfinches and dispensing private tutoring lessons and selling short sketches to the newspaper. He sent any money he could spare to his family in Moscow. Chekhov is considered an exemplar author in the genre of Realism. A child-family separation theme plays out in several of Chekhov's stories .
In 1879 Chekhov was admitted to medical school and he joined his family in Moscow. He assumed financial responsibility for the family and while attending classes at Moscow State University, he wrote and sold a large number of humorous stories and vignettes of contemporary Russian life. He published more than four hundred short stories, sketches and vignettes by the age of twenty-six.
He once said:
"Medicine is my lawful wife and literature my mistress; when I get tired of one, I spend the night with the other."
Chekhov, known as "Russia's most elusive literary bachelor,
To Alexei Suvorin who was a lifelong friend, he said:
“ By all means I will be married if you wish it. But on these conditions: everything must be as it has been hitherto—that is, she must live in Moscow while I live in the country, and I will come and see her ... I promise to be an excellent husband, but give me a wife who, like the moon, will not appear in my sky every day.”
On 25 May 1901, Chekhov married Olga Knipper and the
marital arrangements with Olga was, he lived largely at Yalta (southern Ukraine), she in Moscow, pursuing her acting career.
Chekhov is said to be the father of the modern short story end had influenced Ernest Hemingway, Shimizu Kunio, Ai Nagai Woody Allen and many more.
It was Chekhov who first deliberately wrote dialogue in which the mainstream of emotional action ran underneath the surface. It was he who articulated the notion that human beings hardly ever speak in explicit terms among each other about their deepest emotions, that the great, tragic, climactic moments are often happening beneath outwardly trivial conversation
One can argue Anton Chekhov is the second-most popular writer on the planet. Only Shakespeare outranks Chekhov in terms of movie adaptations of their work, we generally know less about Chekhov than we know about mysterious Shakespeare.
Chekhov died of tuberculosis at the age of 44 on Jul 15, 1904.
Sat, 05 Sep 2020 - 05min - 45 - #45- A Story Without A Title, Anton Chekhov-part 3
At last he came out. Gathering all the monks around him, with a tear-stained face and with an expression of grief and indignation, he began telling them of what had befallen him during those three months. His voice was calm and his eyes were smiling while he described his journey from the monastery to the town. On the road, he told them, the birds sang to him, the brooks gurgled, and sweet youthful hopes agitated his soul; he marched on and felt like a soldier going to battle and confident of victory; he walked on dreaming, and composed poems and hymns, and reached the end of his journey without noticing it.
But his voice quivered, his eyes flashed, and he was full of wrath when he came to speak of the town and of the men in it. Never in his life had he seen or even dared to imagine what he met with when he went into the town. Only then for the first time in his life, in his old age, he saw and understood how powerful was the devil, how fair was evil and how weak and faint-hearted and worthless were men. By an unhappy chance the first dwelling he entered was the abode of vice. Some fifty men in possession of much money were eating and drinking wine beyond measure. Intoxicated by the wine, they sang songs and boldly uttered terrible, revolting words such as a God-fearing man could not bring himself to pronounce; boundlessly free, self-confident, and happy, they feared neither God nor the devil, nor death, but said and did what they liked, and went whither their lust led them. And the wine, clear as amber, flecked with sparks of gold, must have been irresistibly sweet and fragrant, for each man who drank it smiled blissfully and wanted to drink more. To the smile of man it responded with a smile and sparkled joyfully when they drank it, as though it knew the devilish charm it kept hidden in its sweetness.
The old man, growing more and more incensed and weeping with wrath, went on to describe what he had seen. On a table in the midst of the revelers, he said, stood a sinful, half-naked woman. It was hard to imagine or to find in nature anything more lovely and fascinating. This reptile, young, long-haired, dark-skinned, with black eyes and full lips, shameless and insolent, showed her snow-white teeth and smiled as though to say: "Look how shameless, how beautiful I am." Silk and brocade fell in lovely folds from her shoulders, but her beauty would not hide itself under her clothes, but eagerly thrust itself through the folds, like the young grass through the ground in spring. The shameless woman drank wine, sang songs, and abandoned herself to anyone who wanted her.
Then the old man, wrathfully brandishing his arms, described the horse-races, the bull-fights, the theaters, the artists' studios where they painted naked women or molded them of clay. He spoke with inspiration, with sonorous beauty, as though he were playing on unseen chords, while the monks, petrified, greedily drank in his words and gasped with rapture. . . .
After describing all the charms of the devil, the beauty of evil, and the fascinating grace of the dreadful female form, the old man cursed the devil, turned and shut himself up in his cell. . . .
When he came out of his cell in the morning there was not a monk left in the monastery; they had all fled to the town.
Fri, 28 Aug 2020 - 06min - 44 - #44- A Story Without A Title, Anton Chekhov-part 2
Dozens of years passed by, and every day was like every other day, every night was like every other night. Except the birds and the wild beasts, not one soul appeared near the monastery. The nearest human habitation was far away, and to reach it from the monastery, or to reach the monastery from it, meant a journey of over seventy miles across the desert. Only men who despised life, who had renounced it, and who came to the monastery as to the grave, ventured to cross the desert.
What was the amazement of the monks, therefore, when one night there knocked at their gate a man who turned out to be from the town, and the most ordinary sinner who loved life. Before saying his prayers and asking for the Father Superior's blessing, this man asked for wine and food. To the question how he had come from the town into the desert, he answered by a long story of hunting; he had gone out hunting, had drunk too much, and lost his way. To the suggestion that he should enter the monastery and save his soul, he replied with a smile: "I am not a fit companion for you!"
When he had eaten and drunk, he looked at the monks who were serving him, shook his head reproachfully, and said:
"You don't do anything, you monks. You are good for nothing but eating and drinking. Is that the way to save one's soul? Only think, while you sit here in peace, eat and drink and dream of beatitude, your neighbours are perishing and going to hell. You should see what is going on in the town! Some are dying of hunger, others, not knowing what to do with their gold, sink into profligacy and perish like flies stuck in honey. There is no faith, no truth in men. Whose task is it to save them? Whose work is it to preach to them? It is not for me, drunk from morning till night as I am. Can a meek spirit, a loving heart, and faith in God have been given you for you to sit here within four walls doing nothing?"
The townsman's drunken words were insolent and unseemly, but they had a strange effect upon the Father Superior. The old man exchanged glances with his monks, turned pale, and said:
"My brothers, he speaks the truth, you know. Indeed, poor people in their weakness and lack of understanding are perishing in vice and infidelity, while we do not move, as though it did not concern us. Why should I not go and remind them of the Christ whom they have forgotten?"
The townsman's words had carried the old man away. The next day he took his staff, said farewell to the brotherhood, and set off for the town. And the monks were left without music, and without his speeches and verses. They spent a month drearily, then a second, but the old man did not come back. At last after three months had passed the familiar tap of his staff was heard. The monks flew to meet him and showered questions upon him, but instead of being delighted to see them he wept bitterly and did not utter a word. The monks noticed that he looked greatly aged and had grown thinner; his face looked exhausted and wore an expression of profound sadness, and when he wept he had the air of a man who has been outraged.
The monks fell to weeping too and began with sympathy asking him why he was weeping, why his face was so gloomy, but he locked himself in his cell without uttering a word. For seven days he sat in his cell, eating, and drinking nothing, weeping, and not playing on his organ. To knocking at his door and to the entreaties of the monks to come out and share his grief with them he replied with unbroken silence.
Fri, 28 Aug 2020 - 07min - 43 - #43- A Story Without A Title, Anton Chekhov-part 1
IN the fifth century, just as now, the sun rose every morning and every evening retired to rest. In the morning, when the first rays kissed the dew, the earth revived, the air was filled with the sounds of rapture and hope; while in the evening the same earth subsided into silence and plunged into gloomy darkness. One day was like another, one night like another. From time to time a storm-cloud raced up and there was the angry rumble of thunder, or a negligent star fell out of the sky, or a pale monk ran to tell the brotherhood that not far from the monastery he had seen a tiger -- and that was all, and then each day was like the next.
The monks worked and prayed, and their Father Superior played on the organ, made Latin verses, and wrote music. The wonderful old man possessed an extraordinary gift. He played on the organ with such art that even the oldest monks, whose hearing had grown somewhat dull towards the end of their lives, could not restrain their tears when the sounds of the organ floated from his cell. When he spoke of anything, even of the most ordinary things -- for instance of the trees, of the wild beasts, or of the sea -- they could not listen to him without a smile or tears, and it seemed that the same chords vibrated in his soul as in the organ. If he were moved to anger or abandoned himself to intense joy, or began speaking of something terrible or grand, then a passionate inspiration took possession of him, tears came into his flashing eyes, his face flushed, and his voice thundered, and as the monks listened to him they felt that their souls were spell-bound by his inspiration; at such marvelous, splendid moments his power over them was boundless, and if he had bidden his elders fling themselves into the sea, they would all, every one of them, have hastened to carry out his wishes.
His music, his voice, his poetry in which he glorified God, the heavens and the earth, were a continual source of joy to the monks. It sometimes happened that through the monotony of their lives they grew weary of the trees, the flowers, the spring, the autumn, their ears were tired of the sound of the sea, and the song of the birds seemed tedious to them, but the talents of their Father Superior were as necessary to them as their daily bread.
Fri, 28 Aug 2020 - 04min - 42 - #42-Aubrey, David Gates - Bread
And Aubrey was her name,
A not so very ordinary girl or name
But who's to blame?
For a love that wouldn't bloom
For the hearts that never played in tune
Like a lovely melody that everyone can sing,
Take away the words that rhyme it doesn't mean a thing
And Aubrey was her name
We tripped the light and danced together to the moon,
But where was June?
No, it never came around
If it did, it never made a sound,
Maybe I was absent or was listening to fast,
Catching all the words, but then the meaning going past,
But God I miss the girl,
And I'd go a thousand times around the world just to be
Closer to her than to me
And Aubrey was her name,
I never knew her, but I loved her just the same,
I loved her name
Wish that I had found the way
And the reasons that would make her stay
I have learned to lead a life apart from all the rest
If I can't have the one I want, I'll do without the best
But how I miss the girl
And I'd go a million times around the world just to say
She had been mine for a day
Thu, 27 Aug 2020 - 05min - 41 - #041- Five Little Pigs, Joseph Martin Kronheim - part 2
The Little Pig who had Roast Beef.
This little pig was a very good and careful fellow. He gave his mother scarcely any trouble, and always took a pleasure in doing all she bade him. Here you see him sitting down with clean hands and face, to some nice roast beef, while his brother, the idle pig, who is standing on a stool in the corner, with the dunce's cap on, has none. He sat down and quietly learned his lesson, and asked his mother to hear him repeat it. And this he did so well that Mrs. Pig stroked him on the ears and forehead, and called him a good little pig. After this he asked her to allow him to help her make tea. He brought everything she wanted, and lifted off the kettle from the fire, without spilling a drop either on his toes or the carpet. By-and-bye he went out, after asking his mother's leave, to play with his hoop. He had not gone far when he saw an old blind pig, who, with his hat in his hand was crying at the loss of his dog; so he put his hand in his pocket and found a halfpenny which he gave to the poor old pig. It was for such thoughtful conduct as this that his mother often gave this little pig roast beef. We now come to the little pig who had none.
The Little Pig who had None.
This was a most obstinate and willful little pig. His mother had set him to learn his lesson, but no sooner had she gone out into the garden, than he tore his book into pieces. When his mother came back he ran off into the streets to play with other idle little pigs like himself. After this he quarreled with one of the pigs and got a sound thrashing. Being afraid to go home, he stayed out till it was quite dark and caught a severe cold. So he was taken home and put to bed, and had to take a lot of nasty physic.
The Little Pig who Cried “Wee, wee,” all the Way Home.
This little pig went fishing. Now he had been told not to go into Farmer Grumpey's grounds, who did not allow anyone to fish in his part of the river. But in spite of what he had been told, this foolish little pig went there. He soon caught a very large fish, and while he was trying to carry it home, Farmer Grumpey came running along with his great whip. He quickly dropped the fish, but the farmer caught him, and as he laid his whip over his back for some time, the little pig ran off, crying, “Wee, wee, wee,” all the way home.
Thu, 27 Aug 2020 - 04min - 40 - #040- Five Little Pigs, Joseph Martin Kronheim - part 1
This little piggy went to market,
This little piggy stayed home,
This little piggy had roast beef
This little piggy had none,
And this little piggy cried wee wee wee all the way home.
The Little Pig who Went to Market.
There was once a family of Five Little Pigs, and Mrs. Pig, their mother, loved them all very dearly. Some of these little pigs were very good and took a great deal of trouble to please her. The eldest pig was so active and useful that he was called Mr. Pig. One day he went to market with his cart full of vegetables, but Rusty, the donkey, began to show his bad temper before he had gone very far on the road. All the coaxing and whipping would not make him move. So, Mr. Pig took him out of the shafts, and being very strong, drew the cart to market himself. When he got there, all the other pigs began to laugh. But they did not laugh so loudly when Mr. Pig told them all his struggles on the road. Mr. Pig lost no time in selling his vegetables, and very soon after Rusty came trotting into the market-place, and as he now seemed willing to take his place in the cart, Mr. Pig started for home without delay. When he got there, he told Mrs. Pig his story, and she called him her best and most worthy son.
The Little Pig who Stayed at Home.
This little pig very much wanted to go with his brother, but as he was somischievous that he could not be trusted far away, his mother made him stay at home, and told him to keep a good fire while she went out to the miller's to buy some flour. But as soon as he was alone, instead of learning his lessons, he began to tease the poor cat. Then he got the bellows, and cut the leather with a knife, so as to see where the wind came from: and when he could not find this out, he began to cry. After this he broke all his brother's toys; he forced the drum-stick through the drum, he tore off the tail from the kite, and then pulled off the horse's head. And then he went to the cupboard and ate the jam. When Mrs. Pig came home, she sat down by the fire, and being very tired, she soon fell asleep. No sooner had she done so, than this bad little pig got a long handkerchief and tied her in her chair. But soon she awoke and found out all the mischief that he had been doing. She saw at once the damage that he had done to his brother's playthings. So, she quickly brought out her thickest and heaviest birch, and gave this naughty little pig such a beating as he did not forget for a long time.
Thu, 27 Aug 2020 - 04min - 39 - #039- The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Beatrix Potter - part 2
He went back towards the tool-shed, but suddenly, quite close to him, he heard the noise of a hoe— scratch, scratch, scratch, Peter scattered underneath the bushes. But presently, as nothing happened, he came out, and climbed upon a wheelbarrow, and peeped over. The first thing he saw was Mr. McGregor hoeing onions. His back was turned towards Peter, and beyond him was the gate!
Peter sat down to rest; he was out of breath and trembling with fright, and he had not the least idea which way to go. Also he was very damp with sitting in that can.
After a time, he began to wander about, going lippity— lippity—not very fast, and looking all around.
He found a door in a wall; but it was locked, and there was no room for a fat little rabbit to squeeze underneath.
An old mouse was running in and out over the stone doorstep, carrying peas and beans to her family in the wood. Peter asked her the way to the gate, but she had such a large pea in her mouth that she could not answer. She only shook her head at him. Peter began to cry.
Then he tried to find his way straight across the garden, but he became more and more puzzled. Presently, he came to a pond where Mr. McGregor filled his water-cans. A white cat was staring at some goldfish; she sat very, very still, but now and then the tip of her tail twitched as if it were alive. Peter thought it best to go away without speaking to her; he had heard about cats from his cousin, little Benjamin Bunny.
He went back towards the tool-shed, but suddenly, quite close to him, he heard the noise of a hoe— scratch, scratch, scratch, Peter scattered underneath the bushes. But presently, as nothing happened, he came out, and climbed upon a wheelbarrow, and peeped over. The first thing he saw was Mr. McGregor hoeing onions. His back was turned towards Peter, and beyond him was the gate!
Peter got down very quietly off the wheelbarrow, and started running as fast as he could go, along a straight walk behind some black-currant bushes.
Mr. McGregor caught sight of him at the corner, but Peter did not care. He slipped underneath the gate and was safe at last in the wood outside the garden.
Mr. McGregor hung up the little jacket and the shoes for a scarecrow to frighten the blackbirds.
Peter never stopped running or looked behind him till he got home to the big fir-tree.
He was so tired that he flopped down upon the nice soft sand on the floor of the rabbit-hole and shut his eyes. His mother was busy cooking; she wondered what he had done with his clothes. It was the second little jacket and pair of shoes that Peter had lost in a fortnight!
I am sorry to say that Peter was not very well during the evening.
His mother put him to bed and made some chamomile tea; and she gave a dose of it to Peter!
"One table-spoonful to be taken at bed-time."
BUT Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cotton-tail had bread and milk and blackberries, for supper.
Wed, 26 Aug 2020 - 04min - 38 - #038- The Tale of Peter Rabbit, Beatrix Potter part 1
ONCE upon a time there were four little Rabbits, and their names were— Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail, and Peter.
They lived with their Mother in a sandbank, underneath the root of a big fir tree.
"Now, my dears," said old Mrs. Rabbit one morning, "you may go into the fields or down the lane, but don't go into Mr. McGregor's garden: your Father had an accident there; he was put in a pie by Mrs. McGregor."
"Now run along, and don't get into mischief. I am going out."
Then old Mrs. Rabbit took a basket and her umbrella, to the baker's. She bought a loaf of brown bread and five currant buns.
Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cottontail, who were good little bunnies, went down the lane to gather blackberries.
BUT Peter, who was very naughty, ran straight away to Mr. McGregor's garden and squeezed under the gate!
FIRST, he ate some lettuces and some French beans; and then he ate some radishes.
And then, feeling rather sick, he went to look for some parsley.
But round the end of a cucumber frame, whom should he meet but Mr. McGregor!
Mr. McGregor was on his hands and knees planting out young cabbages, but he jumped up and ran after Peter, waving a rake and calling out, "Stop thief!"
Peter was most dreadfully frightened; he rushed all over the garden, for he had forgotten the way back to the gate.
He lost one of his shoes among the cabbages, and the other shoe amongst the potatoes.
After losing them, he ran on four legs and went faster, so that I think he might have got away altogether if he had not unfortunately run into a gooseberry net, and got caught by the large buttons on his jacket. It was a blue jacket with brass buttons, quite new.
Peter gave himself up for lost and shed big tears; but his sobs were overheard by some friendly sparrows, who flew to him in great excitement, and implored him to exert himself.
Mr. McGregor came up with a sieve, which he intended to pop upon the top of Peter; but Peter wriggled out just in time, leaving his jacket behind him.
And rushed into the tool-shed and jumped into a can. It would have been a beautiful thing to hide in, if it had not had so much water in it.
Mr. McGregor was quite sure that Peter was somewhere in the tool-shed, perhaps hidden underneath a flowerpot. He began to turn them over carefully, looking under each.
Presently Peter sneezed— "Kertyschoo!" Mr. McGregor was after him in no time,
And tried to put his foot upon Peter, who jumped out of a window, upsetting three plants. The window was too small for Mr. McGregor, and he was tired of running after Peter. He went back to his work.
Wed, 26 Aug 2020 - 04min - 37 - #037- I Have a Dream, Martin Luther King, Jr. part 3
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice (Yeah), sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of “interposition” and “nullification”, one day right there in Alabama little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers. I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with new meaning: “My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!”
And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania. Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado. Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California. But not only that: Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia. Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee. Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring. And when this happens (Let it ring, Let it ring), and when we allow freedom ring (Let it ring), when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men, and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: “Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
Tue, 18 Aug 2020 - 05min - 36 - #036- I Have a Dream, Martin Luther King, Jr. part 2
1963 is not an end, but a beginning. And those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges. But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: in the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds.
Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. (My Lord) Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny, and they have come to realize that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall always march ahead. We cannot turn back. There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating for whites only. We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive. Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
Tue, 18 Aug 2020 - 06min - 35 - #035- I Have a Dream, Martin Luther King, Jr. part 1
Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his iconic speech, titled I Have a Dream, on August 28, 1963- from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. at the event of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
I will be reading the speech of Martin Luther King Junior, as it was written and read by Martin Luther king Jr. on August 28, 1963.
However, you as a English learner should know that, In the United States of America today, the word Negro is a demeaning word, it is an offensive word, it is a bad word, that you should not say or write it. if you must read in its place - you should say - the “N” word instead. Also, the correct way to describe a person of African decedent, in the USA is: He or she is an African American or He or She is a Person of Color.
In this recording I divided in 3 parts to make easier to read and listen.
I have a Dream by Martin Luther King Junior
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.
But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land. And so we’ve come here today to dramatize a shameful condition.
In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked insufficient funds.
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so we’ve come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children. It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality.
Tue, 18 Aug 2020 - 07min - 34 - #034- Jack and the Beanstalk, English Fairy Tales
Jack and the Beanstalk
English Fairy Tales
Once upon a time there lived a poor widow and her son Jack. One day, Jack’s mother told him to sell their only cow. Jack went to the market and on the way, he met a man who wanted to buy his cow. Jack asked, “What will you give me in return for my cow?” The man answered, “I will give you five magic beans!” Jack took the magic beans and gave the man the cow. But when he reached home, Jack’s mother was very angry. She said, “You fool! He took away your cow and gave you some beans!” She threw the beans out of the window. Jack was very sad and went to sleep without dinner.
The next day, when Jack woke up in the morning and looked out of the window, he saw that a huge beanstalk had grown from his magic beans! He climbed up the beanstalk and reached a kingdom in the sky. There lived a giant and his wife. Jack went inside the house and found the giant’s wife in the kitchen. Jack said, “Could you please give me something to eat? I am so hungry!” The kind wife gave him bread and some milk.
While he was eating, the giant came home. The giant was very big and looked very fearsome. Jack was terrified and went and hid inside. The giant cried, “Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I’ll grind his bones to make my bread!” The wife said, “There is no boy in here!” So, the giant ate his food and then went to his room. He took out his sacks of gold coins, counted them and kept them aside. Then he went to sleep. In the night, Jack crept out of his hiding place, took one sack of gold coins, and climbed down the beanstalk. At home, he gave the coins to his mother. His mother was very happy, and they lived well for some time.
Jack Climbed the beanstalk and went to the giant’s house again. Once again, Jack asked the giant’s wife for food, but while he was eating the giant returned. Jack leapt up in fright and went and hid under the bed. The giant cried, “Fee-fi fo -fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I’ll grind his bones to make my bread!” The wife said, “There is no boy in here!” The giant ate his food and went to his room. There, he took out a hen. He shouted, “Lay!” and the hen laid a golden egg. When the giant fell asleep, Jack took the hen and climbed down the beanstalk. Jack’s mother was very happy with him.
After some days, Jack once again climbed the beanstalk and went to the giant’s castle. For the third time, Jack met the giant’s wife and asked for some food. Once again, the giant’s wife gave him bread and milk. But while Jack was eating, the giant came home. “Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman. Be he alive, or be he dead, I’ll grind his bones to make my bread!” cried the giant. “Don’t be silly! There is no boy in here!” said his wife.
The giant had a magical harp that could play beautiful songs. While the giant slept, Jack took the harp and was about to leave. Suddenly, the magic harp cried, “Help master! A boy is stealing me!” The giant woke up and saw Jack with the harp. Furious, he ran after Jack. But Jack was too fast for him. He ran down the beanstalk and reached home. The giant followed him down. Jack quickly ran inside his house and fetched an axe. He began to chop the beanstalk. The giant fell and died.
Jack and his mother were now very rich, and they lived happily ever after.
Mon, 17 Aug 2020 - 06min - 33 - #033- The Town Mouse And The Country Mouse, Aesop
A Town Mouse once visited a relative who lived in the country. For lunch, the Country Mouse served wheat stalks, roots, and acorns, with a dash of cold water for drink. The Town Mouse ate very sparingly, nibbling a little of this and a little of that, and by her manner making it very plain that she ate the simple food only to be polite.
After the meal, the friends had a long talk, or rather the Town Mouse talked about her life in the city while the Country Mouse listened. They then went to bed in a cozy nest in the hedgerow and slept in quiet and comfort until morning. In her sleep the Country Mouse dreamed she was a Town Mouse with all the luxuries and delights of city life that her friend had described for her. So, the next day when the Town Mouse asked the Country Mouse to go home with her to the city, she gladly said yes.
When they reached the mansion in which the Town Mouse lived, they found on the table in the dining room the leavings of a very fine banquet. There were sweetmeats and jellies, pastries, delicious cheeses, indeed, the most tempting foods that a Mouse can imagine. But just as the Country Mouse was about to nibble a dainty bit of pastry, she heard a Cat mew loudly and scratch at the door. In great fear the Mice scurried to a hiding place, where they lay quite still for a long time, hardly daring to breathe. When at last they ventured back to the feast, the door opened suddenly and in came the servants to clear the table, followed by the House Dog.
The Country Mouse stopped in the Town Mouse's den only long enough to pick up her carpet bag and umbrella.
"You may have luxuries and dainties that I have not," she said as she hurried away, "but I prefer my plain food and simple life in the country with the peace and security that go with it."
Poverty with security is better than plenty in the midst of fear and uncertainty.
Wed, 12 Aug 2020 - 03min - 32 - #032-The Declaration of Independence of the USA, Thomas Jefferson Cont.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:
For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule in these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Powers to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our Seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.
Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of Consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.We, therefore, the Representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do.
Thu, 06 Aug 2020 - 08min - 31 - #031-The Declaration of Independence of the USA,Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was its primary author, finalizing all revisions that were adopted by the 2nd Continental Congress on July 4th, 1776. It took almost a month for all 56 delegates to sign it.
We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness—-That to secure these Rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed, that whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is theirRight, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security. Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the Present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid World.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People; unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only.He has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.
He has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and Amount and Payment of their Salaries.
He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.
He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislature.
Thu, 06 Aug 2020 - 08min - 30 - #030- The Child's Story, Charles Dickens part 3
Whenever these partings happened, the traveler looked at the gentleman, and saw him glance up at the sky above the trees, where the day was beginning to decline, and the sunset to come on. He saw, too, that his hair was turning grey. But, they never could rest long, for they had their journey to perform, and it was necessary for them to be always busy.
At last, there had been so many partings that there were no children left, and only the traveler, the gentleman, and the lady, went upon their way in company. And now the wood was yellow; and now brown; and the leaves, even of the forest trees, began to fall.
So, they came to an avenue that was darker than the rest and were pressing forward on their journey without looking down it when the lady stopped.
"My husband," said the lady. "I am called."
They listened, and they heard a voice a long way down the avenue, say, "Mother, mother!"
It was the voice of the first child who had said, "I am going to Heaven!" and the father said, "I pray not yet. The sunset is very near. I pray not yet!"
But, the voice cried, "Mother, mother!" without minding him, though his hair was now quite white, and tears were on his face.
Then, the mother, who was already drawn into the shade of the dark avenue and moving away with her arms still round his neck, kissed him, and said, "My dearest, I am summoned, and I go!" And she was gone. And the traveler and he were left alone together.
And they went on and on together, until they came to very near the end of the wood: so near, that they could see the sunset shining red before them through the trees.
Yet, once more, while he broke his way among the branches, the traveler lost his friend. He called and called, but there was no reply, and when he passed out of the wood, and saw the peaceful sun going down upon a wide purple prospect, he came to an old man sitting on a fallen tree. So, he said to the old man, "What do you do here?" And the old man said with a calm smile, "I am always remembering. Come and remember with me!"
So the traveler sat down by the side of that old man, face to face with the serene sunset; and all his friends came softly back and stood around him. The beautiful child, the handsome boy, the young man in love, the father, mother, and children: every one of them was there, and he had lost nothing. So, he loved them all, and was kind and forbearing with them all, and was always pleased to watch them all, and they all honored and loved him. And I think the traveler must be yourself, dear Grandfather, because this is what you do to us, and what we do to you.
Wed, 05 Aug 2020 - 04min - 29 - #029- The Child's Story, Charles Dickens part 2
Still, one day, in the midst of all these pleasures, the traveler lost the boy as he had lost the child, and, after calling to him in vain, went on upon his journey. So he went on for a little while without seeing anything, until at last he came to a young man. So, he said to the young man, "What do you do here?" And the young man said, "I am always in love. Come and love with me."
Still, one day, in the midst of all these pleasures, the traveller lost the boy as he had lost the child, and, after calling to him in vain, went on upon his journey. So he went on for a little while without seeing anything, until at last he came to a young man. So, he said to the young man, "What do you do here?" And the young man said, "I am always in love. Come and love with me."
So, he went away with that young man, and presently they came to one of the prettiest girls that ever was seen--just like Fanny in the corner there--and she had eyes like Fanny, and hair like Fanny, and dimples like Fanny's, and she laughed and colored just as Fanny does while I am talking about her. So, the young man fell in love directly--just as Somebody I won't mention, the first time he came here, did with Fanny. Well! he was teased sometimes--just as Somebody used to be by Fanny; and they quarreled sometimes--just as Somebody and Fanny used to quarrel; and they made it up, and sat in the dark, and wrote letters every day, and never were happy asunder, and were always looking out for one another and pretending not to, and were engaged at Christmas-time, and sat close to one another by the fire, and were going to be married very soon--all exactly like Somebody I won't mention, and Fanny!
But, the traveler lost them one day, as he had lost the rest of his friends, and, after calling to them to come back, which they never did, went on upon his journey. So, he went on for a little while without seeing anything, until at last he came to a middle-aged gentleman. So, he said to the gentleman, "What are you doing here?" And his answer was, "I am always busy. Come and be busy with me!"
So, he began to be very busy with that gentleman, and they went on through the wood together. The whole journey was through a wood, only it had been open and green at first, like a wood in spring; and now began to be thick and dark, like a wood in summer; some of the little trees that had come out earliest, were even turning brown. The gentleman was not alone, but had a lady of about the same age with him, who was his Wife; and they had children, who were with them too. So, they all went on together through the wood, cutting down the trees, and making a path through the branches and the fallen leaves, and carrying burdens, and working hard.
Sometimes, they came to a long green avenue that opened into deeper woods. Then they would hear a very little, distant voice crying, "Father, father, I am another child! Stop for me!" And presently they would see a very little figure, growing larger as it came along, running to join them. When it came up, they all crowded round it, and kissed and welcomed it; and then they all went on together.
Sometimes, they came to several avenues at once, and then they all stood still, and one of the children said, "Father, I am going to sea," and another said, "Father, I am going to India," and another, "Father, I am going to seek my fortune where I can," and another, "Father, I am going to Heaven!" So, with many tears at parting, they went, solitary, down those avenues, each child upon its way; and the child who went to Heaven, rose into the golden air and vanished.
Wed, 05 Aug 2020 - 05min - 28 - #028- The Child's Story, Charles Dickens part 1
Once upon a time, a good many years ago, there was a traveler, and he set out upon a journey. It was a magic journey, and was to seem very long when he began it, and very short when he got half way through.
Once upon a time, a good many years ago, there was a traveller, and he set out upon a journey. It was a magic journey, and was to seem very long when he began it, and very short when he got half way through.
He traveler along a rather dark path for some little time, without meeting anything, until at last he came to a beautiful child. So he said to the child, "What do you do here?" And the child said, "I am always at play. Come and play with me!"
So, he played with that child, the whole day long, and they were very merry. The sky was so blue, the sun was so bright, the water was so sparkling, the leaves were so green, the flowers were so lovely, and they heard such singing-birds and saw so many butterflies, that everything was beautiful. This was in fine weather. When it rained, they loved to watch the falling drops, and to smell the fresh scents. When it blew, it was delightful to listen to the wind, and fancy what it said, as it came rushing from its home-- where was that, they wondered!--whistling and howling, driving the clouds before it, bending the trees, rumbling in the chimneys, shaking the house, and making the sea roar in fury. But, when it snowed, that was best of all; for, they liked nothing so well as to look up at the white flakes falling fast and thick, like down from the breasts of millions of white birds; and to see how smooth and deep the drift was; and to listen to the hush upon the paths and roads.
They had plenty of the finest toys in the world, and the most astonishing picture-books: all about scimitars and slippers and turbans, and dwarfs and giants and genii and fairies, and blue-beards and bean-stalks and riches and caverns and forests and Valentines and Orsons: and all new and all true.
But, one day, of a sudden, the traveler lost the child. He called to him over and over again, but got no answer. So, he went upon his road, and went on for a little while without meeting anything, until at last he came to a handsome boy. So, he said to the boy, "What do you do here?" And the boy said, "I am always learning. Come and learn with me."
So he learned with that boy about Jupiter and Juno, and the Greeks and the Romans, and I don't know what, and learned more than I could tell--or he either, for he soon forgot a great deal of it. But, they were not always learning; they had the merriest games that ever were played. They rowed upon the river in summer, and skated on the ice in winter; they were active afoot, and active on horseback; at cricket, and all games at ball; at prisoner's base, hare and hounds, follow my leader, and more sports than I can think of; nobody could beat them. They had holidays too, and Twelfth cakes, and parties where they danced till midnight, and real Theaters where they saw palaces of real gold and silver rise out of the real earth, and saw all the wonders of the world at once. As to friends, they had such dear friends and so many of them, that I want the time to reckon them up. They were all young, like the handsome boy, and were never to be strange to one another all their lives through.
Wed, 05 Aug 2020 - 05min - 27 - #027- The Army Goes Rolling Along, Edmund L. Gruber, John Philip Sousa
The Army Goes Rolling Along"
The Official Song of The United States Army
The current lyrics tell the story of the past, the present, and the future.
The song was originally written in 1908 by field artillery First Lieutenant [later Brigadier General] Edmund L. Gruber, while stationed in the Philippines as the "Caisson Song”.
In 1917 The song was transformed into a march by John Philip Sousa and renamed "The Field Artillery Song." It was adopted in 1956 as the official song of the Army and retitled, "The Army Goes Rolling Along.
Lyrics
March along, sing our song, with the Army of the free.
Count the brave, count the true, who have fought to victory.
We’re the Army and proud of our name!
We’re the Army and proudly proclaim:
First to fight for the right,
And to build the Nation’s might,
And The Army Goes Rolling Along.
Proud of all we have done,
Fighting till the battle’s won,
And the Army Goes Rolling Along.
Then it’s hi! hi! hey!
The Army’s on its way.
Count off the cadence loud and strong;
For wherever we go,
You will always know
That The Army Goes Rolling Along.
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 04min - 26 - #026- The Gift of the Magi, O. Henry -Part 4
The Gift of the Magi
by O. Henry
White fingers and nimble tore at the string and paper. And then an ecstatic scream of joy; and then, alas! a quick feminine change to hysterical tears and wails, necessitating the immediate employment of all the comforting powers of the lord of the flat.
For there lay The Combs--the set of combs, side and back, that Della had worshipped for long in a Broadway window. Beautiful combs, pure tortoise-shell, with jewelled rims--just the shade to wear in the beautiful vanished hair. They were expensive combs, she knew, and her heart had simply craved and yearned over them without the least hope of possession. And now, they were hers, but the tresses that should have adorned the coveted adornments were gone.
But she hugged them to her bosom, and at length she was able to look up with dim eyes and a smile and say: "My hair grows so fast, Jim!"
And then Della leaped up like a little singed cat and cried, "Oh, oh!"
Jim had not yet seen his beautiful present. She held it out to him eagerly upon her open palm. The dull precious metal seemed to flash with a reflection of her bright and ardent spirit.
"Isn't it a dandy, Jim? I hunted all over town to find it. You'll have to look at the time a hundred times a day now. Give me your watch. I want to see how it looks on it."
Instead of obeying, Jim tumbled down on the couch and put his hands under the back of his head and smiled.
"Dell," said he, "let's put our Christmas presents away and keep 'em a while. They're too nice to use just at present. I sold the watch to get the money to buy your combs. And now suppose you put the chops on."
The magi, as you know, were wise men--wonderfully wise men-who brought gifts to the Babe in the manger. They invented the art of giving Christmas presents. Being wise, their gifts were no doubt wise ones, possibly bearing the privilege of exchange in case of duplication. And here I have lamely related to you the uneventful chronicle of two foolish children in a flat who most unwisely sacrificed for each other the greatest treasures of their house. But in a last word to the wise of these days let it be said that of all who give gifts these two were the wisest. Of all who give and receive gifts, such as they are wisest. Everywhere they are wisest. They are the magi.
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 04min - 25 - #025- The Gift of the Magi, O. Henry - Part 3
The Gift of the Magi
by O. Henry
At 7 o'clock the coffee was made, and the frying-pan was on the back of the stove hot and ready to cook the chops.
Jim was never late. Della doubled the fob chain in her hand and sat on the corner of the table near the door that he always entered. Then she heard his step on the stair away down on the first flight, and she turned white for just a moment. She had a habit of saying little silent prayers about the simplest everyday things, and now she whispered: "Please, God, make him think I am still pretty."
The door opened and Jim stepped in and closed it. He looked thin and very serious. Poor fellow, he was only twenty-two--and to be burdened with a family! He needed a new overcoat and he was without gloves.
Jim stepped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the scent of quail. His eyes were fixed upon Della, and there was an expression in them that she could not read, and it terrified her. It was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any of the sentiments that she had been prepared for. He simply stared at her fixedly with that peculiar expression on his face.
Della wriggled off the table and went for him.
"Jim, darling," she cried, "don't look at me that way. I had my hair cut off and sold it because I couldn't have lived through Christmas without giving you a present. It'll grow out again--you won't mind, will you? I just had to do it. My hair grows awfully fast. Say 'Merry Christmas!' Jim, and let's be happy. You don't know what a nice-what a beautiful, nice gift I've got for you."
"You've cut off your hair?" asked Jim, laboriously, as if he had not arrived at that patent fact yet, even after the hardest mental labor.
"Cut it off and sold it," said Della. "Don't you like me just as well, anyhow? I'm me without my hair, ain't I?"
Jim looked about the room curiously.
"You say your hair is gone?" he said, with an air almost of idiocy.
"You needn't look for it," said Della. "It's sold, I tell you--sold and gone, too. It's Christmas Eve, boy. Be good to me, for it went for you. Maybe the hairs of my head were numbered," she went on with a sudden serious sweetness, "but nobody could ever count my love for you. Shall I put the chops on, Jim?"
Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake. He enfolded his Della. For ten seconds let us regard with discreet scrutiny some inconsequential object in the other direction. Eight dollars a week or a million a year--what is the difference? A mathematician or a wit would give you the wrong answer. The magi brought valuable gifts, but that was not among them. This dark assertion will be illuminated later on.
Jim drew a package from his overcoat pocket and threw it upon the table.
"Don't make any mistake, Dell," he said, "about me. I don't think there's anything in the way of a haircut or a shave or a shampoo that could make me like my girl any less. But if you'll unwrap that package you may see why you had me going a while at first."
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 05min - 24 - #024- The Gift of the Magi, O. Henry - Part 2
The Gift of the Magi
by O. Henry
Now, there were two possessions of the James Dillingham Youngs in which they both took a mighty pride. One was Jim's gold watch that had been his father's and his grandfather's. The other was Della's hair. Had the Queen of Sheba lived in the flat across the airshaft, Della would have let her hair hang out of the window someday to dry just to depreciate Her Majesty's jewels and gifts. Had King Solomon been the janitor, with all his treasures piled up in the basement, Jim would have pulled out his watch every time he passed, just to see him pluck at his beard from envy.
So now Della's beautiful hair fell about her, rippling and shining like a cascade of brown waters. It reached below her knee and made itself almost a garment for her. And then she did it up again nervously and quickly. Once she faltered for a minute and stood still while a tear or two splashed on the worn red carpet.
On went her old brown jacket; on went her old brown hat. With a whirl of skirts and with the brilliant sparkle still in her eyes, she cluttered out of the door and down the stairs to the street.
Where she stopped the sign read: "Mme Sofronie. Hair Goods of All Kinds." One Eight up Della ran, and collected herself, panting. Madame, large, too white, chilly, hardly looked the "Sofronie."
"Will you buy my hair?" asked Della.
"I buy hair," said Madame. "Take yer hat off and let's have a sight at the looks of it."
Down rippled the brown cascade.
"Twenty dollars," said Madame, lifting the mass with a practiced hand.
"Give it to me quick" said Della.
Oh, and the next two hours tripped by on rosy wings. Forget the hashed metaphor. She was ransacking the stores for Jim's present.
She found it at last. It surely had been made for Jim and no one else. There was no other like it in any of the stores, and she had turned all of them inside out. It was a platinum fob chain simple and chaste in design, properly proclaiming its value by substance alone and not by meretricious ornamentation--as all good things should do. It was even worthy of The Watch. As soon as she saw it she knew that it must be Jim's. It was like him. Quietness and value--the description applied to both. Twenty-one dollars they took from her for it, and she hurried home with the 78 cents. With that chain on his watch Jim might be properly anxious about the time in any company. Grand as the watch was, he sometimes looked at it on the sly on account of the old leather strap that he used in place of a chain.
When Della reached home her intoxication gave way a little to prudence and reason. She got out her curling irons and lighted the gas and went to work repairing the ravages made by generosity added to love. Which is always a tremendous task dear friends--a mammoth task.
Within forty minutes her head was covered with tiny, close-lying curls that made her look wonderfully like a truant schoolboy. She looked at her reflection in the mirror long, carefully, and critically.
"If Jim doesn't kill me," she said to herself, "before he takes a second look at me, he'll say I look like a Coney Island chorus girl. But what could I do--oh! what could I do with a dollar and eighty-seven cents?"
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 05min - 23 - #023- The Gift of the Magi, O. Henry - Part 1
The Gift of the Magi
by O. Henry
One dollar and eighty-seven cents. That was all. And sixty cents of it was in pennies. Pennies saved one and two at a time by bulldozing the grocer and the vegetable man and the butcher until one's cheeks burned with the silent imputation of parsimony that such close dealing implied. Three times Della counted it. One dollar and eighty-seven cents. And the next day would be Christmas.
There was clearly nothing left to do but flop down on the shabby little couch and howl. So Della did it. Which instigates the moral reflection that life is made up of sobs, sniffles, and smiles, with sniffles predominating.
While the mistress of the home is gradually subsiding from the first stage to the second, take a look at the home. A furnished flat at $8 per week. It did not exactly beggar description, but it certainly had that word on the look-out for the mendicancy squad.
In the vestibule below was a letter-box into which no letter would go, and an electric button from which no mortal finger could coax a ring. Also appertaining there unto was a card bearing the name "Mr. James Dillingham Young."
The "Dillingham" had been flung to the breeze during a former period of prosperity when its possessor was being paid $30 per week. Now, when the income was shrunk to $20, the letters of "Dillingham" looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D. But whenever Mr. James Dillingham Young came home and reached his flat above he was called "Jim" and greatly hugged by Mrs. James Dillingham Young, already introduced to you as Della. Which is all very good.
Della finished her cry and attended to her cheeks with the powder rag. She stood by the window and looked out dully at a grey cat walking a grey fence in a grey backyard. To-morrow would be Christmas Day, and she had only $1.87 with which to buy Jim a present. She had been saving every penny she could for months, with this result. Twenty dollars a week doesn't go far. Expenses had been greater than she had calculated. They always are. Only $1.87 to buy a present for Jim. Her Jim. Many a happy hour she had spent planning for something nice for him. Something fine and rare and sterling--something just a little bit near to being worthy of the honor of being owned by Jim.
There was a pier-glass between the windows of the room. Perhaps you have seen a pier-glass in an $8 Bat. A very thin and very agile person may, by observing his reflection in a rapid sequence of longitudinal strips, obtain a fairly accurate conception of his looks. Della, being slender, had mastered the art.
Suddenly she whirled from the window and stood before the glass. Her eyes were shining brilliantly, but her face had lost its color within twenty seconds. Rapidly she pulled down her hair and let it fall to its full length.
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 05min - 22 - #022- The Aged Mother, Matsuo Basho- Part 2
The Aged Mother
by Matsuo Basho
Once more he shouldered his burden (how light it seemed now) and hastened down the path, through the shadows and the moonlight, to the little hut in the valley. Beneath the kitchen floor was a walled closet for food, which was covered and hidden from view. There the son hid his mother, supplying her with everything she needed, continually watching, and fearing she would be discovered. Time passed, and he was beginning to feel safe when again the governor sent forth heralds bearing an unreasonable order, seemingly as a boast of his power. His demand was that his subjects should present him with a rope of ashes.
The entire province trembled with dread. The order must be obeyed yet who in all Shining could make a rope of ashes? One night, in great distress, the son whispered the news to his hidden mother. “Wait!” she said. “I will think. I will think” On the second day she told him what to do. “Make rope of twisted straw,” she said. “Then stretch it upon a row of flat stones and burn it on a windless night.” He called the people together and did as she said and when the blaze died down, there upon the stones, with every twist and fiber showing perfectly, lay a rope of ashes.
The governor was pleased at the wit of the youth and praised greatly, but he demanded to know where he had obtained his wisdom. “Alas! Alas!” cried the farmer, “the truth must be told!” and with deep bows he related his story. The governor listened and then meditated in silence. Finally, he lifted his head. “Shining needs more than strength of youth,” he said gravely. “Ah, that I should have forgotten the well-known saying, “with the crown of snow, there cometh wisdom!” That very hour the cruel law was abolished, and custom drifted into as far a past that only legends remain.
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 03min - 21 - #021- The Aged Mother,Matsuo Basho- part 1
The Aged Mother
by Matsuo Basho
Also known as The Story of the Aged Mother, this Japanese folktale tells the story of an unkind ruler who issues cruel orders, including one demand that all old folks are to be abandoned and left to die. Basho tells a poignant story about a mother and her son and their love for one another.
Long, long ago there lived at the foot of the mountain a poor farmer and his aged, widowed mother. They owned a bit of land which supplied them with food, and they were humble, peaceful, and happy.
Shining was governed by a despotic leader who though a warrior, had a great and cowardly shrinking from anything suggestive of failing health and strength. This caused him to send out a cruel proclamation. The entire province was given strict orders to immediately put to death all aged people. Those were barbarous days, and the custom of abandoning old people to die was not uncommon. The poor farmer loved his aged mother with tender reverence, and the order filled his heart with sorrow. But no one ever thought twice about obeying the mandate of the governor, so with many deep and hopeless sighs, the youth prepared for what at that time was considered the kindest mode of death.
Just at sundown, when his day’s work was ended, he took a quantity of unwhitened rice which was the principal food for the poor, and he cooked, dried it, and tied it in a square cloth, which he swung in a bundle around his neck along with a gourd filled with cool, sweet water. Then he lifted his helpless old mother to his back and started on his painful journey up the mountain. The road was long and steep; the narrow road was crossed and re-crossed by many paths made by the hunters and woodcutters. In some place, they lost and confused, but he gave no heed. One path or another, it mattered not. On he went, climbing blindly upward -- ever upward towards the high bare summit of what is known as Obatsuyama, the mountain of the “abandoning of the aged.”
The eyes of the old mother were not so dim but that they noted the reckless hastening from one path to another, and her loving heart grew anxious. Her son did not know the mountain’s many paths and his return might be one of danger, so she stretched forth her hand and snapping the twigs from brushes as they passed, she quietly dropped a handful every few steps of the way so that as they climbed, the narrow path behind them was dotted at frequent intervals with tiny piles of twigs. At last the summit was reached. Weary and heart sick, the youth gently released his burden and silently prepared a place of comfort as his last duty to the loved one. Gathering fallen pine needles, he made a soft cushion and tenderly lifted his old mother onto it. He wrapped her padded coat more closely about the stooping shoulders and with tearful eyes and an aching heart he said farewell.
The trembling mother’s voice was full of unselfish love as she gave her last injunction. “Let not thine eyes be blinded, my son.” She said. “The mountain road is full of dangers. LOOK carefully and follow the path which holds the piles of twigs. They will guide you to the familiar path farther down.” The son’s surprised eyes looked back over the path, then at the poor old, shriveled hands all scratched and soiled by their work of love. His heart broke within and bowing to the ground, he cried aloud: “oh, Honorable mother, your kindness breaks my heart! I will not leave you. Together we will follow the path of twigs, and together we will die!”
Tue, 04 Aug 2020 - 06min - 20 - #020- Old King Cole,Mother Goose
Old King Cole
Was a merry old soul,
And a merry old soul was he:
He called for his pipe,
And he called for his bowl,
And he called for his fiddlers three.
Every fiddler, he had a fiddle,
And a very fine fiddle had he;
Twee tweedle dee, tweedle dee, went the fiddlers.
Oh, there's none so rare,
As can compare
With King Cole and his fiddlers three.
Wed, 29 Jul 2020 - 01min - 19 - #019- The Blind Men and the Elephant, James Baldwin
There were once six blind men who stood by the road-side every day, and begged from the people who passed. They had often heard of elephants, but they had never seen one; for, being blind, how could they?
It so happened one morning that an elephant was driven down the road where they stood. When they were told that the great beast was before them, they asked the driver to let him stop so that they might see him.
Of course they could not see him with their eyes; but they thought that by touching him they could learn just what kind of animal he was.
The first one happened to put his hand on the elephant's side. "Well, well!" he said, "now I know all about this beast. He is exactly like a wall."
The second felt only of the elephant's tusk. "My brother," he said, "you are mistaken. He is not at all like a wall. He is round and smooth and sharp. He is more like a spear than anything else."
The third happened to take hold of the elephant's trunk. "Both of you are wrong," he said. "Anybody who knows anything can see that this elephant is like a snake."
The fourth reached out his arms, and grasped one of the elephant's legs. "Oh, how blind you are!" he said. "It is very plain to me that he is round and tall like a tree."
The fifth was a very tall man, and he chanced to take hold of the elephant's ear. "The blindest man ought to know that this beast is not like any of the things that you name," he said. "He is exactly like a huge fan."
The sixth was very blind indeed, and it was some time before he could find the elephant at all. At last he seized the animal's tail. "O foolish fellows!" he cried. "You surely have lost your senses. This elephant is not like a wall, or a spear, or a snake, or a tree; neither is he like a fan. But any man with a par-ti-cle of sense can see that he is exactly like a rope."
Then the elephant moved on, and the six blind men sat by the roadside all day, and quarreled about him. Each believed that he knew just how the animal looked; and each called the others hard names because they did not agree with him. People who have eyes sometimes act as foolishly.
Wed, 29 Jul 2020 - 04min - 18 - #018- A Strange Story, O. Henry
In the northern part of Austin there once dwelt an honest family by the name of Smothers. The family consisted of John Smothers, his wife, himself, their little daughter, five years of age, and her parents, making six people toward the population of the city when counted for a special write-up, but only three by actual count.
One night after supper the little girl was seized with a severe colic, and John Smothers hurried downtown to get some medicine.
He never came back.
The little girl recovered and in time grew up to womanhood.
The mother grieved very much over her husband's disappearance, and it was nearly three months before she married again, and moved to San Antonio.
The little girl also married in time, and after a few years had rolled around, she also had a little girl five years of age.
She still lived in the same house where they dwelt when her father had left and never returned.
One night by a remarkable coincidence her little girl was taken with cramp colic on the anniversary of the disappearance of John Smothers, who would now have been her grandfather if he had been alive and had a steady job.
"I will go downtown and get some medicine for her," said John Smith (for it was none other than he whom she had married).
"No, no, dear John," cried his wife. "You, too, might disappear forever, and then forget to come back."
So John Smith did not go, and together they sat by the bedside of little Pansy (for that was Pansy's name).
After a little Pansy seemed to grow worse, and John Smith again attempted to go for medicine, but his wife would not let him.
Suddenly the door opened, and an old man, stooped and bent, with long white hair, entered the room.
"Hello, here is grandpa," said Pansy. She had recognized him before any of the others.
The old man drew a bottle of medicine from his pocket and gave Pansy a spoonful.
She got well immediately.
"I was a little late," said John Smothers, "as I waited for a street car."
Wed, 29 Jul 2020 - 03min - 17 - #017- The Disciple, Oscar Wilde
When Narcissus died the pool of his pleasure changed from a cup of sweet waters into a cup of salt tears, and the Oreads came weeping through the woodland that they might sing to the pool and give it comfort.
And when they saw that the pool had changed from a cup of sweet waters into a cup of salt tears, they loosened the green tresses of their hair and cried to the pool and said, `We do not wonder that you should mourn in this manner for Narcissus, so beautiful was he.'
`But was Narcissus beautiful?' said the pool.
`Who should know that better than you?' answered the Oreads. `Us did he ever pass by, but you he sought for, and would lie on your banks and look down at you, and in the mirror of your waters he would mirror his own beauty.'
And the pool answered, `But I loved Narcissus because, as he lay on my banks and looked down at me, in the mirror of his eyes I saw ever my own beauty mirrored.'
Wed, 29 Jul 2020 - 02min - 16 - #016- Wild Blue Yonder, Robert MacArthur Crawford's
History of the Air Force Song
In 1937, after the U.S. military had been developing airplanes for more than a decade, the Assistant Chief of the Air Corps, Brigadier General Henry Arnold, thought the Army Air Corps needed a fight song similar to the Army, Navy, and Marine Corps.
In 1938, Liberty Magazine offered a $1,000 prize in a contest for composers to come up with a suitable song for the Air Force. A committee of Army Air Force wives selected Robert MacArthur Crawford's composition, which was officially introduced at the Cleveland Air Races in 1939. The Air Force actually did not exist as a separate branch of the U.S. military until 1947.
In 1938 the service was renamed "Army Air Force", and the song title changed to agree.
In the lyrics, there is one verse that commemorates fallen Air Force service members, and has a different melody and more somber mood:
Lyrics of the song:
Off we go into the wild blue yonder,
Climbing high into the sun.
Here they come zooming to meet our thunder,
At 'em, boys, Give 'er the gun! (Give 'er the gun now!)
Down we dive, spouting our flame from under,
Off with one helluva roar!
We live in fame or go down in flame. Hey!
Nothing will stop the U.S. Air Force!
Minds of men fashioned a crate of thunder,
Sent it high into the blue;
Hands of men blasted the world asunder;
How they lived God only knew! (God only knew then!)
Souls of men dreaming of skies to conquer
Gave us wings, ever to soar!
With scouts before
And bombers galore. Hey!
Nothing'll stop the U.S.A Air Force!
Toast to the Host Lyrics
This verse commemorates fallen Air Force service members, and has a different melody and more somber mood:
Here's a toast to the host
Of those who love the vastness of the sky,
To a friend, we send a message of his brother men who fly.
We drink to those who gave their all of old,
Then down we roar to score the rainbow's pot of gold.
A toast to the host of men we boast, the U.S. Air Force!
Zoom!
Off we go into the wild sky yonder,
Keep the wings level and true;
If you'd live to be a grey-haired wonder
Keep the nose out of the blue! (Out of the blue, boy!)
Flying men, guarding the nation's border,
We'll be there, followed by more!
In echelon, we carry on. Hey!
Nothing'll stop the U.S. Air Force!
Tue, 28 Jul 2020 - 07min - 15 - #015- The Fox and The Monkey,Aesop
Aesop was a Greek fabulist and storyteller born in 620 BCE (Before the Christian Era) and died in 564 BCE (Before the Christian Era) . He is credited with a number of fables now collectively known as Aesop's Fables
The Fox And The Monkey
by Aesop
At a great meeting of the Animals, who had gathered to elect a new ruler, the Monkey was asked to dance. This he did so well, with a thousand funny capers and grimaces, that the Animals were carried entirely off their feet with enthusiasm, and then and there, elected him their king.
The Fox did not vote for the Monkey and was much disgusted with the Animals for electing so unworthy a ruler.
One day he found a trap with a bit of meat in it. Hurrying to King Monkey, he told him he had found a rich treasure, which he had not touched because it belonged by right to his majesty the Monkey.
The greedy Monkey followed the Fox to the trap. As soon as he saw the meat, he grasped eagerly for it, only to find himself held fast in the trap. The Fox stood off and laughed.
"You pretend to be our king," he said, "and cannot even take care of yourself!"
Shortly after that, another election among the Animals was held.
The true leader proves himself by his qualities.
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 02min - 14 - #014- The Elephant's Child,Rudyard Kipling- Part 5 of 5
The Elephant's Child ,Part 5 of 5
One dark evening he came back to all his dear families, and he coiled up his trunk and said, "How do you do?" They were very glad to see him, and immediately said, "Come here and be spanked for your 'satiable curiosity."
"Pooh," said the Elephant's Child. "I don't think you people's know anything about spanking; but I do, and I'll show you."
Then he uncurled his trunk and knocked two of his dear brothers head over heels.
"O Bananas!" said they, "Where did you learn that trick, and what have you done to your nose?"
"I got a new one from the Crocodile on the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River," said the Elephant's Child. "I asked him what he had for dinner, and he gave me this to keep."
"It looks very ugly," said his hairy uncle, the Baboon.
"It does," said the Elephant's Child. "But it's very useful," and he picked up his hairy uncle, the Baboon, by one hairy leg, and hove him into a hornets' nest.
Then that bad Elephant's Child spanked all his dear families for a long time, till they were very warm and greatly astonished. He pulled out his tall Ostrich aunt's tail-feathers; and he caught his tall uncle, the Giraffe, by the hind-leg, and dragged him through a thorn-bush; and he shouted at his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, and blew bubbles into her ear when she was sleeping in the water after meals; but he never let any one touch the Kolokolo Bird.
At last things grew so exciting that his dear families went off one by one in a hurry to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, to borrow new noses from the Crocodile. When they came back nobody spanked anybody any more; and ever since that day, O Best Beloved, all the Elephants you will ever see besides all those that you won't, have trunks precisely like the trunk of the 'satiable Elephant's Child.
I Keep six honest serving-men:
(They taught me all I knew)
Their names are What and Where and When
And How and Why and Who.
I send them over land and sea,
I send them east and west;
But after they have worked for me,
I give them all a rest.
I let them rest from nine till five.
For I am busy then,
As well as breakfast, lunch, and tea,
For they are hungry men:
But different folk have different views:
I know a person small—
She keeps ten million serving-men,
Who get no rest at all!
She sends ‘em abroad on her own affairs,
From the second she opens her eyes—
One million Hows, two million Wheres,
And seven million Whys!
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 04min - 13 - #013- The Elephant's Child,Rudyard Kipling- Part 4 of 5
The Elephant's Child PART 4 OF 5
"Then you will have to wait a long time," said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake. "Some people do not know what is good for them."
The Elephant's Child sat there for three days waiting for his nose to shrink. But it never grew any shorter, and, besides, it made him squint. For, O Best Beloved, you will understand that the Crocodile had pulled it out into a really truly trunk, same as all Elephant's have today.
At the end of the third day a fly came and stung him on the shoulder, and before he knew what he was doing he lifted up his trunk and hit that fly dead with the end of it.
"'Vantage number one!" said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake. "You couldn't have done that with a mere-smear nose. Try and eat a little now."
Before he thought what he was doing the Elephant's Child put out his trunk and plucked a large bundle of grass, dusted it clean against his forelegs, and stuffed it into his mouth.
"'Vantage number two!" said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake. "You couldn't have done that with a mere-smear nose. Don't you think the sun is very hot here?"
"It is," said the Elephant's Child, and before he thought what he was doing he schlooped up a schloop of mud from the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo, and slapped it on his head, where it made a cool schloopy-sloshy mud-cap all trickly behind his ears.
"'Vantage number three!" said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake. "You couldn't have done that with a mere-smear nose. Now how do you feel about being spanked again?"
"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child, "but I should not like it at all."
"How would you like to spank somebody?" said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake.
"I should like it very much indeed," said the Elephant's Child.
"Well," said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake, "you will find that new nose of yours very useful to spank people with."
"Thank you," said the Elephant's child, "I'll remember that; and now I think I'll go home to all my dear families and try."
So the Elephant's Child went home across Africa frisking and whisking his trunk. When he wanted fruit to eat he pulled fruit down from a tree, instead of waiting for it to fall as he used to do. When he wanted grass he plucked grass up from the ground, instead of going on his knees as he used to do. When the flies bit him he broke off the branch of a tree and used it as a fly-whisk; and he made himself a new, cool slushy-squshy mud-cap whenever the sun was hot. When he felt lonely walking through Africa he sang to himself down his trunk, and the noise was louder than several brass bands. He went especially out of his way to find a broad Hippopotamus (she was no relation of his), and he spanked her very hard, to make sure that the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake had spoken the truth about his new trunk. The rest of the time he picked up the melon rinds that he had dropped on his way to the Limpopo--for he was a Tidy Pachyderm.
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 05min - 12 - #012- The Elephant's Child,Rudyard Kipling- Part 3 of 5
The Elephant's Child PART 3 OF 5
Then the Elephant's Child put his head down close to the Crocodile's musky, tusky mouth, and the Crocodile caught him by his little nose, which up to that very week, day, hour, and minute, had been no bigger than a boot, though much more useful.
"I think," said the Crocodile--and he said it between his teeth, like this--"I think to-day I will begin with Elephant's Child!"
At this, O Best Beloved, the Elephant's Child was much annoyed, and he said, speaking through his nose, like this, "Led go! You are hurtig be!"
Then the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake scuffled down from the bank and said, "My young friend, if you do not now, immediately and instantly, pull as hard as ever you can, it is my opinion that your acquaintance in the large-pattern leather ulster" (and by this he meant the Crocodile) "will jerk you into yonder limpid stream before you can say Jack Robinson."
This is the way Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake always talked.
Then the Elephant's child sat back on his little haunches, and pulled, and pulled, and pulled, and his nose began to stretch. And the Crocodile floundered into the water, making it all creamy with great sweeps of his tail, and he pulled, and pulled, and pulled.
And the Elephant's Child's nose kept on stretching; and the Elephant's child spread all his little four legs and pulled, and pulled, and pulled, and his nose kept on stretching; and the Crocodile threshed his tail like an oar, and he pulled, and pulled, and pulled, and at each pull the Elephant's Child's nose grew longer and longer--and it hurt him
Then the Elephant's Child felt his legs slipping, and he said through his nose, which was now nearly five feet long, "This is to butch for be!"
Then the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake came down from the bank, and knotted himself in a double-clove-hitch round the Elephant's Child's hind legs, and said, "Rash and inexperienced traveler, we will now seriously devote ourselves to a little high tension, because if we do not, it is my impression that yonder self-propelling man-of-war with the armour-plated upper deck" (and by this, O Best Beloved, he meant the Crocodile) "will permanently vitiate your future career."
That is the way all Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snakes always talk.
So he pulled, and the Elephant's Child pulled, and the Crocodile pulled, but the Elephant's Child and the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake pulled hardest; and at last the Crocodile let go of the Elephant's Child's nose with a plop that you could hear all up and down the Limpopo.
Then the Elephant's Child sat down most hard and sudden; but first he was careful to say "Thank you" to the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake; and next he was kind to his poor pulled nose, and wrapped it all up in cool banana leaves, and hung it in the great grey-green greasy Limpopo to cool.
that for?" said the Bi-Colored-Python-Rock-Snake.
"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child, "but my nose is badly out of shape, and I am waiting for it to shrink"
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 05min - 11 - #011- The Elephant's Child,Rudyard Kipling- Part 2 of 5
"That is odd," said the Elephant's Child, "because my father and mother, and my uncle and my aunt, not to mention my other aunt, the Hippopotamus, and my other uncle, the Baboon, have all spanked me for my 'satiable curiosity--and I suppose this is the same thing."
by Rudyard Kipling
The first thing that he found was a Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake curled around a rock.
"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child most politely, "but have you seen such a thing as a Crocodile in these promiscuous parts?"
"Have I seen a crocodile?" said the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake, in a voice of dretful scorn. "What will you ask me next?"
"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child, "but could you kindly tell me what he has for dinner?"
Then the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake uncoiled himself very quickly from the rock, and spanked the Elephant's Child with his scalesome, flailsome tail.
"That is odd," said the Elephant's Child, "because my father and mother, and my uncle and my aunt, not to mention my other aunt, the Hippopotamus, and my other uncle, the Baboon, have all spanked me for my 'satiable curtiosity--and I suppose this is the same thing."
So he said good-bye very politely to the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake, and helped to coil him up on the rock again, and went on, a little warm, but not at all astonished, eating melons, and throwing the rind about, because he could not pick it up, till he trod on what he thought was a log of wood at the very edge of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees.
But it was really the Crocodile, O Best Beloved, and the Crocodile winked one eye--like this!
"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child most politely, "but do you happen to have seen a Crocodile in these promiscuous parts?"
Then the Crocodile winked the other eye, and lifted half his tail out of the mud; and the Elephant's Child stepped back most politely, because he did not wish to be spanked again.
"Come hither, Little One," said the Crocodile. "Why do you ask such things?"
"What are you doing"'Scuse me," said the Elephant's Child most politely, "But my father has spanked me, my mother has spanked me, not to mention my tall aunt, the Ostrich, and my tall uncle, the Giraffe, who can kick ever so hard, as well as my broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, and my hairy uncle, the Baboon, and including the Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake, with the scalesome, flailsome tail, just up the bank, who spanks harder than any of them; and so, if it's quite all the same to you, I don't want to be spanked any more."
"Come hither, Little One," said the Crocodile, "for I am the Crocodile," and he wept crocodile tears to show it was quite true.
Then the Elephants' child grew all breathless, and panted, and kneeled down on the bank and said, "You are the very person I have been looking for all these long days. Will you please tell me what you have for dinner?"
"Come hither, Little One," said the Crocodile, "and I'll whisper."
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 04min - 10 - #010- The Elephant's Child ,Rudyard Kipling - part 1 OF 5
One fine morning in the middle of the Procession of the Equinoxes this 'satiable Elephant's Child asked a new fine question that he had never asked before. He asked, "What does the crocodile have for dinner?" Then everybody said, "Hush!" in a loud and dreadful tone, and they spanked him immediately and directly, without stopping, for a long time.
The Elephant's Child PART 1 OF 5
by Rudyard Kipling
In the High and Far-Off Times the Elephant, O Best Beloved, had no trunk. He had only a blackish, bulgy nose, as big as a boot, that he could wriggle about from side to side; but he couldn't pick up things with it. But there was one Elephant--a new Elephant--an Elephant's Child--who was full of 'satiable curiosity, and that means he asked ever so many questions. And he lived in Africa, and he filled all Africa with his 'satiable curiosities. He asked his tall aunt, the Ostrich, why her tail-feathers grew just so, and his tall aunt the Ostrich spanked him with her hard, hard, claw. He asked his tall uncle, the Giraffe, what made his skin spotty, and his tall uncle, the Giraffe, spanked him with his hard, hard hoof. And still he was full of 'satiable curiosity! He asked his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, why her eyes were red, and his broad aunt, the Hippopotamus, spanked him with her broad, broad hoof; and he asked his hairy uncle, the Baboon, why melons tasted ! just so, and his hairy uncle, the Baboon, spanked him with his hairy, hairy paw. And still he was full of 'satiable curiosity! He asked questions about everything that he saw, or heard, or felt, or smelt, or touched, and all his uncles and his aunts spanked him. And still he was full of 'satiable curiosity!
One fine morning in the middle of the Precession of the Equinoxes this 'satiable Elephant's Child asked a new fine question that he had never asked before. He asked, "What does the crocodile have for dinner?" Then everybody said, "Hush!" in a loud and dreadful tone, and they spanked him immediately and directly, without stopping, for a long time.
By and by, when that was finished, he came upon Kolokolo Bird sitting in the middle of a wait-a-bit thornbush, and he said, "My father has spanked me, and my mother has spanked me; all my aunts and uncles have spanked me for my 'satiable curiosity; and still I want to know what the Crocodile has for dinner!"
The Kolokolo Bird said, with a mournful cry, "Go to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, and find out."
That very next morning, when there was nothing left of the Equinoxes, because the Precession had preceded according to precedent, this 'satiable Elephant's Child took a hundred pounds of bananas (the little short red kind), and a hundred pounds of sugar-cane (the long purple kind), and seventeen melons (the greeny-crackly kind), and said to all his dear families, "Good-bye. I am going to the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, to find out what the Crocodile has for dinner." And they all spanked him once more for luck, though he asked them most politely to stop.
Then he went away, a little warm, but not at all astonished, eating melons, and throwing the rind about, because he could not pick it up.
He went from Graham's Town to Kimberley, and from Kimberley to Khama's Country, and from Khama's Country he went east by north, eating melons all the time, till at last he came to the banks of the great grey-green, greasy Limpopo River, all set about with fever-trees, precisely as Kolokolo Bird had said.
Now you must know and understand, O Best Beloved, that till that very week, and day, and hour, and minute, this 'satiable Elephant's Child had never seen a Crocodile, and did not know what one was like. It was all his 'satiable curiosity.
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 06min - 9 - #009- The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of The United States
The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag
A Pledged means you make a promise, you swear it. An Allegiance- means loyalty, to be faithful.
In the United States, before all government function is customary to recite the Pledge of Allegiance, also when one became a Citizen of the United States.
The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States
should be rendered by standing at attention facing the flag with the right hand over the heart. When not in uniform men remove any non-religious headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart. Persons in uniform should remain silent, face the flag, and render the military salute. Members of the Armed Forces not in uniform and veterans may render the military salute in the manner provided for persons in uniform.
a) It is the universal custom to display the flag only from sunrise to sunset on buildings and on stationary flagstaffs in the open. However, when a patriotic effect is desired, the flag may be displayed 24 hours a day if properly illuminated during the hours of darkness.
(b) The flag should be hoisted briskly and lowered ceremoniously.
(c) The flag should not be displayed on days when the weather is inclement, except when an all weather flag is displayed.
(d) The flag should be displayed daily on or near the main administration building of every public institution.
(e) The flag should be displayed in or near every polling place on election days.
(f) The flag should be displayed during school days in or near every schoolhouse.
Here is
The Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag: “I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”,
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 03min - 8 - #008- The Bremen Town Musicians, Brothers Grimm PART 2
The Bremen Town Musicians- PART # 2
Brothers Grimm
So they made their way to the place where the light was, and soon saw it shine brighter and grow larger, until they came to a well-lighted robber's house. The donkey, as the biggest, went to the window and looked in.
"What do you see, my grey-horse?" asked the cock. "What do I see?" answered the donkey; "a table covered with good things to eat and drink, and robbers sitting at it enjoying themselves." "That would be the sort of thing for us," said the cock. "Yes, yes; ah, how I wish we were there!" said the donkey.
Then the animals took counsel together how they should manage to drive away the robbers, and at last they thought of a plan. The donkey was to place himself with his fore-feet upon the window-ledge, the hound was to jump on the donkey's back, the cat was to climb upon the dog, and lastly the cock was to fly up and perch upon the head of the cat.
When this was done, at a given signal, they began to perform their music together: the donkey brayed, the hound barked, the cat mewed, and the cock crowed; then they burst through the window into the room, so that the glass clattered! At this horrible din, the robbers sprang up, thinking no otherwise than that a ghost had come in, and fled in a great fright out into the forest. The four companions now sat down at the table, well content with what was left, and ate as if they were going to fast for a month.
As soon as the four minstrels had done, they put out the light, and each sought for himself a sleeping-place according to his nature and to what suited him. The donkey laid himself down upon some straw in the yard, the hound behind the door, the cat upon the hearth near the warm ashes, and the cock perched himself upon a beam of the roof; and being tired from their long walk, they soon went to sleep.
When it was past midnight, and the robbers saw from afar that the light was no longer burning in their house, and all appeared quiet, the captain said, "We ought not to have let ourselves be frightened out of our wits;" and ordered one of them to go and examine the house.
The messenger finding all still, went into the kitchen to light a candle, and, taking the glistening fiery eyes of the cat for live coals, he held a lucifer-match to them to light it. But the cat did not understand the joke, and flew in his face, spitting and scratching. He was dreadfully frightened, and ran to the back-door, but the dog, who lay there sprang up and bit his leg; and as he ran across the yard by the straw-heap, the donkey gave him a smart kick with its hind foot. The cock, too, who had been awakened by the noise, and had become lively, cried down from the beam, "Cock-a-doodle-doo!"
Then the robber ran back as fast as he could to his captain, and said, "Ah, there is a horrible witch sitting in the house, who spat on me and scratched my face with her long claws; and by the door stands a man with a knife, who stabbed me in the leg; and in the yard there lies a black monster, who beat me with a wooden club; and above, upon the roof, sits the judge, who called out, 'Bring the rogue here to me!' so I got away as well as I could."
After this the robbers did not trust themselves in the house again; but it suited the four musicians of Bremen so well that they did not care to leave it any more. And the mouth of him who last told this story is still warm.
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 06min - 7 - #007- The Bremen Town Musicians, Brothers Grimm PART 1
Jacob Ludwig Carl Grimm was born in 1785, and his brother Wilhelm Carl Grimm was born in 1786.
Wilhelm Grimm and Jacob Grimm were among the first and best-known collectors of German and European folk tales
The Bremen Town Musicians PART 1 OF 2
By Brothers Grimm
A certain man had a donkey, which had carried the corn-sacks to the mill indefatigably for many a long year; but his strength was going, and he was growing more and more unfit for work. Then his master began to consider how he might best save his keep; but the donkey, seeing that no good wind was blowing, ran away and set out on the road to Bremen. "There," he thought, "I can surely be town-musician." When he had walked some distance, he found a hound lying on the road, gasping like one who had run till he was tired. "What are you gasping so for, you big fellow?" asked the donkey.
"Ah," replied the hound, "as I am old, and daily grow weaker, and no longer can hunt, my master wanted to kill me, so I took to flight; but now how am I to earn my bread?"
"I tell you what," said the donkey, "I am going to Bremen, and shall be town-musician there; go with me and engage yourself also as a musician. I will play the lute, and you shall beat the kettledrum."
The hound agreed, and on they went.
Before long they came to a cat, sitting on the path, with a face like three rainy days! "Now then, old shaver, what has gone askew with you?" asked the donkey.
"Who can be merry when his neck is in danger?" answered the cat. "Because I am now getting old, and my teeth are worn to stumps, and I prefer to sit by the fire and spin, rather than hunt about after mice, my mistress wanted to drown me, so I ran away. But now good advice is scarce. Where am I to go?"
"Go with us to Bremen. You understand night-music, you can be a town-musician."
The cat thought well of it, and went with them. After this the three fugitives came to a farm-yard, where the cock was sitting upon the gate, crowing with all his might. "Your crow goes through and through one," said the donkey. "What is the matter?"
"I have been foretelling fine weather, because it is the day on which Our Lady washes the Christ-child's little shirts, and wants to dry them," said the cock; "but guests are coming for Sunday, so the housewife has no pity, and has told the cook that she intends to eat me in the soup to-morrow, and this evening I am to have my head cut off. Now I am crowing at full pitch while I can."
"Ah, but red-comb," said the donkey, "you had better come away with us. We are going to Bremen; you can find something better than death everywhere: you have a good voice, and if we make music together it must have some quality!"
The cock agreed to this plan, and all four went on together. They could not, however, reach the city of Bremen in one day, and in the evening they came to a forest where they meant to pass the night. The donkey and the hound laid themselves down under a large tree, the cat and the cock settled themselves in the branches; but the cock flew right to the top, where he was most safe. Before he went to sleep he looked round on all four sides, and thought he saw in the distance a little spark burning; so he called out to his companions that there must be a house not far off, for he saw a light. The donkey said, "If so, we had better get up and go on, for the shelter here is bad." The hound thought that a few bones with some meat on would do him good too!
Mon, 27 Jul 2020 - 06min - 6 - #006- The Star-Spangled Banner, Francis Scott Key/voz Demi Lovato
The Star-Spangled Banner" is the national anthem of the United States. The lyrics come from the "Defense of Fort McHenry".
The poem was written on September 14, 1814, by a 35-year-old lawyer and amateur poet, Francis Scott Key.
After witnessing, the bombardment of Fort McHenry by British ships of the Royal Navy in Baltimore Harbor, during the Battle of Baltimore in the War of 1812.
Key was inspired by the large U.S. flag, with 15 stars and 15 stripes, known as the Star-Spangled Banner, flying triumphantly above the fort during the U.S. victory.
The poem was set to the tune of a popular British song written by John Stafford Smith and became a well-known U.S. patriotic song. It is known for being very difficult to sing.
Often only the first verse is sung
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 thru the perilous 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?On the shore, dimly seen through the mists of the deep,
Where the foe’s haughty host in dread silence reposes,
What is that which the breeze, o’er the towering steep,
As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning’s first beam,
In full glory reflected now shines in the stream:
‘Tis the star-spangled banner! Oh long may it wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!And where is that band who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle’s confusion,
A home and a country should leave us no more!
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps’ pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave:
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav’n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: “In God is our trust.”
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave!Tue, 21 Jul 2020 - 04min - 5 - #005-The Princess and the Pea,Hans Christian Andersen
Hans Christian Andersen was born in 1805 in Denmark, so he was a Danish Author. He died in 1875. He was usually called H.C. Andersen, Although a prolific writer of plays, travelogues, novels, and poems, he is best remembered for his fairy tales.
The Princess and the Pea
by Hans Christian Andersen
ONCE upon a time there was a prince who wanted to marry a princess; but she would have to be a real princess. He travelled all over the world to find one, but nowhere could he get what he wanted. There were princesses enough, but it was difficult to find out whether they were real ones. There was always something about them that was not as it should be. So he came home again and was sad, for he would have liked very much to have a real princess.
One evening a terrible storm came on; there was thunder and lightning, and the rain poured down in torrents. Suddenly a knocking was heard at the city gate, and the old king went to open it.
It was a princess standing out there in front of the gate. But, good gracious! what a sight the rain and the wind had made her look. The water ran down from her hair and clothes; it ran down into the toes of her shoes and out again at the heels. And yet she said that she was a real princess.
Well, we'll soon find that out, thought the old queen. But she said nothing, went into the bed-room, took all the bedding off the bedstead, and laid a pea on the bottom; then she took twenty mattresses and laid them on the pea, and then twenty eider-down beds on top of the mattresses.
On this the princess had to lie all night. In the morning she was asked how she had slept.
Oh, very badly! She said . I have scarcely closed my eyes all night. Heaven only knows what was in the bed, but I was lying on something hard, so that I am black and blue all over my body. Its horrible!
Now they knew that she was a real princess because she had felt the pea right through the twenty mattresses and the twenty eider-down beds.
Nobody but a real princess could be as sensitive as that.
So the prince took her for his wife, for now he knew that he had a real princess; and the pea was put in the museum, where it may still be seen, if no one has stolen it.
There, that is a true story.
Mon, 20 Jul 2020 - 04min - 4 - #003- This land is your land,Woodrow Wilson Guthrie
Woodrow Wilson Guthrie as born in 1912 in Oklahoma, U.S.– He died in 1967 . He was an American singer-songwriter, who is considered one of the most significant figures in American western folk music. His music, including songs, such as "This Land Is Your Land", has inspired several generations both politically and musically
Guthrie wrote hundreds of country, folk, and children's songs, along with ballads and improvised works. He frequently performed with the slogan "This machine kills fascists" displayed on his guitar.
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood Forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
As I was walking that ribbon of highway
I saw above me that endless skyway
I saw below me that golden valley
This land was made for you and me.
I roamed and I rambled and I followed my footsteps
To the sparkling sands of her diamond deserts
While all around me a voice was sounding
This land was made for you and me.
There was a big high wall there
They tried to stop me
The sigh was painted said Private property
But on the back side it didn’t say nothing
This land was made for you and me
When the sun came shining, and I was strolling
And the wheat fields waving and the dust clouds rolling
A voice was chanting, As the fog was lifting,
This land was made for you and me.
This land is your land, this land is my land
From California to the New York Island
From the Redwood Forest to the Gulf Stream waters
This land was made for you and me.
Wed, 15 Jul 2020 - 03min - 3 - #004- The Three Little Pigs, English Fairy Tales
The Three Little Pigs
English Fairy Tales,
Once upon a time there was an old mother pig who had three little pigs and not enough food to feed them. So when they were old enough, she sent them out into the world to seek their fortunes.
The first little pig was very lazy. He didn't want to work at all and he built his house out of straw. The second little pig worked a little bit harder but he was somewhat lazy too and he built his house out of sticks. Then, they sang and danced and played together the rest of the day.
The third little pig worked hard all day and built his house with bricks. It was a sturdy house complete with a fine fireplace and chimney. It looked like it could withstand the strongest winds.
The next day, a wolf happened to pass by the lane where the three little pigs lived; and he saw the straw house, and he smelled the pig inside. He thought the pig would make a mighty fine meal and his mouth began to water.
So he knocked on the door and said:
Little pig! Little pig!
Let me in! Let me in!
But the little pig saw the wolf's big paws through the keyhole, so he answered back:
No! No! No!
Not by the hairs on my chinny chin chin!
Then the wolf showed his teeth and said:
Then I'll huff
and I'll puff
and I'll blow your house down.
So he huffed and he puffed and he blew the house down! The wolf opened his jaws very wide and bit down as hard as he could, but the first little pig escaped and ran away to hide with the second little pig.
The wolf continued down the lane and he passed by the second house made of sticks; and he saw the house, and he smelled the pigs inside, and his mouth began to water as he thought about the fine dinner they would make.
So he knocked on the door and said:
Little pigs! Little pigs!
Let me in! Let me in!
But the little pigs saw the wolf's pointy ears through the keyhole, so they answered back:
No! No! No!
Not by the hairs on our chinny chin chin!
So the wolf showed his teeth and said:
Then I'll huff
and I'll puff
and I'll blow your house down!
So he huffed and he puffed and he blew the house down! The wolf was greedy and he tried to catch both pigs at once, but he was too greedy and got neither! His big jaws clamped down on nothing but air and the two little pigs scrambled away as fast as their little hooves would carry them.
The wolf chased them down the lane and he almost caught them. But they made it to the brick house and slammed the door closed before the wolf could catch them. The three little pigs they were very frightened, they knew the wolf wanted to eat them. And that was very, very true. The wolf hadn't eaten all day and he had worked up a large appetite chasing the pigs around and now he could smell all three of them inside and he knew that the three little pigs would make a lovely feast.
So the wolf knocked on the door and said:
Little pigs! Little pigs!
Let me in! Let me in!
But the little pigs saw the wolf's narrow eyes through the keyhole, so they answered back:
No! No! No!
Not by the hairs on our chinny chin chin!
So the wolf showed his teeth and said:
Then I'll huff
and I'll puff
and I'll blow your house down.
Well! he huffed and he puffed. He puffed and he huffed. And he huffed, huffed, and he puffed, puffed; but he could not blow the house down. At last, he was so out of breath that he couldn't huff and he couldn't puff anymore. So he stopped to rest and thought a bit. But it was too much. The wolf danced about with rage and swore he would come down the chimney and eat up the little pig for his supper.
Tue, 14 Jul 2020 - 07min - 2 - #002- Just So Stories (poems),Rudyard Kipling
Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay ,British India in 1865 – died in 1936 at the age of 70. He was an English journalist, short-story writer, poet, and novelist
Kipling's works of fiction include The Jungle Book, The Man Who Would Be King, and many short stories,
Just So Stories (poems)
BY Joseph Rudyard Kipling
The Camel's hump is an ugly lump
Which well you may see at the Zoo;
But uglier yet is the hump we geT
From having too little to do.
Kiddies and grown-ups too-oo-oo,
If we haven't enough to do-oo-oo,
We get the hump,
Cameelious hump,
The hump that is black and blue!
We climb out of bed with a frouzly head,
And a snarly-yarly voice. ---
We shiver and scowl and we grunt and we growl
At our bath and our boots and our toys;
And there ought to be a corner for me
(And I know' there is one for you)
When we get the hump,
Cameelious hump,---
The hump that is black and blue!
The cure for this ill is not to sit still,
Or frowst with a book by the fire;
But to take a large hoe and a shovel also,
And dig till you gently perspire;
And then you will find that the sun and the wind,
And the Djinn of the Garden too,
Have lifted the hump,
The horrible hump,
The hump that is black and blue!
I get it as well as you-oo-oo,
If I haven't enough to do-oo-oo!
We all get hump,
Cameelious hump,
Kiddies and grown-ups too!
- How the Camel Got His Hump
-
I am the Most Wise Baviaan, saying in most wice tones,
"Let us melt into the landscape, just us two by our lones."
People have come, in a carriage, calling.
But Mummy is there....
Yes, I can go if you take me, Nurse says she don't care.
Let's go up to the pig-styes and sit on the farmyard rails!
Let's say things to the bunnies, and watch 'em
skitter their tails!
Let's'-oh, anything, daddy, so long as it's you and me,
And going truly exploring, and not being in till tea!
Here's your boots (I've brought 'em), and here's your
cap and stick,
And here's your pipe and tobacco. Oh, come along
out of it, quick!
How the Leopard Got His Spots
Tue, 14 Jul 2020 - 03min - 1 - #001 - I N D E X - Mary Had a Little lamb, Mother Goose
The most popular Nursery rhymes has no known author -it is anonymous, but in 1695, a French author Charles Perrault created many stories and fairy tales. He put together all popular nursery rhymes, and fairy tales, under the name of the Tales of Mother Goose. Mother Goose stories was first translated into English by Robert Samber in 1729.
Thanks to Mr. Perrault for giving us Mother Goose and creating fairy tales in the 1690's, so we may continue to enjoy them until today
Mary had a little lamb by Mother Goose
Mary had a little lamb
Its fleece was white as snow And everywhere that Mary went
The lamb was sure to go He followed, her to school one day
That was against the rule It made the children laugh and play
To see a lamb at school And so, the teacher turned him out
But still he lingered near And wait patiently about until
Mary did appear What makes the lamb love Mary so?
The eagerly children cry Oh, Mary loves the lamb you know
The teacher did reply
I N D E X
01 #1 Mary Had a Little lamb *
02 #2Just So Stories (poems),
#3This land is your land
#4The Three Little Pigs
#5The Princess and the Pea
#6The Star-Spangled Banner *
#7- #8 The Bremen Town Musicians
#9 The pledge allegiance of the flag
#10-#14The Elephant's Child
#15The Fox and the Monkey
#16 Wild Blue yonder - Air force USA *
#17 The Disciple
#18 A strange story
#19The Blind Men and the Elephant
#20 Mother Goose Old King Cole *
#21, #022 The Aged Mother
#23- #026 The Gift of the Magi
#27-The Army Goes Rolling Along *
#28-#030 The Child's Story
#31- #32The Declaration of Independence of the USA
#33 The Town Mouse and The Country Mouse
#34 jack and the beanstalk
#35 - #37 I Have a Dream
#38, #39 the tale of Peter Rabbit
#40, #41 five little pigs
#42 Aubrey *
#43, #45 A Story Without A Title
#46 Who was Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
#47 What A Wonderful World, Louis Armstrong *
#48 Androclus and the Lion
#49 The Great Feast
#50 Two Nights at Neempani,
#51 The Gettysburg Address
#52 - #54 The Little Red Hen,
#55-#59 Les Miserable*
Tue, 14 Jul 2020 - 03min
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