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GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.
1850.

Devereux, del.      Hogan and Thompson, pr.
Lake of Como.
GEO. R. GRAHAM, EDITOR.

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXXVII.      July, 1850.      No. 1.

Table of Contents

Fiction, Literature and Articles

Poetry, Music, and Fashion

Transcriber’s Notes can be found at the end of this eBook.

POETRY.

REVIEWS.

MUSIC.

ENGRAVINGS.

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXXVII.     PHILADELPHIA, JULY, 1850.     No. 1.

It may be universally affirmed that every thing having shape either grows or is put together, is a living organism or a contrived machine; and the radical distinction between minds in all the modes of their operation, and between things in all the forms of their manifestation, is expressed in the antithesis of vitality and mechanism. To suggest, in a manner necessarily imperfect and rambling, some of the important consequences involved in this distinction, is the object of the present essay.

And first, in regard to minds, it may be asked, to what faculties and operations of the intelligence do you apply the term vital, as distinguished from other faculties and operations indicated as mechanical? The answer to this question may be spiritually true without being metaphysically exact, and we shall hazard a brief one. The soul of man in its essential nature is a vital unit and person, capable of growth through an assimilation of external objects; and its faculties and acquirements are all related to its primitive personality, as the leaves, branches, and trunk of a tree to its root. In the tree there are sometimes dead branches and withered leaves, which constitute a part of the tree’s external form without participating in the tree’s internal life. The same thing occurs in the human mind. Faculties, originally springing from the soul’s vital principle, become disconnected from it, lose all the sap and juice of life, and dwindle from vital into mechanical powers. The customary vocabulary of metaphysics evinces the extent of this decay in its division of the mind into parts, each part with a separate name and performing a different office. It is plain that no organism, vegetable, animal, or human, admits of such a classification of parts, for the fundamental principle of organisms is unity in variety, each part implying the whole, growing out of a common centre and source, and dying the moment it is separated. When, therefore, we say that the mind has faculties which are not vitally related to each other, that the whole mind is not present in every act, that there are processes of thought in which a particular faculty operates on its own account, we assert the existence of death in the mind; what is worse, the assertion is true; and, what is still worse, this mental death often passes for wisdom and common sense, and mental life is stigmatized as fanaticism.

Now, this antithesis of life and death, vitality and mechanism, the conception of the spirit of things, and the perception of the forms of things, is a distinction available in every department of human thought and action, and divides minds into two distinct classes, the living and the lifeless. The test of the live mind is, that it communicates life. The only sign here of possession is communication; and life it cannot possess unless life it communicates. Spiritual life implies a combination of force and insight, an indissoluble union of will and intelligence, in which will sees and intelligence acts. A mental operation, in the true meaning of the phrase, is a vital movement of the mind; and although this movement is called a conception or an act according as it refers to meditation or practice, it cannot in either case be a conception without being an act, or an act without being a conception. Conception, in the last analysis, is as truly an act of the mind as volition; both are expressions of one undivided unit and person; and the only limit of conception, the limit which prevented Kepler from conceiving the law of gravitation, and Ben Jonson from conceiving the character of Falstaff, is a limitation of will, of personality, of individual power, of that innate force which is always the condition and the companion of insight. All the vital movements of the mind are acts whether the product be a book or a battle; and that is a singular philosophy of the will which calls Condé’s charge at Rocroi an act, and withholds the name from Shakspeare’s conception of Othello.

As this spiritual force is ever the characteristic of vital thought, such thought is both light and heat, kindles as well as informs, and acts potently on other minds by imparting life as well as knowledge. There are many books which contain more information than Paradise Lost, but Paradise Lost stimulates, dilates and enriches our minds by communicating to them the very substance of thought, while the other books may leave us as poor and weak as they found us, with the addition only of some names and forms of things which we did not know before. The great difference, therefore, between a vital and mechanical mind is this, that from one you obtain the realities of things, and from the other the mere appearances; one influences, the other only informs; one increases our power, the other does little more than increase our words. The action of a live mind upon other minds is chiefly an influence, and the true significance of influence is that it pierces through all the formal frippery of opinion and speculation lying on the surface of consciousness, and touches the tingling and throbbing nerve at its centre and soul; rousing the mind’s dormant activity, breathing into it a new motive and fresh vigor, and making it strong as well as wise. As regards the common affairs of the world, this influence is as the blast of an archangel’s trumpet, waking us from the death of sloth and custom. In the fire of our newly kindled energies the mean and petty interests in which our thoughts are ensnared wither and consume; and, discerning vitalities where before we only perceived semblances, a strangeness comes over the trite, a new meaning gleams through old appearances, and the forms of common objects are transfigured, as viewed in the vivid vision of that rapturous life. Then, and only then, do we realize how awful and how bright is the consciousness of a living soul; then immortality becomes a faith, and death a delusion; then magnanimous resolves in the heart send generous blood mantling in the cheek, and virtue, knowledge, genius, heroism, appear possibilities to the lazy coward who, an hour before, whined about his destiny in the hopeless imbecility of weakness. Although this still and deep ecstasy, this feeling of power and awe, is to most minds only a transient elevation, it is still a revelation of the vital within them, which should at least keep alive a sublime discontent with the sluggish apathy of their common existence. “Show me,” says Burke, “a contented slave and I will show you a degraded man,”—a sentence right from the hot heart of an illustrious man, whose own mind glowed with life and energy to the verge of the tomb, and who never knew the slavery of that sleep of mental death, which withers and dries up the very fountains of life in the soul.

The usual phrases by which criticism discriminates vital from mechanical minds, are impassioned imagination and logical understanding. This vocabulary, though open to objections, as not going to the root of the matter, is still available for our purpose. It draws a definite line between genius and talent. The man of impassioned imagination is vital in every part. The primitive spiritual energy at the centre of his personality permeates, as with warm life-blood, the whole of his being, vivifying, connecting, fusing into unity, all his faculties, so that his thought comes from him as an act, and is endowed with a penetrating and animating as well as enlightening power. The thoughts of Plato, Dante, Bacon, Shakspeare, Newton, Milton, Burke, not to mention others, are actors in the world—communicating life, forming character, revealing truth, generating energy in recipient minds. These men possess understanding as far as that term expresses an operation of the mind, but understanding with them is in living connection with imagination and emotion; they never use it as an exclusive power in themselves, they never address it as an exclusive power in others. To understand a thing in its external qualities and internal spirit, requires the joint operation of all the faculties; and no fact is ever thoroughly understood by the understanding, for it is the person that understands not the faculty, and the person understands only by the exercise of his whole force and insight. The man of understanding, so called, simply perceives the forms of things and their relations; the man of impassioned imagination perceiving forms and divining spirit, conceives the life of things and their relations. The antithesis runs through the whole realm of thought and fact. The man of understanding, when he rises out of sensations, simply reaches abstractions; and in the abstract there is no life. Ideas and principles belong as much to the concrete, to substantial existence, as the facts of sensation; the law of gravitation is a reality no less than the planet Jupiter; but to the man of mechanical understanding, ideas subside into mere opinions, and principles into generalities; and as by the very process of his thinking he disconnects, and deadens by disconnection, the powers by which he thinks, he cannot exercise, conceive or communicate life, cannot invent, discover, create, combine. This is evident from the nature of the mind, and it is proved by history. In art, religion, science, philosophy, politics, the minds that organize are organic minds, not mechanical understandings.

The principle we have indicated, applies to all matters of human concern, the simplest as well as the most complicated. Let us first take a familiar instance from ordinary life. In the common intercourse of society we are all painfully conscious of the dominion of the mechanical, prescribing manner, proscribing nature. In the Siberian atmosphere of most social assemblies the soul congeals. The tendency to isolation of mind from mind, and heart from heart, is most apparent in the contrivances by which society brings its members bodily together—the formal politeness excluding the courtesy it mimics. Hypocrisy, artifice, non-expression of the reality in persons—these are apt to be the characteristics of that dreary solitude which passes under the exquisitely ironical appellation of “good society.” The universal destiny of men and women who engage in this game of fashion as the business of life, is frivolity or ennui. They either fritter to pieces or are bored to death. Nothing so completely wastes away the vitality of the mind, and converts a person into a puppet, as this substitution of the verb “to appear,” for the verb “to be.” Whatever is graceful in manner, carriage and conversation, is natural; but the art of politeness, as commonly practiced, is employed to deaden rather than develop nature, from its ambition to reduce the finer instincts to mechanical forms. In the very term of gentleman there is something exceedingly winning and beautiful, expressing as it does a fine union of intelligence and courtesy; but in genteel society the word too often means nothing more than foppish emptiness, and Sir Philip Sidney gives way to Beau Nash.

Even here, however, the moment a person with a genius for society appears, it is curious to see how quickly the different elements are fused together, by a few flashes of genuine social inspiration. Convention is at once abolished, each heart finds a tongue, giggling turns into merriment, conversation occurs and prattle ceases, and a party is really organized. A little sincerity of this sort in social intercourse would infinitely beautify life.

In one of the most important matters connected with the welfare of men, that of practical ethics, we have another example of the despotism of the mechanical and disregard of the vital, in human life. A true writer on morals should understand two things, morality and immorality; but a mechanical mind can do neither. He neither communicates the life of moral ideas, nor discerns the life of vicious ideas, but simply has opinions on morals, and opinions on vice. The consequence is that most of the “do-me-good” books are lifeless as regards effect—are contemptuously abandoned by men to children, and by children are learned only to be violated. At last it becomes the sign of green juvenility to quote an abstract truism against a concrete vice, and no person in active life considers himself at all bound to accommodate his conduct to axioms. Indeed, common writers on ethics have become unenviably notorious for expending the full force of their feebleness in statements of generalities, which are universally assented to, and almost as universally disregarded. Complacently perched on the chill summits of abstract principles, these gentlemen appear to experience a grim satisfaction in sending down into the warm and living concrete a storm of axiomatic snow and sleet. Having no practical grasp of things, they emphasize duties without possessing any clear insight of practices, and accordingly their indignant blast of truism whistles shrilly over the heads of the sinners it should lay prostrate. Wanting the power to pass into the substance and soul of existing objects and living men, they content themselves with applying external rules to external appearances, glory in the gift of invective as divorced from the secret of interpretation, and being thus shrews rather than seers, they do that worst of injuries to the cause of morality which results from denouncing the devil without understanding his deviltry. In the republic of delusion and democracy of transgression there are certain errors deserving the name of “popular,” errors which mislead three quarters of the human race; and the analysis and exhibition of these should be a leading object of practical morality. Thoroughly to comprehend one of these impish emissaries of Satan, and clearly to demonstrate that the rainbow bubbles he sports in the sun are begotten by froth on emptiness, might not be so grand a thing as to strut about in the worn-out frippery of moral commonplaces, but it would expose one fatal fallacy which assists in misguiding public sentiment, distorting human character, and impelling reasonable men into those expeditions after the unreal, which are every day wrecked on the rocks of nonsense or crime. But to do this requires a vital mind, and in matters of morals society is very well content not to be pricked and probed in conscience by the sharp benevolence of truth. The mechanical moralists disturb no robber or murderer, no cheat or miser, no spendthrift or profligate, no man who wishes to get what he is pleased to call a living by preying on his neighbors. They neither expose nor reform wickedness, but simply toss words at it, for a consideration. Yet from such moral machines it is supposed that, in the course of education, ingenuous youth can get moral life; and real surprise is often expressed by parents, when their children return from academies or colleges, that the only vital knowledge, in form and in essence, that the dear boys have mastered, relates to sin and the devil.

If the mechanical moralists are to be judged by their effects—by their capacity to do the thing they attempt—and thus judged, have terrible sins of omission resting on their work, what shall we say of the mechanical theologians?—There is against each of three liberal professions a time-honored jest, adopted by “gentle dullness,” all over the world, and from its universality almost worthy of a place in Dugald Stewart’s “fundamental principles of human belief.” The point of these venerable facetiæ consists in associating law with chicane, medicine with homicide, and preaching with Dr. Young’s “tired nature’s sweet restorer, balmy sleep.” A joke which seems to be thus endorsed by the human race carries with it some authority, and it would be presumptuous to touch never so gently the subject of theology, without a preliminary remark on this question of dullness. Sin is sarcastic, sin is impassioned, sin is sentimental, sin is fascinating, sin swaggers in rhetoric’s most gorgeous trappings and revels in fancy’s most enticing images, and why should piety alone have the reputation of being feeble and dull? The charge itself, while it closes to the general reader Jeremy Taylor’s wilderness of sweets equally with Dr. Owen’s “continent of mud,” is not without its benumbing effect upon the preacher, for bodies of men commonly understand the art of adapting their conduct to the public impression of their character, and are not apt to provide stimulants when readers only expect soporifics. The truth is that sermons are never dull as sermons, but because the sermonizer is weak in soul. No man with a vision of the interior beauty and power of spiritual truths, no man whom those truths kindle and animate, no man who is truly alive in heart and brain, and speaks of what he has vitally conceived, can ever be dull in the expression of what is the very substance and doctrine of life. The difficulty is that clergymen are apt to fall into mechanical habits of thinking; then ideas gradually fade into opinions; truths dwindle into truisms; a fine dust is subtly insinuated into the vitalities of their being; the holy passion with which their thoughts once gushed out subsides, and “good common sense” succeeds to rapture; and thus many an inspiring teacher, originally a conductor of heaven’s lightning, and exulting in the consciousness of the immortal life beating and burning within him, has lapsed into a theological drudge, dull in his sermons because dull in his conceptions, neither alive himself nor imparting life to others. This decay often occurs in conscientious and religious men, who sufficiently bewail the torpor of soul which compels them to substitute phrases for realities, and to whom this mental death, as they feel it stealing over them, is at once a spell and a torment. The clergyman, who does not keep his mind bright and keen by constant communion with religious ideas, is sure to die of utter weariness of existence. He has once caught a view of the promised land from the Pisgah height of contemplation—wo unto him if it “fades into the light of common day.”

But leaving such perilous topics as ethics and divinity to wiser heads, and passing on to the subjects of philosophy and science, it may be asked—does not the mechanical understanding hold undisputed sway in these? Has impassioned imagination any thing to do with metaphysics, mathematics, natural philosophy, with the observation and the reasoning of the philosopher who deals with facts and laws? The answer to this question is an emphatic yes. That roused, energetic and energizing state of mind which we have designated as impassioned imagination, is as much the characteristic of Newton as of Homer. The facts, direction and object are different, but the faculty is the same. A man of science without a scientific imagination, vital and creative like the poetical imagination, belongs to the second or third class of scientific men, the Hayleys and Haynes Baileys of science. Men of mechanical understandings never discover laws and principles, but simply repeat and apply the discoveries of their betters. Nothing but the fresh and vigorous inspiration which comes from the grasp of ideas, could carry such men as Kepler and Newton through the prodigious mass of drudgery, through which ran the path which led to their objects; for genius alone is really victorious over drudgery, and refuses to submit to the weariness and deferred hope which attend upon vast designs. Indeed, in following the processes of scientific reasoning, whether inductive or deductive, we are always conscious of an element of beauty in the impression left on the mind, an element which we never experience in following the steps of the merely formal logician. Take the discussion, for instance, between Butler and Clarke on the à priori argument for the existence of God, and no reader who attends to the progress of the reasoning can fail to feel the same inner sense touched which is more palpably addressed by the poet. All the great thinkers, indeed, in all the branches of speculative and physical science, are vital thinkers, and their thoughts are never abstract generalities, but always concrete conceptions, endowed with the power to work on other minds, and to generate new thought. Bacon, the greatest name in the philosophy of science, was so jealous of the benumbing and deadening effect of all formal and mechanical arrangement of scientific truth, that he repeatedly opposes all systematization of science, and in his Natural Philosophy followed his own precepts. In the Advancement of Learning he says: “As young men, when they knit and shape perfectly do seldom grow to a further stature, so knowledge, while it is in aphorisms and observations, it is in growth; but when it is once comprehended in exact methods, it may perchance be further polished and illustrated, and accommodated for use and practice; but it increases no more in bulk and substance.” And again he remarks: “The worst and most absurd sort of triflers are those who have pent the whole art in strict methods and narrow systems, which men commonly cry up for their regularity and style.” In illustration of this we may adduce Whewell’s celebrated works, The History and Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences. Here are great learning, logical arrangement, a complete superficial comprehension of the whole subject; but life is wanting. Most of the great discoveries and inventions with which such a book would naturally deal have been made since the publication of Bacon’s Novum Organon; but more mental nutriment and inspiration, more to advance the cause of science, can be found in one page of the Novum Organon than in Whewell’s whole five volumes. Such is the difference between a vital and mechanical mind in the history and philosophy of science; and the difference is more observable still when we come to consider the deep and constant enthusiasm, the persisting, penetrating genius of the practical discoverer, as contrasted with the cold and uncreative memory-monger and reasoning machine, who too often passes himself off as the real savant. The only great man of science who has detailed his processes in connection with his emotions is Kepler, and everybody has heard of the “sacred fury” with which he assaulted the fortresses in which nature long concealed her laws. His page flames with images and exclamations. His operations to conquer the mystery in the motions of the planet Mars are military. His object is as, he says, “to triumph over Mars, and to prepare for him, as one altogether vanquished, tabular prisons and equated eccentric fetters.” When “the enemy left at home a despised captive, had burst all the chains of the equations, and broken forth of the prisons of the tables,” and it was “buzzed here and there that the victory is vain,” the war rages “anew as violently as before,” and he “suddenly brings into the field a new reserve of physical reasonings on the rout and dispersion of the veterans.” A poet can thus vitalize mathematics, and “create a soul under the ribs” of physical death.

In politics and government, the most practical objects of human interest, the men who organize institutions and wisely conduct affairs, are men of vital minds; while the whole brood of ignorant and scampish politicians, whose vulgar tact is but a caricature of insight, and who are as great proficients in ruining nations as statesmen are in advancing them, are men of mechanical minds. In politics, perhaps, more practical injury has resulted from the dominion of formal dunces, than in any other department of human affairs—politics being the great field of action for all speculators in public nonsense, for all men whose incompetency to handle things would be quickly discovered in any other profession. But a great statesman, no less than a great poet, discerns the life of things in virtue of having himself a live mind, and, not content with observing men and events, divines events in their principles, and thus reads the future. When he proposes a scheme of legislation, all its results exist in his mind as possibilities, and if an effect is produced not calculated in the conception, he is so far to be accounted a blunderer, not a statesman. Perhaps of all the statesmen that ever lived, Edmund Burke had this power of reading events in principles in the greatest perfection; and certainly there are few English poets who can be said to equal him in impassioned imagination. This imagination was not, as is commonly asserted, a companion and illustrator of his understanding, appending pretty images to strong arguments, but it included understanding in itself, and was both impetus and insight to his grandly comprehensive and grandly energetic mind. Fox, Pitt, and all the politicians of his time, were, in comparison with him, men of mechanical intellects, constantly misconceiving events; mere experimenters, surprised at results which they should have predicted. There is something mortifying in the reflection that, in free countries, the people have not yet arrived at the truth, that great criminality as well as great impudence are involved in the exercise of political power without political capacity. A politician in high station, without insight and foresight, and thus blind in both eyes, is an impostor of the worst kind, and should be dealt with as such.

In art and literature the doctrine of vital powers lies at the base of all criticism which is not mere gibberish. It is now commonly understood that the creative precedes the critical; that critical laws were originally generalized from poetic works; and that a poem is to be judged by the living law or central idea by which it is organized, which law or idea is as the acorn to the oak, and determines the form of the poem. The power and reach of the poet’s mind is measured by his conception of organic ideas, of ideas which, when once grasped, are principles whence poems necessarily grow, and are eventually realized in works. The universality of Shakspeare is but a power of vital conception, not limited to one or two ideas, but ranging victoriously over the world of ideas. These celestial seeds, once planted in a poetic nature, germinate and grow into forms of individual being, whose loveliness and power shame our actual men and actual society by a revelation of the real and the permanent. Chaucer, Shakspeare, Spenser, Milton, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley, in virtue of their power to realize and localize the ideal, give us “poor humans” a kind of spiritual world on earth.

The schoolmasters of letters, those gentlemen who frame laws of taste, and manufacture cultivated men, commonly display a notable oversight instead of insight of the distinction between vital and mechanical minds, between authors who impart power and authors who impart information. They judge the value of a book by its external form instead of internal substance, and altogether overlook the only important office of reading and study, which plainly is the acceleration of our faculties through an increase of mind. Mind is increased by receiving the mental life of a book, and assimilating it with our own nature, not by hoarding up information in the memory. Books thus read enrich and enlarge the mind, stimulating, inflaming, concentrating its activity; and though without this reception of external life a man may be odd, he cannot be original. The greatest genius is he who consumes the most knowledge, and converts it into mind. But a mechanical intellect merely attaches the husks of things to his memory, and eats nothing. It is for this reason that heavy heads, laden with unfertilizing opinions and dead facts which never pass down into the vitalities of their being, are such terrific bores. Considering literature not as food but as luggage, they cram their brains to starve their intelligence—and wo to the youth whom they pretend to instruct and inform! A true teacher should penetrate to whatever is vital in his pupil, and develop that by the light and heat of his own intelligence—like the inspiring master described by Barry Cornwall’s enthusiast:—

A man who reads live books keeps himself alive, has a constant sense of what life means and what mind is. In reading Milton, a power is communicated to us, which, for the time, gives us the feeling of a capacity for doing any thing, from writing a Hamlet to whipping Tom Hyer. “My ——, sir,” said the artist who had been devouring Chapman’s Homer, “when I went into the street, after reading that book, men seemed to be ten feet high.” This exaltation of intelligence is simply a movement of our consciousness from the mechanical to the vital state, and to those whose common existence is in commonplaces such an exaltation occasions a shock of surprise akin to fear.

In an art very closely connected with one of the highest forms of literature, the art of acting, we have another illustration of the fundamental antithesis, in processes and in results, between vitality and mechanism. Few, even among noted performers, have minds to conceive the characters they play; and it consequently is a rare thing to see a character really embodied and ensouled on the stage. The usual method is to give it piece by piece, and part by part, and the impression left on the audience is not the idea of a person, but an aggregation of personal peculiarities. Mr. Macready, for instance, has voice, action, understanding, grace of manner, felicity in points: but each is mechanical. His mind is hard and unfusible, never melts and runs into the mould of the individuality he personates, never imparts to the audience the peculiar life and meaning embodied by his author. His energy is not vital but nervous; his mode of arriving at character is rather logical than imaginative. He studies the text of Hamlet, infers with great precision of argument the character from the text, and plays the inference. Booth, on the contrary, who of all living actors has the most force and refinement of imagination, conceives Hamlet as a person, preserves the unity of the person through all the variety in which it is manifested, and seems really to pass out of himself into the character. Macready leaves the impression of variety, but of a variety not drawn out of one fertile and comprehensive individuality: Booth gives the individuality with such power that we can easily conceive of even a greater variety in its expression without danger to its unity. The impression which Macready’s Hamlet leaves on the mind is an impression of Mr. Macready’s brilliant and versatile acting; the impression which Booth stamps on the imagination is the profound melancholy of Hamlet, underlying all his brilliancy and versatility. A man can witness Booth’s personation of Macbeth, Hamlet, Lear and Othello, with great delight, and with great accession of knowledge, after reading the deep Shakspearian criticism of Goethe, Schlegel and Coleridge: but every one feels it would be unjust to bring Macready to the test of such exacting principles.

In these desultory remarks on a variety of suggested topics, we have attempted to illustrate the radical distinction between vitality and mechanism, impassioned imagination and logical understanding, the communication of mental life and the imparting of lifeless information, as that distinction applies to all things which occupy human attention and stimulate human effort. We have indicated, in a gossiping way, the dangerous ease with which the mechanical supersedes the vital in those departments of knowledge and affairs which originated in the mind’s creative and organizing energy; in society, in governments, in laws, literature and institutions, in ethical, mental and physical science; and have tried to show that such an usurpation of torpor over activity dulls and deadens the soul, makes existence a weakness and weariness, and mocks our eyes with nothing but the show and semblance of power. A man of mechanical understanding can but exist his four-score years and ten, and a dreary time he has of it at that, bored and boring all his few and tiresome years; but a live mind has the power of wonderfully condensing time, and lives a hundred common years in one. From the phenomena presented by men of genius we can affirm the soul’s immortality, because they give some evidence of the joy, the ecstasy, involved in the idea of life; but to a mechanical being, endowed with a spark of vitality sufficient only to sting him with rebuking possibilities, an endless existence would be but an endless ennui. The ground for hope is, that man, using as he may all the resource of stupid cunning, cannot kill the germ of life which lies buried in him; hatred and pride, the sins of the heart, may eat into it, and his “pernicious soul” seem, like Iago’s, to “rot half a grain a day;” mechanism, the sin of the head, may withdraw itself into “good common sense,” and contentedly despise the joyous power of vital action; but still the immortal principle constituting the Person survives—patient, watchful, persistent, unconquerable, refusing to capitulate, refusing to die.

P.

———

BY ALFRED B. STREET.

———

———

BY JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.

———

———

BY JAMES T. FIELDS.

———

OR THE CAPTAIN’S SON AND THE SAILOR BOY.

A SEA STORY.

———

BY S. A. GODMAN.

———

CHAPTER I.

“Rouse up, rouse up, my hearty! Bear a hand and be lively for that little devil-skin abaft, has been hailing for you this five minutes.”

Thus spoke, with a rough voice, but in a kind tone, a tall and powerfully built sailor, as he descended the forecastle-ladder, to a boy of some ten years of age, who, lying stretched upon his back on a mess-chest, was fast asleep. Loud as were the tones of the speaker, they made no impression upon the boy. Wrapped in the deep, sweet slumber of childhood, his body fatigued, his conscience clear, and his mind at ease, he was enjoying one of those refreshing rests that are only permitted to the young and contented—the sleep that manhood longs after but seldom experiences.

A beautiful picture would that forecastle and its inmates have made, could they have been transferred to canvas. The boy, a noble one, as he reposed with closed eye-lids and upturned face, over which bright smiles were flitting—the reflection of pleasant, hopeful dreams—seemed an embodiment of intelligence and innocence; notwithstanding the coarse canvas trowsers and striped cotton-shirt which formed his only attire. The man, with his muscular and strongly-knit figure, his bronzed cheeks, huge whiskers, brightly gleaming eyes and determined expression of countenance, was the personification of bodily strength, physical perfection and perfect self-reliance. The one looked as if he were a spirit from a higher sphere, who had by chance become an inmate of that dark, confined, triangular-shaped and murky apartment; and appeared all out of place amidst its mess-chests, bedding, and other nautical dunnage, and its atmosphere reeking with the odors of bilge-water, tar, and lamp-smoke. The other was in keeping with the surrounding objects; his bright red flannel shirt, his horny hands, his very attitude showed him one to ease and comfort unaccustomed, whose only home was a forecastle, his abiding-place the heaving ocean.

Wearied with awaiting the result of his verbal summons, the seaman reached down to awaken his companion with a shake; and as he did, a beam of affection so softened the expression of his countenance, and lent so much tenderness to his eye, that with all his roughness and uncouthness, the weather-beaten tar became really handsome; for, than love, there is no more certain beautifier. Though undisturbed by noise, no sooner was the sailor-boy touched, than, true to the instinct of his calling, he sprung from his resting-place, as wide awake, and with his faculties as much about him, as if he had always been to sleep a stranger—and exclaimed,

“Is it eight bells already, Frank? I thought I had just closed my peepers.”

“Just closed your peepers, my little lark! I began to think your eye-lids were battened down, it seemed such a hard pull for you to heave them up. You haven’t had much of a snooze though, for it’s only four bells; but that young scaramouch astern wants you to take him in tow. So you had better up-anchor and make sail, Tom, for the cabin, or the she-commodore will be sending the boatswain after you with the colt.”^[1]

Scarcely waiting to hear the completion of the sentence, the lad hurried up the ladder to the deck, and in a few seconds was at the door of the cabin. Standing just inside the entrance, a drizzling rain preventing him from coming further, stood the youth to whom Frank had referred, by the not very flattering appellations of devil-skin and scaramouch. There was but little difference in the age of the two boys. Not the slightest resemblance or similarity, however, existed between them in any other respect.

The sailor-boy was large for his years—with a figure that gave promise of symmetry, grace, and an early maturity; his head was in keeping with his body—admirably developed, well balanced, and covered with a profusion of rich, dark brown hair; his forehead, broad and intellectual, lent additional beauty to his full, deep-blue eyes; and with his ruddy cheeks, giving evidence of vigorous health, he was just such a boy as a prince might desire his only son and heir to be.

The captain’s son was slight and rather under-sized, with a sickly look, produced apparently more by improper indulgences than natural infirmity; sparkling black eyes, black hair, and regular features, added to a well-shaped head and fine brow, would have rendered him good-looking in spite of his sallow complexion, had it not been for a peevish, discontented and rather malignant expression, that was habitual to him.

The physique of the lads did not differ more than their dress. The one was clothed in a suit of the most costly broadcloth, elegantly made, with boots upon his feet, and a gold chain around his neck to support the gold watch in his pocket. The other, bare-footed, bare-necked, jacketless, was under no obligations to the tailor for adding to the gentility of his appearance. Yet any person, even a blind man, could he have heard their voices, would at once have acknowledged that the roughest clad bore indellibly impressed upon him the insignia of nature’s nobility.

No sooner did the captain’s son see the boy of the forecastle, than he addressed him in a tone and style that harmonized with the sneering expression of his face:

“So, you good-for-nothing, lazy fellow, you’ve made me stand here bawling for you this half hour. What’s the reason you did not come when I first called?”

“Why, Master Charles, I would not have kept you waiting if I had known you wanted me; but I was asleep in the forecastle, sir. Frank Adams woke me up—and I’ve come as quick as I could.”

“Asleep this time in the afternoon! Why don’t you sleep at night? I never sleep in the afternoons. But you had better not make me stand and wait so long for you another time, or I’ll tell my mamma, and she’ll get father to whip you.”

At this threat a bright flush overspread the face and neck of the sailor-boy, and for an instant his eye assumed a fierce expression that was unusual to it; but suppressing his feelings, he replied in his accustomed tone,

“I was up all night, Master Charles, helping to reef top-sails, and lending a hand to get up the new fore-sail in place of the old one that was blown out of the bolt-ropes in the mid-watch. This morning I could not sleep, for you know I was playing with you until mess-time.”

“Well, Tom, come into the cabin and let’s play, and I wont say any thing about it this time,” said Charles, as he walked in, followed by his companion.

What a difference there was between the apartment in which the lads now were, and the one which Tom had left but a few moments before. It was the difference between wealth and poverty.

The vessel, on board of which our scene is laid, was a new and magnificently-finished barque of seven hundred and fifty tons, named the Josephine. The craft had been built to order, and was owned and commanded by Lewis Barney Andrews—a gentleman of education and extensive fortune, who had been for many years an officer in the United States navy. Getting married, however, and his wife’s objecting to the long cruises he was obliged to take in the service, whilst she was compelled to remain at home, he effected a compromise between his better half’s desire that he should relinquish his profession, and his own disinclination to give up going to sea entirely, by resigning his commission in the navy, and purchasing a ship for himself. The Josephine belonged to Baltimore—of which city Captain A. was a native, and was bound to the East Indies. She was freighted with a valuable cargo, which also belonged to the captain, and had on board besides the captain, his wife, son and servant-girl, a crew consisting of two mates, and a boatswain, fourteen seamen, a cook, steward, and one boy.

Her cabin—a poop one—was fitted up in the most luxurious style. Every thing that the skill of the upholsterer and the art of the painter, aided by the taste and experience of the captain, could do to make it elegant, beautiful and comfortable, had been done. Extending nearly to the main-mast the distance from the cabin-door to the transom was full fifty feet. This space was divided into two apartments of unequal size, one of twenty, the other thirty feet, by a sliding bulkhead of highly polished rosewood and superbly-stained glass.

The after-cabin was fitted up as a sleeping-room, with two mahogany bedsteads and all the appurtenances found in the chambers of the wealthy on shore. The forward-cabin was used as a sitting and eating-room. On the floor was a carpet, of whose fabric the looms of Persia might be proud—so rich, so thick, so magnificent was it, and deep-cushioned ottomans, lounges and rocking-chairs were scattered along the sides and were placed in the corners of the apartment.

Not far from the door, reclining on a lounge, with a book in her hand, was the wife of the captain, and the mother of Master Charles. She was a handsome woman, but one who had ever permitted her fancies and her feelings to be the guides of her actions. Consequently her heart, which by nature was a kind one, was often severely wrung by the pangs of remorse, caused by the recollection of deeds committed from impulse, which her pride would not permit her to apologize or atone for, even after she was convinced of her error.

As the two boys entered the cabin she looked at them, but without making any remark, continued the perusal of her book, whilst they proceeded to the after-cabin, and getting behind the bulkhead were out of her sight. For some fifteen minutes the stillness of the cabin was undisturbed; but then, the mother’s attention was attracted by the loud, angry tones of her son’s voice, abusing apparently his play-fellow. Hardly had she commenced listening, to ascertain what was the matter, ere the sound of a blow, followed by a shriek, and the fall of something heavy upon the floor, reached her ear. Alarmed, she rushed into the after-cabin, and there, upon the floor, his face covered with blood, she saw the idol of her heart, the one absorbing object of her affection, her only son, and standing over him, with flashing eyes, swelling chest, and clenched fists, the sailor-boy.

So strong was the struggle between the emotions of love and revenge—a desire to assist her child, a disposition to punish his antagonist—that the mother for a moment stood as if paralyzed. Love, however, assumed the mastery; and raising her son and pressing him to her bosom, she asked in most tender tones, “Where he was hurt?”

“I ain’t hurt, only my nose is bleeding because Tom knocked me down, just for nothing at all,” blubbered out Charles.

The mother’s anxiety for her son relieved, the tiger in her disposition resumed the sway; letting go of Charles, she caught hold of Tom, and shaking him violently, demanded, in shrill, fierce tones, how he, the outcast, dared to strike her child!

Unabashed and unterrified, the sailor-boy looked in the angry woman’s face without replying.

“Why don’t you answer me, you cub! you wretch! you little pirate!—speak! speak! or I’ll shake you to death!” continued the lady, incensed more than ever by the boy’s silence.

“I struck him because he called my mother a hussy, if you will make me tell you,” replied Tom, in a quiet voice, though his eye was bright with anger and insulted pride.

“Your mother a hussy! Well, what else was she? But you shall be taught how to strike your master for speaking the truth to you, you good for nothing vagabond. Run and call your father,” she continued, turning to Charles, “and I’ll have this impertinent little rascal whipped until he can’t stand.”

In a moment Captain Andrews entered; and being as much incensed as his wife, that a sailor-boy, a thing he had always looked upon as little better than a block or rope’s end, had had the audacity to strike his son, he was furious. Taking hold of Tom with a rough grasp, he pushed him out on deck, and called for the boatswain. That functionary, however, was slow in making his appearance; and again, in louder and more angry tones, the captain called for him. Still he came not; and, spite of his passion, the captain could but gather from the lowering expressions of the sailors’ countenances, that he was at the commencement of an emeute.

——

CHAPTER II.

Accustomed to have his commands always promptly obeyed, the wrath of Captain Andrews waxed high and furious at the dilatoriness of the boatswain. Without any other exciting cause, this apparent insubordination on the part of one of his officers, was enough to arouse all the evil passions of his heart. Educated under the strict discipline of the United States service, he had been taught that the first and most important duty of a seaman was obedience. “Obey orders, if you break owners,” was the doctrine he inculcated; and to be thus, as it were, bearded on his own quarter-deck, by one of his own men, was something entirely new, and most insulting to his pride. Three times had he called for the boatswain without receiving any reply, or causing that functionary to appear.

When the captain first came out of the cabin, his only thought was to punish the sailor-boy for striking his son; but his anger now took another course, and his desire to visit the boatswain’s contumacy with a heavy penalty was so great, that he forgot entirely the object for which he had first wished him. Relinquishing his hold on Tom’s shoulder, the captain hailed his first officer in a quick, stern voice,

“Mr. Hart, bring aft Mr. Wilson, the boatswain.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” responded the mate, as he started toward the forecastle-scuttle to hunt up the delinquent. “Hillo, below there!” he hailed, when he reached the scuttle, “You’re wanted on deck, Mr. Wilson!”

“Who wants me?” was the reply that resounded, seemingly, from one of the bunks close up the ship’s eyes.

“Captain Andrews is waiting for you on the quarter-deck; and if you are not fond of tornadoes, you had better be in a hurry,” answered the mate.

Notwithstanding the chief dickey’s hint, the boatswain seemed to entertain no apprehensions about the reception he would meet at the hands of the enraged skipper; for several minutes elapsed before he made himself visible on deck.

As soon as the captain saw the boatswain, his anger increased, and he became deadly pale from excess of passion. Waiting until Wilson came within a few feet of him, he addressed him in that low, husky voice, that more than any other proves the depth of a person’s feeling, with,

“Why have you so long delayed obeying my summons, Mr. Wilson?”

“I was asleep in the forecastle, sir, and came as soon as I heard Mr. Hart call,” replied Wilson.

But the tone in which he spoke, the look of his eye, the expression of his countenance, would at once have convinced a less observant person than Captain Andrews, that the excuse offered was one vamped up for the occasion, and not the real cause of the man’s delay.

“Asleep, sir! Attend now to the duty I wish you to perform—and be awake, sir, about it! And you may, perhaps, get off easier for your own dereliction afterward—for your conduct shall not remain unpunished,” answered the captain.

“Captain Andrews, boy and man, I have been going to sea now these twenty-five years, and no one ever charged Bob Wilson with not knowing or not doing his duty before, sir!” rejoined the boatswain, evidently laboring under as much mental excitement as the captain.

“None of your impertinence, sir! Not a word more, or I will learn you a lesson of duty you ought to have been taught when a boy. Where’s your cat,^[2] sir?” continued the captain.

“In the razor-bag,”^[3] replied the boatswain.

“Curse you!” ejaculated the captain, almost beside himself at this reply, yet striving to maintain his self-possession; “one more insolent word, and I will have you triced up. Strip that boy and make a spread-eagle of him; then get your cat and give him forty.”

During this conversation between the captain and the boatswain, the crew had been quietly gathering on the lee-side of the quarter-deck, until at this juncture every seaman in the ship, except the man at the wheel, was within twenty feet of the excited speakers. Not a word had been spoken amongst them; but it was evident from the determination imprinted upon their countenances, from their attitudes, and from the extraordinary interest they took in the scene then transpiring, that there was something more in the boatswain’s insubordination than appeared on the surface; and whatever it was, the crew were all under the influence of the same motive.

Mr. Wilson, the boatswain of the Josephine, was a first-rate and thorough-bred seaman. No part of his duty was unfamiliar to him; and never did he shrink from performing any portion of it on account of danger or fatigue. Like many other simple-minded, honest-hearted sons of Neptune, he troubled himself but little about abstruse questions on morals; but he abhorred a liar, despised a thief, and perfectly detested a tyrant. And though he could bear a goodly quantity of tyrannical treatment himself, without heeding it, it made his blood boil, and his hand clench, to see a helpless object maltreated.

Ever since the Josephine had left port, there had been growing amongst the crew a disposition to prevent their favorite, Tom, the sailor-boy, from being imposed upon and punished, as he had been, for no other reason than the willfulness of the captain’s son, and the caprice of the captain’s wife. Not a man on board liked the spoiled child of the cabin. No fancy, either, had they for his mother; because, right or wrong, she always took her son’s part, and oftentimes brought the sailors into trouble. The last time Tom had been punished a grand consultation had been held in the forecastle, at which the boatswain presided; and he, with the rest of the crew, had solemnly pledged themselves not to let their little messmate be whipped again unless, in their opinion, he deserved it.

This was the reason why the boatswain, one of the best men in the ship, had skulked when he heard the captain’s call: he had seen him come out of the cabin with Tom, and rightly anticipated the duty he was expected to perform. Such great control does the habit of obedience exercise over seamen, that although he was resolved to die before he would suffer Tom to be whipped for nothing, much less inflict the punishment himself, the boatswain felt a great disinclination to have an open rupture with his commanding officer. The peremptory order last issued by the captain, however, brought affairs to a crisis there was no avoiding; he either had to fly in the face of quarter-deck authority, or break his pledge to his messmates and his conscience. This, Wilson could not think of doing; and looking his captain straight in the face, in a quiet tone, and with a civil manner, he thus addressed his superior:

“It does not become me, Captain Andrews, so be as how, for to go, for to teach my betters—and—and—” here the worthy boatswain broke down, in what he designed should be a speech, intended to convince the captain of his error; but feeling unable to continue, he ended abruptly, changing his voice and manner, with “Blast my eyes! if you want the boy whipped, you can do it yourself.”

Hardly had the words escaped the speaker’s lips, before the captain, snatching up an iron belaying-pin, rushed at the boatswain, intending to knock him down; but Wilson nimbly leaped aside, and the captain’s foot catching in a rope, he came down sprawling on the deck. Instantly regaining his feet, he rushed toward the cabin, wild with rage, for the purpose of obtaining his pistols. Several minutes elapsed before he returned on deck; when he did he was much more calm, although in each hand he held a cocked pistol.

The quarter deck he found bare; the crew, with little Tom in their midst, having retired to the forecastle, where they were engaged in earnest conversation. The second mate was at the wheel, the seaman who had been at the helm having joined his comrades, so that the only disposable force at the captain’s command was the chief mate, the steward and himself, the cook being fastened up in his galley by the seamen. On the forecastle were fifteen men. The odds were great; but Captain Andrews did not pause to calculate chances—his only thought was to punish the mutinous conduct of his crew, never thinking of the possibility of failure.

Giving one of his pistols to Mr. Hart, and telling the steward to take a capstan bar, the captain and his two assistants boldly advanced to compel fifteen sailors to return to their duty.

——

CHAPTER III.

Whilst the captain, mate and steward, were making their brief preparation for a most hazardous undertaking, the men of the Josephine, with that promptness and resolution so common amongst seamen when they think at all, had determined upon the course they would adopt in the impending struggle.

Although the numerical discrepancy between the two parties seemed so great, the actual difference in their relative strength was not so considerable as it appeared. The sailors, it is true, had the physical force—they were five to one; but the captain’s small band felt more confidence from the moral influence that they knew was on their side, than if their numbers had been trebled, without it.

Habit ever exercises a controlling influence, unless overcome by some powerful exciting principle, and men never fly in the face of authority to which they have always been accustomed to yield implicit obedience, but from one of two causes—either a hasty impulse, conceived in a moment, and abandoned by actors frightened at their own audacity; or, a sense of wrong and injustice so keen and poignant, as to make death preferable to further submission.

Aware of custom’s nearly invincible power, having often seen seamen rebel, and then at the first warning gladly skulk back to their duty, the captain unhesitatingly advanced up the weather-gangway to the break of the forecastle, and confronted his mutinous crew. The men, who were huddled around the end of the windlass, some sitting, others standing, talking together in low tones, only showed they were aware of the captain’s presence by suddenly ceasing their conversation—but not a man of them moved.

Captain Andrews, though quick tempered, was a man of judgment and experience; and he saw by the calmness and quietness of his men, that their insubordination was the result of premeditation—a thing he had not before thought—and he became aware of the difficulties of his position. He could not, for his life, think of yielding; to give up to a sailor would, in his estimation, be the deepest degradation. And moral influence was all he could rely upon with which to compel obedience—feeling that if an actual strife commenced, it could but result in his discomfiture. His tone, therefore, was low and determined, as with cocked pistol in hand he addressed his crew:

“Men, do you know that you are, every one of you, guilty of mutiny? Do you know that the punishment for mutiny on the high seas is death? Do you know this? Have you thought of it?” Here the captain paused for an instant, as if waiting for a reply; and a voice from the group around the windlass answered—

“We have!”

Rather surprised at the boldness of the reply, but still retaining his presence of mind, the captain continued:

“What is it then that has induced you to brave this penalty? Have you been maltreated? Do you not have plenty of provisions? Your regular watches below? Step out, one of you, and state your grievances. You know I am not a tyrant, and I wish from you nothing more than you promised in the shipping articles!”

At this call, the eyes of the men were all turned toward Wilson, the boatswain, who, seeing it was expected from him, stepped out to act as spokesman. Respectfully touching his tarpaulin, he waited for the captain to question him. Observing this, the captain said,

“Well, Wilson, your messmates have put you forth as their speaker; and it strikes me that you are the ringleader of this misguided movement. I am certain you have sense enough to understand the risk you are running, and desire you to inform me what great wrong it is that you complain of. For assuredly you must feel grievously imposed upon, to make you all so far forget what is due to yourselves as seamen, to me as your captain, and to the laws of your country!”

“I ain’t much of a yarn-spinner, Captain Andrews, and I can turn in the plies of a splice smoother and more ship-shape than the ends of a speech; and it may be as how I’ll ruffle your temper more nor it is now, by what I have to say—” commenced the boatswain.

“Never mind my temper, sir,” interrupted the captain, “proceed!”

“We all get plenty of grub, Captain Andrews, and that of the best,” continued Wilson; his equanimity not in the least disturbed by the skipper’s interruption. “We have our regular watches, and don’t complain of our work, for we shipped as seamen, and can all do seamen’s duty. But sailors have feelings, Captain Andrews, though they are not often treated as if they had; and it hurts us worse to see those worked double-tides who can’t take their own part, than if we were mistreated ourselves; and to come to the short of it, all this row’s about little Tom, there, and nothing else.”

“Is he not treated just as well as the rest of you? Has he not the same quarters, and the same rations, that the men are content with? Who works him double-tides?” answered the captain, his anger evidently increasing at the mention of Tom’s name; and the effort to restrain himself, being almost too great for the choleric officer to compass.

“You can’t beat to wind’ard against a head-sea, Captain Andrews, without a ship’s pitching, no more than you can reef a to’s-sail without going aloft.” Wilson went on without change in manner, though his voice became more concise and firm in its tone. “And I can’t tell you, like some of them shore chaps, what you don’t want to hear, without heaving you aback. We ain’t got any thing agin you, if you was let alone; all we wants is for you to give your own orders, and to keep Mrs. Andrews from bedeviling Tom. The boy’s as good a boy as ever furled a royal, and never skulks below when he’s wanted on deck; but he stands his regular watches, and then, when he ought to sleep, he’s everlastingly kept in the cabin, and whipped and knocked about for the amusement of young master, and that’s just the whole of it. We’ve stood it long enough, and wont return to duty until you promise—”

“Silence, sir!” roared the captain, perfectly furious, and unable longer to remain quiet. “Not another word! I’ve listened to insolence too long by half, already! Now, sir, I have a word to say to you, and mind you heed it. Walk aft to the quarter-deck!”

The boatswain, though he heard the order plainly, and understood it clearly, paid no attention to it.

“Do you hear me, sir?” asked the captain. “I give you whilst I count ten, to start. I do not wish to shoot you, Wilson; but if you do not move before I count ten, I’ll drive this ball through you—as I hope to reach port, I will!”

Raising his pistol until it covered the boatswain’s breast, the captain commenced counting in a clear and audible tone. Intense excitement was depicted on the faces of the men; and some anxiety was shown by the quick glances cast by the chief mate and steward, first at the captain, and then at the crew. Wilson, with his eyes fixed in the captain’s face, and his arms loosely folded across his breast, stood perfectly quiet, as if he were an indifferent spectator.

“Eight! Nine!” said the captain, “there is but one left, Wilson; with it I fire if you do not start.”

The boatswain remained motionless. “Te—” escaped the commander’s lips; and as it did, the sharp edge of Wilson’s heavy tarpaulin hat struck him a severe blow in the face. This was so entirely unexpected, that the captain involuntarily threw back his head, and by the same motion, without intending it, threw up his arm and clenched his hand enough to fire off the pistol held in it; the ball from which went through the flying-jib, full twenty feet above Wilson’s head.

The charm that had held the men in check, was broken by the first movement toward action, and they made a rush toward the captain and his two supporters. Bravely, though, they stood their ground; and Frank Adams, the sailor introduced with Tom in the forecastle, received the ball from the mate’s pistol in the fleshy part of his shoulder, as he was about to strike that worthy with a handspike. Gallantly assisted by the steward, the captain and mate made as much resistance as three men could against fifteen. The odds were, however, too great; spite of their bravery, the three were soon overpowered and the contest was nearly ended, when a temporary change was made in favor of the weaker party by the appearance in the fray of the second mate. He, during the whole colloquy, had been at the wheel, forgotten by both parties. His sudden arrival, therefore, as with lusty blows he laid about him, astonished the seamen, who gave back for an instant, and allowed their opponents to regain their feet. They did not allow them much time, however, to profit by this respite, for in a few seconds, understanding the source from whence assistance had come, they renewed the attack with increased vigor, and soon again obtained the mastery. But it was no easy matter to confine the three officers and the steward, who resisted with their every power, particularly as the men were anxious to do them no more bodily injury than they were compelled to, in effecting their purpose.

So absorbed were all hands in the strife in which they were engaged, that not one of them noticed the fact that what had been the weather-side of the barque at the commencement of the affray, was now the lee; nor did any of the men—all seamen as they were—observe that the vessel was heeling over tremendously, her lee-scuppers nearly level with the water. A report, loud as a cannon, high in the air, first startled the combatants; then, with a rushing sound, three large, heavy bodies, fell from aloft, one of which striking the deck near the combatants, threatened all with instant destruction, whilst the other two fell with a loud splash into the sea to leeward.

In the new danger, both the victors and vanquished were equally interested, and at the same instant looked aloft to discover the cause. The first glance convinced every one of the necessity for prompt and vigorous action. Their position was, indeed, one fraught with imminent danger. Left without a helmsman, by the second mate going to the assistance of the captain, the barque, close-hauled with a stiff breeze blowing, had come up in the wind, and was now flat aback; that is, the wind, instead of blowing against the sails from behind, was before them. The fore and main-royal, and top-gallant masts, with all their gear, had been carried away; and the ship was gathering stern-way at a rate that would soon run her under.

The natural desire for self-preservation, combined with the instincts and habits of both officers and men to cause them entirely to forget the fierce contest in which they had just been engaged—their thoughts were changed from each other, to the ship and its situation—and the officers were at once permitted to regain their feet.

No sooner did Captain Andrews find himself at liberty, than he at once assumed command, and issued his orders as loud and clear as if nothing had interrupted his authority.

“To the wheel! to the wheel! Mr. Hart! All hands ware ship!” were his first words; and the men with alacrity hurried to their stations, whilst the mate ran to the helm.

The captain’s wife and son had been in the cabin, anxiously awaiting the result of the controversy on the forecastle, but alarmed by the failing spars, they had hurried on deck and were now on the poop. In the hurry and confusion consequent upon the ship’s hazardous position, all hands were so busy that no one paid attention to Charles and Mrs. Andrews; and they were too much alarmed to take due care of themselves, else would they have sought a less exposed situation. As the spanker jibed, Charles was standing nearly amidships on the deck, and before he even had time to shriek, the boom struck him and hurled him over the monkey-rail into the sea. His mother, who was close to the mizzen-mast, saw him just as he went over, and terror-stricken, sunk to the deck in a swoon, without uttering a sound. Unable to swim, a puny child in the angry waves of the rough Atlantic, the case of Charles seemed a hopeless one; but rescue came from a source he could have least expected. Tom, the sailor-boy, who was on the tafferel belaying the spanker-sheet to windward, recognized the captain’s son as he floated clear of the stern; and actuated by that generous, gallant spirit that had so endeared him to his messmates, he shouted to the mate that Charles was over-board! and fearlessly sprang into the sea to his assistance. Tom was an excellent swimmer, and he found no difficulty in supporting Charles’ delicate form until the barque hove round, when they were both picked up and taken on board.

The joy of the mother at having restored to her the idol of her heart; the grateful feelings she and the father felt toward the deliverer of their child, we will not attempt to describe; only the results will we give of this heroic action. Tom was treated by the captain as a son; the crew were forgiven for their mutinous conduct, and cheerfully returned to duty; and Tom, now a distinguished naval officer, dates his first step upon the ladder that leads to eminence, from the day he so narrowly escaped a severe whipping.

Laurensville, South Carolina.

(FROM THE GERMAN OF CHAMISSO.)

———

BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

———

———

BY MRS. E. C. KINNEY.

———

Jenny Lind

(IN LA SONNAMBULA)
Engraved in London for Graham’s Magazine by W. H. Mote after the original Painting by J. W. Wright

———

BY HENRY T. TUCKERMAN.

———

[WITH A PORTRAIT.]

The Life of the North is to us a fresh revelation; and, by a striking coincidence, one after another of its phases have come upon our transatlantic vision, in rapid succession. To many Americans Thorwaldsen was the only name associated with art, but a few years since; and to those who had visited Rome, the benign and venerable man was a vivid and pleasing reminiscence, appropriate to the idea of his grand apostolic figures, and the affectionate honor in which his native Denmark held their noble sculptor. But with Ole Bull fairly commenced our knowledge of the genius of Northern Europe. The play of the wind through her forests of pines, the glint of her frozen streams, the tenderness of her households, and the solemnity of her faith, seemed to breathe in the wizard tones of his violin; while her integrity was written in the form, the manners, and the very smile of the musician. Then the spirit of her literature began slowly to win its gentle but impressive way to the American heart. Longfellow’s translation of Bishof’s Tegnér’s Children of the Lord’s Supper, with the graphic introduction descriptive of moral life in Sweden, touched the same chord in New England breasts, that had vibrated to the religious pathos of Bryant, Dana, and Hawthorne; while not a few readers became simultaneously aware of a brave Danish poet recently followed to the tomb by the people of Copenhagen, with every token of national grief. The dramas of Œhlenschläger, from their union of familiar expression with the richest feeling, though but partially known in this country, awakened both curiosity and interest. Then, too, came to us the domestic novels of Miss Bremer, portraying so heartily the life of home in Sweden, and appealing to the most universal sympathies of our people. Finally, Hans Andersen’s delicious story-books veiling such fine imaginative powers under the guise of the utmost simplicity, raised up for him scores of juvenile admirers, while children of a larger growth enjoyed the originality of his fictions with equal zest, as the offspring of rare human sympathy and original invention. The pictures wafted to our shores by the late revolutionary exigencies of the Continent, have often yielded glimpses of northern scenery. Norwegian forests, skies and mountains, attracted the eye at the Dusseldorf gallery; and thus through both art and literature, the simple, earnest, and poetic features of life in the north, were brought within the range of our consciousness. It developed unimagined affinities with our own; and now, as it were, to complete and consecrate the revelation, we are to hear the vocal genius of Northern Europe—the Swedish nightingale, Jenny Lind, is coming!

From an unpretending edifice in one of the by-streets of the city of Stockholm in Sweden, a quarter of a century ago, a troop of children might have been seen to emerge, at noon, and break the silence that at other hours invested the place, with the lively chat and quick laughter natural to emancipated scholars. In a few moments they dispersed to their several homes, and early the next day were again visible, one by one, disappearing, with a more subdued bearing, within the portal of the humble domicil.

Stockholm is justly regarded as the most elegant city of Northern Europe. It is situated at the junction of the lake Mälar with an inlet of the Baltic. Although usually described as founded on seven isles, it is, in point of fact, mainly situated on three; the smallest and most central having been the original site, and still constituting the most populous and active section. The irregularity of its form, and the blending of land and water, renders the appearance of the city remarkably picturesque. From the elevated points, besides the various buildings, craft of all kinds in motion and at anchor, numerous bridges and a fine back-ground of mountains are discernible, and combine to form a beautiful panorama. The royal palace is exceeded in magnificence only by that of Versailles. Through this busy and varied scene, on a pleasant day, there moved rapidly the carriage of one of those useful, though unrecognized beings, who seem born to appreciate the gifts which God so liberally dispenses, but whom the insensibility and selfishness of mankind, in general, permit to languish in obscurity until a fortunate circumstance brings them to light. Some time previous, the good lady, in passing the seminary to which we have alluded, had been struck with the beauty of a child’s voice that rose blithely from the dwelling. She was induced to alight and enter; and her astonishment was only increased upon discovering that this cheerful song came from a diminutive girl, busied in arranging the school-room, during a temporary recess. She learned that this maiden was the daughter of the school-mistress; and the somewhat restricted air of homely comfort visible in the establishment, and the tinge of severity in the manners of the mother, contrasted forcibly in the lady’s imagination with the apparently instinctive soaring of the child’s spirit into the atmosphere of song, from her dim and formal surroundings, as the sky-lark lifts itself from a lowly nest among the dark weeds up to the crystal heavens. It was a sweet illustration of the law of compensation.

The air the child was singing, as she busied herself about the room, was a simple, native strain, quite familiar and by no means difficult of execution; it was the quality of the voice, the natural flow of the notes, the apparent ease, grace and earnest sweetness of the little songstress, that gained the visiter’s ear and heart; and now she had come to urge upon the parents the duty of affording every encouragement to develop a gift so rare and beautiful; she expressed her conviction that the child was born for a musical artist, and destined not only to redeem her parents from want, but to do honor to her country. This impression was deepened when she learned that this musical tendency manifested itself as early as the age of three, and that the little girl had long awakened the wonder of the family by repeating accurately even intricate airs, after having heard them but once; that she had thus sung habitually, spontaneously, and seemed to find of her own volition, a peculiar consolation in the act for the dry routine of her life, though from without, not a single circumstance gave any impulse or direction to this vocal endowment.

She exhibited also to the just perception of Madame Lundberg, herself a celebrated Swedish actress, as well as a benevolent woman, the usual conditions of genius, in backward physical growth, precocious mental vigor, and mature sensibilities. The latter, indeed, were so active, that her mother, and even her kind adviser doubted if she possessed sufficient energy of character for so trying a profession as that of an artist; and this consideration added to the prejudice of the parents against a public, and especially a theatrical career, for a time, chilled the hopes of the enthusiastic patroness. At length, however, their consent was obtained that the experiment should be tried, and the diffident little girl, only accustomed to domestic privacy, but with a new and strange hope wildly fluttering in her bosom, was taken to Croelius—a veteran music-master of Stockholm; who was so delighted with her rare promise that one day he led her to the house of Count Pucke, then director of the court theatre. Her reception, however, did not correspond with the old man’s desires; for the nobleman coldly inquired what he was expected to do with such a child? It must be confessed that the absence of beauty and size did not, at the first glance, create any high anticipations in behalf of the demure maiden. Croelius, though disappointed, was quite undismayed; he entreated the director to hear her sing, and declared his purpose to teach her gratuitously, if he could in no other way secure the cultivation of her voice and talents. This earnestness induced the count to listen with attention and candor; and the instant she had finished, he exclaimed, “She shall have all the advantages of the Stockholm Academy!” Such was Jenny Lind’s initiation into the life of an artist.

She now began regularly to appear on the stage, and was soon an adept in juvenile parts. She proved widely attractive in vaudevilles, which were written expressly for her; and it is remarkable that the charm did not lie so much in the precocious intelligence, as in the singular geniality of the little actress. Nature thus early asserted her dominion. There was an indefinable human interest, a certain original vein that universally surprised and fascinated, while it took from the child the eclat of a mere infant phenomenon, by bringing her from the domain of vulgar wonder into the range of that refined sympathy one touch of which “makes the whole world kin.” In a year Croelius reluctantly gave up his pupil to Berg, who to kindred zeal united far more energy; and by him she was inducted thoroughly into the elements of her art.

Probation is quite as essential to the true development of art as encouragement. The eager, impassioned, excitable temperament needs to be chastened, the recklessness of self-confidence awed, and that sublime patience induced through which reliable and tranquil energy takes the place of casual and unsustained activity. By nature Jenny Lind was thoughtful and earnest, disposed to silence, and instinctively reserved; while the influence of her early home was to subdue far more than to exhilarate. The change in her mode of life and prospects was so unexpected, her success as a juvenile prodigy so brilliant, and the universal social favor she enjoyed, on account of the winsome amiability of her character, so fitted to elate a youthful heart, that we cannot but regard it as one of the many providential events of her career, that just at the critical moment when the child was losing herself in the maiden, and nature and education were ultimately shaping her artistic powers, an unexpected impediment was allowed to check her already too rapid advancement; and a pause, sad enough at the time, but fraught with enduring benefit, gave her occasion to discipline and elevate her soul, renew her overtasked energies, and plume her wings while thus aware of the utility of her trial, we can easily imagine its bitterness. The loss of a gift of nature through which a human being has learned to find both the solace and the inspiration of existence, upon which the dearest hopes were founded, and by which the most glorious triumphs were achieved, is one of those griefs few can realize. Raphael’s gentle heart bled when feebleness unnerved the hand that guided the pencil to such lovely issues, and big tears rolled down Scott’s manly cheek when he strove in vain to go on with his latest composition. How desolate then must that young aspirant for the honor, and the delights of the vocal art, have felt when suddenly deprived of her voice! The dream of her youth was broken in a moment. The charm of her being faded like a mist; and the star of hope that had thus far beamed serenely on her path, grew dim in the cold twilight of disappointment—keen, entire and apparently irremediable. This painful condition was aggravated by the fact that her age now rendered it out of the question to perform childish parts, while it did not authorize those of a mature character. The circumstances, too, of her failure were singularly trying. She was announced to appear as Agatha in Weber’s Frieschutz—a character she had long regarded as that in which her ability would be genially tested. To it her young ambition had long pointed, and with it her artistic sympathies were familiarly identified. The hour came, and that wonderful and delicate instrument—that as a child she had governed so adroitly, that it seemed the echo of her mind;—that subtle medium through which her feelings had been wont to find such ready and full vent, refused to obey her will, yielded not to the pleadings of love or ambition; was hushed as by some cruel magic—and Jenny Lind was mute, with anguish in her bosom; her friends looking on in tearful regret, and her maestro chagrined beyond description! Where had those silvery tones fled? What catastrophe had all at once loosened those invisible harp strings? The splendid vision of fame, of bounteous pleasure, of world-excited sympathy, and of triumphant art, disappeared like the gorgeous cities seen by the traveler, from the Straits of Messina, painted in tinted vapor on the horizon. Jenny Lind ceased to sing, but her love of art was deepened, her trust in nature unshaken, her simplicity and kindliness as real as before. Four long years she lived without the rich promise that had invested her childhood; but, with undiminished force of purpose, she studied the art for which she felt herself born, with patient, acute, earnest assiduity, and then another and blissful episode rewarded her quiet heroism. The fourth act of Robert le Diable had been announced for a special occasion; and it so happened that in consequence of the insignificant role of Alice, consisting of a single solo, no one of the regular singers was disposed to adopt the character. In this emergency, Berg was reminded of his unfortunate pupil. She meekly consented to appear, pleased with an opportunity to be useful, and oblige her kind maestro. While practicing this solo, to the delight and astonishment of both teacher and pupil, the long-lost voice suddenly re-appeared. It seemed as if Nature had only withdrawn the gift for a season, that her child might gather strength and wisdom to use it efficiently, and in an unselfish spirit; and then restored it as a deserved recompense for the resignation and truth with which the deprivation had been borne. We can fancy the rapturous emotions of the gentle votary that night, when she retired from the scene of her new and unanticipated triumph. The occasion has been aptly compared to the memorable third act of the Merchant of Venice on the evening of Kean’s debut at Drury Lane. Jenny Lind immediately reverted to her cherished ideal part—that of Agatha. She was now sixteen years of age—her character rendered firm by discipline, her love of music deepened by more comprehensive views and a better insight, and her whole nature warmed and softened by the realization of the fondest and earliest hopes, long baffled, yet consistently cherished. The most experienced actors were struck with wonder at the facility and perfection of her dramatic style; in this, as in her vocalism, was, at once, recognized that peculiar truth to nature which constitutes the perfection of art—that unconsciousness of self and circumstance, and that fresh idea of character, at once so uncommon and so delightful. She drew the orchestra after her by her bold yet true execution; and seemed possessed with the genius of the composer as well as with the idiosyncrasies of the character she sung, so complete and individual was the result. Already the idol of her native city, and the hope of the Swedish stage, her own ideas of art and aims as an artist remained unchanged. Her first desire was to seek the instruction of Garcia, with a view to perfect her method and subdue some vocal difficulties. She gracefully acknowledged the social homage and theatrical distinction awarded her; but these were but incidental to a great purpose. She had a nobler ambition to satisfy, a higher ideal to realize, and pressed on her still obstructed way, unallured by the pleasures of the moment and undismayed by the distance of the goal. In order to obtain the requisite means for a sojourn at Paris, she made excursions through Norway and Sweden, with her father, during the vacations of the theatre, to give concerts, and when sufficient had thus been acquired, she obtained leave of absence from the Stockholm director, and left home for Paris, notwithstanding the dissuasion of her parents. They confided, however, as before, in her own sense of right; and she hastened to place herself under the instruction of Garcia. Here another keen disappointment subdued her reviving hopes. At the first trial, her new teacher said: “My child, you have no voice; do not sing a note for three months, and then come and resume again.” Once more she wrapt herself in the mantle of patience, went into studious retirement, and, at the prescribed time, again returned to Garcia, whose cheering words now were, “My child, you can begin your lessons immediately.” Simple words, indeed, but more welcome to that ardent child of song, intent on progress in the art she loved, than the wildest plaudits. She returned with an elastic step, and entered with joyful enthusiasm upon her artistic career. Meyerbeer immediately offered her an engagement at Berlin. The consummate skill of her teacher, and her own enlarged experience and high resolves, made her advancement rapid and genuine. Thenceforth a series of musical triumphs unexcelled in the history of the lyrical drama, attended the life of Jenny Lind. We might repeat countless anecdotes of the universal admiration and profound sympathy she excited at Berlin, Vienna, Dresden, Bremen, Munich, Aix la Chapelle, and, indeed, wherever her voice was heard on the stage and at concerts. The testimonies of the highest private regard, and public appreciation, were lavished upon her in the shape of costly gifts, wreaths of silver, poetic tributes, philosophical criticisms, the breathless silence or overwhelming applause of entranced multitudes, and all the signs of enthusiastic delight at the advent of a true child of nature and of song. To us the record of her two visits to England are yet vivid, and it is needless to reiterate the extraordinary demonstrations which there attested her singular merits, and unequalled attractiveness. The population of Berlin and Vienna assembled at midnight to bid her adieu; and when she last left her native city, every ship in the harbor was manned and every quay crowded to see her embark in the presence of the queen. Nor are these spontaneous tributes to be exclusively ascribed to the love of novelty and the excitement of renown. Heroes and heroines the world cannot do without, unless it lapses into frigid and selfish materialism; admiration for talent and sympathy with genius are but human instincts. It is seldom, however, that these sentiments are upheld and sanctioned by reverence for worth. Therefore is it beautiful to witness the voluntary oblations which attend the great artist whose expression, however eloquent, is the true manifestation of a pure, noble and disinterested spirit. It is not Jenny Lind in her personality, but as a priestess of art, an interpreter of humanity, a gifted and loyal expositer of feelings, that lend grace to life and elevation to the soul, that draws the common heart toward her with such frank and ardent gratulation. Her well-known and unostentatious charities, her simplicity of life, her sympathy with her fellow-creatures, and unaffected manners, so accord with the glorious art she so rarely illustrates as to justify to reflection the impulsive admiration she excites.

It is not in sublimity that Jenny Lind excels; and whatever excellence her Norma may possess, it is not of that characteristic species which renders her impersonations of La Figlia del Regimento, of Alice, of Lucia, and of Amina, so memorable. In the former character she makes innocence play through the rude habits acquired in the camp, in a way so exquisite as to enchant as by the spell of reality. In the Bride of Lammermoor, there is a melancholy beauty which haunts the listener. It is her greatest tragic part. The pathos of the third act seems re-produced from the very genius which created the romance. Her Amina is Bellini’s; and this is saying all that praise can utter. We may realize her versatility by comparing the comic jealousy so archly displayed in the Noces de Figaro, with the tenderness of the sleep-walking scene in La Somnambula. It has been well observed of her that, in the former opera, “she adheres to the genius of Mozart with a modest appreciation of the genius of that master”—a commendation as high as it is rare. One of the most remarkable traits of her artistic skill is its exquisite and wonderful discrimination—a quality no description can make obvious.

The peculiar charm of Jenny Lind, as an artist, is her unconsciousness. We are disposed to regard this as one of the most reliable tests of superior gifts. It at least proves the absorption of self in what is dearer—a condition essential to all true greatness. The most acute observers of this beautiful vocalist fail to detect the slightest reference either to her audience or herself while engaged in a part. For the time being her very existence seems identified with the character she represents; it is the after-thought, not the impression of the moment that brings us to the artist; infected by the complete realization of the scene, we think of it alone; and only when it has passed away do we become aware that the genius of another has, as it were, incarnated a story or a sentiment before us, through will, sympathy and talent. The process is quite as unthought of as that by which a masterpiece of painting or sculpture has been executed, when we stand before it rapt in that harmonious spell that permits no analysis and suggests no task-work, any more than the landscape of summer, or the effulgence of a star. We feel only the presence of the beautiful, the advent of a new creation, the irresistible appeal to the highest instincts of the soul. Carlyle says “the unconscious is the alone complete”—an aphorism which Jenny Lind robs of all mystery; for her superiority consists in the wholeness and unity of her effects, and this is produced by a kind of self-surrender, such as we rarely see except in two of the most genuine phases of humanity—genius and childhood; in this tendency they coalesce; and hence the freshness that lingers around the richly endowed nature, and the universal faith which it inspires. The secret is that such characters have never wandered far from nature; they have kept within sight of that “immortal sea that brought us hither;” they constitute an aristocracy spontaneously recognized by all; and they triumph as poets, artists, and influential social beings, not through the exercise of any rare and wonderful gift, but from obedience to the simple laws of truth—to the primal sympathies, and to a kind of innate and glorious confidence which lifts them above ignoble fear and selfish tricks. The true hero, poet, artist, the true man or woman, who seem to the multitude to be peculiarly endowed, differ from those who do them voluntary homage, chiefly in this unconsciousness of self; this capacity to be ever “nobler than their moods;” this sympathetic breadth of life that enables them to go forth with a kind of elemental power and enter into other forms of being; the principle of their existence is faith, not dexterity; sentiment, not calculation.

It will be seen that we recognize a moral basis as the source of Jenny Lind’s fascination; and if we were obliged to define this in a single word, perhaps the lexicon would furnish none so expressive as the homely one—truth. But we use it as significant of far more than the absence of falsehood; we mean by it candor, trust, spontaneity, directness. We believe that Jenny Lind inspires sympathy in spite of her petite figure, not altogether because she warbles enchantingly, and has amiable manners, but also on account of the faith she at once excites. We perceive that love of approbation is not her ruling impulse, although her profession might excuse it; but that she has an ideal of her own, an artistic conscience, a love of art, a musical ministry to satisfy and accomplish, and that these considerations induce a nobler ambition than co-exists with mere vanity. It is said that the remarkable novel of Consuelo, by George Sand, is founded on the character and history of Jenny Lind. Whether this be so or not, the theory of the tale, the guileless devotion to art as such, which stamps the heroine with such exalted grace, finds a parallel in this famed vocalist of the North; the same singleness of purpose and intact clearness of soul, the same firm will and gentle heart are evident. Much, too, of her success is attributable to the philosophy of Consuelo’s maestro—that to reach the highest excellence in Art, the affections as well as the mind must be yielded at her shrine. There is a subtle and deep relation between feeling and expression, and the biographies of those who have achieved renown in the latter, under any of its artistic forms, indicate that it has embodied that within them that found no adequate response in actual life. The highest efforts of the poet and musician, are confessedly the result of baffled or overflowing emotion; disguised, perhaps, as to the form, but clearly evident in the tone of their productions. Mozart and Raphael, Bryant and Paganini, have illustrated this most emphatically. Jenny Lind seems to have kept her better feelings alive by the habitual exercise of benevolence, and a diffusive friendliness, while her concentrated and earnest activity finds utterance in her art. Hence the sway she has gained over countless hearts, each absorbed in its own dream or shadowed by its own regrets, that glow again in the kindling atmosphere of song, which gushes from a soul over which no overmastering passion has yet cast a gloom, and whose transparent waters no agitation of conflicting desires has ever made turbid and restless. Jenny Lind has been a priestess at the shrine of Art, and therefore interprets its oracles “as one having authority.”

In this country the idea of fashion and the mere relish of amusement, have blended so exclusively with the support of the Opera, that we seldom realize its artistic relations and influence. The taste for the Italian Opera seems to have extended in the ratio of civilization; and although it is, after all, an exotic among the Anglo-Saxons—a pleasure born in the “sweet South,” and in its very richness of combination, suggestive of the impassioned feeling and habitual luxury of those climes—yet, on the other hand, it is typical of the complex life, wants and tendencies of modern society. The old English tragic drama, robust, fierce-hearted and unadorned, has faded before it; the theatre, as a reunion of wits, and an arena for marvelous histrionic effects, as a subject of elegant criticism, and a nucleus for universal sympathy, may be said not to exist; while the Opera has become the scene of display, elegance, and pleasure on the one hand, and of the highest triumphs on the other. The sentiment of the age has written itself in music—its wide intelligence, its keen analysis, its revolutionary spirit, its restlessness, and its humanity, may be traced in the rich and brilliant combinations of Rossini, in the grand symphonies of Beethoven, in the pleading tenderness of Bellini, and in the mingled war-notes and sentiment of Verdi. The demand for undisguised and free expression, characteristic of the times, finds also its requisite scope in the lyrical drama. Recitation is too tame, pantomime too silent, scenic art too illusive, costume too familiar, music too unpicturesque; but all these combined are, at once, as romantic, exciting, impressive, and melo-dramatic as the varied aptitudes, the exacting taste, and the broad, experimental genius of the age. The gifts of nature, the resources of art, the gratification of the senses, the exigencies of fashion and taste, and the wants of the heart and imagination find in the Opera a most convenient luxury. The lyrical drama has thus gradually usurped the place of tournament and theatre; it is a social as well as an artistic exponent of the day; and those who have best illustrated it are justly regarded as public benefactors. Few, however, have ministered in this temple, with the artless grace, the pure enthusiasm, the vestal glory of Jenny Lind. The daughters of the South, ardent and susceptible, but capricious and extravagant, heretofore won its chief honors; their triumphs have been great but spasmodic, gained by impulse rather than nature, by glorious gifts of person rather than rare graces of soul. Jenny Lind, with her fair hair and blue eyes, her unqueenly form, and child-like simplicity, has achieved almost unparalleled success, by means quite diverse. Her one natural gift is a voice of singular depth, compass, flexibility and tone. This has been, if we may be allowed the expression, mesmerized by a soul, earnest, pure and sincere; and thus, with the clear perception and dauntless will of the North has she interpreted the familiar musical dramas in a new, vivid, and original manner. One would imagine she had come with one bound from tending her flock on the hill-side, to warble behind the foot-lights; for so directly from the heart of nature springs her melody, and so beyond the reach of art is the simple grace of her air and manners, that we associate her with the Opera only through the consummate skill—the result of scientific training—manifested in her vocalism. The term warbling is thus adapted peculiarly to express the character of her style; its ease, fluency, spontaneous gush, and the total absence of every thing meretricious and exaggerated in the action and bearing that accompanies it. It is like the song of a bird, only more human. Nature in her seems to have taken Art to her bosom, and assimilated it, through love, with herself, until the identity of each is lost in the other.

The union of such musical science—such thoroughly disciplined art with such artlessness and simplicity, is, perhaps, the crowning mystery of her genius. To know and to love are the conditions of triumph in all the exalted spheres of human labor; and in the musical drama, they have never been so admirably united. Her command of expression seems not so much the result of study as of inspiration; and there is about her a certain gentle elevation which stamps her to every eye, as one who is consecrated to a high service. Her ingenuous countenance, always enlivened by an active intelligence, might convey, at first, chiefly the idea of good-nature and cleverness in the English sense; but her carriage, voice, movements, and expression in the more affecting moments of a drama, give sympathetic assurance of what we must be excused for calling—a crystal soul. In all her characters she transports us, at once, away from the commonplace and the artificial, if not always into the domain of lofty idealism, into that more human and blissful domain of primal nature; and unhappy is the being who finds not the unconscious delight of childhood, or the dream of love momently renewed in that serene and unclouded air.

In accordance with this view of Jenny Lind’s characteristics, the enthusiasm she excited in England, is alluded to by the leading critics, as singularly honest. No musical artist, indeed, was ever so fitted to win Anglo-Saxon sympathies. She has the morale of the North; and does not awaken the prejudice so common in Great Britain, and so truly described in Corinne, against the passionate temperament and tendency to extravagance that mark the children of the South. No candidate for public favor was ever so devoid of the ordinary means of attaining it. There is something absurd in making such a creature the mere nucleus of fashionable vanity, or the object of that namby-pamby criticism that busies itself with details of personal appearance and French terms of compliment. Jenny Lind is not beautiful; she does not take her audiences by storm; she exercises no intoxicating physical magnetism over their sensitive natures. She is not classic either in form or feature, or manner, or style of singing. Her loveliness as a woman, her power as an artist, her grace as a character, lies in expression; and that expression owes its variety and its enchantment to unaffected truth to nature, sentiment and the principles of art.

And now that Jenny Lind is hourly expected among us, let a word be ventured as to what self-respect and the love of art make appropriate for her reception. Let not so charitable a soul be mortified by a tasteless hospitality; let not this genuine artist be seized upon by the remorseless purveyors of meretricious Fashion; and, above all, let not her gentle and candid nature be subjected to the vulgarism of the lionizing mania! As a priestess of Art, in its highest and sweetest form, as a fair ministrant to the spirit of Beauty, as a true musical interpreter of humanity—let the people welcome her with sincere and grateful recognition. This is the most acceptable tribute an unperverted soul can receive or bestow. It is that intelligent sympathy due from a free and educated society, and cheering to a discriminating recipient. Far from Nature’s minstrel be the critical affectation of the professed amateur, and the empty adulation of the coxcomb. Let her pure and exquisite vocalism—the result of such discipline, faith, and rare gifts of heaven, find a response in the American heart unprofaned by absurd excitement, and truly indicative of a genuine and cordial appreciation of the beautiful in art, and the excellent in character.

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BY MRS. EMMA C. EMBURY.

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BY MRS. ELIZABETH J. EAMES.

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BY HENRY B. HIRST.

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A SOUTHERN NOVELET.

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BY W. GILMORE SIMMS.

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CHAPTER I.

To the reader who, in the pursuit of the facts in our national history, shall confine himself only to those records which are to be found in the ordinary narrative, much that he reads will be found obscure, and a great deal absolutely untruthful. Our early historians gave themselves but little trouble in searching after details. A general outline was all that they desired, and, satisfied with this, they neither sought after the particular events which should give rise to the narrative, nor into the latent causes which gave birth to many of its actions. In the history of South Carolina, for example, (which was one brimming with details and teeming with incidents,) there is little to be found—as the history is at present written—which shall afford to the reader even a tolerably correct idea of the domestic character of the struggle. We know well enough that the people of the colony were of a singularly heterogeneous character; that the settlers of the lower country were chiefly Cavaliers and Huguenots, or French Protestants, and that the interior was divided into groups, or settlements, of Scotch, Irish, and German. But there is little in the record to show that, of these, the sentiment was mixed and various without degree; and that, with the exception of the parishes of the lower country, which belonged almost wholly, though with slight modifications, to the English church, it was scarcely possible to find any neighborhood, in which there was not something like a civil war. The interior and mountain settlements were most usually divided, and nearly equally, between their attachments to the crown and the colony. A Scotch settlement would make an almost uniform showing in behalf of the English authority—one, two, or three persons, at the utmost, being of the revolutionary party. An Irish settlement (wholly Protestant, be it remembered) would be as unanimous for the colonial movements; while the Germans were but too frequently for the monarchical side, that being represented by a prince of Hanover. The German settlements mostly lay in the Forks of Edisto, and along the Congarees. The business of the present narrative will be confined chiefly to this people. They had settled in rather large families in Carolina, and this only a short period before the Revolution. They had been sent out, in frequent instances, at the expense of the crown, and this contributed to secure their allegiance. They were ignorant of the nature of the struggle, and being wholly agricultural, could not well be taught the nature of grievances which fell chiefly upon commerce and the sea-board. Now, in Carolina, and perhaps throughout the whole south, the Revolution not only originated with the natives of the country, but with the educated portions of the natives. It was what may be termed the gentlemen of the colony—its wealth and aristocracy—with whom and which the movement began; and though it is not our purpose here to go into this inquiry, we may add that the motives to the revolutionary movement originated with them, in causes totally different from those which stimulated the patriotism of the people of Massachusetts Bay. The pride of place, of character and of intellect, and not any considerations of interest, provoked the agricultural gentry of the south into the field.

It was the earnest desire of these gentry, at the dawning of the Revolution, to conciliate the various people of the interior. At the first signs of the struggle, therefore, an attempt was made to influence the German population along the Edisto and Congaree, by sending among them two influential men of their own country, whose fidelity to the mouvement party was beyond dispute. But these men were unsuccessful. They probably made few converts. It is enough, if we give a glimpse at the course of their proceedings in a single household in the Forks of Edisto.^[5] George Wagner and Felix Long arrived at the habitation of Frederick Sabb, on the 7th day of July, 1775. Frederick was an honest Dutchman of good character, but not the man for revolution. He was not at home on the arrival of the commissioners, but his good vrow, Minnicker Sabb, gave them a gracious reception. She was a good housekeeper, with but one daughter; a tall, silent girl, with whom the commissioners had no discourse. But Minnicker Sabb, had she been applied to, might have proved a better revolutionist than her spouse. It is very certain, as the results will show, that Frederica Sabb, the daughter, was of the right material. She was a calm, and sweetly-minded damsel, not much skilled in society or books—for precious little was the degree of learning in the settlement at this early period; but the native mind was good and solid, and her natural tastes, if unsophisticated, were pure and elevated. She knew, by precious instincts, a thousand things which other minds scarcely ever reach through the best education. She was what we call, a good girl, loyal, with a warm heart, a sound judgment, and a modest, sensible behavior. We are not seeking, be it remembered, a heroine, but a pure, true-hearted woman. She was young too—only seventeen at this period—but just at the season when the woman instincts are most lively, and her susceptibilities most quick to all that is generous and noble. She made the cakes and prepared the supper for the guests that evening, and they saw but little of her till the evening feast had been adjusted, and was about to be discussed. By this time old Frederick Sabb had made his appearance. He came, bringing with him three of his neighbors, who were eager to hear the news. They were followed, after a little space, and in season for supper, by another guest—perhaps the most welcome of all to the old couple—in the person of a favorite preacher of the Methodist persuasion. Elijah Fields, was a man of middle age, of a vigorous mind and body, earnest and impetuous, and represented, with considerable efficiency, in his primitive province, the usefulness of a church which, perhaps, more than any other, has modeled itself after that of the Primitive Fathers. We shall see more of Elijah Fields hereafter. In the course of the evening, three other neighbors made their appearance at the farm-house of Frederick Sabb; making a goodly congregation upon which to exercise the political abilities of Messrs. Wagner and Long. They were all filled with a more or less lively curiosity in regard to the events which were in progress, and the objects which the commissioners had in view. Four of these neighbors were of the same good old German stock with Frederick Sabb, but two of them were natives of the country, from the east bank of the north branch of the Edisto, who happened to be on a visit to an adjoining farmstead. The seventh of these was a young Scotchman, from Cross Creek, North Carolina, who had already declared himself very freely against the revolutionary movement. He had, indeed, gone so far as to designate the patriots as traitors, deserving a short cord and a sudden shrift; and this opinion was expressed with a degree of temper which did not leave it doubtful that he would gladly seek an opportunity to declare himself offensively in the presence of the commissioners. As we shall see more of this person hereafter, it is only right that we should introduce him formally to the reader as Matthew or Mat Dunbar. He went much more frequently by the name of Mat than Matthew. We may also mention that he was not entirely a politician. A feeling of a tender nature brought him to the dwelling of old Sabb, upon whose daughter, Frederica, our young Scotchman was supposed to look with hungry eyes. And public conjecture did not err in its suspicions.

But Mat Dunbar was not without a rival. Richard Coulter was the only native of the country present, Parson Fields excepted. He was a tall, manly youth, about the same age with Dunbar. But he possessed many advantages over the latter, particularly in respect to person. Tall, while Dunbar was short, with a handsome face, fine eye, and a luxuriant shock of hair, and a massive beard of the same color, which gave quite a martial appearance to his features, otherwise effeminate—the spectator inevitably contrasted him with his rival, whose features, indeed, were fair, but inexpressive; and whose hair and beard were of the most burning and unmitigated red. Though stout of limb, vigorous and athletic, Mat Dunbar was awkward in his movement, and wanting in dignity of bearing. Mentally, the superiority of Coulter was not so manifest. He was more diffident and gentle than the other, who, experienced by travel, bold and confident, never exhibited himself at less than his real worth. These preliminaries must suffice. It is perhaps scarcely necessary to say that Frederica Sabb made her comparisons between the two, and very soon arrived at one conclusion. A girl of common instincts rarely fails to discover whether she is sought or not; and the same instincts lead her generally to determine between rivals long in advance of the moment when they propose. Richard Coulter was certainly her favorite—though her prudence was of that becoming kind which enabled her easily to keep to herself the secret of her preference.

Old Sabb treated his guests with good Dutch hospitality. His wife and daughter were excellent housekeepers, and the table was soon spread with good things for supper. Butter, milk, and cream-cheeses, were not wanting; pones and hoe-cakes made an ample showing, and a few boiled chickens, and a large platter of broiled ham, in the centre of the table, was as much a matter of course in that early day, in this favorite region, as we find them among its good livers now. Of course, supper was allowed to be discussed before the commissioners opened their budget. Then the good vrow took her place, knitting in hand, and a huge ball of cotton in her lap, at the door, while the guests emerged from the hall into the piazza, and sweet Frederica Sabb, quietly, as was her habit, proceeded to put away the debris of the feast, and to restore the apartment to its former order. In this she was undisturbed by either of her lovers; the custom of the country requiring that she should be left to these occupations without being embarrassed by any obtrusive sentiments, or even civilities. But it might be observed that Richard Coulter had taken his seat in the piazza, at a window looking into the hall, while Mat Dunbar had placed himself nearly at the entrance, and in close neighborhood with the industrious dame. Here he divided himself with attentions to her, and an occasional dip into the conversation on politics, which was now fully in progress. It is not our purpose to pursue this conversation. The arguments of the commissioners can be readily conjectured. But they were fruitless to persuade our worthy Dutchman into any change, or any self-committals, the issue of which might endanger present comforts and securities. He had still the same answer to every argument, delivered in a broken English which we need not imitate.

“The king, George, has been a good king to me, my friends. I was poor, but I am not poor now. I had not a finger of land before I came hither. Now, I have good grants, and many acres. I am doing well. For what should I desire to do better? The good king will not take away my grants; but if I should hear to you, I should be rebel, and then he would be angry, and he might make me poor again as I never was before. No, no, my friends; I will sign no association, that shall make me lose my lands.”

“You’re right!” vociferated Mat Dunbar. “It’s treason, I say, to sign any association, and all these rangers here, in arms, are in open rebellion; and should be hung for it; and let the time come, and I’m one to help in the hanging them!”

This was only one of many such offensive speeches which Dunbar had contrived to make during the evening. The commissioners contented themselves with marking the individual, but without answering him. But his rudely expressed opinions were not pleasing to old Sabb himself, and still less so to his worthy vrow, who withdrew at this into the hall; while the stern voice of Elijah Fields descended in rebuke upon the offender.

“And who art thou,” said he, abruptly, “to sit in judgment upon thy brethren? And who has commissioned thee to lend thyself to the taking of human life. Life is a sacred thing, young man—the most precious of human possessions, since it depends on the time which is allowed us whether we shall ever be fit for eternity. To one so young as thyself, scarcely yet entered on thy career as a man, it might be well to remember that modesty is the jewel of youth, and that when so many of the great and good of the land have raised their voices against the oppressions of the mother country, there may be good reason why we, who know but little, should respect them, and listen till we learn. If thou wilt be counseled by me, thou wilt hearken patiently to these worthy gentlemen, that we may know all the merits of their argument.”

Dunbar answered this rebuke with a few muttered sentences, which were hardly intelligible, making no concessions to the preacher or the commissioners, yet without being positively offensive. Richard Coulter was more prudent. He preserved a profound silence. But he was neither unobservant nor indifferent. As yet he had taken no side in the controversy, and was totally uncommitted among the people. But he had been a listener, and was quietly chewing the cud of self-reflection.

After a little while, leaving the venerable signiors still engaged in the discussion—for Wagner and Long, the commissioners, were not willing to forego the hope of bringing over a man of Sabb’s influence—the young men strolled out into the grounds, where their horses had been fastened. It was almost time to ride. As they walked, the Scotchman broke out abruptly:

“These fellows ought to be hung, every scoundrel of them; stirring up the country to insurrection and treason; but a good lesson of hickories, boys, might put a stop to it quite as well as the halter! What say you? They ride over to old Carter’s, after they leave daddy Sabb’s, and it’s a lonesome track! If you agree, we’ll stop ’em at Friday’s flats, and trice ’em up to a swinging limb. We’re men enough for it, and who’s afraid?”

The proposition was received with great glee by all the young fellows, with one exception. It was a proposition invoking sport rather than patriotism. When the more eager responses were all received, Richard Coulter quietly remarked:

“No, no, boys; you must do nothing of the kind. These are good men, and old enough to be the fathers of any of us. Besides, they’re strangers, and think they’re doing right. Let ’em alone.”

“Well, if you wont;” said Dunbar, “we can do without you. There are four of us, and they’re but two.”

“You mistake,” replied Coulter, still quietly, “they are three!”

“How! who!”

“Wagner, Long, and Richard Coulter!”

“What, you! Will you put yourself against us? You go with the rebels, then?”

“I go with the strangers; I don’t know much about the rebellion, but I think there’s good sense in what they say. At all events, I’ll not stand by and see them hurt, if I can help it.”

“Two or three boys,” continued Dunbar, “will make no difference!”

This was said with a significant toss of the head toward Coulter. The instincts of these young men were true. They already knew one another as rivals. This discovery may have determined the future course of Coulter. He did not reply to Dunbar; but, addressing his three companions, he said, calling each by his Christian name, “You, boys, had better not mix in this matter before it’s necessary. I suppose the time will come, when there can be no skulking. But it’s no use to hurry into trouble. As for four of you managing three, that’s not impossible; but I reckon there will be a fight first. These strangers may have weapons; but whether they have or not, they look like men; and I reckon, you that know me, know that before my back tastes of any man’s hickory, my knife would be likely to taste his blood.”

Dunbar replied rudely for the rest; and, but that Coulter quietly withdrew at this moment, seemingly unruffled, and without making any answer, there might have been a struggle between the two rivals even then. But the companions of Dunbar had no such moods or motives as prompted him. They were impressed by what Coulter had said, and were, perhaps, quite as much under his influence as under that of Dunbar. They accordingly turned a cold shoulder upon all his exhortations, and the commissioners, accordingly, left the house of old Sabb in safety, attended by young Coulter. They little knew his object in escorting them to the dwelling of Bennett Carter, where they staid that night, and never knew the danger from which his prompt and manly courage had saved them. But the events of that night brought out Richard Coulter for the cause of the patriots; and a few months found him a second-lieutenant in a gallant corps of Thompson’s Rangers, raised for the defense of the colony. But the commissioners parted from Frederick Sabb without making any impression on his mind. He professed to desire to preserve a perfect neutrality—this being the suggestion of his selfishness; but his heart really inclined him to the support of the “goot King Jorge,” from whom his grants of land had been derived.

“And what dost thou think, brother Fields,” said he to the parson, after the commissioners had retired.

“Brother Sabb,” was the answer, “I do not see that we need any king any more than the people of Israel, when they called upon Samuel for one; and if we are to have one, I do not see why we should not choose one from out our own tribes.”

“Brother Fields, I hope thou dost not mean to go with these rebels?”

“Brother Sabb, I desire always to go with my own people.”

“And whom callest thou our own people.”

“Those who dwell upon the soil and nurse it, and make it flourish, who rear their flocks and children upon it, in the fear of God, and have no fear of man in doing so.”

“Brother Fields, I fear thou thinkst hardly of ‘goot King Jorge,’” said our Dutchman, with a sigh. “Minnicker, my vrow, got you de Piple.”

——

CHAPTER II.

We pass over a long interval of quite three years. The vicissitudes of the Revolution had not materially affected the relations of the several parties to our narrative. During this period the patriots of South Carolina had been uniformly successful. They had beaten away the British from their chief city, and had invariably chastised the loyalists in all their attempts to make a diversion in favor of the foreign enemy. But events were changing. These performances had not been effected but at great sacrifice of blood and treasure, and a formidable British invasion found the State no longer equal to its defense. Charleston, the capital city, after frequent escapes, and a stout and protracted defense, had succumbed to the besiegers, who had now penetrated the interior, covering it with their strongholds, and coercing it with their arms. For a brief interval, all opposition to their progress seemed to be at an end within the State. She had no force in the field, stunned by repeated blows, and waiting, though almost hopeless of her opportunity. In the meantime, where was Richard Coulter? A fugitive, lying perdu either in the swamps of Edisto or Congaree, with few companions, all similarly reduced in fortune, and pursued with a hate and fury the most unscrupulous and unrelenting, by no less a person than Matthew Dunbar, now a captain of loyalists in the service of George the Third. The position of Coulter was in truth very pitiable; but he was not without his consolations. The interval which had elapsed since our first meeting with him, had ripened his intimacy with Frederica Sabb. His affections had not been so unfortunate as his patriotism. With the frank impulse of a fond and feeling heart, he had appealed to hers, in laying bare the secret of his own; and he had done so successfully. She, with as frank a nature, freely gave him her affections, while she did not venture to bestow on him her hand. His situation was not such as to justify their union—and her father positively forbade the idea of such a connection. Though not active among the loyalists, he was now known to approve of their sentiments; and while giving them all the aid and comfort in his power, without actually showing himself in armor, he as steadily turned a cold and unwilling front to the patriots, and all those who went against the monarch. The visits of Richard Coulter to Frederica were all stolen ones, perhaps not the less sweet for being so. A storm sometimes brought him forth at nightfall from the shelter of the neighboring swamp, venturing abroad at a time when loyalty was supposed to keep its shelter. But these visits were always accompanied by considerable peril. The eye of Matthew Dunbar was frequently drawn in the direction of the fugitive, while his passions were always eager in the desire which led him to seek for this particular victim. The contest was a well-known issue of life and death. The fugitive patriot was predoomed always to the halter, by those who desired to pacify old revenges, or acquire new estates. Dunbar did not actually know that Coulter and Frederica Sabb were in the habit of meeting; but that they had met, he knew, and he had sworn their detection. He had become a declared suitor of that maiden, and the fears of old Sabb would not suffer him to decline his attentions to his daughter, or to declare against them. Dunbar had become notoriously an unmitigated ruffian. His insolence disgusted the old Dutchman, who, nevertheless, feared his violence and influence. Still, sustained by good old Minnicker Sabb, his vrow, the father had the firmness to tell Dunbar freely, that his daughter’s affections should remain unforced; while the daughter herself, seeing the strait of her parents, was equally careful to avoid the final necessity of repulsing her repulsive suitor. She continued, by a happy assertion of maidenly dignity, to keep him at bay, without vexing his self-esteem; and to receive him with civility, without affording him positive encouragement. Such was the condition of things among our several parties, when the partisan war began; when the favorite native leaders in the South—the first panic of their people having passed—had rallied their little squads, in swamp and thicket, and were making those first demonstrations which began to disquiet the British authorities, rendering them doubtful of the conquests which they had so lately deemed secure. This, be it remembered, was after the defeat of Gates at Camden, when there was no sign of a Continental army within the State.

It was at the close of a cloudy afternoon, late in October, 1780, when Mat Dunbar, with a small command of eighteen mounted men, approached the well-known farmstead of Frederick Sabb. The road lay along the west bank of the eastern branch of the Edisto, inclining to or receding from the river, in correspondence with the width of the swamp, or the sinuosities of the stream. The farm of Sabb was bounded on one side by the river, and his cottage stood within a mile of it. Between, however, the lands were entirely uncleared. The woods offered a physical barrier to the malaria of the swamp; while the ground, though rich, was liable to freshet, and required a degree of labor in the drainages which it was not in the power of our good Dutchman to bestow. A single wagon-track led through the wood to the river from his house; and there may have been some half dozen irregular foot-paths tending in the same direction. When within half a mile from the house, Mat Dunbar pricked up his ears.

“That was surely the gallop of a horse,” he said to his lieutenant—a coarse, ruffianly fellow like himself, named Clymes.

“Where away?” demanded the other.

“To the left. Put in with a few of the boys, and see what can be found.”

Clymes did as he was bidden; but the moment he had disappeared, Dunbar suddenly wheeled into the forest also, putting spurs to his horse, and commanding his men to follow and scatter themselves in the wood. A keen suspicion was at the bottom of his sudden impulse; and with his pistol in his grasp, and his teeth set firmly, he darted away at a rate that showed the eagerness of the blood-hound, on a warm scent. In a few moments the wood was covered with his people, and their cries and halloes answering to each other, turned the whole solitude into a scene of the most animated life. Accustomed to drive the woods for deer, his party pursued the same habit in their present quest, enclosing the largest extent of territory, and gradually contracting their cordon at a given point. It was not long before a certain degree of success seemed to justify their pursuit. A loud shout from Clymes, his lieutenant, drew the impetuous Dunbar to the place, and there he found the trooper, with two others of the party, firmly confronted by no less a person than Frederica Sabb. The maiden was very pale, but her lips were closely compressed together, and her eyes lightened with an expression which was not so much indicative of anger as of courage and resolve. As Dunbar rode up, she addressed him.

“You are bravely employed, Captain Dunbar, in hunting with your soldiers a feeble woman.”

“In faith, my dear Miss Sabb, we looked for very different game,” replied the leader, while a something sardonic played over his visage. “But perhaps you can put us in the way of finding it. You are surely not here alone?”

“And why not? You are within hail of my father’s dwelling.”

“But yours, surely, are not the tastes for lonely walks.”

“Alas! sir, these are scarcely the times for any other.”

“Well, you must permit me to see that your walks are in no danger from intrusion and insult. You will, no doubt, be confounded to hear that scattered bands of the rebels are supposed to be, even now, closely harbored in these swamps. That villain, Coulter, is known to be among them. It is to hunt up these outlyers—to protect you from their annoyances, that I am here now.”

“We can readily dispense with these services, Captain Dunbar. I do not think that we are in any danger from such enemies, and in this neighborhood.”

It was some effort to say this calmly.

“Nay, nay, you are quite too confident, my dear Miss Sabb. You know not the audacity of these rebels, and of this Richard Coulter in particular. But let me lay hands on him! You will hardly believe that he is scarce ten minutes gone from this spot. Did you not hear his horse?”

“I heard no horses but your own.”

“There it is! You walk the woods in such abstraction that you hear not the danger, though immediately at your ears. But disperse yourself in pursuit, my merry men, and whoso brings me the ears of this outlaw, shall have ten guineas, in the yellow gold itself. No Continental sham! Remember, his ears, boys! We do not want any prisoners. The trouble of hanging them out of the way is always wisely saved by a sabre-cut or pistol-bullet. There, away!”

The countenance of Frederica Sabb instantly assumed the keenest expression of alarm and anxiety. Her whole frame began to be agitated. She advanced to the side of the ruffianly soldier, and put her hand up appealingly.

“Oh! Captain Dunbar, will you not please go home with me, you and your men? It is now our supper hour, and the sun is near his setting. I pray you, do not think of scouring the woods at this late hour. Some of your people may be hurt.”

“No danger, my dear—all of them are famous fox-hunters.”

“There is no danger to us, believe me. There is nobody in the woods that we fear. Give yourself no trouble, nor your men.”

“Oh! you mistake, there is surely some one in this wood who is either in your way or mine—though you heard no horse.”

“Oh! now I recollect, sir, I did hear a horse, and it seemed to be going in that direction.”

Here the girl pointed below. The tory leader laughed outright.

“And so he went thither, did he? Well, my dear Miss Sabb, to please you, I will take up the hunt in the quarter directly opposite, since it is evident that your hearing just now is exceedingly deceptive. Boys, away! The back track, hark you—the old fox aims to double!”

“Oh, go not! Go not!” she urged, passionately.

“Will I not!” exclaimed the loyalist, gathering up his reins and backing his steed from her; “Will I not! Away, Clymes—away, boys; and remember, ten guineas for that hand which brings down the outlaw, Richard Coulter!”

Away they dashed into the forest, scattering themselves in the direction indicated by their leader. Frederica watched their departure with an anxious gaze, which disappeared from her eyes the moment they were out of sight. In an instant all her agitation ceased.

“Now, thank Heaven! for the thought!” she cried. “It will be quite dark before they find themselves at fault; and when they think to begin the search below, he will be wholly beyond their reach. But how to warn him against the meeting, as agreed on? The coming of this man forbids that. I must see! I must contrive it!” And with these muttered words of half meaning, she quietly made her way toward her father’s dwelling, secure of the present safety of her lover from pursuit. She had very successfully practiced a very simple ruse for his escape. Her apprehensions were only but admirably simulated; and in telling Dunbar that the fugitive had taken one direction, she naturally relied on his doubts of her truth, to make him seek the opposite. She had told him nothing but the truth, but she had told it as a falsehood; and it had all the effect which she desired. The chase of the tory captain proved unsuccessful.

——

CHAPTER III.

It was quite dark before Captain Dunbar reached the cottage of Frederick Sabb, and he did so in no good humor. Disappointed of his prey, he now suspected the simple ruse by which he had been deluded, and his first salutation of Frederica Sabb, as he entered the cottage was in no friendly humor.

“There are certain birds,” said he, “Miss Sabb, who fly far from their young ones at the approach of the hunter, yet make such a fuss and outcry, as if the nest were close at hand, and in danger. I see you have learned to practice after their lessons.”

The girl involuntarily replied, “But, indeed, Captain Dunbar, I heard the horse go below.”

“I see you understand me,” was the answer. “I feel assured that you told me only the truth, but you had first put me in the humor not to believe it. Another time I shall know how to understand you.”

Frederica smiled, but did not seek to excuse herself, proceeding all the while to the preparations for supper. This had been got in readiness especially for the arrival of Dunbar and his party. He, with Clymes, his first officer, had become inmates of the dwelling; but his troopers had encamped without, under instructions of particular vigilance. Meanwhile, supper proceeded, Sabb and his vrow being very heedful of all the expressed or conjectured wants of their arbitrary guests. It was while the repast was in progress that Dunbar fancied that he beheld a considerable degree of uneasiness in the manner and countenance of Frederica. She ate nothing, and her mind and eyes seemed equally to wander. He suddenly addressed her, and she started as from a dream, at the sound of her own name, and answered confusedly.

“Something’s going wrong,” said Dunbar, in a whisper to Clymes; “we can put all right, however, if we try.”

A significant look accompanied the whisper, and made the second officer observant. When supper was concluded, the captain of the loyalists showed signs of great weariness. He yawned and stretched himself amazingly, and without much regard to propriety. A like weariness soon after exhibited itself in the second officer. At length Dunbar said to Old Sabb, using a style of address to which the old man was familiar, “Well, Uncle Fred, whenever my bed’s ready, say the word. I’m monstrous like sleep. I’ve ridden a matter of fifty miles to-day. In the saddle since four o’clock—and a hard saddle at that. I’m for sleep after supper.”

The old man, anxious to please his guest, whom he now began rather to fear than favor, gave him soon the intimation which he desired, and he was conducted to the small chamber, in a shed-room adjoining the main hall, which had been assigned him on all previous occasions. Old Sabb himself attended his guest, while Lieutenant Clymes remained, for a while longer, the companion of the old lady and her daughter. Dunbar soon released his host from further attendance by closing the door upon him, after bowing him out with thanks. He had scarcely done so, before he approached one of the two windows in the chamber. He knew the secrets of the room, and his plan of operations had been already determined upon. Concealing his light, so that his shadow might not appear against the window, he quietly unclosed the shutter so as to fix no attention by the sound. A great fig-tree grew near it, the branches in some degree preventing the shutter from going quite back against the wall. This afforded him additional cover to his proceedings, and he cautiously passed through the opening, and lightly descended to the ground. The height was inconsiderable, and he was enabled, with a small stick, to close the window after him. In another moment he passed under the house, which stood on logs four or five feet high, after the manner of the country, and took a crouching attitude immediately behind the steps in the rear of the building. From these steps to the kitchen was an interval of fifteen or eighteen yards, while the barn and other outhouses lay at convenient distances beyond. Shade trees were scattered about, and fruit trees, chiefly peach, rendering the space between something like a covered way. We need not inquire how long our captain of loyalists continued his watch in this unpleasant position. Patience, however, is quite as natural as necessary a quality to a temper at once passionate and vindictive. While he waited here, his lieutenant had left the house, scattered his men privily about the grounds, and had himself stolen to a perch which enabled him to command the front entrance to the cottage. The only two means of egress were thus effectually guarded.

In a little time the household was completely quiet. Dunbar had heard the mutterings, from above, of the family prayers, in which it was no part of his profession to partake; and had heard the footsteps of the old couple as they passed through the passage-way to the chamber opposite the dining hall. A chamber adjoining theirs was occupied by Frederica Sabb; but he listened in vain for her footsteps in that quarter. His watch was one calculated to try his patience, but it was finally rewarded. He heard the movement of a light foot over head, and soon the door opened in the rear of the dwelling, and he distinguished Frederica as she descended, step by step, to the ground. She paused, looked up and around her, and then, darting from tree to tree, she made her way to the kitchen, which opened at her touch. Here, in a whisper, she summoned to her side a negro, an old African, whom we may, at the same time, mention, had been her frequent emissary before, on missions such as she now designed. Brough, as he was called, was a faithful Ebo, who loved his young mistress, and had shown himself particularly friendly to her affaires de cœur. She put a paper into his hands, and her directions employed few words.

“Brough, you must set off for Massa Richard, and give him this. You must creep close, or the soldiers will catch you. I don’t know where they’ve gone, but no doubt they’re scattered in the woods. I have told him, in this paper, not to come, as he promised; but should you lose the paper—”

“I no guine loss ’em,” said Brough, seemingly rather displeased at the doubt, tacitly conveyed, of his carefulness.

“Such a thing might happen, Brough; nay, if you were to see any of the tories, you ought to destroy it. Hide it, tear it up, or swallow it, so that they won’t be able to read it.”

“I yerry, misses.”

“Very good! And now, when you see Massa Richard, tell him not to come. Tell him better go farther off, across the fork, and across the other river; for that Mat Dunbar means to push after him to-morrow, and has sworn to hunt him up before he stops. Tell him, I beg him, for my sake, though he may not be afraid of that bad man, to keep out of his way, at least until he gathers men enough to meet him on his own ground.”

The startling voice of Dunbar himself broke in upon the whispered conference. “Mat Dunbar is exceedingly obliged to you, Miss Sabb.”

“Ah!” shrieked the damsel—“Brough—fly, fly, Brough.” But Brough had no chance for flight.

“His wings are not sufficiently grown,” cried the loyalist, with a brutal yell, as he grappled the old negro by the throat, and hurled him to the ground. In the next moment he possessed himself of the paper, which he read with evident disappointment. By this time the sound of his bugle had summoned his lieutenant, with half a dozen of his followers, and the kitchen was completely surrounded.

“Miss Sabb, you had best retire to the dwelling. I owe you no favors, and will remember your avowed opinion, this night, for Mat Dunbar. You have spoken. It will be for me yet to speak. Lieutenant Clymes, see the young lady home.”

“But, sir, you will not maltreat the negro?”

“Oh! no! I mean only that he shall obey your commands. He shall carry this note to your favorite, just as you designed, with this difference only, that I shall furnish him with an escort.”

“Ah!”

Poor Frederica could say no more. Clymes was about to hurry her away, when a sense of her lover’s danger gave her strength.

“Brough;” she cried to the negro; “you won’t show where Massa Richard keeps?”

“Never show the tories not’ing, missis.”

The close gripe of Dunbar’s finger upon the throat of the negro, stifled his further speech. But Frederica was permitted to see no more. The hand of Clymes was laid upon her arm, and she went forward promptly to save herself from indignity. She little knew the scene that was to follow.

[To be continued.

AND THE SPIRIT BRIDAL.

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BY MISS L. VIRGINIA SMITH.

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NO. 1.—MASSINGER’S GREAT DUKE OF FLORENCE.

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BY ENNA DUVAL.

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Cozimo, duke of Florence, a noble and virtuous prince had the misfortune to lose, by death, his duchess, Clarinda, a lady of such rare and matchless virtues, that, as he said, the whole world could not produce one worthy to be her second. In her grave he buried all thoughts of woman.

His courtiers, and ministers of state, repeatedly urged him to a second marriage, for they feared that after his death, he being childless, distraction might breed in the state, and cause the downfall of his noble house. Residing at the court was a beautiful and wealthy orphan, Fiorinda, duchess of Urbin, the ward of Cozimo, and she was the one that his counsellors desired him to wed. Kindly, but sadly, he always waived aside their counsel, telling them, that the lovely Fiorinda should have a more fitting mate, and that as regarded the welfare of the state, his princely care would provide one worthy to succeed him.

This “worthy successor,” was his nephew Giovanni, his sister’s son, an orphan, dependent on his bounty. This youth he loved for his dear sister’s sake, and he spared no pains or trouble to render him worthy of his future high position. The more to further this, Cozimo placed Giovanni under the sole charge of a noble, and highly educated Florentine gentleman, Carolo Charomonte by name, who lived retired on an estate five hours distance from Florence. This gentleman discharged, to the utmost of his power, the duty the duke committed to him, and by means of his rare experience, using great care, he trained the young Giovanni up in all those arts, peculiar and proper to future greatness; therefore it was no wonder, but rather a necessity, that when this young prince had grown to be a man, he should make good the princely education he had derived from his accomplished tutor.

His uncle had studiously kept him away from court, during the perilous season of youth; but as the young Giovanni approached manhood, he gave such great promise of ability, that Cozimo could no longer withstand his tender desire for his company. Report filled the duke’s ears with stories of his nephew, which, if true, would have made him a miracle—a wonder in arts and arms; and in order to test the verity of this fine account, he sent his secretary, Contarino, to summon Giovanni to his presence.

This secretary came to Charamonte’s house, bearing compliments, and courtly thanks, and promises of munificent reward, from the duke. These the noble Charamonte received with dignified, courteous gratefulness; and although it was a sweet thought to him, that nature had so well aided him in his great duty as to enable him to return to his royal master a phœnix of grace and goodness, in the person of his nephew, this very yielding up of his charge, filled his breast with sadness. The young Giovanni had a disposition so gentle and sweet by nature, that it won on all appointed to attend him, insomuch that it made them rivals, even in the coarsest office, to get precedency to do him service; no wonder then, that his guardian, who had always found him obedient, loving, and reverential as a son, should have unconsciously permitted his affections to twine around him with a parent’s fondness. Nor did Giovanni receive his uncle’s summons with pleasure; as he read the duke’s letter the frequent changes of his countenance, manifested how strongly his unwillingness contended with his duty.

He loved his guardian, regarded him with as much respect and service as would have been due to the one who gave him life; but still more fondly did he love the good Charamonte’s incomparable daughter—the fair Lidia. She had been his companion from childhood; the partner of his studies and his pleasures. The commands of his uncle revealed to him in an instant the nature of his regard for her; but, at the same time, he felt the misery and hopelessness of such a love. His high station he felt would be a barrier to honorable love, and this thought deepened tenfold his anguish. In sweet, tender words he bewailed his sad fate, when he bade farewell to her, describing, in touching language, their future lot had he been born in a more humble state.

“Ah! Lidia,” he exclaimed, “then I might have seen and liked with mine own eyes, and not as now, with others. I might still continue my delights with you, that are alone, in my esteem, the abstract of society. We might walk in solitary groves, or in choice gardens, and in the variety of curious flowers, contemplate nature’s workmanship and wonders; then for change, near to the murmur of some bubbling fountain, I might hear you sing, and from the well tuned accents of your tongue, in my imagination, conceive the melody of Heaven’s harmony; then with chaste discourse we would return imp feathers to the broken wing of time. But all this I must part from—I might after continued innocence of love and service have been your husband—”

Here Lidia checked him, and reminded him that she was, and ever would be his servant; that it was far from her, even in a thought, to cherish such saucy hopes as these. Had she been heir to all the globes and sceptres, that mankind bows to, then, at her best, she might have deserved him; but now, in her humble state, she could only wish that he might find a partner—a princess equal to him, who would make it the study of her life, with all the obedience of a wife, to please him. For her own part, she would be content to live and be their humblest handmaid. So humble and childlike doth love show itself in a pure, gentle nature.

In this sweet sorrowful manner they parted from each other, and Giovanni hastened to do his uncle’s bidding; but first he embraced his good old guardian, saying, farewell, and assured him that should he ever reach his high destination their fortunes should be shared—then joining the secretary, he repaired to the Florentine court.

Duke Cozimo had a favorite, Lodovico Sanazarro by name, and he loved him so dearly that he used to say Sanazarro’s merits were so great that should he divide his dukedom with him, he would still continue his debtor. Princes’ favorites are apt to be undeserving men, notwithstanding they may be set off with all the trim of greatness, state, and power; for princes are men, not gods, and though they can give wealth and titles, they cannot give virtues, that is out of their power. But Duke Cozimo had proved the correctness of his judgment in the choice of his friend. Sanazarro’s nature was like pure, tried gold, and any stamp of grace the duke was pleased to give him, to make him current to the world, did but add honor to the royal bestower. Even the courtiers felt no envy against him, for he was no lazy drone, but an industrious bee. He fought the enemies of the state, and displayed great valor; then, after returning crowned with conquest, he labored in the service of his royal master, sharing in the cares and burthen of the government.

Duke Cozimo’s secret design was to wed this favorite with his wealthy ward, Fiorinda. This noble princess was not averse to this plan, for Lodovico being a handsome and brave gentleman, had quite won her heart and she loved to dwell on his exploits in the field, and abilities displayed in the council. Sanazarro, however, was very modest, and never dared to lift his thoughts so high as to woo so rich and noble a dame as the Princess Fiorinda.

Encouraged by her guardian, Fiorinda endeavored by courteous, but delicate advances, to remove this diffidence. She always received him with distinction, and took occasion repeatedly to send him gifts, which he received with the reverent gratefulness of a subject; expressing more ceremony in his humble thanks, than feeling of the favor—appearing almost willfully ignorant, and blind to the tender feeling which prompted these courteous condescensions. But true love is patient, and forbearing, and as Sanazarro displayed no love for any other lady, she used to comfort herself with the thought, that it was the light of her high estate that made him blind, and taxed her woman’s wit for means to lessen the difference between them. The frequent dangers that he was exposed to, however, in the service of the state, made her unhappy, and after the young Prince Giovanni came to court, she took occasion to interest him in Sanazarro’s favor, begging that he would be suitor to the duke not to expose this brave, noble gentleman to so much peril, but rather to command him, after his great labors, to take rest.

Prince Giovanni received this request with delight, for he also had a boon to ask of the duchess. So great was his love for the fair Lidia Charomonte, that he could no longer bear the separation from her, and after describing her with a lover’s colors to the princess, he begged she would take occasion to ask permission of the duke, to add this matchless virgin to her train of ladies. She promised to effect his desire, right quickly; and they parted from each other with bright hopes.

Soon after Giovanni’s return to court, the secretary who had brought him, while reporting to the duke an account of his journey, gave an enthusiastic description of Charomonte’s daughter, and in doing this, implied that the prince loved her. Straightway, but quietly, the kind duke conceived the design of securing also his dearly loved nephew’s happiness, but fearing that this object of his love might not be worthy of so high a fortune, he resolved to send his trusty favorite, Sanazarro, to Charomonte’s house, to see this paragon of beauty and virtue.

This he did without acquainting Sanazarro with his reasons, and the favorite fulfilled his master’s orders, thinking the duke wished to contract a marriage with this humble maid. But after seeing the fair Lidia he was so struck with her beauty, modesty, and wit, that he forgot his duty to his master and his honor. The recollection of past favors from the duke, even the beautiful, kind, forbearing Duchess Fiorinda, seemed as nothing to him, under the influence of this wild infatuation. He returned to court, resolved to find some means of blinding the duke, and turning him aside from pursuit of the fair Lidia. The secretary he knew he could silence, and the Prince Giovanni, the only one who could disclose his falsehood, he hoped to quiet, by telling him of the duke’s purpose of marriage, which would of course endanger his prospect of succeeding to the dukedom.

How weak and wicked are the best of men when exposed to some trials. Here was this loyal, noble, honorable gentleman, who had withstood the weakening effects of princes’ favor, yielding truth and allegiance at a moment when he should have been most strong—at a moment when he felt most confidence. He forgot the honors and glories by Cozimo’s grace conferred upon him; he deceived his trust and made shipwreck of his loyalty. Did he not deserve ruin?

Prince Giovanni received the news of his uncle’s projected marriage with indifference, answering most nobly, that he had no right, because he had received benefits from his uncle’s hands, to prescribe laws for his pleasure. But when he heard who his uncle purposed to wed, then his own love raised the standard of rebellion in his heart, and he willingly united with the false Sanazarro in decrying the charms of his loved mistress. Both singly and together they spoke disparagingly of this beautiful lady, and Cozimo believed them, although it caused him some surprise, but, as he said, he had never found them false.

But falsehood in weaving its net, always forgets to leave a loop-hole for its own escape. Too late Giovanni remembered the favor he had asked of the Duchess Fiorinda, and he hastened to request her to be silent in the matter. But while he was seeking her fruitlessly, she was already with the duke moving him, with all a woman’s eloquence, to command the presence of Charomonte’s fair daughter at the court, saying, that his nephew had given her such an abstract of perfection in his description of this maiden, that she did not wish to employ her as a servant, but to be by her instructed, and use her as a dear companion.

Duke Cozimo listened with amazement, and then, almost doubting his senses, made the princess repeat all that Giovanni had told her. This she did, using his very words: that she possessed all that could be wished for in a virgin. That she had rare beauty, her discourse was ravishing, she had quickness of apprehension, with choice manners and learning too, not usual with women.

This account was so unlike the report given by Giovanni and Sanazarro to him, that the duke saw with anger he had been deceived. This wounded him deeply, for he could not bear the thought of insincerity and falsehood in his nephew and bosom friend. He felt that he had been trifled with, and resolved to examine into the matter himself, then, if he found they had played him false, he would punish them with rigor. But he smothered his wrath, meaning to act quietly without their knowledge. He told the duchess her suit was granted; that the fair Lidia should come to her; but in return he would ask her to go with him the following morning on a short journey to the country. As he made this request, Giovanni and Sanazarro entered just in time to hear it. The duke greeted them coldly and left them. Joyfully the duchess hastened to communicate to Prince Giovanni her success. He dissembled his confusion awkwardly, and essayed to thank her for her kindness. She courteously received his thanks, and then with sweet condescension greeted Sanazarro, begging him to accept of a diamond from her, and wear it for her sake. Saying this, she bade them both adieu, and hastened to be in readiness for the duke’s journey.

The young prince and Sanazarro gazed at each other in consternation. Something must be done, however, and that right quickly, for they both felt certain that it was the duke’s intention to see Lidia with his own eyes, and that the journey of the following day was to Charomonte’s house. Hastily Giovanni decided upon sending his serving man that night with a letter to Lidia. In this letter he told her that the duke, his uncle, had heard of her, and her beauty, and was about to seek her he feared, with unlawful love. “If he see you, as you are, fair Lidia,” he concluded, “my hoped-for happiness will be changed into an everlasting night. Let your goodness find some means to prevent my uncle seeing you, and thus you will save two lives, your own and the honorer of your virtues, Giovanni.”

Giovanni’s messenger found the young Lidia in the midst of her father’s household, who with the kind, old Charomonte, were devising all manner of merry-makings, in order to divert the sadness which had hung over her since the departure of the young prince. She received the letter with joy, and retired to read it in secret, that no one might witness her emotion. So soon as she read his request, the very means of accomplishing it flashed quickly into her mind. As the duke had never seen her, she resolved upon presenting to him another in her place. Her maid, Petronilla, was the person decided upon. This girl was ill-favored, coarse and rude. The only difficulty she had to surmount, would be her father’s opposition, but she thought she would contrive with the servants’ aid, to have Petronilla presented to the duke when her father was not present. This difficulty the duke unconsciously relieved her from, for he came to Charomonte’s mansion in anger; and so soon as he arrived he dismissed his train, desiring to see Charomonte alone. Then he upbraided him with treason—for he suspected the old man of dishonor. He feared that Giovanni had become entangled with this Lidia, and not knowing Sanazarro’s suspicions, he attributed Giovanni’s double dealings, to a dishonorable illicit connection with this girl, connived at by her father.

Poor old Charomonte listened to his royal master’s reproaches with angry amazement. So soon as the duke had ended, he replied with words that proved how his loyalty and outraged feelings contended for mastery. In speaking of his daughter, the light of his eyes, the comfort of his feeble age, he described her so lovingly and tenderly that the duke commanded she should be shown to him.

“But,” said he, “you shall not prepare her to answer these charges. We will see her immediately, and to prevent all intercourse, we do confine thee close prisoner to thy chamber, till all doubts are cleared.”

Lidia was summoned, and in her place came Petronilla, escorted by Giovanni and Sanazarro, followed by the servants, bearing a sumptuous banquet. At the sight of her coarse appearance the duke felt that the manners of her mind must be transcendent to defend so rough an outside. She received him boisterously, and at the banquet, behaved rudely and indelicately, and drank so freely of the wine, that she had to be carried away from the duke’s presence. The imposture, however, was so gross, that the duke began to suspect some cunning deceit or trick had been played upon him; but he dissembled this suspicion, and sent out Giovanni and Sanazarro with his train, saying he would soon join them; that he wished first to see the Signor Charomonte in private, that he might, with a few kind words of comfort, take leave of the poor old man.

It appeared to him unlikely that both Charomonte and Contarino, his old secretary, could be so blinded. “It may be,” he said to himself, “that the daughter, for some ends unknown, has personated this rude behaviour, which seems so ridiculous and impossible. Whatever be the riddle, however, I will resolve it, if possible.”

Charomonte, on being summoned, came to him; but when he heard the duke’s pitying description of the pretended Lidia, he instantly went to his daughter’s chamber, where she was feigning illness, and forced her into the presence of Cozimo. The beautiful Lidia trembling, and in tears, knelt before him and besought his mercy.

“Ah,” exclaimed the duke, “this is the peerless form I expected to see;” then turning to Charomonte, he commanded that Sanazarro and his nephew, Giovanni, should straightway be imprisoned in separate chambers, guarded, until he should pronounce sentence against them as traitors.

In tender, touching language, Lidia pleaded for the prince, and asked that whatever punishment he deserved, to inflict it on her, as she was the sad cause of his offence.

“I know,” she said, “that the prince is so far above me that my wishes even cannot reach him, and to restore him to your wonted grace and favor, I’ll abjure his sight forever, and betake myself to a religious life, where, in my prayers, I may remember him, but no man will I ever see but my ghostly father. Be not, O sire, like the eagle that in her angry mood destroys her hopeful young for suffering a wren to perch too near them.”

Cozimo listened with admiration, and raising her tenderly put her suit off with courteous compliments, telling her that if she would cheer her drooping spirits, bring back the bloom of health to her pale cheek, and let him see the diamond of her beauty in its perfect lustre, there could be no crime that he would not look with eyes of mercy upon if she advocated it.

Already in his mind had he thought of a fitting punishment for his nephew. He resolved to make them all believe that he intended himself to wed the fair Lidia, and acted accordingly.

Poor Sanazarro, in the solitude of his prison, awakened too late to a sense of his wicked, disloyal treachery. He remembered the duke’s kindness and love, in making him almost his second self. The influence of Lidia’s charms faded away, and he recalled the loving favors he had received so carelessly from the beautiful Duchess Fiorinda. Now, he stood without friends, and no one dared or even cared to make intercession to the duke for him. As he thought of the Duchess Fiorinda’s love and past kindness, he resolved to appeal to her, and sent a message to her, begging her mediation in his favor, although he acknowledged himself most unworthy.

But true love forgetteth and forgiveth all injuries, and so soon as the lovely Fiorinda heard his sad plight, she repaired to the duke and entreated of him to be merciful and gracious to his poor servant, Sanazarro. Cozimo reminded her of his infidelity to him, his kind master; and then, to move her still more to anger, he recalled how coldly Sanazarro had always received her courtesies, and how easily he had yielded to the charms of another, and that other beneath her in rank.

The poor lady for a moment struggled with her pride, which whispered to her that, to endure a rival, and one also who was an inferior, betokened poverty of spirit, but her noble heart obtained the mastery, and she replied,

“True love must not know degrees or distances. Lidia may be as far above me in her form as she is in her birth beneath me; and what I liked in Sanazarro he may have loved in her. Vouchsafe to hear his defense.”

The duke consented, and said that both Sanazarro and the young prince should have a speedy trial, in which he would not only be judge, but accuser; and then expressed himself in such courteous, gallant words about the fair Lidia, that Charomonte and the courtiers stared in amazement. They could scarcely credit what he wished to make them believe—that he, the faithful, mourning widower, who had remained constant so many years, purposed a second marriage with this young maiden, so unfit for him in station and age.

The trial commenced, and the prisoners, almost hopeless of mercy, presented themselves, with their lovely advocates, the duchess and Lidia, before the duke. Cozimo, at the sight of Lidia, professed to forget every thing in the rapture her beauty caused him; and after exhausting love’s sweet language in describing her charms, he turned, with looks of rage, to the prince and Sanazarro, and told them they knelt too late for mercy. But Lidia and the duchess reminded him he had promised a gracious hearing to his prisoners, before passing sentence.

Duke Cozimo descended from the chair of state, and placing the two ladies in his seat, told them they should be his deputies; but they must listen to his accusation which would justify the sentence he was about to pronounce on these traitorous heads. First, he reminded Sanazarro of his cold indifference to Fiorinda’s condescending love, and his unfaithfulness to her; but the duchess interrupted him, and told him that charge was naught; she had already heard the count’s confession, and had freely pardoned him.

The duke courteously bowed, but continued and upbraided Sanazarro with his treachery to him, his indulgent master. Then he turned to Giovanni and reminded him of how careful of his interests he had always been; how he had remained unwedded, to secure to a thankless nephew a throne. “We made you both,” continued the duke, “the keys that opened our heart’s secrets, and what you spoke we believed as oracles. But you, in recompense of this, to us, who gave you all, to whom you owed your being, with treacherous lies endeavored to conceal this peerless jewel from our knowledge. Look on her,” he said, pointing to the blushing Lidia, “is that a beauty fit for any subject? Can any tire become that forehead but a diadem? Even should we grant pardon for your falsehood to us, your treachery to her, in seeking to deprive her of that greatness she was born to, can ne’er find pardon.”

As the duke finished, the ladies quickly descended from the chair of state, and kneeling, with the prince and Count Sanazarro before him, besought his mercy, which Charomonte reminded him, was more becoming in a prince than wreaths of conquest. The courtiers and old councillors united their entreaties, but the duke remained inflexible. Turning to Charomonte, he said,

“You, Carolo, remember with what impatiency of grief we bore our Duchess Clarinda’s death, and how we vowed—not hoping to see her equal—never to make a second choice. We did not know that nature had framed one that did almost excel her, and with oaths, mixed with tears, we swore our eyes should never again be tempted. Charomonte, thou heardest us sware—are those vows, thinkest thou, registered against us in heaven?”

Charomonte told him that if he were to wed a woman who possessed all woman’s beauties and virtues united, he had already sworn so deeply, that the weight of his perjury would sink him.

“This is strong truth, Carolo,” replied the duke, “but yet it does not free them from treason.”

“But,” answered the good old Charomonte, who began to suspect the duke’s design, “the prince, your nephew, was so earnest to have you keep your vows to heaven, that he vouchsafed to love my daughter.”

The duke turned to Lidia, as if for assurance of this, who blushingly replied, “He told me so, indeed, sire.”

“And the count has averred as much to me,” said the Duchess Fiorinda, with a playful air and a merry laugh, for she saw by the duke’s manner that he had only been feigning this stern severity as a punishment to the young men.

“Ah,” said Duke Cozimo, smiling, “you all conspire to force our mercy from us.”

Then he placed the gentle, lovely Lidia’s hand in Giovanni’s, and as he pronounced the pardon of the prince and count, he told them they must merit their forgiveness by service and love to their mistresses, the duchess and the beautiful Lidia.

Thus ends this story, courteous reader, and

WRITTEN AT NIGHT IN CAVE HILL CEMETERY.

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BY GEO. D. PRENTICE.

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BY WILLIAM P. MULCHINOCK.

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Air—“Some love to roam o’er the dark sea-foam.”

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BY MRS. CAROLINE H. BUTLER.

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I have been induced to a brief series of heart-histories by a remark of Longfellow, in Kavanagh. In speaking of the ever sanguine yet irresolute schoolmaster, who was “forced to teach grammar when he would fain have written poems,” he says, “Mr. Churchill never knew that while he was exploring the Past for records of obscure and unknown martyrs, in his own village, ——, the romance he was longing to find and record, had really occurred in his neighborhood, among his own friends.” Again, Emerson says, “Every roof is agreeable to the eye until it is lifted, and then we find tragedy, and moaning women, and hard-eyed husbands, and deluges of lethe.”

There is truth in this. Beneath every roof-tree some romance is at work—some heart-history compiling. The evening lights twinkle from cottages sleeping peacefully upon the hill-sides and valleys—music and mirth break on the air from brilliantly illuminated dwellings—then the night wears on—the cottage-lights no longer gleam—silence wraps the abode of wealth—and from out the majesty of the heavens encircling all, the gentle moon and bright, flashing stars look down alike on sheltered cot or marble dome. Yet, “lift the roof,” lay bare the heart which pulsates in every bosom, and we shall find each has its own tale of romance woven from life’s mingled threads of grief, of love, of happiness—perhaps of shame.

Let me, then, from out the “simple annals” of a quiet country town, sketch, with a faithful pen, these heart-histories—these romances from real life.

The little village to which they may be traced, I must forbear to name. That it does not exist merely in the imagination, let it suffice the incredulous reader. There are bright, dancing rills spangling its broad meadows—the “sweet south wind” plays over innumerable fields of billowy grain, and the tinkle of the cow-bell is heard within the sweet-scented pine forests which crown the summit of each rising hill. The roots, some of which I am about to “lift,” cover no costly edifices. They are for the most part humble and unpretending, yet so embosomed among fruit and forest-trees as to render each cottage of itself a coup d’œil of beauty. There are, to be sure, two or three exceptions; the large, three-story brick house of Judge Porter, for instance, with its long, winding avenues, and, as Mrs. Malaprop would say, its “statutes” placed in awful frigidity about the grounds, frightening the children of the neighborhood as so many sheeted ghosts. The beautiful villa, too, of Dr. Bartine, (these names are, of course, fictitious,) which stands on a gentle eminence somewhat remote from the village. It was built by a gentleman of wealth and cultivated taste, who lived only to see it completed. It was then knocked down under the hammer of Tom Pepper, the village auctioneer, to the highest bidder, a worthy farmer, with as many children as barn-door fowl. For six months, droning spinning-wheels, and rattling looms, made music in the classic rooms—squashes and red-peppers hung on the frescoed walls, while the conservatory, with its marble fount, served admirably for the dairy of the notable Mrs. Grimes—pots of butter, and round, yellow cheeses, taking the place of rhododendrons and fragrant jessamines. Fortunately for the preservation of this tasteful dwelling, at the end of six months, it was purchased by young Doctor Bartine, who, after putting it in complete repair, and removing the unseemly pig-stye and other excrescences from the face of the beautiful lawn, brought hither his pretty young bride. There is the parsonage sequestered from the street by elms a century old; and the venerable church, from whose well-worn portals a narrow foot-path conducts to that peaceful spot where, “when life’s fitful fever ended,” the villagers come one by one and lie down to their dreamless rest. There all is hushed. The wind, as it softly sweeps the pliant willow, seems to whisper a requiem for the peaceful dead; a few birds flit noiselessly about, but no song of gladness trills from their little throats, their notes are low and plaintive, as if they mourned for the hand which once fed them, but will never feed them more.

Such are the prominent local features of the little village, into whose quiet precincts I have wandered. And there are many such primitive towns nestling among our hills and valleys, some even less pretending; and there are lone cottages scattered by the road-side, and huts of squalid poverty, and the thrifty homestead of the farmer, all of which have their heart-histories.

Love’s autocrasy must form the theme of my first romance from the real; and, indeed, if the truth was known, there are but few heart-histories in whose compilation that troublesome little sprite has not more or less interfered.

Lucy Leyton, with that bright, roguish eye of hers, and her sunny smile shall attest the truth of my words.

The proprietor of the great Leyton farm which covers more than a hundred acres of the richest land in New England, is a true specimen of her stalwort sons, her independent, industrious farmers—a noble race, uniting integrity, sound sense, and a high standard of moral worth, under manners the most plain and unpretending—keenly sensitive for the public weal, hospitable, kind, and thrifty—not over generous, not over prodigal of their means, yet far removed from that selfish avarice which would refuse a helping hand to those who would rise in the world if they had the means to start with, (and how many such there are,) or close their doors upon the weary wayfarer, vagrant though he might be. Of this class is Andrew Leyton.

A few words upon the domestic economy of Leyton farm. Mr. Leyton is a widower, and my little heroine, Lucy, his only child. People wondered, as people always will, why such a young-looking, hale, hearty man as Andrew Leyton, did not take a second wife; but when asked about it, he always had two answers ready—first, he was too much hurried about his farm-work to spend time in courting and marrying; second, old Dinah, who had lived with his father before him, though she was old, was a first-rate manager; and Heaven forbid he should unloose her tongue by talking about bringing a second Mrs. Leyton into the house. And so year after year old Dinah stood her ground, holding undisputed sway in kitchen and hall, doing pretty much as she pleased with her master, looking, in fact, upon the strong, athletic, six-foot Andrew Leyton as a mere child, “the boy,” as she termed him, when speaking to her cronies; and as for Lucy, she would have held her in leading-strings to this day probably, if Mr. Leyton had not sent her from home to acquire more advantages of education than the village-school could offer.

Lucy was a bright, darling little child, saying and doing a thousand witty things; and Mr. Leyton made up his mind that she was a perfect prodigy even at four years old—parents are pretty apt to imagine just such things—so he determined, from the time she could first lisp her letters, that she should have the very best education his means would afford; and when in process of time she came to know more than the schoolmaster, (in farmer Leyton’s opinion,) he resolved to part with his darling for a little while, that she might have the benefit of a fashionable boarding-school. In selecting the establishment of Mrs. Tracy, situated some thirty miles from Leyton farm, he proved himself more fortunate than many who send forth their children to gather “apples of wisdom,” but who return with thistles.

At the end of two years Lucy was pronounced “finished,” and returned home. If Mr. Leyton had thought her a prodigy at four years old, what must he have considered her at seventeen, for she had contrived to store away a goodly amount of knowledge in her little head, even if she was at times a little flighty. Yes, and notwithstanding she must have been so hurried at Mrs. Tracy’s with her algebra, and her French, and her philosophy, and her history, she had somehow managed to commence a little heart-history of her own; but then she did not let any one read it, not she. Farmer Leyton himself never knew a word about this unbargained for accomplishment.

One day when Lucy had been at home about a week, Mr. Leyton had occasion to go down into the village with a load of his renowned potatoes for Judge Porter.

“Dear father, will you please see if there is not a letter in the post-office for me?” cried Lucy, running out to the gate.

“Ha! ha!—a letter for you! that’s a new idea! Yes, but come and kiss me.”

And poising one little foot upon the hub of the cart-wheel, Lucy sprang lightly to the side of her father, gave him a hearty smack upon each sunburned cheek, and then alighted again like a bird upon the soft, green turf.

Now the farmer was no great scribe. Unless to announce a marriage or a death, it was a rare thing for him either to indite or receive a letter. The post-office revenue of Uncle Sam was but little benefitted by Andrew Leyton. He was somewhat pleased, therefore, that his Lu should expect a letter; so, after unloading, he brought his team to a stand-still in front of the tavern, which, beside offering entertainment for man and beast, served also for the post-office. Sure enough, there was a letter—a very thick one too—for “Miss Lucy Leyton,” directed in an elegant flowing hand—a gentleman’s hand.

“Hum!—What does this mean!” thought Farmer Leyton, turning the letter over and over, and looking at the seal,—“L’Amour,” “Fidelité.”

Lucy was watching for his return; and as soon as she saw the well-known team rise the hill, she flew swiftly along the road to meet it. Her father held up the letter. Ah! what a bright, happy face was hers, as she caught it from his hand; and seating herself under a shady tree by the road-side, she eagerly tore off the envelope, and pressed the insensible chirography to her lips.

“Hum!—what does this mean!” again thought the farmer, eyeing Lucy keenly. “Gee-haw, Darby—Gee-up, Dick!” he cried, sweeping his cart-whip above the sleek hides of his oxen, yet all the time noting uneasily the bright blush, the happy smile of Lucy, all absorbed as she was in the contents of her letter.

In less than a week there came another.

“Hum!” said Mr. Leyton, putting it in his pocket, “I must see what this means.”

He went home, foddered the cattle, and then walked into the house.

“Come here Lu, sit down by me.”

Lucy laid aside her work, and drawing a low foot-stool to the side of her father, folded her dimpled hands upon his knees, and looked up smiling into his face.

“Well, Lu, you had a nice time, didn’t you, at Mrs. Tracy’s?” said Mr. Leyton, smoothing back the long, golden curls from her white upturned brow.

“Indeed I did, my dear father. I am sure, although I was so anxious to see you, I was sorry to come away.”

“Hum! Mrs. Tracy used to keep you pretty strict, I suppose—never let you go out, did she?”

“O yes, we walked every day—an hour in the morning, and an hour after school at night; it was very pleasant, sometimes Mrs. Tracy would go with us, and sometimes—O, it was so pleasant!” and Lucy heaved a sigh as she concluded.

“I take it for granted you never saw any boys there, Lu, did you?”

Lucy blushed, and wondered what in the world possessed her father to talk so; at last she answered, very demurely:

“Why, father, it was a school for girls you know; it would have been very strange, I am sure, to have seen a set of rude boys in our pleasant school-room.”

“That is not what I mean, you little puss you—did any young men ever visit at Mrs. Tracy’s?”

“Mercy, no, Mrs. Tracy would not even let Edward invite—”

“Edward—who is Edward?”

“Mrs. Tracy’s nephew, father,” replied Lucy, stooping to tie her little slipper, which just at that particular moment it seemed necessary for her to attend to.

“Hum—and I suppose Edward walked with you, didn’t he?” said Mr. Leyton.

“Yes, father, when Mrs. Tracy could not go.”

“I thought so. Who is he? What is he? What is his name—this Edward?”

Poor Lucy, how she tried not to blush, and yet what a glow instantly suffused the tell-tale countenance she averted from the scrutinizing glance of her father.

“His name is Bartine—Edward Bartine—he is a very fine young man, father—every body loves him.”

“Hum!”

“All the girls loved him, just like a brother.”

“And you loved him just like a brother, I suppose.”

“Sir.”

“Hum—well go on—what was this very fine young man doing at a young ladies’ boarding-school?”

“He only came up from New Haven to pass a few months with Mrs. Tracy, and to pursue his studies with Dr. Heber—he is going back to college very soon, I suppose.”

“Going back to college! Ah, I understand, I understand—some wild scapegoat, I’ll be bound, suspended for misdemeanor—never will be worth a straw—never will be good for any thing, not he—wasting the money which his father has toiled hard to earn, I’ll warrant you!”

“No, indeed, father, Edward Bartine is no such person, indeed he is not!” eagerly interposed Lucy.

“How do you know? I tell you he is. See here Lu—who is this from?” and putting his hand in his ample coat-pocket Mr. Leyton drew forth the letter, holding it up, however, at arm’s length.

“O, dear, dear father, please give it to me, please do—that’s a dear father!” cried Lucy, springing up, her face radiant with joy, and extending her hand for the precious missive.

“Not so fast, little Miss Lucy Leyton—sit down again—there is your letter—now open it and read it to me,” said Mr. Leyton, passing his arm around her waist to prevent her flight.

“O, father, please let me go—indeed I cannot read it to you!” urged Lucy, the tears trembling like dew-drops on her long fringed eye-lids.

“Well, then, I’ll read it myself—it must be very fine; I should like to read a letter from such a nice young man,” said Mr. Leyton, attempting to take it.

“Father, please don’t, it is only about—about—”

“Never mind, I will see what it is about. Lucy, you must either give me the letter or read me the contents—I must know them!” and this time Mr. Leyton spoke sternly.

The poor girl dared not disobey. With a trembling hand she broke the seal, and, in a voice scarcely audible, read:

“My dearest, sweet Lucy.”

“Hum—puppy! go on.”

“My dearest, sweet Lucy—To-morrow—to-morrow I leave for—for—” Lucy could proceed no further, but covered with blushes hid her face in her father’s bosom.

“Well, well Lu, don’t cry; I don’t want to hear any more of such silly stuff. There give me the letter, it will serve nicely to light my pipe,” said Mr. Leyton, twisting it in his fingers.

“Father, wont you let me have the letter—wont you, father?” pleaded Lucy.

“No, Lucy. Now go and get pen, ink, and paper; this must be answered.”

Quite pale and frightened, Lucy brought her little desk and placed it on the table.

“Are you ready?” said Mr. Leyton, “well then, begin, Mr. Edward—what’s his name—Bartine—”

“Yes, sir.”

“You are a base designing young man—”

“Must I say so, father? indeed, he is no such thing!” interrupted Lucy, looking up all in tears.

“I say he is—go on—‘you are a base designing young man, so, although I am but a farmer’s daughter, never presume to address another letter to me.’ Have you wrote that—very well, now add, ‘My father desires his compliments, and would like to try the strength of his new raw-hide upon your shoulders.’”

Lucy sobbed aloud.

“Now, say, ‘Respectfully, very, Lucy Leyton.’”

Mr. Leyton took up the blotted page, read it, sealed and directed it, and put it in his pocket. Then taking Lucy in his arms and kissing her, he said:

“My darling, I would not grieve you for the world; what I am doing is for your good, my child, though I know you think me very cruel, but you will thank me one of these days. There—now go to your chamber and lie down awhile; kiss me, dear Lu.”

Lucy pressed her lips to his with a loud sob, and then hastening to her little chamber, she bolted the door, and throwing herself upon the bed, gave way to her affliction—for the first time a tear had blotted her heart-history!

“What the mischief ails the girl I wonder? she don’t eat—she don’t sleep, and half the time there are tears in her pretty eyes; her rosy cheeks are all gone, and every now and then she sighs enough to break one’s heart! Hang me if I can stand it! she thinks I don’t see it—when I am by she tries to smile and sing as she used to—she thinks I haven’t any eyes—but I have. Confound that fellow—I wish I had kept her at home—well, well, poor Lu—something must be done, or else she’ll die!”

Thus soliloquized Andrew Leyton, a few weeks after the scene just related. Now, Mr. Leyton was neither a severe nor an obstinate man—there was never a more tender father, nor a kinder master. He was little connusant of the great world, it is true, but enough so to render him keenly apprehensive for his daughter. He knew there were unprincipled young men enough, who solely from vanity, and for self-gratulation would not scruple to win the affections of a young, artless girl like Lucy, and his jealous fears imputed the same unworthy motive to the professions of young Edward Bartine. Thus it was his love for his only child, amounting almost to idolatry, which had caused him to take the perhaps somewhat hasty step he had done—he was a father, and who can blame him? Yet it cut him to the heart when he saw how deeply poor Lucy suffered from his well meant kindness.

“Something must be done!” again exclaimed Mr. Leyton, slowly pacing to and fro the little porch, and watching, with a sad, perplexed countenance, the slight figure of Lucy strolling pensively through the garden, and at length the “something” took upon itself a shape which mightily pleased his fancy.

Mr. Leyton had one sister who, in his boyhood, had emigrated, together with almost every member of the Leyton family, to the far west. She had married there, but had been early left a widow, with one son. Andrew had several times offered her a home in his house; but the distance was great—new friends and associations had been formed to supplant earlier ties, and the widow, though grateful for her brother’s kindness, preferred the banks of the Ohio to the fertile vale of the Connecticut. Now, Mr. Leyton had no son, and a vague idea had now and then seized him to unite Lucy to his sister’s child. Thus the great Leyton farm would be continued in the family, when he was dead and gone. True, he had never seen him—but what of that—he was certain he must be a fine fellow, a good honest lad, for all the Leytons were so from the beginning.

“Yes, I will write this very night!” said Mr. Leyton, stopping suddenly in his walk, as this bright thought suggested itself. “I’ll just invite Reuben to come on and see the old homestead, where his grandfather, and his great grandfather lived and died, and then if he only takes a fancy to Lu, which of course he cannot fail of doing, I shall be happy as a lord—he will soon drive this college scape-grace from her mind!”

“Lu, how do you like your Cousin Reuben?” said Mr. Leyton, knocking the ashes from his third evening pipe.

Lucy looked up from her work and smiled faintly, as she replied:

“My dear father, you know I have never seen him.”

“True, true, neither have I, but I tell you what, Lu, I am going to write out to Reuben to come on and make us a visit, and bring his mother too, if she will; how should you like it?”

“Very much, indeed, I shall be delighted to see Aunt Richards, whom you have so often talked to me about.”

“And Cousin Reuben too?”

“Yes, of course I should.”

“Well, Lu, I hope you will like Reuben, for do you know I have quite set my heart upon having him for a son-in-law—what say you?” said Mr. Leyton, abruptly.

Lucy at once burst into tears, and went on to protest, in the most earnest manner, that she should never marry—she would not marry for the world, she could never love anybody—she wished her father would not talk so—she was very happy as she was—O, very happy, indeed!

However, Mr. Leyton wrote the letter, and it took him three good hours to do so. Then in the morning, as he was very busy, for it was haying time, he told Lucy he wished she would walk down into the village and put it in the post-office.

What could have put it into Lucy’s little head to do as she did, I am sure I don’t know. I will not pretend to exculpate such a piece of mischief, not I, I will only state facts.

Just think, now, of Lucy Leyton writing such a letter—but she did! And then she neatly folded it, and enclosing the one designed for Mr. Reuben Richards, with a glowing cheek, and palpitating bosom, she directed it to Mr. Edward Bartine, Yale College, New Haven, and putting on her bonnet and shawl, tripped fleetly to the office and deposited it.

“Ah, she’ll come round—all right yet!” said Mr. Leyton, a few days after, as he overheard Lucy caroling one of her lively songs.

In due time, allowing for the speed of steam-boats, rail-cars, and stages all the way from the Ohio, a young man, with a ponderous leather trunk, alighted at Mr. Leyton’s gate. It was after dinner, and the farmer was enjoying his afternoon pipe, while Lucy, sitting very quietly by his side, was reading the village news. But all of a sudden, as she saw the young man approaching, she sprung up in the strangest confusion and ran into the house. Mr. Leyton rose up, put down his pipe, and hastily advanced to meet the youth.

“This must be my dear nephew, Reuben!” he said, extending his hand; “I know the true Leyton look. I am glad to see you, my lad!”

“Thank you, Uncle Leyton, how are you—how is Lucy?” replied the stranger, warmly shaking hands.

“She is well, Reuben, and will be very glad to see you; come into the house—you must be weary after such a long journey. Lucy! Lucy! why where has she flown to? Lucy! O, here she comes. Well Lu, we have got him at last—this is your Cousin Reuben—give her a kiss—that’s right.”

Lucy turned very pale when she first cast her eyes upon her cousin, who, with very red hair and a somewhat limping gait, advanced to salute her, then a rosy blush, and an arch smile, but half suppressed, stole over her pretty face. But she blushed still deeper, and drew back timidly from the tender embrace her young relative would fain have bestowed upon her.

“My own, dear Lucy!” was softly whispered in her ear.

“So your mother wouldn’t venture with you,” said Mr. Leyton, “well, I am sorry, for it is many a long year since we met; I hope she is strong and healthy, Reuben.”

“Not very, she is greatly troubled with the rheumatism.”

“That’s bad. And how are all the rest of the folks—how is Uncle Bill, and Deacon Gracie?”

“Dead.”

“Bless me, dead! you don’t say your poor Uncle Bill is dead!” exclaimed Mr. Leyton, aghast at such news of an only brother.

“N—not exactly dead—half killed with the rheumatism, I mean, and the deacon, O, the deacon has gone to California.”

“What! Deacon Gracie gone to California—well that beats all! I’ll warrant old Mr. Stubbs is living!”

“Dead, a year ago.”

“Dead, is he? what killed him? I should like to know, for I thought him good for a hundred years.”

“Rheumatism, uncle.”

“Rheumatism again! what in the world do you live in such a climate for? Well, Reuben, how do you like your Cousin Lucy’s looks? I think she is some like your mother, who resembled the Darlings more than the Leytons.”

“I think Lucy is a decided Darling!” replied Cousin Reuben, with a mischievous glance at the fair object in question.

“But you look more like the Leytons, all but your hair; none of the Leytons ever had red hair!” continued the farmer, “and, excuse me, but I must say I could never abide it; however, I guess you will reconcile me to it. What makes you limp so, nephew, nothing serious I hope.”

“O, no, nothing but rheumatism, Uncle Andrew.”

“Good gracious, rheumatism again! Now make yourself at home, will you, for I must go and look after my men. Lucy take good care of your cousin, I will soon be back.”

“Don’t hurry, uncle, I am quite at home!” and as Mr. Leyton closed the door, Cousin Reuben sprung to the side of Lucy, and stealing his arm around her waist, imprinted a kiss upon her blushing cheek.

“I say, nephew, we must bathe your rheumatics in beef-brine,” said Mr. Leyton, re-opening the door. Then hastily closing it again, he snapped his fingers, exclaiming, “Ah, it will do! it will do! he is a fine young fellow, I see, only that confounded red hair—he got that from the Richards.”

A week and more passed on. Lucy and her cousin agreed wonderfully, and Mr. Leyton was in perfect ecstasy at the recovered bloom and spirits of his daughter.

“Ah, Lu,” said he one day, slyly pinching her cheek, “what do you think of Cousin Reuben now; a’nt he worth a dozen of your college fellows?” and Lucy protested she really liked Reuben just as well as she had ever done Mrs. Tracy’s nephew.

Cousin Reuben, who was now perfectly domesticated, made himself not only very agreeable, but useful to his Uncle Leyton in various ways, and the farmer regretted more and more every day that he had not known him before. Reuben was a geologist, and he explained to Mr. Leyton how some portions of his farm, which he had thought the most unproductive, might be made to yield good crops; he was an architect, and he drew the plan of the new house which Mr. Leyton designed to erect in the spring. He was a botanist, a geometrician, an astromer,

“Why, how in the world did you pick up so much learning out West? I should think you had been to college by the way you talk!” said Mr. Leyton, one evening, addressing his nephew, who had just been expounding some knotty point.

“Yes, uncle, and I have just taken my degree,” replied Reuben, looking at Lucy.

“You, the deuce you have. Why where did your mother raise the money to send you to college?”

“My education was provided for by my grandfather’s will.”

“It was, eh! well, I am glad of it, and so the Richards family were a good stock after all. I am sure I never dreamed you had been to college, though I thought from the first you knew considerable for your years.”

“Thank you, Uncle Andrew.”

“And what are you going to do now?”

“My dear uncle, I shall soon receive my diploma for the practice of medicine; then, if you will give me dear Lucy for a wife, I will buy that pretty cottage at the foot of the hill, and commence business.”

“You buy it! No, no, I am able to buy it myself, and give it to Lucy on her wedding-day. I am sorry you don’t like the farm better, for I had set my heart upon seeing you settled upon the old family estate, but no matter. Come here Lu, will you marry your Cousin Reuben? Ah, I see you will; here take her nephew she is yours—God bless you!”

Lucy burst into tears, and for a moment her lover also appeared much agitated. He then took Mr. Leyton’s hand:

“Then you really like me, uncle?”

“First rate, lad.”

“And you don’t know of any one else whom you would prefer for a son-in-law!”

“Always had my eye upon you, Reuben.”

“But suppose you have been imposed upon; suppose that I am not your nephew after all!”

“Ho, ho! imposed upon—not my nephew! don’t talk to me—imposed upon, pooh, don’t I know the Leyton look—all but the red hair—I wonder where you got that from!”

“I bought it of Frizeur and Frizette, French barbers, Broadway, New York, it is a capital wig, don’t you think so?” replied the young man, coolly taking it off, and handing it for the inspection of Mr. Leyton.

“Hey! why, what’s all this—who are you—what does this mean?” exclaimed Mr. Leyton, starting up in astonishment, wig in hand, and staring at the fine looking youth with dark-brown locks, who was now bending so tenderly over Lucy.

“Mr. Leyton, why should I hesitate to confess who I am,” was the answer, “since you have already assured me of your affection, and of your willingness to bestow upon me this dear hand. My name is Edward Bartine.”

“Bartine—Bartine—why, that is the same fellow—”

“That you was going to try your new raw-hide upon, my dear sir!”

“Hum, and if I had it here I would try it now!”

“O, no, you wouldn’t, father!” interposed Lucy.

“Grant me your patience a moment, Mr. Leyton,” resumed Edward, “with your prejudice against me, I was very certain you would never allow me to visit Lucy. You must believe me, when I assure you that the imposition I have practiced upon you has been most repugnant to me, and nothing but the hope of gaining your favor, under the guise of your nephew, could have tempted me to act the part I have.”

“My nephew! but how did you know any thing about my nephew? Lucy, did you—”

“Yes, sir.”

“Say, Mr. Leyton, will you forgive me, will you still confer upon me your dear Lucy, may I, as Edward Bartine, again receive the priceless gift you but now bestowed upon ‘Cousin Reuben?’”

“You have deceived me, young man,” replied Mr. Leyton, “although I acknowledge I was wrong to harbor such prejudice against a stranger. Would there was not so much depravity in the world as to warrant my suspicions—but so it is, and upright, noble-minded young men must sometimes suffer for the unprincipled libertinisms of those who best serve the devil by beguiling the purest and fairest of God’s creatures! But I forgive the deception. You were no less a stranger to me as Edward Bartine than as Reuben Richards, and I have learned to love you. Yes, you shall have Lucy, and the pretty white cottage to boot. Once more I give her to you, and again I say, God bless you and make you both happy, my dear children!”

In a few moments Lucy raised her head from her father’s shoulder, and looking archly in his face, said:

“Dear father, here is that letter for Cousin Reuben, shall we send it?”

“Ah, you little jade, now I understand! send it, yes, and we will have them all here to the wedding; if—the rheumatism will permit! ha, ha, what a lame concern you made of them, eh!”

“Yes, my dear sir, but the plot has not proved a lame one!” replied Edward, laughing.

Dr. Bartine and the charming Lucy, reside in the beautiful villa noticed in the commencement of this sketch, which, however, Edward insisted upon purchasing himself.

Mrs. Richards, and her son Reuben, accepted the invitation of Andrew Leyton, and now reside altogether at the farm. Reuben is a great favorite with his uncle, who, however, acknowledges that Edward pleases him best for a son-in-law. It is said Reuben will soon be married to a pretty girl in the neighbourhood, and will, without doubt, succeed to the Leyton farm.

ON SEEING HER PORTRAIT FOR GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

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BY J. R. FRY.

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EDITOR OF GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE

Geo. R. Graham

Engraved by W.G. Armstrong from a painting by T.B. Read

[WITH A PORTRAIT.]

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BY CHARLES J. PETERSON.

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When a man, left a friendless orphan in boyhood, overcomes every obstacle of fortune, and rises to wealth and station, we justly conclude that he is possessed of no common abilities. But when the same individual, beggared by unforeseen events, retains still the confidence of his fellow men, and finally conquers fate a second time, and resumes his lost position, we do not exaggerate if we call him an extraordinary man. Yet such, unless the partiality of friendship deceives us, is George R. Graham.

The father of Mr. Graham was a gentleman of education and fortune, resident in Philadelphia, where he was known, about thirty years ago, as an enterprising shipping merchant. At one period he was a partner of the late Robert Fleming, then carrying on an active trade between Charleston and Ireland. Subsequently he entered largely into commerce on his own account, but disastrous times approaching, he shared in the general ruin, and ultimately, not only his fortune, but his life sunk under the blow. He left two children, of whom the eldest, the subject of our memoir, was born on the 18th of January, 1813. The early death of the father materially affected the interests of the son. Mr. Graham had been designed for the bar, and all his studies were directed to that end; the preliminary arrangements had even been made for him in the office of the Hon. Charles Jared Ingersoll; but the reverses and death of the parent frustrated the scheme, and the young orphan, who had been born apparently to a life of comparative ease, was left penniless and almost friendless, to carve his way to distinction alone.

But, even at this early age, he did not despair. Of a sanguine temperament and determined will, he resolved to re-construct the shattered fortunes of his family. He had been placed, on his father’s death, and when only fifteen years of age, with his maternal uncle, Mr. George Rex, an opulent farmer of Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, after whom he had been named; and with this gentleman, and in the country he remained until he was nineteen. The time, however, was not lost. On the contrary, it was to this period of his life he is indebted for that robust constitution which afterward enabled him to endure the severe application to which he addressed himself. During these four years he omitted no opportunity to improve his mind. He read every thing that came in his way. But books, fortunately, were not so abundant then as now, so that what he read he digested, and thus acquired habits of correct thought, so rare among the hasty students of the day.

In 1832, Mr. Graham returned to the city, and commenced to learn the trade of a cabinet-maker. But he had already resolved that he would yet be a lawyer, as his father had intended; and accordingly, to effect this object, he now addressed himself with that untiring energy which has ever characterised him. His first object was to discipline his mind, to improve his tastes, and to enlarge his stores of knowledge. For this purpose he began a course of literary study, and, for three years, prosecuted it with undiminished ardor, exhibiting, during the entire period, a perseverance amid difficulties which entitles him to a high place among self-taught men. His trade requiring his attention for ten or twelve hours daily, he had but a short interval to spare for recreation and sleep, but having resolved to devote six hours out of the twenty-four to literary pursuits, he rigidly adhered to his plan, gaining the time, when necessary, by rising before dawn.

At the age of twenty-two he made the acquaintance of a son of the late Judge Armstrong, of Philadelphia, and by him was introduced to the judge, who at once arranged to receive him as a student. For the three years, during which he studied law, he continued laboring at the bench, devoting the early morning hours and the evening to Coke and Blackstone. By the regulations of the Pennsylvania courts, the last year of a student’s course has to be spent in the office of some practicing attorney; and this he was enabled to effect by rising at four o’clock in the morning, laboring until nine, then visiting the office, and often returning to the bench in the evening. The writer of this happened to be a student with the same preceptor at this period, and writes of facts to which he was an admiring eye-witness.

The natural bent of the mind, in all well-balanced natures, triumphs in the end over the plans of parents and the exigencies of circumstances alike. Under the influence of a commendable pride, Mr. Graham had resolved notwithstanding his early misfortunes, to fulfill his father’s wish, and become a member of the bar; but now, he discovered that his tastes led him toward a literary life. He accordingly began to contribute a series of papers to the Philadelphia press, which, at once attracted attention by the vigor of their thought, not less than the freshness of their style. He persisted, however, in his intention of entering the bar, and, in 1839, was admitted to practice.

His inclination for literature continuing instead of diminishing, he resolved to abandon the active pursuits of his profession, and embark in avocations more suitable to his tastes. Accordingly, in the same year he became editor of the Saturday Evening Post, a well-known weekly journal, at that time published by Samuel C. Atkinson. In the following year, he became joint proprietor as well as editor. He continued, in connection with his partners, to publish this journal for several years, but finally, in 1846, parted with his entire interest in it.

It is as a magazine editor and publisher, however, that Mr. Graham has made himself especially famous. In 1839, at the time he became editor of the Post, he purchased of Mr. Atkinson the Casket, a monthly magazine of respectable ability and circulation. This periodical he continued to publish, under its old name, until December, 1840, when he bought the list of the Gentleman’s Magazine, and united the two monthlies as Graham’s Magazine, issuing the first number in January, 1841. The success of this new enterprise was unprecedented. Having spared no expense to procure able writers and elegant embellishments, the result was that he produced a periodical of unexampled merit and beauty; and, at once, thousands were added to his list. A new spirit was infused into magazines. Before this period, the monthlies had been filled with second-hand English stories, or indifferently written original tales; while their poetry, except what was taken from well-known authors, was such as “both gods and men abhor.” The illustrations were few and indifferent.

The freshness, beauty, and ability of Graham’s Magazine at once placed it before all others in the popular favor, and though its rivals hastened to imitate the example it had set, it continued to maintain, and maintains to this day, the supremacy.

The success of Mr. Graham’s Magazine was such, that, by January, 1842, it had attained a circulation of more than thirty thousand. Meantime no expense was spared to increase its excellence, both literary and pictorial. Mr. Sartain, the celebrated engraver, was kept busily employed in furnishing mezzotints for it: and some of the engravings then executed by that artist, and by Smillie, Rawdon and Tucker, have certainly never been since surpassed. The most eminent authors in the United States were, at the same time, sought for its pages. At first, these writers were incredulous that any American magazine could afford them adequate remuneration; but the success which had already attended Mr. Graham’s improvements convinced him that the public would sustain him in his effort to raise the character of our periodical literature, and accordingly he persevered in his design. No sooner were Longfellow, Bryant, Cooper, and others of our leading authors, discovered to be permanent contributors to Graham’s Magazine, than thousands, who had heretofore looked with contempt on an American monthly, hastened with their subscriptions, to encourage the enterprising publisher. The benefit thus done to popular literature cannot be calculated. But it was such that it will be long, perhaps, before any one man will have it in his power to do again as much.

The demand of a large business, and the watchfulness necessary to keep the lead, left Mr. Graham but little time for literary composition. He had, however, increased his own reputation as a writer, of occasional articles contributed to his newspaper and magazine, but principally to the latter. Thoroughly read in Bolingbroke, Addison, Burke, and others of the classic authors of the language, his style was distinguished by a finish, yet an idiomatic force such as is rarely found among the careless writers of the day. A clear, sound thinker; with a fervid imagination; possessing a keen sense of the ridiculous; and having a great command over the resources of language, he always wrote to the point, in a racy, nervous style, mingling eloquence and satire by turns, and never, as hackneyed writers so often do, drowning the idea with “excess of words.” His choice of terms was singularly felicitous. He wrote the language as the translators of the Bible wrote it, with a large mixture of Saxon derivations, yet with purity. In invective, as in sarcasm, he was especially powerful. A series of editorial articles contributed to the newspaper under his management, and still remembered, are instances of the former: his letters to Jeremy Short, are examples of the latter. In a word, as a terse, and even eloquent writer, Mr. Graham holds a high rank. As a critic his judgment is always generous, but just.

In 1846, Mr. Graham purchased the North American, a daily newspaper of standing and influence in Philadelphia. He had no sooner embarked in this new enterprise than it exhibited proofs of his energy and tact: and, in a very short while, the ability with which the journal was conducted made it a name throughout the entire Union. In 1847, he still further extended the influence and reputation of his newspaper, by purchasing, in connection with his partners, the United States Gazette, and consolidating it with the North American. But he had now attained, at least for awhile, the summit of his successes. Having been induced to engage in certain stock speculations, he entered into them with all the ardor of his character, and though for a time successful, eventually impaired his fortune to such a degree that he was forced to part temporarily with the Magazine and North American. This misfortune happened in July, 1848. A man of his energy, however, could not be kept down: fortune might depart, but failed to overcome him. He continued to edit his Magazine, even after parting with the proprietorship of it, until March, 1850, when circumstances having induced the retirement of Samuel D. Patterson, he succeeded in regaining his interest in his favorite periodical; and from that period has added the duties of publisher to those of editor. This restoration to his old position is the result of indomitable energy, which he possesses in a degree that is as rare as it is praiseworthy. With men of his stamp nothing is impossible.

As a man Mr. Graham inspires general affection. The warmth of his heart, and the frankness of his manners make for him friends wherever he goes. Generous to a fault, forgetful of injuries, conciliating in his deportment, he is one to be alike popular with the many and loved by the few. His faults, where he has them, are those of a noble nature. His sense of honor is keen. He could do no man wrong intentionally. In all his actions, even to the most trivial, the energy of his character, and the kindness of his heart are equally discernible.

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BY HENRY GILES.

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In a cottage on the banks of Doon, near the town of Ayr, in Scotland, in 1759, Robert Burns, one of the world’s sweetest poets, first saw the light of life. The peasant-child soon learned to know existence in toil and sorrow; torn at an early age from study to labor, grief went hand in hand with glory through his remaining years. We find him amidst the wild eccentricities of an irregular youth, without any settled aim, as he himself declares, but with some stirrings of ambition, that were only as the blind gropings of Homer’s Cyclops around the walls of his cave. With characteristic ardor, and with more zeal than wisdom, he mingled in the theological and political squabbles of the times, and by the destructive boldness of his satire, and the shafted power of his ridicule, he created many enemies whom it was easier to provoke than to propitiate. Nor must we hold him blameless. In the prodigality of wit, and the wildness of laughter; in the madness of merriment, and the pride of genius, he treated opinions and persons with an unsparing levity which a more thoughtful experience would have taught him to regard with reverence or forbearance. That his genius went too frequently in company with his passions, and that the glory of the one was sometimes wrecked in the delirium of the other, it is not allowed us to deny; but these follies had their penalties; and if it were possible, they were better now forgotten in the ashes of his early grave. Burns was a man that sinned, and one that suffered; but he was not a man that sinned callously, or that suffered meanly; and it is not for the living to write in marble errors which the departed repented in tears.

Incidents of romance and anguish checker the opening of his poetic fame with sadness as well as sunshine. His “Highland Mary,” the love of his youth, and the dream of his life is wrenched from his heart by death. Then comes the melancholy episode of his attachment to Jean Armor, with its heavy retribution of wretchedness. His name has begun to gather honor among his native hills; the small provincial edition of his poems is hailed with proud enthusiasm; but yet, with poverty and a bleeding spirit, he looks across the ocean to foreign exile. Suddenly his purpose is turned aside, and we behold him in Edinburgh among the exclusives and magnates of the land. There, as at the plough, we find him still the true and sturdy man. In the throng of Highland chieftains and border barons, in the full blaze of pride and beauty, he felt within him a humanity beyond the claim of titles; genius had given him a superscription more impressive than device of heraldry; the patent of nobility was written with fire in his heart, and the proud ones of earth became poor before the aristocrat of heaven. In that day of classic propriety, a poet from the plough, full of passionate earnestness, must have been in Edinburgh a startling phenomenon. But nature made herself heard in the very citadel of art; cavil was silent, and admiration offered willing homage. The wealthy marveled at the inspired peasant; and wherever the eloquent ploughman appeared, there were the nobles collected together. Dukes gave him their silken hands; duchesses received him with sweetest smiles; earls pledged him in the wine-cup; and for the moment, the haughty and the high-born recognized the presence of a greatness superior to their own. But Burns was not a man to hold popularity long in circles such as these. He was too stoutly individual for the apathy of elegant mediocrity, and he was too sternly independent for the sensibility of patronizing grandees: he saw nothing to venerate in a title when it was but the nickname of a fool; and he was undazzled by a star when it glittered on the breast of a ruffian or a dunce. But though Burns escaped the danger of aristocratic delusion, he did not escape the danger of aristocratic feasts. These were the times of night-long carousals, and pottle-deep potations. Burns had neither the firmness to resist such dissipation, nor the constitution to endure it; and he carried from it impaired health and impaired habits—an irritable discontent with his condition, and an instability of purpose fatal to a life of labor. Having placed a tomb over the neglected remains of poor Ferguson, the poet, he retired to the country, shared his success with his brother Gilbert, met his mother steeped in tears of honest joy, married his Jean, and gave peace to a wounded spirit.

From this era of light in his course; from this day, bright with fame and conscious virtue, we trace him along a path devious and clouded. We follow him through the toil of a profitless farm, to the struggles of a country gauger, and from these to a destitute death-bed. In all his follies and his sufferings, we behold him true to a manly nature, loyal to noble principles; and however seamed and deformed may have been the surface of his life, virtue remained unshaken in the centre of his soul. With a large family, and only seventy pounds a year, he had an open hand for the poor, and a hospitable roof for stranger and for friend; and although he died owing no man any thing, yet he has been stigmatized as a prodigal and a spendthrift. He gave the world his immortal songs without money and without price; and with the generosity of benignant genius, he sympathized with every effort of the humble men around him for a nobler life, he ministered to their intellectual wants, and he aided their intellectual struggles. Accordingly, we observe him at a time when he was harassed with cares and overcome with toil on a barren farm, establishing a book club in his neighborhood, forming its rules, and directing its operations. To estimate this in the true spirit, we must remember that it was sixty years ago, when as yet there had been no “Mechanics’ Institutions” in the land, and when Lyceums were not; when cheap editions of standard works had not arisen even on a printer’s dream, and “Societies for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge” were enfolded, as the poets say, in the mighty womb of futurity. Dr. Currie, of Liverpool, a genial and eloquent (though patronizing) biographer of Burns, in narrating this portion of his life, questions the utility of literary studies for the great masses of the people. Strange questioning this, in a life of Burns—the cottage-boy, whom the little knowledge of a rustic school awakened for eternity; raised from the clods of the valley to a place among the stars, a burning and imperishable light; and who, but for that little knowledge, might have been as nameless clay as any that nurtures the grass of a village church-yard.

The ideas of Currie have almost vanished with his times; still even yet we occasionally hear some small-souled cynic, some snail-shell philosopher, who thinks himself of those sages with whom wisdom is to perish, sneer scornfully at popular knowledge. Popular knowledge, it is true, is not the wisdom of Solomon; it has not the depth of Bacon, or the sublimity of Newton; still, so far as it goes, it is a good, and though the pedant may deride, the philanthropist will rejoice. And what, after all, is the ground of Mr. Pedant Wiseacre’s pride? Perhaps some learned investigation on the contraction of the Greek kai, or the tail of the Greek gamma. Seriously, the critic and the scholar, when true to their noble office, deserve our admiration and our gratitude; but those who grub merely for withered roots, which never produce either fruits or flowers; and, then, with insect vanity, give themselves airs of scorn, are themselves saved from contempt, only because all creatures have their uses. It is well for society that there should always be men of great and solid learning; and evil would be the day when slight acquirement should be a substitute for laborious thought; but it is also desirable that these accumulated treasures should be widely and bountifully distributed. It is good to have deep fountains in our munitions of rocks, but it is not good that these fountains should waste themselves in darkness; it is not good that they should merely feed the gorgeous river, and the mighty cataract, they should also steal along in the sunny streamlet, and give beauty to the secluded nook. Let there be rich men, and let them rejoice in their riches; let there be great men, and let them exult in their greatness; let there be men of strong intellect, but let them in their strength be merciful; it is not, however, the great, the noble, or the strong, that are ever of destructive nature; it was the lean kine of Egypt that became the devourers—and yet were as skinny as before; so there are poor, lean, hungry animals of the critic species—unproductive as they are voracious, that are naturally the most unsparing and the most ferocious.

When Burns went first to Edinburgh he was the rage, and homage to him became the cant of certain circles. But it is seldom that such homage survives a season. Poor Burns lived not long; but he lived long enough to understand in bitterness the hollowness of drawing-room applause. On a second visit to the Scottish metropolis, the enthusiasts of the first had disappeared. It is ridiculous enough now to us to think of any lord or lady of bedizened mediocrity supposing they could do honor by their notice to such a man as Robert Burns; but ridicule deepens to contempt, when we read of paltry provincials in Dumfries looking ascant at their mighty townsman, our indignation chokes our laughter at the record of treatment which small fashionables could offer to a great poet. Mr. Lockhart gives an anecdote from a gentleman who told him that he was seldom more grieved than when riding into Dumfries, one fine summer’s evening, to attend a country ball, he saw Burns walking alone on the shady side of the principal street of the town, while the opposite side was gay with successive groups of gentlemen and ladies, all drawn together for the festivities of the night—not one of whom appeared willing to recognize him. The horseman dismounted and joined Burns, who, on his proposing to him to cross the street, said, “Nay, nay, my young friend, that’s all over now,” and quoted, after a pause, some verses of Lady Grizzle Baillie’s pathetic ballad.

Burns, amidst poverty and sorrow, when needful comforts had almost failed him in his sickness, and his children nearly wanted bread, in the thirty-eighth year of his age, quitted a world that was not soon to look upon his like again. Burns, the gladdener of so many hearts, was at last outwrestled, and the mighty fell—Burns, who had so deeply felt the rapture of genius, and the misery of life.

The retribution with which the errors of Burns chastised him, holds out impressive warning to all who are capable of drawing wisdom from example. If happiness could have found a resting-place in one of the most honest hearts that ever struck against a manly bosom; if happiness had been with noble poetry, with an eloquence that never failed, with an imagination rich as the breast of nature, and bright as the stars in heaven; if happiness could have been brought down from the sky by lofty and aspiring sentiments, or fixed upon earth by generous and gentle affections; then happiness would have been the lot of Burns. But Burns had contracted habits to which peace soon becomes a stranger; and he who has such habits, be he bard, or be he beggar, has already entered on the evil day; he may say in all the bitterness of his soul, “Farewell the tranquil mind.” It would seem as if Burns pictured by anticipation his own sad fate when he wrote the Bard’s Epitaph. “Whom did the poet intend?” asks Wordsworth, as quoted by Allan Cunningham, “who but himself—himself anticipating the too probable termination of his own course. Here is a sincere and solemn avowal—a public declaration from his own will—a confession at once devout, poetical and human—a history in the shape of a prophesy!” What more was required of the biographer than to have put his seal to the writing, testifying that the foreboding had been realized, and the record was authentic.

Thus much I thought I might venture on our poet’s life; I shall now proceed to offer some remarks upon his genius.

Burns was a true child of nature; thence his growing power, and thence the promise of his lasting fame. But though the child of nature, he was not the offspring of mere rude or uncultivated nature. The Scottish peasantry were a class of men among whom such a mind as that of Burns could perhaps receive its most fitting development. Without the refinement which tends to repress spontaneous expression, they had sufficient of moral and intellectual education to give that expression variety and strength. Their country, their history, and their religion, were all such as to train a serious and reflective imagination. Therefore it is that no peasantry have furnished so much to national literature as the Scottish, and especially to national poetry. Within a period by no means extensive in their annals, they have given to the world such writers as Ferguson, simple and full of music; Allan Ramsay, in his “Gentle Shepherd,” the very genius of pastoral poetry; Tannahill, a lowly spirit of melody and pathos, a sweet voice of truth and tenderness; Hogg, the glorious wizard of the mountains, coming down from his shepherd’s wilderness, his memory peopled with all olden legends, and his fancy teeming with all fairy dreams. Burns, then, though mightiest, is but one of an honorable family; though greatest and grandest among them, they are his kindred; of some he is the heir, of others, he is the progenitor.

Burns is a poet true, as I have said, to nature, and therefore true to art. Burns is not mechanically artificial, but he is patiently artistical. He had none of that indolent vanity which shrinks from careful preparation, which trusts all to sudden excitement, and undigested emotions. He looked, as every man of genius does, to the ideal; he knew it was not to be comprehended in a passing glance, or reached in a rapid bound, or embodied in a single effort; and he knew that in the endeavor to unfold it, no execution could be too thoughtful, and no labor too great. It is not the consciousness of power, but the conceit of vanity, which relies presumptuously upon momentary impulse, which mistakes the contortions of a delirious imbecility for the movements of celestial agitation. The very creation of God, which required but the will and word of Omnipotence for instant and perfect existence, has been gradually constructed—the earth on which we stand, so fair to look upon, so robed with beauty, so radiant with life and light, has been evolved from chaos through innumerable formations and even the thunder so astounding in its crash, and the lightning so sudden in its stroke, have long been generating in the womb of heaven. The man of genius, the man of creative power, is at once inspired and industrious; at once a man of passion and a man of patience; at once a constructor and analyser, a man of enthusiasm, but also a man of wisdom. Genius is not intoxication, and it is even more than rapture; it is capacity subject to the law of truth and beauty; the intense action of the soul, exalted, harmonious, and illuminated. The dash of noble thoughts may come suddenly on the brain; the torrent of enkindled feeling may rush upon the heart, but the spirit of order and of art must move over the face of this brilliant chaos, ere it is shaped into that perfection which the world does not willingly let die. All mighty souls know this; the rustic Burns knew it, not less than the godlike Milton.

The genius of Burns is now, by that instinctive appreciation which forms the supreme tribunal, placed in the highest order. Whence is this? All he has written may be contained in a moderately sized volume. If quantity of production therefore were needed to exalt a writer, which it is not, Burns should remain in the region of mediocrity. Neither has he composed as critics would seem to require, a work of elaborate and faultless excellence; for he has not even attempted a tragedy or an epic poem. But critics cannot decide this point, and that common heart which decides for all has decided for Burns. The depth and extent of his humanity has gained him his distinction, and it is that humanity which gains distinction for any who outlive their age. It is this spirit of love and sympathy which evinces the kindred that all men recognize; it is this spirit that reaches the truth of nature below all changes, custom and convention; below all colors which climates paint upon the skin; it is this which outlives all facts and fashions, and abides forever in the immortal heart. Whoever has this spirit must live; whoever has it not must die; whoever has this spirit must live, defiled though he may be with many evils; whoever has it not must die, no matter how excellent he may be besides; no matter what his brilliancy, his sagacity, his talent, the generations will outlast them all; will give them to as deep oblivion as they do the tongues of Babel. The world cherishes Boccacio, notwithstanding the offences of his tales; so it likewise preserves Chaucer; Rabelais and old Montaigne continue in literature despite of their impurities; and to think of Shakspeare dying would be to conceive the extinction of letters or our race. All these men are deathless brothers, and Burns is amongst them. His poetry is thoroughly human; a poetry which reproduces as we read it all the feelings of our wayward nature; which shows how man was made to be merry, and how he was made to mourn; which enters the soul on its sunny or its gloomy side, expands the heart with laughter or chastens it with melancholy.

In knowledge of man, Burns strikes us with wonder unspeakable, when we consider the narrow circle in which he lived, and the early age at which he died. A single song is like a compressed drama; and within the circle of these songs we have impulses from every stage of life, from the perturbations of youth to the chill of age. To every shade of sentiment and affection; to every change and turn of inward experience, to every oddity and comicality of feeling, he has given a voice of musical and energetic utterance.

Man, and man directly—man in the play of all his passions, is, with Burns, the great object of interest. The descriptive and the picturesque for their own sake have therefore no place in his writings. A picture with him is never more than the drapery of a passion. The chivalric past has none of his veneration; and the past, in any form, only kindles him when he associates it with the movements of humanity or the struggles of liberty. The conflicts of feudalism, the rivalry of dynasties, the gorgeous falsehoods of departed ages, had no enchantment to warm his fancy or to rule his pen. In this respect, the writings of Scott and those of Burns are as opposite as are their characters. The brilliancy of descriptive narrative glows over the poems of Scott—the strong life of passion throbs in those of Burns. Even in the record of a tour this contrast is observable. Scott has the eye of an antiquarian and a map-maker united. Burns glances along as if space were a tiresome obstruction to his fiery nature: Scott surveys every baronial castle, and notes all its chronicles. Burns raves with inspired fury on the field where the invader was struck down, where “tyrants fell in every blow.” Scott imagined that genius owed homage to rank; Burns gave the obligation another version, and conceived that rank should do reverence to genius. Peasant-born, he was too proud in his humanity to covet titles: almost morbidly jealous of individual independence, hereditary aristocracy was not to him poetically impressive; its outward glare provoked his scorn, and its deeper abuses sickened his imagination.

Two most human qualities in all poets are pre-eminent in Burns—I mean pathos and humor.

His pathos is profound but kindly. No writer is less gloomy than Burns, and yet none for the extent of his compositions has more pathos. No writer within the same compass has grander thoughts or deeper beauty; and, by some magic of the heart, grand thoughts and deep beauty are always allied to melancholy. The canopy of the blue heavens, when not a cloud swims in its brightness, makes our rapture sad: so it does when the stars stud it with ten thousand lights: the mountain’s majesty and the ocean’s vastness subdue our souls to thought, and in this world of ours thought has ever something of the hue of grief. It would seem as if a mysterious connection existed between great objects and pensive feelings, between lofty sentiments and deep regrets, a kind of struggle in our higher nature against the limits of its condition: a disappointment at the long interval that separates our aspirations from the ideal, tinges with sorrow all our sensations of the beautiful. Pathos such as this imbues all the graver poetry of Burns. Scarcely is there a wo which wrings the bosom between the cradle and the grave which has not an expression in the solemn music of his verse, from the gentlest whisper of feeling to the frenzies of every pain and the agonies of every passion. But though deep, his melancholy is not morbid. It is the melancholy of great capacities and of real suffering; of error reacting on itself a just infliction; or glorious desires yearning for their congenial objects. The muse of Burns was a rustic maiden; a maiden healthful and hardy. Fits of vapors she might occasionally have, but the heather of her native mountains soon restored the elasticity of her step, and the breeze of her pleasant valleys quickly recalled the bloom to her cheek and the lustre to her eye. At times she sought the solitudes; but she returned ere long to human homes, and sang her wild and simple songs to the friendly circle. She loved, it is true, to meditate under the green shadow of the forest, and to look up in raptured spirit to the lurid and darkened heavens; but she loved no less the blessed sunshine on the harvest hill, and the cottage smoke that floated in the evening sky. If occasionally she wept amidst the graves of her heroes, she came from the places of the dead, more boldly to proclaim liberty in the places of the living.

This pathos is neither maudlin nor misanthropic. It does not make the head giddy with paradox; nor whirl the heart upon a wild and chaotic tempest of doubt and selfishness; it does not dissect out the evils of human nature, and gloat over them with a diseased voluptuousness; it does not lead you to sit at the feast of despair, with the spectres and skeletons around you of unsocial horrors. It is no mawkish pretence of sentiment. Burns is true to what he feels; and, right or wrong, he speaks it as it is. He maintains this course in his good and his evil. It saved him from groveling and bombast; it saved him from intellectual cant, and from literary quackery. No language is so eloquent as honest language. Truth goes direct to its purpose, while affectation is crawling around its petty circumlocutions; and, as the straight line is the shortest, the most sincere words are the most resistless. As the poet had honesty in himself, he had faith in others. His appeal was weakened by no skepticism in the capacity of humble men to appreciate the noble and the beautiful. He spoke to them as beings whose hearts were of the same substance as his own; he spoke confident of the result, and he was not disappointed. The first auditors of his verses were the obscure dwellers among Scottish hills and hamlets, and to his words he received as true a response as poetic enthusiasm could have desired. The sons and daughters of toil proved to him, that he had not trusted them in vain. He gave them his faith, and they paid back the trust with a priceless love.

I have said that the pathos of Burns is not morbid—and I have said truly. In its lowest depths, it is not dark—in the uttermost sadness, it is not despairing. He grieves, but he never whines; and when he utters forth tones the most plaintive, they are yet so vigorous and so full, that, by the strong sound of them, you feel that they come out from the stalwort struggle of a manly bosom. He has pathos, too, of every variety. He has the pathos of sympathy—and this sympathy is often so intense, as to amount to a passionate indignation. As thus, in the poem—“Man was made to Mourn:”—

This is a large and noble eloquence, condensed into a soul-fraught poetry; yet is it but one out of the many stanzas of which the whole consists, of equal power. So, likewise, he has the pathos of pity, of tenderness, in their finest modulations. The chords of his own heart were most delicately attuned to “the soft, sad music of humanity;” and the breathings of its sorrow were of that genuine humanity, to which other hearts cannot but respond. How much of such pitiful gentleness have we constantly in his poetry, often coming near to gusts of anger—like the song of a mourner in a stormy midnight—or, the moan of the tempest after its rush. But sometimes we have low and melancholy plaints, without one tone of harshness, in such exquisite verses, as those on “The Mouse,” and “The Mountain Daisy”—in “Poor Mailie’s Elegy”—and “The Farmer’s Address to the Old Mare on New Year’s Day.” Illustrations of this point are in all his writings, prose as well as poetry; but I will only mention one other—his “Lines on a Wounded Hare.” Burns has, in an eminent degree, the pathos which springs from contemplation of our mortal life; and not less, that which comes from those solemn questionings of the spirit, to which experience and the Past, give only accusing answers. A man of genius may do wrong; he may lose himself in the mazes of the passions; he may forget himself in the excitement and turbulence of the senses—but all this is at a deadlier cost than it is to any other man. Let no puny-copyist of genius only in its errors and its wanderings, doubly deceive himself—first, by supposing that he has genius, and then, more fatally, deceive himself by inferring that genius has impunity. True, it is, that genius, like charity, covereth a multitude of sins—and for the delight and the beauty which a great soul showers upon the world, the world does abundantly forgive. But, genius does not forgive itself. A strong moral sensibility—though, it may be, not strong moral principle—is mostly a concomitant—if not an essential element—in the nature of a man of genius, and, therefore, when such a man does violence to his higher sentiments, his very genius becomes his punishment. The grandeur of his ideal—the innate love that he must have to the good and to the beautiful—the extent of his moral associations—the tenacity of his moral memories—the vitality of his imagination, calling back again, and back again, the thoughts which had only disappeared, but were not dead—all conspire to chastise him, and to chastise him by the faculties which enchant and move the world. The depth and the compass of his sympathies afflict him; and, as the fountains of thought and feeling are full within him, so much the greater are the agitations that shake him. These remarks concern mainly those men of genius whose nature is that of a comprehensive humanity. Men there have been, and are, that might be adduced to contradict the position I have ventured here to take: for they were capable of much that was unworthy—and yet they did not suffer or repent. Some were deniers, and some were sensualists—the deniers had fine art, and the sensualists had fine sentiments—and all were men of genius. I have no reply to make, except that, in such men, their genius, as their humanity, was of partial, though intense development; and that such was a class to which Burns did not belong. He was neither a denier nor a sentimentalist. He was a man—take him for all in all—and he was a poet in the whole compass of the man. The man spoke through the poet, not in gladness only, but, also, in every note of sorrow and compunction. What sombre power in his Ode to Despondency.

See this again, in the affection with which he loved the sombre phases of external nature, and the force with which he painted them. Thus he meditates in Winter:

Then passing from this low-breathing despondency, we have lyric tragedy shouting down despair in a kind of reckless ecstacy. Bold and brave is this “Song of Death:”

In the pathos of love Burns has no superior. What poet in ancient or modern times, short of Shakspeare, has sung with more varied inspiration than Burns, the agitations with which love convulses the heart of man, and breaks the heart of woman? In a few compressed, but simple-meaning lines, he reveals the passion in all its regrets and agony. And here also, we can see the force, the simplicity—the vehement sincerity of his poetry: and we can see exactly the same characteristics in his life. Allan Cunningham, in his biography of Burns, tells a very affecting anecdote, which I may here fairly adduce in illustration. Jean Armor was lying ill in the house of her parents. Burns had arranged to quit the country for ever, but wanted, once before he left, to see his Jean. Burns attempted to go into the house, but her father stood in the door to exclude him. Burns, maddened by his grief, pushed the old man aside, rushed up to his daughter’s chamber, and throwing himself across the bed, wept as if his heart would burst. And, with regard to his verses to “Mary in Heaven,” if any thing could be more pathetic, than the verses themselves, it was the circumstances in which he composed them. It is now familiar to all who read the least of literary history, that this sublimely pathetic ode, was composed on the anniversary of the maiden’s death, while the poet lay abroad in the field during a bright harvest night, recalling the images of past affections, and out from this dream of the wakeful and troubled heart came that dirge of music which the noblest humanity inspired, and which the rudest humanity must love. It is so familiar to every one, that I will not dare to profane it, by repetition. But here are a few lines of a song, lyrical with all the melody of sadness.

The humor of Burns, too, is full of humanity. It is affluent with all the rich and laughing juices of the heart, and has only just so much of acid as adds pungency to sweetness. Burns has the humor most characteristic of his country; but beyond that, he has a humor belonging to himself—a humor which, while it distinguishes the individual, endears him to his kind. In common with his countrymen, he has the cautious innuendo—the sly allusion—the insinuated sarcasm—the shrewd but mocking suggestion—the implied irony—the dextrously concealed and quiet fun—the sober joke—but he goes beyond all this—and has a humor—which can make men of every nation shake their sides—a humor that often unites the broadness of Rabelais with the sentiment of Sterne. Such a humor demands not only extraordinary wealth of imagination, but also, extraordinary force of intellect—a very uncommon fancy and a very strong common sense. And, it was the union of these in Burns which so well enabled him to be at once comic and satirical—which enabled him so happily to combine the sarcastic and the ludicrous—and he does this in such a way, that while his victims writhe before us, we discern no malignity in their torturer. But, it is in jocund, queer, joyous humor—humor reckless in its gladness, that Burns the most excels. In this species of humor he has scarcely an equal. Few of the greatest masters in humor come near him; and in what we may call the comic-lyric, he stands almost alone. The humor that makes richest melody in the heart; that sings for very joy; that by every note in which laughter can sing out its ecstacy—swells the choruses of mirth and merriment—the humor that is a jubilee in the bosom, that gives widest liberty to fancy—a saturnalia, in which no thought of care or labor, dares intrude—a carnival, in which all kindly oddities of conception play their parts—a humor that combines imagination and feeling into numberless bright varieties, to exhilarate our life—of this humor, Burns in his laughing moods is the potent wizard—of this enlivening magic his gayer songs are the resistless spells.

This humor, too, is generously and jovially human, and although Burns’ ridicule is often coarse, it is rarely cruel. He strikes, but it is with the arm of a man, and not with the blasting of a fiend. Gall he does sometimes mingle with the cup of satire, but never the deadly night-shade; the barb he sharpens keenly, but he does not steep it in poison. He painted, it is true, with a breadth and richness of coloring that made men hold their sides and set the table in a roar, the fooleries and absurdities of individuals; the pretensions of sects, and the bitterness of factions; the vanities of professions; the motley trivialities of presumptuous and stolid nonsense; but in the very storm of his sarcasm, he spares our common nature. There is a ridicule which properly may be called diabolical; which desecrates every thing endeared and noble; which laughs not in festivity of spirit, but in bitterness of heart; which like the witches in Macbeth, around the midnight cauldron, shrieks in the irony of satanic mirth over the degradation of humanity. This temper is realized in the writings of Swift, and affected in those of Byron; but we discover no trace of it in the compositions of Burns. Burns would give even to Satan himself the grace of repentance, and a chance of heaven. Burns, like Byron, can pass rapidly from the grave to the grotesque, but altogether in a different spirit. In the one it is the prodigality of fun; in the other it is willfulness of scorn; in the one, it is sport; in the other it is derision; the one as friend to friend mocks humanity pleasantly; the other makes it a Sancho Panza, tosses it in a blanket, and laughs the louder, the more it is humiliated. I believe the spirit of Byron was naturally a fine one; but it was spoiled, if not utterly ruined, as to all its higher capacities and sympathies. I say not that his moral humanity was extinguished, because that would be uncandid; but I do say, that he became fantastic and capricious to such a degree as to fail in the charities which not only soften life, but dignify literature.

Attributing humor to Burns, I do not estimate it as the slight matter which many seem to think it. If we trust some persons, we should conceive that length of face was length of wisdom, gravity of look, the veil of oracles; thickness of skull the safeguard of knowledge; and rigidity of muscle, the solemn surface of an unfathomable philosophy. But humor in its higher form is the quality, not only of a liberal, but of a cultivated spirit. It requires that the mental powers be vigorous as well as genial. It requires imagination and intellect, as well as a heart in the right place, and the juices of the body in a good condition. Humor as well as pathos is the result of sympathy—of sympathy that embraces man in the most brotherly cordiality—weeps with those who weep, and rejoices with those who do rejoice. This is the humor of Shakspeare; it is the humor of Hogarth; it is the humor of Burns. And many a noble use has this honest faculty—often is it more effective than sermons, to make life lambent, to clear the sky, that was becoming too heavy around us, to warm social intercourse, to nurture our socialities, to dissipate evil passions, and by its pleasant mockeries, to shame us out of nonsensical miseries.

Time would now fail me to refer to the poetry of Burns with any special detail; but for pages so well known, a few brief reminiscences will be sufficient. How full of beauty is “The Vision,” the poem in which, with a self-conscious greatness, almost Miltonic, he celebrates his own consecration to the glory of his country; we read it in delight, in wonder, and with sorrow, and with joy; we verily admit, that, “the light which led astray was light from heaven.” With what solemn pleasure we recall the “Cottar’s Saturday Night.” No other poem in the language shows how much the eye of a poet can see, how much the heart of a poet can feel, where another heart is dull, and another eye is blind. To the prosaic nothing familiar is exciting, but to the inspired all existence is full of glory. Here upon a cottage floor we have placed before us, the most pure, and the most noble virtues; the piety that looks to heaven; the patriotism that dignifies earth; here we have the father returned from his toil, with his “wee things” circling his knees, his clean hearth stone; his “thrifty wifie’s” smile; his soul made glad with Sabbath hopes and with holy thoughts; here are brothers and sisters gathered from the work-day world around the parents that shielded, and that blessed their infancy; here are the pleasant face, and the heart’s own smile; here the homely feast with a joy which luxury refuses, and a gratitude which no luxury inspires; here is first love with maiden blushes, shames and fears; here are all the sublimities of the affections, all in the shades of unnoticed life. How noble is that father and that peasant-priest, as he bares his “haffit locks,” and “let us worship God he says with solemn air;”

And how exalted that love of country which utters this fine supplication:

The spirit of hilarity has never been so admirably blended with the gloomy and the tender, as in the tale of “Tam O’Shanter.” Heroic and immortal Tam will stand his ground while the name of witch or warlock has a place in language. This marvelous mixture of fun and fancy; this chronicle of midnight revelry; this record of wit and waggery, of good fellowship and ghosts, has now a lodgment in every mind that relishes drollery and genius. Here we have the sublime with the ludicrous; images most delicate with images most homely; subtle analogies with grotesque incongruities; touches of sorrow with strokes of glee; all coming in such rapid succession, that, while the broad grin is on the lip, the tear is starting to the eye. “The Jolly Beggars” gives us the very saturnalia of low life; jovial poverty frolics away in the full abandonment of extravagance, dashed over, however, here and there, with those shadings of regret which obtrude the sadness of life, when men try to forget it most. The “Halloween,” pictures the poor man’s carnival, such as it used to be in Scotland, with all its superstitions and its sports. “The twa Dogs,” is a genial exposition of the poor man’s philosophy. The dog of wealth, laying aside his master’s pride in his master’s absence, meets the peasant dog with very kindly courtesy; and both sitting tranquilly on their haunches, with nose to nose, and most sagacious phizzes, discuss the comparative merits of riches and poverty, pity the folly of their two-legged fellow creatures, congratulate each other on their canine superiority, and bless their stars for being dogs instead of men. Cæsar, the dog of high life, with an air of peculiar respectability and most complacent compassion, wonders how poor folks can live at all. Luath, his humble friend, knows that poor folks not only live, but live with very many pleasures; and this Luath was a dog of sympathy; he shared the cottage sorrow; he shared also the cottage joy; he rattled away among the dancers; wagged his tail in the highest glee of his honest heart, and gave his chorus to the merry sound. When adversity was on the hearth, his face grew long; when better times returned, it was broad again.

The whole of this poem is fraught with the noblest and the most endearing humanity—a humanity most varied and most musical in its tones—running quickly along all the chords of sadness and of merriment, throwing forth a harmony of charity and heart-breathing kindness, in which grave sounds and gay mingle together, but not one vibration ungenial or discordant. That Burns should give to dogs sentiments thus characteristic of a sweet and generous temper, corresponds entirely to the feelings with which he regarded that animal, as illustrated in a passage which I have lately found, taken from a newspaper.

The following original anecdote of Burns is in a work entitled the “Philosophy of the Seasons,” by Rev. Henry Duncan:

“I well remember with what delight I listened to an interesting conversation which, while yet a school-boy, I enjoyed an opportunity of hearing in my father’s manse, between the poet Burns and another poet, my near relation, the amiable Blacklock. The subject was the fidelity of the dog. Burns took up the question with all the ardor and kindly feeling with which the conversation of that extraordinary man was so remarkably embued. It was a subject well suited to call forth his powers, and when handled, by such a man, not less suited to interest the youthful fancy. The anecdotes by which it was illustrated have long escaped my memory; but there was one sentiment expressed by Burns with his characteristic enthusiasm which, as it threw a light into my mind, I shall never forget. “Man,” said he, “is the God of the dog. He knows no other; he can understand no other; and see how he worships him! With what reverence he couches at his feet; with what love he fawns upon him, with what dependence he looks up to him, and with what cheerful alacrity he obeys him. His whole soul is wrapped up in his God; and the powers and faculties of his nature are devoted to his service; and these powers and faculties are exalted by the intercourse. It ought just to be so with the Christian: but the dogs put the Christians to shame.”

It is thus, that the spirit of human love, the truest element of poetic beauty, can ennoble and consecrate all it touches; it is thus that Burns elevates the most lowly objects; the farmer’s mare, proud in her age and services; the little cowering mouse, houseless and frightened; the dying ewe; the wounded hare; the simple daisy; rustic sweethearts and rustic beggars; all were endeared to his generous imagination, and over them, while words have meaning, there will be laughing eyes, and serious faces.

Burns has been great in whatever poetry he attempted, but in lyric poetry, he is greatest of all. The songs of Burns, in every point of view, are truly wonderful compositions. We are at a loss which most to admire, their number and variety, or their individual perfection. The lyre of Burns incessantly changes its tone, and in every change it throws forth a flood of new inspiration. Great indeed is the task to give poetic and condensed expression to those thousand impulses that ever heave within us, and are evanescent as the ocean wave; to furnish fitting words for the ideal and fervid longings which millions feel, but cannot utter for themselves; to embody in lasting form, innumerable and undefined desires; to touch chord after chord of memory and emotion, and to awaken the divine music that slumbers in the soul; in a word, to give melody and speech to the complicated heart of man: great is the task, but Burns has accomplished it.

Burns—great in sadness and great in humor; so human in his melancholy, so loving in his laughter. When we hear the pleasant peal of his hearty mirth, our bosoms dilate, until we could embrace our species in affection. When, changing his tone, we feel the breath of his indignation or listen to his cry against oppression, our pulse beats quicker and our blood flows faster. Burns, bard of the brave and fervent soul, destined to move humanity as long as language shall endure; as long as the love of liberty, of independence, of fearless honesty, or patriotic courage, shall have a refuge in our world.

Burns is a nobleman of nature;—a man for the toilsmen of earth to look upon and hope. In humble, rustic life, under the thatched roof, which gave the peasant his shelter; in the field where the heir of labor in the sweat of his brow fulfilled the original destiny of man, Burns fed inspired thoughts, and laid the foundation of a deathless fame. True, his life was short in years; but how passing long was it in emotions, in capacious and crowded fancies. His spirit was goaded, no doubt, with the vulgar cares of poverty, and the worse results of passion; but it was glorified also with conscious genius; he could retreat from the vexations of the world to the sanctuary of his enriched imagination, and there, amidst all the evils of his outward condition, he could find in poetry its own exceeding great reward. Through all the sorrows that overspread his short but rapid course; amidst all the clouds that hung heavily over his path, glimpses of joy were ever and anon bursting on his enraptured eye, which it is given only to the favored ones to behold. And who would not, if he could, have a soul so adorned with the beautiful, rather than without it, be overburdened with the load of external fortune? Had Burns been merely a man of title, he had been forgotten as all titled dust since the days of Nimrod; as unknown as the dukes of Edom; a pompous funeral and a lying epitaph would have given him to oblivion. As it is, the recollection of him is garnered in the choicest corners of the heart, and his name is linked forever to the music of sweetest sounds.

I am now at the close of my task. I have gone through it lovingly, and with reverence; sensible along the way of much goodness in my subject, and not forgetful, either, of some evil also. That many faults are in the compositions of Burns, I apprehend most clearly; and that sad irregularities were in his life, it requires small trial of candor to confess; but to have spread them out in ostentatious commentary would have served no purpose of this article, and gratified no desire of the reader. I am not blind to those errors; I propose no excuse; I deprecate no just condemnation, and I have been forbearing from no moral indifference, no moral insensibility. But dealing with the memory of genius, I reflected that the man was before his God, and the poet had met the sentence of the world. For wisdom, or for warning, the events of his life are sufficiently familiar—he that runs may read, their moral meaning let him read and ponder—let him learn, and let him be better. But I have no sympathy with that vampire-like spirit which disentombs the faults of the illustrious dead to feed the nauseous appetites of itself or others; I tread upon the grave with caution and compassion; and while I do not regard genius as repealing the law of virtue, neither do I regard it as beyond the law of mercy. We need, all of us, great tenderness from those who surround us; we need much, too, from those who survive us. If we require charity from men, who give them nothing, let us grant it to those who have enriched us, and enriched the ages. In the noble and eloquent verses of Halleck, we, too, say of Burns:

———

BY HENRY C. MOORHEAD.

———

If the reader has ever passed along the banks of the Susquehanna, or floated down its waters, he has not failed to admire the beautiful coves which are here and there formed by the bending hills on either side. With a mountain border sweeping round in the shape of a half moon, and the river flowing in a straight line in front, these terrestrial crescents form a series of most charming landscapes. In one of the most charming of them all lived an old gentleman whom we shall call Richard Parkett.

Many years before the period of the following incidents, the wife of Mr. Parkett had died, committing to his care with her dying words, an infant daughter. They called her, after her mother, Lucy; she grew up like a wild flower in her sequestered home, and, at the time we speak of, was just budding into womanhood. And surely no opening rose could be more lovely. The bloom of health was on her cheek; her step was free and elastic as that of the fawn on the neighboring mountain, and her spirits as bounding and joyous as those of the birds which “warbled their native wood-notes wild” around her dwelling.

“My child,” said Mr. Parkett, to her one day, “there is to be an arbitration in the neighborhood to-morrow, to settle some matters in dispute between myself and a neighbor, and we will need you for a witness.”

“For a witness—what does that mean?”

“Why they will make you swear a terrible oath to tell the truth,” said the old gentleman, smiling affectionately; “and then two or three lawyers will endeavor to puzzle you so as to prevent your doing it.”

“And who are these puzzling lawyers?”

“One of them, whose particular business it will be to puzzle you if he can, is a young man named Burton.”

“Burton?—Sidney Burton? He is the young gentleman who called here last winter to see you on business, is he not?”

“Really, you seem to have an excellent memory for young gentlemen’s names.”

Lucy blushed slightly, but made no answer. However, she was much more sober and thoughtful than usual all that day.

The arbitration came on, and Lucy was sworn as a witness. Her story was short and simple, and referred merely to a conversation which she had heard, and about which the parties could not now agree. As Burton was counsel on the other side, he then proceeded to cross-examine her. It was of great importance to his cause that he should shake her confidence in what she had said; and he therefore proceeded (with great delicacy, however) to ply her with an infinite variety of perplexing questions.

But, although she was artless as a child, her quick apprehension, and her clear, ready answers filled him with admiration; which was not at all diminished by an occasional volley of mischievous satire which raised a smile at his expense. He even continued the examination for some time after he saw that it was useless, for the pleasure it afforded him. At length, all parties being satisfied, the dispute was amicably settled, and Mr. Parkett invited the company to his house.

Nothing could have pleased Burton better than such an invitation; he wished to see more of this charming witness, and to present himself before her under more favorable circumstances than in a cross-examination. Lucy, on her part, was equally pleased with this arrangement, for Burton’s image had never ceased to haunt her imagination since the day she had first casually seen him at her father’s house some months before. She could not explain the mystery to herself, but she felt an indefinable interest in every thing that concerned him, and her heart beat warm and quick at the sound of his voice.

On the following morning Burton was urged to stay a day longer, and join a fishing excursion which had been projected. He readily consented; the necessary “tacklings” were soon collected; the party embarked in two canoes, and Burton found himself in one of these small and crazy vessels with Lucy, a young gentleman, her cousin, being in one end to direct its course. Some distance above was one of those “falls” which in so many places obstruct the navigation of that beautiful river, but which furnish among their rocks the most excellent of fishing grounds. Hugging the shore until they had passed above the rapids, they proceeded to drop their boats down upon those rocks which were known to furnish the finest eddies. The current was rapid, and the young man who was steering the boat in which we are chiefly interested, in attempting suddenly to change its course, lost his balance, and fell headlong into the water. The boat swung rapidly round, and, being borne sideways among the breakers, soon capsized. Lucy and Burton both disappeared beneath the foaming torrent; but our hero quickly rose, and, being an expert swimmer, watched eagerly for the appearance of Lucy; then grasping her dress, he buffeted the waves with a strong arm, and succeeded in landing her safely on a rock which projected above the water. To his inexpressible alarm, she seemed to be entirely helpless and inanimate. He commenced chafing her forehead, when in a few minutes she opened her eyes, and the crimson tide of life bounded into her face, neck, and bosom. She stood up and looked anxiously round for her father. In a few minutes the other canoe approached, (having first picked up the young man who had occasioned the accident,) and the whole party immediately returned home.

What more could be wanting to bring these two young hearts together. This romantic little incident sealed their fate; and although their tongues were yet silent, their eyes spoke eloquently of love. On the following morning Burton departed, but he soon returned; and at length the good people of the neighborhood began to wonder whether it was arbitrations that brought the young lawyer so often amongst them.

In a village some miles from Mr. Parkett’s residence, lived a young man of great wealth and little principle, named Lander, who had been fascinated by Lucy’s beauty, and exasperated on finding that her affections were bestowed upon another; Mr. Parkett had been much in the habit of visiting this village of late, for the purpose of indulging an unfortunate passion for gambling, which had almost ruined him in his youth, but which for many years he had entirely restrained. This passion, however, had been lulled, not extinguished; a slight indulgence was sufficient to rekindle it, and it soon raged more fiercely than ever; and he became an easy prey to a brace of gamblers who were the intimate associates of Lander.

“How now,” said Lander, to one of these gamblers, one morning, “what success had you last night.”

“Better than ever. The old man is completely infatuated, and grows more desperate every day. If his daughter is as easily won as her father’s money, your siege will be a short one—she will soon surrender.”

“She will not surrender while she can help it,” said Lander; “but go on as you have begun, and I will have her yet. I will have her, or I will crush the whole family to the earth; they shall learn that the hand of Charles Lander is not to be spurned with impunity. But how do his accounts stand now?”

“We have won all the money he could raise, and he has commenced giving us his notes.”

“Good! bring me the notes and I will cash them for you. But have you followed my instructions, and let him win occasionally, to keep up his courage? Remember, you have no claim on me until you have brought him to the brink of ruin.”

“We have taken care of that, and he has the most unbounded confidence in his own skill. He attributes all his losses to ill-luck, when the silly old fool could not win a dollar if we chose to prevent him.”

Thus was this unfortunate man led on from one stage of ruin to another, by the constant hope of retrieving his past losses until his obligations to pay were no longer worth receiving. Lander, in the meantime, had been lifting these notes, and so disposing of them that he could use them for the accomplishment of his purposes. Without appearing as a party himself, he caused Mr. Parkett to be urgently pressed for payment. Harassed and threatened with exposure, the old man endeavored to borrow money to pay off the most urgent of these claimants; but rumors had got abroad of secret embarrassments and doubtful titles, which made it impossible for him to obtain a loan on any terms.

During all this time Lander had been assiduous in his attentions to Lucy, and employed every artifice to make a favorable impression upon her and upon her father. But Mr. Parkett was far from admiring his character, and above all he knew that Lucy’s heart was wholly devoted to Burton. Having brought affairs to this crisis, Lander one day said to Mr. Parkett, in a tone of great delicacy,

“I understand, sir, that you have been endeavoring to negotiate a loan; and I have been sorry to learn that you were not successful. Now, sir, I have means under my control which are entirely at your disposal.”

“You are very kind, sir,” said Mr. Parkett; “but you must excuse me for saying that it would not be proper for me to accept of such a favor at your hands.”

“I hope, sir,” said Lander, biting his lip, “that you do not consider me unworthy of the privilege of doing you a kindness.”

“It is painful for me to explain,” replied Mr. Parkett, “but after what has passed between you and my daughter, although we shall both always take pleasure in treating you as a friend, common delicacy forbids that we allow you to place us under any obligation.”

“But there is now a weight of obligation on the other side; and you must allow me to make some return for the many acts of kindness I have received under your roof. You have heretofore treated me as a friend; treat me so still, and allow me to serve you.”

Mr. Parkett felt that in honor he could not accept this offer; but ruin stared him full in the face, and he saw no other means of escaping the exposure which he dreaded—for when his bankruptcy became known, the cause could not be long concealed. He therefore no longer absolutely refused, but took time to consider. This Lander felt confident would lead to acceptance; and he returned home triumphing in the successful progress of his plot, and sanguine of final success. But Burton came again to mar his prospects. He, too, had heard of Mr. Parkett’s difficulties, and tendered his services. It was finally agreed that he should raise several thousand dollars, to be secured by mortgage; and that in the following autumn, when he and Lucy were to be married, the establishment should be delivered over to them. Burton, by turning his means (which were not great) into cash, and borrowing on the credit of his future prospects, succeeded in raising the necessary sum, and placed it in Mr. Parkett’s hands. Lander’s offer was, of course, declined.

With this money in his possession the old gentleman went to the village to make arrangements for the payment of the most importunate of his creditors. As he walked along the street, he came in front of the house which had been the scene of his ruinous losses. An irresistible temptation seized him to make one more effort to retrieve his fortunes. He would try his luck; if fortune smiled, all would yet be well; if she frowned, after losing a small sum, he would abandon the gambling-table forever. With this resolution, he entered, and was soon wholly absorbed in the chances of the game. Fortune did smile, and, with unwonted success, he became bold and desperate. The stakes grew heavy, and he fearlessly increased them. His wily competitor marked his time, and made them still higher; Parkett again increased them. His competitor doubled them. Parkett, now mad with excitement, threw down all that he had brought, and all that he had won. There was a breathless pause. The result was announced—and he had lost! For several minutes he stared vacantly around him, then, pulling his hat over his brows, he rushed from the house.

His ruin was now complete; but what explanation could he give to Burton? and, what would become of his darling child? He returned home, and going directly to his private room, sent for Burton, who, observing his extraordinary emotion, remained a wondering and anxious listener.

“You asked me for my daughter’s hand,” said he, “and I gave it to you, because I thought you worthy of her. You then supposed me to be an honest man, and the owner of valuable possessions. It is my duty now to inform you, that I am a villain and a beggar.”

“I beg you will compose yourself,” said Burton, believing that his mind had become disordered; “you allow your pecuniary difficulties to affect you too deeply. However they may result, they cannot affect either your honor, or my affection for your daughter. She has given me her heart, and I ask nothing from you but her hand.”

“My honor, it is true, is beyond the reach of circumstances,” said Parkett, bitterly. “You this morning loaned me five thousand dollars, to pay the most pressing claims against my property. That money is gone—no matter how—and the claims are not staid. I have not only brought ruin upon myself, but upon you also. My property will be sacrificed, and your money lost; What say you now? Am I not a villain?”

“I must again entreat you to compose yourself,” replied Burton; “and, I repeat, that I love your daughter for herself alone; and, if all that you have said were true, I would not the less claim her for my wife.”

“Young man,” said Parkett, seizing Burton eagerly by the hand, “she is yours; and may God Almighty bless your union. The dread of bringing sorrow and wretchedness upon my innocent lamb wrung my heart most of all. You have relieved me from that care, and the grave will soon hide my shame.”

To prevent the property from being sacrificed, it was thought best to advertise it for private sale. Lander came forward and became the purchaser, at a price which, after paying off the prior claims, left a very small balance to reimburse Burton; who, however, soon became rich in the possession of Lucy. Mr. Parkett lived to see his daughter married, and soon after went down to a peaceful but melancholy grave.

“This is an humble dwelling, Lucy,” said Burton, when they had moved into their new home, “but, it is said, that happiness is oftener found in the cottage than in the palace. So philosophers teach, but I believe women generally think differently.”

“You shall represent the philosopher, and I the woman,” said Lucy, “and we’ll see.”

“In spite of philosophy,” continued Burton, “I confess that I would prefer a somewhat larger house, and furniture of a better quality than this.”

“And I confess,” said Lucy, “that in spite of your opinion of women, I shall be happier as it is.”

“Alas! my sweet wife,” said Burton, “you have never known what care or trouble was; you have lived all your life amongst happy friends, and been the gayest of them all; every wish of your heart has been gratified as soon as formed. Heaven grant it may be as you now think!”

“But you doubt it. Really, for a philosopher, you know but little of woman’s heart. To have all her frivolous wishes gratified, to live in the midst of gayety and idleness, and be free from care, and, I suppose, from all reflection, seems to be your opinion of her highest state. But you do her injustice; her heart throbs with ambition as well as man’s, though its object may be different.”

“Ambition is not formed of such habitations as this,” said Burton, sadly.

“Woman’s ambition may be,” said Lucy. “Suppose she were able to make this humble cottage a more delightful dwelling than the most luxurious mansion, to smooth her husband’s brow, and cause him to forget poverty and toil? Would not this be an object worthy of ambition?”

“It is,” said Burton, kissing her affectionately, “and you have gained that object already. When I spoke of women, I should not have included all women, and you shall prove that there are exceptions.”

At this moment there was a knock at the door, one of the sheriff’s officers entered and handed Burton a paper. The latter read it, then calmly folded it, and put it in his pocket. But his wife’s eye had been on him, and when the officer had withdrawn, she said:

“This is some new calamity; do not conceal it from me, Sydney; your cheek grew pale as you read that paper—let them take all we have, for whilst you are spared I shall be happy.”

“My matchless wife,” said Burton, “you have borne our past trials so bravely, that I am not afraid of your sinking under this new misfortune: but summon up all your fortitude, for you will need it. Our persecutor, Lander, has not exhausted his arts yet, but is determined to humble us still more. He has power over us now, and employs it to gratify his cowardly malice. But let him beware! That power may one day change hands, and then, so help me Heaven! I will bruise his serpent head beneath this heel;” and he stamped his foot fiercely on the floor.

“Now you distress me, indeed,” said Lucy; “but, oh, Sydney! you will not forget your promise, that there shall be no violence between you and that wicked man.”

“Forgive me,” said Burton, “I forgot myself; that promise is sacred, and never will I grieve your gentle heart by breaking it. But see what this villain has done! He has managed, by some artifice, to get possession of claims against me, which I never dreamed would be pressed, until I should be able to pay them without inconvenience. He has brought suit, and we must prepare to surrender up even the poor remnants that are left us.”

“I understand it all,” said Lucy. “Oh, my poor father!”

“Let him rest in peace,” said Burton; “if he acted unwisely he paid the penalty of a broken heart: let us not disturb his ashes.”

Lucy threw her arms around her husband’s neck, and wept like a child.

“You forgive him then,” she said, “for the sake of his daughter’s love and duty. Oh, Heaven will bless you for your generosity.”

“Heaven has blessed me,” said he, fondly embracing her; “and I would not give one throb of this loving heart for all the gold Lander ever owned.”

But the sad reality at length came, and their relentless creditor advertised the poor furniture of their cottage for sale. Burton found, as is usual under such circumstances, that his friends had grown remarkably polite and formal; but they kept at a distance, and no one offered him assistance; nor could he ask it, as the claims were much greater than he could possibly pay, and his income from his profession little more than afforded him a subsistence. He was, therefore, “sold out,” all but the scanty articles which the law allows the poor.

But although the world had grown cold, his own fire-side was still as bright as ever; and when he thought of Lucy, as he had first seen her—a gay, mischievous girl, raised in the lap of luxury, and then looked upon her as his wife—serene and cheerful in the midst of poverty and worldly disgrace, he admired and reverenced the depths of woman’s affection. And this deep, pure fountain of love flowed only for him! Well might he prize it above rivers of gold!

Some time after, Burton was one day searching among the old records in one of the public offices, when his eye fell upon a time-worn, mutilated will, which bore the name of Thomas Parkett inscribed on the back. Knowing that Lucy’s grandfather had borne that name, his curiosity led him to open the paper, and examine its contents. After reading on for some time, deciphering the words with great difficulty, he suddenly started back, as if he had seen the ghost of his wife’s ancestor. Then returning to the paper, he eagerly read it over again, pausing and reflecting long upon each sentence. Then carefully making a copy of it, he returned the papers to their place, and went directly home with a rapid step and a beating heart.

Whilst Burton was reading the paper which produced so strange an effect on him, there sat near him one of those wretched men who disgrace an honorable profession by hanging upon its outskirts, gaining an infamous livelihood by stirring up litigation, and practising schemes of fraud and villany. Dissipated and unprincipled, Witherman was equally reckless in his means of getting money, and prodigal in spending it. He was consequently at times reduced almost to starvation, and ready for any desperate enterprise. Happening to look up at the moment, he observed Burton’s emotion, and watched his subsequent movements until he left the room. Then taking down the same bundle of papers, he began to look through them to see if he could find what had so much interested Burton. The name of Parkett soon attracted his attention, for he knew that that had been the name of Burton’s father-in-law. Opening the will, therefore, he read on until he came to the part which had startled Burton:

“Aha!” he exclaimed to himself, “I see the game now, and I’ll find some means to have a hand in it. So much for reading men’s looks and motives; I shall make a good day’s work of this.”

“Lucy, my dear,” said Burton, after he reached home, “how would you like to become mistress again of the old homestead?”

“Ah, Sydney, why do you ask me such a question? you know that I am reconciled to living here, but then I don’t like to think of my old home.”

“It is certainly a delightful place, especially at this season of the year, with its green fields and blooming orchards. Suppose we go and spend the summer there?”

“I have no wish ever to see it again.”

“Suppose you could call it your own, would it have none of its former attraction?”

“As that can never be, it is hardly worth while to answer your question. But what is the matter with you? You seem to be strangely excited; tell me what it is, I can bear it.”

“Prepare yourself then, for startling news; you are the mistress and owner of the old homestead.”

“Oh, why do you mock me with such a tale,” said Lucy, tears starting into her eyes; “do let me forget that ever I lived there.”

“I should be sorry to trifle with you on so tender a subject,” said Burton, “but I mean what I say. You have borne adversity like a heroine; let us now see what effect prosperity will have. Here is copy of your grandfather’s will, which I have just seen for the first time. By it his property is entailed, as lawyers call it; that is, it is settled upon your father and his immediate descendants, to pass from one generation to another, according to the English rule of primogeniture. Your father could not sell it in the way he did, (of which he was no doubt ignorant,) and you, being his only child, have a full and perfect right to it under the will.”

“But if it was sold and paid for, would it be right for me to claim it from the purchaser?”

“It will be right, at all events, to defend yourself from persecution. The property is yours by the law of the land, and if Lander obtained it, as we have good reason to believe he did, he ought not to be allowed to keep it. I will advise you to nothing that is not becoming in a dutiful child. Better this poverty than the consciousness of having acted unjustly: but we will consult with some discreet friend, and then do what we may conclude to be right.”

Lucy was grave and thoughtful; she had long been accustomed to suppress her feelings of vanity and pride, and had become entirely reconciled to her humble fortunes; but her heart fluttered at the thought of being the owner of ample possessions, and of those scenes, too, from which she had never been able entirely to wean her affections. But then came other reflections. Was it possible that her father had practiced a fraud for her benefit? And, if so, would it be right for her to take advantage of it? The law might give her the property, but would truth and justice allow her to take it?

After careful inquiry, it was deemed proper that suit should be brought; and Burton, remembering the maxim that “the lawyer who pleads his own cause has a fool for his client,” employed counsel to conduct it for him.

No sooner had this suit been brought, than Witherman hastened to Lander:

“I see, sir,” said he, “that Burton has brought suit in the name of his wife for the recovery of the property you purchased from her father.”

“He has; and what can it mean? The claims which I had against him were notes given at the gambling table, but they had been put in circulation, and I understood you, that he couldn’t dispute them in my hands. Or has he discovered that I knew for what they were given?”

“He has made a worse discovery than that.”

“What! do you really think he has the means of supporting his claim?”

“I am sure of it, unless you choose to employ my skill to baffle him. If you had entrusted the investigation of the title and the papers to me, I might have saved you from this difficulty; but you preferred a bungler, who gave you a title that expired with Parkett himself. For this want of confidence you must now either lose the property or pay me my own price for saving it.”

“You know that I never scrupled to pay you well when an emergency required your services; but what is the defect in this title?”

“By the will of Parkett’s father, which Burton has recently discovered among the old papers in the office—for it has never been recorded—and which I have seen, it appears that Parkett himself merely held the property as tenant in tail. A particular kind of deed was therefore necessary, under our laws, to convey a complete title. Your deed is in the common form, and conveyed only a life interest; and the instant Parkett died the property became vested in his daughter.”

“In his daughter! Oh, miserable blunderers! then all my schemes of vengeance recoil on my own head. But stay; you say that your skill can provide a remedy; if you can save me from the humiliation of this defeat, you shall have your own price. What is your plan?”

“Among the modes of barring an entail is a deed of warranty with assets; that is, if Parkett gave you a deed warranting the title for himself and his heirs, and on his death left to his daughter other property equal in value to that which he sold you, then her claim cannot be sustained, but your title is good.”

“This is excellent consolation! He gave me a deed of warranty, it is true, but you know that he left his daughter and her husband only the privilege of paying some thousands of dollars which Burton had borrowed for him a few months before.”

“I know all that; and if he had left them the necessary property you would not need my services to enable you to baffle them.” Then taking up a pen, and writing a few lines, Witherman continued: “There, sign that, and I pledge myself to make your title good.”

“When I promised that you should have your own price,” said Lander, “I did not expect such a demand as this; but I will stand to what I have said, and see that you keep your pledge;” and he signed a note for an exorbitant sum.

The day of trial at length came; and Burton repaired to the Court with the confidence of a man who knows that his cause is good, and his evidence conclusive. The law was well settled, and the fact, a matter of record. His cause was, therefore, quickly and triumphantly made out, by simply reading the will in evidence. Nothing could be more satisfactory: the court, the jury, the by-standers, all saw at a glance that the question was settled; and nothing was now wanting but the formality of a verdict.

“Gentlemen,” said the judge to Lander’s counsel, “I suppose it is hardly necessary to pursue this matter any further.”

“I beg your honor’s pardon,” said one of the leading members of the bar, whose services Witherman had secured, and who acted under his instructions, and in perfect good faith; “our defense shall be brief, but I hope decisive.”

He then proceeded, to Burton’s utter amazement, to declare that he was prepared to prove, that Mr. Parkett, on his daughter’s marriage, had settled property on her far exceeding in value that which was now in controversy. That the settlement had been drawn by a member of the bar, now dead, and was recently found among his papers, duly signed, sealed and witnessed; that Mr. Parkett had been reputed a man of wealth, and yet, to the surprise of every body, died poor. Here, then, was the explanation of this great wonder. He and the present plaintiff alone knew that the property now in controversy was entailed. He might, therefore, sell it for its full value, and yet, on his death, it would pass by descent to his daughter. It was necessary, however, that he should leave no property behind him; for if his daughter should receive other property of equal value from him, it would bar her claim to this. His other property was, therefore, clandestinely conveyed to her, and he died apparently without possessing any.

Fully believing this statement, as he did, the learned counsel followed it up with a stream of burning invective. Turning upon Burton, he scourged him with a whip of scorpions. He represented him as the contriver and adviser of the infamous project, and the recipient of all the benefits, if it should be successfully accomplished. Being perfectly honest and sincere, he believed that in covering Burton with infamy, he was only vindicating the honor of his profession. The evidence which Witherman had put into his hands was then produced. The hand-writings of Parkett and of the subscribing witness, were satisfactorily proved by several unexceptionable witnesses, who, as is usual in such cases, were as positive as if they had seen the names written. The manner in which the paper had been found, and many other circumstances, so strongly corroborated this view of the subject, that the opinions of all present were soon reversed; and Burton, whom they had lately considered a wronged and persecuted man, now stood before them a sordid villain, baffled and unmasked. The judge indulged in some sharp reflections on the iniquity of the plaintiff’s claim, and the jury promptly and indignantly rejected it. Witherman had kept his promise, and Lander was again triumphant.

Burton was almost stupefied by this new and unexpected blow, and sat for some time gazing vacantly at the clerk who announced the verdict; then, quietly leaving the court house, and avoiding all observation, with a heavy heart and a gloomy brow he hastened homewards. His wife had been impatiently awaiting his arrival, and hastened to receive him and congratulate him on his victory—for she never had dreamed of any other result. But a single glance of his eye was enough to fill her heart with dismay, and cause her to turn from him in tears. She read there the emotions of a soul in torture, and knew that his strong mind and regulated passions could not be thus moved by any thing else than what he deemed a signal calamity. Burton silently threw himself into a chair, and struggled hard to recover his usual serenity of mind and countenance. But all in vain. The anguish of his spirit was insupportable. At length he groaned out,

“Lucy, I am a ruined man.”

“Alas! Sydney, why do you speak thus? Why do you look thus? If your hopes of wealth are defeated, surely there are other sources of happiness left to us, far more precious than this. Have we not been happy in this little cottage? and if we lose it, we shall be happy in one that is humbler still. If they have robbed us of our property, they cannot at least deprive us of our good name. Whilst you continue to be loved and respected by the whole community you are more than rich. Your talents and known integrity will soon bring you riches and honors. Oh,” continued she, unconscious that her words went like poisoned arrows to his heart, “if you could have heard the language of praise that has so often made my heart beat high with pride, you would feel that a reputation for truth, honor, and a high and noble spirit, does not need the ornament of wealth to make it honorable.”

Burton covered his face with his hands, as Lucy continued her loving but torturing exhortation:

“Suppose,” said she, “that instead of a paltry loss of money, your reputation had been stained, your character blackened, your name dishonored; how trifling would then have seemed such a loss as that you have now suffered? Think, then, of what you still possess, rather than of what you have lost or failed to gain; and let us be grateful to a kind Providence for having spared you at least an unsullied reputation.”

“Ay,” said he, mechanically pursuing her train of reflection, “you are right. Reputation, reputation, reputation! all the rest is dross compared with that. I would not have exchanged the good opinion of one honest man for all the property I have been contending for; I would not have forfeited the esteem of the community in which I live, for millions of acres. Disappointment has been my portion from childhood; I have often groaned and wept in sorrow; to-day, for the first time, I have blushed and hung my head in shame. Reputation! it has been the balm of my wounded spirit; the light of my life, the star of my hope. This morning it was mine by the agreement of all the world; but where is it now?”

At this moment an officer of the court entered and handed him a slip of paper. He glanced at it for a moment, and then handed it to his wife, repeating, “Ay, where is my reputation now?” It was an order of court, directing him to appear and show cause why his name should not be stricken from the roll of attorneys for dishonorable and fraudulent conduct. Lucy had no sooner read it, than, with a sharp cry, she sunk insensible on the floor. Burton flew to her assistance, reproaching himself with want of consideration in subjecting her to so sudden a shock, and feeling a new sense of desolation come over him at the prospect of losing his dearest, best, only remaining friend. He began to fear, too, that his conduct had caused even her to conceive suspicions of his integrity; and this reflection was the bitterest drop in all the cup. She presently revived, and he hastened to assure her of his innocence. He explained to her all that had happened. The signature which had been produced in court as her father’s, was so much like it that, under other circumstances, he would himself have sworn to it without hesitation. He could not tell how it was, but he was entangled in a net from which he saw no hope of escape. Every thing was against him; the testimony of respectable witnesses, all appearances, and all opinions.

“Sydney,” said Lucy, at length smiling through her tears, “there are two great subjects on which I have often heard you discourse with more enthusiasm than on any other—the one was faith, and the other moral courage. In such moments I sometimes thought that your eye pierced through the mists of time, and realized the glories of eternal truth and justice; and I believed, (for such was your language,) that your heart would never quail before the presence of men, so long as you possessed an approving conscience. Have you forgotten these principles, or were they mere flights of imagination?”

“They were great truths; but, alas! the clouds of adversity have darkened even my moral perceptions.”

“Oh, Sydney,” she continued, “I have heard you maintain, that adversity was the chief agent in developing the human soul; that virtue was not worthy of the name, until it had been tried in the furnace of affliction; and how often have I heard you say, that the highest and truest courage, was that which calmly and firmly sustains itself against the current of popular opinion.”

“Very true! very true!” said Burton, his countenance almost relaxing into a smile.

“Why,” continued Lucy, “there have been times when I almost wished to see you under such circumstances, that I might apply your glorious pictures to yourself; that I might behold in you the hero, the philosopher, the man whose faith never wavered, though friends betrayed; whose heart never failed, though all the world opposed him. I dreamed that you were all these; and, oh! how my heart swelled with love and admiration. Nay, it was not a dream; you were, you are all these, my own brave and true-hearted Sydney.”

Burton’s eye recovered its wonted fire, and, as he paced the room with a firm and energetic step, he felt his spirit return unto him.

“Sweet monitor,” he said, “you have recalled me to myself. Alas! that I should have forgotten my philosophy, the moment an opportunity occurred for putting it in practice. This is my first practical lesson. It is a stern one; but, (thanks to your cheering voice,) I am now prepared to receive it and to profit by it. Whilst all continues right here, (laying his hand upon his heart,) I am prepared for any extremity of fortune. When the sky is curtained with clouds, men say that the stars have gone out, because they can no longer see them; but, in truth, they shine on with the same calm, steady light, whether seen or unseen by mortal eyes. And so it is with virtue; though calumny may render it invisible from without, it never ceases to warm and illuminate the heart in which it dwells.”

When the time came for Burton to appear before the court and answer the charge of fraudulent and dishonorable conduct, he found himself wholly unable to combat the array of arguments that were brought against him. It was manifest, too, that every body looked on him as a fallen and ruined man. His former friends saluted him with cold civility; as he passed along the way closed before him; wherever he went he found himself alone. He had nothing to oppose to the charge but his own solemn declaration; and that, of course, in a case so clear, could avail him nothing. The forms proper to the occasion were gone through with as an appointed ceremony; and the judge proceeded to pronounce the sentence, which he had written out beforehand. After dwelling on the importance of the legal profession; on the necessity of unsullied integrity in those who practice it; on the infamous character of Burton’s offence, and the indisputable certainty of his guilt, he was about to pronounce sentence of expulsion from the Bar, when he was interrupted by the confusion created by some one forcing his way in great haste through the crowd. It proved to be the venerable clergyman of the village, who begged that the judge, before proceeding further, would allow him to say a few words.

“I come,” said he, “from the death-bed of a member of this bar, Mr. Witherman, and I bring to your honor a message of grave importance. Though fearfully tortured with the pangs of a guilty conscience, I believe that he was perfectly sane; and with his dying voice he implored me to hasten hither and assure your honor, on the word of a dying penitent, that the charge you are this morning trying against Sydney Burton is wholly false; that being skillful in the imitation of hand-writing, he had himself forged the papers which bore the name of Richard Parkett, and contrived all the other circumstances which seemed so conclusive of Burton’s guilt. He then bade me hand your honor this paper, which he said would enable you to unravel the whole conspiracy; and these were his last words. I have thus discharged my mission; and I hope its urgency will excuse my unceremonious interruption of your proceedings.”

The cause was immediately adjourned for further consideration.

“I have just been thinking of it, Lucy,” said Burton, one bright spring morning, as they walked together in the garden at the old homestead, “to-morrow is the anniversary of our first fishing excursion. It is an epoch in our lives worth commemorating. Let us, therefore, get up another, as much like it as possible; except, indeed, the upsetting of the canoe—which answered a very good purpose, then, but there would be no occasion for it now. With a little stretch of imagination we can easily go back some years and fancy it to be the same day and the same occasion. You are again the mistress of this beautiful home; troops of friends will again come at our bidding; nature is clad in the same green mantle; the birds sing the same songs; and the waters murmur the same tunes. A kind Providence has also turned our darkness into light. One short hour ago, and yonder mountain was robed in mist to its very base; see, now, how it sparkles in the sunshine! But, Lucy, why are you plucking all those beautiful flowers?” Lucy pointed in silence to a distant enclosure, which contained her father’s grave. A feeling of sadness passed like a shadow over their hearts, reminding them that life is a checkered scene of joy and sorrow. And here we shall leave them, to the indulgence of those contending emotions of regret, gratitude, and bright anticipation.

———

BY HELEN IRVING.

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———

BY FRANK FORESTER.

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The American Woodcock, Scolopax minor, or, as it has been subdistinguished by some naturalists, from the peculiar form of its short, rounded wing, the fourth and fifth quills of which are the longest, Microptera Americana, is, as the latter title indicates, exclusively confined to this hemisphere and continent. It is much smaller than its European namesake, being very rarely killed exceeding eight or nine ounces in weight, and sixteen inches in extent from tip to tip of the expanded wings; whereas the European cock averages full twelve ounces, being often found up to fifteen, and measures twenty-five or twenty-six inches.

In general appearance and color they bear a considerable affinity each to the other; the upper plumage of both being beautifully variegated, like the finest tortoise-shell, with wavy black lines on a rich brown ground, mottled in places with bright fawn color and ash-gray; but the breast and belly of the American bird are of a deep fulvous yellow, darkest on upper part and fading to a yellowish white at the vent, while its European congener has all the lower parts of a dull cream color, barred with faint dusky waved lines, like the breast feathers of some of the falcons.

It has generally been believed that the large cock of the Eastern continent is never found in America; and all analogy would go to strengthen that belief, for neither of the birds range on their respective continents very far to the northward, whereas it is those species only which extend into the Arctic regions, and by no means all of them, that are common to the two hemispheres. Some circumstances have, however, come recently to my knowledge which lead me to doubt whether the large woodcock of the Eastern hemisphere does not occasionally find its way to this continent, although it is difficult to conceive how it should do so, since it must necessarily wing its way across the whole width of the Atlantic, from the shores of Ireland or the Azores, which are, so far as is ascertained, its extreme western limit.

A very good English sportsman resident in Philadelphia, who is perfectly familiar with both the species and their distinctions, assures me that during the past winter a friend brought for his inspection an undoubted English woodcock, which he had purchased in the market; it weighed twelve ounces, measured twenty-five inches from wing to wing, and had the cream-colored barred breast which I have described. The keeper of the stall at which this bird was purchased did not know where it had been killed, but averred that several birds had previously been in his possession, precisely similar to this in every respect. It is not a little remarkable that the same gentleman who saw this bird, and unhesitatingly pronounced it an European cock, was informed by a sporting friend that he had seen in Susquehanna county a cock, which he was satisfied must have measured twenty-five inches in extent, but which he unfortunately missed. There is likewise, at this time, in the city a skull and bill of a woodcock of very unusual dimensions, of which I am promised a sight, and which, from the description, I am well nigh convinced is of the European species.

It is possible that these birds may have been brought over and kept in confinement, and subsequently escaped, and so become naturalized in America; and yet it is difficult to conceive that persons should have taken the trouble of preserving so stupid and uninteresting a bird as the woodcock in a cage, unless for the purpose of transporting them from one country to another in order to the introduction of new species.

This might be done very easily with regard to some species, and with undoubted success; and it has greatly surprised me that it has never been attempted with regard to our American woodcock, which might unquestionably be naturalized in England with the greatest facility; where it would, I have no doubt, multiply extraordinarily, and become one of the most numerous and valuable species of game, as the mildness of the winters in ordinary seasons would permit the bird to remain perennially in the island, without resorting to migration in order to obtain food.

The woodcock and snipe can both be very readily domesticated, and can be easily induced to feed on bread and milk reduced to the consistency of pulp, of which they ultimately become extremely fond. This is done at first by throwing a few small red worms into the bread and milk, for which the birds bore and bill, as if it were in their natural muddy soil.

In all countries in which any species of the woodcock is found, it is a bird essentially of moderate climates, abhorring and shunning all extremes of temperature, whether of heat or of cold.

With us, it winters in the Southern States from Virginia, in parts of which, I believe, it is found at all seasons of the year, through the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida to Louisiana and Mississippi, in the almost impenetrable cane-brakes and deep morasses of which it finds a secure retreat and abundance of its favorite food, during the inclement season, which binds up every stream and boggy swamp of the Middle and New England States in icy fetters.

So soon, however, as the first indications of spring commence, in those regions of almost tropical heat, the woodcock wings its way with the unerring certainty of instinct which guides him back, as surely as the magnet points to the pole, to the very wood and the very brake of the wood in which he was hatched, and commences the duties of nidification.

I am inclined to believe that the woodcock are already paired when they come on to the northward; if not, they do so without the slightest delay, for they unquestionably begin to lay within a week or two after their arrival, sometimes even before the snow has melted from the upland. Sometimes they have been known to lay so early as February, but March and the beginning of April are their more general season. Their nest is very inartificially made of dry leaves and stalks of grass. The female lays from four to five eggs, about an inch and a half long, by an inch in diameter, of a dull clay color, marked with a few blotches of dark brown interspersed with splashes of faint purple. It is a little doubtful whether the woodcock does or does not rear a second brood of young, unless the first hatching is destroyed, as is very frequently the case, by spring floods, which are very fatal to them. In this case, they do unquestionably breed a second time, for I have myself found the young birds, skulking about like young mice in the long grass, unable to fly, and covered with short blackish down, the most uncouth and comical-looking little wretches imaginable, during early July shooting; but it is on the whole my opinion that, at least on early seasons, they generally raise two broods; and this, among others, is one cause of my very strong desire to see summer woodcock shooting entirely abolished.

Unless this is done, I am convinced beyond doubt, that before twenty years have elapsed the woodcock will be as rare an animal as a wolf between the great lakes and the Atlantic sea-board, so ruthlessly are they persecuted and hunted down by pot-hunters and poachers, for the benefit of restaurateurs and of the lazy, greedy cockneys who support them. There is, however, I fear little hope of any legislative enactment toward this highly desirable end; for too many even of those who call themselves, and who ought to be, true sportsmen, are selfish and obstinate on this point, and the name of the pot-hunters is veritably legion. Moreover, it is to be doubted whether, even if such a statute were added to our game-laws, it could be enforced; so vehemently opposed do all the rural classes, who ought to be the best friends of the game, show themselves on all occasions to any attempt toward preserving them, partly from a mistaken idea that game-laws are of feudal origin and of aristocratic tendency; and so averse are they to enforce the penalties of the law on offenders, from a servile apprehension of giving offense to their neighbors.

At present, in almost all the States of which the woodcock is a summer visitant, either by law or by prescription July is the month appropriated to the commencement of their slaughter; in New York the first is the day, in New Jersey the fifth, and in all the Middle States, with the single exception of Delaware, where it is deferred until August, some day of the same month is fixed as the termination of close time. Even in Delaware the exception is rendered nugatory, by a provision permitting every person to shoot on his own grounds, whether in or out of season, in consequence of which the birds are all killed off early in June.

It may now be set down almost as a rule, that in all the Atlantic seaboard counties, and, indeed, every where in the vicinity of the large cities and great thoroughfares, the whole of the summer hatching is killed off before the end of July, with the exception of a few scattered stragglers, which have escaped pursuit in some impenetrable brake or oozy quagmire which defies the foot of the sportsman; that few survive to moult, and that the diminished numbers, which we now find on our autumn shooting-grounds, are supplied exclusively by the northern and Canadian broods, which keep successively flying before the advancing cold of winter, and sojourning among us for a longer or a shorter period, ere they wing their way to the rice-fields of the Savannah, or the cane-brakes of the Mississippi.

If my method could be generally adopted, of letting the fifteenth day of September, after the moulting season is passed, and when the birds are beginning again to congregate on their favorite feeding-grounds, be the commencement of every sort of upland shooting, without any exception, the sport would be enormous; the birds at that season are in full vigor, in complete plumage, in the perfection of condition for the table, and are so strong on the wing, so active and so swift, that no one could for a moment imagine them to be the same with the miserable, puny, half-fledged younglings, which any bungling boy can butcher as he pleases, with the most miserable apparatus, and without almost as well as with a dog, during the dog-days of July.

The weather is, moreover, cool and pleasant, and in every way well-suited to the sport at this season; dogs have a chance to do their work handsomely and well, and the sportsman can do his work, too, as he ought to do it, like a man, walking at his proper rate, unmolested by mosquitoes, and without feeling the salt perspiration streaming into his eyes, until he can hardly brook the pain.

But no such hope existing as that state legislatures, dependent, not on rational but on brute opinion, should condescend to hear or listen to common sense, on matters such as game laws, are we, or are we not, to abandon our plan, to sacrifice our knowledge and enlightened views on this subject to obstinate ignorance; or shall we not take the better part, and decide, according to Minerva’s lesson in Tennyson’s magnificent Ænone,

We shall resist and persist; at least I shall—I, Frank Forester, who never in my life have killed a bird out of season intentionally, and who never will—who am compelled by sham sportsmen, cockney and pot-gunners to shoot woodcock in July; who have been invited, times out and over again, to shoot cock on men’s own ground, and therefore within the letter of the law, in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland, before the season; who have ever refused to take the advantages, which every one takes over me; and who still intend to persist, though not to hope, that there may be sense enough, if not integrity, among the legislatures of the free states, to prevent the destruction of all game within their several jurisdictions.

As the thing stands—and by the thing I mean the law—woodcock are to be shot on or about the first day of July; and if, dear reader, you try to shoot any where within fifty miles of New York, or twenty-five of Philadelphia, much later than the tenth of June, I am inclined to think that you will find wonderfully little sport; before the season, do not fire a shot, if you will take my advice, if poachers will violate the law, and the law will not enforce itself against poachers, abstain from becoming a poacher yourself, and do not shoot before the season fairly commences.

At this period of the year woodcock are almost invariably found in the lowlands; sometimes, as, for instance, at Salem, in New Jersey, and many other similar localities along the low and level shores of the Delaware, in the wide, open meadows, where there is not a bush or brake to be seen for miles; but more generally in low, swampy woods, particularly in maple woods, which have an undergrowth of alder; along the margin of oozy streamlets, creeping through moist meadows, among willow thickets; and in wet pastures trampled by cattle, and set here and there with little brakes, which afford them shade and shelter during the heat of the day.

Of the latter description is the ground, once so famous for its summer cock-shooting, known as “the drowned lands,” in Orange County, New York, extending for miles and miles along the margins of the Wallkill and its tributaries, the Black Creek, the Quaker Creek, and the beautiful Wawayanda. Many a day of glorious sport have I had on those sweet level meadows, enjoyed with friends long since dispersed and scattered, some dead, untimely, some in far distant lands, some false, and some forgetful, and thou, true-hearted, honest, merry, brave, Tom Draw; thou whilom king of hosts and emperor of sportsmen, thou, saddest fate of all, smitten, or ere thy prime was passed away, by the most fearful visitation that awaits mankind—the awful doom of blindness! never again shall I draw trigger on those once loved levels—the rail-road now thunders and whistles close beside them, and every man and boy and fool, now sports his fowling-piece; and not a woodcock on the meadows but, after running the gauntlet of a hundred shots, a hundred volleys, is consigned to the care of some conductor, by him to be delivered to Delmonico or Florence, for the benefit of fat, greasy merchant-princes; and if it were not so, if birds, swarmed as of yore in every reedy slank, by every alder-brake, in every willow tuft, the ground is haunted by too many recollections, rife with too many thick-succeeding memories to render it a fitting place, to me at least, for pleasurable or gay pursuits.

But, as I have said before, summer cock-shooting on the Drowned Lands of Orange County, is among the things that have been—one of the stars that has set, never to be relumed, in the nineteenth century; and the glory of “the Warwick Woodlands” has departed.

In Connecticut, in some parts, there is very good summer cock-shooting yet; and also in many places in the neighborhood of Philadelphia, in the rich alluvial levels around the Delaware, the Schuylkill, and their tributary rivers; but the sportsman, who really thirsts for fine shooting—shooting such as it does the heart good to hear of—must mount the iron-horse, whose breath is the hissing steam, and away, fleeter even than the wings of the morning, for Michigan and Illinois and Indiana, for the willow-brakes of Alganac, and the rice-marshes of Lake St. Clair; and there he may shoot cock till his gun-barrels are red-hot, and his heart is satiate of bird-slaughter.

It is usual at this season to shoot cock over pointers or setters, according to individual preference of this or that race of dogs; for myself, of the two, I prefer the setter, as in cock-shooting there is always abundance of water to be had, and this rough-coated, high-strung dog can face brakes and penetrate coverts, which play the mischief with the smooth satiny skin of the high-blooded pointer.

In truth, however, neither of these, but the short-legged, bony, red and white cocking-spaniel, is the true dog over which to shoot summer woodcock; and no one, I will answer for it, who has ever hunted a good cry of these, will ever again resort either to setter or pointer for this, to them, inappropriate service.

The true place for these dogs is the open plain, the golden stubble, the wide-stretching prairie, the highland moor, where they can find full scope for their heady courage, their wonderful fleetness, their unwearied industry, and display their miracles of staunchness, steadiness, and nose.

In order to hunt these dogs on cock, you must unteach them some of their noblest faculties, you must tame down their spirits, shackle their fiery speed, reduce them, in fact, to the functions of the spaniel, which is much what it would be to train a battle-charger to bear a pack-saddle, or manage an Eclipse into a lady’s ambling palfrey.

The cocking-spaniel, on the contrary, is here in his very vocation. Ever industrious, ever busy, never ranging above twenty paces from his master, bustling round every stump, prying into every fern-bush, worming his long, stout body, propped on its short, bony legs, into the densest and most matted cover, no cock can escape him.

See! one of them has struck a trail; how he flourishes his stump of a tail. Now he snuffs the tainted ground; what a rapture fills his dark, expressive eye. Now he is certain; he pauses for a moment, looks back to see if his master is at hand; “Yaff! yaff!” the brakes ring with his merry clamor, his comrade rushes to his aid like lightning, yet pauses ever, obedient to the whistle, nor presses the game too rashly, so that it rise out of distance. Up steps the master, with his thumb upon the dexter hammer, and his fore-finger on the trigger-guard. Now they are close upon the quarry; “yaff! yaff! yaff! yaff!” Flip flap! up springs the cock, with a shrill whistle, on a soaring wing. Flip flap! again—there are a couple. Deliberately prompt, up goes the fatal tube—even as the butt presses the shoulder, trigger is drawn after trigger. Bang! bang! the eye of faith and the finger of instinct have done their work, duly, truly. The thud of one bird, as he strikes the moist soil, tells that he has fallen; the long stream of feathers floating in the still air through yonder open glade, announces the fate of the second; and, before the butt of the gun, dropped to load, has touched the ground, without a word or question, down charged at the report, the busy little babblers are couched silent in the soft, succulent young grass. Loaded once more, “Hie! fetch!” and what a race of emulation—mouthing their birds gently, yet rapturously, to inhale best the delicate aroma, not biting them, each cocker has brought in his bird, and they and you, gentle reader, if you be the happy sportsman who possesses such a brace of beauties, are rewarded adequately and enough.

For the rest, a short, wide-bored, double-barrel, an ounce of No. 8 shot, and an equal measure of Brough’s diamond-grain, will do the business of friend microptera, as effectually, at this season, as a huge, long, old fashioned nine-pounder, with its two ounce charge; and it will give you this advantage, that it shall weigh less by three pounds, and enable you to dispense with a superfluous weight of shot, which, on a hot July day, especially if you be at all inclined to what our friend Willis calls pinguitude, will of a necessity produce much exudation, and some lassitude.

By the time these lucubrations shall be in thy hands, kind and gentle sportsman, the dog-days will be, and July cock-shooting; and that, where thou shootest soever, thou mayest find the woodcock lying as thick and as lazy as in the cut above, is the worst wish in thy behalf, of thy friend and servant at command,

Frank Forester.

A NEW PAGE OF NATURAL HISTORY.

———

BY L. A. WILMER.

———

Of all marine animals (except midshipmen and second-lieutenants in the navy) the shark is, perhaps, one of the most unpopular. In general, it is difficult to give reason for the unpopularity or popularity of any thing, but with reference to the shark, there is much reason to suppose that he has, by cruel misrepresentation, been exposed to unmerited dislike. Had he been altogether bad, it is most likely that he would have found a zealous advocate long ago; whereas, we are the first, we believe, who ever undertook to say a word in his defense. As a shark is thought to have many counterparts among the human species, we must be extremely careful how we launch our invectives at him, lest by direct implication we should abuse some of our most respectable fellow-citizens. But, without affectation, we have always felt a high degree of respect for this inhabitant of the deep, to whom we may justly ascribe some very estimable and admirable qualities. In the first place, he is the great controversialist of the watery world. “If he cannot always convince,” as some one said of a renowned American orator, “he never failed to silence his opponent;” and this, in the tactics of disputation, is almost as grand an achievement as convincing itself. We read that Tycho Brahe had his nose bitten off in a controversy with another distinguished mathematician. But, although the shark—provided as he is with a jaw as effective as a broad-axe—is well qualified to “chop logic,” we doubt if he would be satisfied with such a paltry exploit as that which has been accredited to Tycho’s snappish adversary; and, indeed, we see no use in mincing the matter when it becomes necessary to “use up” an opponent. The best advice we can give in such a case is to “go the whole hog” at once. But it is not with the controversial abilities of the shark that we have to deal at present. It was the chief design of this sketch to speak chiefly of his business habits—on which we intend to found a certain comparison that we have in our eye—and so (as Bottom, the weaver, says) “to grow to a conclusion.”

The shark is a great speculator in his way. He follows in the wake of the ship for days and weeks together, looking out for “a good chance.” His industry and perseverance are rewarded at last, if a poor Jack Tar happen to fall overboard; but if disappointed in his expectations of such an auspicious event, he is obliged to console himself with Jacob Faithful’s excellent maxim, “better luck next time.” If, in pursuit of his object, instead of catching a jolly fat sailor, he should be hooked or harpooned himself, he philosophically considers it as a fair business transaction; for, in every speculation, somebody must suffer—the great object of all speculating skill being to decide who is to be victimized. Speculation, therefore, is pretty much the same thing in substance, whether it be terrene or aquatic.

Shakspeare, with his customary acuteness of observation, declares that there are “both land-rats and water-rats.” Some other immortal genius has made the startling discovery that there are both water-sharks and land-sharks; and we find that in each of these generic divisions there is more specific arrangement than we have leisure or inclination to discuss. The engraver has supplied us with a specimen of one variety of the land-shark, which may be distinguished at a glance by the globular symbols at the end of the tail—the use or meaning of which has never been clearly explained, though the world has been favored with many ingenious hypotheses in relation to the subject. The common opinion is that the three balls are significative of the fact, that should the animal get possession of any of your property, it is two to one that you will never recover it. Others say that as balls have a remarkable facility in going down hill, they significantly point out the route you are likely to take should you venture to have any dealings with this formidable creature.

The least observation of the picture will convince you that there is speculation in the eye of this land-shark. Mark the eager expression! so much like that you may have observed in the glance of his maritime brother, as he ogled you from his billowy alcove. See the open mouth, and teeth displayed, as if prepared for a “bite.” Judging from the “valence” (as Hamlet calls it,) at the bottom of the visage, we opine that this animal does not shave himself—though he is said to shave his victims rather closely. The beard, by the way, is regarded as a hereditary characteristic of this devouring race—the origin of which is traced to Lombardy. The ancient inhabitants of that country were called Longobardi, which name some etymologists derive from Latin words, signifying long-beards. Among these unshaven gentry, it appears, pawn-broking, the most remorseless kind of shaving, was first established. From this seminary of shavers, the whole world was supplied with professors—fellows remarkable for great latitude of conscience as well as longitude of beard; benevolent fellows, too, always ready to accommodate the needy with a loan, “on the most agreeable terms”—as some of them promise to do, per advertisement, at the present day; the phrase, “most agreeable terms,” being understood to signify one hundred and fifty per cent. per annum! This moderate rate of interest is continued down to our own times, showing that the pawn-broker is piously attached to the usages of his ancestors, while others, in the race for improvement, are constantly trampling, with profane feet, on the ashes of the venerable dead.

“My Uncle,” as the pawn-broker is affectionately called by his customers, honors the assumed relationship by loaning out his dollars to every applicant who can comply with his stipulations. In this particular, some gay, frolicksome nephew would propose him as a model for uncles in general; especially because he never requires an exact account of how the cash loaned is to be expended, nor does he seem to take it for granted that you are on the direct road to ruin because you happen to stand in need of pecuniary assistance. On the contrary, he speaks of money-borrowing as one of the finest strokes of policy, and professes his willingness to lend any imaginable sum—if you are prepared to deposit some “collateral” worth about four times the amount. This being done, your generous creditor never harasses you for repayment, you may abscond, if you choose, and proceed to California, or any other remote region celebrated for gold, or brimstone—assuring yourself that your kind “uncle” will not interfere with your departure or inquire after you when you are gone.

With all this liberality and generous forbearance, the pawn-broker is regarded as one of the most voracious of predatory animals; but be it understood that there are land-sharks compared with which he is a mere minnow, inasmuch as his operations are all on a small scale, and the figure he makes among the speculating leviathans of the day is comparatively insignificant.

The Harpers are printing this entertaining work as fast as the volumes are received from England. The English price is about three dollars and a half a volume; the American twenty-five cents. As a record of Southey’s life, character, and opinions, and as conducting us into the workshop of the greatest of book-makers, the work has great value, apart from its attractive qualities of literary and personal gossip. The impression it leaves of Southey is, on the whole, a favorable one. It makes him appear as an honest, just, active, persistent, independent man,—one who can “toil terribly,”—a staunch friend, a direct and open opponent,—with a good deal of bigotry but no deviltry,—and altogether a person with few of the vices which most commonly beset writers by profession. His letters are admirable, both in themselves and as true specimens of epistolary composition. They show Southey just as he was, quick in forming opinions, confident in expressing them, thoroughly convinced that he had no intellectual superior in England, freed from envy by self-esteem, and ready to settle every question that is started, by a few dogmatic sentences, which sparkle “like salt in fire.” The singular perfection of his character, considered in respect to its capacity for active intellectual labor, came from his almost miraculous confidence in his faculties and content with himself. He has so high an opinion of Robert Southey as to be unconcerned about any thing which lies beyond the grasp of his powers, and, accordingly, however much we may find reason to doubt or deny many of his statements, they ever have a joyous raciness which tingles pleasantly on our perceptions.

The present work commences with a delightful autobiography, which Southey carried down to the age of fifteen. His son then takes up the narrative. This, however, is little more than arranging the correspondence, and explaining allusions in it. The great charm of Southey’s style is its stimulating simplicity; and this is felt throughout the present “Life.” We have marked, in reading the work, a number of passages, which seem to us especially characteristic, and cannot refrain from quoting a few of them. He tells us, in his autobiography, that his elder brother was very beautiful; “so much so, that, when I made my appearance on the 12th of August, 1774, I was sadly disparaged by comparison with him. My mother, asking if it was a boy, was answered by her nurse, in a tone as little favorable to me as it was flattering, ‘Ay, a great ugly boy!’ and she added, when she told me this, ‘God forgive me! when I saw what a great red creature it was, covered with rolls of fat, I thought I should never be able to love him.’” This is the most perfectly dramatic statement of the most important event which can happen to a person, ever given in a biography; and it conciliates the reader at once.

The record of his early life is given with much amusing details. His parents were rather illiterate, and he depended on chance to gratify his thirst for books, with nobody to select what were proper to his age. He read Beaumont and Fletcher through before he was eight years old,—a most curious book for a child, when we consider the obscenity, licentiousness, and slang which mingle with the romantic beauty of those dramatists. He says they did him no harm, for the reason that he was so young. In Mrs. Rowe’s Letters he read her version of the stories of Olendo and Sophronia, and the Enchanted Forest, from Tasso, and despaired at the time of ever reading more of the poem until he was man, “from a whimsical notion that, as the subject related to Jerusalem, the original must be in Hebrew;” and there was not learning enough in his father’s house to set him right on the point.

Perhaps the most interesting peculiarity of books like the present, is their expression of the private opinions which their subjects entertained of contemporary men and events. This certainly is the raciest element in the Correspondence of Southey, and his letters are next in attractiveness to a cosy chat with himself. Of Bentham, he remarks—“It has pleased the metaphysico-critico-politico-patriotico-phoolo-philosopher Jeremy Bentham, to designate me, in one of his opaque works, by the appellation of St. Southey, for which I humbly thank his Jeremy Benthamship, and have in part requited him.” His hatred of Jeffrey, and contempt of Reviews, provoke many a sardonic remark, replete with his peculiar humor. “Turner,” he writes to Rickman, “complained heavily of Scotch criticism, which he seems to feel too much. Such things only provoke me to interject Fool! and Booby! seasoned with the participle damnatory; but as for being vexed at a review—I should as soon be fevered by a flea-bite! . . . I look upon the invention of reviews to be the worst injury which literature has received since its revival.” Of Coleridge he says—“His mind is in a perfect St. Vitus’s dance—eternal activity without action.” Jeffrey, according to Southey, is a bad politician, a worse moralist, and a critic, in matters of taste, equally incompetent and unjust. It is unfortunate that his criticism on himself and on others, in these letters, is not of a kind to entitle him to condemn the editor of the Edinburgh Review. “Cowper,” he asserts, “owed his popularity to his piety, not to his poetry, and that piety was craziness.” His opinion was altered, of course, when he afterward edited an edition of Cowper’s works. Of Walter Savage Lander’s poem of Gebir, he says—“I look upon Gebir, as I do upon Dante’s long poem in the Italian, not as a good poem, but as containing the finest poetry in the language.” His power of appreciating Wordsworth may be estimated by his remark, in a letter to Scott, on the “Ode on the Intimations of Immortality from the Recollections of Childhood.” “The Ode on Pre-existence,” he says, “is a dark subject darkly handled. Coleridge is the only man who could make such a subject luminous. The Leech Gatherer is one of my favorites.” We might quote many other critical judgments, “equally incompetent and unjust,” but if the last does not satisfy the reader, it is impossible to quote any thing that will.

The following passage, from a letter written in 1812, gives so vivid an impression of Shelley in his enthusiastic youth, that we cannot refrain from extracting it. The style is very characteristic of Southey’s manner throughout the letters.

“Here is a man in Keswick, who acts upon me as my own ghost would do. He is just what I was in 1794. His name is Shelley, son to the member for Shoreham, with £6000 a year entailed upon him, and as much more in his father’s power to cut off. Beginning with romances of ghosts and murder, and with poetry at Eton, he passed, at Oxford, into metaphysics; printed half-a-dozen pages, which he entitled “The Necessity of Atheism;” sent one anonymously to Coplestone, in expectation, I suppose, of converting him; was expelled in consequence; married a girl of seventeen, after being turned out of doors by his father; and here they both are, in lodgings, living upon £200 a year, which her father allows them. He is come to the fittest physician in the world. At present he has got to the Pantheistic stage of philosophy, and, in the course of a week, I expect he will be a Berkleyan, for I have put him upon a course of Berkley. It has surprised him a good deal to meet, for the first time in his life, a man who perfectly understands him, and does him full justice. I tell him that all the difference between us is that he is nineteen and I am thirty-seven; and I dare say it will not be very long before I shall succeed in convincing him that he may be a true philosopher, and do a great deal of good with £6000 a year; the thought of which troubles him a great deal more at present than ever the want of sixpence (for I have known such a want) did me. God help us! the world wants mending, though he did not set about it exactly in the right way.”

This Life of Southey promises to be an important addition to the biographical treasures of English literature, and we look with great expectation for the remaining volumes, which will record his quarrels with Byron, his coldness to Coleridge, and the publication of his most important works.

This work is a real addition to English literature, containing a succinct view of a subject which has heretofore been treated by those English scholars, who have treated of it at all, in a fragmentary and unsatisfactory manner. The Slavic nations contain a population of seventy millions, and it is strange that a work like the present has not been produced before, the subject being rich in matter both to interest and instruct the better class of readers.

“Taloi,” as we presume is well known, is the name assumed by Mrs. Robinson, the learned wife of the learned gentleman who prefaces the present history. Few living women can be said to excel her in the rare combination of erudition with heartiness. This volume owes much of its attractiveness to the feminine qualities which sometimes guide and sometimes relieve her erudite researches. Her selection of anecdotes, illustrative of national character, is very happy. In speaking of the submission with which the Slavic Nations received Christianity, the people readily following their superiors, she remarks, that “Vladimir the Great, to whom the Gospel and the Koran were offered at the same time, was long undecided which to choose; and was at last induced to embrace the former, because ‘his Russians could not live without the pleasure of drinking.’”

There are many poetical translations in the volume of much excellence, some of them having such a marked peculiarity that, without knowing the originals, a critic might pronounce them to be true versions. Two or three poems, relating to the desolate condition of motherless orphans, are introduced by a reference to a Danish ballad, which we trust that Longfellow will search after and translate. “The Danes,” says Taloi, “have a beautiful ballad, in which the ghost of a mother is roused by the wailings and sufferings of her deserted offspring, to break with supernatural power the gravestone, and to re-enter, in the stillness of the night, the neglected nursery, in order to cheer, to nurse, to comb and wash the dear little ones whom God once entrusted to her care.” The following translation of a ballad, written in the Upper Lusatian language, we extract:

The naïveté of this is similar to a little quotation which the author gives from a Servian elegy. A poor girl sings: “Our Lord has of every thing his fill; but of poor people he seems to have greater plenty than of anything else!”

The following description, from a Servian lyric, we commend to contributors to Albums. It will keep them in comparisons for a life-time:

The simplicity of the ballads which Mrs. Robinson has so copiously translated, will win many readers who take but little interest in intellectual history. But it is as a history of literature that the book is deserving of most attention, and as a historian the author displays great learning, gracefully managed. The criticism is conducted on enlarged principles of taste, and the diction is uniformly clear, condensed, and elegant. The publisher has done his part towards making the volume attractive, by printing it in large type on good paper.

We cannot divine the publisher’s object in engaging the services of “one of the best French Scholars in this Country,” and moreover “a member of the Philadelphia Bar,” to translate this miserable trash into bad English. Some of the later works of George Sand, undoubtedly evince genius, but the novel under consideration, one of the first products of her unregulated passions and speculative profligacy, has nothing in plot, character, incident, or style, to give piquancy to its coarseness. It is licentious, but then it is so stupid, that its perusal would be a penance to a roué. Its immorality and falsehood might have a charm to some minds, but the raciness of these qualities is spoiled by the detestable and yawn-provoking sentimentality by which they are pervaded. The publication of such books is an offence equally to taste and morals, and tends to corrupt the intellect as well as the conscience of such readers as are foolish enough to buy them, and bad enough to read them. One of the worst signs of the times is the systematic degradation of literature into a mere handmaid of profligacy, as exhibited in the numberless manufactories of cheap damnation spread all over the land—manufactories which send out an incessant stream of ugly looking pamphlet novels, whose leading claim to notice is their brazen brainlessness and stupid indecency. We have been informed that these things are read, but on what principles of human nature the assertion is made is a mystery to us. They are so absolutely unreadable, according to the worse view ever taken of the human mind by misanthrope or metaphysician, that we must be allowed to doubt the fact, and to congratulate the philanthropist that the devil, in this case, has underrated the taste even of our blackguards and flats. We do hope for the credit of the species, that if the popular heart and conscience are doomed to be corrupted by a cheap literature, it will not be done by such wretched stuff as forms the staple of George Sand’s “Indiana.”

The author of this volume has already distinguished herself as the writer of two popular novels, in which a distinct moral purpose is connected with well drawn characters and interesting events. In the present work she makes woman the reformer of social evils, and views her as she appears at the North, the South, and the West. There are many opinions expressed for which Miss McIntosh can only give what logicians call “the lady’s reason,” but, as a whole, the book is calculated to do good, and can be safely commended to the attention of “Women in America.”

COMPOSED BY

N. STEENCKEN,

AND RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED TO

MRS. A. WATSON.

Presented by Lee & Walker, 162 Chestnut Street.

NO. 1.—ESMERALDA.

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Tight fitting pardessus, bordered with gimp, and trimmed with a thin, loose fringe, twisted at the end. The sleeve is formed by the stuff folded on itself; but it is not separate from the body.

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Pardessus for the house, of taffetas trimmed with ruches and pinked or scalloped trimmings.

Anaïs Toudouze

Many thousands of the readers of Graham’s Magazine, will be glad to welcome in this form this admirable sea novel, which was published in this Magazine in 1840. It was one of the most popular articles that ever appeared in this country, and now that the author avows himself, he will justly be placed among the foremost writers of the age for directness and energy of style, graphic force of description and skillful delineation of character. Cooper, in his palmiest days, never excelled the splendor of some of the descriptive passages of this writer. Many of the incidents we learn, for the first time, are taken from events that occurred during the war, and the whole story is drawn from the original log-book of a privateer of 1812, now in the possession of the author.

It is refreshing to turn to the natural, patriotic tone of this work, after wading through the sea of indifferent books, which now-a-days make up the marketable cheap literature; and we thank Mr. Peterson, on this account, for allowing the Cruisings to appear. It will find a welcome and a response in the hearts of all pure men; and purchasers wherever a spark of patriotism lingers. It is sold at the cheap rate of twenty-five cents, and by the hundred at a still lower price.

Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts.—We had hoped to be able to notice the Spring Exhibition of this Society, but cannot do justice to the splendid array of home and foreign talent on the walls of its Galleries, in the present number; our comments must, therefore, be delayed until next month. A large number of paintings have been received from Europe, in competition for the prizes offered by the Academy. Among these, we may enumerate the following: “Ahasuerus, King of the Medea and Persians, exalting Mordecai,” by P. Van Schendel, of Brussels; “Wrecking and Succour,” and “The Schelde in a fresh gale,” by P. T. Schotel, of Mendembled, Holland; “The Auspicious Moment,” and “The Recovery,” by Carl Hubner, of Dusseldorf; “An Auction Scene,” by A. W. Wedeking, of Bremen; two “Views in the High Alps,” by G. F. Diday, of Bremen; “Amphitrite and Diana,” after Moreto’s Spanish comedy, “El desden con el desden,” by J. Schoppe, of Berlin; “Ruins of Castle Teck on the Suabian Alps,” by H. Herdtle, of Stuttgard; “Judith and Holofernes,” by E. Jacobs, of Gotha; “The Marseillaise first song by Rouget de Lisle,” by Godefri Gaffens, of Antwerp; “A Lake Scene,” by Ildephonse Stoequart, of Antwerp; “Abraham receiving the Divine Promise,” by J. A. Kruseman; “Joseph and Potiphar’s Wife,” by François Vinck, of Anvers, Belgium; “Tobias Receiving his Wife,” and an “Italian Peasant Girl,” by Edward Ihlee, of Cassel; “The Judgment of Solomon,” by Jh. Van Severdonck, of Brussels; three panels, “Adam and Eve finding the dead body of Abel,” “Abel carried to Heaven by an Angel,” and “Cain in the power of Satan,” by Edward du Jardin, of Antwerp; “The Penny of Cæsar,” by Joseph Belleman, of Antwerp; “A Roman Aqueduct at Alcala-la-Real in Spain, with a Caravan of Muleteers,” by F. Bossuet, of Brussels; and several others. The productions of our own artists are numerous, and will challenge a favorable comparison with these. Rothermel’s latest work will add greatly to his reputation.

Chromo Xylography.—The very beautiful title-page, for the July volume, which we furnish our readers in this number, is the work of Mr. Devereux, an accomplished artist of this city. This style of art is known as “Chromo Xylography,” and Mr. Devereux has certainly, thus far excelled all other artists in the beauty and delicacy of his pictures. The Lake of Como—the central design of our picture—is printed in eight different tints; and the blending of colors has all the purity of painting. When it is considered that this effect is produced by printing from eight different blocks, we may consider this picture an achievement, and highly creditable to its designer.

True Paris Fashions.—We resume with this number, our Paris Fashions, which our subscribers will at once see are far superior in beauty of design and coloring to any that have appeared in Graham for a long time. The order for this plate we sent to Paris the moment we ascertained that we should again become the exclusive conductor of “Graham,” and our agent is instructed to forward one each month, from the best houses there, to appear simultaneously with the same designs in Paris. We thus furnish our colored plate—one month in advance of even wood-cut fashion plates—and at least two months earlier than those which are re-engraved and colored in this country. This single feature of “Graham” renders it superior to any work in this country, in regard to embellishments.

OURSELF.

If blushes were transferable, our face in the magazine for this month, should, we suppose, be like a maiden’s before the ardor of her first lover—but steel is as unsusceptible as brass, we find; so, with a very unconscious air, we shall brave the battery of bright eyes, impervious to a frown.

As to our Memoir, by Mr. Peterson—the veritable Jeremy Short—it is done in his most amiable vein; and though not exactly the history of the Wandering Jew—being rather that of Barnaby Rudge’s Raven, crying continually, “Never say die”—our readers may take it with the grains of allowance which should be given to a vigorous writer with a fine imagination, who is determined to make a hero.

We had written a long article, commemorative of other days, but have since thought it better to let by-gones be by-gones. That we feel proud of our reinstation in this Magazine—the child of our happier days—we shall not deny. The gold that bought it for us—if estimated by the happiness it has diffused—must have dropped from heaven, baptized for good. The dark shadows—the regrets and heart-burnings of the past are over. A bright future is before us, high hopes and determined resolves are ours now—light leaps over the mountain-tops, and the “good time” so long a coming, rushes joyfully to meet us—is here.

“Graham.”

Our thanks are due to our brethren of the quill throughout the entire Union, for the very general, and very generous welcome we have received on coming back to the profession. While we shall never forget their kindness, and have small hopes of ever being able to repay a tythe of it, we shall endeavor so to act as not to dishonor their endorsement, or to forfeit their good opinion.

Transcriber’s Notes:

Archaic spellings and hyphenation have been retained as well as some spellings peculiar to Graham’s. Punctuation has been corrected without note. Other errors have been corrected as noted below. For illustrations, some caption text may be missing or incomplete due to condition of the originals used for preparation of the ebook.

[The end of Graham's Magazine Vol. XXXVII No. 1 (July 1850) edited by George R. Graham]