ons for the man of
the house to delicately retire to the barn while we women got to bed,
and to disappear again in the morning while we dressed. In some places
the meals were so badly cooked that I could not eat them, and often the
only food my poor little pupils brought to school for their noonday meal
was a piece of bread or a bit of raw pork.

420

Hero stories have a special place in the
literature of childhood, and of all such
stories none has ever surpassed that of
Leonidas and his brave Spartans. The account of
that famous event is given from Miss Yonge's _A
Book of Golden Deeds_ (1864), which is yet one
of the best storehouses of hero stories. It is
published in a variety of editions by different
publishers, and teachers will find it an
excellent source for usable material.

THE PASS OF THERMOPYLAE

CHARLOTTE M. YONGE

_B. C. 430_

There was trembling in Greece. "The Great King," as the Greeks called
the chief potentate of the East, whose domains stretched from the Indian
Caucasus to the Aegaeus, from the Caspian to the Red Sea, was marshaling
his forces against the little free states that nestled amid the rocks
and gulfs of the Eastern Mediterranean. Already had his might devoured
the cherished colonies of the Greeks on the eastern shore of the
Archipelago, and every traitor to home institutions found a ready asylum
at that despotic court, and tried to revenge his own wrongs by
whispering incitements to invasion. "All people, nations, and
languages," was the commencement of the decrees of that monarch's court;
and it was scarcely a vain boast, for his satraps ruled over subject
kingdoms, and among his tributary nations he counted the Chaldean, with
his learning and old civilization, the wise and steadfast Jew, the
skillful Ph[oe]nician, the learned Egyptian, the wild freebooting Arab
of the desert, the dark-skinned Ethiopian, and over all these ruled the
keen witted, active native Persian race, the conquerors of all the rest,
and led by a chosen band proudly called the Immortal. His many
capitals--Babylon the great, Susa, Persepolis, and the like--were names
of dreamy splendor to the Greeks, described now and then by Ionians from
Asia Minor who had carried their tribute to the King's own feet, or by
courtier slaves who had escaped with difficulty from being all too
serviceable at the tyrannic court. And the lord of t