Milford High School - Oak Lily and Ivy Yearbook (Milford, MA)

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Vol. IV. MILFORD, MASS., FEBRUARY, 1888. No. 6 Three Typical Greeks. “Wine bibber, with the forehead of a dog And a deer’s heart! Thou never yet hast dared To arm thyself for battle with the rest, Nor join the other chiefs prepared to lie In ambush,—such thy craven fear of death.” S UCH Avere the Avords you might have heard, had you been stand¬ ing on the sea-sliore of Troy, tAvo thousand years ago. Who Avas the speaker? Achilles, the hero of the Iliad, a man Avho had a wider range of character than any other of the Greeks. He Avas angry Avith Aga¬ memnon, the commander of the Gre¬ cian forces, who had thre.atened to take away his prize. GroAving more angry as the quari’el continued, he Avas restrained from immediate deeds of violence only by divine in¬ terposition. Yet, when Agamem¬ non sent heralds to the tent of Achilles to take his prize, he re¬ ceived them kindly and gave it to them, thus showing his obedience and courtesy. As we shall see, however, the Avro!ig was not forgotten. For though he Avas the bravest warrior of all the Greeks, and the one the Trojans feared above all others ; and though he Avas longing to engage in the battles as Ixdore, he was too angry and had too much self respect to indulge his wish. Not until his friend Palroclus had been killed by Trojan Hector did his proud spirit relent. ' I ' lien his tierce anger was turned from th(“ Greeks to the Tro¬ jans, and he returmal to the tight, avenging his friend’s fall by the death of llc-ctor. But Avhen Hec¬ tor’s father, Pri.am, came and begged the body of his son, Achilles not only respected the helpless old man ami granted his ixupiest, but .ali o promised to retrain from the tight during the eleven days of the funer¬ al ceremonies. Let us turn to a brighter side of his character. He was a man Avho hated falsehood and denounced it in the strongest terms; a man who was open and truthful in his dealings with his associates. As an orator he Avas very out-spoken. We learn also that he was a filial son and a loving father. We see many of today, Avho, like him, possessing an intense nature, find it hard to forgive when they are injured. But who is that A dio stands in chest and shoulders above the others, who— “ ‘From place to place Walks round among the ranks of soldiery. As when the thick-fleeced father of the flocks Moves through the multitude of his white sheep?’ “ ‘That is Ulysses, the man of many arts, Of shrewd device and action wisely planned.’ ” Him I place next among the heroes of the Iliad. Although he is not Achilles’ equal, he ranks next to no other hero. Imagine to yourself the man as Homer paints him when— “He stood with eyes cast down, and fixed on earth. And neither moved his sceptre to the right Nor to the left, but held it motionless. Like one unused to public speech. He seemed An idiot out of humor. But when He sent from his full lungs his mighty voice. And words came like a fall of snow. No inoi tal then would dare to strive with him P’or mastery in speech.” His hearers Avere lost in Avonder and gave him their close iittention, for¬ getting all about his personal appear¬ ance. His words Avere never wasted, but Avere to the point, and when he referred to himself, it Avas only to nnike his statement stronger. He S] oke at times of crises, Avhen promi)t, decided action was needed. —he it was who said the right thing at the right time. What a daring deed it was for him to enter Troy in disguise and carry off the Palladium ! Then what inventive genius he shoAved in con¬ triving and building that mammoth horse, a piece of stratagem, by Avhich Troy Avas at last taken. What Avon- derful self-command and courage he must have had to keep himself and the others quiet, within the horse, Avhen the Trojans Avere standing around, wondering what it was for and threatening to destroy it. Hoav he longed to be restored to his home during his twenty long years of ab¬ sence ! What a wide experience those misfortunes must have given h im ! How quick to see a Avay out of danger! Hoav much greater an abili¬ ty to plan and perforin than he had before! Ulysses is a man Avho excels in many things. A man of great in- ventiA e genius, Avith a nature bal¬ anced betAveen prudence and daring. We find him represented, in one side of his character, by the inventors of this day. They have the ready Avit and the poAver to carry out Avhat they plan ; and some, too, may learn from him a lesson of patience and perseverance. “Now uprose Nestor, the master of persuasive speech, The clear-toned Pyliau orator, Avhose tongue Dropped words more sweet than honey, lie had seen Two generations, that grew up and lived With liim on Sandy Pylos, pass away. And now he ruled the third.” Nestor has not as broad a character as Achilles or Ulysses. At first glance, one might think him similar to Ulysses in some respects ; but he was not. True, he was an orator ; but one of an entirely different stain]). He used his gentle, flowip

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eloquence to offer suggestions, to give good advice, or to calm their angry counsels, especially when Achilles and Agamemnon quarreled in the Assembly. He was egotisti¬ cal, to be sure, but spoke with au- thorit} A great warrior in his younger days, he fought with some of the most warlike men on the earth. We find his stamp of orato¬ ry in few men of the present day. Such men, however, attract the peo¬ ple and have tremendous influence with them. When men who have this quality use it on the right side they are a ])ower for good. Achilles, Ulysses, Nestor,—these three immortal Greeks I place before you. If the elements of their charac¬ ters could be combined in one man of a Christian character, what a power for good would that man be to the state, what a blessing to the town in which he lived! How he would be ‘ consulted and followed! Today there is so much need of such men—men of strong minds, who can see the wants of their times and supply them. Let us try to cultivate some of the best traits of their characters, and illustrate them in our daily life. E. B. B. Queen Featherweight. Oft have T climbed the smoking Aetna, or have been hurled to the sky by its fearful eruptions. Earth’s hollow mountains are my delight and afford abundant caverns for my hid- ing-])laces. I also love to linger near the bright constellations, which, like so many diamonds studding the sky in many a fantastic foian, light the aerial world when earth is in peace¬ ful repose. Sometimes I visit the boundless expanse around the Sun- and gaze upon his vast realms. But these journeys are long and very dis¬ agreeable, especially if one is alone, and so 1 rarely take them. My husband, who is very obliging, accompanies me on ilelightful trips through broad rivers and lakes whose banks are teeming wdth vegetation, through narrow valleys with sloping hills on either side, between narrow mountains, flinging dark shadows over the water, into the bright sun¬ light. Now and then w e ascend into the air, and having refreshed our¬ selves with sleep in the snow-white clouds, steal quietly down with the falling dew and kiss the tired flowers. It would be useless to give you my photograph, for you would not rec¬ ognize it, and altho ugh those canni¬ bals on earth are thirsting after my blood and that of my husband, still it neither conveys to them taste nor smell, but still they will devour us. I have gone so far up into the air as to frighten my husband who called loud¬ ly for me to return. It makes me laugh to hear those men on earth, called “astronomers,” talk about stars, planets and the like. If they would listen to me, I could give them facts enough to reach around their little O globe. Ton can burn me at a high tem¬ perature, aud my heat is very intense. I do not use face-powder, even if my complexion is rather pale. I am totally different from my husband. He is always attacking everything and working the best he knows how. But for all that he is sixteen times heavier than I am. I do not help you breathe, on the contrary I retard your breathing. Fire has no terror for me while it hails with delight the apj)roach of my husband. Woe be to the animal that is so unlucky as to fall into my clutches ! His fate wouM be a speedy death. I remember once my husband and I were traveling and, as we were cold, we thoughtlessly lighted a fire. There was a terrific explosion, knocking me off my feet and throwing us together with such force that water flew all around and extinguished the fire. I am the light¬ est lady in the world, and Avould make the fortune of that greatest of curiosity seekers, P. T. Barnum. In spite of so many good qualities I also have my failings; for I have only one arm, and so, whenever I feel unusually affectionate I can oidy clasp one of my husband’s two hands at a time. Man is indebted to no one more than to me. My husband and I give him intense heat for his arts, ena¬ bling him to melt refractory metals and produce a beautiful light used in light-houses. Every Fourth of July you see what seem to be huge soap- bubbles of many colors, which the toy-makers have fashioned, and many little heart has been gladdened by this simple device. Lately men have put this princi|)le to practical use in war-balloons, wdiich are used both for surveying an enemy’s coun¬ try and for dropping explosive shells on it. Man has been sleeping and is just waking uj) to the fact that I, Queen Featherw ' eight, am one of the most useful of all the elements and to me he is most indebted. ,1. L. M., ’89. Energy. “ ■ HIS world belongs to the ener- l getic,” so sai d Emerson, so say we. But wdiat is energy? In imagi¬ nation stand with me uj)on the banks of the Merrimac. It is Sunday morn¬ ing. Everything is (piiet and ])eace- ful. Along its borders are the im¬ mense mills, building after building. Behind a massive dam lies the hoard¬ ed water, striving to burst its barri- trs. Here is potential energy—the power of doing work. But wdien, on the morrow, the gate is raised, when the great wheels begin to turn and the noisy hum of the machinery is heard, then the power is utilized and we have kinetic energy. Nearly all of us possess the former, but it is the latter, the ability towmrk exerted, that is so essential to every¬ one of us in the accomplishment of anytiiing we undertake. It stands first among the agents of success; above genius, above natural ability, above education, all of which are val¬ uable oidy as they are directed by the spurring force of energy. The old saying, “The gods for labor sell us all good things,” expresses the true sentiment that labor is master of everything we seek; for when a man takes for his motto, “Either I will find a way or make one,” nothing can effectually hinder his success. In¬ deed, the more labor we exert, the more hardship we endure in securing an object of so much the more worth is it to us, and so much the more ap¬ preciated when in our possession. Hecall Napoleon’s passage of the Alps, the toils of its rugged passes, the dangers of its rivers of ice, the perils of the avalanches ;—and yet his wonderful energy surmounted the eternal snovys and brought him into Italy, victorious. Look through the pages of history, and you may rightly record, in the list of examples of en¬ ergy, all who have won great achieve¬ ments and whose names are handed down to posterity. ' I ' here is a phys¬ ical and a mental energy, and today the latter is triumphing grandly. Ten long years were the Greeks striving by brute force to batter down the walls of Troy, fighting hand to hand, sparing no toil nor blood. At last the mental energy of the wily Ulys¬ ses contrived the wooden horse, be¬ fore which fell Priam’s citadel. In the training-school of life each must be the architect of his own for¬ tune, and life will be what each one’s j)ersonal energy makes it. Indeed, Chas. Buxton has said that, in his ex¬ perience, the difference between one man and another, between the weak and powerful, the great and the insignificant, is energy, invinci¬ ble determination, a pur])ose once formed, and then victory or death. But it may be said, “Had I the ad¬ vantage which this one possesses, or the superior talent in any direction ' which that one exhibits, I would then know what to do.” Can we all ex-