INDIAN ELOQUENCE.

The following beautiful, simple, energetic, and affecting Speech was made by Logan, Chief of the Shawanesses, in the Year 1774, to Lord Dunmore, Governor of the Province of Virginia.

I now ask of every white man whether he hath ever entered the cottage of Logan, when pressed with hunger, and been refused food; or, whether coming naked and shivering with cold, Logan hath not given him something to cover himself with? During the course of the late war, so long and so bloody, Logan hath remained quiet upon his mat, wishing to be the advocate of peace. Yes, such is my attachment for white men, that even those of my nation, when they passed by me, pointed at me, saying, Logan is a friend to white men. I had even thoughts of living amongst you; but that was before the injury received from one of you. Last summer Colonel Cressop massacred in cold blood, and without any provocation, all the relations of Logan, without sparing either his wife or his children. There is not now one drop of my blood in the veins of any human creature existing. This is what has excited my revenge. I have sought it; I have killed several of your people, and my hatred is appeased. I rejoice to see the prospect of peace brighten upon my country. But do not imagine my joy is instigated by fear. Logan knows not what fear is. He will never turn his back in order to save his life. But, alas! no one remains to mourn for Logan when he shall be no more.

ON ENTHUSIASM OF CHARACTER.

The shades of human character are so numerous, and the advantages resulting from an extensive acquaintance with them, of so much importance, that few subjects, perhaps, are more worthy of attention or speculation; and it would be a task of the highest advantage to society, could we trace the source and causes of the diversities, and point out the particular advantages resulting from each. By the former of these, we should, in some degree, be enabled to train the mind to the fashion most amiable and really advantageous; by the latter, we should have the opportunity of directing to their proper objects of pursuit the passions and dispositions as they are displayed before us.

BON MOT.

A gentleman who possessed a much larger quantity of nose, than nature usually bestows upon an individual, contrived to make it more enormous by his invincible attachment to the bottle, which also beset it with emeralds and rubies. To add to his misfortunes, this honest toper’s face was somewhat disfigured by not having a regular pair of eyes; one being black, and the other of a reddish hue. A person happening once to observe, that his eyes were not fellows, congratulated him on that circumstance. The rosy gilled old tipler demanded the reason. “Because,” replied the jocular genius, “if your eyes had been matches, your nose would certainly have set them in a flame, and a dreadful conflagration might have been apprehended.”

Account of the COURTSHIP and MARRIAGE of the celebrated DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.

Johnson had from his early youth, been sensible to the influence of female charms. When at Stourbridge school, he was much enamoured of Olivia Lloyd, a young quaker, to whom he wrote a copy of verses, which I have not been able to recover; and I am assured by Miss Seward, that he conceived a tender passion for Miss Lucy Porter, daughter of the lady whom he afterwards married. Miss Porter was sent very young on a visit to Litchfield, where Johnson had frequent opportunities of seeing and admiring her; and he addressed to her the following verses, on her presenting him with a nosegay of myrtle:

His juvenile attachments to the fair sex were, however, very transient; and it is certain, that he formed no criminal connection whatsoever. Mr. Hector, who lived with him in his younger days in the utmost intimacy and social freedom, has assured me, that even at that ardent season his conduct was strictly virtuous in that respect; and that though he loved to exhilarate himself with wine, he never knew him intoxicated but once.

In a man whose religious education has secured from licentious indulgences, the passion of love, when once it has seized him, is exceedingly strong; being unimpaired by dissipation, and totally concentrated in one object. This was experienced by Johnson, when he became the fervent admirer of Mrs. Porter, after her first husband’s death. Miss Porter told me, that when he was first introduced to her mother, his appearance was very forbidding: he was then lean and lank, so that his immense structure of bones was hideously striking to the eye, and the scars of the scrophula were deeply visible. He also wore his hair, which was straight and stiff, and separated behind; and he often had, seemingly, convulsive starts and odd gesticulations, which tended to excite at once surprise and ridicule. Mrs. Porter was so much engaged by his conversation that she overlooked all these external disadvantages, and said to her daughter, “this is the most sensible man I ever saw in my life.”

Though Mrs. Porter was double the age of Johnson, and her person and manner, as described to me by the late Mr. Garrick, were by no means pleasing to others, she must have had a superiority of understanding and talents, as she certainly inspired him with a more than ordinary passion; and she having signified her willingness to accept of his hand, he went to Litchfield to ask his mother’s consent to the marriage, which he could not but be conscious was a very imprudent scheme, both on account of their disparity of years, and her want of fortune. But Mrs. Johnson knew too well the ardour of her son’s temper, and was too tender a parent to oppose his inclinations.

I know not for what reason the marriage ceremony was not performed at Birmingham; but a resolution was taken that it should be at Derby, for which place the bride and bridegroom set out on horseback, I suppose in very good humour. But though Mr. Topham Beauclerk used archly to mention Johnson’s having told him, with much gravity, “Sir, it was a love-marriage on both sides,” I have had from my illustrious friend the following curious account of their journey to church upon the nuptial morn. “Sir, she had read the old romances, and had got into her head the fantastical notion that a woman of spirit should use her lover like a dog. So, Sir, at first she told me that I rode too fast, and she could not keep up with me; and, when I rode a little slower, she passed me, and complained that I lagged behind. I was not to be made the slave of caprice; and I resolved to begin as I meant to end. I therefore pushed on briskly, ’till I was fairly out of her sight. The road lay between two hedges, so I was sure she could not miss it; and I contrived that the should soon come up with me. When she did, I observed her to be in tears.”

This, it must be allowed, was a singular beginning of connubial felicity; but there is no doubt that Johnson, though he thus shewed a manly firmness, proved a most affectionate and indulgent husband to the last moment of Mrs. Johnson’s life; and in his “Prayers and Meditations,” we find very remarkable evidence that his regard and fondness for her never ceased, even after her death.

ANGER.

Lord Somers was naturally of a choleric disposition; and the most striking part of his character, was the power of controuling his passion at the moment when it seemed ready to burst forth. Swift, in his “Four last Years of Queen Anne,” has in vain endeavoured to blacken this amiable part of that great man’s character, as what the dean mistook for a severe censure, has proved the greatest panegyric. “Lord Somers being sensible how subject he is to violent passions, avoids all incitements to them by teaching those, whom he converses with, from his own example, to keep within the bounds of decency; and it is indeed true, that no man is more apt to take fire upon the least appearance of provocation; which temper he strives to subdue, with the utmost violence upon himself; so that his breast has been seen to heave, and his eyes to sparkle with rage in those very moments when his words and the cadence of his voice were in the humblest and softest manner.”

THE VICTIM OF MAGICAL DELUSION.
OR, INTERESTING MEMOIRS OF MIGUEL, DUKE DE CA*I*A.

UNFOLDING MANY CURIOUS UNKNOWN HISTORICAL FACTS.

Translated from the German of Tschink.

(Continued from page 70.)

She stopped in the second street at a large palace, telling me that we were on the spot. I ordered the servant to tell his lady, the Marchese Albertini would be glad to wait on her Ladyship, and was admitted. I hastened through the first apartment with a panting heart, and the second door being opened, was very kindly received by an old lady. I was almost petrified by that unexpected sight, like a poor disappointed wretch who, deceived by magic art, expects to rush into the arms of an immortal beauty, suddenly embraces an old toothless beldam. The lady seemed to be equally surprised. I did not know whether it was on account of my person or my astonishment—and I begged her pardon, in a faultering accent, for having committed that mistake, telling her that I had taken the liberty to intrude upon her, in hopes of seeing the Countess de Clairval, when——the door of a third apartment was opened, and a lady beautiful as an angel, dressed in white satin, and of a majestic form, made her appearance. I flew to meet her---and pressed Amelia’s hand to my glowing lips.

Her lovely cheeks were covered with a crimson hue, and after a short interval of silent astonishment, she exclaimed: “Is it possible, my Lord! How does it happen that we have the honour of seeing you here?”

“I don’t know it myself!” I exclaimed, “my life is an uninterrupted train of wonders, and it was certainly one of the most fortunate that brought me to your Ladyship!”

“You find me in the company of a friend,” Amelia said, introducing me to the old lady, “whom I had lost in my earlier youth, but found again four months ago through a most singular accident, which however I think to be one of the most fortunate of my life. You will recollect that when I related to you the history of my youth, I mentioned a white lady who appeared to me in the dusk of evening, in a grotto in my father’s garden, and who had directed and cheered me in my juvenile years like a heavenly being---”

“And that white lady---”

“Is the Baroness de Delier, who is now standing before you.”

“Is it possible?” I exclaimed.

“Yes, it is really so!” replied the lady archly smiling.

I now began to examine her face more attentively. Her physiognomy was exceeding interesting, bearing strong marks of sensibility, and of former beauty, the traces of which the voracious tooth of time had not been able to destroy.

“My Lady,” said I, “the Countess has related to me so much that is noble and wonderful of you, that my astonishment is as natural as my curiosity will be deemed pardonable by you.”

“I dare say,” Amelia interrupted me, “it will give you pleasure if I beg the Baroness to be so kind as to explain that wonderful circumstance to you?”

“Why not,” replied Lady Delier, “let us sit down; old age is thought to be talkative; however I shall be brief in my narrative:——A friend of mine who knew Amelia, and was no stranger to the cruel treatment which she received from her unnatural mother, lived in a house which was separated from that of her parents only by two gardens. The description which my friend gave me of the sufferings of the innocent girl, affected me so much the more, as I ever have been uncommonly fond of children. I resolved to alleviate the hapless fate of the poor child; and with that view designed a plan, which I carried into execution, assisted by her nurse, whom I bribed with fair words and a sum of money. The gardens of my friend, and Amelia’s parents, were separated only by a wall, which had a little gate leading from the garden of the former to the grotto which was in that of the latter. This gate was opened for me by the nurse, who, according to my direction, always retired when I came, and watched at the entrance of the garden to warn me by a signal against sudden surprise. I dare say, my Lord, Amelia will have informed you of my conversations and actions in the grotto.”---

“But why did you conceal your name and rank from the Countess?” I enquired.

“In order to prevent being found out, if the little girl in her childish innocence should have spoken of her meetings with the white lady. When Amelia advanced in years I continued the mystery, because I had observed that it gave to my visits an additional value in her eyes, and rendered my consolations and instructions more effective. However, I did not mean never to disclose my name to her, and I had entrusted the solution of the mystery to the sealed paper which I gave to the daughter of my heart when I took leave of her, and which she afterwards lost.”

“If I am not mistaken, you gave the sealed paper to the Countess, with the injunction to open it when she should have found the man whom her heart should choose for a partner in her happiness and affliction!”

“You are not mistaken! it contained some instructions which are very useful to a girl in love.”

“You foretold the Countess when you took leave of her, that her unhappy fate would take a fortunate turn after three months, and that prediction has really been accomplished by the aunt of the Countess.”

“This was very natural, because the whole matter had been arranged already by the intercession of my friend, who was very intimate with her aunt.”

“But why did you not continue your visits till the arrival of her aunt?”

“Because I went abroad with the Baron de Delier.”

“And you have never seen the Countess since?”

“No! and we should perhaps never have met again, if important affairs had not called me to **** after the decease of the Baron. I saw the Countess accidentally when I was coming from the cathedral. O! my Lord, what are all worldly pleasures, if compared to the happiness of such a re-union? The emotions of my heart broke out so violently, that we were obliged to get in the carriage, and to drive to Amelia’s hermitage, to prevent our being crushed to death by the gaping multitude.”

“Indeed,” exclaimed the Countess, shedding tears of sensibility, and pressing the hand of the Baroness to her bosom, “I shall never forget that day while this heart is beating!”

“And yet, would you believe it, my Lord,” resumed the Baroness, after an affecting pause, “I could scarcely prevail upon her to leave the castle in the forest, and to remove to mine, where we are leading an happy and contented life. My Amelia indeed was turned a downright hermit.”

“I confess, my dear friend,” replied the Countess, “I was so charmed with my solitary residence, and the retired and quiet life I led suited the state of my mind so well, that no one but my dear Baroness could have persuaded me to change my situation.”

The fleeting hours passed rapidly away amid pleasing discourses, and evening was already far advanced before I could resolve to take leave of Amelia and her amiable companion. At length I parted reluctantly, and having been invited to repeat my visit the day following, returned to my lodging in a trance of happiness and joy.

Amelia was the sole object of my thoughts before I fell asleep; Amelia’s image sweetened my rest; her name was the first sound that came from my lips when I awoke, and in her presence I spent the greatest part of the day in a trance of unspeakable bliss.

Her cheerfulness declined, however, with every new day; her serene looks began to grow gloomy; her innate frankness and affability gave room to reserve and melancholy, which she endeavoured in vain to conceal. I surprised her several times fixing her eyes on me in a melancholy manner, and casting down her looks with consternation when she perceived that I observed it—she spoke little, and what she said was incoherent—yet her behaviour was not repelling—her bosom seemed to conceal some secret uneasiness, the cause of which I strove in vain to explore. As often as I began to speak of the Unknown, Amelia looked perplexed and timid at Lady Delier, who always turned the conversation to a different object. I was certain that the Irishman had been in the house; they even confessed that he had informed them of my elevation to the ducal dignity; but this was all I could learn. This circumstance and Amelia’s behaviour gave rise to apprehensions which made me suffer the torments of hell. I could not endure this situation longer than four days; at the evening of the fourth day I took advantage of an opportunity which I had to speak to Lady Delier in private, and pressed her to unfold that mystery to me. After many fruitless persuasions, I obtained at length the promise to be informed of what I so anxiously wished to know, and was requested to meet her at twelve o’clock the next day in the fir-grove behind the garden of the castle, when she would satisfy my curiosity.

I awaited the noon-tide hour with impatience. At length the wished for hour arrived, and with the last stroke I was going to hasten to the fir-grove, however I met the Irishman on the stair-case. “Come with me, my Lord!” he said, as soon as he saw me!

“Whither?”

“You will be surprised in a most pleasing manner. Make haste, my carriage is waiting for you.”

“I cannot accept your invitation before one o’clock. I must finish first a business of great importance, which cannot be postponed.”

“My business also cannot be postponed, and is of far greater importance. I am going to take you to an old acquaintance whom you have ardently wished to see this good while.”

“An old acquaintance—whom I have ardently wished to see?---It is not---”

“Your tutor I mean. Come, make haste!” 

I embraced the Irishman with a loud exclamation of joy, pressed him vehemently to my heart, and leaped into the carriage.

We drove through the city gate; our horses gallopped at a furious rate, and yet they were too slow for my impatience. “Is he far from hence?” I exclaimed, “where does he live, is he well, does he know that I am coming?” “All that you shall know presently!” said the Irishman, ordering the coachman to stop.

We got out of the carriage, and the sun was overclouding like the face of the Irishman. He uttered not a word, and made a silent signal to follow him.

The place where we were was a lonely solitary spot in the suburbs. The Irishman stopped at a high wall over which the tops of tall trees were portending. My conductor looked at me with a melancholy air, and then beat with his fist against a large gate. The folding doors burst open with a dreadful noise, and I beheld a burying-place before me. The Irishman entered. “What business have we here?” I exclaimed in a faultering accent. “Come along and be a man!” so saying, he pulled me after him, and the door was shut again by an invisible hand.

(To be continued.)

BENEVOLENCE.

There is a beautiful story recorded in an ancient Pagan writer, “That the deity who formed the first man out of the ground, reflecting at the same time on the calamities which the unhappy creature was to undergo, wept over his work, and tempered it with tears.” By this accident man was endued with a softness of disposition, and the most tender feelings: his descendants inherited these benevolent qualities, that by mutually relieving each other’s sufferings, they might in some measure alleviate their own; and that some amends might be made for the natural wants and imperfections of their nature, by the pleasure which they receive from soothing distress, and softening disappointment.

For the New-York Weekly Magazine.

HAPPINESS.

Thou art the being that the whole race of mortals are in search of, or more properly, thou art the phantom they seek! how different their pursuit! The king endeavours to find thee in his palace, while surrounded by his courtiers. The courtier thinks he is happy when paying adulation to his prince. The statesman pursues thee, when fulfilling the duties of his station. The citizen seeks thee in his family. The debauchee frequents the brothel, in hopes to find thee. The seducer is happy when betraying to the paths of infamy the unwary female. The votary of religion imagines thou art no where to be found but in the duties it enjoins. The poet seeks thee in his garret. The critic thinks he has thee in possession while venom trickles from his pen. The mariner is aiming at thee while he explores the “trackless path.” The warrior is so fascinated with thee that even rivers of blood cannot impede his progress.

The beautiful Sylvia was grasping at thee, while at her feet were expiring a groupe of lovers, whom she affected to treat with cold disdain; no kind looks, no tender glances were bestowed. She completely acted the coquet. At length she promised her hand to Sigismund; but in the short space of time that was to precede their nuptuals, she manifested the greatest partiality for the libertine Frederick. She afterwards said it was only done to try the firmness of her lover. Her folly appeared obvious when too late. When Sigismund beheld himself slighted after the promise she had made him, he imagined he was odious in her eyes. He chose, therefore, for his partner, one that would not act deceitfully, the blushing Lydia became his bride.

Do these different characters follow after happiness. They do—And are they happy?---Go to the monarch, seated on his throne, with his brows encircled with a crown of gold; to him let the question be put. Should he answer, “I am the only happy mortal,” would it not induce you to laugh in his face, and tell him that you were by far the happiest?

L. B.

New-York, Aug. 24, 1796.

HUMAN LIFE.

The faint glimmerings of the pale-faced moon on the troubled billows of the ocean, are not so fleeting and inconstant as the fortune and condition of human life. We one day balk in the sun-shine of prosperity, and the next, too often, roll in anguish on the thorny bed of adversity and affliction. To be neither too fond of prosperity, nor too much afraid of adversity, is one of the most useful lessons we have to learn and practise in the extensive commerce of this world.

NEW-YORK.

MARRIED,

At Norwalk, On Wednesday evening last, by the Rev. Mr. Burnet, Obediah Wickes, of Troy, to Miss Sally Raymond, of Norwalk.

TO ———.

For the New-York Weekly Magazine.

LINES

Addressed to a Gentleman who had been a Prisoner to the Indians, and was ransomed by the merchants of Detroit.

For the New-York Weekly Magazine.

TO EMMA.

For the New-York Weekly Magazine.

LINES

On the Death of a young Lady who fell a victim to the effects of Lightning.

NEW-YORK: Printed by JOHN BULL, No. 115, Cherry-Street, where every Kind of Printing work is executed with the utmost Accuracy and Dispatch.—Subscriptions for this Magazine (at 2s. per month) are taken in at the Printing-Office, and by E. MITCHELL, Bookseller, No. 9, Maiden-Lane.

A PEEP INTO THE DEN OF IDLENESS.

Yonder! under those ragged rocks, where the baleful yews waving their sable branches of mournful cypress throws an awful gloom; a den dark and ghastly opens its horrid mouth! ’Tis there idleness is lodged, the great thief of time, and destroyer of innocence and human felicity.

What a dreadful cave!——how it yawns amid the noisome lakes and shaggy bushes! Vice and sin breed here; like monsters they hiss with impudence, and howl with too late repentance. Security and Carelessness, Sloth and Ignorance, joined hand in hand, stalk around. Hark how their mingled yells echo, in the caverns of the rocks, and drive downy footed Silence far away! Prodigality and Wantonness hover aloft, and call their votaries to the scene of irrevocable loss, and to the prison of unavoidable destruction, which at a little distance opens before them: there crowds led on by Error, and intoxicated with Folly sport to ruin.

But what frightful figure is that now emerging from the cave!---Riot and Noise attend him, and Bacchus (jolly god), and Venus, (bewitching queen) appear in the rear. That figure is Idleness, for defiance appears in his looks, and temerity and effrontery are stampt in indelible characters on his brow. Ebriety too with flushed cheeks and staggering gait appears in the group, whilst light-footed Mirth, led on by Gaiety, dance to the warbling notes of the birds of pleasure.

All around see the traps and gins put up to catch the imprudent, the giddy, and the thoughtless! Artfully are they covered over! but Wisdom’s keen eye sees the dangerous snares, and turns back with abhorrence. And see yonder the deceiving waters of pleasure and filthy lakes of impurity; a sink of vice and sin where evil conceptions breed, and hell-bred monsters sport in the sordid waves. I am shocked to my very heart at the sight!---Come, heaven-born peace and meek-eyed Religion, oh! come and destroy this horrid den, this rueful spot, where destruction secretly lurks, and where crowds daily unwaringly resort to inevitable and delicious ruin.

A FRAGMENT ON BENEVOLENCE.

He gives his mite to the relief of poverty. Joy enlivens his countenance, and sparkles in his eye. He can lay his hand upon his heart, and say, “I have done a good thing.” But who can do justice to his feelings? None but those whose lips the God of Israel hath touched with sacred fire! None but those whose pens are guided by the inspiration of the Almighty! And though at this moment my heart expands with the delightful sensation, I am totally unable to express it. Most devoutly do I thank thee, O Lord, that thou hast given me feeling. The sensation, indeed, is sometimes painful; but the intellectual pain far excels the most delightful sensual pleasure.---Ye kings and princes of the earth, possess your envied grandeur! Let the epicure gratify his palate; let the miser hoard his gold in peace. Dear sensibility! do thou but spread thy benign influence over my soul, and I am sure I shall be happy.

He held out his hat. “Pity me,” said he, but turned away his face, to hide his blushing countenance, and the tear which stole down his cheek. I saw it; and that little tear, with a force as powerful as the inundations of the Nile, broke through all the bounds of cautious prudence. Had the wealth of the Indies been in my pocket, I could hot but have given it. I gave all I had. He cast his glistening eyes upon me. “You have saved a family: may God bless you!” with my then sensations I could have been happy through eternity. At that instant I could have wished all the wheels of Nature to have stopped.

CURIOUS SUPERSCRIPTION ON A LETTER.

(Taken from an Irish Paper.)

A letter with the following curious superscription on it was put in the post office of Balbriggen.

“To Mr. John Winters,

Newtown Gore---county Leitrim, to be forwarded to Terence Sheanan, or to John Owen, or Mary Sheanan, all brothers, in Corrocopel, or elsewhere, near or about Newtown Gore, or somewhere else in that country.” !!!