GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXX.      April, 1847.      No. 4.

Table of Contents

Fiction, Literature and Articles

The Fields of Stillwater and Saratoga |
Mrs. Bell’s Ball |
The Islets of the Gulf; or Rose Budd |
Thomas Carlyle and His Works |
Mr. Kerr Mudgeon |
Abroad and at Home |
A Coquette Conquered |
Review of New Books |

Poetry, Music, and Fashion

The Oriole’s Return |
The Skater’s Song |
Love Unrequited |
Autumn |
Stanzas |
The Portrait |
April |
Pittsburgh |
The Statue in the Snow |
General Taylor’s Gallop |
Lines to a Jews-Harp |
Fanny’s First Smile |
Le Follet |

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

Robert Hinshelwood          Smillie & Hinshelwood

SARATOGA BATTLE GROUND AT STILLWATER.

Engraved expressly for Graham’s Magazine.

GRAHAM’S MAGAZINE.

Vol. XXX.     PHILADELPHIA, April, 1847.     No. 4.

THE FIELDS OF STILLWATER AND SARATOGA.

IN PART FROM ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS.

———

BY N. C. BROOKS, A. M.

———

In the Revolutionary war the plan of operations adopted by the British Ministry for the close of the year 1777 was as follows. General Howe, with a portion of the troops, was to occupy New York, and occasionally act toward the South; while General Burgoyne would descend from Canada and the lakes, reduce the contiguous country on his way, and by forming near Albany a junction with a part of the forces from New York, cut off all communication between the Eastern and Western States. As it was confidently expected that the several fortresses in the descent of General Burgoyne would fall into his hands, he was instructed by the ministry to leave garrisons in them, and thus, by a chain of posts, bind the entire country, while, from time to time, as occasion required, he could make excursions for provisions into the Eastern Provinces adjacent. General Burgoyne himself went over to England for the express purpose of concerting this plan with the ministry, and every thing relative to the expedition was arranged upon an extensive and liberal scale. His troops, exclusive of the artillery, consisted of seven thousand two hundred regulars, of whom three thousand two hundred were Germans, and several regiments of Provincials and Canadians, with great bodies of Indians. Besides these, he had a large number of batteaux-men and axe-men, to transport and clear the way for the troops, and a powerful train of battering and field artillery. This was about the force which General Burgoyne considered necessary, and had stipulated for, in the plan which he submitted to the British Minister.

The commander himself was a man of great ability and experience, active in enterprise, and ambitious of military glory; and those appointed to second his exertions, were officers of distinction. Major General Phillips, of the artillery, had gained great renown in Germany, as also Brigadier Frazer. The other Brigadiers, Hamilton and Powell, were valuable officers. The Brunswickers, Major General Baron Reidesel, and Brigadiers Specht and Gall, had also seen much service. And lastly, the Indians were under the directions of Langdall and St. Luc, great partisans of the French in the late war, the former of whom planned with the nations he was to lead, the defeat of General Braddock. Consequently, from the experience and bravery of the commander, and the generals under him, the number of his troops, his splendid train of artillery, and the magnitude of the entire appointments of his army, the most sanguine expectations were entertained of the entire success of the expedition.

Having detached Colonel St. Leger with a considerable force of regulars, Continentals, and Indians, by way of Oswego, to make a diversion on the Mohawk river, in favor of the army, General Burgoyne set out with his troops from St. John’s on the 16th of June, 1777. Arrived at Crownpoint, he entertained the Indians with a war-feast, according to the ceremonial established among them, and addressed them relative to the objects of his campaign, and the character of their own expected services. At Ticonderoga, he issued a manifesto, in which it is difficult to say, whether vanity or ferocity were the more conspicuous. After parading his multitudinous titles, he recited the many delinquencies of the Americans, set forth in a vaunting style the force of that power now put forth, by sea and land, to crush the insurrection of the Colonies, and, in the most appalling and sanguinary manner, denounced against the enemies of the mother country, the terrible vengeance of the Indian scalping-knife and tomahawk.

Carrying terror and ruin as they passed, the invaders steadily advanced. Harassed and panic-struck, the people fled before them; the American troops entrusted with the defence of passes and fortifications, were unable to prevent the progress of so formidable an expedition; and the fortresses of Ticonderoga, Mount Independence, Fort Anne, and others, fell successively into the hands of the British. But the troops left to occupy these works, reduced the forces of General Burgoyne in some degree, the difficulties of obtaining provisions, became more perplexing, and events shortly took place which turned the tide of war against the invaders, and inspirited the Americans, while they carried dismay to the breasts of their enemies.

General Burgoyne had learned that there was a large deposit of provisions of every kind at Bennington, and anxious to procure these for his troops, as well as to obtain carriages for his baggage, and horses for mounting Reidesel’s dragoons, he dispatched for that purpose Colonel Baum, with five hundred German troops, one hundred Indians, and two pieces of artillery; to reinforce which he afterward sent five hundred troops, under Lieutenant Colonel Breyman, with two additional pieces of artillery. These forces, without accomplishing any thing, were beaten, in two separate engagements, by the Massachusetts and New Hampshire militia, under General Stark, and a body of Continentals, under Colonel Warner, with the loss of the brave Colonel Baum, and two hundred and seven others killed, and seven hundred wounded and prisoners, four brass field-pieces, and a large quantity of small arms. This first reverse of the invading army took place August 16th, and was followed on the 22d by another.

Colonel St. Leger, dispatched up the Mohawk river some time before, after investing Fort Stanwix with his regulars, Sir John Johnson’s regiment of Tories, and a party of Indians, suffered so severely by the American militia, under Gen. Herkimer, which came to succor the garrison, that he himself was dispirited, and his Indian allies, who had joined him in expectation of but little fighting and much plunder, began to abandon him. At this conjuncture, opportunely for the garrison, Gen. Arnold advanced with troops to raise the siege of Fort Stanwix, and by a well-executed stratagem, so terrified the investing forces, that the Indians deserted the British, and St. Leger himself, on the 22d, fled with so much precipitation, that he left his tents standing in the field; and all his artillery and stores fell into the hands of the Americans. These two events reversed, in an extraordinary degree, the spirits of the people, and disposed the militia with alacrity to flock to the American camp at Stillwater, near Saratoga.

Gen. Burgoyne had hitherto been successful, but he had now reached that point in the expedition, in which the position of the country, the state of the troops, and the season of the year, all favored the American cause, and insured the downfall of the British chieftain. But the brave Gen. Schuyler, who, with great diligence and ability, had directed the affairs of the northern department during so many difficulties and discouragements, was not permitted to enjoy the triumph which his labors had contributed so much to insure. He was at this time superseded by Gen. Gates, and compelled to resign the fruits of his labors and the well-earned fame that was about to crown them. Of him it may be truly said, “he had labored, and others had entered into his reward.”

Confident of the success of the expedition of Baum, Gen. Burgoyne had already pushed on with the advance of his troops to Saratoga, on his way to Stillwater; but learning the loss of the detachment, he suddenly drew back from his advanced position. At length, by great exertions, having procured about thirty days’ provision, constructing a bridge of boats over the Hudson, he crossed over on the 13th and 14th of September with his array and artillery, and occupied the heights and plain of Saratoga.

Changing his position from near the village of Stillwater for one two or three miles in front, Gen. Gates took possession of Bemis’ Heights, a range of hills so called, from the owner of a tavern near the ground, and threw up breast-works and batteries, under the direction of his chief engineer, Thaddeus Koszkiusko, the Polish patriot. The position was a strong one. A range of hills extended on the right bank of the Hudson, between which and the river were alluvial flats, about half a mile in width at the centre, and tapering toward the extremities. A spur of the hills jutting out at the southern extremity of these flats, formed a narrow defile, through which passed, near Bemis’ tavern, the public road along the river margin. The encampment, in shape like the segment of a semicircle, with its convex turned to the north, threatening the advance of the enemy, extended from the narrow defile by the river-side to a steep height at the west, about three-quarters of a mile. In front, at the distance of a quarter of a mile, from right to left of the centre, which it covered, ran a closely wooded ravine; from this to the heights, at the western extremity of the encampment, the ground was level and partially cleared, some of the trees being felled, others girdled and still standing; north of this, in front of the extreme left, to the distance of a mile and a half or two miles, were small fields in imperfect cultivation, obstructed with the stumps and trunks of trees, with a steep eminence forming the western boundary of the whole. A line of breast-works formed of felled trees, logs, rails, and brush, covered with dirt, ran around the encampment, and strong batteries at the extremities, and in the centre, were planted so as to sweep the advance of the enemy, and especially the road by the river side leading through the defile, where the artillery of the enemy would be compelled to pass. A breast-work also extended across the flats, near the defile, having a strong battery immediately upon the river, with another breast-work and battery somewhat in advance, where the road crossed Mill-creek.

The American troops were disposed within their intrenchments as follows: the main body, composing the right wing, and consisting of Glover’s, Nixon’s, and Patterson’s brigades, was under the immediate command of Gates, the general-in-chief and occupied the defile by the river side and the adjacent hills; Gen. Learned, with Bailey’s, Weston’s, and Jackson’s regiments of Massachusetts, and James Livingston’s, of New York, occupied the plain or centre; and Poor’s brigade, consisting of Cilly’s, Scammel’s, and Hale’s regiments, of New Hampshire, Van Courtlandt’s and Henry Livingston’s, of New York, and Latimer’s and Cook’s, of the Connecticut militia, and Morgan’s riflemen, and Dearborn’s light infantry, were posted upon the left, and occupied the heights. The troops of the centre and left, constituted a division, and were under the command of Gen. Arnold, who had his quarters upon the extreme left. Thus arranged, the American troops awaited the advance of the British army.

Leaving Saratoga on the 15th, Burgoyne marched to Coveville, and halting to repair the bridges and roads, he moved on the 17th to a place called Sword’s House. Gen. Arnold, who was sent out on this day to gain intelligence of the enemy, and harass him on his march, after some ineffectual skirmishing, returned with two or three prisoners, from whom he learned the intentions of the British. On the 18th, the British general-in-chief continued his march till he came within a short distance of the “North Ravine,” which forms Wilber’s Basin, at the northern extremity of the flats afore-mentioned, and encamped about three miles from the Americans, his left, consisting mainly of the artillery and German dragoons, under Majors General Phillips and Reidesel, resting on the river; the centre, under Burgoyne himself, extending at right angles to it across the low grounds five or six hundred yards to a range of lofty hills, which were occupied by his left, consisting of the grenadiers under Frazer, and the light infantry of Breyman, who formed the élite of the army.

Determined to force his way through the American lines, the British general formed his army in order of march, about ten o’clock on the morning of the 19th of September. While Burgoyne with the centre, and Frazer with the right wing were to make a circuitous route, concentrate their forces near the head of Middle Ravine, (so called from being equidistant from the North Ravine and South Ravine, in the rear of the American camp,) and having turned the left wing of the Americans fall upon their rear, Generals Phillips and Reidesel, with the artillery, which moved slowly, were to advance along the river road, and, when within half a mile of the American lines, at the time of the junction between Burgoyne and Frazer, to be announced by two signal guns, make an attack in front, and force their way through.

Information having been received through Col. Colburn that the enemy were on their march, Gen. Arnold, anticipating the intentions of the British commander, and anxious to derange his plan of operations by checking the progress of his right wing, pressed upon Gen. Gates the propriety of an attack in advance, and was ordered to detach Col. Morgan’s rifle corps, and some infantry, to observe the motions of the enemy, and harass their advance, and to support Morgan himself, if necessary, with the entire troops of his division. Expecting upon his right a powerful attack from the British artillery and the troops of Reidesel, Gen. Gates was unwilling to weaken that wing by any drafts of troops whatever.

In pursuance of the arrangement of the British commander, Frazer, with the right wing, making a long circuit, arrived where the road to Wilber’s Basin and that to Bemis’ Heights intersect each other, and thence continued south to an eminence about half a mile west of Freeman’s Cottage. At the same time Burgoyne, with a picket in advance, and flankers, composed of Canadians, Provincials and Indians, following the course of the North Ravine about three fourths of a mile, and then marching in a southwest direction, had arrived a little south of Freeman’s Cottage.

At this moment the advance of Morgan, under Major Morris, fell in with the picket of Burgoyne, which had reached the Middle Ravine, and attacking with that impetuosity for which he was remarkable, drove them back till reinforced by a strong party under Major Forbes. The British now advanced with spirit; a sharp conflict commenced, and they were driven back to their line, which was forming beyond the Cottage. Now pressing on again with vivacity, they repulsed the Americans in their turn, and Morgan coming up with the rear, found the van of his command broken and scattered in every direction. Capt. Van Swearingen, Lieut. Moore, and twenty privates fell into the hands of the British.

Collecting his riflemen, and reinforced by a battalion of light infantry under Major Dearborn, the battle was renewed again, about one o’clock, and was vigorously maintained on both sides for some time, with varied success. Forming upon the left of Morgan, the regiments of Scammel and Cilley advanced to his support, and the contest proceeded with redoubled energy.

There seemed to be a generous emulation between the commanders of these regiments, in which their gallant troops fully participated. Col. Scammel is cool and determined, and leads on his men close to the enemy before he will suffer them to fire; Cilley is all vivacity and animation, and dashes into the fight with the enthusiasm of a fox-chase: they are equally brave, and the indomitable obstinacy of the one and energy of the other alike make a serious impression upon the enemy.

Frazer, who by this time had joined with his command the centre under Burgoyne, advanced with great resolution and attempted to cut off a portion of the American troops, when Gen. Arnold, who now appeared upon the field with the New York regiments and a part of Gen. Learned’s brigade, rushed impetuously forward and endeavored to break the British line, by penetrating between the right wing and the centre, and thus to cut off and surround the troops of Frazer. Arnold exhibited his usual bravery; his form towered before his troops; his voice, animating them, resounded along the line like the notes of a trumpet; his men now spring forward, and the fiery contest is close and bloody; the discharges of musketry are quick, incessant and deadly; the Americans press on steadily and close with their adversaries; the enemy resort to their bayonets, but soon falter and give way till the Americans are drawn within the shot of some regiments of German light infantry upon the extreme right. These pour upon the American flank a murderous fire; and after an obstinate resistance of more than an hour, in which the ground is disputed inch by inch, the Americans fall back, sullenly firing, and resume their place in the line.

About three o’clock in the afternoon, the troops were drawn up on each side for a regular engagement. There was an oblong clearing in front of Freeman’s Cottage, about sixty rods in length from east to west, and containing from fifteen to eighteen acres. This field sloped gently down toward the south and east, and was bounded upon the north by an eminence, and a thin grove of pines, and on the south by a dense woods. The British line, with Burgoyne at its head, was formed within the grove of pines upon the north of the clearing mentioned above; and the American line under Arnold within the dense woods. The British advanced to the attack with the most determined bravery, and the action began with great spirit, and was maintained with animation.

Preferring to receive the enemy with the advantages of their position, the Americans kept, in a measure, within cover of the wood in which they were posted, and poured upon the advancing British a destructive fire, which compelled them to falter. Now pressing upon the enemy, the Americans advanced in their turn, till they came within the fire of the British line, and fell back toward their position in the wood. The engagement waxed hot and obstinate, and a destructive fire was kept up, principally between Hamilton’s brigade, consisting mainly of the twentieth, twenty-first, and sixty-second British infantry, and the brigade of Poor, and Morgan’s corps on the part of the Americans. The British centre was severely pressed, and began at length to give way, when General Phillips, who, with infinite labor, had made his way from the left through the intervening woods, brought up a brigade of artillery under the brave Captain Jones, and some grenadiers, and restored the action. The artillery was posted near Freeman’s Cottage, and gave the enemy a decided advantage, for, owing to the impracticable nature of the ground, the Americans could not bring up any artillery during the day to support their fire.

The action now became general. A quick fire ran from right to left along the whole line of battle; the musketry peeled like the continuous roll of a thousand drums; the heavy discharges of artillery with the roar of thunder shook the hills around, and died in sullen echoes down the valleys; while the battle raged tumultuous, like a stormy sea, over the plain intervening between the woods. The contest was obstinate and bloody—a succession of advances and retreats; a scene of daring and destruction; of blood and carnage. The British rushed forward to the very woods, but fled before the murderous fire of the Americans from their covert. The latter in their turn pursued the British to their line, but fell back from the resistance in front and the hot fire that assailed them on the flanks. Major Hull, with a bravery that is some relief to his dark cowardice in the late war, repeatedly charged and took the enemy’s guns; but as the Americans had no means to bring them off, or turn them against their owners, they remained at length with the British.

The action continued without the least intermission, and Arnold in directing the movements of the troops did every thing that a skillful and active officer could accomplish. Finding the enemy reinforced by Gen. Phillips from the left, he ordered out the remaining regiments of Learned’s brigade, and sent to Gen. Gates for a part of the troops under his command. But the general either still fearing the advance of the enemy’s left upon him, and unwilling to weaken his right, or not wishing to give Arnold any efficient support, merely sent him a single regiment, Col. Marshall’s, of Patterson’s brigade. Had he promptly supported Arnold’s division by either of the three brigades under his command, there is no doubt the action would have been a decisive one.

The arrival of the last reinforcements infused a degree of renewed vigor into the Americans; the contest deepened, maddened into a final effort, and raged with destructive fury as the sun set upon the scene of carnage, and the pall of night came down upon the dead and dying. The last troops engaged were those of the brave Lieut. Col. Brooks, in command of Jackson’s regiment, the eighth Massachusetts. He penetrated as far as the extreme right of the British, and became engaged with a part of Breyman’s riflemen, who had acted before but occasionally during the action. Waiting for orders to return, he did not leave the field of battle till near ten o’clock at night. This was the most obstinate battle that had yet been fought, in which the Americans, both regulars and militia, displayed all the bravery of the most hardy veterans.

The American loss fell chiefly upon Morgan’s corps and Poor’s brigade. The regiment of Colonel Cilley, of New Hampshire, and that of Col. Cook, of the Connecticut militia, suffered the most severely. Major Hull’s detachment sustained a loss of nearly one half in killed and wounded. The twentieth and twenty-first regiments of the enemy encountered severe loss, and the sixty-second, under the brave Col. Anstruther, was literally cut to pieces. The colonel himself, and the major, Harnaye, were both wounded, and, of the six hundred men which the regiment numbered on leaving Canada, but sixty men and five or six officers remained fit for duty. The gallant Captain Jones, who commanded the enemy’s artillery with so much effect, fell at the side of his guns, and thirty-six of his forty-eight artillerists, and all the officers, except Lieutenant Hadden, were killed or disabled. His escape was remarkable, for the cap was shot off his head by a musket ball, while engaged in spiking the guns.

The Americans had about three thousand men in the engagement, the British three thousand five hundred. Both parties claimed the victory; though it is evident all the advantages of the contest were in favor of the Americans. The British lay upon their arms, with the intention of renewing the battle next day, but abandoned that design in the morning, and within cannon-shot of the Americans threw up a line of intrenchments, with strong redoubts across the plain to the hills; with an intrenchment also and batteries across the defile at the northern extremity of the flats. The Americans, in the meantime, made great exertions to complete their defences, and render them impregnable.

The position of the Americans was the same as before; the British troops were posted within their intrenchments in the following order: Col. Breyman with the Hessian rifle corps occupied the extreme right, or flank defence; the light infantry, under Lord Balcarras, and the élite of Frazer, were encamped around Freeman’s Cottage, and extended toward the north ravine, flanked by Hamilton’s brigade and the grenadiers; Phillips and Reidesel, with their respective commands, occupied the plain and the ground north of Wilber’s Basin; while, for the protection of the batteaux and hospitals, the Hessians of Hanau, the forty-seventh regiment and a detachment of loyalists, were encamped upon the flats by the river-side.

A serious difference now arose between Generals Gates and Arnold, owing to the jealousy of the former, and the intriguing disposition of his adjutant, Col. Wilkinson. Although the late action had commenced at the instance of Arnold, had been fought under his direction, and by the troops of his division alone, with the exception of a single regiment, yet in his dispatches to Congress, General Gates simply stated the action was fought by detachments from the army, without mentioning either Arnold or his division. In addition to this injustice, Gen. Gates, at the suggestion of Wilkinson, in his general orders immediately after the battle, required that Col. Morgan, whose troops had been for some time a part of Arnold’s command, and by whose assistance, in a great measure, the late battle was won, should “make returns and reports to head-quarters only; from whence alone he is to receive orders.” A correspondence and an angry conference took place that resulted in Gates’ depriving Arnold of the command of his division, which he assumed himself, assigning to Gen. Lincoln, who arrived on the twenty-ninth, the command of the right wing. I will more particularly refer to this misunderstanding, at the close of this article.

The two armies lay encamped within sight of each other from the nineteenth of September till the seventh of October, without any thing taking place, except an occasional affair of pickets. In expectation of a coöperation with Sir Henry Clinton, from New York, and of aid from St. Leger, the British commander was compelled, by the difficulties of procuring provisions, to put his troops upon short allowance, which they bore with a patience and cheerfulness that did them great honor. The American troops in the meantime, fearful of the expedition from New York in favor of Burgoyne, were clamorous for action, and Gen. Arnold, forgetting all the injustice and indignity with which he had been treated, addressed a letter to General Gates, which any generous mind would have considered, in the circumstances, as an overture for reconciliation, made known to him the impatience of the troops for battle, and suggested the dangers of delay and the necessity of an immediate attack. General Gates still remained inactive within his intrenchments, till Gen. Burgoyne, pressed to extremity for provisions, and despairing of assistance, prepared for a second attempt upon the American lines, which gave him the advantage of a defensive action.

It had been necessary, for some time, to send out large parties to cover any provisions destined for the British camp; General Burgoyne determined, therefore, to select a heavy detachment of his best troops, for the ostensible purpose of covering a forage, which should move to the left of the American lines, and, after making a reconnaissance, endeavor to dislodge the Americans, or force a passage through the intrenchments: in the event of being successful, the whole army was to follow.

Entrusting the guard of the camp upon the heights near Freeman’s farm to Brigadiers Hamilton and Specht, and the intrenchments and redoubts upon the flats to Brigadier Gall, about eleven o’clock on the seventh of October, Gen. Burgoyne placed himself at the head of fifteen hundred regulars, the flower of his army, with two twelve-pounders, two howitzers, and six six-pounders, and moved toward the American left. His best officers, Majors-General Phillips and Reidesel and Brigadier Frazer, accompanied the detachment, and seconded the command of the general-in-chief. Having proceeded within three-fourths of a mile of the American camp at the northwest, they displayed and sat down in double ranks, with their arms between their legs. While the foragers of the party were cutting straw in a wheat-field, several officers from the top of a cabin were engaged in reconnoitering, with their glasses, the American left, which was concealed in a great measure from their view by the intervening woods.

General Gates having received intelligence of the movements and position of the enemy, and penetrating his intentions, made arrangements for an immediate attack. In the meantime, a party of Indians, Canadians and Provincials, scouring the woods on the British flank, fell in with the American pickets near the Middle Ravine; a sharp conflict ensued, which drew to the support of the scouting party a strong corps of grenadiers, when the Americans were driven back to the intrenchments. A brisk action ensued, without any material advantage on either side, when a corps of Morgan’s riflemen appeared, whom the Indians and Canadians always held in great terror, and the British retreated to their line, which was forming, pursued by the Americans.

Gen. Burgoyne formed his line of battle across an open field; the left wing consisting of the grenadiers, under Major Ackland, and the artillery, under Major Williams, resting upon a ridge of ground bordered with wood, and covered in front by the head of the Middle Ravine; the centre, under Generals Phillips and Reidesel, was composed of British and German battalions; the right wing, consisting of the light infantry under Lord Balcarras, extended toward the southwest to the foot of a hill densely wooded, and was covered by a worm fence; while, in advance of the right wing, a strong body of flankers was posted under the brave General Frazer, to fall upon the American flank and rear, as the other troops made the attack upon the left.

General Gates ordered Col. Morgan with his corps to commence the action. That sagacious officer proposed and was permitted with his command to march by a circuitous route, and under cover of the woods to gain the hill that ran near the enemy’s right and its advance, and to make an attack in front and flank upon the advanced party under Frazer, and the British right, while the brigade of General Poor opened its fire upon the British left. Allowing time for Morgan to reach his destination, Gen. Poor led on his brigade to the British left, having ordered his men to reserve their fire till some time after they began to rise the hill on and around which the artillery and a part of the grenadiers were posted. As soon as they came in sight they were saluted by the enemy with a shower of grape-shot and musket balls, which overshot them, however, and spent their fury upon the tops of the trees. The Americans rushed on with a shout, and delivering their fire, in quick succession, opened to the right and left, that they might gain the cover of the trees that enclosed the ridge on which the artillery was placed. Here a close and bloody conflict ensued, with the continual discharge of artillery and small arms. Nothing could exceed the bravery of the Americans; they rushed upon the enemy’s guns, which, by repeated charges, were taken and retaken, till the dead and dying were strewed all around. One field-piece was taken for the fifth time, when the brave Cilley in a fit of exultation mounted astraddle of it, and having “sworn it true to the American cause,” turned it upon the enemy, and galled them with their own ammunition, which in their precipitancy they had left behind them. After a long and obstinate contest, in which the grenadiers and artillerists suffered very severely, Major Ackland, the commander of the former, was wounded, and Major Williams, the commander of the latter, was taken prisoner, upon which they broke and fled with consternation.

Simultaneously with the opening of the fire of Poor’s brigade upon the British left, the gallant Col. Morgan, like a torrent, rushed down from the hills that skirted the advance of the British right, and pouring in a rapid and destructive fire, soon drove it back upon the right wing, then, wheeling suddenly to the left, he took the British right in flank, with irresistible impetuosity, and threw their ranks into confusion. While thus disordered, Major Dearborn led up two regiments of fresh troops against them, when, assailed both in flank and front, they broke and fled. The Earl of Balcarras rallied them again, and re-formed them, but overpowered by superior numbers, the whole right wing vacillated and gave way.

While the two wings were thus closely engaged, the centre, composed principally of Hessian troops, had as yet taken no part in the action, for the British commander feared, as the American front extended beyond the grenadiers, that, by breaking his centre, he would give an opportunity to the Americans to cut off and surround a part of his forces. As the battle was thus going on, and indecisive, Gen. Arnold, who found it impossible to restrain himself, swore that he would “put an end to the action,” and galloped off in hot haste to the field, upon a magnificent coal-black steed. Gen. Gates, fearful lest he might “do some rash action,” as he expressed himself, sent Major Armstrong after him to recall him, but the messenger could not reach him to deliver his summons, so quick and varied were his motions, and so perilous the track of his onward course. Placing himself at the head of three regiments, who readily obeyed their former commander, Gen. Arnold advanced with great vigor and attacked the British centre. The Hessians received the assailants with becoming spirit, and, at first, made a brave resistance; but the second charge upon them was furious and irresistible; Arnold with some daring followers dashed into their thickest ranks, carrying with them death and dismay, and the Hessians broke and fled with great precipitancy and consternation.

While the two wings and centre were thus engaged, and the battle was hotly maintained along the whole line, the bravery and skill of the gallant Gen. Frazer was everywhere conspicuous. When the troops began to waver, he encouraged them; when falling back, he rallied them again; when broken, he re-formed them. On his magnificent iron-grey steed, he passed along the line continually, and wherever he appeared he restored order and inspired confidence; the fate of the battle seemed to hang upon his energy, skill and bravery. The sagacious Col. Morgan saw this, and, with more prudence than generosity, called a file of his best marksmen, and said to them, “That gallant officer is General Frazer; I admire and honor him, but it is necessary that he should die—take your stations in that cluster of bushes, and when he passes down the line again, do your duty.” In a few moments the brave and accomplished Frazer fell mortally wounded, and was carried to the camp, a grenadier on each side of his horse supporting him. At his fall a panic pervaded the enemy, and a reinforcement of three thousand New York militia simultaneously arriving, under Gen. Ten Broeck, the whole line under Gen. Burgoyne broke and fled to their encampment, covered in their retreat by Generals Phillips and Reidesel. The Americans pursued them in hot haste to their very intrenchments, and assaulted the works, though possessed neither of battering nor field artillery.

Along the whole line of the British encampment there now rages a storm of grape-shot and musketry; yet the brave Americans, exposed to the deadly fire, or sheltered in part by trees, stumps, and rocks, or covered in gullies formed by the rains, continue the fight with great obstinacy, and many brave men fall on both sides. In this scene of blood and carnage, Arnold was a conspicuous actor. Incited by wounded pride, anger, and military enthusiasm, he fought with reckless bravery, exposed himself with inconsiderate rashness, furiously at times brandished his sword to the danger of his own men, animated his soldiers by the most impassioned appeals, and leading them on, snatched laurels from the very hands of death and danger. With a part of Glover’s and Patterson’s brigades, he rushed on to the works possessed by the light infantry under Lord Balcarras, and a portion of the line, and assaulting, a large abattis which he carried at the point of the bayonet, endeavored to make an opening into the British camp; but, after a sanguinary contest, he was forced to fall back. Leaving the troops now engaged at a greater distance, he dashes furiously on toward the right flank defence, receiving as he passes the fire of the contending armies unhurt.

Gen. Learned, with his brigade, sheltered by a sudden depression of the ground, which covered his men breast high, had been engaged at a long fire with the Germans of the right flank defence, who poured upon them a continual discharge of grape-shot. He now advanced, for nearer contest, his brigade in open column, with Col. Jackson’s regiment in front, in command of Lieut Col. Brooks, to make an assault at an opening between the light infantry, under Lord Balcarras, and the German right flank defence. This part of the lines was occupied by Canadians and Provincials, and was defended by two stockade redoubts. Arnold, in passing on to the British right, met Learned’s brigade advancing, and placing himself at the head of the brigade, orders Brooks, with two platoons, to attack the stockades, while the other troops assault in front. The engagement is now general and sanguinary, the cannon thunder along the line, the peals of musketry are continuous, and the sharp rattle of the rifle is incessant, while the bomb lights up with its red glare, the atmosphere darkened with the smoke of battle and the shades of coming eve.

While the battle thus rages, the intrepid Brooks leads his party, as ordered, against the stockades, which are carried in a moment at the point of the bayonet; and the rest of the brigade assault the lines, though manned by twice their number. After an ineffectual resistance, the enemy are compelled to abandon their position and flee, which lays open the flank of the right defence, consisting of the Germans under Col. Breyman. It consists of a breast-work of timbers piled in a horizontal manner between pickets driven perpendicularly into the earth, and is covered on the right by a battery of two guns, posted on an eminence.

Galloping on to the left, Arnold orders Weston’s and Livingston’s regiments, with Morgan’s corps, to advance and make a general assault, and then returning, he places himself at the head of the regiment under Brooks, and leading it on himself, makes a furious attack upon the German works, which is vigorously resisted. Undismayed, he pushes forward a platoon, and having found the sallyport, forces his way through with his men, and rides triumphantly into the encampment of the enemy. The terrified Germans retreat, yet deliver a fire as they run, by which the steed of the dauntless general is killed, and himself wounded. The same leg which was wounded in storming Quebec, is again shattered by a musket ball. Here Maj. Armstrong, who had been sent by Gen. Gates to order him back from the field, first comes up with him and delivers his message. Retiring to their tents the Germans find the assault general, throw down their arms, or retreat hurriedly to the interior part of the camp, leaving their commander, Col. Breyman, mortally wounded on the field, with many privates killed and wounded, and their tents, artillery, and baggage in possession of the victors. The dislodgement of the German troops effected an opening into the British lines, which exposed the entire encampment. Gen. Burgoyne, therefore, immediately ordered its recovery, but the darkness of the night, and the fatigue of the troops, prevented this attempt at recovery on the part of the British, or any effort on the part of the Americans to improve the advantages it offered. About 12 o’clock at night, Gen. Lincoln, who, during the action, had remained in camp with his command, marched out to relieve the troops that had been engaged, and to possess the ground they had gained. The American loss in this action was about one hundred and fifty, killed and wounded; that of the enemy was much greater, among which were some of their best officers. The enemy lost in addition nine pieces of artillery, and the encampment and equipage of a German brigade.

As the Americans, with fresh troops prepared for action, held possession of a part of the British camp, which exposed their entire defences, a change of position, before the following morning, was rendered necessary to the British commander. During the night, therefore, he executed a removal of his army, camp and artillery, to his former position, about a mile further north, in view of a retreat. To guard against this, Gen. Gates had detached a party higher up the Hudson to hang upon his rear, should he attempt to force a passage.

During the 8th of October, the troops were under arms, in expectation of an attack, and a cannonade was kept up at intervals during the day. About sunset, according to directions which he had given, the corpse of the brave Gen. Frazer, attended by his suite, and by the Generals Phillips, Reidesel, and Burgoyne, was carried to the great redoubt, and there buried. A cannonade was kept up for some time on the procession, till the Americans discovered its character, when they ceased, and fired minute guns in honor of the deceased. The following description of the melancholy scene is from the pen of Gen. Burgoyne himself.

“The incessant cannonade during the solemnity; the steady attitude, and unaltered voice with which the clergyman officiated, though frequently covered with dust, which the shot threw up on all sides of him; the mute but expressive mixture of sensibility and indignation on every countenance; these objects will remain to the last of life on the mind of every man who was present. The growing duskiness, added to the scenery, and the whole marked a character of this juncture, that would make one of the finest subjects for the pencil of a master that the field ever presented. To the canvas and to the page of a more important historian, gallant friend, I consign thy memory. There may thy talents, thy manly virtues, their progress and their period, find due distinction; and long may they survive, long after the frail record of my pen shall be forgotten.”

In relation to the death-wound of Gen. Frazer, it is generally believed to have been from Timothy Murphy, a celebrated marksman, with a double rifle, whose aim was unerring as fate. The death of Frazer is said to have made a deep impression upon Morgan, and to have given him uneasiness even on his dying-bed. I receive the account coming through his minister. Gen. Frazer himself said that he saw the rifleman that shot him, and that he was up in a tree. The range of the wound proved this to be a fact. Consequently, it could not have been one of the file Morgan selected, unless we suppose they ascended trees.

A romantic interest is thrown around the incidents of this campaign by the sufferings of several accomplished and excellent ladies, that followed the fortunes of their husbands, who were officers in the army. On the 19th of September, they followed the route of the artillery and baggage, and when the action began, the Baroness Reidesel, Lady Harriet Ackland, and the wives of Maj. Harnaye, and Lieut. Reynell, of the sixty-second regiment, had possession of a small hut which the surgeons soon occupied. Their sensibility was continually affected by the pitiable sights that were presented as the wounded were brought in, while their terrified imaginations looked forward to similar calamities to their husbands. How afflicting were their circumstances when, during the day, Maj. Harnaye was brought in severely wounded, and intelligence came that Lieut. Reynell was killed. The Lady Harriet’s husband was wounded in the action of the 7th of October, and fell into the hands of the Americans, when, with the greatest heroism, she solicited permission from Gen. Burgoyne, and went over to the American army, that she might wait upon her husband. She accompanied Maj. Ackland to Canada in 1776, and was called to attend on him, while sick in a miserable hut at Chamblee. In the march upon Ticonderoga she was left behind and enjoined not to expose herself to the hazards of the expedition, but joined her husband immediately after his receiving a wound at the battle of Hubberdton, and would not leave him afterward, but shared his fortunes and fatigues. The narrative of the Baroness Reidesel, which gives an account of the expedition, and their own particular sufferings, is as interesting as a romance.

Fearing from some movements of the Americans that they would turn his right and surround him, Gen. Burgoyne, on the 8th, abandoned his hospital with the sick and wounded, whom he recommended to the humanity of Gen. Gates, and commenced a night retreat toward Saratoga, immediately after the burial of Gen. Frazer. In preparation for the retreat they felt severely the loss of this accomplished officer, who prided himself upon generalship in this respect. During the war in Germany, he made good his retreat with 500 chasseurs, in sight of the French army, and often said that if, in the present expedition the troops were compelled to retreat, he would insure, with the advanced corps, to bring them off in safety. About 9 o’clock at night the army began to move, Gen. Reidesel in command of the van-guard, and Gen. Phillips in command of the rear-guard. Delayed by the darkness of the night, the incessant rains, and the bad condition of the roads, liable at any time to an attack in flank, front, or rear, the royal troops reached Saratoga late at night on the 9th, so harassed and weary, that without strength even to cut wood and make fires, the men lay down upon the cold ground in their wet clothes, and the generals themselves lay upon their matresses with no other covering than an oil-cloth.

Gen. Burgoyne detached from this place a working party, under a strong escort, to repair the roads and bridges toward Fort Edward; but on finding the Americans in force on the heights south of Saratoga creek, and evincing a disposition to cross over and attack him, the escort was recalled, and the Provincials, sent to cover the working party, fled at the first attack. The general-in-chief now resolved to abandon his artillery, baggage, and encumbrances of every kind, and make a night march to Fort Edward. The soldiers were to carry their arms and provisions upon their backs, and force a passage at the fording, either above or below the fort. But learning from his scouts that the Americans had a camp in force on the high grounds between Fort Edward and Fort George, as well as parties along the whole shore, he was compelled to abandon the design.

Worn down by a series of toils and attacks; abandoned by the Indians, Provincials, and Canadians; the regulars greatly reduced by the late heavy losses, and by sickness; disappointed of aid from Sir Henry Clinton; suffering from want of provisions; invested and almost surrounded by an army of triple numbers, without the possibility of retreat; exposed to an incessant cannonade, and receiving in camp even the musket balls of his enemy, the British general perceiving that future efforts would be unavailing, convened a council of the generals, field-officers, and commanders of corps, in which it was unanimously resolved to send a communication to Gen. Gates, touching a surrender. A treaty was accordingly opened, and a convention agreed upon on the 16th of October, embracing the following prominent conditions.

The British were to march out of their encampment with the honors of war, and ground their arms by order of their own officers. They were not to be detained as captives, but be permitted to return to England, and not serve again during the war, unless exchanged. The number of men received in surrender to the United States was 5791. Besides this, the United States received an immense park of brass artillery, 7000 stand of arms, clothing for seven thousand recruits; with tents, and great quantities of ammunition, and other military stores.

Some few exchanges of officers were effected. An effort was made to exchange Maj. Ackland for Col. Ethan Allen, then held in rigorous confinement in New York, but the British commander, Lord Howe, refused the proposal. Maj. Ackland was then exchanged for Maj. Otho Holland Williams, of Rawling’s rifle corps, who, after a brave resistance, was wounded and made prisoner at Fort Washington, in 1776, and had since suffered severely in his captivity. Some time after the fall of Charleston, Gen. Phillips was exchanged for Gen. Lincoln. Congress, fearful that good faith would not be kept relative to the soldiers not being employed again in the war, did not permit the British soldiers to embark for England. They were detained till after the close of the war. When information was received of the surrender of Burgoyne and his army, Congress passed a vote of thanks to Gen. Gates, and the troops under his command, and ordered a gold medal to be struck in commemoration of the event, and presented to him in the name of the United States. I have some valuable original documents, throwing strong light upon the history and the men of this eventful period, which I may submit in a second paper.

THE ORIOLE’S RETURN.

Hast thou come back, loved oriole,

  Thy stay has been so long,

To flit among the garden flowers,

  And cheer me with thy song.

Yes, yes, my pretty oriole,

  Thou’st left thy distant bowers,

And come to make thy dwelling-place,

  In this green land of ours.

For cheerful spring, my oriole,

  Returns to us again,

And soon shall summer’s balmy breath

  Spread fragrance o’er the plain.

The fields that late, dear oriole,

  Were white with fleecy snow,

Are green, and the refreshing breeze

  Has bid the fountains flow.

And budding shrubs, sweet oriole,

  Bedeck this blooming scene,

And the wide-spreading willow

  Is clothed in living green.

Then with thy mate, my oriole,

  Come sit upon this tree,

And tune thy gay and lively notes,

  So long unheard by me.

And there, my gentle oriole,

  From thy long journey rest,

Then to the drooping branches, love,

  Suspend thy downy nest.

For all is beauteous, oriole,

  Around, beneath, above,

And little birds are warbling,

  Far in the waving grove.

And the soft rill, my oriole,

  Where oft I have seen thee light,

To drink the waters murmuring by,

  Now sparkles clear and bright.

And thou hast come, loved oriole,

  To glad me with thy voice,

And verdant spring again returns,

  To bid our hearts rejoice.

MISS C. MITCHELL.

MRS. BELL’S BALL.

[A CHAPTER FROM “LEVY LAWRENCE’S ACCOUNT OF HIMSELF.”]

It was about this time, (meaning the time I began to realize that if silver and gold could do every thing, brass could do much,) and shortly after my return to P⁠——, I received an invitation to attend a ball, to be given by the lady of a gallant naval officer, at a public hall, the only one with which the town of P⁠—— was blessed.

To one who had absented himself from such gayeties for some time, and who was particularly fond of them, the thought of a ball was exciting, to say the least—and such a ball! I knew very well what it would be, given by Mrs. Bell, in a fine large hall. Nothing sham. No—Mrs. Bell had too much pride, and so had Mr. Bell, to have any thing to do with an entertainment that was not of the very first order; and Mrs. Bell was too ambitious, and so was Mr. Bell, not to make some endeavor to go a little beyond any of their neighbors.

“I will go to this ball,” said I, and immediately confirmed my determination by writing an acceptance. “I will go, I will rust no longer. Why should I suffer myself to grow mouldy, and hide my light under a bushel, when I might illume, perhaps dazzle, the gay world with my brightness?” I said this, being in a particularly self-satisfied mood, for that morning I had made one dollar, and had the money, the hard specie, in my pocket. Any young man, who is beginning to make his own living, will appreciate my self-satisfaction, for he well knows the pleasure—how great it is—which is experienced from the first fruits of his own exertion, however small they may be.

The ball was to take place in a week, and in the interim, wherever I went, I heard nothing else talked of. Everybody was going—and everybody was full of it. How glad was I that I had accepted! Everybody seemed determined on making an impression, for everybody was planning and arranging, and their lives, for that week, were bound up in the ball—the ball was the end to which their whole present existence was directed. Never since my childhood, on the occasion of an annual visit to the theatre, had I looked forward to any thing with such delightful anticipations as to this ball. What blessings did I not invoke upon the united heads of Mrs. and Mr. Bell, as I heard of some new contrivance for the pleasure of those who were to be their guests on this great occasion. To think that I was going, was happiness enough. I am afraid I did not pay so much attention as I ought to my business. I may have neglected it, but I could not help it.

The week passed. The day of the ball came. The evening—almost the hour. People were beginning to prepare themselves. Not more than time enough remained for me to make my toilet. Many a lady was by this time fully arrayed, and doubtless many a gentleman.

Then it was that I experienced one of those dreadful revulsions of feeling, which no words can describe, and which only those who possess an extraordinary share of moral courage can bear up under. If the sun had gone out at noonday, I should not have been more overwhelmed; if I had waked some morning, and found myself a husband and a father, I should not have wondered more.

I had no clothes to wear!

The moment which brought me to the verge of an earthly Elysium, which was to be introductory to an age of delights, had arrived, and not a decent coat, not a passable pair of pants, not even a respectable pair of boots. I might have known it all before. O fool! fool! I should have wept if I had had any tears to shed; but I had none. My excess of feeling was beyond tears. I sat down like one dumb and stricken. I had clean shirts, and though they had often served me in good stead, they would do me no good now. What could have possessed me, that, on this occasion, when I needed it so much, I should have neglected to provide myself with proper attire? I might as well be in Patagonia without any clothes, as here with my shabby ones.

The clock struck nine. The ball must have begun; and I fancied the gay music, the bright throng, and the sound of dancing feet, and almost smiled as I fancied, the fancy was so pleasant. I tried to reason with myself. Supposing I had not forgotten the clothes, how could I have paid for a new suit, with but one dollar in my pocket? (I hadn’t earned a cent since the day I received the invitation.) Oh! approved credit was as good as money. I had been on tick before now, and might do so again. It was no comfort to think what I might have done. What could be done now? Buying was out of the question; all the money in the world could not in a moment have procured me a new suit. Borrowing? That was out of the question. Whose coats would fit me, and who was there to borrow from? Everybody had gone—gone to the ball.

To the melancholy conclusions of my reasoning succeeded what would, in a child, have been called a temper-fit; and it was no more or less in me. I swore audibly. I wilfully, intentionally, and maliciously kicked over a table, thereby doing serious detriment to its contents, for a glass lamp being broken by the fall, they, together with the carpet, were covered with a plentiful sprinkling of oil. I nearly put the fire out by giving it a severe poking, broke a penknife by energetic use, and if there had been a bell-rope, (I didn’t enjoy the luxury of a bell,) I should have broken that.

Then came a calm; a calm which proceeded from a resolution I had suddenly taken—to go, at any rate.

When Cinderella stood by the magnificent equipage which was to take her to the king’s palace, she reflected upon the inconsistency of her mean apparel, with the gorgeousness before her, and that she was about to encounter. “What,” sighed she, “and must I go thither in these dirty, nasty rags?” Scarcely had she spoken, when her godmother, who was a fairy, touched her with her wand, and in an instant her rags were changed into the most beautiful robes ever beheld by mortal woman.

No gilded chariot waited before me. I had no godmother, with one stroke to put nap upon a thread-bare coat, and make worn-out boots new. There was no magic to be employed upon me, but that of an unflinching spirit, a brazen face, and the little that might be effected by brushes and Day & Martin.

Having dressed with as much care as if I had been putting on regal robes, I started to walk—no such extravagance as a carriage for me—laying this flattering unction to my soul, that perhaps the hall might not be very well lighted, and in the crowd I should escape critical observation. I fortunately found a drygoods shop open, where I stopped to purchase gloves. I paid that dollar for a pair of a light straw color, and felt elegantly dressed when I had encased my left hand in one; alas! the right hand glove, as right hand gloves often do, tore when I gave it the final pull. This additional ill-luck did not trouble me—my mind was steeled.

My hope of a twilight apartment was born, like all other hopes, “but to fade and die.” When I entered, my eyes were blinded with the glare from six dozen solar burners.

I will pass over my entree, my compliments to the hostess, to a corner where I found myself ensconced, back to the wall with P., Mrs. Bell’s cousin. Mrs. Bell was a charming woman, and her cousin P. was another, and so was her cousin Mary. Three more charming cousins could not be found, if you searched that numerous class of relations through. Cousin P. was the woman I delighted in above all others, she had fascinated me in my early youth, and I had maintained a sort of attachment, though time had separated us, married her, and brought me into love with fifty other cousins. I cannot tell how our conversation in the corner commenced, but very soon, almost too soon to be natural, it turned upon dress, and gentlemen’s dress in particular. I remarked that I considered him a fool who said “clothes make the man.” It was no such thing, the man makes the clothes. I cited instances of great geniuses who were very slovenly in their dress. P. seemed much amused; perhaps she thought I wanted to pass myself off for a genius. Heavens! my attempt to look well dressed was too palpable. Being in rather a jocose mood, I asked her how she liked my coat; and the smile with which she replied assured me that she was not insensible to its shabbiness, and saw all its defects as plainly as myself. So I made a clean breast of it, and told her the whole story, and described in a graphic manner the scene I had lately enacted at my room. She was delighted, and thought it the best joke in the world, at the same time expressing a wish that I should exhibit myself to the company. A waltz had just commenced, so what could I do but waltz. P. and I took our places. I knew that the attention of several people was attracted toward us, and two young ladies were seen to exchange glances which said louder than words, “Coat.”

It is astonishing how well navy officers always waltz, also ladies who have been under their training. I liked to watch their short, quick steps, taken with a precision and exactness truly enviable. But though I had been accounted an indifferent waltzer, I now had something new to teach them. I had a relative in Europe, and they had not, or if they had, what use was he, since he made them no communications on the subject of waltzing, my relative had lately sent me valuable advice upon the subject. “Take very long steps,” wrote he, “and never lift your feet from the floor. Slide along, but on no account jump.” These hints I had acted on, though my opportunities for practice had been limited to an occasional evening with a friend, or a few turns with some brother companion, in the small circle of my own apartment. Now had my hour arrived. I communicated my style to P.; and thank fortune she was not unprepared for it. The three cousins were fresh from a visit to the metropolis, where this change had already been adopted. Now we would make a trial, with such brilliant music, and such a glorious smooth spring-floor, who could fail? Down we swept, the whole length of the hall, and all round it, not confining ourselves to the more contracted circle with which the navy, and people in general were satisfied. Down, up, round again—all eyes upon us, as we rounded our rapid way. My coat did not look quite so shabby now. All the young ladies were breathless, the navy stood aghast—they didn’t know what it meant. But how much wider did their eyes open, and their mouths, too, when I took another partner, cousin Mary, and repeated the performance. How can I express their mingled wonder and indignation when I advanced with Mrs. Bell, for a third waltz. What assurance in shabby-coat! But shabby-coat is not to be daunted by trifles. Navy, stand back. They did stand back, and we had the floor all to ourselves; for the few who had commenced to waltz soon stopped, and fell back among the crowd of lookers-on. Shabby-coat and Mrs. Bell were by this time half round. It was a tug—a tug, no other word will express it. Mrs. Bell was more than slightly inclined to embonpoint; but thanks to my strength of arm, I was able to sustain her. Just as we passed the orchestra, I heard a young middy give an order to the leader of the band, “Faster, faster.” Faster played the waltz, and faster, faster waltzed shabby and Mrs. Bell. I was in good time, and could not be got out of it. Our course was exciting—it was tremendous. I look to nature for a comparison, and the great whirlpool on the coast of Norway, roars with a mighty rushing sound in my ear. Shabby-coat had done it. Shabby? It was no longer shabby, not even threadbare; a new nap had extended over its surface, at least it seemed so to the eyes of envying young ladies. What were my boots? Better than Hobb’s best. Coat, boots, and all, were forgotten, to think only of the genius that could achieve such wonders. No more glances of scorn, but glances of desire from ladies, both married and single. The navy scowled malignantly, and many a lieutenant, and many a middy thought of pistols and challenges. I surveyed with a calm smile of satisfaction the revolution I had accomplished. The navy was down, had become at once old-fashioned, and several rather advanced belles boldly talked of their “minnikin diddling steps.”

My triumph was not yet completed. Supper had to be gone through—and such a supper. When I am bidden to a feast, I go and make the most of it. So I did here, and found myself one of the lingerers who still have another glass of champagne, and another glass of sherry to take before the cravings of their stomachs will be satisfied. I was interrupted in my discussion of another delicate bit of quail, by the music of a Strauss waltz. I had engaged P. for the German Quadrille, and it was soon to begin. I reeled down stairs into the dancing hall, and was luckily enabled, by immense ocular exertion, to distinguish the tall figure and blue head-dress of P., amid the blur of sizes and colors which was before me. Soon was I at her side, and soon the dance began. I followed my friend’s advice, to keep my heels to the floor and not jump; but certainly never was so light a pair of heels kept down. It may have been that the head they carried bore the same proportion to them as corks do to feathers; sure it is, that winged Mercury never glided over the earth with a lightness that surpassed mine, as I glided over that ball-room floor. We waltzed several figures of the German Quadrille, till we came to that one where a chair is placed in the centre of the circle, in which each lady in turn sits, and has the opportunity of refusing or accepting every gentleman in the set as a partner in a waltz. It was here the crown was put upon my glory of that evening. Every gentleman was refused but me, and by every lady too. The unfortunate rejected ones stood in a long row behind the chair, while I, shabby, was the only favored one. As for the real state of my dress and appearance, it was as much worse as possible, than when I first entered the hall and was sniffed at—for I had become very much heated by my exertions; my hair was flying in every direction, and my dickey, which in the earlier part of the evening had stood with a dignified erectness, now hung wet and flabby, as when it dangled the previous Monday morning from my washerwoman’s line.

Shall I tell of my dreams that night? I had none, for I slept too sound. But on some future occasion I will relate how I became a great beau, and how I waltzed with a foreign countess, and more than all about my new clothes.

L. L.

THE SKATER’S SONG

Away! on the glist’ning plain we go,

  With our steely feet so bright;

Away! for the north winds keenly blow

  And winter’s out to-night.

With the stirring shout of the joyous rout

  To the ice-bound stream we hie;

On the river’s breast, where snow flakes rest,

  We’ll merrily onward fly!

Our fires flame high; by their midnight glare

  We will wheel our way along;

And the white woods dim, and the frosty air,

  Shall ring with the skater’s song.

With a crew as bold as ever was told

  For the wild and daring deed,

What can stay our flight by the fire’s red light,

  As we move with lightning speed.

We heed not the blast who are flying as fast

  As deer o’er the Lapland snow;

When the cold moon shines on snow-clad pines

  And wintry breezes blow.

The cheerful hearth, in the hall of mirth,

  We have gladly left behind⁠—

For a thrilling song is borne along

  On the free and stormy wind.

Our hearts beating warm—we’ll laugh at the storm

  When it comes in a fearful rage⁠—

“While with many a wheel on the ringing steel

  A riotous game we will wage.”

By the starry light of a frosty night

  We trace our onward way;

While on the ground with a splintering sound

  The frost goes forth at play.

Then away! to the stream, in the moonlight’s beam,

  For the night it waneth fast,

And the silent tread of the ghostly dead

  At the midnight hour hath passed.

H. B. T.

THE ISLETS OF THE GULF;

OR, ROSE BUDD.

Ay, now I am in Arden; the more fool

I; when I was at home I was in a better place; but

Travelers must be content.    As You Like It.

———

BY THE AUTHOR OF “PILOT,” “RED ROVER,” “TWO ADMIRALS,” “WING-AND-WING,” “MILES WALLINGFORD,” &c.

———

[Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1846, by J. Fenimore Cooper, in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of the United States, for the Northern District of New York.]

(Continued from page 192.)

PART VI.

    At the piping of all hands,

  When the judgment signal’s spread⁠—

    When the islands and the land,

  And the seas give up their dead,

And the south and the north shall come;

    When the sinner is dismayed,

      And the just man is afraid,

    Then heaven be thy aid,

        Poor Tom.

Brainard.

The people had now a cessation from their toil. Of all the labor known to sea-faring men, that of pumping is usually thought to be the most severe. Those who work at it have to be relieved every minute, and it is only by having gangs to succeed each other, that the duty can be done at all with any thing like steadiness. In the present instance, it is true, that the people of the Swash were sustained by the love of gold, but glad enough were they when Mulford called out to them to “knock off, and turn in for the night.” It was high time this summons should be made, for not only were the people excessively wearied, but the customary hours of labor were so far spent, that the light of the moon had some time before begun to blend with the little left by the parting sun. Glad enough were all hands to quit the toil; and two minutes were scarcely elapsed ere most of the crew had thrown themselves down, and were buried in deep sleep. Even Spike and Mulford took the rest they needed, the cook alone being left to look out for the changes in the weather. In a word, everybody but this idler was exhausted with pumping and bailing, and even gold had lost its power to charm, until nature was recruited by rest.

The excitement produced by the scenes through which they had so lately passed, caused the females to sleep soundly, too. The death-like stillness which pervaded the vessel contributed to their rest, and Rose never woke, from the first few minutes after her head was on her pillow, until near four in the morning. The deep quiet seemed ominous to one who had so lately witnessed the calm which precedes the tornado, and she arose. In that low latitude and warm season, few clothes were necessary, and our heroine was on deck in a very few minutes. Here she found the same grave-like sleep pervading every thing. There was not a breath of air, and the ocean seemed to be in one of its profoundest slumbers. The hard-breathing of Spike could be heard through the open windows of his state-room, and this was positively the only sound that was audible. The common men, who lay scattered about the decks, more especially from the mainmast forward, seemed to be so many logs, and from Mulford no breathing was heard.

The morning was neither very dark, nor very light, it being easy to distinguish objects that were near, while those at a distance were necessarily lost in obscurity. Availing herself of the circumstance, Rose went as far as the gangway, to ascertain if the cook were at his post. She saw him lying near his galley, in as profound a sleep as any of the crew. This she felt to be wrong, and she felt alarmed, though she knew not why. Perhaps it was the consciousness of being the only person up and awake at that hour of deepest night, in a vessel so situated as the Swash, and in a climate in which hurricanes seem to be the natural offspring of the air. Some one must be aroused, and her tastes, feelings, and judgment, all pointed to Harry Mulford as the person she ought to awaken. He slept habitually in his clothes—the lightest summer dress of the tropics; and the window of his little state-room was always open for air. Moving lightly to the place, Rose laid her own little, soft hand on the arm of the young man, when the latter was on his feet in an instant. A single moment only was necessary to regain his consciousness, when Mulford left the state-room and joined Rose on the quarter-deck.

“Why am I called, Rose,” the young man asked, attempering his voice to the calm that reigned around him; “and why am I called by you?”

Rose explained the state of the brig, and the feeling which induced her to awaken him. With woman’s gentleness she now expressed her regret for having robbed Harry of his rest; had she reflected a moment, she might have kept watch herself, and allowed him to obtain the sleep he must surely so much require.

But Mulford laughed at this; protested he had never been awoke at a more favorable moment, and would have sworn, had it been proper, that a minute’s further sleep would have been too much for him. After these first explanations, Mulford walked round the decks, carefully felt how much strain there was on the purchases, and rejoined Rose to report that all was right, and that he did not consider it necessary to call even the cook. The black was an idler in no sense but that of keeping watch, and he had toiled the past day as much as any of the men, though it was not exactly at the pumps.

A long and a semi-confidential conversation now occurred between Harry and Rose. They talked of Spike, the brig, and her cargo, and of the delusion of the captain’s widow. It was scarcely possible that powder should be so much wanted at the Havanna as to render smuggling, at so much cost, a profitable adventure; and Mulford admitted his convictions that the pretended flour was originally intended for Mexico. Rose related the tenor of the conversation she had overheard between the two parties, Don Juan and Don Esteban, and the mate no longer doubted that it was Spike’s intention to sell the brig to the enemy. She also alluded to what had passed between herself and the stranger.

Mulford took this occasion to introduce the subject of Jack Tier’s intimacy and favor with Rose. He even professed to feel some jealousy on account of it, little as there might be to alarm most men in the rivalry of such a competitor. Rose laughed, as girls will laugh when there is question of their power over the other sex, and she fairly shook her rich tresses as she declared her determination to continue to smile on Jack, to the close of the voyage. Then, as if she had said more than she intended, she added with woman’s generosity and tenderness,—

“After all, Harry, you know how much I promised to you even before we sailed, and how much more since, and have no just cause to dread even Jack. There is another reason, however, that ought to set your mind entirely at ease on his account. Jack is married, and has a partner living at this very moment, as he does not scruple to avow himself.”

A hissing noise, a bright light, and a slight explosion, interrupted the half-laughing girl, and Mulford, turning on his heel, quick as thought, saw that a rocket had shot into the air, from a point close under the bows of the brig. He was still in the act of moving toward the forecastle, when, at the distance of several leagues, he saw the explosion of another rocket high in the air. He knew enough of the practices of vessels of war, to feel certain that these were a signal and its answer from some one in the service of government. Not at all sorry to have the career of the Swash arrested, before she could pass into hostile hands, or before evil could befall Rose, Mulford reached the forecastle just in time to answer the inquiry that was immediately put to him, in the way of a hail. A gig, pulling four oars only, with two officers in its stern-sheets, was fairly under the vessel’s bows, and the mate could almost distinguish the countenance of the officer who questioned him, the instant he showed his head and shoulders above the bulwarks.

“What vessels are these?” demanded the stranger, speaking in the authoritative manner of one who acted for the state, but not speaking much above the usual conversational tone.

“American and Spanish,” was the answer. “This brig is American—the schooner alongside is a Spaniard, that turned turtle in a tornado, about six-and-thirty hours since, and on which we have been hard at work trying to raise her, since the gale which succeeded the tornado has blown its pipe out.”

“Ay, ay, that’s the story, is it? I did not know what to make of you, lying cheek by jowl, in this fashion. Was anybody lost on board the schooner?”

“All hands, including every soul aft and forward, the supercargo excepted, who happened to be aboard here. We buried seventeen bodies this afternoon on the smallest of the Keys that you see near at hand, and two this morning alongside of the light. But what boat is that, and where are you from, and whom are you signaling?”

“The boat is a gig,” answered the stranger, deliberately, “and she belongs to a cruiser of Uncle Sam’s, that is off the reef, a short bit to the eastward, and we signaled our captain. But I’ll come on board you, sir, if you please.”

Mulford walked aft to meet the stranger at the gangway, and was relieved, rather than otherwise, at finding that Spike was already on the quarter-deck. Should the vessel of war seize the brig, he could rejoice at it, but so strong were his professional ideas of duty to the craft he sailed in, that he did not find it in his heart to say aught against her. Were any mishap to befall it, or were justice to be done, he preferred that it might be done under Spike’s own supervision, rather than under his.

“Call all hands, Mr. Mulford,” said Spike, as they met. “I see a streak of day coming yonder in the east—let all hands be called at once. What strange boat is this we have alongside?”

This question was put to the strangers, Spike standing on his gangway-ladder to ask it, while the mate was summoning the crew. The officer saw that a new person was to be dealt with, and in his quiet, easy way, he answered, while stretching out his hands to take the man-rope⁠—

“Your servant, sir—we are man-of-war’s men, belonging to one of Uncle Sam’s craft, outside, and have just come in to pay you a visit of ceremony. I told one, whom I suppose was your mate, that I would just step on board of you.”

“Ay, ay—one at a time, if you please. It’s wartime, and I cannot suffer armed boats’ crews to board me at night, without knowing something about them. Come up yourself, if you please, but order your people to stay in the boat. Here, muster about this gangway, half a dozen of you, and keep an eye on the crew of this strange boat.”

These orders had no effect on the cool and deliberate lieutenant, who ascended the brig’s side, and immediately stood on her deck. No sooner had he and Spike confronted each other, than each gave a little start, like that of recognition, and the lieutenant spoke.

“Ay, ay—I believe I know this vessel now. It is the Molly Swash, of New York, bound to Key West, and a market; and I have the honor to see Capt. Stephen Spike again.”

It was Mr. Wallace, the second lieutenant of the sloop-of-war that had boarded the brig in the Mona Passage, and to avoid whom Spike had gone to the southward of Jamaica. The meeting was very mal-à-propos, but it would not do to betray that the captain and owner of the vessel thought as much as this; on the contrary, Wallace was warmly welcomed, and received, not only as an old acquaintance, but as a very agreeable visiter. To have seen the two, as they walked aft together, one might have supposed that the meeting was conducive of nothing but a very mutual satisfaction, it was so much like that which happens between those who keep up a hearty acquaintance.

“Well, I’m glad to see you again, Capt. Spike,” cried Wallace, after the greetings were passed, “if it be only to ask where you flew to, the day we left you in the Mona Passage? We look’d out for you with all our eyes, expecting you would be down between San Domingo and Jamaica, but I hardly think you got by us in the night. Our master thinks you must have dove, and gone past loon-fashion. Do you ever perform that manœuvre?”

“No, we’ve kept above water the whole time, lieutenant,” answered Spike, heartily; “and that is more than can be said of the poor fellow alongside of us. I was so much afraid of the Isle of Pines, that I went round Jamaica.”

“You might have given the Isle of Pines a berth, and still have passed to the northward of the Englishmen,” said Wallace, a little drily. “However, that island is somewhat of a scarecrow, and we have been to take a look at it ourselves. All’s right there, just now. But you seem light; what have you done with your flour?”

“Parted with every barrel of it. You may remember I was bound to Key West, and a market. Well, I found my market here, in American waters.”

“You have been lucky, sir. This ‘emporium’ does not seem to be exactly a commercial emporium.”

“The fact is, the flour is intended for the Havanna; and I fancy it is to be shipped for slavers. But I am to know nothing of all that, you’ll understand, lieutenant. If I sell my flour in American waters, at two prices, it’s no concern of mine what becomes of it a’terwards.”

“Unless it happen to pass into enemy’s hands, certainly not; and you are too patriotic to deal with Mexico, just now, I’m sure. Pray, did that flour go down when the schooner turned turtle?”

“Every barrel of it; but Don Wan, below there, thinks that most of it may yet be saved, by landing it on one of those Keys to dry. Flour, well packed, wets in slowly. You see we have some of it on deck.”

“And who may Don Wan be, sir, pray? We are sent here to look after Dons and Donas, you know.”

“Don Wan is a Cuban merchant, and deals in such articles as he wants. I fell in with him among the reefs here, where he was rummaging about in hopes of meeting with a wrack, he tells me, and thinking to purchase something profitable in that way; but finding I had flour, he agreed to take it out of me at this anchorage, and send me away in ballast at once. I have found Don Wan Montefalderon ready pay, and very honorable.”

Wallace then requested an explanation of the disaster, to the details of which he listened with a sailor’s interest. He asked a great many questions, all of which bore on the more nautical features of the event, and day having now fairly appeared, he examined the purchases and backings of the Swash with professional nicety. The schooner was no lower in the water than when the men had knocked off work the previous night; and Spike set the people at the pumps and their bailing again, as the most effectual method of preventing their making any indiscreet communications to the man-of-war’s men.

About this time the relict appeared on deck, when Spike gallantly introduced the lieutenant anew to his passengers. It is true he knew no name to use, but that was of little moment, as he called the officer “the lieutenant,” and nothing else.

Mrs. Budd was delighted with this occasion to show-off, and she soon broke out on the easy, indolent, but waggish Wallace, in a strain to surprise him, notwithstanding the specimen of the lady’s skill from which he had formerly escaped.

“Capt. Spike is of opinion, lieutenant, that our cast-anchor here is excellent, and I know the value of a good cast-anchor place; for my poor Mr. Budd was a sea-faring man, and taught me almost as much of your noble profession as he knew himself.”

“And he taught you, ma’am,” said Wallace, fairly opening his eyes, under the influence of astonishment, “to be very particular about cast-anchor places!”

“Indeed he did. He used to say, that roads-instead were never as good, for such purposes, as land that’s locked havens, for the anchors would return home, as he called it, in roads-instead.”

“Yes, ma’am,” answered Wallace, looking very queer at first, as if disposed to laugh outright, then catching a glance of Rose, and changing his mind; “I perceive that Mr. Budd knew what he was about, and preferred an anchorage, where he was well land-locked, and where there was no danger of his anchors coming home, as so often happens in your open roadsteads.”

“Yes, that’s just it! That was just his notion! You cannot feel how delightful it is, Rose, to converse with one that thoroughly understands such subjects! My poor Mr. Budd did, indeed, denounce roads-instead, at all times calling them ‘savage.’”

“Savage, aunt,” put in Rose, hoping to stop the good relict by her own interposition—“that is a strange word to apply to an anchorage!”

“Not at all, young lady,” said Wallace gravely. “They are often wild berths, and wild berths are not essentially different from wild beasts. Each is savage, as a matter of course.”

“I knew I was right!” exclaimed the widow. “Savage cast-anchors come of wild births, as do savage Indians. Oh! the language of the ocean, as my poor Mr. Budd used to say, is eloquence tempered by common sense!”

Wallace stared again, but his attention was called to other things, just at that moment. The appearance of Don Juan Montefalderon y Castro on deck, reminded him of his duty, and approaching that gentleman he condoled with him on the grave loss he had sustained. After a few civil expressions on both sides, Wallace made a delicate allusion to the character of the schooner.

“Under other circumstances,” he said, “it might be my duty to inquire a little particularly as to the nationality of your vessel, Señor, for we are at war with the Mexicans, as you doubtless know.”

“Certainly,” answered Don Juan, with an unmoved air and great politeness of manner, “though it would be out of my power to satisfy you. Every thing was lost in the schooner, and I have not a paper of any sort to show you. If it be your pleasure to make a prize of a vessel in this situation, certainly it is in your power to do it. A few barrels of wet flour are scarce worth disputing about.”

Wallace now seemed a little ashamed, the sang froid of the other throwing dust in his eyes, and he was in a hurry to change the subject. Señor Don Juan was very civilly condoled with again, and he was made to repeat the incidents of the loss, as if his auditor took a deep interest in what he said, but no further hint was given touching the nationality of the vessel. The lieutenant’s tact let him see that Señor Montefalderon was a person of a very different calibre from Spike, as well as of different habits, and he did not choose to indulge in the quiet irony that formed so large an ingredient in his own character, with this new acquaintance. He spoke Spanish himself with tolerable fluency, and a conversation now occurred between the two, which was maintained for some time with spirit and a very manifest courtesy.

This dialogue between Wallace and the Spaniard gave Spike a little leisure for reflection. As the day advanced the cruiser came more and more plainly in view, and his first business was to take a good survey of her. She might have been three leagues distant, but approaching with a very light breeze, at the rate of something less than two knots in the hour. Unless there was some one on board her who was acquainted with the channels of the Dry Tortugas, Spike felt little apprehension of the ship’s getting very near to him; but he very well understood that, with the sort of artillery that was in modern use among vessels of war, he would hardly be safe could the cruiser get within a league. That near Uncle Sam’s craft might certainly come without encountering the hazards of the channels, and within that distance she would be likely to get in the course of the morning, should he have the complaisance to wait for her. He determined, therefore, not to be guilty of that act of folly.

All this time the business of lightening the schooner proceeded. Although Mulford earnestly wished that the man-of-war might get an accurate notion of the true character and objects of the brig, he could not prevail on himself to become an informer. In order to avoid the temptation so to do, he exerted himself in keeping the men at their tasks, and never before had pumping and bailing been carried on with more spirit. The schooner soon floated of herself, and the purchases which led to the Swash were removed. Near a hundred more barrels of the flour had been taken out of the hold of the Spanish craft, and had been struck on the deck of the brig, or sent to the Key by means of the boats. This made a material change in the buoyancy of the vessel, and enabled the bailing to go on with greater facility. The pumps were never idle, but two small streams of water were running the whole time toward the scuppers, and through them into the sea.

At length the men were ordered to knock off, and to get their breakfasts. This appeared to arouse Wallace, who had been chatting, quite agreeably to himself, with Rose, and seemed reluctant to depart, but who now became sensible that he was neglecting his duty. He called away his boat’s crew, and took a civil leave of the passengers; after which he went over the side. The gig was some little distance from the Swash, when Wallace rose and asked to see Spike, with whom he had a word to say at parting.

“I will soon return,” he said, “and bring you forty or fifty fresh men, who will make light work with your wreck. I am certain our commander will consent to my doing so, and will gladly send on board you two or three boats’ crews.”

“If I let him,” muttered Spike between his teeth, “I shall be a poor, miserable cast-anchor devil, that’s all.”

To Wallace, however, he expressed his hearty acknowledgments; begged him not to be in a hurry, as the worst was now over, and the row was still a long one. If he got back toward evening it would be all in good time. Wallace waved his hand, and the gig glided away. As for Spike, he sat down on the plank-sheer where he had stood, and remained there ruminating intently for two or three minutes. When he descended to the deck his mind was fully made up. His first act was to give some private orders to the boatswain, after which he withdrew to the cabin, whither he summoned Tier, without delay.

“Jack,” commenced the captain, using very little circumlocution in opening his mind, “you and I are old shipmates, and ought to be old friends, though I think your natur’ has undergone some changes since we last met. Twenty years ago there was no man in the ship on whom I could so certainly depend as on Jack Tier; now, you seem given up altogether to the women. Your mind has changed even more than your body.”

“Time does that for all of us, Capt. Spike,” returned Tier coolly. “I am not what I used to be, I’ll own, nor are you yourself for that matter. When I saw you last, noble captain, you were a handsome man of forty, and could go aloft with any youngster in the brig; but, now, you’re heavy, and not over active.”

“I!—Not a bit of change has taken place in me for the last thirty years. I defy any man to show the contrary. But that’s neither here nor there; you are no young woman, Jack, that I need be boasting of my health and beauty before you. I want a bit of real sarvice from you, and want it done in old-time’s fashion; and I mean to pay for it in old-time’s fashion, too.”

As Spike concluded, he put into Tier’s hand one of the doubloons that he had received from Señor Montefalderon, in payment for the powder. The doubloons, for which so much pumping and bailing were then in process, were still beneath the waters of the gulf.

“Ay, ay, sir,” returned Jack, smiling and pocketing the gold, with a wink of the eye, and a knowing look; “this does resemble old times sum’at. I now begin to know Capt. Spike, my old commander again, and see that he’s more like himself than I had just thought him. What am I to do for this, sir; speak plain, that I may be sartain to steer the true course?”

“Oh, just a trifle, Jack—nothing that will break up the ground tier of your wits, my old shipmate. You see the state of the brig, and know that she is in no condition for ladies.”

“’Twould have been better all round, sir, had they never come aboard at all,” answered Jack, looking dark.

Spike was surprised, but he was too much bent on his projects to heed trifles.

“You know what sort of flour they’re whipping out of the schooner, and must understand that the brig will soon be in a pretty litter. I do not intend to let them send a single barrel of it beneath my hatches again, but the deck and the islands must take it all. Now I wish to relieve my passengers from the confinement this will occasion, and I have ordered the boatswain to pitch a tent for them on the largest of these here Tortugas; and what I want of you, is to muster food and water, and other woman’s knickknacks, and go ashore with them, and make them as comfortable as you can for a few days, or until we can get this schooner loaded and off.”

Jack Tier looked at his commander as if he would penetrate his most secret thoughts. A short pause succeeded, during which the steward’s mate was intently musing, then his countenance suddenly brightened; he gave the doubloon a fillip, and caught it on the palm of his hand as it descended, and he uttered the customary “Ay, ay, sir,” with apparent cheerfulness. Nothing more passed between these two worthies, who now parted, Jack to make his arrangements, and Spike to “tell his yarn,” as he termed the operation in his own mind, to Mrs. Budd, Rose, and Biddy. The widow listened complacently, though she seemed half doubting, half ready to comply. As for Rose, she received the proposal with delight—the confinement of the vessel having become irksome to her. The principal obstacle was in overcoming the difficulties made by the aunt, Biddy appearing to like the notion quite as much as “Miss Rosy.” As for the light-house, Mrs. Budd had declared nothing would induce her to go there; for she did not doubt that the place would soon be, if it were not already, haunted. In this opinion she was sustained by Biddy; and it was the knowledge of this opinion that induced Spike to propose the tent.

“Are you sure, Capt. Spike, it is not a desert island?” asked the widow; “I remember that my poor Mr. Budd always spoke of desert islands as horrid places, and spots that every one should avoid.”

“What if it is, aunty,” said Rose, eagerly, “while we have the brig here, close at hand. We shall suffer none of the wants of such a place, so long as our friends can supply us.”

“And such friends, Miss Rose,” exclaimed Spike, a little sentimentally for him, “friends that would undergo hunger and thirst themselves, before you should want for any comforts.”

“Do, now, Madam Budd,” put in Biddy, in her hearty way, “it’s an island, ye’ll remimber; and sure that’s just what ould Ireland has ever been, God bless it! Islands make the pleasantest risidences.”

“Well, I’ll venture to oblige you and Biddy, Rosy, dear,” returned the aunt, still half reluctant to yield; “but you’ll remember, that if I find it at all a desert island, I’ll not pass the night on it on any account whatever.”

With this understanding the party was transferred to the shore. The boatswain had already erected a sort of a tent, on a favorable spot, using some of the old sails that had covered the flour-barrels, not only for the walls, but for a carpet of some extent also. This tent was ingeniously enough contrived. In addition to the little room that was entirely enclosed, there was a sort of piazza, or open verandah, which would enable its tenants to enjoy the shade in the open air. Beneath this verandah, a barrel of fresh water was placed, as well as three or four ship’s stools, all of which had been sent ashore with the materials for constructing the tent. The boat had been going and coming for some time, and the distance being short, the “desert island” was soon a desert no longer. It is true that the supplies necessary to support three women for as many days, were no great matter, and were soon landed, but Jack Tier had made a provision somewhat more ample. A capital caterer, he had forgotten nothing within the compass of his means, that could contribute to the comfort of those who had been put especially under his care. Long before the people “knocked off” for their dinners, the arrangements were completed, and the boatswain was ready to take his leave.

“Well, ladies,” said that grum old salt, “I can do no more for you, as I can see. This here island is now almost as comfortable as a ship that has been in blue water for a month, and I don’t know how it can be made more comfortabler.”

This was only according to the boatswain’s notion of comfort; but Rose thanked him for his care in her winning way, while her aunt admitted that, “for a place that was almost a desert island, things did look somewhat promising.” In a few minutes the men were all gone, and the islet was left to the sole possession of the three females, and their constant companion, Jack Tier. Rose was pleased with the novelty of her situation, though the islet certainly did deserve the opprobrium of being a “desert island.” There was no shade but that of the tent, and its verandah-like covering, though the last, in particular, was quite extensive. There was no water, that in the barrel and that of the ocean excepted. Of herbage there was a very little on this islet, and that was of the most meagre and coarse character, being a long wiry grass, with here and there a few stunted bushes. The sand was reasonably firm, however, more especially round the shore, and the walking was far from unpleasant. Little did Rose know it, but a week earlier, the spot would have been next to intolerable to her, on account of the mosquitoes, gallinippers, and other similar insects of the family of tormentors, but every thing of the sort had temporarily disappeared in the currents of the tornado. To do Spike justice, he was aware of this circumstance, or he might have hesitated about exposing females to the ordinary annoyances of one of these spots. Not a mosquito, or any thing of the sort was left, however, all having gone to leeward, in the vortex which had come so near sweeping off the Mexican schooner.

“This place will do very well, aunty, for a day or two,” cried Rose cheerfully, as she returned from a short excursion, and threw aside her hat, one made to shade her face from the sun of a warm climate, leaving the sea-breeze, that was just beginning to blow, to fan her blooming and sunny cheeks. “It is better than the brig. The worst piece of land is better than the brig.”

“Do not say that, Rose—not if it’s a desert island, dear; and this is desperately like a desert island; I am almost sorry I ventured on it.”

“It will not be deserted by us, aunty, until we shall see occasion to do so. Why not endeavor to get on board of yonder ship, and return to New York in her; or at least induce her captain to put us ashore somewhere near this, and go home by land. Your health never seemed better than it is at this moment; and as for mine, I do assure you, aunty, dear, I am as perfectly well as I ever was in my life.”

“All from this voyage. I knew it would set you up, and am delighted to hear you say as much. Biddy and I were talking of you this very morning, my child, and we both agreed that you were getting to be yourself again. Oh, ships, and brigs, and schooners, full-jigger or half-jigger, for pulmonary complaints, say I! My poor Mr. Budd always maintained that the ocean was the cure for all diseases, and I determined that to sea you should go, the moment I became alarmed for your health.”

The good widow loved Rose most tenderly, and she was obliged to use her handkerchief to dry the tears from her eyes as she concluded. Those tears sprung equally from a past feeling of apprehension, and a present feeling of gratitude. Rose saw this, and she took a seat at her aunt’s side, touched herself, as she never failed to be on similar occasions, with this proof of her relative’s affection. At that moment even Harry Mulford would have lost a good deal in her kind feelings toward him, had he so much as smiled at one of the widow’s nautical absurdities. At such times, Rose seemed to be her aunt’s guardian and protectress, instead of reversing the relations, and she entirely forgot herself the many reasons which existed for wishing that she had been placed in childhood, under the care of one better qualified than the well-meaning relict of her uncle, for the performance of her duties.

“Thank you, aunty—thank’ee, dear aunty,” said Rose, kissing the widow affectionately. “I know that you mean the best for me, though you are a little mistaken in supposing me ill. I do assure you, dear,” patting her aunt’s cheek, as if she herself had been merely a playful child, “I never was better; and if I have been pulmonary, I am entirely cured, and am now ready to return home.”

“God be praised for this, Rosy. Under His divine providence, it is all owing to the sea. If you really feel so much restored, however, I do not wish to keep you a moment longer on a ship’s board than is necessary. We owe something to Capt. Spike’s care, and cannot quit him too unceremoniously; but as soon as he is at liberty to go into a harbor, I will engage him to do so, and we can return home by land—unless, indeed, the brig intends to make the home voyage herself.”

“I do not like this brig, aunty, and now we are out of her, I wish we could keep out of her. Nor do I like your Capt. Spike, who seems to me any thing but an agreeable gentleman.”

“That’s because you aren’t accustomed to the sea. My poor Mr. Budd had his ways, like all the rest of them; it takes time to get acquainted with them. All sailors are so.”

Rose bent her face involuntarily, but so low as to conceal the increasing brightness of her native bloom, as she answered,

“Harry Mulford is not so, aunty, dear—and he is every inch a sailor.”

“Well, there is a difference, I must acknowledge, though I dare say Harry will grow every day more and more like all the rest of them. In the end, he will resemble Capt. Spike.”

“Never,” said Rose, firmly.

“You can’t tell, child. I never saw your uncle when he was Harry’s age, for I wasn’t born till he was thirty, but often and often has he pointed out to me some slender, genteel youth, and say, ‘just such a lad was I at twenty,’ though nothing could be less alike, at the moment he was speaking, than they two. We all change with our years. Now I was once as slender, and almost—not quite, Rosy, for few there are that be—but almost as handsome as you yourself.”

“Yes, aunty, I’ve heard that before,” said Rose, springing up, in order to change the discourse; “but Harry Mulford will never become like Stephen Spike. I wish we had never known the man, dearest aunty.”

“It was all your own doings, child. He’s a cousin of your most intimate friend, and she brought him to the house; and one couldn’t offend Mary Mulford, by telling her we didn’t like her cousin.”

Rose seemed vexed, and she kept her little foot in motion, patting the sail that formed the carpet, as girls will pat the ground with their feet when vexed. This gleam of displeasure was soon over, however, and her countenance became as placid as the clear, blue sky that formed the vault of the heavens above her head. As if to atone for the passing rebellion of her feelings, she threw her arms around her aunt’s neck; after which she walked away, along the beach, ruminating on her present situation, and of the best means of extricating their party from the power of Spike.

It requires great familiarity with vessels and the seas, for one to think, read, and pursue the customary train of reasoning on board a ship that one has practiced ashore. Rose had felt this embarrassment during the past month, for the whole of which time she had scarcely been in a condition to act up to her true character, suffering her energies, and in some measure, her faculties to be drawn into the vortex produced by the bustle, novelties, and scenes of the vessel and the ocean. But, now she was once more on the land, diminutive and naked as was the islet that composed her present world, and she found leisure and solitude for reflection and decision. She was not ignorant of the nature of a vessel of war, or of the impropriety of unprotected females placing themselves on board of one; but gentlemen of character, like the officers of the ship in sight, could hardly be wanting in the feelings of their caste; and any thing was better than to return voluntarily within the power of Spike. She determined within her own mind that voluntarily she would not. We shall leave this young girl, slowly wandering along the beach of her islet, musing on matters like these, while we return to the vessels and the mariners.

A good breeze had come in over the reef from the gulf, throwing the sloop-of-war dead to leeward of the brigantine’s anchorage. This was the reason that the former had closed so slowly. Still the distance between the vessels was so small, that a swift cruiser, like the ship of war, would soon have been alongside of the wreckers, but for the intervening islets and the intricacies of their channels. She had made sail on the wind, however, and was evidently disposed to come as near to the danger as her lead showed would be safe, even if she did not venture among them.

Spike noted all these movements, and he took his measures accordingly. The pumping and bailing had been going on since the appearance of light, and the flour had been quite half removed from the schooner’s hold. That vessel consequently floated with sufficient buoyancy, and no further anxiety was felt on account of her sinking. Still a great deal of water remained in her, the cabin itself being nearly half full. Spike’s object was to reduce this water sufficiently to enable him to descend into the state-room which Señor Montefalderon had occupied, and bring away the doubloons that alone kept him in the vicinity of so ticklish a neighbor as the Poughkeepsie. Escape was easy enough to one who knew the passages of the reef and islets; more especially since the wind had so fortunately brought the cruiser to leeward. Spike most apprehended a movement upon him in the boats, and he had almost made up his mind, should such an enterprise be attempted, to try his hand in beating it off with his guns. A good deal of uncertainty on the subject of Mulford’s consenting to resist the recognized authorities of the country, as well as some doubts of a similar nature in reference to two or three of the best of the foremast hands, alone left him at all in doubt as to the expediency of such a course. As no boats were lowered from the cruiser, however, the necessity of resorting to so desperate a measure did not occur, and the duty of lightening the schooner had proceeded without interruption. As soon as the boatswain came off from the islet, he and the men with him were directed to take the hands and lift the anchors, of which it will be remembered the Swash had several down. Even Mulford was shortly after set at work on the same duty; and these expert and ready seamen soon had the brig clear of the ground. As the schooner was anchored, and floated without assistance, the Swash rode by her.

Such was the state of things when the men turned to, after having had their dinners. By this time, the sloop-of-war was within half a league of the bay, her progress having been materially retarded by the set of the current, which was directly against her. Spike saw that a collision of some sort or other must speedily occur, and he determined to take the boatswain with him, and descend into the cabin of the schooner in quest of the gold. The boatswain was summoned, and Señor Montefalderon repeated in this man’s presence, the instructions that he thought it necessary for the adventurers to follow, in order to secure the prize. Knowing how little locks would avail on board a vessel, were the men disposed to rob him, that gentleman had trusted more to secreting his treasure, than to securing it in the more ordinary way. When the story had again been told, Spike and his boatswain went on board the schooner, and, undressing, they prepared to descend into the cabin. The captain paused a single instant to take a look at the sloop-of-war, and to examine the state of the weather. It is probable some new impression was made on him by this inquiry, for, hailing Mulford, he ordered him to loosen the sails, and to sheet home, and hoist the foretopsail. In a word, to “see all ready to cast off, and make sail on the brig at the shortest notice.” With this command he disappeared by the schooner’s companion-way.

Spike and his companion found the water in the cabin very much deeper than they had supposed. With a view to comfort, the cabin-floor had been sunk much lower than is usual on board American vessels, and this brought the water up nearly to the arm-pits of two men as short as our captain and his sturdy little boatswain. The former grumbled a good deal, when he ascertained the fact, and said something about the mate’s being better fitted to make a search in such a place, but concluding with the remark, that “the man who wants ticklish duty well done, must see to it himself.”

The gold-hunters groped their way cautiously about the cabin for some time, feeling for a drawer, in which they had been told they should find the key of Señor Montefalderon’s state-room door. In this Spike himself finally succeeded, he being much better acquainted with cabins and their fixtures, than the boatswain.

“Here it is, Ben,” said the captain, “now for a dive among the Don’s val’ables. Should you pick up any thing worth speaking of, you can condemn it for salvage, as I mean to cast off, and quit the wrack the moment we’ve made sure of the doubloons.”

“And what will become of all the black flour that is lying about, sir?” asked the boatswain with a grin.

“It may take care of itself. My agreement will be up as soon as the doubloons are found. If the Don will come down handsomely with his share of what will be left, I may be bought to put the kegs we have in the brig ashore for him somewhere in Mexico; but my wish is to get out of the neighborhood of that bloody sloop-of-war, as soon as possible.”

“She makes but slow headway ag’in the current, sir; but a body would think she might send in her boats.”

“The boats might be glad to get back again,” muttered Spike. “Ay, here is the door unlocked, and we can now fish for the money.”

Some object had rolled against the state-room door, when the vessel was capsized, and there was a good deal of difficulty in forcing it open. They succeeded at last, and Spike led the way by wading into the small apartment. Here they began to feel about beneath the water, and by a very insufficient light, in quest of the hidden treasure. Spike and his boatswain differed as to the place which had just been described to them, as men will differ even in the account of events that pass directly before their eyes. While thus employed, the report of a heavy gun came through the doors of the cabin, penetrating to the recess in which they were thus employed.

“Ay, that’s the beginning of it!” exclaimed Spike. “I wonder that the fool has put it off so long.”

“That gun was a heavy fellow, Capt. Spike,” returned the boatswain; “and it sounded in my ears as if ’twas shotted.”

“Ay, ay, I dare say you’re right enough in both opinions. They put such guns on board their sloops-of-war, now-a-days, as a fellow used to find in the lower batteries of a two-decker only in old times; and as for shot, why Uncle Sam pays, and they think it cheaper to fire one out of a gun, than to take the trouble of drawing it.”

“I believe here’s one of the bags, Capt. Spike,” said the boatswain, making a dip, and coming up with one-half of the desired treasure in his fist. “By George, I’ve grabbed him, sir; and the other bag can’t be far off.”

“Hand that over to me,” said the captain, a little authoritatively, “and take a dive for the next.”

As the boatswain was obeying this order, a second gun was heard, and Spike thought that the noise made by the near passage of a large shot was audible also. He called out to Ben to “bear a hand, as the ship seems in ’arnest.” But the head of the boatswain being under water at the time, the admonition was thrown away. The fellow soon came up, however, puffing like a porpoise that has risen to the surface to blow.

“Hand it over to me at once,” said Spike, stretching out his unoccupied hand to receive the prize; “we have little time to lose.”

“That’s sooner said than done, sir,” answered the boatswain, “a box has driven down upon the bag, and there’s a tight jam. I got hold of the neck of the bag, and pulled like a horse, but it wouldn’t come no how.”

“Show me the place, and let me have a drag at it. There goes another of his bloody guns!”

Down went Spike, and the length of time he was under water, proved how much he was in earnest. Up he came at length, and with no better luck than his companion. He had got hold of the bag, satisfied himself by feeling its outside that it contained the doubloons, and hauled with all his strength, but it would not come. The boatswain now proposed to take a jamming hitch with a rope around the neck of the bag, which was long enough to admit of such a fastening, and then to apply their united force. Spike assented, and the boatswain rummaged about for a piece of small rope to suit his purpose. At this moment Mulford appeared at the companion-way to announce the movements on the part of the sloop-of-war. He had been purposely tardy, in order to give the ship as much time as possible; but he saw by the looks of the men that a longer delay might excite suspicion.

“Below there,” called out the mate.

“What’s wanting, sir?—what’s wanting, sir?” answered Spike; “let’s know at once.”

“Have you heard the guns, Capt. Spike?”

“Ay, ay, every grumbler of them. They’ve done no mischief, I trust, Mr. Mulford?”

“None as yet, sir; though the last shot, and it was a heavy fellow, passed just above the schooner’s deck. I’ve the topsail sheeted home and hoisted, and it’s that which has set them at work. If I clewed up again, I dare say they’d not fire another gun.”

“Clew up nothing, sir, but see all clear for casting off and making sail through the South Pass. What do you say, Ben, are you ready for a drag?”

“All ready, sir,” answered the boatswain, once more coming up to breathe. “Now for it, sir; a steady pull, and a pull all together.”

They did pull, but the hitch slipped, and both went down beneath the water. In a moment they were up again, puffing a little, and swearing a great deal. Just then another gun, and a clatter above their heads, brought them to a stand.

“What means that, Mr. Mulford?” demanded Spike, a good deal startled.

“It means that the sloop-of-war has shot away the head of this schooner’s foremast, sir, and that the shot has chipp’d a small piece out of the heel of our maintop-mast—that’s all.”

Though excessively provoked at the mate’s cool manner of replying, Spike saw that he might lose all by being too tenacious about securing the remainder of the doubloons. Pronouncing in very energetic terms on Uncle Sam, and all his cruisers, an anathema that we do not care to repeat, he gave a surly order to Ben to “knock-off,” and abandoned his late design. In a minute he was on deck and dressed.

“Cast off, lads,” cried the captain, as soon as on the deck of his own brig again, “and four of you man that boat. We have got half of your treasure, Señor Wan, but have been driven from the rest of it, as you see. There is the bag; when at leisure we’ll divide it, and give the people their share. Mr. Mulford, keep the brig in motion, hauling up toward the South Pass, while I go ashore for the ladies. I’ll meet you just in the throat of the passage.”

This said, Spike tumbled into his boat, and was pulled ashore. As for Mulford, though he cast many an anxious glance toward the islet, he obeyed his orders, keeping the brig standing off and on, under easy canvas, but working her up toward the indicated passage.

Spike was met by Jack Tier on the beach of the little island.

“Muster the women at once,” ordered the captain, “we have no time to lose, for that fellow will soon be firing broadsides, and his shot now range half a mile beyond us.”

“You’ll no more move the widow and her maid, than you’ll move the island,” answered Jack, laconically.

“Why should I not move them? Do they wish to stay here and starve?”

“It’s little that they think of that. The sloop-of-war no sooner begun to fire than down went Mrs. Budd on the canvas floor of the tent, and set up just such a screaming as you may remember she tried her hand at the night the revenue craft fired into us. Biddy lay down alongside of her mistress, and at every gun, they just scream as loud as they can, as if they fancied they might frighten off Uncle Sam’s men from their duty.”

“Duty!—You little scamp, do you call tormenting honest traders in this fashion the duty of any man?”

“Well, captain, I’m no ways partic’lar about a word or two. Their ‘ways,’ if you like that better than duty, sir.”

“Where’s Rose? Is she down too, screaming and squalling?”

“No, Capt. Spike, no. Miss Rose is endeavoring, like a handsome young Christian lady as she is, to pacify and mollify her aunt and Biddy; and right down sensible talk does she give them.”

“Then she at least can go aboard the brig,” exclaimed Spike, with a sudden animation, and an expression of countenance that Jack did not at all like.

“I ray-y-ther think she’ll wish to hold on to the old lady,” observed the steward’s-mate, a little emphatically.

“You be d—d,” cried Spike, fiercely; “when your opinion is wanted, I’ll ask for it. If I find you’ve been setting that young woman’s mind ag’in me, I’ll toss you overboard, as I would the offals of a shark.”

“Young women’s minds, when they are only nineteen, get set ag’in boys of fifty-six without much assistance.”

“Fifty-six yourself.”

“I’m fifty-three—that I’ll own without making faces at it,” returned Jack, meekly; “and, Stephen Spike, you logged fifty-six your last birthday, or a false entry was made.”

This conversation did not take place in the presence of the boat’s crew, but as the two walked together toward the tent. They were now in the verandah, as we have called the shaded opening in front, and actually within sound of the sweet voice of Rose, as she exhorted her aunt, in tones a little louder than usual for her to use, to manifest more fortitude. Under such circumstances Spike did not deem it expedient to utter that which was uppermost in his mind, but, turning short upon Tier, he directed a tremendous blow directly between his eyes. Jack saw the danger and dodged, falling backward to avoid a concussion which he knew would otherwise be fearful, coming as it would from one of the best forecastle boxers of his time. The full force of the blow was avoided, though Jack got enough of it to knock him down, and to give him a pair of black eyes. Spike did not stop to pick the assistant steward up, for another gun was fired at that very instant, and Mrs. Budd and Biddy renewed their screams. Instead of pausing to kick the prostrate Tier, as had just before been his intention, the captain entered the tent.

A scene that was sufficiently absurd met the view of Spike, when he found himself in the presence of the females. The widow had thrown herself on the ground, and was grasping the cloth of the sail on which the tent had been erected with both her hands, and was screaming at the top of her voice. Biddy’s imitation was not exactly literal, for she had taken a comfortable seat at the side of her mistress, but in the way of cries, she rather outdid her principal.

“We must be off,” cried Spike, somewhat unceremoniously. “The man-of-war is blazing away, as if she was a firin’ minute-guns over our destruction, and I can wait no longer.”

“I’ll not stir,” answered the widow—“I can’t stir—I shall be shot if I go out. No, no, no—I’ll not stir an inch.”

“We’ll be kilt!—we’ll be kilt!” echoed Biddy, “and a wicket murther ’twill be in that same man, war or no war.”

The captain perceived the uselessness of remonstrance at such a moment, and perhaps he was secretly rejoiced thereat; but it is certain that he whipped Rose up under his arm, and walked away with her, as if she had been a child of two or three years of age. Rose did not scream, but she struggled and protested vehemently. It was in vain. Already the captain had carried her half the distance between the tent and the boat, in the last of which, a minute more would have deposited his victim, when a severe blow on the back of his head caused Spike to stumble, and he permitted Rose to escape from his grasp, in the effort to save himself from a fall. Turning fiercely toward his assailant, whom he suspected to be one of his boat’s crew, he saw Tier standing within a few yards, leveling a pistol at him.

“Advance a step, and you’re a dead man, villain!” screamed Jack, his voice almost cracked with rage, and the effort he made to menace.

Spike muttered an oath too revolting for our pages; but it was such a curse as none but an old salt could give vent to, and that in the bitterness of his fiercest wrath. At that critical moment, while Rose was swelling with indignation and wounded maiden pride, almost within reach of his arms, looking more lovely than ever, as the flush of anger deepened the color in her cheeks, a fresh and deep report from one of the guns of the sloop-of-war drew all eyes in her direction. The belching of that gun seemed to be of double the power of those which had preceded it, and jets of water, that were twenty feet in height, marked the course of the formidable missile that was projected from the piece. The ship had, indeed, discharged one of those monster-cannons that bear the name of a distinguished French engineer, but which should more properly be called by the name of the ingenious officer who is at the head of our own ordnance, as they came originally from his inventive faculties, though somewhat improved by their European adopter. Spike suspected the truth, for he had heard of these “Pazans,” as he called them, and he watched the booming, leaping progress of the eight-inch shell that this gun threw, with the apprehension that unknown danger is apt to excite. As jet succeeded jet, each rising nearer and nearer to his brig, the interval of time between them seeming fearfully to diminish, he muttered oath upon oath. The last leap that the shell made on the water was at about a quarter of a mile’s distance of the islet on which his people had deposited at least a hundred and fifty barrels of his spurious flour, thence it flew, as it might be without an effort, with a grand and stately bound into the very centre of the barrels, exploding at the moment it struck. All saw the scattering of flour, which was instantly succeeded by the heavy though slightly straggling explosion of all the powder on the island. A hundred kegs were lighted, as it might be, in a common flash, and a cloud of white smoke poured out and concealed the whole islet, and all near it.

Rose stood confounded, nor was Jack Tier in a much better state of mind, though he still kept the pistol leveled, and menaced Spike. But the last was no longer dangerous to any there. He recollected that piles of the barrels encumbered the decks of his vessel, and he rushed to the boat, nearly frantic with haste, ordering the men to pull for their lives. In less than five minutes he was alongside, and on the deck of the Swash—his first order being to—“Tumble every barrel of this bloody powder into the sea, men. Over with it, Mr. Mulford, clear away the midship ports, and launch as much as you can through them.”

Remonstrance on the part of Señor Montefalderon would have been useless, had he been disposed to make it; but, sooth to say, he was as ready to get rid of the powder as any there, after the specimen he had just witnessed of the power of a Paixhan gun.

Thus it is ever with men. Had two or three of those shells been first thrown without effect, as might very well have happened under the circumstances, none there would have cared for the risk they were running; but the chance explosion which had occurred, presented so vivid a picture of the danger, dormant and remote as it really was, as to throw the entire crew of the Swash into a frenzy of exertion.

Nor was the vessel at all free from danger. On the contrary, she ran very serious risk of being destroyed, and in some degree, in the very manner apprehended. Perceiving that Spike was luffing up through one of the passages nearest the reef, which would carry him clear of the group, a long distance to windward of the point where he could only effect the same object, the commander of the sloop-of-war opened his fire in good earnest, hoping to shoot away something material on board the Swash, before she could get beyond the reach of his shot. The courses steered by the two vessels, just at that moment, favored such an attempt, though they made it necessarily very short lived. While the Swash was near the wind, the sloop-of-war was obliged to run off to avoid islets ahead of her, a circumstance which, while it brought the brig square with the ship’s broadside, compelled the latter to steer on a diverging line to the course of her chase. It was in consequence of these facts, that the sloop-of-war now opened in earnest and was soon canopied in the smoke of her own fire.

Great and important changes, as has been already mentioned, have been made in the armaments of all the smaller cruisers within the last few years. Half a generation since, a ship of the rate—we do not say of the size—of the vessel which was in chase of Spike and his craft, would not have had it in her power to molest an enemy at the distance these two vessels were now apart. But recent improvements have made ships of this nominal force formidable at nearly a league’s distance; more especially by means of their Paixhans and their shells.

For some little time the range carried the shot directly over the islet of the tent, Jack Tier and Rose, both of whom were watching all that passed with intense interest, standing in the open air the whole time, seemingly with no concern for themselves, so absorbed was each, notwithstanding all that had passed, in the safety of the brig. As for Rose, she thought only of Harry Mulford, and of the danger he was in by those fearful explosions of the shells. Her quick intellect comprehended the peculiar nature of the risk that was incurred by having the flour-barrels on deck, and she could not but see the manner in which Spike and his men were tumbling them into the water, as the quickest manner of getting rid of them. After what had just passed between Jack Tier and his commander, it might not be so easy to account for his manifest, nay, intense interest in the escape of the Swash. This was apparent by his troubled countenance, by his exclamations, and occasionally by his openly expressed wishes for her safety. Perhaps it was no more than the interest the seaman is so apt to feel in the craft in which he has long sailed, and which to him has been a home, and of which Mulford exhibited so much, in his struggles between feeling and conscience—between a true and a false duty.

As for Spike and his people, we have already mentioned their efforts to get rid of the powder. Shell after shell exploded, though none very near the brig, the ship working her guns as if in action. At length the officers of the sloop-of-war detected a source of error in their aim, that is of very common occurrence in sea-gunnery. Their shot had been thrown to ricochet, quartering a low, but very regular succession of little waves. Each shot striking the water at an acute angle to its agitated surface, was deflected from a straight line, and described a regular curve toward the end of its career; or, it might be truer to say, an irregular curvature, for the deflection increased as the momentum of the missile diminished.

No sooner did the commanding officer of the sloop-of-war discover this fact, and it was easy to trace the course of the shots by the jets of water they cast into the air, and to see as well as to hear the explosions of the shells, than he ordered the guns pointed more to windward, as a means of counteracting the departure from the straight lines. This expedient succeeded in part, the solid shot falling much nearer to the brig the moment the practice was resorted to. No shell was fired for some little time after the new order was issued, and Spike and his people began to hope these terrific missiles had ceased their annoyance. The men cheered, finding their voices for the first time since the danger had seemed so imminent, and Spike was heard animating them to their duty. As for Mulford, he was on the coach-house deck, working the brig, the captain having confided to him that delicate duty, the highest proof he could furnish of confidence in his seamanship. The handsome young mate had just made a half-board, in the neatest manner, shoving the brig by its means through a most difficult part of the passage, and had got her handsomely filled again on the same tack, looking right out into open water, by a channel through which she could now stand on a very easy bowline. Every thing seemed propitious, and the sloop-of-war’s solid shot began to drop into the water, a hundred yards short of the brig. In this state of things one of the Paixhans belched forth its angry flame and sullen roar again. There was no mistaking the gun. Then came its mass of iron, a globe that would have weighed just sixty-eight pounds, had not sufficient metal been left out of its interior to leave a cavity to contain a single pound of powder. Its course, as usual, was to be marked by its path along the sea, as it bounded half a mile at a time, from wave to wave. Spike saw by its undeviating course that this shell was booming terrifically toward his brig, and a cry to “look out for the shell,” caused the work to be suspended. That shell struck the water for the last time, within two hundred yards of the brig, rose dark and menacing in its furious leap, but exploded at the next instant. The fragments of the iron were scattered on each side, and ahead. Of the last, three or four fell into the water so near the vessel as to cast their spray on her decks.

“Overboard with the rest of the powder!” shouted Spike. “Keep the brig off a little, Mr. Mulford—keep her off, sir; you luff too much, sir.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the mate. “Keep her off, it is.”

“There comes the other shell!” cried Ben, but the men did not quit their toil to gaze this time. Each seaman worked as if life and death depended on his single exertions. Spike alone watched the course of the missile. On it came, booming and hurtling through the air, tossing high the jets, at each leap it made from the surface, striking the water for its last bound, seemingly in a line with the shell that had just preceded it. From that spot it made its final leap. Every hand in the brig was stayed and every eye was raised as the rushing tempest was heard advancing. The mass went muttering directly between the masts of the Swash. It had scarcely seemed to go by when the fierce flash of fire and the sharp explosion followed. Happily for those in the brig, the projectile force given by the gun carried the fragments from them, as in the other instance it had brought them forward; else would few have escaped mutilation, or death, among their crew.

The flashing of fire so near the barrels of powder that still remained on their deck, caused the frantic efforts to be renewed, and barrel after barrel was tumbled overboard, amid the shouts that were now raised to animate the people to their duty.

“Luff, Mr. Mulford—luff you may, sir,” cried Spike.

No answer was given.

“D’ye hear there, Mr. Mulford?—it is luff you may, sir.”

“Mr. Mulford is not aft, sir,” called out the man at the helm—“but luff it is, sir.”

“Mr. Mulford not aft! Where’s the mate, man? Tell him he is wanted.”

No Mulford was to be found! A call passed round the decks, was sent below, and echoed through the entire brig, but no sign or tidings could be had of the handsome mate. At that exciting moment the sloop-of-war seemed to cease her firing, and appeared to be securing her guns.

[To be continued.

LOVE UNREQUITED.

———

BY ALICE G. LEE.

———

A sister’s quiet love

  Stirs my heart for thee,

Ask me for none other,

  For it paineth me.

Schiller’s Ballads.

I can but listen to thy words in sorrow⁠—

  Words that are poured from a full, bursting heart.

Thou couldst not thus the form of passion borrow;

  I know thou dost not act a studied part.

For even now thine eyes, so true and earnest,

  Are seeking mine with such a pleading look;

And as that searching gaze on me thou turnest,

  I know that falsehood thou couldst never brook.

Yet I could almost wish deceit were dwelling

  Within the soul laid bare before me now,

That false, false words within thy breast were swelling,

  That I might read it on thy pallid brow.

Or rather, that thou deemedst true and stainless

  The vows that have just trembled to mine ear;

If then thy love could pass away all painless,

  And leave thee much of hope for gloomy fear.

I did not dream that love so high and holy

  Was nursed so long in silence; and for me!

My heart is far too humble, far too lowly,

  To think that such a passion e’er could be.

I read within thine eyes the calm affection

  A brother feels for one who, wild and weak,

Looks up to a strong arm for kind protection;

  No other language did they seem to speak.

And when my hand was warmly grasped at meeting,

  An answering pressure to thine own it gave.

I did not mark thy pulse was wildly beating;

  How could I think from hopeless love to save?

And till I met this eve thy look so thrilling,

  My spirit had not been by sorrow stirred;

But now with tears my heavy eyes are filling,

  Tears, for the hopes which I this hour have heard.

For all the dreams thy soul so long hath cherished,

  ’Tis mine to bid them vanish at a sound,

—Would, rather, that my own high hopes had perished!

  The spell of love not yet my heart has bound,

And ’twould be sin to claim thy high devotion,

  When I could not return one half its worth;

For calmest friendship is the sole emotion

  That for thee, brother! in that heart hath birth.

AUTUMN.

[PRIZE POEM—for which the Premium of $150 was awarded by the Committee.]

———

BY JESSE E. DOW.

———

————————For him the hand

Of Autumn tinges every fertile branch

With blooming gold and blushes like the morn.

Akenside.

Season of fading glory! Oh how sad,

When through the woodland moans thy fitful gale,

Shaking the ripen’d nuts from loftiest bough,

And down the forest side and sylvan road

Whirling the yellow leaves with rustling sound.

Mountain and vale, and mead, and pasture wild,

Have quickly changed their robes of deepest green;

The summer flowers are withered, save a few

Pale tremblers by the sunny cottage door,

That linger, relics of the roseate band,

Till icy winter, wandering from the pole,

Sings their sad death-song on the snowy hills.

Though not a cloud appears to fleck the sky,

The sun at evening shines with tempered heat,

The solitary flicker bores the tree⁠—

The carpenter of birds; and in the path,

The deadly rattlesnake, with flattened head,

And tongue of crimson darting from his mouth,

Watches the idle bird that marks his form,

Till the charmed victim, with affrighted cries,

Drops on his fangs, the vile seducer’s prey.

The hunter takes his way amid the woods,

Or by the ocean side, when far away

The wave that roll’d upon the beach has gone,

To lave a thousand isles of beauty ere

It breaks again in thunder on that shore.

The well-trained setter through the covert seeks

The bird the sportsman’s fancy prizes o’er

The feathered songsters of the woodland wild;

The covey starts, and soon the murd’rous aim

Brings down the plover, or the woodcock dun,

Or mottled pheasant, that puts trust in man,

And finds, as all have found, the trust abused.

On the brown stump the sprightly squirrel sits,

Filling his striped pouch with ripened grain,

While in the thicket near the rabbit glides,

And as his foot falls on the withered leaves,

A rustling sound in the dim woods is heard,

Rousing the chewitt and the piping jay,

And startling from the dead pines naked top,

With hoarsest cry, the reconnoitering crow.

The meadow-lark, with yellow breast, alights

On the old field, and sings her favorite strain⁠—

A clear harmonious song. The Hunter Boy⁠—

A little urchin stealing by his side,

With freckled face, lit up with roguish smiles,

And eyes that twinkled perfect gems of fun⁠—

Armed with an ancient musket, that did speak

The voice of death on wars victorious fields,

Creeps down the garden wall and nears her seat,

Then, casting down his flopping hat of straw,

Rests fearless o’er his trembling playmate’s back,

Takes deadly aim, and shuts both eyes, and fires!

Loud ring the hills, and vales, and plains around,

The border grove is filled with sulphurous smoke,

The cat-bird cries “for shame!” and darts away

Before her leafy resting-place is seen;

And when the cloud of death has floated on,

The victim bird is found a gory thing,

While the proud hero of this manly sport,

Struts down the lane like Cæsar entering Rome.

The patient Angler threads the winding brook,

Tempting the dainty trout with gilded bait;

And ever and anon, as fleecy clouds

Pass o’er the sun, the fish voracious darts

From the cool shadows of some mossy bank,

Swallows the bait with one convulsive act,

And learns too late that death was at the feast;

While the glad sportsman feels the sudden jerk,

And plays his victim with extended line,

Swiftly he darts, and through the glittering rings

The silken line is drawn with ringing sound,

Till wearied out with struggling that but serves

To drive the barbed weapon deeper still,

He seeks his quiet shelter ’neath the bank,

And thence in triumph to the shore is borne,

A prize that well rewards a day of toil.

Along the hills the school-boy flies his kite,

Shoots the smooth marble o’er the studded ring,

Or o’er the commons with a bound and shout,

Beats the soft ball for one well skilled to catch.

Health crowns the joyful exercise, and night

Finds its tired votaries trained for quiet sleep.

Bearing his hazel wand of curious form,

The searcher after earth’s deep spring goes forth,

Handling his mystic prongs as Merlin taught,

Or later follower of the magic school.

Now over hill-tops, stony as the mounds

The Indian warriors raise above their slain,

Then down in valleys, where the sun ne’er shines,

Fringed round with sylvan borders dense and rank,

He trudges, looking wiser than the one

Who passes o’er the busy brain his hand,

And wraps the senses in a sleep profound.

At length, above a vale where willows bend,

And grass grows greenest in the waning year,

His curious tell-tale turns toward the earth;

He stops, and with a shout of joy proclaims

The long sought spot where living water runs,

And where the well may sink, nor sink in vain.

The forest now awakes, while stroke on stroke

Falls on the hoary monarch of the wood,

Now shaking ’mid the scions that have towered

Beneath its shade for years. At length it falls,

And with terrific crash, bears down to earth

Each minor object that obstructs its way⁠—

Down on the verdant carpet that has spread

Beneath its branches in the summer heat,

Behold it lying like a warrior stern,

Who, having grappled in the deadly fray,

Has sank amid his fellows in his pride⁠—

But not to die, tho’ robbed of all its green,

Still shall it in the lofty steeple live,

Or in the battle-ship, whose thunder speaks

The voice of freedom on her ocean way.

The sail that wafts the admiral in his pride,

By it is held to catch the willing gale,

And on its giant breast the fabric rests,

That bears the sturdy warriors of the deep,

And floats them on in sunshine and in storm.

Its branches to the cottage-hearth are given,

And by the fire that feeds and grows on them

The chilly air is changed to breath of spring.

Food, shelter, comfort, from its fall proceed,

And thousands bless the hand that laid thee low.

Above the purple peaks that fringe the west

The swollen clouds obey the tempest’s call,

And rear their domes and battlements of mist,

With turrets, barbicans, and spires of gold;

Now changing into shapes of demon form,

With wreaths of lightning twining round their brows,

And now, like waves of darkness from old night,

Scowling and breaking on the misty hills.

A drowsy stillness steals along the plain,

The leaves are motionless on every tree,

The twitt’ring swallow glides along the ground,

While the more cautious pigeon seeks the eaves.

The geese that o’er the green so stately stalked,

Take flight toward the west with heavy wing,

And scream a welcome to the coming rain.

The cattle from the hills come early home,

And from the fallow ground the lab’rer turns,

Long ere the hour of sunset, with an eye

That reads the secrets of the heavens as well

As though it opened first in Chaldea’s land.

Along the road the mimic whirlwind runs,

And with its unseen fingers lifts the dust;

The town-returning wagon faster moves,

And down the hill, and o’er the sandy plain,

The village Jehu makes the coach-wheel spin;

And while the plover whistles on the moor,

The stage-horn breaks upon the startled ear.

But, hark! the storm-drum beats the tempest charge;

The groaning forest feels its rushing breath,

And bends its yellow head to let it pass;

The vivid lightning takes its errant way,

While echoing, ’mid the sparkling balls of hail,

Is heard the sound of its descending feet

In thunder. The hail drops fearfully around,

Strips the stout trees, and beats to earth the grain,

Wounds man and beast amid the open fields,

And strikes with deadly blow the wild fowl down.

Flash after flash lights up the dreaded scene,

And answering thunder speaks from every cloud;

While the deep caverns of the ocean swell

Their mystic voices in the chorus grand.

Men sit in silence now with anxious looks,

While timid mothers seek their downy beds,

And press their wailing infants to their breasts.

From her low lattice by the cottage-door,

The bolder housewife marks the pelting storm;

Sees the adventurous traveler onward go,

Seeking his distant hamlet, ere the night

Adds tenfold horrors to the dismal scene.

Swiftly the steed bounds o’er the woodland plain,

While hope beams brightly from the rider’s eye,

When lo! a crimson flash, with peal sublime,

Instant as thought, and terrible as death,

Around her bursts. Blinded, she starts, then seeing,

Looks again. The horse and his bold rider lie

Hushed in the marble-sleep that lasts through time.

And while the wind howls mournfully around,

The forest owns the baptism of fire.

The onset o’er, in mingled fire and hail,

Behold the rain in sweet profusion falls.

The warm shower melts the crystal drops that hide

The earth’s brown bosom; and the foaming brooks

Go singing down the hills, and through the vales,

Like happy children when their task is done.

A few bright flashes, and hoarse, rattling peals,

And then, amid the broad and crimson glow,

O’er western hills, a golden spot appears,

That spreads and brightens as the tempest wanes,

Like Heaven’s first smile upon the dying’s face.

’Tis gone, the rumbling of its chariot wheels

Dies in the ocean vales where echo sleeps;

While waves that roll’d in music on the shore,

Lashed into angry surges, foam and break

In notes of terror on the rocky lee.

’Tis gone, and on its bosom dark and wild

The bow of God is hung, in colors bright

And beautiful as morning’s blushing tints,

When the ark rested on the mountain top,

And the small remnant of a deluged world,

Looked out upon the wilderness, and wept.

                 —

Gently the Sabbath breaks upon the hills,

As when the first blest Sabbath marked the course

Of time. The golden sunbeam sleeps upon

The woods. No cloud casts o’er the scene a shade.

The six days’ labor ended, man and beast

Enjoy the season of appointed rest.

The fields are lonely, and the drowsy dells

Scarce catch the whisper of the gentle air;

And now is heard, for over hill and dale,

Up laughing valley, and through whisp’ring glen,

Gladdening the solitary place, and sadder heart,

The sweet-toned Sabbath-bell. Oh, joyful sound!

When from the Indian Isle the storm-tossed bark,

Furls its white pinion by its cradled shore,

And the tir’d sailor, on the giddy yard,

Cent’ring the thoughts of years in one short hour,

Looks to the land, and hears thy melting peal.

At such an hour the grateful heart pours out

Its praise, that upward soars like the blue smoke

Rising from its bright cottage-hearth to heaven;

And from the deep empyrian the ear

Of holy faith an answering note receives,

To still the mourning soul, and dry its tears.

Sweet is the Sabbath to a world of care,

When spring comes blushing with her buds and flowers;

When summer scents the rose, and fills the grain;

When autumn crowns her horn, and binds her sheaves,

And winter keeps his cold watch on the hills.

The wakeful cock from distant farm-yard crows

The passing hour—the miller stops his wheel

To gather headway for the coming task⁠—

And by the turnpike-gate the loaded team,

With bending necks, stand panting, while beneath

The rustic shade the careless teamster waits⁠—

With long-lashed whip, and frock of linsey-wool,

And hat of undyed felt cocked o’er his eye⁠—

There draining to the dregs his foaming gourd,

Stands in his brogans every inch a King.

Approach him, sage professor, as you list,

With question subtil on a point abstruse:

Or with a query as to simple things⁠—

Physics or metaphysics, old or new,

Law, written or unwritten, good or bad,

Logic, domestic or of foreign growth,

Knowledge, too deep to know and never known,

Or sluggish faith, that takes a teeming age

Of miracles, to make one soul believe;

Questions political, that sage to sage

Have past for centuries on, as truants wild

Toss prickly burs, for their unthinking mates

To catch, by moonlight, in the autumnal woods;

Talk of creation, or the Chinese wall,

Wander o’er Athen’s hill or sumac knoll,

Drink at Castalia’s fount or Jasper’s Spring,

And he is there to answer and confound.

Nature’s philosopher! untaught by schools,

Who knows, and can explain in one short hour,

More than the wide world knew in Plato’s day.

                 —

And there the blacksmith by his anvil stands⁠—

Well may you mark his tall and robust form,

His forehead full, where intellect may dwell,

And eye that glances like the flying sparks

When the red bar comes dazzling from the forge.

All day his hammer works his iron will,

The reaper’s sickle and the crooked scythe

The ponderous tire that binds the wagon-wheel,

And the small rivet of the schoolboy’s toy,

Come at his bidding from the metal crude. The patient ox

Waits for his iron shoes beside his door,

And the gay steed that bounds along the course

Neighs merrier when he plates his hoofs with steel;

The temple door on his stout hinges turns,

And in the vault of Mammon rests secure

The treasure guarded by his master-key.

Day after day he toils, as seldom toil

The slaves that drag their lazy length along⁠—

Sleeping at noon that they may dance at night⁠—

In the plantations of the sunny South;

Yet he unmurmuring bears the laborer’s curse,

To share his joys and roam the golden fields,

Erect in form and intellect—a man!

But when the evening comes with cooling breath,

Bringing the hour for labor’s sweet repose,

He clears his brow from every mark of toil,

And seeks his cottage by the village green;

There, having ate in peace his frugal meal,

He turns his mind, insatiate, to his books:

And, by the aid of Learning’s golden key,

Holds sweet communion with the ages past.

Behold! the scholar now in honest pride!

Around him sleep the mystic tomes of years,

Books that the western world ne’er saw before⁠—

The manuscripts of monks, ere printing gave

The world a channel to a sea of thought,

Where all might sail, and drink in raptures in

The spirit-waters, sparkling from their founts.

His tongue can speak more languages than fell

From human lips at Babel’s overthrow;

Nor secret thing, to mortal spirit known,

Is hidden from his penetrating eye.

Versed in the deepest mysteries of the schools,

With memory stored with all the mind e’er grasped,

With talents rarely willed by Heaven to one,

And sympathetic heart that beats for all,

Nor knows an outcast at its feast of love,

Burritt now lives, the wonder of mankind.

Rabbis and sage professors call him learned,

And to his humble gateway come in crowds,

To hear the page of ancient lore rehearsed,

And catch the jewel-thoughts that fall from him

Who sits amid the learned a self-taught man.

                 —

In the dun forest, far away from noise

Of traveled road, beneath the giant trees,

Whose branches form a lofty canopy

O’er a great circle cleared by willing hands,

Where the gray ash obstructs the serpent’s path,

The happy Christians pitch their tents of prayer.

There naught is heard but soothing woodland sounds,

The tempered roar of distant waterfall,

The fox’s sharp bark, the heathcock’s cheerful crow.

The wildcat’s growl amid the deepest shade,

And the shrill scream of hunger-driven hawk,

As through the openings he pursues his prey.

Amid the tents upon the highest spot,

The preachers’ stand in humble form appears,

And by its side the horn with mellow note,

To give the signal meet for praise and prayer.

There all conditions come with hearts of love,

Married and single, sons and daughters fair,

The emigrants from every templed land;

The Saxon, in his pride of high descent,

The Gaul, with spirit-harp of finer strings,

The Pict, ne’er weaned from his romantic hills,

Where o’er the heather rolls the Highland tongue,

The Swiss, whose home is where his cottage smiles,

The light Italian, gayest of the gay,

And the coarse Hollander, who loves the marsh,

Nor deems a heaven a home without a ditch⁠—

The river seaman of the mighty west,

Rude in their speech, but honest as they’re rude,

The man of cities, and the pioneer,

Whose axe first let the sunlight to the woods,

When nature in her lonely beauty slept

On the wide prairie and the sylvan hill⁠—

The beaver-trapper, from the far-off stream;

The bison-hunter, from the saline lick;

And the wild Indian, in his forest dress,

All gather from their journeyings to keep,

In humble guise, a week of holier time.

And now the horn has echoed wide and shrill,

And the great congregation waits for prayer.

One takes the stand—a man not taught by schools⁠—

In habit plain, with hands embrown’d by toil;

Blunt in his speech, yet reverent withall.

Now, scarcely understood, he lifts his voice

In praise to God. Then as his feelings catch

The inspiration of that hallowed hour,

Soars to a pitch of eloquence sublime,

While the deep woods are vocal with his prayer.

His words, like rain upon the thirsty ground,

Fall on the ear of that great multitude.

Now he describes a Savior’s matchless love⁠—

His high estate, his exile from the throne,

His mocking trial, and his felon death;

The noonday sun in darkness veils its face,

And earthquake voices fill the trembling air,

While the old dead in shrouds, through Salem’s streets,

Go forth a ghostly company again,

Singing the song of Moses and the Lamb,

And making the proud Temple’s arches ring,

With the glad praises of Redeeming Love.

’Tis done! the mighty plan is carried out⁠—

The last great Sacrifice for sin is o’er;

Then from the tomb he rolls the stone away,

And shows a risen Savior and a God!

The different hearers testify his power

In different ways. The truth, like a sharp sword,

Has cleaved its path. The flinty heart is crushed;

And the great deep of sin is broken up.

The old transgressors tremble by the stand⁠—

The young in sin repent to sin no more.

A thousand voices join in one wild prayer,

And shrieks, and groans, and shouts of joy arise,

And Heaven keeps Sabbath o’er the autumn woods.

The painted savage, who amid the crowd

Has stood unmoved for days, awakes to life;

His giant breast in wild commotion heaves,

His heart would speak, nor wait to reach his lips;

He stands and vainly calls to his relief

His savage nature; but, alas! ’tis gone.

Then falling on his face amid the woods

That often echoed to his war-whoop fell,

He casts his weapons at his Savior’s feet,

And lays aside his garments stained with blood.

His voice in accents of his soul now speaks,

His eyes with tears of deep contrition stream,

And from a trembling tongue in transport breaks,

Sweet Alleluia to the King of Kings!

The angel hovering o’er that forest scene,

Bears up the tidings on exulting wing,

And soon from the high pinnacles of bliss,

The Seraph harps in sweetness make response,

Alleluia!

The thrilling song in gentle murmuring falls

Upon the anxious ear, like music heard

On the calm ocean at the midnight hour;

Speaks to the broken heart in whispers sweet,

An dies away amid the forest hum,

Alleluia!

The night has come, and one by one the lights

Go out amid the trees, and the vast multitude

Is hushed in sleep.

                 —

The harvest moon sails up its cloudless way,

Full round and red—the farmer’s evening friend,

Lengthening the hours of labor, when the hand

Finds more than it can do within the day.

How gently falls its light upon the plains,

The quiet lake, and music-breathing woods;

The wakened bird mistakes it for the dawn,

And in the bush begins her matin song.

A moment rings the solitary strain,

And then no sound is wafted to the ear,

Save the wild whisper of the dying wind,

Or distant foot-fall of some prowling beast.

Sweet voyager of night! whose fairy bark

Sails silently around the dusky earth,

Whose silver lamp in chastened splendor burns,

Trimmed by the hand that fashioned thee so fair,

And sent thee forth on thy eternal way,

The nearest and the brightest to our eyes

Of Heavens innumerable host—sail on

Thy joyous way, in beauty ’mid the stars,

And catch the song of those bright sentinels,

Who watch the outposts on the bounds of time,

Sending in vain their rays to pierce the gloom

Of drear immensity. The lover’s eye⁠—

Whether he grasps the wreck amid the waves,

Or treads in pride the well appointed deck

Of richly freighted galleon; or is doom’d,

Like Selkirk, in his lonely isle, to dwell

More desolate because his ear had heard,

In Scottish valley, the sweet Sabbath bell;

Or chases, with the seamen of the north,

The monster-whale, by Greenland’s sounding shore,

Where crystal icebergs lift their glittering peaks,

And bathe with rainbow hues the snowy vales;

Or robs the otter of his glossy coat,

Where the Oregon sings her endless hymn

To the Pacific’s waters; or gathers

Birds’ nests ’mid the endless summer isles,

Where waves the cocoa-nut and lofty palm

O’er crystal billows, ’mid whose coral groves

The fish of brightest tints in beauty swim⁠—

In health or sickness, joy or sorrow, turns

Inquiringly to thee, and speaks of love⁠—

Love that endures when strength and reason fails.

So the poor idiot on the moonlit hill,

Patting his dog, his last and truest friend,

Looks up with eye of more than usual fire,

And, ’mid his idle chattering, speaks the name

Of one who loved him best in boyhood’s dream.

Thompson, sweet village! throned upon thy hills,

With happy homes, and spires that gleam above

Thy sacred altars, where the fathers taught,

And generations learned the way to God—

How pleasant, with remembrance’s eye, to view

The varied landscape changing autumn spreads

O’er sunny vales that slumber at thy feet;

Where roll the babbling brook and deeper stream,

Winding, like threads of silver tissue, wrought

By Moorish maidens on their robes of green.

Around thee rise a host of smiling towns,

Bearing the names of mightier ones abroad.

There Dudley, glittering on the northern sky,

Stands on her lofty height supremely fair,

While westward, Woodstock with her groves is seen,

In rural beauty blest; and at her feet,

Wrapt in a silver cloud, sweet Pomfret vale,

Spreads its gay bosom, dear to childhood’s hour.

The iron-horse now darts with lightning speed

Through the green valleys that my boyhood knew,

And at each turn the lovely river makes,

At the mere plashing of the wild swan’s wing,

A babbling village rises from the flood;

And there the halls of labor lift their domes

At Mammon’s call, and countless spindles twirl

The snowy thread, that soon is changed to gold;

While far around is heard the dash of wheels,

And the unceasing roar of swollen dams.

The dead leaves dance upon the river’s breast,

With tufts of cotton-waste, and here and there

A golden apple, dropped by careless boy,

Floating along toward the ocean’s flood.

On the grey oak the fisher-bird awaits

The speckled trout, or chaffin, tinged with gold;

While ’neath the rock the swimmer leaves his clothes,

And ’mid the cooling wave in gladness sports

His ivory limbs, nor heeds the near approach

Of roaming bard, or red-cheeked factory girl,

Who climbs the rustic bridge, nor casts an eye

Toward her Leander, naked in the flood.

On such fair maidens no Duennas wait,

To scare young love from answering love away;

No convent-gates are closed to bar her will,

Nor Hotspur brothers, armed with deadly steel,

In secret wait to guard that honor safe,

Which, but for such restraint, had long since fled.

Beyond the swampy meadow, fringed with flags,

The ancient forest waves its gaudy head,

O’er which the eagle takes his lonely way⁠—

The mighty hunter of the upper air.

There, in the mossy dells, where all is still,

Save when uncertain murmurs come and go

Along the solemn arches of the wood⁠—

Like whispers in a lonely lane at dark,

Or soothing hum of home-returning bee⁠—

The boy, delighted, sets his secret snares,

Clearing broad paths amid the yellow leaves,

Where the cock-partridge may strut in pride

At earliest dawn, and find the fatal noose;

There, when the sun is peeping o’er the hills,

Tinging the woodland sea with gorgeous hues,

He goes, with eager step and anxious eye,

Beholds the path obscured, the sapling sprung,

And, ’mid the maple boughs, his mottled prey.

                 —

The Reaper pauses in the ample field,

Where a rich harvest smiles to bless his toil,

And rests beside the oak, beneath whose shade,

In ages past, the wandering Red Man slept;

There, while the sun poured down his fervent ray,

The happy laborer seeks to quench his thirst,

With crystal water from the lime-stone spring,

Or milk, from prudent housewife’s ample store⁠—

Pure as it came from Nature’s healthy fount;

And while he sits the idle hours away,

He muses o’er his country and her fame,

And dares to claim her empire as his own.

And there, amid the grass, the children play

Around the sun-burnt maidens, as they twine

The bands to bind the golden armfuls tight,

And leave the bristling sheafs, with plenty crowned,

Standing in beauty on the fresh-reap’d hill.

The groaning wagon gathers up the grain

From auburn fields. The yellow sheafs are piled

In ponderous heaps, while one well skilled builds up

The toppling load, and when ’tis finished, sits

On its sere top, crowned with the ripened grain⁠—

The Autumn’s King! And as the reaper’s hale

And rosy children shout for joy, he sings,

With mellow voice, the song of Harvest Home.

The sickle gleams no more amid the fields;

The cradled hills are open to the feet

Of Want’s poor gleaners and the hunter band;

And there the quail walks with her piping brood

Amid the stubble, teaching them to fly.

Amid the orchard, bending ’neath the load

That fair Pomona from her lap has strewn,

The busy husbandmen commence their tasks.

The red-cheeked apple, and the greening pale,

The golden-pippin, and the blue pearmain,

Baldwin and russet, all are toppled down,

And to the air a balmy fragrance give.

And there, the urchins playing all the while,

Select the choicest fruit for future use,

When the long winter night creeps o’er the hill,

And autumn’s golden brow is wrapped in gloom.

The cider-press, beneath the farm-house shade,

Now creaks, as round old Dobbin takes his way,

While from the massive vat the liquid pours,

And in abundant casks ferments and foams.

Hail, generous drink! fair Newark’s honest boast,

The laborer’s beverage in a northern clime,

Where freedom first, in deadly strife was born,

And where her last scarred-follower shall die⁠—

If death to such e’er come.

Oft have I sighed for thee in spicy clime,

Where hung the clustering grape from every bough,

And where the nectar of the gods was free

As Croton-water in old Gotham’s Park.

Untainted with the liquid sin that flows

From the destroyer’s still, thy spirit lifts

The thirsty soul from earth—but not too high,

Nor leaves at morn a flush upon the brow.

An apple caused the first of earth to sin;

But thou, well made, and freed from earthly taint,

Raisest the weary spirit to its tone,

And givest to labor’s cheek the glow of health.

Now, in the rosy morn, the spotted hounds

Before the mounted Huntsmen hie away.

O’er fields and meadows, onward see them go,

Scaling the walls, and trampling down the corn.

And now they penetrate the forest shade,

And from the sylvan dell, and wood-capt hill,

The deep-mouthed bay with wild halloo is heard,

Swelling in cadence to the hunter’s horn.

In her retreat, amid the deepest shade,

Where the long grass is tender, and ne’er fails,

The red-deer hears, and starts, and lists again,

Till louder still the chase’s wild music sounds,

Then down the hill-side to the lake that spreads

Its broad unruffled bosom to the morn,

She takes her course; while on her haunches come

The bellowing pack, like gaunt and hungry wolves.

Now she has gained the stunted alder’s shade,

That line the margin of the waters clear,

And turning quickly round the wave-worn hill,

That towers abruptly o’er the narrow beach,

Dips her light hoofs in the unconscious wave,

And seeks the mountain-pass with lightning speed.

Hid from their sight, the scent in water lost,

The eager pack plunge headlong in the flood;

But soon recalled to duty, ’long the shore

They scour, till one more practiced than the rest,

Stops where the chase her sylvan pathway took,

And bellowing wildly, follows in her track,

With the whole party thundering at his heels.

The wily deer too long has got the start,

And now from distant hill-side sees the foe

Come panting up the dell with weary limb.

A moment only does she look, then turns

And glides in silence down the other side;

And when the Huntsmen gain the lofty height,

The deer is far away—the chase is o’er.

Oh! who can sing the glories of the woods,

When Indian Summer, like a death-smile, rests

On autumn’s sallow cheek too soon to fade.

In ages past, when thou didst gently come,

“With nights of frost, and noons of sultry heat,

When skies were blue as highly tempered steel,

And rivers clear as crystal, and the mist

Upon the mountains hung its silver veil;

When o’er the grass a fairy net-work spread,

And naught was green except the mountain pine,

The willow, and the bullrush by the brook”⁠—

Our fathers feared—for then amid the wilds,

Called by the wampum-belt of varied hue,

The Indian warriors built their council-fire,

And in the war-dance joined with hellish rite,

Till morning broke upon the dusky woods.

Then, at the hour when mortals soundest slept,

And nature was at rest, they sallied forth,

Armed with the hatchet and the scalping-knife,

And trusty rifle, whose report was death.

The sleeping father woke to hear the cry

Of butchered wife, and infant rudely torn

From her clasped arms, to feel the war-club’s power.

One look he gave, and on his silvery head

The hatchet fell, and loosed the flood of life,

Then sinking down in death’s cold senseless sleep,

Added fresh fuel to the crackling flames

That spread around his lonely sylvan cot,

And lit, with hateful glare, the moaning woods.

Next morn the wandering hunter marked the waste,

And found amid the ashes, human bones,

An axe, a child’s steel rattle, and a lock

Of woman’s golden hair, still wet with blood.

                 —

The sun in mellow light sleeps on the hills,

The lazy river rolls in silence on,

The woods keep Sabbath, till the deep-mouthed bay

Of wandering fox-hound breaks upon the ear;

Or from the top of an old chestnut falls,

The tempting nut the startled squirrel drops,

Parting the fading leaves with pattering sound;

Or on the rotten log beside the stile,

The busy partridge beats her woodland drum.

The frost has tipt the trees with lovelier tints

Than pencil ever gave to forest scene;

There, green and gold in various hues combine,

Spotted with crimson where the maple stands,

And when the sun upon the hoar-frost shines,

The foliage sparkles, as though crystals hung

On every leaf, and trembled in the air.

The eye now penetrates the half-clad trees,

And spies the squirrel in his leafy house,

Or marks upon the limb the wish-ton-wish,

Who rests by day, that he may sweeter sing

His song at night, beside the cottage gate.

The thistle-seed, with wing of silver down,

Floats in the air, and flashes in the sun.

The dusky worm that feasted on the leaf

In the green spring-time, weaves his curious shroud,

And fastening it by thread of minute size,

To the tall poplar swings himself to sleep.

Type of the resurrection! lo, he hangs

Between the mortal and the spirit-land,

Till called by God, through Nature’s changeless laws,

He starts a winged creature clad in light,

With tints of morning blushing on his wings.

The fisher’s boat along the river glides,

Nor leaves a ripple in its shallow wake.

The wild swan sports in Anicosta’s wave,

And deems his shadow his departed mate;

The patient heron, on the wave-washed rock

For hours stands, watching his suspecting prey;

The wild-goose raises heavily to join

The gabbling cohort that is hastening on,

High in the air, to the bright summer-land,

Where the superb magnolia lifts its head.

And scents the gale—a wilderness of flowers.

The hardy ivy climbs the giant tree,

To place green garlands on its withered head;

The wild grape from the lofty walnut hangs

Its purple clusters tempting to the sight;

And by the swampy brook, the sunflower turns

Its golden eye in meekness toward its God;

The deer, from sylvan dell comes out to drink;

The buzzard on the dead tree patient waits,

For the returning tide to line the shore

With food well-suited to his groveling taste;

And o’er the bosom of the widening stream,

The lazy fish-hawk flaps his heavy wing.

                 —

Old age and childhood mark, with curious eye,

The lonely scene, and pass, with cautious tread,

Down the still pathway of the dying woods.

Now, round the mighty piles of corn they sit,

The aged ones, the young men, and the lads,

With here and there a son of Afric’s clime,

With eye that rolls in undiminished joy,

And mouth that ready waits to swell the laugh,

Or join the merry huskers’ drinking song.

And thus the labor of a week is done,

While wives and daughters, ’neath the farmer’s roof,

Spread out the festive board with viands rich,

And tempting to the eye of one who bears

The sweat of labor on his swarthy brow.

Now, from its yellow shuck, the ripened corn,

In well-filled ears, is drawn—a pleasant sight;

And while the village maidens pass along,

Stopping, where’er their fancy wills, to husk,

Red ears are placed within their anxious palms,

By roguish ones, who hid them for this hour;

And as they draw the crimson emblems forth,

Full many a kiss is printed on the cheek

Of rosy innocence, by lips that ne’er

Such liberty had dared to take before.

The clock strikes twelve, and from his cozy perch

Beside the fattest pullet, lo, the cock

Proclaims the approaching morn with shrillest crow!

The corn is husked, and now they gather round

The board, while lovely maidens wait to serve

With ready hand, the laborers of the eve.

Now from the lips of village sire ascends

The prayer for Heaven’s rich blessing on their food;

Thanks for the pouring out of plenty’s horn,

And gratitude for life and health—nay, more,

For liberty, without which all things else

Were vain. And while he stands with streaming eye,

And hand that palsy oft has clasped in vain,

His trembling accents fall upon the ear,

Like distant music at the close of day.

The service o’er, the merry feast begins,

Then joy runs riot round the sacred chair,

And dignified propriety is gay

As gipsy maiden, with her silver bells

Tinkling around her heels. At length the dawn

Recalls the joyous throng to other scenes;

And soon the last gay visiter has bade

His warm good-by—and the old house is still.

Left all alone, in calm security,

Straight in his oaken-chair of antique form,

Within his hall, the farmer sits and sleeps,

While the fierce house-dog watches at his feet.

Sweet hour of plenteous ease, when care puts off

His wrinkled brow, and charity and love,

The fairest sisters of the heavenly train,

Go hand in hand along the faded walks,

And sit at evening by the cottage door.

There the old soldier, covered o’er with scars,

Limping along unnoticed by the crowd,

Whose liberties were purchased with his blood,

Finds ’neath the whispering elms before the door

A welcome seat; and there the little ones,

Called from their play by watchful Towser’s growl.

And the patched dress that glory gives her sons,

Gather round their sire with mute surprise,

And list to tales of other days, when war,

With iron feet, swept thundering o’er the glade,

And reared his bloody altars on the hills.

And while they listen, lo! the soldier’s face

Grows less terrific, and his tatter’d dress

No longer seems to hide a vagrant’s form.

With stealthy look and silent step, they seek

The festive board, and silently return;

Then, while he wipes from his dim eye a tear,

They fill the old man’s pack with generous food,

Proffer the goblet full to his parched lips,

And play at “hide and seek” around his chair.

The heart of power may coldly beat when they

Who fought for freedom in her darkest hour,

In age and penury, appear to claim

The boon a monarch never yet refused;

But by the hearth-stones of his native land,

Where liberal thoughts and generous feelings dwell,

The valiant soldier ne’er shall find a churl

To bid him trudge, a rude unwelcome guest.

On Salem’s hill the Hebrews’ reign is o’er,

The silver trump of jubilee is still.

Timbrel and harp and soft-toned dulcimer

Have ceased their strains in Sharon’s rosy vale;

The scattered tribes in earth’s remotest bounds

Wander like sheep upon the mountain-side,

And Israel mourns her empire and her God.

The fisher, solitary, dries his net

On the green rock, amid the silver wave,

Where, robed in purple, sat imperial Tyre,

And through the autumn day beholds no sail,

To catch the scented breeze from Cypress Isle.

The hills of Judah, crowned with ruins gray,

Lift their brown summits to the deep blue air,

And cast their cooling shadows on the sea.

Hushed is the shepherd’s lute, the reaper’s shout,

The bleat of flocks, and patriarch’s song of praise,

The Harvester of years has o’er them past,

And hung his reaping-hook in Joseph’s tomb.

But though the trump of jubilee is still,

And Israel’s host in triumph meet no more

By Jacob’s well, or Siloa’s sacred brook;

Yet in the western world, where Freedom rears

Her banner o’er the altar of her God,

And all religions meet in peaceful mood,

At autumn’s close, the wanderers returned

To distant homes, to keep Thanksgiving Day.

Such was the custom of the Pilgrim band,

When first they trod that wild and wintry shore,

And such th’ observance of their sterling sons,

Who, scattered o’er the freeman’s heritage,

Remember their bold ancestry with pride,

And where they tread, make new New England’s bloom.

                 —

The days grow shorter, and the nights with frost

Creep shivering o’er the landscape’s fading green.

The village stage comes in at later hour,

From city, town, and distant boarding-school

Bringing a host of merry hearts, who seek

The joys of childhood by their native hearths;

And as it pauses at the welcome door

The inmates rush, uncovered, to the stile,

And there, ’mid kisses long and loud, is heard

The mother’s anxious inquiry for health,

The boisterous brother’s rude though hearty hail,

And happy father’s well-timed welcome home.

What joys, what transports centre in the hour

While the old mansion rings with childlike mirth.

                 —

For days the very atmosphere has teemed

With savory odor from the kitchen flue.

And now the day of praise begins, clear, cold and still.

While yet the sun sails up its morning path

The merry peal from village spire is heard,

And straightway pours the tide of life along,

Gathering fresh numbers from each ivied door,

Changing their greetings warm on every hand,

With those by Mammon or by glory called,

Whose wandering feet have homeward turned again:

And many a speaking eye reveals the tale

Of love long felt, but ne’er before expressed.

The church is still, and maiden modesty

Has smoothed her dress and re-arranged her curl,

Then from the choir the pealing anthem swells

With chorus grand—and voices long unused

To holy song join in the symphony

Of praise.

Prayer long and deep and eloquent ensues,

In which the earth, the nation, and the church,

The righteous and the wicked, rich and poor,

Remembrance find. And then a meet discourse,

Recounting changes of the variant year,

Paying a tribute just to absent worth,

And hanging garlands green on glory’s tomb.

The heart is touched—the mourner’s eye grows dim⁠—

The proud are humbled, and the poor rejoice.

And when the speaker closes, with a charge

To pay due homage to the Mighty One

Who guides Arcturus and his boisterous sons,

Binds the sweet influence of the Pleiades,

And breaks Orion’s broad and sparkling bonds,

All hearts, with one accord, in reverence bow,

And pure thanksgiving peals from every tongue.

The service done, they seek their cheerful hearths

To spend the hallowed day in feasts of love.

The feast is set—and joy’s wild burst is o’er⁠—

The mother’s eye has marked the vacant chair⁠—

The father’s ear has missed his first-born’s step⁠—

And where the church-yard sleeps, so still, they look

With hearts of grief, and eyes suffused with tears.

Evening with smiles and tales has come, and round

The social circle blind-man’s buff is played.

Wisdom and years are straightway laid aside,

And manhood lives its childhood o’er again,

Seeking the golden shadows of the days

Long passed away.

And now the youngest having sought repose,

Friend after friend drops in with cheerful heart;

The merry dance succeeds the merry game,

And the light foot with lighter heart keeps time.

Music is also there, with gentle tone,

Singing the favorite tunes of other days.

Age with its wrinkle, childhood with its smile,

Youth with its hope, and manhood with its care,

Joy blends with high esteem, and admiration

Kindles into love.

The old clock ticks the drowsy hours along⁠—

The midnight comes—the joyous throng disperse⁠—

Full many a head on sleepless pillow lies,

Till wearied out, with thinking o’er the past,

The mind surrenders to the body’s guide

And dreams of fancy dance before the eye.

Blest labor! thou dost fringe the poor man’s lids

With gold: and drive remembrance of his wrongs

Away—hang o’er his drowsy visions scenes

Of pleasantness, where round a cheerful cot

Wind paths of peace. Oh, Night! to him what are

The ills of day, if thou but shelter him

With brooding wing.—

Earth without labor—what a dreary waste!

Sadder to view than Asia’s barren plains

Or Afric’s sea of sand. He that would strike

Thy arm of sinews down, would make the field

A solitude, and crowded mart a den

Of thieves.—

When the moist sickle rests upon its hook,

And the rich stores of earth are gathered in,

The fair is held—a feast of fruits and flowers⁠—

Of art’s fine workmanship and labor’s yield.

From the dark pines that fringe Aroostook’s wave

To the wild chapparal that rudely turns

The martial foot from Rio Bravo’s bank,

From the Atlantic’s many-peopled shore

To the Columbia’s vales of living green,

The joyful mandate rings, and man pours forth

His richest treasures to the gaze of day.

The nation sits in judgment on her arts,

Her choice productions and her fruitful glebes,

And cheers the laborer’s toil with voice of praise.

Thus man is dignified by honest toil,

And the dread curse pronounced in Time’s young spring

Becomes a blessing in its autumn day.

So may the laborer stand amid his race⁠—

Taught that true knowledge elevates the soul,

That the poor carpenter of Galilee

Once worked his task—then in the temple taught⁠—

Then gave redemption to a guilty world⁠—

And then resumed his station by his God!

Now from the well-filled barn, in gusty day,

The flail’s loud beat is heard—a pleasing sound⁠—

And from the chaff the full unspotted grain

Is winnowed by the stripling’s feeble hand.

And while the dust is flying far and wide

The wheat is gathered in, a precious store,

Tempting the factor’s mercenary eye,

And bidding famine with her sickly form

Wander afar from Freedom’s hallowed soil;

The timid quail, with well-fledged brood, draws near,

Her tithe to claim from man’s productive toil,

And barn-yard fowls their rich thanksgivings spend,

Nor dream of days of want in time to come,

When winter o’er the frozen earth shall claim

Her sovereignty with cutting blast and snow.

Autumn departs, and soon on hills of brown,

In storms will break the dark solstitial morn.

The grove has lost its verdure and its song,

And withered leaves, in heaps, are mouldering round.

Keen northern blasts, from Greenland’s gelid wastes,

Wake the dark woods of stormy Labrador,

And o’er Canadian wilds and ocean-lakes,

Down Mississippi’s vales in fury howl.

By Huron’s flood the savage wrapped in furs

Gathers his tent of skins beneath the snow,

And ’mid the smoke, for days, securely waits

For the encrusting rain to plate the drift

With glittering ice, that cracks not at his tread,

Where he may chase the moose, whose hoofs break thro’

And leave upon the trail a track of blood.

The miner on Superior’s pictured cliffs,

Where sings the thunder its eternal hymn,

Waits in his cabin rude for hours of spring,

Giving up pleasure, and e’en health itself,

That he may climb to fortune’s fickle height

Through veins of copper, and up shafts of gold.

The pilgrim’s son, in freedom, builds his cot,

And hails a shadowy old world from the new,

On the Pacific’s main, where blooming hills

Hang o’er the flood, and catch the dying strain

Borne on the waves from India’s coral strand.

The farmer’s boy, long since amid the woods,

Has plucked the hazel and the chestnut brown,

And sharp-ribbed walnut, for his winter store,

Leaving the staining butternut untouched,

For the hoar-frost to peel its ragged shell.

The sheep go wandering o’er the barren plains

In search of welcome food, and where the scythe

Between the pointed stones has passed along,

Crop closer than the crooked blade of man

The sallow loiterers of the autumn field.

The red-breasts, gathered into flocks, no longer pipe

Their sweetest songs beside the cottage door:

And the vast family of sea-birds screech

Their notes of sadness o’er the sounding sea.

The rivers lift their voices, as the rain

From chilly clouds falls on the dreary scene,

And high above their banks in torrents swell,

Sweeping the cottage and the well-filled barn,

The dam, the bridge, and the old ivied mill,

With stacks of grain and implements of man,

In wild confusion onward to the sea.

Sad are the notes of nature—doubly sad,

Where leaping o’er her brown and dizzy height,

With robe of silver and a rainbow crown,

Niagara sings her thunder-hymn to earth’s

Remotest waters—where oft the poet’s eye

Beholds, amid the shades of autumn eve,

The Tuscarora in his phantom bark,

Singing his death-song on the cataract’s brow.

Or where, amid Virginia’s fertile vale,

The Rockbridge in its grandeur towers above

The little stream that runs so far beneath,

That human ear ne’er caught its hoarsest brawl.

There where the Deluge pierced the mountain chain

And sent its wild pent river to the sea,

The storm, with sternest music, calls its clouds,

And through the giant arch remorseless sweeps

Causing dread whirlpools of the misty air.

Autumn departs, and earth in sadness mourns,

And all around is desolate and chill.

Empires have had their autumns, and are lost

Beneath the dead and rustling leaves of time.

Egypt, majestic in her ruin, sleeps

Upon the Nile—the pyramids her history

And her tomb. Idumea, ’mid her cliffs,

Yawns in her gloom, an empty sepulchre.

Tadmor is hid amid the desert sand;

Balbec’s tremendous wall upon the waste,

Shelters the spotted lizard and the owl;

And Babylon, the mighty, is a heap

By the Euphrates. Tyre has been swallowed

By the tideless sea; Greece sits in darkness

On her classic hills, ’mid templed groves,

Her king a Saxon, and her children slaves.

The Muscovite has found a shorter way

To old Byzantium; and the lazy Turk

That loiters there, is but a Turk in name.

Dark Ethiopia knows her bounds no more;

Carthage is but a pasture wild for goats;

Persia now roams the waste in broken hordes;

Imperial Rome, once mistress of the world,

Is but a province, where a mitred priest

Sits in the Cæsar’s chair without his crown;

And the furr’d Russ directs the haughty race

Of Ghengis Khan and fiery Tamerlane.

Ages and kingdoms feel the sickle click,

And bend their heads before the reaper’s tread.

The Earth shall have her autumn, with the stars

That sang in beauty at the birth of Time;

And Death shall have his autumn, for he too

Must die. The Heavens shall have their autumn,

And be rolled back to their ancient nothingness.

And all shall fade, and fall around, and die,

But God, and the vast Hierarchy of souls.

                 —

Oh, death! when thou dost come with trembling limbs,

Down the brown hills, where waves the ripened grain,

And bear the aged exile home to God,

While autumn’s wailing wind sings Harvest Home.

When health’s bright roses slowly fade away,

As flowers of spring-time breathed on by the frost;

When dire consumption saps the roots of life,

And slow but sure its victims steal along

The shaded path that winds around the tomb;

Or when by burning fever racked and parched,

The prostrate form with joy awaits the call;

Or when forsaken by the loved and false,

The broken spirit sits beside the grave,

And weaves strange garlands from the withered flowers,

To crown the head-stone of departed hopes,

Thou art a welcome guest.

But when in youth and health, without a sign,

Thou comest in thy most appalling form,

Swift as the sunbeam streaming from on high,

Then thou dost rudely snap hope’s brightest buds,

And form dread sepulchres in every heart⁠—

Chasms that never close with rolling years⁠—

Wounds that forever festering, never heal,

Till deeper sorrows settle on the soul.

Autumn departs, and with it ends the song

Of the rude bard, who first essayed to sing

In high scholastic verse, its scenes of gold;

A pleasant pastime for an idle month,

When the hot sun pour’d down its sickly rays.

And pestilence at noonday walked abroad.

Autumn departs, and on its cheerless gale,

Sighing o’er barren moor and russet grove,

The feeble lay goes forth, with deep distrust,

And much of hope, entwined with more of fear.

If it shall fail—and stranger things have been,

And with the leaves around, whirl through the glen,

And up the forest’s melancholy path,

Lifeless and useless, as its withered band.

’Tis an old truth, by bard of sweetness told,

“Leaves have their time to fall, and stars to set.”

But if perchance some generous soul shall take

The half-fledged warbler to a pleasant home,

Where bright-eyed children gather in their joy⁠—

Type of the host that throng the homes of Heaven⁠—

Glean from its varied notes one sound to please,

One truth to charm and elevate the soul,

And bid young genius in her wild-wood sing,

The scenes and glories of her native land⁠—

Then shall the bard in his retreat rejoice,

And sing again, when spring, with sunny brow,

Shall speak the resurrection of the flowers.

STANZAS.

———

BY THOMAS FITZGERALD.

———

Ah! weary days have passed since last we met,

  But not with time has distance longer grown!

My heart, well-tutored, never can forget

  Its love for thee, my beautiful, my own!

I would that I were near thee, gentle one,

  To see thee gladly smile, and hear thee speak,

And list the sweetness of thy silver tone,

  And mark the changes on thy blushing cheek!

I see the pathway where our ramble led⁠—

  Where brightest flowers in rarest fragrance vied—

The fairy nook, whence sunlight trembling fled,

  And laughing water-fall in music died!

But not for me the pensive walk of eve⁠—

  Life’s sterner duties claim my footsteps now;

Yet does the yearning heart full often grieve

  For those dear haunts where first we breathed love’s vow.

THE PORTRAIT.

———

BY KATE DASHWOOD.

———

A fair, young, thoughtful face—and very pale

  Is the soft dimpled cheek, and o’er her brow

Lingereth a strange, wild beauty; many a tale

  Thy bright ideal weaveth for her now.

Those breathing lips!—they speak not, but you feel

  Love’s thrilling kiss, hath mingled with his sigh,

The dreamy depths of those dark eyes reveal

  The soul of Sappho’s song—to love or die!

Yet on that fair, young brow is set the seal

  Of woman’s firm resolve, and o’er-mastering high.

THOMAS CARLYLE AND HIS WORKS.

———

BY HENRY D. THOREAU.

———

(Concluded from page 152.)

But he is wilfully and pertinaciously unjust, even scurrilous, impolite, ungentlemanly; calls us “Imbeciles,” “Dilettants,” “Philistines,” implying sometimes what would not sound well expressed. If he would adopt the newspaper style, and take back these hard names—but where is the reader who does not derive some benefit from these epithets, applying them to himself? Think not that with each repetition of them there is a fresh overflowing of bile; oh no! Perhaps none at all after the first time, only a faithfulness, the right name being found, to apply it—“They are the same ones we meant before”—and ofttimes with a genuine sympathy and encouragement expressed. Indeed, there appears in all his writings a hearty and manly sympathy with all misfortune and wretchedness, and not a weak and sniveling one. They who suspect a Mephistophiles, or sneering, satirical devil, under all, have not learned the secret of true humor, which sympathizes with the gods themselves, in view of their grotesque, half-finished creatures.

He is, in fact, the best tempered, and not the least impartial of reviewers. He goes out of his way to do justice to profligates and quacks. There is somewhat even Christian, in the rarest and most peculiar sense, in his universal brotherliness, his simple, child-like endurance, and earnest, honest endeavor, with sympathy for the like. And this fact is not insignificant, that he is almost the only writer of biography, of the lives of men, in modern times. So kind and generous a tribute to the genius of Burns cannot be expected again, and is not needed. We honor him for his noble reverence for Luther, and his patient, almost reverent study of Goethe’s genius, anxious that no shadow of his author’s meaning escape him for want of trustful attention. There is nowhere else, surely, such determined and generous love of whatever is manly in history. His just appreciation of any, even inferior talent, especially of all sincerity, under whatever guise, and all true men of endeavor, must have impressed every reader. Witness the chapters on Werner, Heyne, even Cagliostro, and others. He is not likely to underrate his man. We are surprised to meet with such a discriminator of kingly qualities in these republican and democratic days, such genuine loyalty all thrown away upon the world.

Carlyle, to adopt his own classification, is himself the hero, as literary man. There is no more notable working-man in England, in Manchester or Birmingham, or the mines round about. We know not how many hours a-day he toils, nor for what wages, exactly, we only know the results for us. We hear through the London fog and smoke the steady systole, diastole, and vibratory hum, from “Somebody’s Works” there; the “Print Works,” say some; the “Chemicals,” say others; where something, at any rate, is manufactured which we remember to have seen in the market. This is the place, then. Literature has come to mean, to the ears of laboring men, something idle, something cunning and pretty merely, because the nine hundred and ninety-nine really write for fame or for amusement. But as the laborer works, and soberly by the sweat of his brow earns bread for his body, so this man works anxiously and sadly, to get bread of life, and dispense it. We cannot do better than quote his own estimate of labor from Sartor Resartus.

“Two men I honor, and no third. First; the toil-worn craftsman that with earth-made implement laboriously conquers the earth, and makes her man’s. Venerable to me is the hard hand; crooked, coarse, wherein, notwithstanding, lies a cunning virtue, indefeasibly royal, as of the sceptre of this planet. Venerable, too, is the rugged face, all weather-tanned, besoiled, with its rude intelligence; for it is the face of a man living manlike. Oh, but the more venerable for thy rudeness, and even because we must pity as well as love thee. Hardly-entreated brother! For us was thy back so bent, for us were thy straight limbs and fingers so deformed; thou wert our conscript, on whom the lot fell, and fighting our battles wert so marred. For in thee, too, lay a god-created form, but it was not to be unfolded; encrusted must it stand with the thick adhesions and defacements of labor; and thy body, like thy soul, was not to know freedom. Yet toil on, toil on; thou art in thy duty, be out of it who may; thou toilest for the altogether indispensable, for daily bread.”

“A second man I honor, and still more highly; him who is seen toiling for the spiritually indispensable; not daily bread, but the bread of life. Is not he, too, in his duty, endeavoring toward inward harmony, revealing this, by act or by word, through all his outward endeavors, be they high or low? Highest of all, when his outward and his inward endeavor are one; when we can name him Artist; not earthly craftsman only, but inspired thinker, that with heaven-made implement conquers heaven for us. If the poor and humble toil that we have food, must not the high and glorious toil for him in return, that he have light, have guidance, freedom, immortality? These two in all their degrees, I honor; all else is chaff and dust, which let the wind blow whither it listeth.”

“Unspeakably touching is it, however, when I find both dignities united; and he that must toil outwardly for the lowest of man’s wants, is also toiling inwardly for the highest. Sublimer in this world know I nothing than a peasant saint, could such now anywhere be met with. Such a one will take thee back to Nazareth itself; thou wilt see the splendor of heaven spring forth from the humblest depths of earth, like a light shining in great darkness.”

Notwithstanding the very genuine, admirable, and loyal tributes to Burns, Schiller, Goethe, and others, Carlyle is not a critic of poetry. In the book of heroes, Shakspeare, the hero, as poet, comes off rather slimly. His sympathy, as we said, is with the men of endeavor; not using the life got, but still bravely getting their life. “In fact,” as he says of Cromwell, “every where we have to notice the decisive, practical eye of this man; how he drives toward the practical and practicable; has a genuine insight into what is fact.” You must have very stout legs to get noticed at all by him. He is thoroughly English in his love of practical men, and dislike for cant, and ardent enthusiastic heads that are not supported by any legs. He would kindly knock them down that they may regain some vigor by touching their mother earth. We have often wondered how he ever found out Burns, and must still refer a good share of his delight in him to neighborhood and early association. The Lycidas and Comus appearing in Blackwood’s Magazine, would probably go unread by him, nor lead him to expect a Paradise Lost. The condition of England question is a practical one. The condition of England demands a hero, not a poet. Other things demand a poet; the poet answers other demands. Carlyle in London, with this question pressing on him so urgently, sees no occasion for minstrels and rhapsodists there. Kings may have their bards when there are any kings. Homer would certainly go a begging there. He lives in Chelsea, not on the plains of Hindostan, nor on the prairies of the West, where settlers are scarce, and a man must at least go whistling to himself.

What he says of poetry is rapidly uttered, and suggestive of a thought, rather than the deliberate development of any. He answers your question, What is poetry? by writing a special poem, as that Norse one, for instance, in the Book of Heroes, altogether wild and original;—answers your question, What is light? by kindling a blaze which dazzles you, and pales sun and moon, and not as a peasant might, by opening a shutter. And, certainly, you would say that this question never could be answered but by the grandest of poems; yet he has not dull breath and stupidity enough, perhaps, to give the most deliberate and universal answer, such as the fates wring from illiterate and unthinking men. He answers like Thor, with a stroke of his hammer, whose dint makes a valley in the earth’s surface.

Carlyle is not a seer, but a brave looker-on and reviewer; not the most free and catholic observer of men and events, for they are likely to find him preoccupied, but unexpectedly free and catholic when they fall within the focus of his lens. He does not live in the present hour, and read men and books as they occur for his theme, but having chosen this, he directs his studies to this end.

But if he supplies us with arguments and illustrations against himself, we will remember that we may perhaps be convicted of error from the same source—stalking on these lofty reviewer’s stilts so far from the green pasturage around. If we look again at his page, we are apt to retract somewhat that we have said. Often a genuine poetic feeling dawns through it, like the texture of the earth seen through the dead grass and leaves in the spring. There is indeed more poetry in this author than criticism on poetry. He often reminds us of the ancient Scald, inspired by the grimmer features of life, dwelling longer on Dante than on Shakspeare. We have not recently met with a more solid and unquestionable piece of poetic work than that episode of “The Ancient Monk,” in Past and Present, at once idyllic, narrative, heroic; a beautiful restoration of a past age. There is nothing like it elsewhere that we know of. The History of the French Revolution is a poem, at length got translated into prose; an Iliad, indeed, as he himself has it—“The destructive wrath of Sansculotism: this is what we speak, having unhappily no voice for singing.”

One improvement we could suggest in this last, as indeed in most epics, that he should let in the sun oftener upon his picture. It does not often enough appear, but it is all revolution, the old way of human life turned simply bottom upward, so that when at length we are inadvertently reminded of the “Brest Shipping,” a St. Domingo colony, and that anybody thinks of owning plantations, and simply turning up the soil there, and that now at length, after some years of this revolution, there is a falling off in the importation of sugar, we feel a queer surprise. Had they not sweetened their water with Revolution then? It would be well if there were several chapters headed “Work for the Mouth”—Revolution-work inclusive, of course—“Altitude of the Sun,” “State of the Crops and Markets,” “Meteorological Observations,” “Attractive Industry,” “Day Labor,” &c., just to remind the reader that the French peasantry did something beside go without breeches, burn châteaus, get ready knotted cords, and embrace and throttle one another by turns. These things are sometimes hinted at, but they deserve a notice more in proportion to their importance. We want not only a background to the picture, but a ground under the feet also. We remark, too, occasionally, an unphilosophical habit, common enough elsewhere, in Alison’s History of Modern Europe, for instance, of saying, undoubtedly with effect, that if a straw had not fallen this way or that, why then—but, of course, it is as easy in philosophy to make kingdoms rise and fall as straws. The old adage is as true for our purpose, which says that a miss is as good as a mile. Who shall say how near the man came to being killed who was not killed? If an apple had not fallen then we had never heard of Newton and the law of gravitation; as if they could not have contrived to let fall a pear as well.

The poet is blithe and cheery ever, and as well as nature. Carlyle has not the simple Homeric health of Wordsworth, nor the deliberate philosophic turn of Coleridge, nor the scholastic taste of Landor, but, though sick and under restraint, the constitutional vigor of one of his old Norse heroes, struggling in a lurid light, with Iötuns still, striving to throw the old woman, and “she was Time”—striving to lift the big cat—and that was “The Great World-Serpent, which, tail in mouth, girds and keeps up the whole created world.” The smith, though so brawny and tough, I should not call the healthiest man. There is too much shop-work, too great extremes of heat and cold, and incessant ten-pound-ten and thrashing of the anvil, in his life. But the haymaker’s is a true sunny perspiration, produced by the extreme of summer heat only, and conversant with the blast of the zephyr, not of the forge-bellows. We know very well the nature of this man’s sadness, but we do not know the nature of his gladness. There sits Bull in the court all the year round, with his hoarse bark and discontented growl—not a cross dog, only a canine habit, verging to madness some think—now separated from the shuddering travelers only by the paling, now heard afar in the horizon, even melodious there; baying the moon o’ nights, baying the sun by day, with his mastiff mouth. He never goes after the cows, nor stretches in the sun, nor plays with the children. Pray give him a longer rope, ye gods, or let him go at large, and never taste raw meat more.

The poet will maintain serenity in spite of all disappointments. He is expected to preserve an unconcerned and healthy outlook over the world while he lives. Philosophia practica est eruditionis meta, philosophy practiced is the good of learning; and for that other, Oratoris est celare artem, we might read, Herois est celare pugnam, the hero will conceal his struggles. Poetry is the only life got, the only work done, the only pure product and free labor of man, performed only when he has put all the world under his feet, and conquered the last of his foes.

Carlyle speaks of Nature with a certain unconscious pathos for the most part. She is to him a receded but ever memorable splendor, casting still a reflected light over all his scenery. As we read his books here in New England, where there are potatoes enough, and every man can get his living peacefully and sportively as the birds and bees, and need think no more of that, it seems to us as if by the world he often meant London, at the head of the tide upon the Thames, the sorest place on the face of the earth, the very citadel of conservatism. Possibly a South African village might have furnished a more hopeful, and more exacting audience, or in the silence of the wilderness and the desert, he might have addressed himself more entirely to his true audience posterity.

In his writings, we should say that he, as conspicuously as any, though with little enough expressed or even conscious sympathy, represents the Reformer class, and all the better for not being the acknowledged leader of any. In him the universal plaint is most settled, unappeasable and serious. Until a thousand named and nameless grievances are righted, there will be no repose for him in the lap of nature, or the seclusion of science and literature. By foreseeing it he hastens the crisis in the affairs of England, and is as good as many years added to her history.

As we said, we have no adequate word from him concerning poets—Homer, Shakspeare; nor more, we might add, of Saints—Jesus; nor philosophers—Socrates, Plato; nor mystics—Swedenborg. He has no articulate sympathy at least with such as these as yet. Odin, Mahomet, Cromwell, will have justice at his hands, and we would leave him to write the Eulogies of all the giants of the will, but the kings of men, whose kingdoms are wholly in the hearts of their subjects, strictly transcendent and moral greatness, what is highest and worthiest in character, he is not inclined to dwell upon or point to. To do himself justice, and set some of his readers right, he should give us some transcendent hero at length, to rule his demigods and Titans; develop, perhaps, his reserved and dumb reverence for Christ, not speaking to a London or Church of England audience merely. Let not “sacred silence meditate that sacred matter” forever, but let us have sacred speech and sacred scripture thereon. True reverence is not necessarily dumb, but ofttimes prattling and hilarious as children in the spring.

Every man will include in his list of worthies those whom he himself best represents. Carlyle, and our countryman Emerson, whose place and influence must ere long obtain a more distinct recognition, are, to a certain extent, the complement of each other. The age could not do with one of them, it cannot do with both. To make a broad and rude distinction, to suit our present purpose, the former, as critic, deals with the men of action—Mahomet, Luther, Cromwell; the latter with the thinkers—Plato, Shakspeare, Goethe, for though both have written upon Goethe, they do not meet in him. The one has more sympathy with the heroes, or practical reformers, the other with the observers, or philosophers. Put these worthies together, and you will have a pretty fair representation of mankind; yet with one or more memorable exceptions. To say nothing of Christ, who yet awaits a just appreciation from literature, the peacefully practical hero, whom Columbus may represent, is obviously slighted; but above and after all, the Man of the Age, come to be called working-man, it is obvious that none yet speaks to his condition, for the speaker is not yet in his condition. There is poetry and prophecy to cheer him, and advice of the head and heart to the hands; but no very memorable coöperation, it must be confessed, since the Christian era, or rather since Prometheus tried it. It is even a note-worthy fact, that a man addresses effectually in another only himself still, and what he himself does and is, alone can he prompt the other to do and to become. Like speaks to like only; labor to labor, philosophy to philosophy, criticism to criticism, poetry to poetry, &c. Literature speaks how much still to the past, how little to the future, how much to the east, how little to the west⁠—

In the East fames are won,

In the West deeds are done.

One more merit in Carlyle, let the subject be what it may, is the freedom of prospect he allows, the entire absence of cant and dogma. He removes many cart-loads of rubbish, and leaves open a broad highway. His writings are all enfenced on the side of the future and the possible. He does not place himself across the passage out of his books, so that none may go freely out, but rather by the entrance, inviting all to come in and go through. No gins, no net-work, no pickets here, to restrain the free thinking reader. In many books called philosophical, we find ourselves running hither and thither, under and through, and sometimes quite unconsciously straddling some imaginary fence-work, which in our clairvoyance we had not noticed, but fortunately, not with such fatal consequences as happen to those birds which fly against a white-washed wall, mistaking it for fluid air. As we proceed the wreck of this dogmatic tissue collects about the organs of our perception, like cobwebs about the muzzles of hunting dogs in dewy mornings. If we look up with such eyes as these authors furnish, we see no heavens, but a low pent-roof of straw or tiles, as if we stood under a shed, with no sky-light through which to glimpse the blue.

Carlyle, though he does but inadvertently direct our eyes to the open heavens, nevertheless, lets us wander broadly underneath, and shows them to us reflected in innumerable pools and lakes. We have from him, occasionally, some hints of a possible science of astronomy even, and revelation of heavenly arcana, but nothing definite hitherto.

These volumes contain not the highest, but a very practicable wisdom, which startles and provokes, rather than informs us. Carlyle does not oblige us to think; we have thought enough for him already, but he compels us to act. We accompany him rapidly through an endless gallery of pictures, and glorious reminiscences of experiences unimproved. “Have you not had Moses and the prophets? Neither will ye be persuaded if one should rise from the dead.” There is no calm philosophy of life here, such as you might put at the end of the Almanac, to hang over the farmer’s hearth, how men shall live in these winter, in these summer days. No philosophy, properly speaking, of love, or friendship, or religion, or politics, or education, or nature, or spirit; perhaps a nearer approach to a philosophy of kingship, and of the place of the literary man, than of any thing else. A rare preacher, with prayer, and psalm, and sermon, and benediction, but no contemplation of man’s life from serene oriental ground, nor yet from the stirring occidental. No thanksgiving sermon for the holydays, or the Easter vacations, when all men submit to float on the full currents of life. When we see with what spirits, though with little heroism enough, wood-choppers, drovers, and apprentices, take and spend life, playing all day long, sunning themselves, shading themselves, eating, drinking, sleeping, we think that the philosophy of their life written would be such a level natural history as the Gardener’s Calendar, and the works of the early botanists, inconceivably slow to come to practical conclusions; its premises away off before the first morning light, ere the heather was introduced into the British isles, and no inferences to be drawn during this noon of the day, not till after the remote evening shadows have begun to fall around.

There is no philosophy here for philosophers, only as every man is said to have his philosophy. No system but such as is the man himself; and, indeed, he stands compactly enough. No progress beyond the first assertion and challenge, as it were, with trumpet blast. One thing is certain, that we had best be doing something in good earnest, henceforth forever; that’s an indispensable philosophy. The before impossible precept, “know thyself,” he translates into the partially possible one, “know what thou canst work at.” Sartor Resartus is, perhaps, the sunniest and most philosophical, as it is the most autobiographical of his works, in which he drew most largely on the experience of his youth. But we miss everywhere a calm depth, like a lake, even stagnant, and must submit to rapidity and whirl, as on skates, with all kinds of skillful and antic motions, sculling, sliding, cutting punch-bowls and rings, forward and backward. The talent is very nearly equal to the genius. Sometimes it would be preferable to wade slowly through a Serbonian bog, and feel the juices of the meadow. We should say that he had not speculated far, but faithfully, living up to it. He lays all the stress still on the most elementary and initiatory maxims, introductory to philosophy. It is the experience of the religionist. He pauses at such a quotation as, “It is only with renunciation that life, properly speaking, can be said to begin;” or, “Doubt of any sort cannot be removed except by action;” or, “Do the duty which lies nearest thee.” The chapters entitled, “The Everlasting No,” and “The Everlasting Yea,” contain what you might call the religious experience of his hero. In the latter, he assigns to him these words, brief, but as significant as any we remember in this author:—“One Bible I know, of whose plenary inspiration doubt is not so much as possible; nay, with my own eyes I saw the God’s-hand writing it: thereof all other Bibles are but leaves.” This belongs to “The Everlasting Yea;” yet he lingers unaccountably in “The Everlasting No,” under the negative pole. “Truth!” he still cries with Teüfelsdrock, “though the heavens crush me for following her: no falsehood! though a whole celestial Lubberland were the price of apostacy.” Again, “Living without God in the world, of God’s light I was not utterly bereft; if my as yet sealed eyes, with their unspeakable longing, could nowhere see Him, nevertheless, in my heart He was present, and His heaven-written law still stood legible and sacred there.” Again, “Ever from that time, [the era of his Protest,] the temper of my misery was changed: not fear or whining sorrow was it, but indignation and grim, fire-eyed defiance.” And in the “Centre of Indifference,” as editor, he observes, that “it was no longer a quite hopeless unrest,” and then proceeds, not in his best style, “For the fire-baptized soul, long so scathed and thunder-riven, here feels its own freedom, which feeling is its Baphometic Baptism: the citadel of its whole kingdom it has thus gained by assault, and will keep inexpungable; outward from which the remaining dominions, not, indeed, without hard battling, will doubtless by degrees be conquered and pacificated.”

Beside some philosophers of larger vision, Carlyle stands like an honest, half-despairing boy, grasping at some details only of their world systems. Philosophy, certainly, is some account of truths, the fragments and very insignificant parts of which man will practice in this work-shop; truths infinite and in harmony with infinity; in respect to which the very objects and ends of the so-called practical philosopher, will be mere propositions, like the rest. It would be no reproach to a philosopher, that he knew the future better than the past, or even than the present. It is better worth knowing. He will prophecy, tell what is to be, or in other words, what alone is, under appearances, laying little stress on the boiling of the pot, or the Condition of England question. He has no more to do with the condition of England than with her national debt, which a vigorous generation would not inherit. The philosopher’s conception of things will, above all, be truer than other men’s, and his philosophy will subordinate all the circumstances of life. To live like a philosopher, is to live, not foolishly, like other men, but wisely, and according to universal laws. In this, which was the ancient sense, we think there has been no philosopher in modern times. The wisest and most practical men of recent history, to whom this epithet has been hastily applied, have lived comparatively meagre lives, of conformity and tradition, such as their fathers transmitted to them. But a man may live in what style he can. Between earth and heaven, there is room for all kinds. If he take counsel of fear and prudence, he has already failed. One who believed, by his very constitution, some truth which a few words express, would make a revolution never to be forgotten in this world; for it needs but a fraction of truth to found houses and empires on.

However, such distinctions as poet and philosopher, do not much assist our final estimate of a man; we do not lay much stress on them. “A man’s a man for a’ that.” If Carlyle does not take two steps in philosophy, are there any who take three? Philosophy having crept clinging to the rocks, so far, puts out its feelers many ways in vain. It would be hard to surprise him by the relation of any important human experience, but in some nook or corner of his works, you will find that this, too, was sometimes dreamed of in his philosophy.

To sum up our most serious objections, in a few words, we should say that Carlyle indicates a depth,—and we mean not impliedly, but distinctly,—which he neglects to fathom. We want to know more about that which he wants to know as well. If any luminous star, or undissolvable nebula, is visible from his station, which is not visible from ours, the interests of science require that the fact be communicated to us. The universe expects every man to do his duty in his parallel of latitude. We want to hear more of his inmost life; his hymn and prayer, more; his elegy and eulogy, less; that he should speak more from his character, and less from his talent; communicate centrally with his readers, and not by a side; that he should say what he believes, without suspecting that men disbelieve it, out of his never-misunderstood nature. Homer and Shakspeare speak directly and confidently to us. The confidence implied in the unsuspicious tone of the world’s worthies, is a great and encouraging fact. Dig up some of the earth you stand on, and show that. If he gave us religiously the meagre results of his experience, his style would be less picturesque and diversified, but more attractive and impressive. His genius can cover all the land with gorgeous palaces, but the reader does not abide in them, but pitches his tent rather in the desert and on the mountain peak.

When we look about for something to quote, as the fairest specimen of the man, we confess that we labor under an unusual difficulty; for his philosophy is so little of the proverbial or sentential kind, and opens so gradually, rising insensibly from the reviewer’s level, and developing its thought completely and in detail, that we look in vain for the brilliant passages, for point and antithesis, and must end by quoting his works entire. What in a writer of less breadth would have been the proposition which would have bounded his discourse, his column of victory, his Pillar of Hercules, and ne plus ultra, is in Carlyle frequently the same thought unfolded; no Pillar of Hercules, but a considerable prospect, north and south, along the Atlantic coast. There are other pillars of Hercules, like beacons and light-houses, still further in the horizon, toward Atlantis, set up by a few ancient and modern travelers; but, so far as this traveler goes, he clears and colonizes, and all the surplus population of London is bound thither at once. What we would quote is, in fact, his vivacity, and not any particular wisdom or sense, which last is ever synonymous with sentence, [sententia,] as in his cotemporaries, Coleridge, Landor and Wordsworth.

We have not attempted to discriminate between his works, but have rather regarded them all as one work, as is the man himself. We have not examined so much as remembered them. To do otherwise, would have required a more indifferent, and perhaps even less just review, than the present. The several chapters were thankfully received, as they came out, and now we find it impossible to say which was best; perhaps each was best in its turn. They do not require to be remembered by chapters—that is a merit—but are rather remembered as a well-known strain, reviving from time to time, when it had nearly died away, and always inspiring us to worthier and more persistent endeavors.

In his last work, “The Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell,” Carlyle has added a chapter to the history of England; has actually written a chapter of her history, and, in comparison with this, there seems to be no other,—this, and the thirty thousand or three hundred thousand pamphlets in the British Museum, and that is all. This book is a practical comment on Universal History. What if there were a British Museum in Athens and Babylon, and nameless cities! It throws light on the history of the Iliad and the labors of Pisistratus. History is, then, an account of memorable events that have sometime transpired, and not an incredible and confused fable, quarters for scholars merely, or a gymnasium for poets and orators. We may say that he has dug up a hero, who was buried alive in his battle-field, hauled him out of his cairn, on which every passer had cast a pamphlet. We had heard of their digging up Arthurs before to be sure they were there; and, to be sure they were there, their bones, seven feet of them; but they had to bury them again. Others have helped to make known Shakspeare, Milton, Herbert, to give a name to such treasures as we all possessed; but, in this instance, not only a lost character has been restored to our imaginations, but palpably a living body, as it were, to our senses, to wear and sustain the former. His Cromwell’s restoration, if England will read it faithfully, and addressed to New England too. Every reader will make his own application.

To speak deliberately, we think that in this instance, vague rumor and a vague history have for the first time been subjected to a rigid scrutiny, and the wheat, with at least novel fidelity, sifted from the chaff; so that there remain for result,—First, Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell, now for the first time read or readable, and well nigh as complete as the fates will permit; secondly, Deeds, making an imperfect and fragmentary life, which may, with probability, be fathered upon him; thirdly, this wreck of an ancient picture, the present editor has, to the best of his ability, restored, sedulously scraping away the daubings of successive bunglers, and endeavoring to catch the spirit of the artist himself. Not the worst, nor a barely possible, but for once the most favorable construction has been put upon this evidence of the life of a man, and the result is a picture of the ideal Cromwell, the perfection of the painter’s art. Possibly this was the actual man. At any rate, this only can contain the actual hero. We confess that when we read these Letters and Speeches, unquestionably Cromwell’s, with open and confident mind, we get glimpses occasionally of a grandeur and heroism, which even this editor has not proclaimed. His “Speeches” make us forget modern orators, and might go right into the next edition of the Old Testament, without alteration. Cromwell was another sort of man than we had taken him to be. These Letters and Speeches have supplied the lost key to his character. Verily another soldier than Bonaparte; rejoicing in the triumph of a psalm; to whom psalms were for Magna Charta and Heralds’ Book, and whose victories were “crowning mercies.” For stern, antique, and practical religion, a man unparalleled, since the Jewish dispensation, in the line of kings. An old Hebrew warrior, indeed, and last right-hand man of the Lord of Hosts, that has blown his ram’s horn about Jericho. Yet, with a remarkable common sense and unexpected liberality, there was joined in him, too, such a divine madness, though with large and sublime features, as that of those dibblers of beans on St George’s Hill, whom Carlyle tells of. He still listened to ancient and decaying oracles. If his actions were not always what Christianity or the truest philosophy teaches, still they never fail to impress us as noble, and however violent, will always be pardoned to the great purpose and sincerity of the man. His unquestionable hardness, not to say willfulness, not prevailing by absolute truth and greatness of character, but honestly striving to bend things to his will, is yet grateful to consider in this or any age. As John Maidstone said, “He was a strong man in the dark perils of war; in the high places of the field, hope shone in him like a pillar of fire, when it had gone out in the others.” And as Milton sang, whose least testimony cannot be spared⁠—

                  “Our chief of men,

Guided by faith and matchless fortitude.”

None ever spake to Cromwell before, sending a word of cheer across the centuries—not the “hear!” “hear!” of modern parliaments, but the congratulation and sympathy of a brother soul. The Letters and Speeches owe not a little to the “Intercalations” and “Annotations” of the “latest of the Commentators.” The reader will not soon forget how like a happy merchant in the crowd, listening to his favorite speaker, he is all on the alert, and sympathetic, nudging his neighbors from time to time, and throwing in his responsive or interrogatory word. All is good, both that which he didn’t hear, and that which he did. He not only makes him speak audibly, but he makes all parties listen to him, all England sitting round, and give in their comments, “groans,” or “blushes,” or “assent;” indulging sometimes in triumphant malicious applications to the present day, when there is a palpable hit; supplying the look and attitude of the speaker, and the tone of his voice, and even rescuing his unutterable, wrecked and submerged thought,—for this orator begins speaking anywhere within sight of the beginning, and leaves off when the conclusion is visible. Our merchant listens, restless, meanwhile, encouraging his fellow-auditors, when the speech grows dim and involved, and pleasantly congratulating them, when it runs smoothly; or, in touching soliloquy, he exclaims, “Poor Oliver, noble Oliver”—“Courage, my brave one!”

And all along, between the Letters and Speeches, as readers well remember, he has ready such a fresh top-of-the-morning salutation as conjures up the spirits of those days, and men go marching over English sward, not wired skeletons, but with firm, elastic muscles, and clang of armor on their thighs, if they wore swords, or the twang of psalms and canticles on their lips. His blunt, “Who are you?” put to the shadowy ghosts of history, they vanish into deeper obscurity than ever. Vivid phantasmagorian pictures of what is transpiring in England in the meanwhile, there are, not a few, better than if you had been there to see.

All of Carlyle’s works might well enough be embraced under the title of one of them, a good specimen brick, “On Heroes, Hero-worship, and the Heroic in History.” Of this department, he is the Chief Professor in the World’s University, and even leaves Plutarch behind. Such intimate and living, such loyal and generous sympathy with the heroes of history, not one in one age only, but forty in forty ages, such an unparalleled reviewing and greeting of all past worth, with exceptions, to be sure,—but exceptions were the rule, before,—it was, indeed, to make this the age of review writing, as if now one period of the human story were completing itself; and getting its accounts settled. This soldier has told the stories with new emphasis, and will be a memorable hander-down of fame to posterity. And with what wise discrimination he has selected his men, with reference both to his own genius and to theirs: Mahomet,—Dante,—Cromwell,—Voltaire,—Johnson,—Burns,—Goethe,—Richter,—Schiller,—Mirabeau; could any of these have been spared? These we wanted to hear about. We have not as commonly the cold and refined judgment of the scholar and critic merely, but something more human and affecting. These eulogies have the glow and warmth of friendship. There is sympathy not with mere fames, and formless, incredible things, but with kindred men,—not transiently, but life-long he has walked with them.

The attitude of some, in relation to Carlyle’s love of heroes, and men of the sword, reminds us of the procedure at the anti-slavery meetings, when some member, being warmed, begins to speak with more latitude than usual of the Bible or the Church, for a few prudent and devout ones to spring a prayer upon him, as the saying is; that is, propose suddenly to unite in prayer, and so solemnize the minds of the audience, or dismiss them at once; which may oftener be to interrupt a true prayer by most gratuitous profanity. But the spring of this trap, we are glad to learn, has grown somewhat rusty, and is not so sure of late.

No doubt, some of Carlyle’s worthies, should they ever return to earth, would find themselves unpleasantly put upon their good behavior, to sustain their characters; but if he can return a man’s life more perfect to our hands, than it was left at his death, following out the design of its author, we shall have no great cause to complain. We do not want a Daguerreotype likeness. All biography is the life of Adam,—a much-experienced man,—and time withdraws something partial from the story of every individual, that the historian may supply something general. If these virtues were not in this man, perhaps they are in his biographer,—no fatal mistake. Really, in any other sense, we never do, nor desire to, come at the historical man,—unless we rob his grave, that is the nearest approach. Why did he die, then? He is with his bones, surely.

No doubt, Carlyle has a propensity to exaggerate the heroic in history, that is, he creates you an ideal hero rather than another thing, he has most of that material. This we allow in all its senses, and in one narrower sense it is not so convenient. Yet what were history if he did not exaggerate it? How comes it that history never has to wait for facts, but for a man to write it? The ages may go on forgetting the facts never so long, he can remember two for every one forgotten. The musty records of history, like the catacombs, contain the perishable remains, but only in the breast of genius are embalmed the souls of heroes. There is very little of what is called criticism here; it is love and reverence, rather, which deal with qualities not relatively, but absolutely great; for whatever is admirable in a man is something infinite, to which we cannot set bounds. These sentiments allow the mortal to die, the immortal and divine to survive. There is something antique, even in his style of treating his subject, reminding us that Heroes and Demi-gods, Fates and Furies, still exist, the common man is nothing to him, but after death the hero is apotheosized and has a place in heaven, as in the religion of the Greeks.

Exaggeration! was ever any virtue attributed to a man without exaggeration? was ever any vice, without infinite exaggeration? Do we not exaggerate ourselves to ourselves, or do we recognize ourselves for the actual men we are? Are we not all great men? Yet what are we actually to speak of? We live by exaggeration, what else is it to anticipate more than we enjoy? The lightning is an exaggeration of the light. Exaggerated history is poetry, and truth referred to a new standard. To a small man every greater is an exaggeration. He who cannot exaggerate is not qualified to utter truth. No truth we think was ever expressed but with this sort of emphasis, so that for the time there seemed to be no other. Moreover, you must speak loud to those who are hard of hearing, and so you acquire a habit of shouting to those who are not. By an immense exaggeration we appreciate our Greek poetry and philosophy, and Egyptian ruins; our Shakspeares and Miltons, our liberty and Christianity. We give importance to this hour over all other hours. We do not live by justice, but by grace. As the sort of justice which concerns us in our daily intercourse is not that administered by the judge, so the historical justice which we prize is not arrived at by nicely balancing the evidence. In order to appreciate any, even the humblest man, you must first, by some good fortune, have acquired a sentiment of admiration, even of reverence, for him, and there never were such exaggerators as these. Simple admiration for a hero renders a juster verdict than the wisest criticism, which necessarily degrades what is high to its own level. There is no danger in short of saying too much in praise of one man, provided you can say more in praise of a better man. If by exaggeration a man can create for us a hero, where there was nothing but dry bones before, we will thank him, and let Dryasdust administer historical justice. This is where a true history properly begins, when some genius arises, who can turn the dry and musty records into poetry. As we say, looking to the future, that what is best is truest, so, in one sense, we may say looking into the past, for the only past that we are to look at, must also be future to us. The great danger is not of excessive partiality or sympathy with one, but of a shallow justice to many, in which, after all, none gets his deserts. Who has not experienced that praise is truer than naked justice? As if man were to be the judge of his fellows, and should repress his rising sympathy with the prisoner at the bar, considering the many honest men abroad, whom he had never countenanced.

To try him by the German rule of referring an author to his own standard, we will quote the following from Carlyle’s remarks on history, and leave the reader to consider how far his practice has been consistent with his theory. “Truly, if History is Philosophy teaching by experience, the writer fitted to compose history, is hitherto an unknown man. The experience itself would require all knowledge to record it, were the All-wisdom needful for such Philosophy as would interpret it, to be had for asking. Better were it that mere earthly historians should lower such pretensions, more suitable for omniscience than for human science; and aiming only at some picture of the things acted, which picture itself, will at best be a poor approximation, leave the inscrutable purport of them an acknowledged secret; or, at most, in reverent Faith, far different from that teaching of Philosophy, pause over the mysterious vestiges of Him, whose path is in the great deep of Time, whom history indeed reveals, but only all History and in Eternity, will clearly reveal.”

Who lives in London to tell this generation who have been the great men of our race? We have read that on some exposed place in the city of Geneva, they have fixed a brazen indicator for the use of travelers, with the names of the mountain summits in the horizon marked upon it, “so that by taking sight across the index you can distinguish them at once. You will not mistake Mont Blanc, if you see him, but until you get accustomed to the panorama, you may easily mistake one of his court for the king.” It stands there a piece of mute brass, that seems nevertheless to know in what vicinity it is: and there perchance it will stand, when the nation that placed it there has passed away, still in sympathy with the mountains, forever discriminating in the desert.

So, we may say, stands this man, pointing as long as he lives, in obedience to some spiritual magnetism, to the summits in the historical horizon, for the guidance of his fellows.

Truly, our greatest blessings are very cheap. To have our sunlight without paying for it, without any duty levied,—to have our poet there in England, to furnish us entertainment, and what is better provocation, from year to year, all our lives long, to make the world seem richer for us, the age more respectable, and life better worth the living,—all without expense of acknowledgment even, but silently accepted out of the east, like morning light as a matter of course.

APRIL.

Now fitful clouds scud o’er the skies,

  And fairy showers patter by,

And in the wood the low wind sighs,

  And shadows o’er the brown fields fly!

Low fades the sun, then blazes out,

  Glinting on grass, and twig, and tree⁠—

Ah! April, boyish out and out,

  Now tears, and now all jollity!

MR. KERR MUDGEON.

OR “YOU WONT, WONT YOU?”

———

BY JOSEPH C. NEAL.

———

There; now!

You see—do you not?—Nay, you may almost hear it, if you listen attentively. Mr. Kerr Mudgeon—great many of the Kerr Mudgeons about, in various places—but this Mr. Kerr Mudgeon—going to a party as he was—desirous too, as people generally are on such occasions, of looking particularly well—and all ready, to his own infinite satisfaction—all ready except the final operation of putting on his bettermost coat—has torn that important article of gentlemanly costume—one may work without a coat, you know, and work all the easier for the relief; but it is not altogether polite to leave it at home on a peg when you go to a party. Torn his coat—not through his own fault, as Mr. Kerr Mudgeon would tell you explicitly enough—he never is, never was, never can be in fault—but because of that coat’s ill timed and provoking resistance to the operation of being donned. The coat might have known—who is ever thus to be trifled with in the process of dressing? Yes, the coat must have known. Ah, coats and the makers of coats have much to answer for. Kerr Mudgeon is ruffled, ruffles of this sort, causing a man to look none the handsomer or the more amiable for the ruffle. Such ruffles are not becoming.

“Ho! ho! wont go on, hey?” cried Mr. Kerr Mudgeon, and Mr. Kerr Mudgeon panted and Mr. Kerr Mudgeon blew, on the high pressure principle, until the steam of his wrath had reached its highest point.

It is a fearful moment with the Kerr Mudgeons, when it is manifest that something must break—a blood vessel or the furniture, or the peace of the commonwealth. Why will things animate and inanimate conspire to bring about such a crisis? Kerr Mudgeons would be sweet tempered if you would only permit them.

The coat positively refused to go on any further—the contumacious raiment. What could Kerr Mudgeon do in such a strait of perverse broad cloth?

“Tell me you wont go on,” muttered Kerr Mudgeon, setting his teeth, as a rifleman sets his trigger; “I’ll make you go on, I will,” shouted he.⁠—

There’s no such word as fail with Mr. Kerr Mudgeon. Something is sure to be done when he is once fairly roused to the work. It is a rule of his to combat like with like; and so—and so—stamping his foot determinedly, and gathering all his forces for a grand demonstration against the obstinacy of tight sleeves, he carried his point as he proposed to carry it, by a rushing coup de main, to the material detriment of the fabric.—But what of that? Was it not a victory for Kerr Mudgeon? The coat had yielded to the force of his will; and if the victory had been gained at cost, is it not always so with victories?—Glory—is that to be had for nothing?—No—depreciate the cost of glory, and pray tell me what becomes of glory?—It is glory no longer. A luxury, to be a luxury, must be beyond the general reach—too expensive for the millions—too costly for the masses.

“And now—ha! ha!—ho! ho!—he! he!—come off!” shrieked Mr. Kerr Mudgeon; “Now you’ve done all the mischief you could, come off.” Kerr Mudgeon divested himself of the fractured, but now humbled, penitent and discomfitted coat, and following up his first success, like an able tactician, he danced in a transport of joy upon its mangled fragments and its melancholy remains. Ghastly moment of triumph o’er a foe. Alas, Kerr Mudgeon be merciful to the vanquished when incapacitated for the war.

But no—coolness comes not on the instant—not to the Kerr Mudgeons. They have no relationship to the Kew Cumbers. They disdain the alliance; and Mr. Kerr Mudgeon’s coat had been conquered only—not punished.

“That’s what you get by being obstinate,” added he, as he kicked the expiring coat about the room, knocking down a lamp, upsetting an inkstand, and doing sundry other minor pieces of mischief all of which, of course, he charged to the account of the coat, as aforesaid—It was coat’s fault altogether. Mr. Kerr Mudgeon is not naturally in a passion. He would not have been in a passion had it not been for the coat—not he—the coat was the incendiary cause; and we trust that every coat, frock or body—sack-coat or any other of the infinite variety of coats now in existence, with all other coats that are to be, may take timely example and salutary warning from the doleful fate of Mr. Kerr Mudgeon’s coat, that there may be no sewing of tares, and an exemption from rent. A coat is never improved by participation in battle.

And this unhappy coat, which has thus fallen a victim to its incapacity to adapt itself to the form and pressure of circumstances, is by no means a singular case in the experience of Mr. Kerr Mudgeon. We mention it rather as a symbol and as an emblem of the trials and vexations that ambuscade his way through life, to vex him at unguarded moments and shake him from his propriety. Boots, it will appear, have served him just so, particularly on a warm morning when unusual effort fevers one for the day. Did you ever see Kerr Mudgeon in a contest with his boots, when the leather, like a sturdy sentinel, refused ingress to Kerr Mudgeon’s heel and declared that there “was no admission” to the premises, in despite of coaxings, of soap, and of the pulverizations of soap-stone? If you never saw that sight, you ought to see it, before you shuffle off this mortal coil—indeed you ought, as Kerr Mudgeon toils and pants at the reluctant boots, in the vain effort “to grapple them to his sole, with hooks of steel.” Then it is most especially that a Kerr Mudgeon is “lovelily dreadful,” like ocean in a storm. Whether Salt Petre will explode or not, just set the Kerr Mudgeons at a tight boot, and you shall hear such explosions of tempestous wrath as were never heard under other circumstances. The Gun Cotton is like lambs-wool in the comparison, as Kerr Mudgeon hops about in a state of betweenity, the boot half on, half off, declining either to go forward or to retreat. We pity that boot should Kerr Mudgeon find a failure to his deep intent. It has sufferings in store—a species of storage which is never agreeable.

Corks, too—did you ever dwell upon a Kerr Mudgeon endeavoring to extract a cork, without the mechanical appliances of a screw? The getting out of corks with one’s fingers is always more or less of a trial. There is donkeyism in corks; and those that will yield a little, are generally sure to break. Concession, conciliation, and compromise demand under these circumstances, that if the cork will not come out, it should be made to go in, to employ the ingenuity of future ages in fishing it up with slip-knots and nooses. But Kerr Mudgeon with a cork—he never, “Mr. Brown,” can be prevailed upon to “give it up so;” not even if you find the cork-screw for him. Rather would he hurt his hand, loosen his teeth, break his penknife or twist a fork into an invalid condition, than allow himself to be ingloriously baffled by the contemptible oppugnation and hostility of a cork and a bottle, thirsty and impatient as he may be for the imbibation of the contents thereof. If all else fail—Kerr Mudgeon enraged, and the bystanders in an agony of nervousness at the scene—“smack” goes the bottle’s neck against a table or “whack” over the back of a chair—“you wont, wont you!”—or in the more protracted and aggravating case, “smash!” goes the whole bottle to the wall, for the embellishment of paper hangings and the improvement of carpeting—Victoria!

Something is always the matter, too, with the bureau when he would open or shut a drawer.—Either it will not come out or it wont go in. That drawer must take the consequences; and doors—lucky are they to escape a fractured panel, if doors prove refractory, as doors sometimes will.—Nobody can open a door so featly as a Kerr Mudgeon.

“You wont, wont you?” and so he appeals to the ultima ratio regum—the last reasoning of Kings—which means as many of thumps, cuffs and kicks as may be requisite to the purpose. It is a knock-down argument.

Pooh! pooh!—how you talk of the efficacy of the soft answer in the turning away of wrath.—Nonsense, Mr. George Combe, that wrath to the wrathful is only fuel to the flame. Mr. Kerr Mudgeon has no faith in passive resistance and in other doctrines of that sort. Smite his cheek, and then see what will come of the smitation. Go to him if you want “as good as you give,” and you will be sure to obtain measure, exact, yea, and running over.

And so Mr. Kerr Mudgeon has always a large stock of quarrel on hand, unsettled and neat as imported—feuds everywhere, to keep him warm in the winter season. A good hater is Mr. Kerr Mudgeon—a bramble bush to scratch withal.

“Try to impose on me,” says Kerr Mudgeon, “I’d like to see ’em at it. They’ll soon find I’m not afraid of anybody;” and he therefore seeks to impress that fact with distinctness on everybody’s mind; and, in consequence, if anybody has unexpended choler about him—a pet rage or so, pent up, or a latent exasperation—make him acquainted with Kerr Mudgeon, and observe the effect of the contact of such a spark as Mudgeon with an inflammable magazine. Should you find yourself peevish generally, and a little crusty or so, to those around you—primed, as it were, for contention, should it be fairly offered, stop as you go to business, at Kerr Mudgeon’s. He will accommodate you, and you will feel much better afterward, you will—“calm as a summer morning,” as the politicians have it.

Kerr Mudgeon rides; and his horse must abide a liberal application of whip and spur, sometimes inducing it as a corollary—is a tumble to be regarded as a corollary from the saddle?—inducing it as a corollary, that Kerr Mudgeon must abide in the mire, with a fractured tibia or fibia, as the case may be. “You wont, wont you?”— and there are horses who don’t, when not able clearly to understand what is to be done. Now, the horse swerves, and Kerr Mudgeon takes the lateral slide. Again the steed bows—with politeness enough—and Kerr Mudgeon is a flying phenomenon over his head—gracefully, like a spread-eagle in a fit of enthusiasm. When he is down he says he never gives up to a horse.

Kerr Mudgeon delights also to quicken the paces of your lounging dog, by such abrupt and sharp appeal to the feelings of the animal as occasion may suggest; and often there is an interchange of compliment, biped and quadrupedal, thus elicited, returning bites for blows, to square accounts between human attack and canine indignation. Some dogs do not appreciate graceful attentions and captivating endearments. “Dogs are so revengeful,” says Kerr Mudgeon. His dogs always run away; “dogs are so ungrateful, too,” quoth he.

Unfortunate Kerr Mudgeon!—What is to become of him until the world is rendered more complaisant and acquiescent, prepared in all respects to go his way?

In the street, he takes the straightest line from place to place, having learnt from his schoolboy mathematics, that this is decidedly the shortest method of going from place to place. And yet, how people jostle him, first on the right hand and then on the left? Why do they not clear the track for Kerr Mudgeon?

Then at the Post Office, in the hour of delivery.

Kerr Mudgeon wants his letters. What is more natural than that a man should want his letters?

“Quit scrouging!” says somebody, as he knocks Mr. Kerr Mudgeon in the ribs with his elbow.

“Wait for your turn!” cries somebody else, jostling Mr. Kerr Mudgeon on the opposite ribs.

Still Kerr Mudgeon struggles through the press, resolved upon obtaining his letters before other people obtain their letters, having his feet trampled almost to a mummy, his garments disarranged, if not torn, and in addition to bruises, perhaps losing his fifty dollar breast-pin, to complete the harmony of the picture; but still obtaining his letters in advance of his competitors—five minutes saved or thereabouts—what triumph! what a victory! To be sure, after such a struggle, Mr. Kerr Mudgeon consumes much more than the five minutes, in putting himself to rights, and finds himself in a towering passion for an hour or two, besides groaning for a considerable length of time over his bruises and his losses, all of which might have been escaped by a few moments of patience. But then the victory—“you wont, wont you?” Was Kerr Mudgeon ever baffled by any species of resistance? Not he.

“People are such brutes,” says he; “no more manners than so many pigs—try not to let me get my letters as soon as any of them, will they? I’ll teach ’em that a Kerr Mudgeon is not to be trifled with—just as good a right to be first as anybody; and I will be first, wherever I go, cost what it may.”

We do not know that Kerr Mudgeon ever entered into a calculation as to the profit and loss of the operation of the rule that governed his life in intercourse with society. Indeed, we rather think not. But it is probable that in the long run, it costs as much as it comes to, if it does not cost a great deal more, thus to persist in having one’s own way in every thing. In crossing the street now, when the black and fluent mire is particularly abundant, Mr. Kerr Mudgeon insists upon the flag-stones—“as good a right as anybody,” and thus pushes others into a predicament unpleasant to their boots and detrimental to their blacking, so that their understandings become clouded, as they lose all their polish. In general, such a course as this does very well—but it will sometimes happen, as it has happened, that two Kerr Mudgeons meet—the hardest fend off—and thus our Kerr Mudgeon is toppled full length into a bed much more soft than is altogether desirable, which vexes him.

Did you, of a rainy day, ever see Kerr Mudgeon incline his umbrella to allow another umbrella to pass? We are sure you never did. Kerr Mudgeon’s umbrella is as good as anybody’s umbrella, and will maintain its dignity against all comers, though it has been torn to fragments by the sharp points of other umbrellas, which thought themselves quite as good as it could pretend to be—and so, Kerr Mudgeon got himself now and then into a fray, to say nothing of suits for assault and battery, gracefully and agreeably interspersed. Ho! ho! umbrellas!—“you wont, wont you?”

Kerr Mudgeon walks with a cane—carries it horizontally under his arm, muddy at the ferule perchance; and canes thus disposed, come awkwardly in contact with the crossing currents of persons and costumes. But what does he care for the soiled garments of the ladies or the angry countenances of offended gentlemen? Is not Kerr Mudgeon with his cane, as good as anybody else and his cane? Horizontally—he will wear it so. That’s his way.

“The world don’t improve at all,” cries Kerr Mudgeon. “They may make speeches about it, and pass resolutions by the bushel; but it is my candid opinion that it grows obstinater and obstinater every day. It never yields an inch, and a man has to push, and to scramble, and to fight forever to make any headway for himself—black and blue more than half the time. Every day shoots up all over rumpuses and rowses. But, never mind—the world needn’t flatter itself that it’s a going to conquer Kerr Mudgeon and to put him down too, as it does other people. Kerr Mudgeon knows his rights—Kerr Mudgeon is as good as anybody else. Kerr Mudgeon will fight till he dies. He was never made to yield, and he never intends to yield, so long as his name is Kerr Mudgeon. It’s a good name—never disgraced by movements of the knuckle-down character, and I’m determined to carry on the war just as all the Mudgeons did that went before me. If a horse kicks me, I’ll kick him back; and I wouldn’t get out of the way, like Mr. Daniel Tucker in the song, if a thirty-two pound shot was coming up the street, or a locomotive was a whizzin’ down the road. Stand up straight—that’s my motto. Give ’em as good as they can bring; that’s the doctrine; and while a single bit of Kerr Mudgeon remains—while any of his bones hang together, that’s him squaring off right in the centre of the track, ready for you, with his coat buttoned up and a fist in each of his hands.”

Kerr Mudgeon’s face is settled grimly into the aspect of habitual defiance. His brows are forever knitting, not socks or mittens, but frowns, and his mouth is knotted like a rope. When he looks around, it seems to be an inquiry, as to whether any gentleman present is disposed to pugilistic encounter,—if so, he can be accommodated; and the whole disposition of his garments indicates contention—war to the knife.

Kerr Mudgeon complains that he has no friends, and is beginning to stand solitary and alone, with but a dreary prospect before him, in a world that grows “obstinater and obstinater every day;” and he has yet to learn, if such learning should ever penetrate through the armor of hostility wherewith he is begirt, that perhaps, if we desire to have a smooth and easy time of it, we must ourselves begin by being smooth and easy. The belligerent ever meets with belligerents. There’s no difficulty about that. There is a sufficiency of war in every atmosphere, if you are disposed to condense it upon yourself; and no one eager to enjoy the pleasure, need wander far in search of quarrels. Kerr Mudgeon finds them everywhere—“rumpuses and rowses”—But it is a shrewd doubt whether one’s general comfort is greatly promoted by the aggravation of rudeness and roughness. It is easier to bend a little to inclement blasts, than to be snapped off by perpendicular resistance—easier to go round an obstacle than to destroy your temper and your clothing, in the exhausting effort to clamber over it; and it may be said of every quarrel in which Kerr Mudgeonism is engaged, that probably both parties are in fault, though Kerr Mudgeonism is in all likelihood, the responsible party.

Yet, “you wont, wont you?” is a great temptation to combativeness and destructiveness. Is it not, all ye people of the Kerr Mudgeon temperament?

Painted by Frankenstein       Engraved by A. W. Graham

PITTSBURG

Engraved expressly for Graham’s Magazine

PITTSBURGH.

———

BY E. M. SIDNEY.

———

As some vast heart that high in health

  Beats in its mighty breast,

So, to and fro, thy living wealth

  Throbs through the boundless West.

Thy keels the broad Ohio plow,

  Or seek the Atlantic main;

Thy fabrics find the Arctic snow,

  Or reach Zahara’s plain!

Toil on, huge Cyclop as thou art,

  Though grimed with dust and smoke,

And breathing with convulsive start⁠—

  There’s music in each stroke!

What if the stranger smirch and soil

  Upon thy forehead sees?

Better the wealth of honest toil

  Than of ignoble ease!

And yet thou’rt beautiful—a queen

  Throned on her royal seat!

All glorious in emerald sheen,

  Where thy fair waters meet.

And when the night comes softly down,

  And the moon lights the stream,

In the mild ray appears the town,

  The city of a dream!

ABROAD AND AT HOME.

———

BY F. E. F., AUTHOR OF “AARON’S ROD,” “PRIZE STORIES,” ETC.

———

Ros. Farewell, Monsieur traveler: Look you, lisp, and wear strange suits; disable all the benefits of your own country; be out of love with your nativity, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are; or I will scarce think you have swam in a gondola.     As You Like It.

“I did not see you at the opera, last night, Mrs. Fielding,” said Miss Collingwood.

“No,” replied the other, “I was not there. How were you pleased?”

“Oh, delighted!” returned the young lady, with animation. “It is an excellent company. The tenore has a superb voice, and the prima donna is charming. And everybody was there. You mean to go to-morrow, I suppose?”

“No,” said Mrs. Fielding; “the last time I heard that opera was in Paris. Lablache, Tamburini and Persiani sang; and I cannot bear to destroy the illusion by seeing it here. When one has been abroad, and heard music in such perfection, it spoils one for all one can get in this country.”

This was said in such a tone of superiority, that Miss Collingwood was a little dashed; but she replied,

“Oh, we cannot expect Lablache and Persiani; but still, this is an excellent company.”

“I’m told they are very tolerable,” replied Mrs. Fielding, in the same languid, supercilious manner. “But music, I think, should know no mediocrity. Now, in Paris, you have every thing in such perfection! There was nothing I enjoyed so much while I was abroad, as the opera. Persiani is an exquisite creature! And Lablache—what a voice! And Tamburini!” And Mrs. Fielding rolled up her eyes in an ecstasy, quite breathless and overcome by her recollections. “I don’t think,” she continued “I could bear hearing the same music sung by second-rate, or probably third or fourth-rate artistes, which I presume these people are. They are from Havana, I believe?”

“Yes,” answered Miss Collingwood, now quite ashamed of the enthusiasm with which she had first spoken of them, and almost thankful she had not mentioned the “season tickets,” she had been before on the point of announcing with such pride and delight. “We had a very full house,” she continued, however, too full of the subject to desist from it altogether, though not daring to dwell upon the music any longer. “Everybody, you know, was there; and I am told every seat in the house is engaged for to-morrow.”

“Is it possible!” exclaimed Mrs. Fielding. “How these people do succeed here! Poor wretches, that can scarce get an engagement at one of the third or fourth-rate theatres abroad, have nothing to do but to come to this country to make their fortunes.”

“But Mr. Livingston told me that he had heard Signora D. in Paris, at the Grand Italian Opera,” replied Miss Collingwood, plucking up a little courage.

“He never heard her in the world, at the Grand Italian Opera,” replied Mrs. Fielding, as decidedly as if she had kept the run of all the operas and prima donnas from the beginning. “She sang some ten or fifteen years ago, at the French opera, the Opera Comique, which is quite a different affair; but that, as I say, was ten or fifteen years ago—and fifteen years is the life of an opera singer. She is quite passée now, and could not, at the present time, get an engagement at even one of the minor theatres in Paris.”

“She has a beautiful voice,” persisted Miss Collingwood, “and sings with exquisite taste and execution.”

“Oh,” replied Mrs. Fielding, raising her shoulders with what was meant for a French shrug, “she is the debris of a good singer, I admit. Her style must be correct ever to have sung even at the Opera Comique. All of course we can expect in this country, are those whose best days are gone abroad.”

“Did you see much of the Falconers, when you were abroad, Mrs. Fielding?” resumed Miss Collingwood, glad to turn the conversation from music, which she was all but told she had no opportunity or possibility of understanding.

“I merely met them,” replied Mrs. Fielding, in a somewhat slighting manner. “They were in no society, you know,” she continued, as if the inferior circle in which they moved was such as to prevent their coming in contact with herself, who was of course in a very different atmosphere.

“Indeed!” said Miss Collingwood, with much interest and curiosity in her manner; “we heard here that they were in a good deal of society. Mrs. Falconer told me they were at a concert at Prince B.’s, where they saw the countess G. and Lady A. and all the great people; and they were presented at court—and—I don’t know where they were not.”

“Oh, my dear!” ejaculated Mrs. Fielding, as if too much amused by their assurance to utter more on the instant.

“But was it not so?” pursued Miss Collingwood.

“They may have been at a charity concert at the Prince B.’s,” replied Mrs. Fielding; “I think it very probable—for these poor nobles are very glad to sell tickets on such occasions to any one who can afford to buy them; and, indeed, they prefer Americans, as people they never can come in contact with again. But in no other way, I assure you, could they ever have been at the Prince B.’s. As to being presented at court, anybody can—that is, I mean, who takes letters to our Ambassador. Poor Mr. L., I used to pity him, for the people he was obliged to present! I do assure you, one often blushes for one’s countrymen abroad!” continued Mrs. Fielding. “Such looking, such dressed creatures as they are! And talking so loud, too! And it is so difficult to make foreigners understand that these vulgarians are not first class Americans. I have often tried to explain it; but I seldom found Europeans, even of the highest rank, who understood our society.”

“But that would not apply to the Falconers,” persisted Miss Collingwood. “They had as much right to good society abroad as anybody.”

“Perhaps so,” replied Mrs. Fielding; “I did not mean them, particularly. But, my dear Miss Collingwood, it amuses me to hear these people talk of the society they were in abroad. Now, they were in no society at all. It’s not the easy matter to get in society in Europe, that it is in this country. People do not throw their doors open to Americans, I assure you, unless, indeed, under very extraordinary circumstances.”

“But I understood the Falconers had excellent letters,” continued Miss Collingwood; “and, then, their fortune would give them every facility, you know, that could be desired.”

“Letters!” repeated Mrs. Fielding, contemptuously. “It does amuse me to hear you Americans talk of letters. I should like to know who has a right to give them! They might as well have taken so much waste paper abroad! And, as to their fortune! What is an American fortune in Europe!” continued Mrs. Fielding, warmly, (for her husband’s means were quite limited;) just enough to make them conspicuous without being sufficient to give them consequence! “Of all the people one meets traveling, there are none so ridiculed or ridiculous as our millionaires, who think their money must carry them through every thing. They are cheated and fleeced, and laughed at by the very people who are cheating them. No, my dear Miss Collingwood, I don’t deny that it is a very pleasant thing to have money abroad, as well as at home; but don’t suppose that it is going to give you any consequence there. In a polished society like that, education, accomplishments, personal qualifications, are all an American can hope to rest any claim upon at all. Now, I don’t mean to say that we had any superior claims of any kind; but, owing to some circumstances, we saw society that few Americans are ever admitted in. My mother’s English relatives treated us with the utmost kindness, and through Sir Frederick T., we really had opportunities that were very gratifying, of seeing every thing that was desirable. We could not have traveled under more delightful auspices.”

This was said with an air of careless modesty, as if announcing a fact about which there was no dispute.

“How charming it must have been!” exclaimed Miss Collingwood. “And did you really find the higher classes so superior to ours, Mrs. Fielding?”

“Oh, my dear!” ejaculated Mrs. Fielding, “unfortunately there’s no question about it! I sometimes almost regret our visit to Europe, on that account. It does spoil one so for home.”

While she was still speaking, the Falconers entered. They and Mrs. Fielding had not met (being residents of different cities) since their return from Europe. They greeted each other with great cordiality, and were, during the first few minutes of their interview, so occupied with what really seemed the pleasure of seeing each other, that Miss Collingwood, the lady on whom they were calling, seemed in a fair way of being forgotten. After having, however, inquired and taken the address of the Falconers, Mrs. Fielding took her leave of the party. After a few minutes’ general conversation, Miss Collingwood said,

“I observed you at the opera, last night, Miss Falconer; how were you pleased?”

“Very well,” replied the young lady. “It is not a first-rate company, of course—but very fair.”

“I am glad to hear you say so,” replied Miss Collingwood, eagerly, “for it struck me as such; but Mrs. Fielding spoke of its being so very inferior, that I supposed I must be mistaken. Indeed, I take it for granted, that hearing such music as she has heard at the opera, in Paris, must make one fastidious.”

Miss Falconer smiled as she replied,

“I don’t think Mrs. Fielding heard music enough at the Italian Opera, in Paris, to spoil her for any she may hear in this country.”

“Why,” returned Miss Collingwood, with the sudden expression of one who has caught a new light, “she tells me she has heard Lablache, Tamburini, Persiani, &c.”

“Of course,” replied Miss Falconer. “Everybody hears them once or twice. But what is it to hear an opera once?”

“But why only once or twice?” inquired Miss Collingwood.

“It’s so expensive,” replied Miss Falconer. “I forget what our box cost us—but something enormous. I know papa said it was one of our principal expenses in Paris. And the Fieldings, you know, are in very moderate circumstances. I doubt whether Mrs. Fielding was ever a second time at the Grand Opera. The minor French theatres are cheap enough; but to hear these great singers repeatedly, really costs a young fortune. Indeed, Mrs. Fielding,” she continued, laughing, “may go and hear this company with profit, if not pleasure; for she knows nothing of music. It was the spectacle, I do believe, she enjoyed, more than the music, when she was there.”

“She seems to have enjoyed her visit to Europe excessively,” returned Miss Collingwood.

“Yes, so she says,” replied the other; “and I am surprised at it, too.”

“Indeed! Why so?”

“Oh, they traveled with no advantages; and I should not think there was much pleasure in seeing merely the outside of places.”

“But I understood they had peculiar advantages,” persisted Miss Collingwood; “particularly with regard to society. Their cousin, Sir Frederick T., was very kind to them.”

“I know—they are forever talking of Sir Frederick T. But, after all, who is Sir Frederick T.? A mere country baronet! The idea of his introducing American cousins, is amusing!”

Miss Collingwood laughed.

“You throw quite a new light on the subject, Miss Falconer. Here Mrs. Fielding has been quite dazzling poor simple me, who took it all for gospel. She really made me feel as if I knew nothing of either music, men or manners. I was ignorant enough to suppose that Sir Frederick T. or sir anybody could introduce whoever they pleased.”

“It’s just as much as those people, the poorer branches of the nobility, I mean, can do to keep their own footing,” replied Miss Falconer, “let alone bringing in American relations. On the Continent, if you have money, the thing is easier. Democracy and poverty have made greater strides there. The golden key is a passée partout in Paris. Without it, to be sure, there is little to be enjoyed; with it, much, indeed.”

“Did you see much of the Fieldings, abroad?” inquired Miss Collingwood, amused, and curious to hear what version Miss Falconer would give of the acquaintance with her country people in Europe.

“No,” she replied. “It was such a journey to get up to their rooms in Paris, that I only called a few times. Climbing those Parisian stairs is no small exertion, I assure you, without you are really interested in the people you are visiting.”

“I was asking Mrs. Fielding if it was not a fatiguing way of living, but she said, ‘No—that you become so accustomed to it, that you never think of it, and that, though her apartments were au troisième, she lived in such a state of excitement she was not conscious of undergoing more fatigue than when at home.’ ”

“Her apartments au troisième!” exclaimed Miss Falconer, laughing heartily. “Now, Miss Collingwood, did Mrs. Fielding really speak of being au troisième—are you sure?”

“Yes, certain. Why—were they not? I thought everybody lived somewhere between heaven and earth, in Paris,” said Miss Collingwood.

“To be sure they do,” replied Miss Falconer; “and the Fieldings were considerably nearer heaven than earth. Why, we were au troisième. The Fieldings were au hautième, just under the roof; the very attics, I believe, for I am sure there could not possibly have been another story above. I know I never climbed so high in my life, except when I went up Mount Vesuvius, as I did when I called to see the Fieldings. I should think they must be glad to be home, to some of the comforts of life, again.”

“But I thought Paris was such a cheap place,” continued Miss Collingwood.

“Cheap! Yes, so it is, if you are willing to live as Parisians live—that is, with no luxuries, and scarce any comforts. I suppose you can live cheap here, if you take attic rooms, with hardly any furniture, and eat in all sorts of odd places. That is the way half the French people live, and Americans can do it too, if they please, abroad—which they cannot do at home. Pleasures are cheap, to be sure; that is, of the inferior sort. But I should say there was scarce enough to compensate people accustomed to a different style of living, in French vaudevilles and street amusements, for such sacrifices.”

“Hardly,” replied Miss Collingwood; “but how is it, then, that you are so delighted with Europe?”

“Why, in the first place, we don’t all live exactly in the way I have described. You can have luxuries and comforts too, beside exquisite pleasures, if you please to pay for them. But then the expense is enormous.” And so Miss Falconer continued to let Miss Collingwood know that what she had been saying only applied to other Americans, not to themselves at all. “And, moreover,” she continued, “there is much of excitement and novelty abroad, that carries one through a great deal. And perhaps most of us think it was pleasanter in looking back than it was in the reality. I dare say Mrs. Fielding actually believes she enjoyed herself excessively. But I should say the pleasantest part of her trip was the getting home,” she added, smiling.

“Then you do not think she need be spoilt for America, by all she has seen abroad?” pursued Miss Collingwood.

“She spoilt! No, indeed!” replied Miss Falconer. “I don’t deny that there is a great deal to be enjoyed there, that can’t be enjoyed at home. But I think Mrs. Fielding may enjoy a great deal at home, she certainly never enjoyed abroad.” And so saying, Miss Falconer rose and bid Miss Collingwood good morning.

“It’s very strange,” observed Miss Collingwood, afterward, to her sister, “that so few Americans give the same story of themselves and each other abroad. They all tell you that they only were in society, and that others were not. It is really amusing to hear them. I wonder, now, who tells the truth, the Fieldings or the Falconers?”

“Both, and—neither,” replied her sister, laughing.

“How so?”

“They tell truth of each other, but not of themselves. I mean,” continued the younger Miss Collingwood.

“That may be it!” exclaimed Miss Collingwood. “That never occurred to me before. And then, how they all talk of being ‘spoilt for this country,’ by their travels.”

“So they are,” rejoined the younger sister—“truly spoilt. How few of them you find return really improved! They are spoilt, though not from excess of fastidious refinement, but from absurd airs. Of all things, I dread hearing, ‘When I was abroad.’ I am always sure some absurd impertinence is coming. Then the fine acquaintances they all have; when, depend upon it, they know nobody who is anybody. There’s Mrs. Ashland, who wont let you admire even a beauty she don’t happen to fancy; but she’ll tell you, ‘It is such an American taste;’ or, ‘In this country you don’t understand this, that and the other.’ Ah! that ‘In this country,’ is the worst of all. Just as if ‘this country’ was not their country! And then, if they have only been in Paris a fortnight, they are omnipotent on fashions for the rest of their days.”

“But, surely,” resumed the elder sister, “there must be a great deal that is improving and delightful in foreign travel.”

“I have no doubt,” replied the other, “that there is a great deal to be enjoyed, as Miss Falconer says; and a great deal to be suffered, too,” she added, laughing, “if the whole truth were known. Much to be learnt, too. Intelligent, well-educated people, find pleasure everywhere—a great deal, no doubt, abroad—and, as Miss Falconer says, more in getting home. One thing, I am sure of, however. I never found anybody who had improved abroad, who was spoilt for home.”

THE STATUE IN THE SNOW.

———

BY J. BAYARD TAYLOR.

———

Numb and chill the Savoyard wandered

  By the banks of frozen Seine,

Oft, to cheer his sinking spirit,

  Singing low some mountain strain.

But, beside the wintry river,

  Rose the songs of green Savoy,

Sadder than ’mid Alpine valleys,

  Sung by many a shepherd boy!

From the bleak and distant Vosges

  Swept the snowy whirlwind down,

Flinging wide its shifting mantle

  Over slope and meadow brown.

Like a corpse, the silent landscape

  Lay all stark and icy there,

And a chill and ghostly terror

  Seemed to load the leaden air.

Still that shivering boy went forward,

  Though his heart within him died,

When the dreary night was closing

  Dull around the desert wide.

Sobbing wild in lonely sorrow,

  On his numb cheek froze the tear;

And his footstep, faint and weary,

  Heeded not the gathering fear!

Through the desolate northern twilight,

  To his home-sick pining, rose

Visions of the flashing glaciers,

  Lifted in sublime repose.

Horns of Alp-herds rang in welcome,

  And his mother kissed her boy!⁠—

Back his bounding heart was hurried

  From the vales of dear Savoy!

For, amid the sinking darkness,

  Colder, chillier, blew the snows,

Till but faint and moaning whispers

  From his stiffening lips arose.

Then beside the pathway kneeling,

  Folded he his freezing hands,

While the blinding snows were drifted

  Like the desert’s lifted sands.

As in many an old cathedral,

  Curtained round with solemn gloom,

One may see a marble cherub

  Kneeling on a marble tomb!

With his face to heaven upturning,

  For the dead he seems to pray,

While the organ o’er him thunders,

  And the incense curls away!

Thus he knelt, all pale and icy,

  When the storm at midnight passed,

And the silver lamps of heaven

  Burned above the pausing blast.

In that starry-roofed cathedral

  Knelt the cherub form in prayer,

While the smoke from snowy censers

  Drifted upward through the air.

Though no organ’s grand vibration

  Shook the winds that lingered near,

Think ye not the hymns of angels

  Trembled on his dying ear?

A COQUETTE CONQUERED.

OR THE TRIALS OF A HEART OF PRIDE.

———

BY JAMES S. WALLACE.

———

CHAPTER I.

        “——I know he doth deserve

As much as may be yielded to a man:

But nature never framed a woman’s heart

Of prouder stuff than that of Beatrice;

Disdain and scorn hide sparkling in her eyes,

Misprising what they look on: she cannot love,

Nor take no shape, nor project of affection,

She is so self-endeared.”

—Shakspeare.

“There was a sound of revelry by night”—music and the dance—the twin-born daughters of fashionable enjoyment presided o’er the scene. Amy Laverty shone like a blaze of beauty; it was almost impossible for a casual observer to decide in what particular grace or elegance she so excelled her compeers as to queen it over all. One admired the glossy ringlets, which fell in profusion over a brow and neck which would have defied the pencils of Inman or Sully, or the chisel of Powers; another, the intellectuality which beamed from her full eye, “soft as when the blue sky trembles through a cloud of purest white.” Each beauty of feature and of form had its admirer, and though all differed as to her style of charms, still opinion was unanimous as to her transcendant perfection.

Rich in all these profuse gifts of nature’s bestowing, the world had likewise been bountiful in its distribution of favors. Her parents were wealthy, and her life flowed on in one unbroken stream of careless, ceaseless pleasure. Scene after scene in the drama of life passed before her, heightened in its fairy, dream-like influence, by the continual good-humor and complacency of both the actors and auditors. The gilding and tinsel, which irised every view, and which that skillful artist, Fashion, presented with ever-varying hue, concealed the misshapen mass on which the coloring was laid. Art caused the plain canvas of life to glow with gaudy tints, and luxury, with unsparing hand, laid on her rainbow pigments.

All was gay and joyous in the mansion of Mr. Laverty, on the night when Amy entered her eighteenth year. A splendid ball, unrivaled in brilliancy even in that recherché circle, had brought together the young and beautiful. The glare had attracted the fluttering insect and the ephemera of fashion, as well as those whose positions in society gave them the entrée where “exclusiveness” set her potent seal. Amid the wreath of loveliness which graced the apartments, the fairest flower was Amy; to the stately grandeur of the dahlia she added the softest delicacy of the rose—the air seemed redolent of gaiety where’er she moved, and the beaming joyousness of her smile won hearts in adoration.

And yet, was this bright, this gifted girl entirely happy? The world called her so, in its hollow acceptation of the term; she thought herself so. But there was a canker beneath all this brightness. An overbearing pride—a dependence on wealth and flattery for happiness, was all-essential to her existence. She was surrounded by all that fortune and its attendant luxuries could give, and yet something was wanting—it was a heart to love or contract a friendship—it was that sacred mellowing of our natures, which experience of salutary chastening alone can impart. The sunbeam of the world does not produce this ripeness of heart, clouds and gloom will best mature it; like the perfumed shrub, which is scentless until crushed, so from the soul most deeply wrung by wo, rises the incense most grateful to divinity. Though Amy dwelt in a paradise of the world’s planting—amid it a demon was stalking—an insatiate fiend, whose presence was death to true happiness—the same which tempted our first parents to transgress, and this was—pride!

“He really looks well to-night—a more manly form I never saw,” whispered a fair young friend to Amy.

“Yes, he is passable,” was her reply, “but, then, who is he? Nobody—his father I am told is a small farmer in the interior of Lancaster county, and a certain proportion of the yearly proceeds of the dairy and the stock is exclusively set apart, I suppose, to enable my young gentleman to pursue his studies at the University here.”

“Really—quite a pity!” was all the “exclusive” young lady could drawl out in reply.

“And would you believe it,” continued Amy, “he has had the assurance to interpret a little past politeness of mine into something more tender, and has actually dared to tell me that he loved me!”

“Really—how sentimental! He is quite romantic for a clodpole,” was again drawled out in response.

The hands of both the ladies were now claimed for quadrilles, and the conversation was interrupted. In the mean time the object of their remarks was leaning against the folding-door of the apartment, and contemplating with an abstracted air, the gay group around him. And yet Henry Stanton was not of a disposition to allow pleasure to fleet away without claiming his allotted share. But now thought was burning within him, and he felt that a decisive moment had arrived in his destiny. He loved Amy Laverty deeply and purely. Unaccustomed to the frivolities of the world of fashion, and judging only from his own ardent impulses, he fancied that he had discovered an answering chord in Amy’s heart which vibrated to the tone of his own. He knew not the difference between the conventional politeness of the ball-room, and those purer feelings which can be nurtured only by the fire-side. Stanton was skilled in the lore of books, but not in the inexplicable mysteries of the human heart. Being, however, of a decided disposition, and having resolved to woo, he determined without delay to make a more explicit declaration of his attachment to Amy.

He accordingly embraced the first opportunity which transpired, during the evening, to draw the fair girl into a favorable train of conversation, and reiterated his love in that style of mingled deference and fervor, which always gushes to the lips from the promptings of a manly heart. Amy listened in silence, and as he ceased, her clear, silvery laugh rang in his startled ear, as she exclaimed:⁠—

“Really, Mr. Stanton, the repetition of this honor is so unexpected, that I am at a loss how to reply, or how to thank you. What jointure, besides a green-vegetable stall in High Street Market, to retail your papa’s cabbages, and your mamma’s cream-cheeses, am I to expect with your hand and heart?”

Stanton, for a moment, felt a death-like chill curdle his blood; but reassuring himself, he replied calmly, and with the impressiveness of deep feeling: “I could bring you nothing, Miss Laverty, but an honest name; talents, which friends are partial enough to say I possess, and the ardent aspirations, which are the heritage of young manhood’s resolution to win its way to honorable distinction in a profession, which has been adorned by the proudest names in the world’s annals.”

“Well, sir,” said the proud beauty, with a toss of the head, “you offer lavishly of your abundance! In works of charity, I grant you, fair sir, your mite would be recorded with the millionaire’s ostentatious subscription, but Amy Laverty’s heart is not a ‘poor-box,’ to receive with equal gratitude either which may be offered. No, I prefer equipage, and an establishment which shall be the envy of all, in actual possession, to your slow accumulation of legal fees in abeyance—and so, Mr. Attorney, you are answered à la Blackstone! But don’t despond, Mr. Stanton, nor revolve over any of the dozen schemes of suicide which the alternate flush and pallor of your cheeks tell me you are meditating. I can be a generous friend, if not your devoted affianced, and my waist is yours for the next waltz, although I see one approaching to ask the favor, who thinks his money can buy a claim to it, as his father did military bounty-lands during the last war.”

They joined the whirl of dancers. Amy waltzed like a sylph. It does not require heart to waltz well. Stanton admired her graceful postures, and twined with her the mazes of the voluptuous dance; but the spell of the enchantress was broken—he was heart-whole and free. He could, as a young and ardent lover, have forgiven any personal slight; but the cold sneer upon the quiet and unostentatious occupation of his parents, wounded him to the quick. When they separated for the night he had taken his first lesson—read the first leaf in the mysterious volume of woman’s heart, and he gleaned wisdom from its perusal. The midnight lamps may assist lovers as well as law-students in the prosecution of their respective occult sciences. The chandelier irradiates the volume of human nature, as does the taper the intricacies of Coke upon Littleton.

——

CHAPTER II.

Yes,—maidens, fair or brown,

  Lofty or lowly.

Light as the thistle down,

  As cypress holy—

When poets whisper near,

  Go join the dancers;

And turn a stony ear

  To all romancers.

—James Smith.

Why should I toil in such a fruitless cause,

To serve a flirt, who only heeds the laws

  That folly and caprice suggest?

—Bernal.

Four years had flown by. All Washington had assembled at the grand gala ball, which celebrated the re-election of Gen. Jackson to the Presidential chair. From every part of the Union, wealth, beauty and talent seemed to meet in this common centre of attraction; and the family of Mr. Laverty, the rich Philadelphia merchant, formed one of the most important integers of the great unit, Fashion.

Amy was lovelier far, than when we saw her last. Every petal of the bud had unfolded—she was radiant as the very impersonation of beauty’s self—her mien was queen-like—her arched brow and forehead had been sung as the ebon bow of Cupid reposing on a tablet of alabaster. Amid the gay revel, every eye was turned upon her. Ladies pronounced her stiff and formal, while the gentlemen protested that “Venus, when she rose, fresh from the soft creation of the wave, was not more beautiful!”

Amy must have possessed charms of no common order, or this unanimity of the female censure would have been destroyed. Panegyric, on the part of gentlemen, is not so certain a criterion, for we have known Sheridan Knowles drawn upon for a comparison, as above, when Shakspeare’s “starved executors, the greedy crows,” would have been more apposite, and have heard Moore quoted⁠—

Why doth azure deck the sky

But to be like thine eye of blue,

and applied to the veriest green gooseberry optics ever saw! Such comparisons, if not “odorous,” as Mrs. Malaprop would have them, are nevertheless generally picked from the most forced hot-beds in the garden of compliment, and loom large, like the sunflower, with a special care always to face about to the rising beams of the sun of riches or fashion.

“I believe, Miss Laverty, I have engaged the pleasure of your hand for the next set?” said the gay, noble and fine-looking Frank Pennant, coming up to the belle of the ball-room.

“Certainly, sir, with all my heart,” was the reply, as she rose.

“Fortunate dog that I am—then I have both your hand and your heart,” laughed Frank.

A slight sigh escaped Amy. Why? Was she in love? Was the place where her heart ought to have been, touched? “Nous verrons,” as the politicians quote from the venerable father of the trans-Mason and Dixon line press.

“Others might sigh, my dear Miss Laverty,” continued Frank, as he was leading Amy to their place in a cotillion, “for such a confession as you made just now! He will indeed be a happy man, who asks your hand for the grand promenade of life, and receives it with all your heart!”

“Do you think so, Mr. Pennant?” archly asked Amy, with a glance from her eye, which might have made Diogenes turn his tub bottom upward, to hide himself under—“why, when you ask it, it would be almost heresy to refuse.”

“Upon my word, Miss Laverty!—are you sharp-shooting, or do you mean to canonize me? Heresy to refuse me! Why, my catalogue of rejections rivals in length that of an old operatic friend, Don Juan’s conquests! Through all the grades in the navy, up to my present rank, I have been tossed to and fro by bright eyes and obdurate hearts, like a nautical shuttlecock, by the battledores of the fair sex! One has disliked my long voyages—the other my short pay; one has had a soul above a middy, and passed me with a cut direct, just as I was entered ‘passed’ by the commissioners—another left me, it being a losing game to love a simple lieutenant; while another—ah! she would have eloped with me to the world’s end, at the risk of the rope’s end, if I had but been a poor cabin boy, with a touch of the romantic in my disposition; whereas, unfortunately, that very day the President had promoted me, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate! So you see fate, professional promotion, the President and Congress, have all been against me, and I have been declined as often as any common noun in the entire language!”

“But now, Mr. Pennant,” interrupted Amy, “as you have attached yourself to me⁠—”

“Attached myself! My dear Miss Laverty, how could I help it? Are we not,—we poor devils, all and singular, the captives that swell your triumph? Look, now, at Walton, how he eyes me, half cannibalish, half wolfish, because I have unconsciously retained your hand after the last balancez! Excuse me!”

“Come, Mr. Pert, don’t interrupt me. I was about to say—as you have attached yourself to our party for the last three weeks, and have been trying to make yourself exceedingly agreeable in my eyes, I shall demand that you report to me in future, and I will prevent you from being entangled in any of the labyrinths of our sex’s wiles or whims!”

“Will you, indeed! What a sweet Ariadne!”

“I can give you the clue to escape the monsters!”

“And entangle me yourself, at last,—to weave a web and detain me for your own amusement, I trust!”

“Nay, Frank!—pray excuse me, Mr. Pennant; I did not mean—do you really wish that I may entangle you in any web I may have the skill to weave?”

“Well, my dear Miss Laverty,” replied Pennant, “three weeks have glided away very delightfully in your meshes, and I am free to confess the silken bondage pleases me. I love a flirtation, where no heart can be broken! I like to tilt against breasts of adamant, and shiver the spears of repartee against the solid barrier!”

“And judge you, I have a heart of adamant, Mr. Pennant?”

“I have been told so, Miss Laverty.”

“And pray, by whom?”

“My old friend and class-fellow, Harry Stanton.”

“Henry Stanton!”

“Yes, you remember him? the son of one of our Lancaster county farmers, who has made such a sensation the past winter, as a member of your Pennsylvania Legislature, at Harrisburg.”

“Oh, yes! Cabbages and cream cheeses, I remember!”

“Madam!”

“He made love to me four years ago, and I was compelled to reject him.”

“I know it, Miss Laverty. He told me you were without a heart, and therefore I have been under no restraint in our little innocent flirtations, as no life-chord can be cracked.”

“Henry Stanton is a friend of yours, then?”

“Yes, Miss—almost a brother. I shall marry his sister Kate, next May.”

“You, Mr. Pennant!”

“Yes—she came, saw and conquered, the past fall, as I returned from my last cruise. A sweet girl she is, Miss Laverty.”

“Mr. Pennant, will you step and find my father, and ask him to order the carriage? I have danced enough, to-night, and will retire.”

Frank withdrew, and Amy sighed again! That night tears wet her pillow. Tears around the couch of youth, and wealth and beauty! Ah! gold may purchase the gorgeous bouquet, to adorn the opera box, even in mid-winter; but all the wealth of India cannot buy one single shoot of heart’s ease! It is a fairy plant, and blossoms loveliest in the humble shades of life!

And Amy slept at last; but she slept uneasily, amid confused dreams that Kate and Henry Stanton were attempting to poison her! About the same time, Queen Mab was with Frank Pennant, too, and he laughed happily in his sleep, as he dreamed that Kate was pelting him, in mimic play, with rose-buds and myrtle leaves, while his dear friend Harry looked on smilingly. If dreams are an index to our waking thoughts, it needs no somnosophist to interpret what was passing in the dark chambers of their thoughts!

——

CHAPTER III.

        Though each young flower had died,

There was the root—strong, living not the less

That all it yielded now was bitterness;

Yet still such love as quits not misery’s side,

Nor drops from guilt its ivy-like embrace,

Nor turns away from death’s, its pale heroic face.

—Mrs. Hemans.

Another four years passed away! The whirlwind which wrecked many a tall commercial house, and strangled many a long accumulated fortune, had passed over Philadelphia, carrying dismay, desolation and anguish. The firm of which Mr. Laverty was the head, bent, but did not break. Confidence in him was not impaired, for he was an unexceptionable business man; but it was well known that he had sacrificed more than half his fortune to secure the remainder.

And who that visited, during the summer of 1837, the various fashionable watering-places, does not remember that pale girl, who, attended by a doating father, sought a restoration of impaired health. Amy was lovely still; true, the sunny smile was gone—but, in the place of that garish splendor of radiance, which was wont “to burn like the mines of sulphur,” there remained the calm and dreamy beauty of the moonlighted sky. The rose had fled her cheek, but the lily, in all its purity, shone from her Parian brow. She had felt, at last, that she possessed a heart. She was no longer “a lump of ice in the clear, cold morn.” But her heart was an unwritten scroll, upon which none of late dared attempt to inscribe the word “love.” Many admired, some adored,—but her name had gone forth, as of a heartless coquette. To win her love, would have been ineffably sweet; but, like the French gallant, no one thought it reasonable to thrust his head into a hive in search of the honey!

“Amy Laverty looks better, to-night, and begins to beam radiantly again, Walton,” said a gay lounger, to his friend.

“Yes,” was the reply, “chaste as the icicle, and every whit as cold! Like the henchman of Harold the Dauntless, she has, or had, the faculty of chilling all who ventured within her influence!”

“Oh! you speak feelingly,” laughed Withers, “for I remember, now, that she had you ‘within her influence,’ some years since, when you held a clerk-ship at Washington; and then she placed her icy fingers on you! A frozen child dreads the frost, I perceive, as much as a burned child does the fire!”

“Rail away, Tom! With honest Grumio, ‘I confess the cupe!’” replied our old friend Stanton, who, at the Jackson Inaugural Ball, had been the subject of Pennant’s remarks to Amy, during the flirtations of the dance. “The undeniable fact is, I was jilted.” In those few words are embodied the history of Amy’s life. “Van Buren never had so many applications for office, since he was inaugurated, in March last, as she has had proposals, and the disappointed applicants have been about as numerous under one administration as the other. I was deeply, desperately, madly in love with her, but she cured me—chilled me off!”

“Has she a heart, think you, Stanton?” continued Withers, with mock solemnity. “I have read of a French surgeon, who dissected a man, and found him without that organ. Do you not think that ‘the Laverty’ might be coupled with him, in this Noah’s ark of a world, as the two of a kind?”

“Nay, hardly as bad as that! Amy has been thoughtless, ambitious, and possessed of the pride of Lucifer—like him, she is a fallen angel; fallen from the effects of that pride, but I sincerely believe she has been humbled in a measure—that she has a heart, and that it has been touched. I have seen much of her; for my dismissal as her lover, never interrupted our friendly relations; and she has been an altered woman ever since Frank Pennant married Kate Stanton;—but the change came too late, and she now stands a fair chance to “lead apes,” for I know not the man who would venture to address her! The days of your Petrucios and Duke Aranzas are past, and live but in the drama. And so she attained the reputation of a coquette, and therefore—”

“Yes, I understand,” interrupted Withers; “but see, yonder goes Mr. Stanton, another of her discarded ones. I am told she passed some bitter slight on him.”

“Yes, she made no secret of her scorn at the humble lot of his parents. But she little knew the brilliant career which destiny and perseverance had marked out for him. Henry Stanton goes to Congress this winter; and no man of his age was ever elected under such brilliant auguries of success. He has never married, and I have reason to believe that her conduct has had a marked influence upon his whole past life.”

“How so?”

“Shortly after his rejection by her his father died. A frugal life had done as much as all the stock speculations at the Exchange could have effected, and he was found to be extremely rich—a round hundred thousand at the least. Stanton could have lived in ease and independence; but his honorable pride was stung, and he seemed determined to win his way to eminence, that the proud beauty might see that mind, not money, was the true standard of nature’s nobility.”

“And do they ever meet now?”

“Oh, yes—as cold friends. I have sometimes thought—and were it any other man than Henry Stanton, I should be certain—that he loves her still. I have watched him gaze upon her, when he thought himself unobserved, and having known myself what it was to feel an unrequited passion, have been almost convinced that the old flame was only smothered or concealed, but not burned out.”

This conversation details what “the world” thought upon the persons in whose fate our story is interested. And how was it with Amy Laverty? Was the proud, imperious beauty brought to feel the nothingness of pride when it would shut out from the heart the pleadings of youth, talent, and high chivalric honor? Had a miracle been wrought? It had, indeed; she would now have exchanged the world’s wealth for the love of Henry Stanton. She had watched his brilliant career, at first with indifference, but at length the thought would intrude itself, that he, upon whose eloquence admiring listeners hung enraptured; whose fame was ringing through the land, and whose smile was courted by all, might have been hers. At such times the monitor within would say, what a noble pride it would have been to call such a man all her own. By almost imperceptible degrees the imperious girl was changed to an humbled and deep-loving woman.

This change of feeling, from one extreme to the other most opposite, is a curious constitution of human nature. It is only in the mysterious workings of Providence, and its various applications for the benefit of mankind, that we can trace the solution of this apparent paradox, that actions or feelings frequently produce effects the very reverse of those which we would have expected. Thus joyous sensations often leave a tinge of pain, and sorrows bring a cordial balm to the afflicted heart. Tell the mother, who weeps the ruin of her hopes and joys over the grave of a darling child, that her offspring is now reaping the fruits of an innocent life in a world of never-ending bliss, and her rising sobs will show that these consoling reflections strongly augment her grief. The angry man is more deeply incensed at every mark of favor, and the conduct of the lover assures us, that “fears and sorrows fan the fire of joy.”

The influence of this converted passion, if the term may be allowed, is co-existent with all our thoughts and actions, and occurs when the mind is occupied by some powerful feeling, whose commanding influence seems to subdue every inferior emotion. The patriot forgets individual wrongs in his love of country; the soldier knows not fear, anxiety, or hope, when the “big war” makes “ambition virtue.” Even religion itself is not uninfluenced by this principle. The apostles, we are told, when confined in the prisons of Thyatira, sang praises unto God at midnight; as if the darkness and gloom of their dungeon, and the aggravating circumstances of their confinement, heightened the triumph of their devotion, and enabled them, notwithstanding the fearful earthquake which shook the foundations of their prison, to conduct with moderation and fortitude. The flames of persecution, while consuming the bodies of suffering martyrs, seem to have given new energy to the pious emotions of their minds, and enabled the fervency of their devotions to rise superior to every external object. The design of such a constitution of our nature is easily seen; it is thus the powers of the human mind are made to correspond with the occasion on which they are excited. It is a principle salutary in its effects upon ourselves, and illustrative of His character who has established all things in benevolence and wisdom.

Thus we may see how the chastening hand can convert the proudest scorn to the timidity of love, feeling itself hopelessly unrequited; and by tracing the arcana of the heart’s mysteries, discover how natural was the process, or rather the retribution, which turned the pride of Amy, and made her recoil from the contemplation of her former self.

——

CHAPTER IV.

I vowed that I would dedicate my powers

  To thee and thine: have I not kept the vow?

  With beating heart and streaming eyes, even now

I call the phantoms of a thousand hours,

Each from the voiceless grave.

                   —

            ——The lady’s heart beat fast,

As half in joy, and half aghast,

On those high domes her look she cast.

—Shelley.

Again turn we to Washington—that mighty capital, that great political heart of our Union, from whose pulsations are supplied the entire arteries of our body politic. It was the memorable session of 1840, when the halls of legislation were turned into a hustings, and Whig and Democrat broke their lances in defence of Harrison or Van Buren, as their political predilections dictated; that session, when grave legislators took an inventory of the furniture of the presidential mansion, from the “gold spoons” down to the napkins of the pantry; when the horrors of a standing army were so vividly displayed, and guns, bayonets, and boarding-pikes bristled out from every line of Mr. Secretary Poinsett’s annual report from the War Department; when the conqueror of Proctor, and the victor at Tippecanoe was proved a “granny” and a “coward,” by men who had never smelt gunpowder in their lives, save in the homœopathic compounds of their boyish squibs and India crackers; when both parties succeeded, by most overwhelming arguments, in convincing their friends that the country would “go to the bow wows,” if their antagonists succeeded; when the halls of legislation were stripped of every leaf, branch and limb, of their original design, and the hickory and the buckeye were formed in fantastic garlands around “the stump” which alone remained; when blood-hounds and conscience-keepers, tabourets and petticoats, British gold and bank bribes, were household and familiar words; when every man, woman, and child, was possessed of the devil of partisan malignity, and we staid United Staters, sang songs, drank hard cider, held conventions, got up torch-light processions, and shouted for our candidates as if Bedlam had been keeping holyday, with its inmates all out electioneering.

One morning, in early spring, the galleries of the House of Representatives were thronged to suffocation, long before the mallet of the Speaker called the members to Order, by a quasi “lucus a non lucendo” process! Time never seemed to lag so tardily, as did the hands of the clock, opposite R. M. T. Hunter’s chair—it appeared as if they would never point zenith-ward to the hour of high noon! Had it been the last night of a session when those hands have a prescriptive right to “hasten slowly” to the witching church-yard hour, lest in the hurry of the closing scene, something might be omitted, which the law makers had no time to think of during the seven or eight preceding months—had it been the close of a session, we affirm that those “tardy paced hands” would have acquitted themselves to admiration—but now, never did Juliet when she had “bought the mansion of a love but not possess’d it” wish the “fiery footed steeds” to “gallop apace” with more intensity of expectation, than did the attending crowd long for the hour of twelve. At last it came—the humdrum voice of an assistant clerk was heard reading “yesterday’s minutes” as monotonously as the sounds of a “woodpecker tapping the hollow beech tree!” When Corwin of Ohio rose and moved that the further reading of the minutes be dispensed with, bright eyes in the gallery voted him thanks, and when the “morning hour” was over and the Speaker called the “orders of the day”—then, “mute expectation spread its anxious hush” over the entire auditory!

“When the House adjourned with this bill under consideration, the gentleman from Pennsylvania was entitled to the floor,” said the Speaker.

And Henry Stanton rose to the question. He who but a few years before had “no jointure but a green vegetable stall in the market” to offer the rich and proud Amy Laverty in exchange for her love! Calm, dignified and self possessed he rose, though a thousand eyes were bent fixedly upon him. This was the calmness of confident mastery of his subject—the dignity of conscious intellectual greatness. Slowly, emphatically and unostentatiously he pronounced his exordium—then with consummate skill, he combatted all the arguments of his opponents and fortified his own position. Warmed with his subject “rapt, inspired,” he commenced his peroration. Brilliant as the lightning flash; glowing as the lava flow; bold, dashing, impetuous as the mighty mountain torrent was the character of his eloquence! Scarcely could the listening crowd restrain themselves from open applause and many rising indications of an almost irrepressible movement, were silenced by the Speaker’s hammer.

Edward Stanton surpassed even all his former brilliant efforts! Was it caused by the excitement of the subject, the intellectual intoxication of success? No:—his hour of triumph had arrived, the goal he had struggled for years to attain was won!—for in the Ladies’ Gallery, immediately over the Speaker’s chair, and directly in front of the orator, sat Amy Laverty; she who, in early youth, had so cruelly scorned him; she who had withered the freshness of his heart, and dried up the gushing fountains of love in his soul! He saw not the crowd around him—he heard not the murmurs of applause—he heeded not the triumphant glance of political friends nor the gloomy looks of discomfited opponents—his soul was on his tongue, and as the jewels of rhetoric, the brilliant gems of oratory, and the diamond shafts of satire fell from his lips—he poured them all,—prodigally, and with a feeling of supernatural power, as an offering before the shrine of his young, blighted and cruelly crushed love!

At length he closed amid the plaudits of the privileged few on the floor of the House, and the waving of snowy ’kerchief from the gallery. In the midst a stifled sob was heard, then a piercing shriek! “A lady in the gallery had fainted—from the heat!”

Strange, inexplicable mystery of the human heart! Two wells of passion, long sealed up and apparently dried, had burst their confines!

Oh fame! oh popular applause! how little knew any in that Hall, why the young orator was so transcendently brilliant that day!—How little divined the companions of Amy what was the cause of that sudden fainting fit!

The hospitable mansion of Secretary Woodbury was thrown open that evening. Gay forms crowded every room and silvery voices resounded through every hall. In a remote corner of one apartment, within the recess of a window, stood Henry Stanton and Amy Laverty. Their hands were intertwined; his eyes beamed with pride and hers with happiness. We have but a few words of their conversation to chronicle.

“Why—why, ask me if I love you?” said Amy.

“Why?” responded Stanton in that deep voice and choking utterance which are only assumed when the heart speaks audibly; “why? that I may feel that my day dreams are now reality: that I may know that time has worn away those faults of early education, which clouded the brightness of your native excellence; that I may be assured that we have both come out purified from the crucible of suffering, the fuel to which has been supplied from our very hearts! I would know that you love me, that I may be supremely happy.”

“Be happy then, as far as the knowledge of my love can make you so,” frankly replied Amy—“but oh Henry, in our after life, I fear me, I shall often have occasion to resist the tempter against which you have this day warned me, and to whose power over me, time, more than your words, had opened my eyes! I feel that while I have life I must have pride!”

“Amy!”

“Yes Harry:—pride in thee!”

GENERAL TAYLOR’S GALLOP.

COMPOSED AND RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

TO THE LADIES OF

MISS CARPENTER’S DANCING ASSEMBLY.

BY A. J. R. CONNER.

PRESENTED BY J. G. OSBOURN, NO. 112 SOUTH THIRD STREET.

[Copyright secured.]

LINES TO A JEWS-HARP.

———

BY L. B. M.

———

Wee burlesque on the minstrel’s line!

Unsung by bard in lay divine,

Unconsecrate to fane or shrine.

    In theme most lowly;

Thou tiny, uncouth, jingling thing!

Scarce big enough for Elfin king,

Thou joy of childhood’s sunny spring,

    And treasure holy.

How oft, in sooth, I’ve wonder’d who

He could have been, that famous Jew

Who gave thee birth and name, and threw

    No doubt around thee,

Of the soul’s wealth, all that he had,

And then, perchance, went music-mad,

And died at last of joy; so glad

    That he had found thee.

Was he some Smithy, grim and old,

Whose anvil iron changed to gold,

And, forging thee, turned he to mould,

    O’erpowered with glory?

Alas! such fate doth quick befall

Spirits too ripe for earthly thrall;

Fame, of her children, great and small,

    Tells oft such story.

Or was he one in youth’s glad prime,

When Hope trips arm in arm with time,

Who hit upon thy frame sublime,

    And when he placed thee

First to his lips, with urchin pride,

And heard thy tinkling murmurs glide,

“Eureka!” in his spirit cried,

    Is’t true I’ve traced thee?

Then thanks from all his countless tribe

(Henceforth their joy to him ascribe,)

When in their pockets sly they bribe,

    ’Neath school-dame’s glances,

With bits of string, wi’ top, and ball,

Thy cannie self, thou Harp so small,

Watching the sun creep on the wall,

    Till noon advances.

Ah! relic of that guileless day!

As now I list thy humble lay

Beneath my windows, far away

    In thought I’m winging;

And, lo! I see a brighter land,

I meet the clasp of many a hand,

And seem to listen as I stand,

    To voices singing.

And, oh! thou gleesome harper, still

Thy little strain my heart must fill,

When thou, o’er mead and distant hill,

    Art gayly hieing,

Oh! that its note had power to fling

Far from the soul its sorrowing,

And wake it to a second spring,

    Nor leave it sighing.

FANNY’S FIRST SMILE.

———

BY FRANCES S. OSGOOD.

———

It came to my heart—like the first gleam of morning,

  To one who has watched through a long, dreary night⁠—

It flew to my heart—without prelude or warning⁠—

  And wakened at once there a wordless delight.

That sweet pleading mouth, and those eyes of deep azure,

  That gazed into mine so imploringly sad,

How faint o’er them floated the light of that pleasure,

  Like sunshine o’er flowers, that the night-mist has clad!

Until that golden moment, her soft, fairy features

  Had seemed like a suffering seraph’s to me⁠—

A stray child of Heaven’s, amid earth’s coarser creatures,

  Looking back for her lost home, that still she could see!

But now, in that first smile, resigning the vision,

  The soul of my loved one replies to mine own:

Thank God for that moment of sweet recognition,

  That over my heart like the Morning light shone!

REVIEW OF NEW BOOKS.

The Prose Writers of America. With a Survey of the History, Condition, and Prospects of American Literature. By Rufus Wilmot Griswold. Illustrated with Portraits from Original Pictures. Phila.: Carey & Hart. 1 vol. 8vo.

This is more able than any of Mr. Griswold’s preceding books. It contains biographical and critical notices of seventy American prose writers, with judiciously selected extracts from their various writings. These notices display an unusually extensive acquaintance with American literature, conscientiousness in forming opinions, and boldness in stating them—and they are written in a flowing and vigorous style. A large portion of the information they convey, respecting our literary men, can be found in no other place. The most carefully written of the biographies are those of Edwards, Franklin, Hamilton, Webster, Irving, Cooper, Prescott, Wayland, Brownson, Hooker, Emerson, Willis, and Dana. The defect in the book, as regards American writers, is the omission of some ten or twelve who could present good claims to admittance. Toward the end the editor seems to have been cut short in his selections by the growing size of his work. In his critical estimates Mr. Griswold is independent and decided. We have noticed but one or two cases where his personal feelings have at all intruded to exalt the objects of his criticism. There is no doubt that the book is honest—and this is saying a great deal, when we reflect how many inducements the editor of such a work has to gratify his amiabilities or resentments.

Mr. Griswold has prefaced his book with fifty pages of disquisition on the intellectual history, condition, and prospects of the country. In this he takes a comprehensive view of American literature, and discusses the aids and obstacles to its advancement. Some of the obstacles commonly urged as barriers to its improvement, he considers as aids. These are the form of our government, the nature of our institutions, and the restless and turbulent movements of the democracy. Literature, indeed, has flourished best in those countries where the people have been most alive, and engaged in the tumults which attend life. The fierce democracy of Athens presented no obstacles to the genius of Æschylus, Sophocles, or Plato. The author of the “Divine Comedy” passed his life amid the shock of contending factions. The Reformation gave an impetus to the literature of every country in which it was felt. It would be useless to multiply examples. Another obstacle to intellectual progress is found by some in the absence of a wealthy and privileged class, who have leisure for literary pursuits. Now, without adopting Mr. Griswold’s remark, that “the privileged classes of all nations have been drones,” it is still evident that the greatest works in philosophy, literature, and art, which adorn the world, have not proceeded from them. As far as regards English literature, indeed, authors have been poor men writing for a subsistence. Provision for physical necessities has ever been the strongest spur to intellectual action. But the value of a wealthy class, of persons who have leisure to read if not to write, is, that they are the natural patrons of authors. Hundreds of books are yearly published in England, which could not find sufficient readers here to pay for the paper.

The chief difficulty in the way of American literature, according to Mr. Griswold, is a want of patriotism, or an “intelligent and earnest effort to foster the good we possess and acquire the good we need;” and he thinks the defect mainly proceeds from the absence of a just law of copyright. In other words, there is no absence of intelligence in the United States, but the intelligence sufficient to write a good book can find a better remuneration by being devoted to other pursuits. Mr. Griswold expresses himself in very plain language regarding copyright. All arguments against copyright, he contends, “as universal and perpetual as the life of the book, are but insults to common sense.” He thinks that literary property is that to which a man’s right is most unquestionable and exclusive. “The feudal chief by rapine, or the speculator by cunning, wins an estate, and the law secures him and his heirs in its possession while there are days and nights. An author creates a book, which, beside diffusing a general benefit, yields a revenue as great, perhaps, as that from the estate which has been acquired by force or fraud, and the law, without alleging any fault, seizes it, and bestows it on the mob.” The remarks, also, on the effect of our present law of copyright, in flooding the country with the monstrosities and immoralities of the French mind, are worthy of attention from every practical statesman. Indeed, it is for the interest of every person who has any stake in a country, that its literature should be high and pure. Demoralize the mind of a nation by bad books, and you undermine its social and political institutions. It is of some importance to know what Mr. Prettyman peruses in the parlor, but of more importance what Dick cons over at the plough, or what Sally reads in the kitchen.

We have not space to follow Mr. Griswold in his rapid and interesting view of what has been done so far in the United States in the establishment of a sound national literature. He proves that in the face of all discouragements, we have done as much in “the fields of Investigation, Imagination, Reflection, and Taste, in the present century, as any other twelve million of people—about our average number for this period—in the world.” He supports the assertion by a long array of names and works in all departments of literature, and the aggregate impression which his catalogue leaves on the mind, is one of pride and hope. We commend Mr. Griswold’s book to everybody who wishes to think well of his country, in that which is the noblest boost of a nation—its literature.

Songs of the Sea, and other Poems. By Epes Sargent. Boston: James Monroe & Co. 1 vol. 12mo.

Mr. Sargent’s poems have such peculiar and original merits, that we are glad to see them in their present elegant form. As a writer of songs, he is full of vigor and life, pouring out the emotion he desires to express in free flowing verse, and touching with a sure sagacity the very point in the reader’s mind at which he aims. His lyrics, especially “A Life on the Ocean Wave,” have consequently been extensively popular. As a descriptive writer, he possesses even superior claims to consideration. The scene he attempts to portray is reflected in his verse with exquisite artistical skill. The object is painted distinctly to the eye as it is in nature, with an imaginative atmosphere superadded. “Like a green field reflected in a calm and perfectly transparent lake, the image is distinguished from the reality only by its greater softness and lustre.” His poems relating to the sea are full of descriptions, which have the effect of fine paintings; and they awaken feelings similar to those which the real scene would rouse in the mind. All his poems, whether relating to emotion, description, or action, are distinguished by a sweetness and genial beauty of sentiment, which evidence a healthy mind, in which grace and strength, elegance and elevation, harmoniously dwell together. His writings borrow no interest from any morbid moods of his own mind, and are “sicklied o’er” by no egotism or whining whimsies. We could instance many beautiful poems in the volume, illustrating our remarks, but it would be needless. The book will commend itself and its author to the best sympathies of the reading public.

The Battle of Life. By Charles Dickens. New York: Wiley & Putnam.

The cheapest and most popular method of acquiring reputation as a critic, is to declare that the last work of a popular writer is his worst. A large number of such reputations have been made since the appearance of Dickens’ “Battle of Life.” It has been received with an almost universal sneer. The truth is, that, though certain portions of the story are unnatural, and the whole book rather carelessly written, yet it contains more wit, humor and pathos, more subtil characterization, and finer felicities of style and description, than any other novelist of the day could have produced. We trust that Dickens will write a great many books as good. He can do better.

The Countess of Rudolstadt. (Sequel to Consuelo.) By George Sand. Translated by F. G. Shaw. Boston: Wm. D. Ticknor & Co. 2 vols. 12mo.

Consuelo is undoubtedly the best and purest book of its distinguished authoress. In the present work the long story of the heroine is concluded. It has great merits as a delineation of life and character, and evidences a wider sweep of mind than belongs to any other woman of the time; but it is deformed by the writer’s peculiar philosophical, ethical, and social system, and toward the end rather fades away into a dramatic statement of opinions. Perhaps, however, it is the best expression yet given of the whole mind of the authoress, and it might be profitably studied as an expression of the opinions and objects of the extreme radical party of Europe—the party which aims to supplant not merely political but social institutions—the party which would take the world upon its knee, as a Yankee does a stick, and whittle it into a new shape. George Sand, of course, with all her masculine habits of thought and action, is still rather ignorant of many of the topics she confidently discusses, and not unfrequently suggests that portion of the old song, which expresses pity that charming women should talk about what they do not understand; but she grapples with a large number of debatable subjects as well as most male reformers. Mr. Shaw’s translation is very well done.

Cyclopædia of English Literature. Edited by Robert Chambers. Boston: Gould, Kendall & Lincoln.

This work is now in the course of publication in semi-monthly parts, to be concluded in sixteen numbers at twenty-five cents each. It contains a history of English literature from the earliest period to the present day, and a biography and criticism of each author, together with extracts from his writings. It thus gives a view of the whole broad field of English literature, through five centuries of time, and in every department of thought in which the genius and talent of the nation have been exercised. The American edition is printed, we believe, from the English plates, and contains an immense number of portraits and illustrative pictures. It is one of the cheapest books ever printed, and one, too, calculated to afford instruction and delight to every order of mind. We trust that it will have a large circulation in the United States. It will be a good guide to the reading public in the choice of books, and enable them to see at a glance the relative value of English authors. It is both a library in itself, and a friendly adviser in the selection of a library. About a thousand authors are referred to in the work, and from most of them the editor has made extracts.

Travels in Peru. By Dr. J. J. Von Tschudi. Translated from the German, by Thomasini Ross. New York: Wiley & Putnam. 2 parts. 12mo.

To that large portion of the reading public who delight in narratives of travel and descriptions of foreign scenery and manners, this work will be very acceptable. It is the production of an honest and learned German scholar, and relates to a country whose population and natural characteristics are full of materials to interest the general reader, the student, and the man of science. The author is not a brilliant writer, and his narrative presents none of those flashing imaginations which delight the reader of Lamartine and Kinglake, but he is uniformly solid, judicious, and pleasing. He contrives to convey a clear impression of every thing which came under his notice, during a long residence in Peru, and gives the results of the most extensive researches and careful observations.

Ballads and other Poems. By Mary Howitt. New York: Wiley & Putnam. 1 vol. 12mo.

Mary Howitt well characterised her own works when she declared that the ruling sentiment of her soul was the love of Christ, of the poor, and of little children. The mingled simplicity and intensity of her nature makes her a good writer of ballads—a species of composition which peculiarly demands unsophisticated feeling and simple expression. There is a certain quaintness, purity and youthfulness—a command of those words which picture incident, emotion, and character, immediately to the eye and heart—and on overflowing affectionateness of nature, in most of the ballads composing this volume, which will recommend them directly to the best feelings of her readers.

The Dog. By William Youatt. With Illustrations. Edited By E. S. Lewis, M. D., &c. 1 Vol. Crown 8vo.

This beautiful little volume will fill a vacancy long acknowledged and deplored by the lover of dogs in this country. It is strange that no treatise on this subject should have before appeared here, to satisfy the desires of the innumerable owners and fanciers of dogs. Knowing, as we do, but little of these matters, we will not pretend to pronounce authoritatively on its value. We can answer, however, for the interest of its style and manner, while it seems to us to bear the impress of one who is thoroughly master of his subject. Youatt, indeed, is the highest authority in all veterinary matters among those who know most, and Dr. Lewis has well seconded him. The volume, indeed, seems to contain every thing of interest or importance relating to the natural history of the Dog, his numerous varieties and uses—his breeding, breaking, and training; as much of his anatomy as is necessary to be known by those who would properly understand him; a full description of the numerous diseases and accidents to which he is liable, with the means to palliate or cure.

LE FOLLET

Boulevart St. Martin, 61.

Etoffes des Magasins du Passage Choiseul, r. Nve. des Petits-Champs, 32;

Robes de Mme. Mercier, r. Neuve des Petits-Champs, 82—Chapeaux de Mme. Baudry, r. Richelieu, 87;

Fleurs de Cartier, r. Louis-le-Grand, 30—Toilettes de Mme. Victorine Leclerc & Ducelles, boul. des Capucines, 7.

Lingerie de Vafflard, r. Ménars, 5—Chaussures de Hoffmann, r. du Dauphin, 9.

Graham’s Magazine.

Transcriber’s Notes:

Table of Contents has been added for reader convenience. Archaic spellings and hyphenation have been retained. 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 available for preparation of the eBook.

page 205, the 16th of June, 1777 ==> some modern references indicate June 14th

page 208, down the vallies; ==> down the valleys;

page 209, making a reconnaisance, ==> making a reconnaissance,

page 210, after they begun to ==> after they began to

page 220, three boat’s crews. ==> three boats’ crews.

page 222, Not a musquito, ==> Not a mosquito,

page 227, it it might not be ==> it might not be

page 227, powder. It course, ==> powder. Its course,

page 228, moment the sloop of war ==> moment the sloop-of-war

page 228, added [To be continued.

page 231, the sportman’s fancy ==> the sportsman’s fancy

page 232, freighted gallion; or ==> freighted galleon; or

page 236, carpenter of Gallilee ==> carpenter of Galilee

page 239, we will rememember that ==> we will remember that

page 245, a brazen indicater ==> a brazen indicator

page 249, find the Artic snow, ==> find the Arctic snow,

page 254, even in that recherch ==> even in that recherché

page 255, with the millionare’s ==> with the millionaire’s

page 255, a la Blackstone! But ==> à la Blackstone! But

page 257, many tall a commercial ==> many a tall commercial

page 258, look she cast.—Shelly. ==> look she cast.—Shelley.

page 264, appearance of Dicken’s ==> appearance of Dickens’

page 264, number of debateable ==> number of debatable

[End of Graham's Magazine, Vol. XXX, No. 4, April 1847]